Sally’s gift of home dressmaking had been sorely missed over the years she’d spent down in the relative safety of Somerset with her brother and little boy, but on her return to Cliffehaven, she’d soon been in great demand, and John had turned their front parlour into a workroom for her so she could fit customers in private and work in peace while little Harry was at school. Rita and Ivy had been very lucky to have her make their wedding finery, but Peggy suspected Sally would have done it no matter how busy she was, for she still regarded herself as one of Peggy’s chicks – which she most definitely was to Peggy’s mind – and rather touchingly wanted to repay the love and kindness she’d found at Beach View. Which, of course, she hadn’t needed to do at all.

Peggy eyed the bitter lemon without much joy and decided a single dash of gin could do no harm. She went to the bar expecting to find Rosie, but there seemed to be no sign of her, so poor Brenda was really struggling. As Peggy patiently waited to be served, Gloria began thumping out ‘Ten Green Bottles’.

Peggy watched her chicks joining in with great enthusiasm and once again felt her heart contract at the realisation that this could be the last time they were all together. Ivy would return to London on Sunday; Danuta planned to leave for Poland at the end of the month, and Sarah had told her earlier that she and Jane would be on their way to Singapore at the beginning of September. It was still not known when Rita would embark on her long journey with Peter to Australia, but it would inevitably be sooner rather than later now the Japs had been cleared out of those southern waters.

Peggy’s smile was soft as her gaze drifted to her darling eldest daughter, Anne. At least she’d come home at last from Somerset with her children and young Charlie; yet even she would soon be moving out of Beach View with her husband, Martin, back into the cottage they’d bought at the start of the war.

Peggy knew things still weren’t really right between Anne and Martin, but they loved each other enough to struggle on, determined to pick up the pieces and repair the damage the war had done to Martin and their marriage. Martin seemed to be coping better with family life, even though Peggy suspected he was still plagued with nightmares from his years in the German prison camp. What he’d experienced there was never mentioned or explained, but he’d found someone in Roger Makepeace, his wingman and fellow POW, who shared his demons and, according to Ron, the two men still met daily at Cliffe aerodrome to sit in deckchairs and slowly put their worlds to rights.

As for Charlie, Peggy rarely saw him. He’d joined the local rugby club, spent hours with his grandfather Ron and Uncle Frank, and quite often went out night fishing with Frank, or spent hours on the beach helping to mend the trawling nets or tinker with the engines. The cheeky little boy who’d left Beach View six years ago was now fifteen, and as tall and strong as a man, with a stubborn determination to follow his own path in life that was the very essence of his father, and his grandfather.