‘Doing what bit?’ a boy’s voice demanded from the door, and as if somehow conjured up by the mere mention of his name, Tom bounded into the room. He dumped the Red Cross collection box he was carrying onto the large trestle table behind which the women were seated.

‘Good crowd this arvo,’ he said, ‘the blokes were pretty generous, particularly the Yanks, but then the Yanks always are.’

Tom had been making the rounds on his bike, calling in at a number of inner-city pubs collecting Red Cross donations. He’d managed to tie up other bits of business along the way, as was his custom. Tom was ever efficient. He’d dropped off a few frogs and mice to Val at The Brown’s and he’d delivered a package for his new buddy, Frank, to the American Officers’ Club, which was housed in the Queen’s Hotel.

‘So what particular bit will you be doing, Mrs Sanderson?’ he asked, grabbing an Anzac biscuit from the plate that sat beside the teapot.

‘I haven’t really decided yet.’ Amelia looked from mother to son, a little flustered.

‘Just an idea, Tom, nothing more,’ Grace said briskly, aware Amelia was feeling cornered. ‘I suggested Mrs Sanderson might think of billeting an officer at her house, that’s all.’

‘Great idea,’ Tom agreed enthusiastically through a mouthful of biscuit, ‘you should give it a go, Mrs Sanderson.’ He was about to enthuse further, but catching a warning glance from his mum, changed the subject instead. ‘Hey, these are really beaut biscuits, I bet they’re homemade.’

Grace smiled. It was an unwittingly perfect call. ‘Yes, they are. Amelia … Mrs Sanderson baked them herself.’

‘Well, they’re great,’ Tom said, ‘really great!’ Influenced by his new American friends, ‘great’ featured equally alongside ‘beaut’ in Tom’s vocabulary these days.

Amelia looked pleased, both by the compliment and the enthusiasm displayed by the person who had made it. She very much liked young Tom. ‘They’re not quite as good as they should be,’ she said, not self-deprecatingly, but rather critically for she was proud of her baking skills. ‘I had a can of golden syrup but very little sugar, so the balance of sweetness in this batch isn’t quite right, I’m afraid.’

‘Probably what makes them spot on,’ Tom said, his freckle-faced grin cheekily disarming, ‘but I’ll get you some sugar, Mrs Sanderson, don’t you worry about that. Easy as pie.’ And it would be. He’d get a bag of sugar from Baz – he ran errands for Baz as well as the Americans, and Baz always gave him a fair exchange of favours. In his own innocent way, young Tom Francis was as much a profiteer as Baz himself.

‘Want me to give you a hand?’ he asked, the question appearing rhetorical for he was already dragging another chair up to the trestle table.

‘Yes, thank you, dear, how nice,’ his mother said.