Rainbow's End - Tapa dura

Liverpool, 1904. When Ada Docherty gives birth to twins, Deidre and Donal, in her tiny house in Evangelist Court, she has no choice but to make Ellen, her eldest daughter, bring them up, for she must work to feed seven hungry mouths. But in Dublin, Maggie McVeigh's lot is even harder, for she sleeps on straw in a tumbledown tenement. When a local woman, Mrs Nolan, needs someone to look after her sons, Maggie takes on the job and finds security and comfort - and love, too, with the eldest boy, Liam. When war is declared, life changes dramatically. Ellen, newly in love, follows her young man to France - but does he share her feelings? A tragedy sends Liam off to the trenches whilst at home wartime shortages and a constant stream of bad news affect both families. But a surprise is awaiting them. Let yourself be swept away by this warm and delightful story of two families struggling through poverty and hardship to reach their Rainbow's End.

Soon they were laughing and teasing one another as though the episode on the beach had never happened.

Though not quite as though it had happened, thought Ellen ruefully as they climbed back aboard the train. They had kissed and she had a shrewd feeling that such a kiss should have changed their relationship in some way, made them more...well, perhaps more aware was the closest she could get. And it hadn't. She was still fonder of Tolly than anyone else she knew, but she understood, at last, that she must wait and let him find out just what it was he wanted. If it was her...oh, how marvelous that would be! But if it wasn't, she would have to learn to live with it.

They reached the Pier Head when the street lamps were all being lit and went back to Heyworth Street on the first tram to come along. Then Tolly saw her to her door, saying a very sweet goodnight to her on the pavement, and when, at the last minute, he caught her shoulders and kissed her brow, she smiled up at him and tried to pretend that the chaste salute was all she had ever expected from him.