Deep down, Joe Watson knew that Molly felt the same way he did. Knowing it made him bolder, filled him with arrogance and caused him to be so impatient that the hours before darkness seemed to stretch before him like never-ending years. But he comforted himself with the belief that the waiting would be worth it when he had Molly close in his arms. Oh yes, the waiting would be well worth it! And who knows? He might even be so foolish as to take her for his wife. Oh, but that might be going a bit too fast, he cautioned himself. After all, she had three young ’uns from her estranged husband. And tying yourself up for life to one woman wasn’t all that wise. Especially if you could take that woman to your bed whenever the fancy came on you. No. First things first. In these past weeks, Joe Watson had cursed the fact that Molly already had a husband and he himself might be made to wait for her hand in marriage. Now, though, he was quietly grateful for it.

‘Mammy, tell Tom to behave himself!’ little Sal moaned. ‘He won’t let us play nicely.’ With a loud sigh, she put down her side of the makeshift skipping rope and ran to where Tom was mischievously wrenching the other end from Peggy’s determined grasp. ‘I’ve showed you how to skip in the middle of the rope, you bad boy!’ she scolded him. ‘And you have to take your proper turn. If you don’t want to play, then go and sit on the steps with our mam!’

‘Bad boy,’ echoed Peggy, stubbornly refusing to let go of the rope, ‘not your turn!’ There then followed a bevy of jeers and calls from Tilly Watson’s assorted offspring, who were dutifully lined up to wait their turn at running into the gyrating rope, where they might manage a few quick skips before getting their little legs hopelessly entangled, at which point they were promptly banished by Sal to hold the rope while others took their place at the end of the line.

‘Do as Sal tells you, Tom,’ Molly instructed, beginning to come down the steps, stopping only when she saw him turn from the indignant Peggy and scurry in that dipping, lopsided fashion to the back of the queue, his face spread wide in a happy, mischievous grin. Flattening himself against the wall, he looked up at Molly with such laughing eyes that she didn’t have the heart to chastize him further. Instead she smiled back at him, shook her head in exasperation and began her way back up the steps, resuming her cold seat at the top and thinking how it would soon be getting dark.

‘Little sods!’ Tilly Watson had come to the scullery door to see what all the shouting was about. ‘You lot buck yer ideas up!’ she yelled, wagging a finger to the upturned faces. ‘Any more arguing an’ you’ll be put to bed afore yer time… d’yer hear me?’ When the colourful assortment of heads – including those of Molly’s three – all frantically nodded, she mumbled quietly to herself, before yelling again, ‘Yer soon coming in anyroad, yer buggers… it’s not long to yer bedtime as it is!’ This observation produced a trail of loud moans and groans, which she stopped short by threatening, ‘Yer can give over belly-aching… else I’ll march the bloody lot of yer up these steps this very minute!’ Silence descended. ‘Huh! So think on!’ she finished, cunningly winking at the amused Molly, who dared not look down at the small, fearful faces in the yard, for fear they might see how much she was enjoying Tilly’s ‘fierce’ banter.