Earlier that morning, Grace’s husband, Ben Dolling had been involved in a fatal accident. The cause of the accident had been John Claridge, who until that morning had been a very close family friend. John and Ben had been working together their new project which, still, no one really knows what it is. John was drilling into some material that Ben was holding up for him, when suddenly the wood snapped in half, and the drill went straight into Ben. Ben was rushed straight to hospital, but there was nothing they could do, he died just fifteen minutes after his arrival.
Ben was married to a lady called Grace. They had been married for seven years and had two children, Tabitha who was four, and Todd who was two. Ben was mainly a carpenter, but had a few other jobs when the carpenting wasn’t going very well.
Bach to the story, as soon as grace heard about the accident, she dropped the children to her next door neighbors and rushed straight to hospital. She got to the room just as Ben slipped away. It seemed as if he had held on until Grace had got there and then passed away.
As Grace returned home, she felt numb, sorrowful, and angry; Angry at Ben for leaving her; Angry at John for being so careless; And angry at God for letting it all happen.
Grace couldn’t face picking up the children for a while after she returned home so she went for a walk, as it was too unnerving sitting in the house alone. Grace didn’t know where to go, as her family had deserted her when she married ‘too young’, and she had moved away from her friends in London to keep the children safe..
After about an hour, Grace picked up the children, and went home. The house felt ice cold, and empty to Grace. The children kept asking, ‘ Where’s daddy?’ but all Grace could say was ‘He’ll be home soon,’ knowing full well that she would have to tell them the truth sometime.
That night, Grace got no sleep, her bed felt so empty without Ben and she knew that her saving would soon be running out and she would need to work.
Grace got up the next morning to find dark, grey clouds and no sunshine. She had decided to leave the children on their own for the day. At the time, Grace didn’t know any better than to do that. She thought that Tabitha was old enough to look after herself, and her little brother.
Grace left the house to find work, and found a job in the local dress factory. She started that day and got home at about seven o’clock in the evening.
Grace carried on with the same routine the next day, but when she returned home, the children had gone. Her initial reaction was that they were hiding but she then came across a letter from her next door neighbor saying that shed had taken in the children after having found them alone. The letter said that they were going to call social services. Grace was distraught. She had no one left. She was Alone.
There was only one person that the majority of the blame was aimed at, and that was John. If it wasn’t for him then none of this would have happened. Grace collapsed on the floor in floods of tears; swearing revenge and at that grabbed the first sharp object that she saw, and stormed over to John’s.
