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but when I asked why, she’d no idea. She mightn’t be so bad it Eugene was there, but him being in the Merchant Navy, like, it means he’s hardly ever home.”
    “It’s a terrible shame,” Flo said sincerely. Norman Cameron was Martha’s godson and the most delightful baby she’d ever known. It was terrible to think he was getting his mam down. “Can’t Eugene get a different job?”
    “Not with a million men already out of work,” Martha said. “Mind you, that’ll soon change if there’s a war.”
    “There won’t be a war,” Flo said quickly. She looked at her sister, scared. “Will there?”
    “Oh, I don’t know, luv. According to the papers, that Hitler’s getting far too big for his boots.”
    Like Mam dying, war was something best not thought about. After Martha left, Flo tried to bury herself in her book, but the man over whom the heroine was pining was a pale, insipid creature compared to Tommy O’Mara, and instead of words, she kept seeing him on the page: his dark, shameless eyes, his reckless face, the cheeky way he wore his cap. She reckoned it was a good job she wouldn’t be seeing him again. If he’d been as knocked sideways by her as she’d been by him, he might ask her out, and although a good Catholic girl should never, never go out with a married man, Flo wasn’t convinced she’d be capable of resisting Tommy O’Mara.
    She did see him again, only two days later. He came into the laundry, this time bearing two white shirts that already looked perfectly clean. She looked up from the press and found him smiling at her intently as if she was the only woman in the world, never mind the laundry.
    “I’d like these laundered, please.”
    Flo had to swallow several times before she could answer. “You need to take them round the front and Mr Si Fritz will give you a ticket,” she said, in a voice that sounded as if it belonged to someone else.
    He frowned. “Does that mean I won’t see you when I collect them?”
    “I’m afraid not,” she said, still in someone else’s voice.
    He flung the shirts over his shoulder, stuck his thumbs in his belt and rocked back on his heels. “In that case, I’ll not beat about the bush. Would you like to come for a walk with me one night, Flo? We can have a bevy on the way—you’re old enough to go in boozers, aren’t you?”
    “I’ll be nineteen in May,” Flo said faintly. “Though I’ve never been in a booz—a pub before.”
    “Well, there’s a first time for everything.” He winked.
    “See you tomorrer night then, eight o’clock outside the Mystery gates, the Smithdown Road end.”
    “Rightio.” She watched him leave, knowing that she’d done something terribly wrong. She felt very adult and worldly wise, as if she was much older than Sally and Martha. Tomorrow night she was going out with a married man and the thing was she didn’t care!
    “What did he want?” Olive Knott brought her down to earth with a sharp nudge in the ribs.
    “He brought his shirts to the wrong place. I sent him round the front.”
    Olive’s brow creased worriedly. “He didn’t ask you out, did he?”
    For the first time in her life Flo lied. “No.”
    “He’s got his eye on you, that’s plain to see. Oh, he has a way with him, there’s no denying it, but it’s best for nice girls like you to stay clear of men like Tommy O’Mara, Flo.”
    But Flo was lost. She would have gone out with Tommy O’Mara if Olive had declared him to be the divil himself.
    Friday was another dull day and there was drizzle on and off until early evening when a late sun appeared. It looked as soft as a jelly in the dusky blue sky, and its gentle rays filled the air with gold dust.
    Flo felt very odd as she made her way to the Mystery.
    Every step that took her nearer seemed of momentous significance, as if she was walking towards her destiny, and that after tonight nothing would ever be the same again. She thought of the lie she’d told at home—that she was