‘Oh, Mammy, I love my bedroom, so I do! And isn’t Mr Reynolds kind? He’s put up all those lovely shelves along one wall of my room and he says next time the old Queen is in port, he’ll come back an’ put doors on so my toys won’t get dusty. Becky and me’s been ever so busy unpacking the boxes and putting my stuff on the shelves, but we’ve come down for elevenses, ’cos you get really hungry and thirsty when you’re working hard, don’t you, Mammy?’
Emmy had been washing china at the sink but swung round and smiled at Diana and Becky as they burst into the room. ‘I know what you mean and I could do with a cuppa myself,’ she admitted. ‘Just let me finish these cups and I’ll cut you some bread and you can butter it. I’m afraid there’s no milk, but if I give you sixpence, perhaps you could go down to the shop on the corner and buy yourselves lemonade.’
Even as she made the offer, Emmy felt guilty. She had always impressed upon Peter the importance of milk in a child’s diet, yet here she was, on her very first day in her new home, letting Diana and Becky drink lemonade because it was easier. She had asked about milk delivery – in Lancaster Avenue, the milkman had left three pints on the doorstep each day – but this had only caused Beryl to give a short laugh. ‘Milk delivery, chuck?’ she had said incredulously. ‘In the court? No one delivers here . . . don’t you remember? That’s why most of us has conny-onny in our tea.’
Emmy had pretended to remember – she certainly did remember the conny-onny – but in fact, the delivery or non-delivery of milk had been her mother’s business. When she was in her teens, her mother had occasionally sent her to Jane McCann’s on Silvester Street to buy fresh milk, or butter, eggs or cheese. At the time, the young Emmy had not known about milk delivery, so had never thought to question it. Now, she thought crossly, she was having to learn things which she felt she should have known. But at least Diana and I are learning together, she consoled herself, handing the child a sixpenny bit. ‘Now don’t go further than the corner,’ she told her daughter. ‘You’re too little to go wandering the streets. It isn’t as if you had an older brother or sister who could go with you, see you across roads and so on.’
Diana, on her way to the kitchen door, turned back. ‘Charlie would go with us if we gave him a penny for his trouble, like Aunty Beryl does,’ she said persuasively. ‘He and Lenny do Aunty Beryl’s messages as soon as they’ve had breakfast. He’d do ours as well, Mammy, if we asked him.’
‘No, Diana. It’s only a bottle of lemonade, not a whole lot of shopping, and you and Becky won’t really even have to leave the courts, not if you go to the shop on the corner,’ she said. ‘Another day perhaps we’ll ask Charlie to get our shopping when he gets Aunty Beryl’s, but for today you and Becky can either go, or drink water.’
At this harsh remark, Diana’s eyes flew wide open in pained surprise, but she raised no more objections and the small girls clattered down the hallway and out through the front door. Emmy finished washing the last of the china and turned to survey her new domain. The men had made an excellent job of it. The walls were snowy with whitewash and the shelving which Mr Reynolds had erected had been painted sunshine yellow, giving the room a far brighter appearance than most of the other kitchens in the court. They had done wonders in the parlour, too. They had distempered the walls in a pleasant shade which, one of the men had told her, was called deep cream. The carpet with roses on it from Lancaster Avenue had been reverently laid on the floor, after the boards had been sanded and then waxed until they shone pale gold. Emmy’s beloved chint-zupholstered chairs and sofa just about fitted in, and the china cabinet, which contained all the pieces Emmy most valued, stood by the fireplace, the empty grate hidden by a fire screen embroidered with roses.
Upstairs, the two bedrooms on the first floor were practical rather than pretty, though Mr Reynolds had done his best. Emmy’s double bed was flanked by a wardrobe and a washstand, which had been bought cheap from Paddy’s Market on the Scotland Road – there had been no room for Emmy’s bedroom suite – and Diana’s little room held her bed, another cheap washstand and the shelving which Mr Reynolds had put up for her toys. Because the houses were terraced and back to back, all the windows overlooked the court itself, and there was no denying that it was a pretty dreary outlook. Once, when the houses had first been built, they must have been a cheery red brick with whitewashed steps and, no doubt, sparkling windows, but now, getting on for a century later, the bricks were blackened, the windows usually dirty and the steps – or the steps opposite No. 2, at least – more grey than white. It wasn’t that no one cared, it was the grime from factory chimneys, warehouses and the railway, which had blackened the bricks and made it impossible for whitened steps to remain so.
Emmy glanced once more round her kitchen, then decided she simply had to get out of here, if only for a few minutes. It was probably because there was no back door, no means of entering or leaving except through the court itself, which suddenly made her feel as if she was boxed up and someone was hammering the last nail into the lid of the box, but, whatever it was, Emmy grabbed her short jacket from its hook on the back of the door, jingled a few coins into her pocket and set off in pursuit of Diana and Becky. I’ll buy a few biscuits so we can have something to eat with our elevenses, she thought wildly, and then remembered that, though she had brought her tea caddy with her, she had not got any milk. Irritatingly, she felt tears rise to her eyes and despised herself for such weakness. She was determined to be independent, yet she suddenly felt she would die if she didn’t have a cup of tea. She was about to turn back, to borrow some milk off someone, when she remembered Beryl’s remark about condensed milk. Of course, she could buy conny-onny at any corner shop, and once the tin was in her possession she would be able to have tea as long as the tea leaves in the caddy lasted. Briskly, Emmy dashed her hand across her eyes, straightened her drooping shoulders, and made for the corner shop. Over the last few years, she had stopped taking sugar in her tea because she wanted to keep her slim figure, but what did that matter now? Peter had been proud of her looks, of her eighteen-inch waist and long, slim legs, but who was there to care, now, if she drank tea with conny-onny in it and got as fat as a balloon? Come to that, the thought of a cup of hot, sweet tea was downright comforting and Emmy knew she needed comfort almost more than anything else.
‘Mammy! We’ve got the lemonade but why’s you out here? Did you want some more messages? Shall we go back to Mr Hedges’ shop? He’s a funny man, Mammy; he axed us if we wanted to put it on the slate and then he laughed and gave Becky and me an iced gem each.’ It was Diana, one cheek distended by the iced gem, both arms cradling the bottle of lemonade as though it were her dearest child. ‘If you take the lemonade, Mammy, we’ll go back to Mr Hedges for you.’
Emmy, however, refused this offer. ‘We’ll all go back together,’ she said, with a gaiety she did not really feel. ‘I’m going to buy a tin of milk so I can have a cup of tea and I thought I’d get some biscuits. You like biscuits, don’t you?’
Both children agreed enthusiastically and turned back towards the shop, rather to Emmy’s relief. She had just remembered that she had not locked her door behind her, and though she was sure no intruder would enter the place she had impressed upon Diana, three times already this morning, that they must never, never leave the house unlocked unless, of course, they were at home. It would clearly be best if her daughter did not discover that her responsible mother had ignored her own warnings and left the door on the latch. When they got back to No. 2, therefore, she made a pretence of unlocking and then herded the children before her into the kitchen. Once there, she made herself a cup of tea, poured the children’s lemonade into two mugs, tipped the biscuits from their bag on to a plate, and looked around for her handbag. For an awful, heart-stopping moment, she could not see it and wondered, desperately, whether she had been wrong, whether someone had entered the house in her absence. But it was all right; her handbag had been partially hidden by the teapot and she pounced on it, drawing out one of the two keys to the house which she now possessed. ‘I’m going to put this key on a piece of string, darling,’ she told Diana. ‘It isn’t so important right now, because I haven’t got a job yet, but when I do you may want to let yourself into the house after school, so you’ll need a key of your own.’ She had been knotting the string into a loop as she spoke and now she held it out to Diana, expecting the child to be pleased at this sign of trust, but Diana was putting both hands behind her back and shaking her head violently.
‘No, Mammy. Everyone else in the court puts the key through the letter box, I told you they did, and that’s what we should do.’
Emmy was about to expostulate, to say that a key dangling through the letter box was an open invitation to a thief, but then she checked herself. In all the years that she had lived in the court, she had never heard of a break-in, though there had been cases of people robbing their own gas meters, or popping next door to borrow a cup of sugar and never returning it. Besides, she realised that Diana, even if she did not know it, was trying to fit in. What other children did, she would do, and other children pulled the latch key up through the letter box, they did not have their own key on a piece of string round their necks. Indeed, for a big family, this would have been impossibly expensive, as well as risky, for, children being children, the younger ones would probably have lost their latch keys the first time the weather was warm and someone suggested a game of alley football or a dip in the Scaldy.
But Diana was still shaking her head, still staring. Emmy said, placatingly: ‘Yes of course, I was forgetting. Now you may have two biscuits with your lemonade, and then you can play outside for a bit, whilst I get us some luncheon.’
‘Dinner,’ Diana said quickly. ‘It’s dinner in the middle of the day, Mammy, and tea when your daddy gets home. Or supper; some famblies call it supper.’
‘Yes, of course. I’m sorry,’ Emmy said humbly, as the two children left the kitchen. A pang had gone through her when Diana had mentioned the returning fathers, but Diana herself had clearly not been affected by her remark. This daughter of hers was going to fit in far better and more easily than she herself would, yet Emmy had been born and bred in this very house. But it will be all right when I get a job, Emmy reminded herself, finishing her cup of tea and going over to the cupboard where her vegetables were kept. Mr Reynolds had drilled holes in it, explaining that this would allow air to circulate, which would help the vegetables to remain fresh for longer. ‘Though you’ll be wantin’ to buy spuds an’ that each day at this time of year,’ he had warned her. ‘If you don’t, you’ll find the spuds wi’ shoots six inches long and little green leaves at the top afore you know it. An’ cabbage . . . well, they shoot like Jack’s beanstalk, if you know what I mean.’
But the vegetables had only been in the cupboard since Emmy had brought them from Lancaster Avenue the previous day, so now she opened the door and began to count potatoes into the colander. She decided half a dozen would be sufficient and was about to close the cupboard again when she heard a little scraping noise and caught a flicker of movement. She drew back just as a small, grey form emerged from behind some carrots. Emmy was almost sure it was munching. She was not frightened of mice but did not much fancy the thought of sharing her kitchen, let alone her vegetables, with the creatures, and began to try to evict it. She got it out of the vegetable cupboard but lost it under the sink, and was wondering how the working party had managed to miss its entry hole when there was a brisk bang on the front door followed by footsteps along the hallway, and then the kitchen door burst open and Beryl appeared.
‘Hello, queen, how are you doing?’ she said breezily. ‘Most of us have our main meal in the evenin’ when the fellers come home so I thought I’d come over and bring a loaf and a heel of cheese; if you’ll provide the tea, I’ll do the rest. I sent young Diana back to my place wi’ Becky. I’ve left ’em bread an’ cheese an’ home-made lemonade – Charlie will see everyone gets a share – and I thought you an’ me might have a bit of a chat while we eat.’
Emmy felt a huge wave of relief engulf her. There was so much she did not know, so much she needed to ask Beryl! Now that she came to think of it, she and Diana never had a main meal at lunchtime but saved it for the evening, even when Peter was not home. Of course, she had never had to prepare lunch, but Lucy had done so, and it was usually sandwiches and an apple, or a sausage roll each, followed by a piece of cake. What had she been thinking of, about to prepare potatoes and cabbage and carrots this early in the day? But Beryl was looking at her so kindly, with so much understanding, that she suddenly found her eyes were filling with tears and she flung herself on the other woman, weeping unrestrainedly. ‘Oh, Beryl, whatever is the matter with me?’ she sobbed. ‘I know most folk have their main meal at night – we did ourselves in Lancaster Avenue – yet I started getting a proper dinner in the middle of the day! Oh, Beryl, am I going mad?’
Beryl gave her a hearty hug and then a shake. She was laughing but her eyes were still full of sympathy and understanding. ‘No, you aren’t goin’ mad, queen,’ she said gently. ‘But you’re in a rare old muddle, ain’t you? Diana telled me you were goin’ to cook a dinner so I thought I’d come over and sort you out a bit. Besides, I’ve got something important to tell you. Remember that big dining rooms on the Scottie? Well, it were more of a chop house really . . . heaps of businessmen go there for their grub. You were pally wi’ one o’ the girls what worked there – Iris, wasn’t it? – afore you wed.’
‘McCullough’s,’ Emmy said, triumphantly, after a moment’s thought. ‘Yes, I remember it. They paid all right and Iris used to get a lot of tips. She was ever so pretty and had a way of looking at the fellers through her lashes which brought the money tumbling out of their pockets.’
‘Yes, that’s right, McCullough’s,’ Beryl agreed. ‘Well, they’ve got a vacancy for a waitress. I believe it’s shift work because they open at seven in the morning for breakfasts and close around ten to half past, at night. But as you say, the money’s good and I dare say they’ll be able to arrange the hours to suit.’
Emmy could not help herself. She spoke before she had thought, the words tumbling off her tongue. ‘Oh, but Beryl, I’ve never been a waitress. I mean to look for an office job, either on reception or as a secretary. I worked in an office before, and I thought . . . I thought . . .’
Beryl heaved a sigh. ‘The sort of secretarial work you’d get wouldn’t earn you enough to pay your rent and feed yourself and Diana,’ she said bluntly. ‘If I remember rightly, chuck, I earned more working on a factory assembly line than you got for being in the typing pool at the Royal. You can’t afford to ignore the money for the sake of being able to say you work in an office, norrany more.’
Emmy felt her cheeks grow hot. Beryl was right, of course. She did not fancy telling folk that she was a waitress, but saying she had an office job would have been acceptable enough. Come to that, she remembered, guiltily, that she had never actually told Peter what her job at the Royal entailed. She had said she was the secretary for the Head of Claims, and since Peter hadn’t visited her at work he had never discovered that, in fact, her position was rather more lowly. However, Emmy had never kept a secret from Beryl in her whole life and she remembered, now, how Beryl had laughed at her, telling her that she was lucky she did not have to take her wages home and hand over a weekly sum to her mother. ‘If you did, you wouldn’t have enough to buy yourself an ice cream in the interval at the flicks,’ she had teased. ‘I like me brothers and sisters and wouldn’t be without them, but you’ve shown me the advantages of being an only child, young Emmy.’
Right now, however, Beryl was looking at her quizzically, and once more Emmy hurried into speech. ‘You’re right, of course, you always are – oh, how I wish I were sensible like you! But . . . but I don’t know anything about being a waitress, so why should they employ me? I don’t want to lie and pretend I’ve had experience at waiting on because they’ll soon realise that it’s not true.’
‘They’ll employ you ’cos you’re so perishin’ pretty,’ Beryl told her frankly. ‘As for waitin’ on, I don’t know as you’d need much experience, they just like you to be quick and neat, I think.’ She eyed her friend consideringly. ‘To tell the truth, Em, I think it’ll be good for you. You’ll meet lots of people – ordinary people, not smart ones earning big salaries – and you’ll make pals. I know you had one or two friends at the Royal, but these girls will be more . . . more down to earth, I s’pose you could call it. The girl who told me about the job – Freda, her name is – said that McCullough’s employs a huge staff and that everyone’s real friendly an’ helpful towards each other.’
‘It sounds lovely,’ Emmy said quickly, and was glad she had done so when she saw Beryl’s face clear. ‘Can I apply at once? Does it have to be in writing or do I just go round there?’
Beryl laughed. ‘Freda’s a pal of mine from way back, when we both worked on the assembly line. I axed her to let me know when a job were comin’ up, ’cos the best thing out is to gerrin when the boss first hears he’s goin’ to be a member of staff short. Gettin’ someone means advertisin’ an’ interviewin’, ’cos McCullough’s is too big just to put a card in the window, like. But if a pretty girl comes along the same day his waitress gives in her notice, then the chances are he’ll give her the job an’ save himself trouble, see?’
‘Yes, I see,’ Emmy said doubtfully. ‘But you haven’t answered my question, Beryl. Do I go round there or what?’
‘The waitress who’s goin’ to give in her notice is havin’ a baby,’ Beryl said. ‘She’s been waitin’ until she begins to show but she’s decided to leave at the end of this coming week because she’s havin’ what they call a sick pregnancy. She says it’s all right when she’s on the afternoon shift but she can’t go on throwin’ up out the back when she’s on earlies without someone noticin’. So if you go round to McCullough’s – Mac’s, the girls call it – around eleven o’clock on Friday, you may be lucky.’
‘Right, I’ll do that,’ Emmy said eagerly. Suddenly, she felt full of hope and enthusiasm. She realised she had been allowing the new little house – which was not really new to her at all – to depress her. She had not known how much she would miss the beautiful garden in Lancaster Avenue, nor the spacious airy rooms, not to mention the constant companionship of young Lucy. She guessed that Diana would not spend as much time with her as she had done in Lancaster Avenue, because here the child only had to step out of her front door to find a great many companions. All the courts swarmed with children and though Emmy might tell herself that this was a good thing and would make life very much easier for her daughter, she now had to acknowledge that it would mean that she herself would not be as important to Diana as she had been in Lancaster Avenue.
So, clearly, the sooner she could get work the better and what did it matter, after all, whether she worked in an office or a restaurant? What really counted was earning enough money to keep herself and Diana and being able to cope with the work. Thinking about it, she realised that, though she had not forgotten her shorthand, it would undoubtedly be extremely rusty, whilst her typewriting, which had once been fast, would have slowed down a lot. It was horrid having to remind herself that she might not be able to hold down an office job, but with Beryl’s eye upon her she had to acknowledge the truth, if only to herself. If she went back into an office, she would have to start at the bottom of the ladder, and it might be many months – years, even – before the young Mrs Wesley earned as much as the even younger Miss Dickens had once done.
‘What about clothes though, Beryl?’ she said. If she had been applying for an office job, she would have worn her best and most expensive outfit, but she realised she had no idea what a prospective waitress should wear. ‘Does it matter? Only they wear a sort of uniform, don’t they?’
‘Wear something plain, preferably dark,’ Beryl said. ‘They’ll tell you what they want you to wear if you get the job, but for the interview . . .’ Her eyes flickered over Emmy’s figure and Emmy glanced down at herself. She was wearing a black skirt and a dark grey cardigan beneath the pink gingham wraparound apron which she always wore when she was doing some small task in the house. ‘What you’re wearing now is fine, Em. Oh, and you’ll need flat shoes, black ones. D’you have any?’
Emmy mentally reviewed the many pairs of shoes in her wardrobe upstairs, then shook her head sadly. ‘I’ve got plenty of brown walking shoes but no black ones,’ she admitted. ‘I’d best buy some before Friday, then.’
Beryl cast her eyes at the ceiling and heaved a dramatic sigh. ‘You will do nothing of the sort,’ she remarked. ‘We’ll get some black shoe dye from Clarkson’s on the Scottie; it’ll only cost but a few pennies. Now, how about makin’ me a cup of tea?’
*
‘Becky, where’s Charlie gone?’ Diana’s voice was shrill and aggrieved. ‘He telled me to go into his house and fetch a piece of rope off the dresser, which I done, only now I can’t find him anywhere!’
Becky was crouching on the paving stones trying to balance five small pebbles on the back of her hand, but she glanced up as Diana spoke and the pebbles clattered to the ground. Becky scowled. ‘Him and Lenny’s gone off. They’s done Mammy’s messages, took in water, chopped kindlin’ an’ that, an’ now they’s gone to earn some dosh, Charlie said. It’s for the penny rush at the pictures, come Sat’day,’ she added in a kindly tone, seeing Diana’s look of puzzlement. ‘That’s the children’s cinema show,’ she finished.
‘Oh,’ Diana said vaguely. She had never heard of a children’s cinema show – certainly never attended one – and could not imagine why Charlie should need to earn money. Surely, dear Aunty Beryl would give him his Saturday sixpence each week, as her own mammy did? But she was beginning to realise that life was very different here in Nightingale Court from the life she had lived in Lancaster Avenue. Today was Friday and it was the most different day of all, since Mammy had gone off all by herself, refusing to let Diana accompany her. When Diana reminded her mammy that she loved shopping and could help carry the parcels, Mammy had replied, quite sharply, that she was going after a job and that Aunty Beryl and Charlie would give an eye to her. ‘Then what am I to do? What’s you playin’, Becky?’
Becky sighed and stood up. ‘Nothin’ much,’ she said. ‘Did you get the rope? If so, I’ll show you how to skip.’
It was humiliating, having to let a girl a whole year younger than herself teach her so many things, particularly as Becky was slow for her age, but Diana was getting used to it. Becky had shown her how to mark out a hopscotch pitch and how to choose a flat piece of slate, how to throw it into the square and how to retrieve it afterwards. She had taught her how to play cherry-wobs and marbles and instructed her in the art of collecting broken bits of china to use as currency when playing shop, and now, it seemed, she would teach Diana to skip rope. Diana sighed. She would much rather have been with Charlie, earning pennies for this Saturday rush, but she had promised Mammy not to go out of the court unless she was accompanied by a grown-up, so she had better knuckle down and learn to skip rope – until Charlie returned, that was. Once he was back, she would take up her usual admiring position, some six feet behind him, and would tag him for the rest of the day. She knew this sometimes irritated him, but could not help herself. He was her hero, he had saved her life at New Brighton, and anyway, he liked having someone to cheer him on when he played football, or to sit and chat to him whilst he chopped up orange boxes for kindling, or trekked to and fro carrying Aunty Beryl’s water supply into the house, morning and evening.
‘You holds the rope in both hands . . .’
It did not take Diana long to realise that Becky was trying to teach her an art which she could not do herself, and when an older girl, clad in a filthy grey wisp of a dress, her mop of tangled curls held back from her face with a bootlace, came and snatched the rope off Becky, Diana felt almost relieved. She would not have minded had the girl merely appropriated the rope for her own use, but apparently this was not her intention. ‘You hold one end, littl’un, while your pal holds the other,’ she instructed Becky. ‘Turn it at the same time an’ I’ll run in an’ you can watch what I does. Then we’ll swap round and you can both have a go.’
‘Thanks, Wendy,’ Becky said gratefully. ‘I’s norra very good skipper but Di wants to learn, don’t you, Di?’
Diana agreed that she did, and by the time Aunty Beryl called them in for bread and cheese and weak tea she had got the hang of it and thanked Wendy sincerely for her help. She thought she had never seen a girl as dirty as her new friend, and noticed Aunty Beryl’s eyebrows almost disappearing into her hair when she saw with whom they were playing. But she made no comment, and since Charlie entered the house hot on her heels, Diana soon forgot the whole incident.
‘I wonder how your mammy’s gettin’ on,’ Aunty Beryl said idly, as she cut slices from the long loaf and handed each child a very small square of cheese. ‘Did you have a nice game, you two? I take it, Charlie,’ she added, addressing her son as she pushed a mug towards him, ‘that you and Lenny were earning yourself a few pennies, lugging lino back home from Paddy’s Market?’
‘I can skip,’ Diana said proudly. ‘I’m better’n Becky, ain’t I, Becks?’
‘That’s grand,’ Aunty Beryl said. ‘Charlie?’
‘Lenny an’ me carried bags, mostly,’ Charlie admitted through a mouth crammed with bread and cheese. ‘We’ve got twopence each now, so that’s all right. Where’s Aunty Emmy, Mam? Only we’s off to St Martin’s rec this afternoon for a game o’ footie an’ we can’t take no kids.’
‘I’ll keep an eye on Diana,’ his mother said. ‘Aunty Emmy’s off on – on business, but she’ll be home for tea.’
Diana opened her mouth to say that her mother had gone after a job, then caught Aunty Beryl’s eye and said nothing. She saw no reason why she should not tell the assembled Fishers where her mother was, but Aunty Beryl must have had a reason for that glance. So Diana continued placidly to eat her bread and cheese and to plan how she might persuade the older woman to take her down to the rec to watch the boys’ game.
Emmy arrived at the dining rooms promptly at eleven o’clock and, after a moment’s hesitation, went inside. She was immediately glad she had taken Beryl’s advice to go when it was quiet since the enormous room was only half full of women, having coffee or tea, little cakes or biscuits, and chattering away like a cage full of birds. Emmy looked round, a trifle self-consciously, then took her place at one of the tables. A waitress approached her to ask for her order and Emmy said, in a shy whisper, that she would like a pot of tea, please, and some biscuits and that she was Emmy Wesley, who knew Freda. The girl smiled immediately, gave a brisk little nod, and went off to get her order, and Emmy thought thankfully that Beryl, as usual, had known exactly what she was doing when she had insisted that Emmy and Freda must meet. ‘Freda will see you right,’ Beryl had assured her young friend. ‘As soon as she knows you’re in the place, she’ll tell you if the boss is about, an’ if he ain’t, she’ll tell you where to wait till he is.’ She had instructed Emmy to behave as any other customer would until Freda came over and told her what she should do. Emmy intended to follow these instructions to the letter, and just hoped that the boss was on the premises.
She had drunk two cups of tea and finished the ginger biscuits before Freda came over to the table. Emmy had met her the previous day; she was in her early forties, with a broad, placid face, neatly shingled grey-streaked hair, and a sturdy figure. Emmy had taken to her at once and now, watching her covertly, saw that she was light on her feet and quite as quick and agile as some of the girls half her age. She swooped upon Emmy’s table, saying chattily: ‘The boss is in the office, miss, if you was wantin’ a word. I telled him you were enquiring about work an’ he said to ask you to step through. I’ll show you the way.’
Emmy murmured her thanks, picked up her handbag and followed the older woman. They crossed the enormous room and Freda tapped briskly on a door which said ‘Private, No Admittance’ then flung it open. She ushered Emmy inside, gave her arm a quick and encouraging squeeze, and said: ‘Here’s Mrs Wesley, Mr McCullough. If you’ll give me a shout when you’ve finished with her . . .’ She did not complete the sentence but whisked out of the room, closing the door firmly behind her.
For a moment, Emmy felt downright terrified, but then she remembered everything Beryl had told her. She straightened her shoulders and gave the middle-aged man behind the desk her brightest smile. She judged him to be in his forties and, possibly, to have some foreign blood in him since his hair and eyes were very dark and his skin was swarthy. He had a square face with broad cheekbones and a strongly cleft chin and she thought, apprehensively, that he looked stern and wondered whether she was wise to want to work for him. He must have sensed her doubts, however, for he gave her a smile of extraordinary sweetness which completely changed his face.
Emmy took a deep breath and returned the smile. ‘Good morning, Mr McCullough,’ she said. ‘I was wondering if you have any vacancies? I – I would like to get work since my daughter will be going back to school in a fortnight and, to be frank, I need the money.’
‘And you’ve heard on the grapevine that one of my staff’s leaving me,’ Mr McCullough said. He sighed. ‘Don’t trouble to deny it, young woman, ’cos I don’t believe in fairy tales. However, you’re presentable and you’ve got a nice big smile. Ever waited on before?’
‘No, I’m afraid not,’ Emmy said regretfully. ‘But I’m a quick learner, Mr McCullough.’
‘Oh aye, that’s what they all say. It’s hard work, d’you know that? The money’s good but there’ll be times when your feet are killing you and your back’s aching and someone doesn’t turn up for their shift, so you’ll be asked to work double. What about that, eh? You say you’ve got a child. What’ll happen when you’re on earlies, or lates for that matter? And there’s school holidays.’
‘That’s all arranged. I live next door to my best friend and she’ll have Diana when I’m working,’ Emmy said quickly. She had known that these questions were going to come and she and Beryl had prepared for them. Mr McCullough preferred his waitresses to be what he called ‘steady’ which often meant married and with children, though he also employed very much younger girls. ‘And in case you’re wondering, I’m – I’m a widow. My husband died in a dockside accident last month, which is why I need to find work.’
Mr McCullough nodded. ‘I’m sorry for your loss, Mrs Wesley,’ he said gravely. ‘Now, as you may know, it is our usual practice to give our waitresses a trial run. Are you willing to do that? I can put you on from twelve till two with Harriet and keep an eye on you, see if you’re up to the work. How would that be?’
Once again, Emmy had been prepared for this. ‘He won’t never take on anyone without his seein’ ’em doin’ the work,’ Freda had told her the previous day. ‘It’s a job what needs someone who can smile at the grumpiest customer an’ make ’em feel . . . well, as if they care, if you know what I mean.’
But right now, Mr McCullough was still staring at her, waiting for a reply, his dark eyes, fringed with thick black lashes, very bright.
‘Yes, that will be grand, Mr McCullough,’ Emmy said. She added, with a flash of humour: ‘I’m as keen as you are to see whether I can do the work, to tell you the truth!’
Mr McCullough laughed. ‘Good for you, Mrs Wesley,’ he said approvingly. Getting quickly to his feet, he crossed the room and opened the door, then beckoned to her. ‘Come along with me.’
It was a good thing, Emmy reflected, that she had worn a dark cardigan and skirt, for she was provided with a frilly white apron, a stiff white collar and cuffs and a rather becoming little cap which she wore perched on her smooth blonde hair. She did not look exactly like the other waitresses, but she doubted that any but a very observant customer would know that she was not a member of staff. Harriet proved to be a long, thin girl with bright ginger hair, pale blue eyes and an enchanting smile. She took Emmy round with her for the first hour, explaining in an undervoice how the ordering system worked and what one should say to customers to make them feel at ease. ‘They’ll ask you what’s on, even though there’s that bloody great chalkboard right in front of their eyes, and menu cards on every table,’ she told her helper. ‘What they mean is, “What’ll I like best?” which is a hard one, believe me. I usually say, “The roast beef is prime today and the veggies are peas an’ carrots,” or else I say, “We’re gettin’ a bit low on treacle pud, but I dare say I could squeeze out one more helpin’,” anything to make ’em feel you’ve got their interests at heart, see? An’ once you get to know ’em, you’ll remember that this feller always goes for a roast, or prefers a nice lamb chop, or can’t abide gooseberry tart, and you act according. See wharr I mean?’
When the second hour started, Harriet told Emmy to start taking orders on her own account. ‘But write each order out in full. Don’t use abbreviations until you’ve gorr’em all by heart,’ she told her. ‘If the kitchen don’t understand and send out the wrong grub, tempers get frayed.’
Emmy had already been provided with a pad and pencil attached to her waist by a long silver chain, and now she approached her first table. The four men seated there gave her only the most cursory of glances before demanding to know, in thick Lancashire accents, whether the steak and kidney pud was still on and if it came with boiled potatoes or mash.
‘Which would you prefer, sir?’ Emmy asked politely, knowing that was what Harriet would have said. Two of the men wanted boiled potatoes and two wanted mash and they all demanded extra gravy, which Emmy only pretended to write down, since she had seen for herself that the plates of steak and kidney were all swimming in the stuff. ‘And to drink?’ Emmy asked hopefully. Harriet had told her that if a customer ordered a bottle of wine, the waitress got a percentage of the money, but these men said they would have tea – a large pot – and would not order their puddings until they had finished their main course. Emmy nodded intelligently, swept the table with a smiling glance, and hurried off to spike her order. She tore the page with the order on it off her pad and thrust it on to the long metal spike which stood by the kitchen hatch, then remembered that she had not put the table number on it, remedied the fault, and turned back into the restaurant. When the cooks had made up the order, they would shout her name and she would go into the kitchen, find the order and return to the restaurant.
Time sped by and it was well past two o’clock before Emmy realised that the room was starting to empty. She was suddenly aware of aching feet, perspiration patches beneath both arms and a mixture of tiredness and excitement, for though it had been incredibly hard work she found she had enjoyed every minute.
She had noticed Mr McCullough seated at a corner table, apparently working on some books, for she did not once see him glance up at her. By the time Harriet told her that she had done all right and should seek out Mr McCullough, he had left the table, so she tapped on the office door and went in.
He was seated behind the desk and gestured her to a chair, saying as he did so: ‘Well? How did you find it?’
Emmy was surprised, having assumed that he would tell her how she had done, but answered readily enough. ‘I liked it, sir. The customers are ever so friendly – at least, they’re all polite – and though the work is hard and my feet do ache, people are so nice about the food and how they’ve enjoyed it . . . it’s difficult to explain, but I feel . . . well, useful I suppose.’ She stared across the desk, trying to read Mr McCullough’s expression, and found herself hoping, fervently, that he would tell her she had got the job and begin to discuss terms.
Instead, he surprised her once more. ‘Get many tips, did you?’
For answer, Emmy dug into the capacious pocket of her frilly apron and carefully laid the coins therein on the desk. Mr McCullough bent forward and counted, then leaned back and smiled at her. ‘Three and sevenpence! Well, Mrs Wesley, the job’s yours if you want it.’ Emmy opened her mouth to speak but he shushed her with a wave of the hand. ‘You’ve not heard the terms and conditions yet, so let’s get down to business. You liked waiting on, all right, and you were good at it, but I must make it clear that it won’t be your only job. The waitresses are responsible for the cleanliness of the whole dining room; that means windows and floors as well as the tables and chairs, of course. And if the place is quiet, I expect my girls to muck in with the kitchen staff, performing tasks such as peeling potatoes, cleaning cabbage, making a suet crust for a pudding . . . in short, doing anything that is needed. Again, if someone’s ill or away, you may be asked to take over their job for a few days. And then there’s the washing-up. We’ve got special staff for that, but sometimes they need a helping hand. Well, Mrs Wesley, how do you feel about the job now?’
‘The same. I’d still love to work here,’ Emmy said frankly. ‘The only trouble is, Mr McCullough, I – I’ve never really learned to cook and I wouldn’t want to spoil good ingredients by doing it all wrong.’
Mr McCullough laughed. ‘Don’t worry about that. We’ve a reputation for excellent food so you won’t find yourself thrown into the deep end, as far as cooking is concerned. You’ll be taught how to make simple things – under an expert’s eye, of course – and before you know it, you’ll be doing all sorts. Oh, perhaps I should mention that your wages won’t vary whatever task you’re carrying out, and I expect the girls told you that your tips are your own. At Christmas, all tips go into a pool and are divided up amongst the entire staff on Christmas Eve, but that’s the only exception. And now to uniform. We provide aprons, caps, collars and cuffs, so all you will need to buy is a black dress, or a black skirt and blouse, and some flat black shoes. Can you manage that, do you think?’ Emmy assured him that she already possessed a couple of plain black dresses, and Mr McCullough nodded approvingly. ‘Good, good. I am Mr Mac to my staff – McCullough is such a mouthful – and you, of course, will be Mrs Wesley, though I dare say the staff will use your first name when you’re not in the dining room. And now we had best discuss wages . . .’
‘Mammy!’ Diana flew across Beryl’s kitchen and cast herself into her mother’s arms. ‘Oh, you’ve been gone ages. I would have been upset only Aunty Beryl said that were a good sign. What happened, Mammy? Did you get the job?’
Beryl, peeling potatoes at the sink, turned and grinned. ‘One look at your mammy’s face tells me she’s now a waitress,’ she announced. ‘I tek it he were pleased with you, chuck? And by the grin on your face, I reckon you took to it like a duck to water. Am I right?’
‘You are,’ Emmy said, sinking on to a kitchen chair and arching her back, rubbing vigorously at it as she did so. ‘It’s awful hard work, you were right there, but I really enjoyed it, and the money’s good, especially when you think of the tips. Why, I only waited on for a couple of hours – actually, it were only an hour by myself – and I took three and seven in tips, can you believe it?’
Beryl nodded. ‘I can. You’re a pretty girl, chuck, and you’ve got nice ways. I thought you’d do well, waiting on. So long as it ain’t too much for you, of course. Fancy a cuppa?’
‘I’d love one,’ Emmy said eagerly. ‘I had a cup before I left Mac’s, but that seems a long time ago now.’
‘When do you start? An’ wharrabout uniform?’ Beryl asked, dropping the peeled potatoes into a large pan of water and carrying it over to the stove. ‘D’you have to provide your own?’
‘I start first thing Monday morning, on the early shift, so I have to be up at the crack of dawn,’ Emmy told her. ‘But mornings are a lot quieter, so Mr McCullough – I mean Mr Mac, he said to call him that – likes to start new staff on earlies to get them used to it gradually, like. As for uniform, I have to provide two plain black dresses and they give me white collars and cuffs, a frilly white apron and a cap. I hand in my whites, as they call them, when I finish my shift and get clean ones next day.’
‘Do you have two black dresses?’ Beryl asked curiously. ‘If not, we’ll go down to Paddy’s Market tomorrow and get you a couple o’ second-hand ones. You can rinse them out on Sunday and they’ll be fine for work on Monday.’
‘It’s all right. I’ve got several black dresses which will do,’ Emmy said hastily; she did not fancy wearing a second-hand dress, no matter how carefully it had been rinsed. She indicated the bag on the floor. ‘I’ve bought fish and chips for Di and me to celebrate, but I’ll shove ’em in the oven when I get home and warm them through. To tell the truth, I’m far too tired and excited to turn round and start cooking.’
Diana, who had been diligently drawing pictures on a piece of old brown wrapping paper, looked up. ‘Oh, Mammy, fish ’n’ chips is me favourite food! Will we have it always when you’re workin’ at – at that place?’
Emmy laughed but shook her head. ‘No, darling, not every night. When I’m on earlies, I’ll be home well before you come out of school, so I’ll have time to cook you something nice.’ She turned back to Beryl. ‘My mam never did teach me to cook, and when she died I always had Lucy to do it,’ she admitted ruefully. ‘But Mr Mac explained that part of the job would be helping the kitchen staff when they’re busy and the restaurant isn’t. And he says they’ll teach me to cook.’
She beamed at Beryl, who laughed and shook her head. ‘Some folk land on their feet every time, like cats,’ she observed. ‘But I’m real glad you got the job, queen, because it’ll solve a good few of your problems, see if it don’t.’
Later that evening, when Emmy was putting Diana to bed, it occurred to her to wonder out loud why Beryl had not applied for such a job herself. After all, at the moment, Beryl worked extremely hard and did not get particularly well paid for her labours. Diana, pulling on her white cotton nightgown, eyed her parent with astonishment. ‘Who’d look after the kids if Aunty Beryl went to be a waitress in a smart dining rooms?’ she asked incredulously. ‘Granny Pritchard can’t help, now that she’s bedridden. In fact she needs looking after herself. And anyway, Mammy, Aunty Beryl’s fat and . . . well, she isn’t like you, is she?’
‘She’s a lot more efficient than I am,’ Emmy said severely, but even as she spoke, a picture of Beryl rose before her mind’s eye and she was forced to acknowledge that her small daughter had hit the nail on the head. It wasn’t that Beryl was fat so much as, well, sort of saggy, Emmy concluded. Once, her friend’s thick brown curls had been fashionably cut and regularly brushed. Now it looked as though Beryl cut them herself with blunt scissors. After the birth of her youngest child, Beryl had developed bad varicose veins and now she walked with a limp, trying to spare her left leg where the veins were worst. Although she was always clean and as neat as possible, all her clothing was old and darned, and her down-at-heel shoes, the only pair she possessed, Emmy thought, were cracked and broken.
Emmy said goodnight to Diana and went downstairs. She remembered Beryl on her wedding day, looking so happy and pretty. She remembered her after Charlie’s birth, showing her baby off, wearing a floral print and white sandals. But now, with four children and a multitude of small jobs, she was beginning to resemble a good many of the other women in the court. If she pulled herself together, Emmy began to think, then remembered Bobby. It was no use Beryl’s pulling herself together, not until Bobby was old enough to be left with the other children. And then she remembered something else Diana had said. She had said that Beryl was fat. Emmy’s hands flew to her mouth as realisation dawned. Beryl wasn’t fat, she was expecting again!
For a moment, Emmy was tempted to rush round to her friend, to ask if it were true, but what good would that do? She remembered Peter saying, when they first got married, that too many children made women old before their time and forced men to work for miserably small wages because they dared not leave a job and try for a better one in case they found themselves without work, struggling to bring up a family on the dole. She had been lucky that Peter had known all about birth control and had ‘taken precautions’, but he was an intelligent man. Beryl’s Wally was kind-hearted and sweet-tempered, but Beryl would be the first to admit that he was not at all clever. It probably never occurred to him that life would be easier if babies didn’t arrive with such appalling regularity. And Beryl, of course, would not dream of discussing such intimate things, not even with her best friend.
But I’m not so squeamish, Emmy told herself, sitting down before the kitchen fire. I’ll go over there first thing tomorrow and get her to come out with me, and we’ll have a good talk. It’s about time I did something for Beryl instead of the other way round.