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like me to pick up a jug of soup for you at the kitchen, Auntie?’
    â€˜No, thank you, love. I’ll be up there myself later on. We received a donation of fifty pounds of cooking apples this morning. The committee will need all the help they can get to peel and stew them.’
    â€˜We’ll see you there. Bye, Auntie Anna. Come on, Tom. I live across the road.’
    Anna picked up her bucket. It was time to go in, get her cloak and walk to the soup kitchen. She was looking forward to the warmth of the Church Hall.
    She watched Amy enter into her house and hang her cloak on the peg in the hall. Tom was taking his time wiping his feet on the rag rug in the porch.
    Mary and Jim Watkins hadn’t considered any of the local boys who’d tried to court Amy, good enough for their daughter. So, Anna doubted they’d look kindly on an Irishman. Even one who was Father Kelly’s nephew.
    Which was a pity given the love she’d seen in Tom Kelly’s eyes when he’d looked at Amy. But more especially the love in Amy’s bright blue eyes when she’d looked back at Tom.

CHAPTER FOUR
    â€˜Why did you walk Amy home, Mr Kelly?’ Mary Watkins asked bluntly after Amy introduced them.
    â€˜I asked her to show me the way to the soup kitchen, Mrs Watkins. I told Father Kelly, he’s my uncle, that I’d meet him there later. I’d have never found my own way back to the church hall from the picket.’
    â€˜So, you walked Amy down the picket as well, Mr Kelly.’ Mary didn’t hide her annoyance. ‘Where did you meet?’
    â€˜In the main street. My uncle promised to show me the town but he received a message asking him to call on one of his parishioners just after we set off. He saw Miss Watkins, introduced us and I asked her if she’d be kind enough to show me the town.’
    â€˜By the look of her, she was delighted.’ Mary frowned at her daughter.
    â€˜Mr Kelly would have walked straight to the soup kitchen from town if I hadn’t been upset, Mam. The strikers were white shirting a blackleg again. It was horrible. He fell and they were hitting him.’
    â€˜What’s horrible is the way some men are prepared to work for less than a living wage in order to steal another man’s job,’ Mary declared. ‘What you have to remember, my girl, is that if Arnold Craggs and the blacklegs win this strike, there’ll soon be no food on this table at all.’
    â€˜I forgot to ask, Miss Watkins,’ Tom interrupted. ‘Why did they put a white shirt on the man?’
    â€˜So they’ll be able to see him in the dark if he tries to creep back into town at night. The miners want to make sure that the blacklegs stay away once they’ve taken the trouble to drive them out of Tonypandy,’ Mary informed him. ‘Did you recognise the blackleg, Amy?’
    â€˜No, Mam.’
    â€˜Then he’ll be one of the foreigners management brought in to steal your father’s and the other miners’ jobs. I’m happier knowing he’s not a neighbour.’
    â€˜Auntie Anna told me someone’s donated a load of cooking apples. I need to go to the kitchen early to help peel them.’ Amy opened the dresser and took out the family’s largest enamelled jug.
    â€˜I hope you don’t mind me walking to the soup kitchen with Miss Watkins, Mrs Watkins.’ Tom smiled at Amy’s mother. But she refused to be swayed by his charm.
    â€˜Looks like I have little choice in the matter. But I’ll send one of your brothers up to walk you back, Amy. Wait for him.’
    â€˜Yes, Mam.’ Amy walked down the passage and lifted the cloak from the peg.
    â€˜It was nice meeting you, Mrs Watkins.’ Tom pulled his cap from his pocket.
    Mary Watkins gave him the goodbye he’d been expecting. ‘Good luck in America, Mr Kelly.’
    â€˜I’ve had warmer welcomes when there’s been frost in the