Free While We're Apart by Ellie Dean

had once been a coaching inn and a refuge for the Cliffehaven smugglers, who’d used the large cellar to hide their booty and then transported it through a secret doorway into the tunnels that led to the church and the parsonage. Ron and his son, Jim, had made similar use of this hideaway before the war when they took the fishing boats across the Channel, but now Ron had converted this cellar into a shelter so the customers could stay and keep on drinking during the air raids.
    The old inn stables had long since disappeared and their Victorian replacements now provided shops on the ground floor and spacious apartments above. The ancient tiled roof of the pub dipped in the middle like a weary sway-backed horse and overshadowed the tiny diamond-paned windows, and the whitewashed walls that leant rather tipsily towards the pavement were veined with dark wooden timbers.
    The iron-studded oak door opened on to an uneven brick floor, an inglenook fireplace, and bench seating beneath the front and back windows. An upright piano stood in one corner, and in front of an ornate glass and mirrored fitment that acted as storage for bottles and glasses there was a highly polished wooden counter, two porcelain-handled beer pumps, and a heavy brass till. A collection of pewter tankards hung from hooks above the bar, and various leather straps holding horse brasses decorated the weathered, blackened beams on either side of the inglenook.
    A few tables and chairs were scattered around, but most of the customers preferred to stand by the counter, one foot resting on the shining brass rod that ran round the base. Lit only by a few wall-lights and a single low-watt bulb over the bar, and with the blackout curtains tightly drawn, entering it was like walking into a cave smelling strongly of pipe and cigarette smoke and spilt beer. And yet, in winter, when there was a log fire blazing in the inglenook, it was the snuggest place in Cliffehaven.
    Ron was standing in his preferred spot at the end of the bar by the brass till, enjoying a welcome pint after his long walk with Harvey, and gazing with love and pride at the landlady, Rosie Braithwaite. Rosie kept everyone in order as she served the drinks and made sure the other, older barmaids were managing to cope with the hectic pace. She didn’t miss a trick, his Rosie, and he felt the familiar glow of pleasure as he watched her sashay back and forth in her high heels, for she was the prettiest sight with her laughing blue eyes, platinum hair and luscious figure.
    She exchanged some mild banter with one of the airmen, and then flashed Ron a naughty grin just to let him know that although she flirted with her male customers, her heart was his.
    He winked back, saw the envy in the other men’s eyes, and only just managed to resist puffing out his chest like a rooster. He might be over sixty, and considered by some to be past it, but there was still plenty of life in this old dog yet, and with a woman like Rosie on his arm, he was a king.
    Rosie had arrived in Cliffehaven to take over the pub some years ago and had caused a great stir amongst the male population of a certain age, for she was not only as glamorous as a film star, but it appeared she was unencumbered by a husband or children. She was also a bit of a mystery, for it was most unusual to have a lone woman owning and running a pub, and she wasn’t at all forthcoming about her personal history. Yet this merely enhanced her would-be suitors’ interest, and made the competition to snare her more intense.
    Ron had been immediately smitten, but Rosie had kept him and all the other men at arm’s length, seemingly preferring her own company, all too aware that a woman in her position could very quickly become the target of gossip. It had taken several years of making himself generally useful about the place before he’d been invited upstairs to her living quarters to share a cup of tea or a quiet drink after the pub was