Free The Cobbler's Kids by Rosie Harris Page B

was afraid she wouldn’t be able to find them. But then she caught sight of them walking down the floating roadway onto the Wallasey ferry boat.
    Making sure they didn’t see her, she followed them onto the boat. When they finally reached Seacombe her father and Benny were amongst the first off the boat and they were again lost in the crowd. The next time she caught sight of them they were heading towards the Seacombe Ferry Hotel.
    Vera watched in disbelief as he sat Benny down on the steps outside the pub and left him there while he went in. She was torn between rushing over and picking Benny up and waiting to see what happened next.
    Minutes passed and she could see that Benny was becoming fractious. She was about to walk over to him when her father came out, grabbed Benny by the hand, and began marching along the promenade towards Egremont.
    Vera followed in their wake and saw them stop at Mother Redcap’s, and then again at two more pubs before they reached New Brighton. Each time her father went in and left Benny outside. He never once brought him out a drink and, since Vera was gasping from the heat, she knew that by now Benny must be feeling exhausted.
    When they reached New Brighton, her father began walking smartly along the Ham and Egg Parade towards Perch Rock. He was almost dragging Benny off his feet, so she felt she had to do something.
    Jostling her way through the crowds of holidaymakers she reached their side as her father was about to go into the Mariner’s Arms on the corner of Victoria Road. But she was so breathless that she couldn’t speak. As she saw the startled look on her dad’s face she knew there was no need to say anything, her reproachful stare had said it all.
    ‘Here,’ he pushed Benny towards her, ‘take him home, he seems to have had enough.’
    ‘It’s a wonder he hasn’t come to some harm being left outside so many pubs,’ Vera exploded furiously as she picked Benny up in her arms and cuddled him. ‘I know now why he’s always half dead by the time you arrive home after one of your Sunday walks.’
    ‘Less of your lip!’
    She stared defiantly back at him, her blue eyes dark with anger. ‘Dragging him around all day on a pub crawl without anything to eat or drink, and you call that looking after him! It’s enough to give him sunstroke in this heat!’ she fumed.
    ‘Take him back home like I’ve told you to do and think yourself lucky I don’t belt you one right here in front of everybody,’ he growled.
    ‘You wouldn’t dare,’ she said scornfully. ‘There’s a scuffer on the corner watching us and he’s itching to come over here and find out what’s going on. One whiff of your beery breath and he’ll arrest you, especially when I tell him how you’ve been mistreating little Benny!’

Chapter Nine
    May 1924 couldn’t come soon enough for Vera Quinn. That was when she would be fourteen and able to leave school to earn some money. There was only one drawback, though, she couldn’t find a job.
    Rita, had already been promised work on the assembly line at the biscuit factory where her grandfather worked. Vera had gone along to see if they would take her on as well, but she’d been told the list was closed, and that they were now fully staffed.
    ‘You could try at Lyon’s Corner House in town,’ Rita told her. ‘That’s where I would have liked to work really but factory work is better paid.’
    ‘Work as a Nippy and have to wear one of them daft little frilly hats? No thank you!’ Vera laughed.
    She was beginning to think that she would have to go into the centre of Liverpool for a job, or else work at one of the factories at Kirkdale or Wavertree. But by chance she heard about a vacancy for a junior clerk at Elbrown’s, the paint and wallpaper merchant’s in Great Homer Street.
    ‘I wouldn’t fancy having to sit at a desk writing out invoices all day,’ Rita commented. ‘Anyway, working at that place you’ll come home stinking of turpentine and