Peggy’s gaze drifted over Ron’s sprouting vegetable plot and the ugly corrugated iron Anderson shelter, noting that Queenie the cat had found a sunny spot by the flint wall, and was curled in a tight knot, fast asleep. The few chickens that had so far escaped the cooking pot were scratching about in their run. The cockerel, which they’d nicknamed Adolf because of the way he strutted about, was sitting on the roof of the coop surveying his harem with a proprietorial glint in his eye. He was a ruddy nuisance with his crowing at all hours, but as the hens laid a good number of eggs and he was often drowned out by the sound of the planes going overhead, Peggy could almost forgive him.

She let her mind wander as she wrestled with the sheets, vaguely aware of the familiar background noise of the wireless coming from the many open windows of the neighbouring houses as well as her own. Every shop, pub, factory, office and home kept the wireless on now, but Peggy didn’t take much notice of it unless it was time for the news, and then the whole of Cliffehaven stopped what they were doing and gathered round in the hope that the growing rumours of an Allied invasion into France had become reality.

It was now almost the end of May, and the number of air raids over France and Germany had increased dramatically. As the news of Allied victories in Italy and the Far East came through, the time seemed right to push their advantage and get rid of Hitler and his thugs once and for all. Yet those in charge appeared to have other ideas, and the waiting was getting to Peggy, just as it was for everyone, for there was still no clue as to when the invasion might happen. But it would – it had to if this war was ever to end.

She looked up as several squadrons of bombers and fighter planes roared overhead. They’d recently been taking off and landing at nearby Cliffe aerodrome day and night, the bombing campaign over the northern shores of France and into Germany increasing in strength and regularity. Her heart swelled with pride as the heavy-bellied roar of the huge British bombers rattled the window panes and sent a tremor through the walls of the old Victorian terraced houses and in the ground beneath her feet. ‘God speed and bring you home safely,’ she murmured.