During the Scottish autumn of 1891, Irishman, Lucan Hayes, a coal miner, loses his wife to childbirth. In his darkest hour, he meets prostitute Meg-Anne Dunn. This brief encounter would alter their lives forevermore.
Lucan must find a way to rais...
As they approached the Scott's residence Lucan could hear the sound of children laughing and squealing. They were about to knock on the door when it was flung opened. A young girl dashed past them. She ducked under Lucan's arm where he held onto the railing of the stairs.
No sooner had she reached the bottom when a boy of similar age stopped abruptly in front of them and stared wide-eyed. "Hello, Mista Hayes. Mum's in the back." He grinned at Thaiter, and then called loudly, "Mum... Mista Hayes is here." He smirked again and pointed at his sister. "Tess... I'm gonna get you for that!"
Both Lucan and Thaiter followed his finger.
Tess was standing outside the gate with a wide grin on her face. Hands on waist, she poked out her tongue, wiggled her hips and called in a sing song voice, "Alex! Alex! He's no man, cause he cooks chooks in a frying pan!"
Alex grinned again. "Sorry, Mista Hayes gotta go." And with that he dashed down the stairs.
Tess screamed and ran down the road with Alex not far behind her.
When Thaiter and Lucan turned back towards the door the large cheerful face of Margaret Scott beamed down at them. She wiped her hands on her apron. "Thaiter. Sorry about that lot," she said as her eyes followed her children's progress. "He'll catch her and she'll be back in tears." Margaret chuckled, and waved them in. "Come on. I've got some tea brewing."
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She motioned them to take a seat while she bustled about getting cups, milk and a biscuit tin from various shelves. "So, this'd be your nephew?" she asked as she continued to move from one place to the other.
"Yeah, this is Lucan and his lot, Covey and Riley. I wasn't expecting him to have lads."
Margaret beamed at the boys and held out a treat to each of them. "If ya want to play, the others are under the house digging for gold. They'd be happy to have some help."
Covey's eyes widened. "Gold?"
Margaret nodded. "And if ya find any you're welcome to keep it."
"Can I go, Da?" Covey beamed.
Lucan nodded and grinned as he watched Covey help Riley down the back stairs.
Placing a mug of tea in front of each of them, Margaret then went to the stove to stir what was in a large pot. "So how was your journey, Lucan?" she said.
Lucan studied Margaret as he spoke to her. He watched as she started to roll out some dough she had in a bowl. "Yeah, not too bad. I think the worst was coming from Myola to here."
She chuckled. "Yeah, that's the worst of it."
Tess ran into the room with tears streaming down her face. Margaret hugged Tess to her. "Knew this would happen, girl," she said as she patted her on the back, stirred the pot, took a sip of tea and chastised Alex for making his sister cry.
