Free Nest of Sorrows by Ruth Hamilton

came free with the service, then locked herself gratefully into a cubicle. Although splashings and singings could be heard from adjoining baths, this was one of the few places where she could feel alone. She filled the bath as far as it would go without spilling into the overflow, poured in some salts, stripped off her disreputable clothes and sank beneath hot soothing water. It was bliss. Heaven, she had long ago decided, was a hot bath with taps, a soft towel and a jug to rinse her hair with afterwards. Simple. Life could be so simple.
    It would be simple with Mike. Mike had already left school and had done his national service in the Air Force. So now they would go to college together, get engaged, be married as soon as the last term was over, then live happily ever after in a cottage with roses round the door. In the evenings, they would paint, together and separately. One day, one of them would become famous. One day, there’d be a Wray hanging in some London gallery and all the snobs would gather to say that they simply had to have a Wray. It didn’t matter which one of them became famous – the other would stay at home to mind children and prune roses. Happy. Simple. A perfect life, a life without parents.
    She worried about Mam, though. It seemed cruel, leaving her alone with Dad the way he was. It was obvious that he’d never really forgiven life and Mam for not giving him a son. Still. There was nothing she could do about any of it, was there? And it was OK to be happy. Yes, it was OK.
    That evening found Kate standing on the corner outside the Palais de Danse. She knew she looked nice. From Auntie Vera, who was always generous with her clothes, she had borrowed a newish cotton dress in pale cream with a pattern of large gently blue cornflowers. The same aunt had lent her some dyed blue high-heeled shoes and an off-white stole full of holes, as light as a spider’s web, it was. Her burnished hair had curled properly for once, and it reached just to her shoulders, softening the startlingly clean lines of her face.
    Mike was late. It wasn’t like him to be late. A few of the lads whistled as they passed her, while one or two asked her to go in with them, but she remained where she was, faithful as always. Then he came round the corner with a girl on his arm and a fixed smile on his face. The shock sent her reeling, so that she literally fell against the building.
    ‘Kate!’ He sounded breathless. ‘This is Josianne, our Pamela’s French penfriend. My naughty little sister had other plans for tonight, so I brought poor Josianne as my guest. She has very little English.’
    ‘Allo?’ The pretty gamin face was creased by a frown. She looked gorgeous, all swathed in a red silky-satiny material with a daring halter neck. Her eyes and hair were dark, and the mouth was generous, too generous for Katherine’s liking. ‘How old is she?’
    ‘J’ai seize ans!’
    ‘Ah.’ Sixteen! She looked older than Kate did! And suddenly the cornflower dress was dowdy, just a borrowed frock with no glamour, no panache. ‘Shall we go in, then?’ Katherine’s tone was cool.
    Inside, a few Brothers and lay-teachers from the girls’ school were getting politely inebriated at the bar. Mike left the two girls together while he went for pineapple juices and a glass of beer for himself. Josianne’s eyes swept over the room with an air of contempt. ‘
Il n’y a quelquechose à manager?
’
    ‘I don’t speak French.’
    ‘Oh. There is not the professeur of French at your
lycée
?’
    ‘Yes, there is the professeur of French. I don’t like French, can’t do it.’
    ‘
C’est la même chose pour moi
. For me the same. I not like English, so my father is send me here.’
    Katherine ground her teeth noiselessly. Mike’s French was flawless – he spoke it like a native! But when he returned to the table, Josianne had been whisked away by the first in a long queue of potential partners.
    He sipped at the beer, his eyes