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It did not take long for the father to find work. He possessed an amazing gift of the gab and could talk his way into, or out of, any situation. It was the holding of a job which was the problem.
In a matter of weeks he had managed to make steps out of rough store-bought timber. He bolted the new timber supports to the osteoporotic skeleton of the house.
Somehow he had also to manage to talk the landlord into ‘Just a little more time.’ He persuaded the poor man also to reconnect the power and the water temporarily … though what feats of persuasion he had to use on the ‘powers that be’ can only be guessed at.