He raised his head, a sheen of sweat on his brow and his face still contorted with pain. ‘It’s all right. I mean it, I’m sorry. I lost my head for a moment, that’s all. It’s over, don’t look like that.’

She stared at him, the knife still held in front of her. ‘Get out of my house.’

He took a couple of long breaths, gingerly straightening and wincing as he did so. ‘I’ve frightened you and it wasn’t supposed to be like this but you made me so angry, you must see that? Look, see to her.’ He gestured towards Betsy who was still yelling and crying.

She didn’t lower the knife, nor did she move.

‘Rose, I care about you and I want to look after you and the bairn, is that so wrong? It’s what Davey would have wanted—’

‘Don’t say that! Don’t you talk about him.’

Her voice was so shrill it made him jump and cut off his words in mid-flow. He stared at her, his chin jerking up out of his collar in a nervous movement that was uncharacteristic of him. He’d gone about this all wrong, he knew that, but seeing that card in the newsagent’s window had sent him crazy. She shouldn’t have done it; how had she expected him to react at the thought of another man – possibly four from what she had said – living in this house with her? His anger was beginning to boil again but he tried to rein it in as he said, ‘You understand I won’t allow you to have lodgers? I’ll come and live with you here and pay you whatever you like, but no one else is, Rose. I mean it. I’d kill the first man who tried.’

She could see he meant it, something so dark was looking out of his eyes that it sent a shiver down her spine. Nevertheless, she kept her gaze steady and her voice firm when she said, ‘You can’t tell me what to do or how to live my life. I want you to go now and never come back.’

‘You don’t mean that,’ he said with the arrogance she always associated with him, ‘and even if you do it’s not going to happen. I told you, I love you.’

‘And yet you’ve threatened me and my daughter?’

‘You made me do that.’ His tongue drew a quick line over his upper lip. ‘All I want to do is love you and take care of you and I’ve told you I’ll marry you, haven’t I? Damn it, I could name any one of a handful of women who’d bite my hand off for an offer like that.’

‘Well, go and ask one of them then.’