The train rattled into the station at South Kensington and we jumped up and got out. I stood on the platform, enchanted. "It looks almost the same," I murmured, because the brick arches set into the walls and the green ironwork holding up the shelters was familiar to me from childhood trips to the Natural History Museum.

"Same as what?" said Charlie, leaning over my shoulder.

"Nothing," I said.

Up a few stairs through the ticket hall, and into a long shopping arcade and out onto the street. I looked around, then began to navigate us towards Brompton Road, which I recalled led towards Harrods.

"Sure you ain't been here before, odd' un?" said Charlie. "You seem mighty sure of where you is going."

"This way's good as any, ain't it?" I replied, grinning. The spectre of my mother reached backwards through the years and whispered in a pained tone in my ear: Isn't it, Emma. Ain't isn't a word.

We walked past the Natural History Museum and the Victoria and Albert museum. It was strange to see the familiar red brick and limestone, but unworn by ninety years of London pollution. A policeman stood on the intersection directing traffic.

A little while later, we were standing looking up at Harrods. Everything was bigger on this side of town. Mile End was still mostly rickety two-storey brown brick terraces. Knightsbridge towered over us, and crowded in around us. Hoardings proclaimed "Bargains here!". I kept close to Charlie's side.

In the East End, the road was full of pedestrians, men pushing barrows, trams, and rickety old lorries. Here, shiny black motorcars sparred with open-topped omnibuses to familiar locations: "Putney Bridge" and "Tottenham Court Road".

Men in light-coloured, pin striped suits mixed with beautifully dressed women wearing silk dresses that showed underneath their beautiful coats, gloves and hats. A group of them came towards us, and I sidled out of their way. They passed without acknowledgement.

"Here," Charlie said, "give me your arm."

I tucked my hand into his elbow.

"These folk ain't better'n us," he said, his cockney becoming pronounced.

I nodded, but in my bones I didn't believe it, because I could feel my shoes pinching and my underwear scratching, and my hand was bare of the one valuable thing I had owned: the bracelet that was now in the custody of Isaac Belifante. And even though I didn't come from this era, I could feel that my clothing was at least five years out of date and my hat not just cheap but gauche.

"Come on," I said, tugging Charlie with me, "let's go back."

"Already?" he said, trailing behind. "But we came all this way."

"I know, but I want to leave." There was a rock in my stomach threatening to climb into my throat. Somehow, in Knightsbridge, standing outside Harrods, I felt more lost and out of place than I ever had dodging trams and costermongers in Mile End.

Charlie hooked his hand in mine and swung me around. "This family of yourn in Durham," said Charlie, "are they rich, or what?"

"No," I said, then, "does it matter?"

"You don't talk or dress like any northerner I've ever seen come into London," he said, "and it bothers you, don't it, that you ain't done up like those fancy ladies we saw."

I shrugged. "Doesn't it bother you?"

"Naw, I'm used to it," said Charlie, releasing my hand and sticking his deep in his pockets. "They dress fine and have nice manners, but God judges us all the same in the end."

I tried to see it his way, but having been one of those dress-fine-nice-manners types, I couldn't quite manage it. And yet, it made me want to stay closer to Charlie. I didn't want to join the glittering throng of the Bright Young People; I wanted to go back to Mrs. Lawrence's little, damp-stained house on Maplin Road and pretend they didn't exist.

"Listen, why don't we hop on a 'bus up to Soho? I know a nice spot there for a cuppa, and you said you wanted to take a gander at the theatres."

"All right," I mumbled.

Charlie looked around. "Here, this'll get us there," he said, grabbing my hand and jogging towards a bus that was sitting in traffic a short way ahead of us. The hoardings on the side shouted, Cerebos Salt! See how it runs. He jumped on the back of the bus, handed two fares to the conductor, and pulled me up to the open top deck.

I felt my homesickness--hometimesickness?--start to recede as the bus rattled up Knightsbridge to Hyde Park Corner, then along the top of Green Park. From here I could observe the gorgeously-dressed men and women more as a spectator. I leaned against the safety rail and drank in the sights of the dress silhouettes, the amazing hats, the feathers and gloves. Charlie was crammed onto the bench seat next to me, with his left foot out in the aisle. Every time someone came up, he had to tuck his foot in and lean against me to let them past.

The bus ambled along the road, and suddenly I realised we were at Piccadilly Circus. "Come on," I said, pushing at Charlie to get him to stand up.

"Eh?" he said.

"Let's get off and walk from here."

Shaking his head, Charlie preceded me down the stairs. The conductor tipped his hat at us as we jumped off the bus.

"This is Piccadilly Circus," I said, then remembered I was supposed to not know London and added, "Isn't it? I've seen it in postcards." There was the statue of Eros, and there was Regent Street, arcing away to our left.

"It is, odd 'un," said Charlie. "Are you ready for dinner?"

I realised I was hungry and nodded.

"This way," said Charlie. We walked up Regent's Street for a short while, then turned down one of the narrow alleys between the façades. 

We found a different world. Narrow, uneven streets, winding between tottering tenement houses. The temperature seemed to have decreased by ten degrees here in the shadow of the Regent's Street terraces. Charlie walked sure and swift through the winding streets to a little greasy spoon. We took a seat, and the waitress brought us tea.

I touched my mug and felt the soft wash of a little, warm memory. Of an older woman washing up the cup while a man wrapped his arms around her waist and pressed his chin into her shoulder. Happy memories were rarely strong enough for the objects that witnessed them to remember. I was grateful for this one, and silently wished the unknown couple well as I sipped my tea.

"There, I knew getting a cuppa in you would help," said Charlie. I smiled at him, and he matched the expression. The warmth spread from my hands into my chest. "Just two slices of toast and marg each, luv," he said to the waitress when she came back. I'd discovered by now that "toast and marg" was the great meal of the London poor--perfectly suited to get one through from breakfast to dinner with minimal fuss and expense.

We ate our toast, drank our tea, and then I quickly put down five shillings, enough to cover both of us. "Let me," I said.

"If you insist, odd 'un," he replied, gathering his coat. I watched him, reflecting that I probably would have had a fight on my hands if I'd tried to pay for a meal like this in 2015. Then I chastised myself, because my male friends were perfectly capable of splitting a bill, as long as it wasn't a date. Which this definitely wasn't.

I followed him out of the cafe. "You two have a lovely afternoon," called the waitress in a lovey-dovey voice as we left. I looked over my shoulder at her. Did she think we were a couple?

Charlie didn't say anything, but there was a patch of cold air between him and me as we walked back down to Piccadilly Circus, then through Leicester Square. I admired the theatres: one proclaiming a show called Tilly of Bloomsbury and another The Faithful Heart. The upper storeys of the buildings touted for new plays, or extolled the virtues of soaps, gloves, face cream, travel agents and Lyons' Cakes.

"This'll get us home," said Charlie as we approached Charing Cross.

I looked over at him. His face was set, unreadable. I couldn't think what had changed his mood unless it was the same realisation I had, that this thing we were doing closely resembled a date. Perhaps he was as reluctant to get tangled up with me as I was with him.

The realisation caused a pit to open up in my stomach. Without a word, I let him pay for our tickets home, and followed him down onto the platform.

As soon as we got back to Mile End, Charlie vanished out the door again.

"Gone to knock about with his mates at the Standard," said Mrs. Lawrence, once again engaged in the unending round of laundry. "Did you have a nice day, luv?"

"Yes," I said, "very nice, thank you."

"You'll be raring to get back west, I wager."

I considered this. "No, I don't think so," I replied.