Small transgressions had meant he would be forced to crouch in a corner of the kitchen while his grandfather fried up a hash of sausage, onions and potatoes on the stove. It smelled better than anything the cook on the barge ever served up on the boat. He never knew if it tasted better, because when the time came to eat, he would have to wait in his corner and watch while his grandfather tucked into a steaming plate of fried food. Drenched in the appetizing aroma, his stomach would clench with hunger, his mouth become a reservoir of eager saliva.

The old man would gorge his meal like a hunting dog home in his kennel, his eyes sliding over to the boy in the corner with a contemptuous glare. When he finished, he would wipe his plate clean with a hunk of rye bread. Then he’d take out his bargee’s clasp knife and cut more bread into chunks. He’d take a can of dog food from the cupboard and tip it into a bowl, mixing the bread into the meat. Then he’d put the bowl in front of the boy. ‘You’re the son of a bitch. This is what you deserve until you start to learn how to behave like a man. I’ve had dogs that learned faster than you. I am your master, and you live your life as I tell you.’

Shaking with anxiety, the boy would have to get down on all fours and eat the food without touching it with his hands. He’d learned that the hard way too. Every time his hands came off the floor and moved towards dish or food, his grandfather would plant a steel-capped boot in his ribs. That was one lesson he’d taken to heart very quickly.

If his misdemeanours had been minor, he might be allowed to sleep on the camp bed in the hall between his grand-father’s bedroom and the squalid cold-water bathroom. But if he’d been judged unworthy of such luxury, he’d have to sleep on the kitchen floor on a filthy blanket that still smelled of the last dog his grandfather had owned, a bull terrier who’d suffered from incontinence for the last few days of its life. Cowering in a ball, he’d often been too scared to sleep, the demons of bewilderment keeping him edgy and uneasy.