A harsh portrayal of a callous woman

HIS name was Peter, and he wore hard years on his face.

He had left Kerry in the 1950s and ended up in London. When I met him, in the mid-1980s, he was employed by a firm in King’s Cross that made and sold concrete. Peter cleaned in the yard, hosing down the bays where trucks filled up with concrete. It was a dirty job, but paid well for unskilled labour.

I was working a summer job, and at break we retreated to a shed at the back of the yard that smelled of tea and damp clothes and onions. There, one morning, Peter told me of his admiration for Margaret Thatcher.