Our house stood on the corner of two roads. Because the roads in that part of Brighton are so steep and we were on the uphill side of the junction the house was eight to ten feet above the roads. The garden surrounding it was retained by cement-rendered walls. What lay underneath their skin I never knew. At the back of the house between us and our neighbours rose similarly high walls but these were made of flint set in cement with broken bottles embedded in the top to discourage stray cats. I think the cats ignored the perils, while the glass caused problems for anybody who tried to mend the walls.
The entrance to the garden from the minor road was a set of steep steps with sheer walls to either side. This made an ideal chasm about three feet wide over which we could build bridges and many a summer's day saw me cantilevering planks from one 'bank' until they overlapped the far side. Such feats of engineering were unrivalled in all the world.
Passing in front of the house, the road rose steeply and caused not a few problems in winter for vehicles as well as pedestrians. How cautiously we children would walk along the pavements, sometimes stepping into the road to avoid the piles of snow that had half-thawed only to turn to ice which no foot could imprint; but no vagaries of the weather could compare to the mist and fog that swept the town in those years before the Clean Air Act of 1952. Almost at a stroke the Act cleared the London air of the smogs that claimed so many lives and incapacitated even more; and the effect was felt at the fifty or so miles distance from the capital as well. Even the mile or so which separated us from the sea could not completely dim the sound of ships' foghorns as they ploughed the English Channel on their way to and from Shoreham harbour. And up our hill ran the trolley bus route to Hollingbury.
Ah! Those trolley buses - silent as only an electric vehicle could be, and with a low-speed acceleration beyond any diesel or petrol-engined omnibus. So great was their acceleration that they would toss the hapless passenger who had not reached the safety of a seat. Silent indeed, but prone to throw their connecting arms off the overhead wires if the driver failed to negotiate a corner along the correct line, or moved across an intersection too fast. And then he was stuck until the conductor had retrieved the long pole that was always slung under the vehicle for such eventualities, With a flick he would throw the head of the pole into the air so that it cradled the connecting arms and repositioned them against the underside of the wires. With current re supplied the bus would be on its way as soon as the pole was stowed ready for the next mishap. For many years I pondered how the arms were held aloft as they overcame gravity.
But at night in the fog, these machines took on a different aspect. Our front-room windows were level with the upper deck. With nose pressed to the window and the house lights out it was possible to see them pass silently by. But only just, for the swirling fog reduced visibility to ten yards or so, and most of this was occupied by our front garden. Thus on some nights all that could be seen was a faint, ghostly glare of their lights through their windows, or if the connection between bus and wire was poor, the vivid violet arc light as they lost and re-established contact.