It didn’t ring again. Kerry sat all day, with the bottle of vodka by her side, waiting. Still it didn’t ring. She spent the rest of the day lost in a drunken world of jazz music, smoky clubs, and the arms of a big handsome man called Evander Dorsey.

Molly stood outside St Vincent’s church with Rosalee. Both had on their best hats, coats and gloves, though Rosalee’s gloves were grubby where she had insisted on picking privets all the way to the church. Molly pursed her lips and shook her head. Abel was asleep in bed, getting ready for his night’s work at the club in Soho that Briony now owned. It was his way of getting out of going to Mass, she knew that. She saw the twins and Liselle get out of the boys’ Aston Martin and her heart swelled with pride. They never missed Sunday evening Mass with their gran.

As they walked into the church and genuflected before the Cross of Christ, Molly felt as if her whole life had been worth it for this. Boysie helped Rosalee into the front pew, which was now reserved especially for them, and the others filed in beside her. All knelt and said the regulation prayers, then sat back in silence, waiting for the priest and, hopefully, Kerry to arrive. Liselle watched the back of the church anxiously every time the doors opened. Her mother had better turn up. If she didn’t it meant she was too drunk, and Liselle hated her mother when she was really plastered.

Father Tierney walked down the church and everyone stood up. Boysie looked around the church as the service started, automatically making the responses in Latin as he always had. Boysie and Danny liked Mass. They always had from little children. They liked the feel of the church and they respected its sanctity. They believed in God as they believed in themselves. As the Mass drew to a close and the priest asked for prayers for the sick and the dying, the twins sat happily with their gran and their aunt and cousin Liselle, and enjoyed the feeling the church always created in them.

In there, with its high ceiling and its quietness, they could really believe that there was peace on earth and all was well with man.

Well, with these two men anyway.

The twins dropped their granny off at Briony’s and then took Liselle home. As they walked into the large house they heard the housekeeper, Mrs Harcourt, a widow of uncertain age, shouting.

Liselle rushed into the lounge where her mother was lying unconscious on the floor, the phone beside her.

‘Oh, Miss Liselle! I can’t wake her up. She’s been drinking steadily since she got up, wouldn’t eat a blessed thing, and now she’s unconscious!’