The Leather Boys one starts chatting him up. When Pete walks in they all recognise him and Reggie suddenly understands that Pete too is gay. He leaves. The book was published in 1961 under the pseudonym Eliot George—an inversion of the pen-name of the famous 19th century female author, Mary Ann Evans, who published as George Eliot. Freeman is credited under her own name in the film as the author of the screenplay based on the novel of "Eliot George". The original novel is explicit about the sexual relationship between the two male characters, and about the odds that the hero's wife is
Mary Ann McCracken of 96 years. She is buried in grave number 35 at Clifton Street Cemetery. Mary Ann also shared her brothers interest in reviving the oral-music tradition of Ireland, and was a founding member of the Belfast Harp Society (1808–1813). She supported Edward Bunting in his collecting of traditional music, introducing him to people who could help, acting as his unofficial secretary and contributed anonymously to the second volume of his work "The Ancient Music of Ireland" in 1809. Bunting lived with the McCrackens for thirty-five years, before moving to Dublin 1819. Mary Ann, like her brother, held radical beliefs and