Kettle soup for breakfast and a crust. Charity didn't mind, she was sure that it would be today that daddy came home from war.

She skipped down the cobbled alley, down 50 Steps, swung aside the loose fence panel and slid down the bong till she reached the shunting yard. The air was filled with the clank and whoosh of steam engines. She picked her way between coal stacks and baulks of timber till she reached her secret place, beneath the water tower.

Eyes closed she listened to the blackened engines, Faith and Hope, huffing and grumbling to each other. Each surge of movement followed by the chime of complaints from jostled wagons bashing and crashing each other. And when they got their speed up the rails would start their squealing song.

What time was it? She peered at the station clock.

A faint plume on the horizon of an approaching train. Tiptoe she craned to see. Would the windows be open and crammed with the grinning faces of soldiers, waving caps, their voices raised in song?

Their pockets full of sweets from Ypres.