Kirsty asked sleepily, ‘Will I get up and make the porridge?’ ‘No, no,’ he bade her. ‘We will take a mug of brose just and be off to the creels. We will take our porridge when we get back. It’s the way we’re used to doing it.’ As soon as she heard them leave the house she got up and went into the lamplit kitchen where again she found the peat fire glowing red and the kettle steaming gently on the hob. She made tea and porridge, ate her own breakfast and then got out the girdle and baked some scones. It was still too dark to try cleaning the salt-caked window but she went to search for suitable cloths and cleaning materials in the big cupboard. She found some roughly-made dusters which she guessed had come from a tinker’s bundle and which, since they were still neatly folded, she suspected had not yet made the acquaintance of dust. She also found a scrubbing brush and a floor mop which, unlike the dusters, looked well used. She was wrapping a batch of the cooled scones ready to put into the oatmeal bin when she heard seaboots clumping on the cobbles and then stamping into the house.
