Mary will be making her appearance in the next chapter, just so you all know. Unfortunately, to set up her arrival, I had to have Michael do a bit of an info dump in order to move thins along. I'm not as happy with this chapter as I usually am, but I think the ones after it will be better.

(London, 1923)

"He had a hard time of it." Matthew sighed. Somehow, his nicely ordered little life seemed...cheap in a way. He hadn't had to fight for it or scrape the bottom of the barrel like Bert Alfred did.

"He did, but his fortunes changed pretty quickly." Michael confided after a sip of his drink. "My sister Jane and I ran into him at the park one day and insisted he come home with us for tea. He did and since it was a bank holiday, my father was home. Bert asked him what to do with the money he had saved up and Father suggested he put it in the bank. Bert rather liked this plan, since he'd already had to fight off some unsavory people when the word got out he had a few bob on him."

"Was he okay?" James asked in alarm. Some of the street gangs in London were reputed to be pretty fierce.

Michael nodded, smiling. "He was. He smacked one of them with his crutch and they left him alone after that. Also, while he was at tea, Father noticed how good he was at doing sums in his head. One of the bank tellers was leaving to get married, so Father offered Bert the job, alone with room and board at our house."

"Did he accept it?" Matthew queried. He wondered how someone like Bert, who was accustomed to being his own boss would take the suggestion of a desk job.

"He didn't want to take it at first, but once he'd thought it over a bit, he reckoned that it was the only thing he could do that would allow him to save faster. He also decided to take the money that Gavin had been giving him and put it in a separate account so he could pay off the deed on their home. He figured it was what Jerry would have wanted for his family."

"This bloke sort of makes me feel ashamed of myself." Davey said honestly and the others nodded in agreement.

"So what happened then?" Matthew asked anxiously. He wanted to know what happened, but he also wanted to know when or if this mysterious Mary came back into things!

"Bert wrote a letter to Robby, letting him know that he had a permanent address now and he got a visit from him." Michael chuckled at the memory. "He gave Bert a quarter of all his earnings from the book and it's sequal since it was Bert that had helped him to write it down in the first place. The sequal had just been published in America and there was interest back here, since it was written by a British author. He'd really come all the way to London to make Bert an offer though...

(London, September, 1916)

Bert sat at the kitchen table, tapping his fingers nervously against his leg and gaping at his friend. Robby Graves just sat there, his sister Eugenia at his side, beaming happily.

"You...you want me to what?" he asked finally. He couldn't even begin to wrap his head around what Robby had just asked of him.

Smiling, Robby looked him square in the eye. "Look mate, I've seen your drawings. The British publisher thinks that some illustrations would really add something to the book and you're the man I want to do it."

"Robby, all I've ever done is just be a screever in the park!" Bert protested. He shifted in his seat, still not used to the dress pants and vest that he wore to work at the bank. "What you're talking about is a professional job and I'm just not sure I can do it!"

"I thought of that." Robby said matter of factly. "Which is why I'm going to enroll you in drawing classes at Oxford."

Bert's eyes were fit to bug out of his head. "You're going to WHAT?"

Robby leaned forward. "Bertie Boy, you're not happy at that bank. Anyone with eyes can see that. You need your art to be happy, just like I need my words. You're the only one I want to draw these things because you make things come alive somehow when you draw them. It's just two classes; Art Appreciation, which I thought might give you some different styles and ideas to look at, as well as Introduction to Drawing. That's all you'd need. I...might have shown that sketch you made of No Man's Land to the art instructor."

Bert groaned. "Oh thanks! Just what I want, some teacher pickin' me drawing apart!"

"Bertie Boy, he said it was great! You lacked a few technical things he said, but he was really impressed and wants to teach you." Robby said earnestly.

Resting his head on his hand, Bert tried to think. This would be pretty much everything he wanted, and with the money that Robby had just insisted he take, he wouldn't have to work at the bank anymore. And maybe...maybe this could be the start of something. Perhaps he could also take other jobs, maybe for something cheerful like children's books.

Biting his lip, he decided to do what he would have once done and throw caution to the wind, even though his mind wondered if this would prove to be a wise decision. "All right, Robby. Sign me up for bloody class."

Grinning widely, Robby nodded his head. "You just wait and see, Bertie Boy. This is going to be just what you needed."

Smiling reluctantly, Bert hoped that indeed Robby would be right about that.