The memory of those two full days and nights were all she had to last her a lifetime. And, sadly, they had lasted. Doris had begun to teach in the village school a year after Walter’s death. Her sweetheart, her husband, was with her in every corner of the house, and she needed no one else … ‘poor thing’.
Chapter 2
EVELYNE HAD not been still since she had returned from school. She had slipped a pinafore over her skirt and rolled up her cardigan sleeves. Her thin arms were red raw from the cold, and yet she was sweating. Her pale face shone, her red hair clung in tight curls around her neck and the long braid down her back was loose. She tucked the wildly curling strands back and picked up the heavy buckets, puffing with the effort. As she tipped the water into the pans and the kettle, it splashed out, soaking her, drenching her bare feet which were filthy from the coal-dust-filled streets. She carried the empty buckets outside and waited in line to refill them as she did every day, every week, every month. Come five o’clock the line of village girls and women was always a hive of chatter as they met to collect water for their menfolk’s baths. All their families worked in the mines and every night was bath night.
Lizzie-Ann wiped her button nose on the sleeve of her threadbare cardigan. She grinned at Evelyne.