“Oh don`t leave me Maggie” I pleaded.

“But I must chic” she said.

“But I will still see you from time to time won`t I”

Dad was now back to square one, Grandma was too busy to help and even though I did all I could to help with small jobs such as fetching the accumulator for the wireless from the shop and going for the paraffin to refill the lamps with. (we had no electricity or gas in those days). My small efforts seemed not to make much difference. I came home one day to find Dad on his knees scrubbing the kitchen floor.

“Ah win’it be lang” he said

“I’ve gorra pie in the oven fe tea, set the table riddy.”

“What kind of pie, Dad?” said Ron.

“Cat pie” said Dad and we both laughed. Dad had at least not lost his sense of humour. Granddad Oliver was sitting in his chair with his head in his hands and elbows on his knees.

“What is it Granddad?”

“I’ve got a headache” he said

“I do get them quite a lot.”

I had finished setting the table and Dad was ready to take the pie out of the oven just as Bernard came in.

“By that’s a big one Dad” he said.

It was, he had put two rabbits into the big ten pint dish with potatoes and carrots then put on a crust. It was a delicious meal which we all enjoyed. As Ron and I were washing-up we heard such a commotion in the back yard. Rex our Alsatian was barking , then a loud crash of glass. We all rushed out to see what was going on. A young lad had been into the yard to take the empty jam jars from the top of the inner wall where we kept them ready to give to the rag and bone man. At the sight of the dog he had dropped the jars and run off, but not before Rex had taken a piece out of the seat of his pants. Shortly afterwards his mother came back with him to give Dad a telling off for keeping a dangerous dog.

“I’ll set the ‘Bobby’ on yer” she said, as she left through the back gate.

Rex was a lovely dog and not at all dangerous. I used to ride him like a pony, I never knew him to hurt anyone, if Ron got on his back he would immediately dash under the table knocking him off. Ron would protest about this saying

“It’s just not fair, he’ll ride you anywhere but not me.” It was probably because Ron was much heavier than me, he being three years older and much bigger. I was a thin small child and Ron delighted in kidding me, calling me ‘Skinny Lizzy’ but I was quite strong, which was just as well as many times I carried him home from school. He suffered dreadfully with pains in his legs, this was just put down to growing pains, but we all now know this to be nonsense. I could not bear to see him suffer, he would hold on to the fence along the pathway of the route home before we came to the pit heaps. I gave him piggyback rides going the long way round as I could not go up the pit heaps with him on my back. Dad rubbed ointment into his legs which seemed to ease them.

The meadows behind Grandma’s house were ready to cut, then after it was dry it was put into small haycocks, in neat rows awaiting collection by the horse drawn hay carts to be stacked in the farm stack yards. Ron and I found it great fun jumping over these haycocks. For two days we enjoyed this, but on the third day to our astonishment the farmer was waiting behind one of the haycocks, and we almost jumped onto him. We jumped up as fast as we could to the sound of his voice shouting after us.

“I’ll get yer, you young pests.”

We didn’t realise that we were knocking down the haycocks, which he had to keep putting up again. We reached grandma’s back door and dashed in, as we heard the sound of his knocking on the door we ducked down behind the settee. We could hear the two voices in conversation. Grandma was protesting our innocence, saying that she had not even seen us, and that he could look for himself, to see that we were not in the house, for she truly had not seen us enter. We crouched shivering like two frightened mice. The poor farmer must have thought that he must have been seeing things, as he had already seen us go into the house. Grandma closed the door and came into the room.

“You can come out now from wherever you are” she said, “you are quite safe he has gone.”

A smile came onto her face and Granddad in his bed laughed and chuckled as we told him the tale, after all it was no great sin we had committed.

It was great to have the time to play out after school. Soon the nights would be closing in and we would not be allowed to play out after dark. On one of my ‘Boody’ hunting trips I came upon some boys playing by a pond, they had caught some frogs and to my horror they had stuck straws into them, blown them up and set them off across the water. The poor frogs could not swim, just float helplessly. I was most distressed and ran home to tell Dad.

“Din’t fret yersel” he said, “I’ll gan that way to tak Rex out for his run.”

I hoped that Dad would stop the boys and that the frogs would be alright. The next morning I noticed that Rex was not around and on asking about him Dad said

“I have summit sad to tell yer. Rex has been run over.” My heart missed a beat.

“Where?” I asked “Where did it happen?”

“Halfway up the big bank on the way to The Plantation” Dad said.

I remained silent with my thoughts of Rex and on the way home from school that evening I went straight to the spot where Dad had said it had happened and just sat on the grass verge thinking about him. Ron came and found me and it took all of his persuasion to make me go home. Granddad was sitting with the box of dominoes in his hand.

“Would you like to have a game?” he said.

“Have you got your headache Granddad?” I asked.

“Yes, but if you play dominoes with me it will go away?”

Ron and I played with Granddad until it was time to light the lamp as we could no longer see.

One day a lady from the next row of houses, asked me if I would like to go and play with her daughter. I didn’t know her but she was a very nice little girl named Mariah and her mother Mrs. Cullen was very kind to me. We played in their backyard all that afternoon. Rhya, as she was known, had lots of beautiful dolls with cots and prams to put them in. Having no dolls of my own I was very happy to be allowed to play with hers. She was a beautiful girl with fair hair which hung down in ringlets, her rosy cheeks shining as she smiled at me. I secretly wished that I could look as she did. My hair was dark brown and cut very short with a fringe. Mrs. Cullen made us a tea party with cakes and jelly. When it was time to go home, I thanked her kindly for having me and thought how wonderful to have found such a friend. I hoped that she would ask me again.

The weeks past and it was now October the 12th my birthday. I don’t remember ever having a birthday party or a birthday card, but I knew that Granddad in the bed place would have something for me, so off I went to see him. Granddad was sitting up in bed with a big long box on his lap.

“Come on, little Dolly. Come and see what Granddad has here for yer, it’s ye birthday ye know, six today.”

I clambered up onto his bed and helped him to take off the lid. Grandma was just looking on saying nothing. The lid came off, and there was laid, as though she was asleep just waiting for me to awaken her, the most beautiful doll.

“Oh Granddad, thank you, just what I wanted, how did you know?”

The doll had a china face with rosy cheeks and blonde hair, it reminded me of Rhya. When I returned home clutching my wonderful new treasure, two envelopes lay on the table for me, they were birthday cards. One was from Maggie and one from her mother Mrs. Ogden.

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