Esther gasped at the sight before her. In the distance she could see the pier, a long arm extending right out into the water, with a building at the end. She could see tiny ant-like figures moving along the pier. Then on the sands there were roundabouts and swings and stalls selling whelks and mussels.

A smile curved her lips and she gripped Matthew’s arm. He laughed at her excitement; she was just like a child on a Sunday treat. Wasn’t that just what she was? A child who had never known anything but cuffs and knocks and hard, grinding work, with never a moment given over to sinful pleasure, as her aunt would have called this outing. But Esther wasn’t giving a thought to her aunt today. Today was for fun.

‘What is it, Matthew? What are all these people doing on the beach? Won’t the tide come in and wash away their stalls and such?’

‘The sea dun’t come up this high, not in summer. Mebbe in winter or spring when the real high tides come and the winds whip ’em up too. But these folks is all gone by the winter. These are summer folk.’

‘Look at all these people – where are they all from? From the town?’

Matthew laughed again. ‘Naw, they’re the holiday-makers and the day trippers. They come on the trains.’

Esther shuddered. ‘Ah dun’t like trains.’

‘Why, have you been on one, then?’

‘Not me!’ she cried. ‘But the railway ran through the village where I lived before. Great noisy thing – an’ dangerous too. Killed a sheep once.’ That, to Esther, was sacrilege.

‘Ah’ve never bin on a train,’ Matthew mused. ‘Ah’d like to tek a ride on one some day.’

‘Well, dun’t ask me to come with ya,’ she said resolutely, and Matthew laughed at her again. She did not take offence but laughed with him. They wandered around the stalls, watching the folk. Women dressed in their Sunday best and carrying parasols, their long skirts sweeping the sand; the men sweating in their dark suits and starched white collars and bowler hats. A little boy, dressed in a sailor suit, skipped past them bowling a hoop. A small girl in a frock with such stiff petticoats that she hardly dared to move, walked sedately by her mama. Esther watched the child enviously, imagining her Kate in such a pretty dress. But the subject of Esther’s daydreams lay heavily in her arms now, asleep against her shoulder, oblivious to all the shouting and laughter of the holiday-makers.

‘Look,’ Matthew pointed out to sea. ‘See the paddle steamer just leaving the landing-stage at the end of the pier. It takes trips out to sea. D’ya want to go?’

Esther shook her head. ‘I’ll keep me feet on dry land, Matthew, if it’s all the same to you.’