Ornamental scrollwork tattoo on upper back

The gates for Halloran House went up on Tuesday, and Mr Pryce would not let me sign them. He says a smith's name belongs on the hinge where the rain can't reach it, and that the scroll belongs to the house, not to us. I said nothing, as I always do, and then spent the afternoon at the forge bending a curl back on itself because it would not turn the way I had drawn it on the card.

The widow who ordered them stood at the carriage step with her gloves off, tracing the top rail with one finger. She didn't ask who made it. She asked whether the swirl would still look the same when the iron rusted, and I told her iron never looks the same twice, which is the truth, though it sounded like a clever answer and I was sorry I'd said it. She paid in full and had the carter leave the old gate posts standing, so the new ones have to be measured against the stone.

On the way home I stopped at St Agnes to look at the bell rope, the one with the brass worked into its ends, because I wanted to see whether my flourish had any cousin in the parish. It did. Someone a hundred years ago had cut almost the same loop into a hymn board, and then, I suppose, had got tired of it and moved on to something plainer.

I left the last curl open on the gate, a little uneven, the way a line runs out when the hand decides it has finished. Mr Pryce calls it a fault. I think it's the only honest part of the whole thing. Write when you can, and tell Mam the coal man has finally paid.

Your loving brother, Tom