‘Coming through,’ her father said, rounding the rhoddie and unceremoniously dumping the hot water into the tub. The steam instantly dissipated. ‘Towel for you,’ he said, draping the ragged cloth over the bush. He limped away again and she quickly stripped off her clothes and climbed in. The water was still breathtakingly cold, the hot pan only just enough to nudge the temperature off turgid. The depth barely came to her hip bones as she sat down but she wasn’t one to linger and she began splashing the water over her arms and face, her teeth gritted. There was an old milk pail on the grass and she reached for it, scooping the water over her head, spluttering and gasping as the biting cold plunged over her shoulders and down her back. She gasped with every splash, her skin rippled with goosebumps as she moved quickly to remove the stench of the day. The mud from the bog had seeped through her trousers, painting her leg brown up to the knee like a woollen sock, and she scrubbed as best she could. Mrs Buchanan had made it clear she was to arrive for work in the morning dressed in women’s clothes, her hair brushed and neatly tied back.

Effie took a deep breath and leant back, bending her knees and sliding down the tub until she could get her back flat and her head and ears under the water. It was as cold as swimming in the sea but she forced herself to remain under as she scrubbed her scalp with her fingertips, her long hair floating around her face like seaweed.

A minute later she emerged with another gasp. Frozen, but clean at least. She stepped out of the bath and clutched the thin towel around her, shivering as the water dripped, not wanting to release the towel from her shoulders and brush herself dry.

Something came to her ear as she stood there, rigid with cold. Voices? There was no window to see through at the back, and the words were indistinct through the thick stone walls, but she could hear it was a man. She could guess who, too – Norman Ferguson, come to rat on her and enlighten her father as to this morning’s latest shame as she came to blows with Angus McKinnon. If he was to hear about Mrs Buchanan as well . . .

She dried herself quickly, determined to give her account and not let his stand as the official record of events. She let herself into the bedroom through the back door and pulled some clean clothes from the trunk. She could hear the voices in the other room, though they were still indistinct through the closed door. She pulled on a patched shirt and John’s soft moss-green trousers that were slightly too short for her now.