Donna interrupted. ‘No, Dolly, you don’t understand. I know his heart better than anyone, and he would no more have anything to do with all this than you or I would. It’s Stephen and Davey Jackson who are the culprits here.’

Dolly’s belly laugh surprised her. Turning the chair away from the screen Donna said vehemently, ‘My God, Dolly, you’ve changed your tune.’

Dolly’s face was grey in the muted light of the computer screen, and suddenly Donna saw how old she really was, the deep lines around her eyes and mouth emphasised by the pale light.

‘Maybe I have, Donna, but I’ve a terrible presentiment in me bones that you’re going to find out things you never dreamt of before, couldn’t have imagined in your wildest dreams in fact, and they’ll all boil down to one person - Georgio.’

Donna turned the computer off and the room was dark. Opening the curtains, she turned on Dolly and said, clearly and heavily, ‘You watch your mouth, lady, before your find yourself out of a home and a job.’

Then she walked from the room, leaving Dolly staring behind her.

Edna McVee was a big girl, a very big buxom girl, and she knew her worth. She made that quite apparent as she took a toke on her joint and said loudly, ‘Bollocks, Henry. I get a tenner a time or I go somewhere else.’

Henry, a small-boned Maltese man with a pencil-thin moustache and handmade shoes, weighed up in his mind his chances against Edna without a blade. He sighed deeply as he realised she would probably kill him.

‘Fair enough, you fat slag,’ he said nastily. ‘But I want a good show, right, and the touchers pay me first. Deal?’

Edna smiled and it transformed her face magically. Under the thick make-up and backcombed blonde hair you could see her youth and prettiness shine through for a few short seconds.

‘The touchers pay me, Henry, remember?’ she sneered.

‘I ain’t being funny, mate, but you’re getting greedy, and if you get too greedy we’ll all leave eventually. This ain’t the only shithole in London, you know.’

Henry bowed in the face of adversity and sixteen stone of young womanhood before him and smiled craftily.

‘Get your fat arse in the booth then, we’ve got customers waiting.’

Edna stood up in all her heavy glory, the silk basque she was wearing straining to keep her size forty-six double D breasts in place, and waltzed from the small office and out to her booth. Edna knew she was popular. The men liked the big girls, with big breasts and thighs and rounded white arses. She knew her worth and she made sure she got it. It was as if the bigger she was, the more they felt they were getting for their money.