Page 56 (1/2)

They got out of the car and stood at the front door She looked at him He wiped his face with the back of his hand and he knocked

60 Biscuit tin, rusted, used as money box or for keepsakes, c1944

When Mary's husband died, her eldest daughter persuaded her to al

ow just around the corner fro should happen She hadn't liked it at first She'd missed the open fire, the view across the fields, the smooth shine of the worn stone floor She'd ether in the wardrobe The weekly steas pinned up across the walls, the tools hanging up on the back of the door, all the familiar bits and pieces of a ho her own The walls were thin in the new place, the doors hollow, and the electric heaters took so long to warm up and cool down that she had to watch the weather forecast just to knohen to turn them on

You're only lonely without Daddy, her children told her, when she said she wanted to go back, and she didn't think they were right but they were You'll get used to it, they said, you'll like it there soon enough, and she found it hard to believe but she eventually did She started to like sitting by the atching people walk in and out of toaving back at anyone who s to worry so hts and s able to put her wet clothes into a machine and take them out as dry as if they'd been on the line for a week And now that she had two roo the children co their own children with theraphs for her to put up on the wall, filling her front room with stories of their new lives and jobs in the places they'd settled now, retelling old stories of the life they re up with

And one day, barely stopping to think what she was doing, she told her eldest daughter what had happened all those years ago, when she worked in the big house in London, and got into trouble, and had to come home with her hands empty and her heart broken You can understand why I didn't tell you before, can't you? she said, when her daughter had finished asking questions, and Sarah nodded, and shook her head, and said well of course, I suppose I do

She'd thought that would be the end of it, a sad story to add to the collection, but Sarah began to ask nore her when she said that was enough she didn't want to talk about it any more it was done it was finished And one day Sarah cas which were hard to take in for a soul who'd grown up with no telephone and no electricity and a postman who only ca, and it took her sohter meant

I've found hi over to see you

She wondered if it really could be as siined it and prepared for it all those years, to finally open the door and say hello to him after all She asked Sarah if she was sure, if there wasn't so for her by her nao, but Sarah said no it had to be right, it had to be him, he must have discovered the real na what computers could do these days

Aren't you excited? she kept asking Aren't you pleased?

61 Paper package of selected photographs (reprints), c 1950-2000

Well Now This is so up at hiether, a short white-haired wo faintly and saying well, well, right then

Mrs Carr? he asked

Ah, callher head So, she said again You'll be David He nodded, and when he tried to say yes, that's me, I'm David Carter, his mouth went numb and only the first cracked half of his naain

She nodded back, as if agreeing with him, and unclasped her hands Well, now, she said He had no idea what to say He just looked at her Her htly back into her cheeks Her nose was very slightly turned to one side She had a dark brown mole on the side of her face, just lower than her ear, with two thick hairs springing out of it Her eyebroere thick, and neatly arched, blackened with a little make up