‘Queenie!’ Albie bellowed.

The boys were standing in the front room, Vinny holding a turkey in his hands. ‘It’s a bit cooked, Mum. Put the oven on. You’ll know when it’s done properly.’

‘Where did you get it?’ asked Queenie.

‘I nicked it. But not from round ’ere ’cause you tell us never to steal from our own. We nicked it miles away, didn’t we, Roy?’

‘Yeah. We did, Mum. We rode our bikes ’til our bums were sore,’ explained Roy.

‘I’m starving, Mum,’ announced Michael.

Queenie took the turkey out of her eldest son’s hands.

‘Where did it come from?’ Albie wanted to know.

‘An ’ouse,’ Vinny replied.

‘You can’t cook it, Queen. The little buggers will never know right from wrong if you serve ’em that for dinner. They can’t go breaking into people’s homes, stealing. It’s totally wrong, love.’

‘It was me that nicked it, not Roy or Michael.’ Vinny didn’t want to get his brothers into trouble. ‘It was all my idea too. ’Cause you bought us nice presents, Mum, I wanted to do something nice back.’

‘By breaking into some poor sod’s home and stealing their half-cooked turkey!’ Albie couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

Queenie glared at her husband. ‘At least the boys showed initiative, Albie. Got off their arses and actually put food on the table. Perhaps now we’re destitute again, you should take a leaf out of Vinny’s book.’

Vinny grinned like a Cheshire cat. He loved making his mum happy. He also loved being the man of the house.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Nine Months Later

Autumn 1956

I knew something was wrong even before the doctor was sent for. Call it sisterly instinct or call me a witch, but I just knew.

Viv was in excruciating pain, but all she kept rambling on about was she couldn’t have Dr Andrews looking up her crotch.

I was in need of a break, desperate for a wee and a fag, so when the doctor arrived, I excused myself for a few minutes.

Bill Harris was pacing up and down in the hallway. ‘How is she? What’s happening?’

‘The baby’s breech, hence the doctor being called. Viv’s a fighter. She’ll be fine,’ I told him.

I went to the toilet. I’d been holding it that long, I sounded like a horse peeing. I then walked out into the garden and sparked up a cigarette. It’d been hours since I’d had one and the nicotine made me feel lightheaded.

I leaned against the fence and even though I’m not overly religious, I held Mrs O’Leary’s rosary beads in my hand and prayed for Viv and that baby. I was so angry when Viv got back together with Bill last New Year and even more livid when she got up the duff for real soon afterwards. After her pregnancy scare, Viv had obviously done it to trap Bill, but now I didn’t care about any of that. I just wanted my sister and her baby to be OK.