From where he stood he could see his father bent at his work; weekday, weekend, he toiled away, sixty years of age, grey-haired and weary but with a sparkle in his eyes that only his work could ignite. Silas Little had been a respected tailor in these parts all his working life. His work was his great pride, even above his family, and only the call of a higher master would take him from it. But the price of such devotion was cruel, for now he walked as bent as when he slaved over his table. His spine was crooked and so too were his fingers; the curvature of his neck had become more prominent these past few years, and his knees gave him great pain when he walked. Even his eyesight was suffering, so that often he would sew a seam where none should be. But, for all that, he was still the best tailor in Blackburn.

From upstairs, Alice spied Harry in the rain. ‘What the devil’s he been up to?’ she asked herself. ‘If ever there was a man with a guilty conscience, it’s him.’

The fevered tapping on the wall sent her running into her mother’s room. ‘For heaven’s sake, Mother, what now?’ she demanded impatiently, at the same time snatching away the stick her mother had used to summon her. ‘I can’t keep running in here all hours of the day and night. I’m not a strong woman, you know that.’

‘Stuff and nonsense!’ Maud was fifty-eight, quick and shrewd, but only in short-spasms. She called these lucid periods her ‘real’ time. The rest of the time she was in another world, a make-believe place where nothing could hurt her. Right now she was enjoying one of her ‘real’ moments.

‘You’re a fit, able woman who likes to imagine she’s too delicate to lift a cup, but I know better, Alice Little, and I’ll thank you not to lie to your mother. Now then, fetch me a jeremiah and be quick about it, before I wet the sheets.’

‘You do, and I’ll rub your nose in it!’ Alice threatened.

‘You’ll never live to see the day, my girl!’ Nevertheless, Maud didn’t doubt for one minute that her daughter would take pleasure in doing such a thing.

‘I mean it, Mother. Wet your bed and you’ll be sorry!’ Scurrying downstairs to the washroom, Alice grabbed up the jeremiah and returned, puffing and panting, into her mother’s room. Throwing back the sheets, she stuffed the jeremiah under her mother’s backside. ‘It’s Harry’s turn to see to you,’ she grumbled. ‘He should be in here, not messing about outside in the rain. What’s he playing at, that’s what I’d like to know!’

‘Oh, shut up, girl!’ In Maud’s eyes Harry could do no wrong.

Under her breath, Alice replied peevishly, ‘You shut up, you old hag!’ Wrinkling her nose with disgust, she watched her mother’s expression change from agony to bliss. The tinkle of water sounded through the room; the smell was vile, for her mother’s urine had grown stronger with age. ‘Hurry up!’ Alice cried. ‘I’ve things to do.’