Content with that promise, the doctor charged her for the consultation and the pills he promised to have a boy deliver along with a sheet of instructions, as soon as he got back to his office, and left.

Anne sat in the other room, feeling worse than before on account of running the Blackes into debt and the workhouse! Kate sat beside her, talking to her about any topic that popped up in her mind, in a desperate attempt to engage and distract her friend.

After seeing the doctor out, Lottie returned to the kitchen, pausing on the threshold. The scene was mixed, like tepid soup. Two friends together side by side, Kate doing what Lottie had encouraged her to do and supporting her friend, yet Anne looked miserable and fraught.

"My girls." she muttered, loud enough for the girls to hear her. Just sayin' the phrase did her old heart some good. "Kate, Anne'll be staying with us for a while, she'll room with ye. Look after her as ye would a sister."

Kate looked at her mother and nodded understandingly, her hand on Anne's arm. She didn't need telling.

Anne turned her eyes up to Mrs. Blacke, startled. "But Elijah will let 'im go. He won't -," she stopped herself.

It wasn't that she didn't want to stay here, especially after having been forbidden from seeing Mrs. Blacke for some time. And she wouldn't dare to say that she wanted to go home and be with her family, and give Mrs. Blacke the idea that she didn't appreciate her. She dreaded making Mrs. Blacke angry again. Anne didn't even know what she wanted. She wanted it both ways. But the idea that her father might stay in jail for a longer period of time was unbearable. Even the thought that he might spend one night there like a common criminal was. A well respected man, her father, in jail! The thought alone made her dizzy again.

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Blacke. Thank you for your generousity," she said with a timid voice.

Lottie looked down at Anne's eyes that seemed to plead with her as if Lottie herself could fix this. This gentle soul was caught between the comforting brutality of the Ward family and tantalising potential of the Blackes.

Damn ye Ben Ward! Lottie silently cursed the man she deemed responsible. Damn ye fer makin' me feel this. If ye were a better man, a better father, this poor girl wouldn't be adrift.

"I don't know, dear. The law is the law and yer da broke it. We'll have ta wait an' see." the older woman answered. "Til we know more, ye stay with us. As the doctor said, I am yer guardian."

Anne looked devastated. "Aye, Mrs. Blacke..." she said in a hushed voice thick with held back tears.

Kate bit her lip while her eyes shifted between her friend and her mother, desperate for inspiration for the right words to do. "Come, Anne," she said at last. "Let's set yer bed. 'T will be nice to share a room, won't it?"

Anne nodded languidly. Kate helped her up and the girls went upstairs. As they passed out the room, Kate's hand gently touched her mother's arm.

Kathleen O'Connor had lived a few houses down from the Blackes some ten years now. Her husband worked for the railway, like Bill, and her eldest had found work at the Teeside. She was on good terms with the Blackes, even if she wasn't above sharing their misfortunes with willing ears. She made up for it by offering Lottie all the ins and outs of other people's lives. Today however, she had come down to number _ to inform Lottie of the misfortunes of her own life. Her Michael had come home with some shocking news and it was her duty to make sure Lottie was aware, before she made her round to all her other neighbours.

Wearing a bright red coat and a grave face, she approached the Blacke's front door and knocked.

The knock at the door was unwelcome. What fresh bother was happening now? Shooing the children away, she headed to the hall. Was Joe suddenly campaigning for mayor on the moral ticket? Had Bill gotten so polished at the pub, was he now waltzing down the North Parade with a potted plant?

Lottie snatched at the handle to quickly open the door.
"Kathleen," Lottie greeted. That coat was too loud, much too young for her.

"Alright, Lottie?" Kathleen greeted her in a thick Irish accent she, unlike the rest of her family, had never lost, despite her having having talked more to the Whitby residents than all the members of her family together. "Michael told me about yer Bill, have ye heard? Are you alright?"

"No.. what about Bill? What's happened?" The words tumbled out of her mouth. In her years of marriage, she'd heard of the dangers of the railway.... Not bloody now!

Oh the poor woman! She hadn't heard, indeed. Kathleen was pleased that she was here to offer some support. "Michael said he was arrested for knocking down some feller at the Red Lion."