- made her tiny bedroom a haven to Daisy.
The table held the sum total of her possessions: her hairbrush, a small, chipped but still quite exquisite vase - another beachcombing find - which Daisy filled with wild flowers from spring to autumn, and Alf’s box holding some ribbons and hair grips which her da and brothers had bought for her birthday the year before, along with a small round hand mirror.
The upper floor of the cottage was reached by means of a steep staircase almost in the form of a ladder, which led directly out of the living room into the one above, but in spite of the range below being kept going day and night in winter the bedroom was always icy cold. Her father and brother, weathered by the hard life they led on the freezing, wind-swept expanse of the North Sea, seemed unaware of the cold, and once they were under their blankets in the two iron beds the larger space boasted - in one of which used to sleep Daisy’s parents and the other her brothers, top and tailed - they were immediately asleep. Not so Daisy. Many was the night she shivered for half-an-hour or so in spite of her stone hot water bottle, finally drifting off to sleep curled round its warmth like a small animal.
A popping sound from the pot on the hob brought her out of the uncharacteristically pensive mood she had fallen into, and she quickly tipped the broth into a clean earthenware bowl and carried it across to her grandmother. ‘Get this down you, Gran. An’ all of it, mind. Remember what that apothecary in Monkwearmouth said when Da went to see him after your last bad turn. You need to eat little an’ often. That’ll be better than all the mustard poultices an’ leeches an’ sulphur baths, he said.’
‘All right, me bairn. All right.’
Once her grandmother was settled and sipping the broth, Daisy walked through to the scullery. The floor here was stone-flagged like the living room, and on it stood a table on which were piled dirty dishes and pans from the family’s evening meal the night before and breakfast that morning.
There was also a poss-tub and poss-stick, a large tin bath which was leaning on its side against the wall, an upturned bucket on which sat a tin bowl, and under the narrow window a smaller table on which lay a large marble slab used for keeping food cool during the warmer months. Next to this stood a barrel made of wooden staves with metal hoops round them. There was another just outside the back door of the cottage to catch the rain and this, together with the freshwater stream which ran on to the beach some fifty yards from the cottages, provided all their water. Daisy now scooped up half a bucketful, filtering it through muslin - ladle after ladle - to strain the dirt out, and carried it through to the living room. She tipped it into the black kale pot permanently suspended by a chain attached to a metal rod which could swing out over the fire when required, and which provided all their hot water for washing clothes and pans, and for bathing in the long tin bath.
‘Lass, I know you’ve got things to see to’ - her grandmother’s voice was apologetic - ‘but yer da wants you to work on the net.’ Nellie gestured towards the big net on the far wall of the cottage, held in place by a double-pronged hook which was fastened to the tarred walls of the room and which held the nets secure when they were being repaired. ‘Him an’ Tom’ve done the heavy work down the sides, you’ll only need the bone needles to mend what’s left.’
‘Aye, all right, Gran. I’ll do the dishes an’ get the mardy cake on for dinner first.’
Poor little lass. Nellie’s sunken eyes watched sympathetically as Daisy’s slim figure bustled about the cottage. The old woman would have been mortally offended if someone had reminded her that her own daughter had been brought up to do the same tasks, and then Nellie hadn’t spared it a passing thought. The truth of the matter was