But when this idyllic life had been going on for some six weeks, and it was the beginning of May, and Sophia had decided that their lives, if not orderly, were certainly delightful, and Uncle Preston had rung up five times in the fortnight to know how they were getting on, and Sophia had spent some of her article-and-poem money on some black silk and made herself a dress to wear in the evening if she were asked out to dine – a new and sinister element was introduced into life at the cottage.

This was beer.

It says much for the influence which Sophia unconsciously exerted over her brothers that so far their existence in the Vale had been a beerless one. Harry, who liked beer and had got used to it and to all kinds of alcohol on tour, used to drink whenever he felt like it at rehearsals and between them, and sometimes he would say to Sophia, ‘Shall I go down to the pub and get some beer?’ and Sophia would say, ‘Good lord no, beastly stuff. I hate the smell of it. Besides, beer is jolly expensive,’ and as Francis did not like it because he had only tasted it once when he was ten and had spat it out immediately, Harry would not bother to press his suggestion.

But when Francis had been in his job three weeks or so, Harry came down and took him out to lunch, and they had beer, and Francis decided that he liked it.

Besides, he was determined not to be melodramatic about drink, because his father had misused it so cruelly. If I never touch a drop, thought Francis, that will be putting too much importance on the stuff. Much more sensible to have it now and then, and not make a fuss. It isn’t likely that I shall become a drunkard, when I remember what Father was like…. This was certainly a sensible way of looking at the situation. It resembled, in its fragile and neat logic, those nautilus shells which put out upon the black and boundless ocean.

The double pressure of Francis’s and Harry’s desire for beer broke down the barriers of Sophia’s influence. Beer bottles were frequently seen at the cottage. Indeed, as the days went on, they were seen there too frequently to meet with the approval of Miss Tessitt, who was, of course, a total abstainer.

‘Ay have always thanked Ged that never a drop ’as passed may lips since Ay was five years old and may Uncle Frank, in fun of course, gave may some port in a spoon, Ay was very sick. Ay was most unwell for days,’ said Miss Tessitt, picking up the beer bottles rather as though they had been dead stoats.

Old Mrs Barker, on the other hand, liked to think of the children drinking beer. She would look pleased when she saw the empty beer bottles through the open door on Saturday mornings when she came to do the step. ‘Been ’avin’ a party, dear?’ she would ask Sophia. ‘Thass right. Enjoy yourself while you can, I say.’ Mrs Barker never referred to her own feelings about beer, but Sophia judged from her appearance when encountered on Saturday nights in the High Street that she liked it.