Free The Wayward Wife by Jessica Stirling

been married?’ Kate asked.
    â€˜Couple of years, give or take,’ Danny answered.
    â€˜It must be hard for you being apart for so long.’
    â€˜You get used to it,’ Danny said.
    â€˜What did you do, what job, before you came here?’
    â€˜Sub-editor on the
Star.
’
    â€˜Did you enjoy working on Fleet Street?’
    â€˜There are worse jobs,’ Danny said. ‘Are you wonderin’ why I’m not in uniform?’
    â€˜The thought never entered my head,’ said Kate.
    Danny shrugged. ‘I failed the medical.’
    â€˜On what grounds?’
    â€˜Flat feet an’ poor eyesight. I’m off to an optician’s for a proper eye test as soon as I can get myself up to London. Are you home tonight or are you on late shift?’
    â€˜Home,’ she said. ‘Lie in tomorrow. I start at noon on a twelve-hour stretch. They tell me February has been a quiet month but it hasn’t seemed so to me.’
    â€˜Are you havin’ trouble with the translations?’
    â€˜Sometimes,’ Kate said. ‘Frequently, if I’m honest.’
    Back in the East End, when he’d lodged with Nora Romano, Danny had been an arbitrator, a problem solver, the dependable chap to whom everyone, including Susan, had turned for advice. All that had changed when Susan had gone to work for Vivian Proudfoot and had fallen for the agent, Mercer Hughes, after which he had been nothing more than a bridge between what Susan had been and what she was in process of becoming.
    He watched Kate put down the beer mug and, stifling a yawn, stretch her arms above her head.
    â€˜I must admit I do find it exhausting sitting for hours listening to strange voices crackling through a pair of headphones,’ she said.
    â€˜What you need,’ Danny said, ‘is a couple of days off.’
    â€˜We’re not entitled to leave, are we?’
    â€˜You’ve heard what’s comin’ down the wires from Germany. Now Europe’s thawin’ out an invasion looks inevitable. Be no leave for any of us when that happens.’
    â€˜Have you been up in London recently?’ Kate said.
    â€˜Not since Christmas.’
    â€˜Don’t you want to see your wife?’
    â€˜â€™Course I do,’ said Danny, hiding his ambivalence.
    â€˜Then why not ask for a forty-eight-hour pass and go home for a day or two, have a proper eye test and spend some time with your wife?’
    â€˜I could certainly do with an eye test,’ Danny said. ‘I can barely read the transcripts these days.’
    â€˜Headaches?’ Kate asked.
    â€˜Now an’ then.’
    â€˜Time you did something about it, Danny.’
    â€˜Aye,’ he said grudgingly. ‘I suppose it is.’
    If Billy had inherited an argumentative streak from his grandfather – a suggestion Matt vehemently denied – his appetite had surely come down from his dad. He happily devoured anything that was put before him and even opened his beak willingly to receive the daily dose of cod liver oil that Breda ladled into him.
    â€˜I wonder if he needs to be wormed,’ Ron said.
    â€˜Don’t be bleedin’ stupid. He’s a growin’ boy who likes ’is vittles,’ Breda said. ‘Don’t you, darlin’?’
    â€˜Yar,’ Billy answered through a mouthful of sausage.
    It was breakfast time in the Hoopers’ kitchen. Since Ron had started shift work at the fire station, it always seemed to be breakfast time for someone and the frying pan was seldom off the stove for long.
    Unusually, Billy’s routine and Ron’s had coincided on that brisk March morning and the whole family, all three of them, were eating together.
    Breda scooped two slices of toast from under the grill and spread them with butter. She added marmalade to one and strawberry jam to the other and put the jammy slice on a plate where Billy could reach it without effort. The marmalade she ate