Rose: I was on the bus the other day. And some old toerag was boasting about all he'd suffered during the war. Stupid old... I tell you, they don't know. It was the women who had the war - the real war. The women were left at home in the shit, not sitting in some sparkling plane or gleaming tank. There's no glamour for us. They should have been with me when old Pauline Woolley went in to labour. D'you remember that, Violet?
Violet Kray: Yes, yes I do, darling.
Rose: Seven hours of screaming down Bethnal Green bloody tube station. Then I had to cut the baby's head off - to save the mother's life. She died anyway, poor old cow. God, there was so much blood! Jesus! And the abortions. Those poor girls. One day they'll drain Victoria Park lake. And you know what they'll find? What glorious remnants of the Second World War? Babies, that's what. Bullets and dead babies. Men! Mum's right. They stay kids all their fucking lives. And they end up heroes - or monsters. Either way they win. Women have to grow up. If *they* stay children, they become victims.
