Eve of the Isle Read Free

modicum of privacy. She was soaked to the skin and beginning to shiver uncontrollably. The noise of the rain on the roof was loud and threatening. How long would the storm last?
    Taking a set of clean smalls from the bottom drawer of the chest, a warm jumper and skirt, she dried herself and dressed quickly. Her boots were ruined and wouldn’tbe wearable for days. Slipping her feet into her only other pair, ones that were held together by a length of coarse string, she was suddenly filled with exhaustion. From early light this morning she had been collecting and preparing the winter flowers she bought from market. The early snowdrops sold well at the picture houses and theatres alike. But she had lost all her stock tonight! It was a calamity and she cringed to think of the loss.
    As she sat wearily on her bed, her eyes closed and Raj’s dear face came to mind; her sailor husband who had lived here with her for three short years before his death. Somehow they had always made ends meet. Those years had been the happiest of her life.
    â€˜Mum, I’ve finished me supper!’
    â€˜So’ve I.’
    Her sons’ voices brought her back to reality. Drawing back the curtain, she turned down the lamp, leaving a soft glow in the room.
    â€˜Tell us a story. A river one,’ said Albert, as she placed the plates to one side and sat on his mattress. ‘About Old Father Thames and the Stink.’
    Eve chuckled. ‘After tonight I don’t think I’ll tell you them stories again.’
    â€˜I was only joking,’ yawned Albert. ‘I wasn’t really afraid. There ain’t no monster is there?’
    â€˜Not if you don’t tempt him,’ said Eve warningly. ‘But if you play on the barges and fall in, you’ll soon find out what Old Father Thames looks like.’
    â€˜Samuel makes me do it.’ Albert peeped accusingly at his brother from behind the sheet.
    â€˜We only watch the other boys,’ Samuel said hurriedly. ‘We don’t jump the barges.’
    â€˜I should hope not,’ said Eve firmly. ‘You know what happened to Tommy Higgins.’
    Some years ago there had been a river fatality in Isle Street. Maude Higgins’ youngest son of fifteen had missed his footing whilst thieving from one of the barges. His body was swept away by the current and gruesomely retrieved weeks later. The Higgins’ six sons were rough diamonds, but they were salt of the earth and the loss of their brother had affected them deeply.
    Eve indicated the bucket. ‘Do you want a wee?’
    â€˜No, we done one whilst you was changing,’ giggled Samuel. ‘The bucket’s half full already from the leak in the roof.’
    â€˜It came down on me head as I was doing one,’ chuckled Albert.
    They all laughed and when Eve had kissed them both, she made the sign of the cross, saying one Our Father and One Hail Mary as was their usual nighttime prayer. ‘Goodnight and God Bless,’ she ended, ‘see you in the morning, by God’s good grace, Amen.’
    â€˜Amen,’ replied the boys sleepily.
    Tiptoeing to her small space, she took a tartan shawl from the chest. Though old and worn from its many flower-selling days, the shawl had been her mother’s and gave Eve great comfort. Pinning up her long hair,she glanced in the small mirror nailed on the wall. Her large amber eyes were heavy with tiredness, shielded by the flutter of her thick brown lashes. She knew from the photograph that her dark hair and delicate bone structure were inherited from her mother. Peg always maintained that if Sarah Flynn had survived the flu epidemic of 1918, she would have preserved her Irish good looks to this day, despite the hard work and worry that had had turned her hair prematurely grey. It was down to Sarah, she insisted, that Eve was possessed of the timeless beauty of her forefathers.
    Another wave of tiredness crept over her as the noise of the rain