A Brighter Tomorrow by Maggie Ford (read with me .txt) 📕

answer. ‘Not today I haven’t. It’s all in my bank account. I’ll have to wait until they open tomorrow morning.’

Mrs Sharp gazed at her. ‘Bank account, eh? Huh! But yer ain’t got ’ardly a penny in ready cash ter bless yer name with now, ’ave yer?’

Ellie shrugged. ‘So what yer goin’ ter do till Monday?’ she was asked.

‘I don’t know.’ She had picked up a few pence she had about her when she’d left the Lowes’, but that wouldn’t go far. She hadn’t really thought, had she?

‘Then yer best stay ’ere another night till this bank of yours opens. ’Ope yer don’t mind the couch again.’

‘I don’t want to be any trouble.’

‘No trouble.’ Mrs Sharp plonked another slice of fried bacon on Ellie’s plate and turned to her son with a piece hanging off the fork she held. ‘D’you want a bit more?’

‘No, I’m full.’ He grinned at Ellie. ‘I don’t eat a terrible lot. In my job, all the racing about I do, sometimes I don’t get time to eat at all.’

Ellie smiled briefly back at him and turned her eyes to his mother. ‘I will pay you back for the food.’

‘Blimey! Don’t come over all high’n’mighty, love. It’s Sunday. We’ve got a shoulder of lamb. Surely one more mouth ain’t goin’ ter make a dent in that. And there’s shrimps and winkles fer tea and a cake I made yesterday. I don’t suppose what you eat would fill a fly, there’s ’ardly any flesh on you at all. Like yer mother you are – thin an’ wiry she was, bless ’er soul.’

That reminded Ellie. ‘Have you heard anything of my father? Do you happen to know where he might be?’

Mrs Sharp pursed her lips and shook her head. ‘Not seen ’air nor ’ide of him since yer mother went. I see Charlie about sometimes. He’s living in Corfield Street, I think. Seems to ’ave got himself a proper gel. I often see ’em up the Bethnal Green Road of an evening when I’m there buying a few bits and pieces orf the stalls. Have you seen ’im lately then?’

Ellie shook her head. ‘About my father: I do need to get in touch with him, but I don’t know where he is.’

‘Perhaps I can ’elp there,’ Ronnie put in. ‘You know, connected with the press an’ all that, I might be able to pull a few strings, see ’ow we go.’

‘Would you?’ Ellie felt a rush of gratitude.

‘Of course, I can’t promise nothing. But I’ll ’ave a try.’

She watched him get up from the table, downing the rest of the strong tea. ‘Me an’ Alice is off ter see one of ’er friends this morning. We’ll be back fer dinner, then we’re out again, so we won’t be ’aving tea. See yer later then,’ he said with a broad smile at Ellie.

It was a long morning. Ellie helped Mrs Sharp wash up the breakfast things, her husband coming down to his breakfast requiring more bacon to be fried, and then wandering off to wherever he was bent on a Sunday morning. A little later Ronnie’s fifteen-year-old sister appeared, requiring more bacon and toast to be got. Once a friend to Ellie, she now seemed awkward, her smile shy, as if not knowing how to treat her, and she was soon off out. Last to come down were the two youngest, required to make do before disappearing out to play in the street.

Mrs Sharp went up to make the beds, leaving Ellie to amuse herself reading some of the several-days-old newspapers lying around. The place was a mess, but she could hardly start tidying up in case her host thought she was hinting.

Dinner found the family squashed around the big table with a need to make a place for her and Ronnie’s fiancée. The afternoon was spent listening to Mrs Sharp’s account of her life since Ellie had left. Tea was a little less crowded with Ronnie and his girl not there – though Ellie was put on her guard as Mr Sharp came sufficiently to life to ask what she saw as awkward questions about what she’d been up to since leaving Gales Gardens.

The evening dragged, Mr Sharp having run out of steam by then. Mrs Sharp, too, seemed to have run out of words, engrossed in darning socks or stitching away at seams that had come apart on anything from shirts and nightgowns to skirts and underclothing, all by the light of a large, ornate oil lamp she’d said earlier had been her mother’s.

The two youngest children went off to bed at seven, protesting until their father gave an angry shout, making Ellie jump and them scurry upstairs. It was the only time he’d opened his mouth; otherwise his head was buried in a newspaper as he puffed away at a foul-smelling pipe. Finally he put the paper over his face and dozed off, filling the room with stentorian snores.

Ronnie’s sister hardly looked up from reading her penny dreadful, and didn’t speak at all. Knowing how they’d been only a year ago, Ellie was made ill at ease, the girl wary and distant. Perhaps it was the way she now spoke. She knew she had changed. Her life had moved on. It didn’t seem possible that they had once all played together in the street.

She was glad when it was time for bed, delayed by having to wait until everyone retired before she could. As before, she slept with her clothes on, unable to wait for morning, when she could be off. She felt in need of a good wash. Her only wash the whole time she’d been here was to sluice her face at the scullery sink where everyone’s ablutions were carried out. No bath, of course; the outside WC in the yard was a cobwebby place with a stained toilet from which she’d had to hurriedly avert her eyes the first time of using it, not caring to see the permanent stains of nature. Mum had