Shattered Dreams Read Online Free PDF

and set up home in a nice house somewhere, maybe even in West Kirby where the toffs live.”
    “Well, Heswall is quite a nice place to live too, Irene. Maybe you’ll live down Mount Drive and have a view across the River Dee? Has he said when you’ll be getting married? Is it to be a short engagement or a long one? I know most couples have to save up to get married, but with his background, the family will probably make sure you have everything that you need.”
    “I think there may be a little problem, Aunty. We haven’t talked about it yet, but Eddie’s family are Roman Catholic. He’ll have to wait until it’s the right time to tell his parents because they probably won’t accept a Protestant like me.”
    “Surely that won’t be a problem, Irene. Once they meet you, they’ll see what a lovely girl you are and then religion won’t come into it. I have heard that their eldest daughter is getting married. Miss Smith told me the other day when I went into the Post Office. She said she’d seen the announcement in the Wirral News . ‘Caitlin Dockerty marrying Lawrence Davies from Shropshire’. She won’t have to change the initial of her surname, will she?”
    “The other thing, Aunty, is that Eddie is only nineteen, so he will need his father’s permission to marry. If his father says no, we’ll have to wait another two years and that will be four years in all that I will have known him.”
    “Well, that isn’t such a bad thing, too many marriages falter because they’ve rushed into it. Remember the old adage of ‘marry in haste and repent at leisure’.”
    On the following Saturday after the dance, Eddie walked Irene as far as her Aunty’s gate.
    “Would you like to come in and have a coffee before you go home?”she asked eagerly. “Aunty will probably still be up and she’s dying to meet you.”
    “It’s all right, Irene, I’ll get off home if you don’t mind, I’ll see you again next Saturday.”
    “Eddie, I hope you don’t think I’m being forward or anything, but last week when you said about us getting married, you did mean it, didn’t you?”
    He laughed nervously and looked a little sheepish, not being able to meet her eyes.
    “Is this because I had a bit to drink, that you think I wasn’t being serious?”
    “Well you did say I was to give you first refusal if I was thinking of marrying someone. I suppose it was a bit of a cockeyed proposal, but you haven’t mentioned anything since.”
    “It’s difficult, Irene. Of course I would like to marry you, but there are so many hurdles to get over before we can be officially engaged. My parents won’t be happy because we aren’t the same religion. I would need their permission to marry as you know I’m only nineteen. But in two years time I’ll be old enough to marry without their consent. So it’s probably best if we keep our engagement secret for the moment, but you know and I know that we’ll get married one day.”
    “Oh, and do you love me, Eddie?”
    “What do you think, Irene, and I know you love me too.”
    She closed her eyes and lifted her face for him to kiss her, but he only kissed her lightly on the cheek, then walked away.
    Gladys walked down the dirt track to the bungalow. She carried a small wicker basket that held a round of salmon sandwiches, an apple, a piece of chocolate cake and a Thermos flask of tea.
    “Cooee,” she called, as she daintily tiptoed in her cuban heels over the plank of wood that served as a ramp to the doorway.
    “Eddie, are you there, darling? Mummy’s here.”
    Her son swung down from the loft, where he had been busy checking that the roofing felt was secure enough.
    “I thought I heard someone and it’s you, Mum. Oh good, you’ve brought me some lunch. That will save me some time not having to come up to the house.”
    “Have you somewhere I could put a tablecloth down and Eddie, is there somewhere you could wash your hands? I brought enough tea for the both of us because