They had just moved into that house on a back street in old San Fernando. The rent was reasonable, the house large, with lavish jalousie (louvers) ventilation and decorative fretwork along the front gallery and overhead panels, as was fashionable of that period. It was in the late nineteen forties. Horse-drawn carts were common on the High Street. Old fashioned shops and stores lined the street and a strong smell of horse and donkey cast emanated from the drains of lower High Street at the wholesale outlets of dry goods merchants.