‘You’d best stay here, George. Don’t you go near her. She’ll talk you round.’
‘I’ll shut her mouth for her. And I’ll get level with him too!’
The old woman grew alarmed.
‘Don’t go near them, George,’ she pleaded. ‘There’s a home for you here. Leave them to it. They’re not worth taking the notice of.’
‘What about the kids, eh?’
‘Fellows will have set them again you. They won’t know you. You see!’
‘That’s what I’m going to do.’ He grew excited. ‘And I tell you, if I have to do time again I’m going to put that b— on his back!’
He put down his tankard with another oath. One of the drinkers in the bar knocked at the counter.
‘Keep still till I’m back, George. I won’t be a minute,’ she said.
‘Get us another pint, then,’ George grumbled.