‘Who – who’s Polly Stamp?’ Betsy asked, drying her eyes. Her mam wasn’t cross with her for hitting Dora and she’d said Dora was a silly little girl. Furthermore, she had caught the acclaim in Alice’s voice and was beginning to feel better about it all. Her mam had said Dora didn’t know anything and that she had bought the bakery herself, so Dora could put that in her pipe and smoke it and she’d tell her so in the morning.

‘Don’t worry your head about Mrs Stamp, hinny.’ Rose kissed the top of Betsy’s head. ‘And don’t worry about Dora either. I shall sort this out tomorrow, all right? And Alice’ – she turned to Daisy’s girls – ‘thank you for being on Betsy’s side in all this. You too, Rachel and Violet. You are good friends, all of you.’

The three little girls beamed and looked at her shyly.

‘Now I’m going to make us all cocoa and I’ve got some ginger nuts and cheese scones to keep you going until we have our dinner.’ She gave Betsy a hug and then walked through to the kitchen, Daisy following her. Daisy looked at her and then whispered, ‘It’s that Bridget Finnigan at the bottom of all this, lass. She’s a nasty bit of work, always has been. Her and her cronies. Ethel McCabe’s another one. You ought to hear their language when they get going, make a sailor blush it would. No one would heed anything they say.’

‘Oh, they would, Daisy.’ Rose turned to face her friend. ‘Believe me, they would, but I’m not having Betsy upset like this.’

‘What are you going to do, lass?’

‘I’m going to make it clear that I’ll be friends with whomsoever I please for a start,’ Rose said grimly, ‘and that I’m not answerable to scum like Mrs Finnigan. I don’t want her served in the shop again, Daisy, nor Mrs McCabe and the rest of that bunch. If they come in when I’m in the back call me.’

Daisy nodded. She had never seen Rose look the way she was looking now. ‘I’m sorry, lass,’ she said helplessly.

‘Don’t be. Perhaps I needed something like this to wake me up but they’ll regret it, Daisy, before I’m finished.’

Again Daisy nodded. She didn’t doubt it. She was seeing another side of her gentle, kind employer and she wouldn’t want to be in Bridget Finnigan’s shoes when she next came into the shop scrounging for stale loaves and leftover cakes.