Free Never Look Back by Lesley Pearse Page B

wasn’t smiling, his tone was gruff, but there was a gentler expression on his face and he was looking around as eagerly as she was.
    ‘Did you know you loved her right off?’ she asked. She was puzzled by the mechanics of courtship, love and romance. Right from a very young girl in Finders Court she’d seen far more brutality between men and women than love and tenderness. She had heard from other flower-girls that men were only nice till they ‘got it’. Yet the few books she’d read all spoke of love being beautiful, and she had always sensed that was the way her parents had felt about one another.
    ‘I suppose I must ’ave,’ he said and gave a little bashful laugh. ‘I knows I couldn’t wait to see ’er again anyways. I wore me arms out rowing over to Greenwich where she worked. She were the only girl fer me.’
    ‘Did you love Peggie too?’ she asked cautiously, fully expecting him either to evade the question or tell her to mind her own business. He didn’t ever speak of Peggie.
    ‘No, I never,’ he said, much to her surprise. ‘And seeing as you’ve brought the subject up, I’ll warn you, don’t you ever dally with a grievin’ man. They ain’t right in the ’ead for a bit. They wants to replace the one they’ve lost, and it don’t work.’
    Matilda digested this bit of wisdom silently. She had never been short of male admirers, hardly a week passed without some lad asking her to go to one of the penny gaffs with him to see the shows. She had seen through the doors of such places, and the raucous drunkenness, the noise and stink of them repelled her. Yet even if a lad was to offer some less crude entertainment, she doubted she’d agree to go. Perhaps she was peculiar, most girls of her age were already living with a man, yet she hadn’t met one she even liked enough to kiss.
    ‘Doing it’, as the other flower-girls referred to sex, sounded so ugly, yet she had always held on to the notion that it must be different if you loved the man and he loved you back. But how would she know that for sure?
    ‘How does a girl know when a man loves her truly?’ she asked tentatively.
    Lucas glanced at his daughter, wondering what prompted such a question. Nell would have known how to answer it, buthe guessed in her absence he would have to try to think what she’d have said.
    ‘When ’e wants what’s right for’ er, I suppose,’ he said. ‘When ’e’d row right across the river just to look at ’er face and never think ’ow far it were. When ’e’d give ’is life willingly for ’er.’
    Matilda’s eyes prickled with tears. She knew somehow that her father’s words were the truth about love, and until a man could offer her that, she wouldn’t settle for anything less.
    As Matilda and Lucas were making their way to Primrose Hill, Giles and Lily were sitting in the parlour digesting their Sunday luncheon, and speaking tentatively about the imminent arrival of Matilda.
    ‘I do agree she has a certain charm,’ Lily said cautiously. ‘But you were so hasty, Giles. We really know nothing about her.’
    ‘I think we know everything which is important,’ he said evenly. ‘She is brave, selfless, honest, and very anxious to improve her station in life. She has a sense of humour, and she is forthright. Tell me, Lily, what was it you didn’t like about her?’
    ‘The way she spoke,’ Lily said quickly and made a little shudder. ‘I know she can’t help that, but it reminds me of where she comes from.’
    Giles half smiled. He knew Lily was imagining a filthy hovel infested with rats. ‘Aggie doesn’t speak very much better than Matilda,’ he said. ‘She goes home at night to a place I doubt you’d wish to live in. You don’t distrust her because of it. So tell me what you did like about the girl.’
    Lily had spent the last couple of days thinking of nothing else but this girl. She was deeply indebted to her for saving Tabitha, and like Giles she had been taken by the girl’s