So we went in. Mrs Heak was sitting in the corner sewing and she had a big pot of rice on and it looked great. So after a while she told Andy to stir the rice. I was sitting up to the fire and I said that I’d stir the rice.

When I was stirring it I picked up little bits of slack (very fine coal) and dabbed them into the rice. By the time I was finished I must have had two handfuls of slack in the rice.

Finally Mrs Heak finished her sewing and got up. She put out plates on the table and a big jug of milk. At that point I said to Tommy John,

‘We’d better be going!’

Mrs Heak said,

‘Not at all. Wait till you have some rice. There’s plenty for us all!’

But I didn’t want to be eating the slack so I didn’t stay.

Tommy John cursed me all the way to the ‘Pass for we were starving and he would have loved a plate of rice.

A few days later, I met Andy Heak. All he would say was,

‘Morrow!

You’re a bad article!’