The Secret Sister by Liz Trenow

Author:Liz Trenow [Trenow, Liz]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781837903344
Published: 2023-04-02T16:00:00+00:00

Lizzie and Peter began spending most of their spare time together. Every evening after supper, they would read, or sometimes play draughts or chess – although he was so much better than her that she gave up and persuaded him to play Ludo instead.

‘That’s just a game of chance,’ he said with a disapproving frown.

‘Isn’t that just like life?’

They talked about books – she enjoyed fiction, and he read, almost exclusively, books about history, politics or religion. ‘Don’t you need a bit of escapism from time to time?’ she asked as he pored over a fat tome on the First World War.

He peered over her shoulder at the battered paperback, found in the welfare centre library, of Murder at the Vicarage. ‘Carnage among the middle classes, how simply delightful, my dear. Just the sort of escape I need.’

She loved his gentle humour, and how they could take the mickey out of each other without causing offence. He was so different from the boys she knew at home, whose enjoyments were all about action: sailing, riding, fishing, wildfowling.

Peter was gentle and thoughtful, his ideas interesting, and he was surprisingly well informed, so much so that she sometimes felt quite ignorant, particularly when straying into politics or history. But she never found him boring. In fact, she found herself increasingly fascinated by him. Alone with her thoughts at night, she began wondering what would have happened had they met in more normal circumstances. Would he be attracted to her? But it was no use even considering it, she told herself, because in a few days’ time he would complete his training and be posted to some faraway pit, probably never to be seen again.

On his final weekend, they went to the pictures again and afterwards to a different café, which turned out to be almost deserted. The smell of home baking and wood fires made Lizzie feel instantly at home, and terribly hungry.

‘Do you know where they’re going to send you after you leave here?’ she asked once they’d ordered.

‘Somewhere else in Yorkshire, I expect,’ he replied. ‘They say you usually get placed in the same area as you trained in.’

‘Do we get a choice?’

He nodded. ‘They’ll accommodate your preference if they can, they say, although how you’re supposed to choose between a dozen places you’ve never heard of is anyone’s guess.’

From his back pocket he produced a sheet of paper with a list of collieries divided into regions, including the type of accommodation offered at each site: hostel, boarding houses or private homes.

‘Which is best, do you think?’ she asked.

‘You tell me. How are you enjoying communal living?’

‘It’s bloody horrible. I get hardly any sleep, the wash block is smelly and cold, and the other lads get on my nerves.’

‘Perhaps try for a pit without a hostel, so you’ll be lodged in a private home.’

‘Frankly, I feel like giving up everything right now.’

‘Don’t do that. We’re contributing to the war effort, aren’t we?’

‘I’m not sure any of us will make a difference to the productivity of a mine, based on present progress.

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