‘Go and fetch the money from Mr Dumas.’ This was said through clenched teeth. Briony nodded and pulled on her boots. Molly watched her as she rushed from the room, a coldness settling on her heart. She would have to watch Briony.

She put the kettle on for a cup of tea and sighed. It was a year since Eileen had gone and the room looked a different place altogether. It now had two proper beds, with good feather mattresses. Two brightly coloured mats on the floor, and a table and chairs somehow squeezed in. The fire was always alight, there was plenty of food in the house - and all of it stuck in Molly’s throat like gall. She had saved enough to move them to a small house in Oxlow Lane, which would be a step up after this place, and still she wasn’t happy about it.

It was the way they got the money that tormented her, night after night. Her baby boy had been stillborn and Eileen, her lovely Eileen, who had been so full of life, so vibrant, was now a shadow of her old self. Withdrawn and moody, she visited once a fortnight, bedecked in her finery, her lovely face white and drawn. It was written there for all to see what Mr Dumas did to her. Eileen had been there a year and every day it broke her more.

Briony walked through the streets towards Mr Dumas’ house with a shiver of excitement. She loved going there. She loved the little garden, the lovely carpets and the sweet-smelling warmth. She made her way past The Bull in Dagenham and into Barking, hurrying. She normally stayed and had a bite with Eileen, and tonight she had a little plan. She smiled and waved at people as she went, a familiar figure in her large black boots, courtesy of Mr Dumas’ two pounds a week, and her long brick red coat, courtesy of Eileen. Her red hair had as usual sprung out of the ribbon and curled around her face and shoulders.

At just gone ten years old she was a tiny little thing. Her face was open, with milk white skin covered in freckles and green eyes that took in everything around her.

She skipped up the street that housed Eileen, her eyes taking in the lace curtains at the respectable windows, and the scrubbed doorsteps. No smelly children playing five stones out on these streets, no drunken brawling men. This was a beautiful place as far as Briony was concerned. Near to Barking Park, it exuded respectability. Briony walked up the pathway and knocked at the big green front door.

Cissy answered and Briony walked into the hallway.

‘Hiya, Cissy. How’s me sister?’ Briony slipped off her coat and gave it to the girl.

Cissy took the coat and laid it across her arm. ‘Not too good, Briony. I think she’s gonna get her monthly visitor soon.’