Read Online To Have and to Hold by Anne Bennett - Free Book Online

difference?’
    ‘Yes, but—’
    ‘Look,’ Lois said, ‘this is your first experience of this, but I have seen them there for years. You get almost used to it, though if I have any spare cash I will buy something because I do feel sorry for them. But if we get upset, it won’t change things for them, will it?’
    And of course it wouldn’t. Carmel saw that and she took her lead from Lois. In the Market Hall there was much to distract her, anyway, for, like the barrows outside, stalls selling meat, vegetables and fish were side by side with junk and novelty stalls and others selling pots and pans, cheap crockery, sheets and towels. However, for Carmel the main draw was the pet stall.
    She had never owned a pet, and though she would have loved a cuddly kitten of her own, or a boisterous puppy to take for walks, she knew there had been barely enough food for the children, never mind an animal. She’d never have taken a defenceless animal near her father either, for she thought a man who would beat his wife and children without thought or care, wouldn’t think twice about kicking an animal to death if the notion took him.
    There were rabbits and guinea pigs in cages, and twittering canaries and budgies that Lois spent ages trying to get to talk. Carmel had never heard of a talking budgie and was inclined to be sceptical. However, just as Lois was maintaining that some budgies did talk and she had an aunt who had owned such a bird, there was a sudden shriek and a raucous voice burst out, ‘Mind the mainsail. Keep it steady, lads. Who’s a pretty boy then?’
    The milling customers laughed and the stall owner went into the back to bring out a parrot that neither Lois nor Carmel had noticed.
    ‘There,’ Lois said with satisfaction. ‘I told you that some birds can talk.’
    ‘You said budgies could, not parrots,’ Carmel contradicted. ‘I knew about parrots, though I had never heard one until today.’
    ‘Even budgies…’
    However, Lois didn’t get to finish the sentence, because someone beside her suddenly said, ‘It’s nearly five o’clock.’
    Carmel put the kitten she had been holding back in the box, and stood up, brushing the straw lint from her coat. ‘We’d better get our skates on,’ she said. ‘The other will be there before we are.’
    ‘No, wait on,’ Lois said. ‘If we are a few minutes late, they won’t mind. They can have a cup of tea or something.’
    ‘But what are we waiting for?’
    ‘The clock,’ Lois said, pulling Carmel to the front of the stall. Everyone was suddenly still, Carmel noticed, and gazing up at the wooden clock on the wall, watching the seconds ticking by. And then the hour was reachedand three figures, like knights and a lady, emerged to strike a set of bells to play a tinkling, but lilting tune. Carmel was as enthralled as anyone else.
    ‘Oh, it’s lovely,’ she cried, when the strains of it had died away.
    ‘It wasn’t always here,’ Lois said, as they walked outside again. ‘It was first put into an arcade up Dale End way, but my dad said that the arcade went out of business through lack of custom. He told me the man who made the clock was never paid the full asking price and he is supposed to have put a curse on it and that was why the arcade in Dale End had to close. That is hardly going to happen here, though, to the thriving Market Hall. You saw that for yourself today.’
    ‘Yes I did,’ Carmel agreed. ‘But I can’t help feeling sorry for the man who made the clock not getting the money for it. It’s a magnificent piece of work and must have taken him ages and ages—and then to be diddled like that…’
    ‘You’re all for the underdog, aren’t you?’ Lois said. ‘First the old lags on the market steps and now the poor clockmaker. I’ve never ever given that man a minute’s thought.’
    ‘I don’t like unfairness.’
    ‘No more do I,’ Lois said. ‘Only now that I am nearly grown up I see that there is unfairness everywhere, and