took a pride in their home, had taken the trouble to paint them themselves, but many had not, arguing that it was the council’s duty. Barbara noted that Rita had done nothing to hers and inside the furniture was decidedly shabby and there was dust everywhere.
‘Did you find your husband?’ she asked. Any subject of conversation was better than being quizzed on why she had been standing outside Virginia’s gate looking as if someone had dealt her a blow to the body and winded her.
Rita pushed a steaming mug of tea across the kitchen table towards her and turned to mix the children’s lemonade with crystals from a packet. Alison, slightly bemused by this strange departure from their normal routine, took hers and politely said, ‘Thank you.’
‘You’re welcome,’ Rita told her, handing the other to Nick, who grabbed it quickly and put it to his mouth. Barbara made him say thank you and turned to sip her tea.
‘No, you couldn’t say I found him, exactly,’ Rita said, when Barbara began to think she had forgotten the question. ‘He did a bunk.’ She had become adept at lying about what had happened to Colin, pretending she didn’t care that her husband had deserted her yet again. It was better than telling everyone he was in prison. ‘As soon as anything happens he doesn’t like, he just clears off.’
‘Had something happened he didn’t like?’
Rita looked at her over the rim of her cup. She didn’t think Mrs Kennett knew the truth; she was simply making small talk to get over the fact that she’d had an almighty shock. Rita didn’t expect to be told what it was, though she could guess. She didn’t live far from Mrs Bosgrove and she had seen Kennett’s new Humber outside the gate on more than one occasion. ‘Don’t know. Not at ’ome, it didn’t. At work, p’rhaps.’
‘Oh.’ Barbara remembered the conversation she had overheard between George and Mr Younger and wished she hadn’t asked the question. ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Younger.’
‘Don’t often get called Mrs Younger. I’m Rita to everyone.’ She chuckled suddenly and her eyes lit with defiant humour. ‘That’s when I’m not being called something worse. But you don’t need to be sorry. It wasn’t your fault.’
‘Do you know where your husband is now?’
‘Oh, the bugger came back two days ago. Right at this minute, I reckon he’s in the betting shop.’ Time off for good behaviour he had told her when she said he was out sooner than she expected.
‘Oh dear, I’m truly sorry. He’s not working?’
‘He says he’s going back to Kennett’s, said he went round the yard yesterday but Mr Kennett was away and he had to speak to him in person.’
‘My husband is abroad, but he’s coming back tonight; I expect he’ll be in the office tomorrow.’
‘I’ll tell Colin, though whether the lazy sod will do anything about it, I don’t know.’
Barbara looked swiftly at Alison. Language like that was not something the child had ever heard, but she was looking out of the window at a cat stalking something in the long grass and appeared oblivious.
‘Do you have a job, Mrs…Rita?’ Barbara asked.
‘I’m a barmaid at The Crown in the evenings and I’m an office cleaner in the mornings.’ She grinned. ‘Greedy of me, I suppose, when there’s so much unemployment, but I need both jobs. I enjoy them, specially the bar work. Lots of people to talk to, a free drink now and then and meals on duty. It don’t leave me too much time to meself, but what good would that do me? I’d only sit at ’ome and feel sorry for meself. Feeling sorry for yerself is just about the worst thing you can do. Another cuppa?’
‘No, thank you, I really must be going. It was very kind of you to ask me.’
Alison had managed to finish her drink without getting it down her front but Nick had not only smeared it round his face and into his hair, he had let it drip down his shirt which had a large ochre stain. Barbara picked him up and put him in the pushchair.
Rita looked up as a girl came into the kitchen. ‘Here’s my Zita,’ she said.
The girl was about thirteen, dressed in a grubby gymslip. She had dark glossy hair braided into a pigtail. She bore no resemblance to Colin Younger and very little to Rita. But she reminded Barbara of someone, though she could not place whoever it was.
Rita laughed, sensing Barbara’s puzzlement but not