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them uniforms we’re going to be making could be for Frank. It gave me a rare old turn, an’ all,’ June admitted.
    ‘Hannah’s very upset that we’re going to be making uniforms,’ Molly commented sympathetically.
    ‘Aye, well, she’s got to snap out of that, otherwise she’s going to find herself out of a job and she can’t afford that. All she’s got is that bit of a pension.’
    ‘It must be awful for her, though, June. I was talking to her for a bit this morning and she was saying as how she’d been married only a few weeks when her husband was killed.’
    ‘Maybe so, but that was nearly twenty years ago,’ June responded bracingly. ‘Things are different now.’
    Their bus arrived and they both climbed on board, Molly paying both fares before slumping thankfully into an empty seat.
    ‘What you got there, girls?’ the conductor ribbed them jovially.
    ‘Blackout material, that’s what,’ June answered.
    ‘Want me to come round and give you a hand putting it up?’ he offered, winking at Molly.
    ‘Give over with yer cheek,’ June told him firmly, but she was still smiling at him, Molly noticed with amusement.
    The bus set them down on the corner of thecul-de-sac and they walked up it together in their normal manner, Molly pausing frequently to admire the flowers growing in the small, neatly tended front gardens whilst June hurried her along, her attention concentrated on reaching home.
    As they drew level with Frank’s mother’s house, Molly stopped walking and suggested warmly, ‘Why don’t you give Frank’s mam a knock, our June, and see if she wants a hand with making up her blackout curtains? Those big windows of hers will take a lot of covering and we could easily run the curtains up for her on our Singer.’
    ‘Why should I put meself out to do her any favours?’ June demanded belligerently.
    ‘You’d be doing it for Frank,’ Molly said gently.
    ‘You’re a right softie, you are – just like Frank. But, aye, go on then, we might as well give her a knock,’ June agreed.
    Unlike their own, Frank’s mother’s gate did not squeak when it was opened, but Molly did not think that the Edwardian tiled pathway looked any cleaner than their own, nor the front step better donkey-stoned. Their mother had been as house-proud as the next woman, and June and Molly, encouraged by Elsie Fowler, had grown up maintaining those standards.
    It was true that their front door did not have the coloured leaded lights adorning number 46’s, nor did they have the advantage of a big bay window overlooking their small front garden, buttheir father kept their privet hedge every bit as neatly clipped.
    ‘Come on, she mustn’t be in, and I’m not wasting any more time standing here knocking again,’ June announced, turning round.
    Molly had started to follow her when she heard the door opening and stopped.
    Mrs Brookes – a former ward sister at the hospital before her marriage, whose discipline and rigidity still remained – was a tall, well-built woman, firmly corseted, with a sharp-eyed gaze that rested disapprovingly on everything and everyone apart from her beloved son. It was certainly fixed less than welcomingly on them now, Molly recognised.
    ‘Oh, it’s you, is it?’ she declared grimly.
    She hadn’t invited them in and quite plainly wasn’t going to do so. Molly quickly realised that June was leaving it to her to speak.
    ‘We were just passing on our way home and we wondered if you wanted any help with your blackout curtains, only me and June are going to be sewing ours tonight and …’
    Was that a small softening Molly could see in the grimly reserved features?
    ‘Yes, and whilst we were in Lewis’s I had a good look at their wedding dress patterns,’ June chipped in determinedly.
    Immediately Frank’s mother’s hackles rose and her mouth pursed with displeasure.
    ‘I’m already sorted out with me blackout curtains.My friend on Carlton Avenue and her daughter have invited me