As well as attending school as a girl, Billy spends his days fetching and carrying buckets of water, scuttles of coal, and baskets of logs whenever needed. He scrubs the kitchen, scullery, and hallway floors on a weekly basis as well as helping Alice with the laundry. But it’s not all work and no play as they both have plenty of time to read or work on their cross-stitch. They skip, play clapping games or cat’s cradle, and sometimes play with the dolls that Mrs Postlethwaite kindly gifted them at Christmas. Alice named hers Vivien after the actress Vivien Leigh and Billy named his Deanna after the famous singer and starlet. He feels a bit silly when Alice wants to play dolls but as Alice says, “It’s just like a toy soldier really, only it’s a girl, not a boy… and it doesn’t have a gun.”
The Petticoat & the Evacuee Scene 101
