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He’s prudent with money. So between him and Papa, our wedding was an exercise in economy. I made the dress, arranged the flowers in margarine tubs, and the tea, sausage rolls and fruitcake were provided by my mother-in-law. Afterwards, we moved into our small house in Stroud Green. In truth, it felt rather like going home when we returned there after the ceremony. At night, I continue to fall to my knees, but now Merfyn heads up the prayers for temperance, sobriety and abstinence. He does not beat me. But once a week on Saturday nights, with the lights off and the curtains pulled tight, we have sexual intercourse.
    Apparently my mother was a gifted seamstress. My father encouraged me to work at my needlecraft, to emanate her skill. He said I had inherited her aptitude for it, even went so far as to praise my efforts. Merfyn is also proud of me, and I like to think pleased with the way I manage our home. In wartime he remarked that I was wonderfully inventive, unpicking worn jumpers and making them anew , fashioning dresses from curtains, faded tablecloths and the like. And, as for my cooking, he told me that he didn’t know how I put dinner on the table with the paucity of our weekly ration.
    ‘You do not slack, Harriet. You are a plough horse. I admire that,’ he said.
    Merfyn has angina. So instead of fighting overseas he did his bit at home, working as an air-raid warden. When he went out at night, I worried that he might be buried under a mountain of bricks the way my mother was, the way I was. But, like a homing pigeon, he always returned. Then we would sit sharing a pot of tea companionably, undeniably weak and stewed from recycled leaves, but a comfort all the same. He would complain about the people he had rousted on his rounds, windows bare, lights on. ‘Can’t afford the curtains, a woman cheeked me tonight. Then turn the light off, I hollered back. Will they ever learn? Do they want to give Jerry an illuminated map showing the blighters where to drop their blessed bombs?’ The general malaise regarding the gas-mask drill was another of his niggles. ‘Hardly anyone has the vision to carry their masks with them. I’ve told them that it’s essential, even demonstrated how to put it on in seconds. But I wear glasses, they moan. And here, what about my hat? So I quote verbatim from the radio broadcasts: “If you are wearing spectacles take them off first. If you are wearing a hat, take it off calmly but quickly. Always hold your breath so that you don’t take gas into your lungs.” They look at me as if I’m touched. Still, I’ve done my job. If Hitler gases the lot of them it won’t be my fault.’
    By then we had already signed the pledge of lifelong abstinence from drink, and I am proud to say are venerable members of the increasingly popular Sons of Temperance. The organisation was founded in the nineteenth century to battle an epidemic of drunkenness, and to offer an alternative to the dissolute lifestyles rife in Britain. The Band of Hope that started up in Leeds in the 1840s was all part of it . Our members live entirely without intoxicating substances, vowing for evermore to refresh minds and bodies in the way God intended, with health-giving recreation, fresh air and non-alcoholic cordials and beverages. And I am happy to say that Brothers and Sisters join us and take up the good cause every day.
    ‘With the war on and the stuff being so difficult to get hold of it’s not so bad. But you mark my words, Harriet, once it’s all over the rot will speedily set back in,’ Merfyn predicted, his face clouded with pessimism. And he was correct. We are kept busy spreading the word, converting the fallen. People are so easily led astray. Though I have to confess that Merfyn and myself do have a mutual weakness of the flesh, one neither of us feels able to deny. I blush when I reflect on the condemnation Papa would most certainly have rained down on us for this shared defect. I confess it. We both have