The Shop Girls

‘Got to have your eye to the main chance,’ he said as they sat down. The waitress was still laying the new top cloth. Frank smoothed it and helped her to reposition the cruet and the little vase.

‘While you’re here,’ he said to her, ‘you may as well take our order. Save your legs, eh? Tea and Welsh rarebit for two, please.’

The elderly waitress gave him a ‘Get on with you!’ look but was clearly charmed as she scribbled the order on her pad. Lily was dumbfounded.

‘When exactly did I say I was going to eat with you?’ she demanded as the waitress walked away.

‘Oh, don’t start all that again,’ said Frank, leaning forwards with his elbows on the table and chin on his hands. ‘Tell me something interesting about yourself. I’m sure there’s lots.’

‘I’m not in the least interesting,’ said Lily. ‘Like everyone else, I get up, I go to work, I go home to my mum …’

‘Right,’ said Frank. ‘Tell me about that, then.’

Exasperated but amused, Lily told him about Dora and Sid and Reg, and how long she’d been at Marlow’s, and how she loved it.

‘I can see you do.’ Frank sat back, pulled down his cuffs and adjusted his cufflinks. They were oval with a blood-red stone. ‘You’re a bit in love with Miss Fro as well, aren’t you? Still, Mr Ward thinks a lot of her, so as a role model, you could do far worse.’

‘She’s taught me a lot,’ said Lily frostily, annoyed at being so transparent. ‘And I’ve got lots more to learn yet. But what about you?’ she probed. ‘Why are you repping? Are you filling in time till you’re called up?’

‘That’s a sore point,’ said Frank. ‘I tried to join up. Last year, the minute I could. But they didn’t want me.’

‘Why not?’

‘Promise you won’t laugh? You’ve got to promise.’

Lily nodded.

‘Flat feet.’

Laugh? Trying not to, Lily spluttered.

‘Oh dear!’

‘Yes, yes, I know, it’s like a music hall joke! They’d never been a problem, not once! I hadn’t a clue till I went for the medical.’

Lily was about to say it had been the same with Jim and his eyesight, but somehow she didn’t. Frank was carrying on anyway.

‘They’ll get desperate enough to take me in the end and I hope they do! My feet are fine – football, running, the lot; I was regional under-sixteen boxing champion!’ He extended an arm. ‘Want to feel my muscles?’

‘No, thank you!’

‘Your loss.’ Frank was unperturbed. ‘Ah, here’s our tea. Are you going to be mother?’

And so it went on. Frank might say he’d rather be doing something different – he didn’t see himself as a babywear rep all his life, he declared – but there was no doubt he was in the right job. He was so persuasive and talkative – cheeky, too. Lily had to laugh at some of his stories – he could have sold sand to the Arabs.

Try as he might, though, as they left Lyons, having insisted on paying for them both, he couldn’t persuade Lily to join him for a drink.

‘I don’t mean some spit and sawdust pub,’ he coaxed. ‘You’re worth more than that. The White Lion’s the place to go, isn’t it, round here?’

The White Lion was utterly respectable, but Lily stood firm.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘Oh, come on. Not even a Tizer? Or a cordial? Would that be demure and ladylike enough for you?’

‘That’s not the point. I’m late as it is. My mum will worry.’

‘All right, you win,’ Frank conceded. ‘I’m not in the business of putting girls’ mums’ backs up. Not when I hope to see them again.’

This time Lily didn’t falter.

‘It’s out of the question,’ she said. ‘I’ve got a boyfriend.’

‘I’m sure you have,’ said Frank easily. ‘Someone as attractive as you. Away in the Forces, is he?’

‘No, actually—’

Her reply was irrelevant. Frank was continuing, smoothly, smiling.

‘Well, whatever. He’s obviously not around at the moment, or not all the time, or you wouldn’t have entertained the possibility of spending the evening with me.’

‘I did try my best not to!’

‘Well, I’m glad you changed your mind.’ Suddenly he sounded sincere. ‘Very glad. I am grateful, Lily. It’s the bit of the job I don’t like, the evenings on your own in some strange place.’

‘Hinton’s not that strange.’

‘Well, it is if a girl can’t go out for an innocent cup of tea and a bite of cheese on toast with a colleague, don’t you think?’

A colleague … was that what he was? She supposed so. And maybe … there were things she’d learnt from him tonight, like making yourself think up good points in an item you don’t think much of, and what he called ‘linking the benefit to the customer’. There was a lot more she’d be interested to find out about his side of the business. Then perhaps she could really impress Miss Frobisher.

Frank could see her mind working and he let it work. He wasn’t a salesman for nothing.

‘I have to go,’ she said finally. ‘But … maybe. When you’re next in town.’

‘Attagirl! It won’t be for a while, you heard what Mr Ward said. But think of me in the wilds of Wales with the autumn gales blowing.’

‘Oh, I’m sure you’ll survive.’

‘You reckon?’

‘Get some of those Army combinations that Ward and Keppler are making.’

Frank threw back his head and laughed.

‘You’ve got a very strange image of me if you think I’d be seen dead in those!’

Lily blushed and turned her face away. She wasn’t sure she wanted to have any image of Frank Bryant, let alone one of his muscled torso in his underwear.

‘Bye, then,’ she said. ‘Thanks for my tea.’

‘You’re very welcome,’ grinned Frank. He tipped an imaginary hat at her. ‘Till next time, Miss Collins.’

Jim spooned the stew he’d made onto plates. His father had already shuffled to the table, but his mother was hovering behind him, watching critically as Jim pulled the scraps of meat apart and mashed down the vegetables into the gravy. Both his parents needed soft, mushy food; almost what you’d feed a baby. Jim thought, not for the first time, how dreadful it was – for everyone – when you had to parent your own parents.

‘Go and sit down, Mother, I’ll bring the plates through.’

With a grunt, his mother obeyed – she was more compliant at the end of the day, when she was tired. In the mornings she was querulous and demanding, and barely a month into the new regime, Mrs Dawkins had twice threatened to walk out. Jim didn’t think she was serious – the money was too useful – but it was another pressure. He wondered if he dared to ask his mother to be a bit more patient with her.

The meal dragged. No one spoke, both his parents laboriously eating. Jim’s father had never been a talkative man, and nowadays breathing was so much of an effort that he had no energy for using his voice. Jim had one eye on the clock, wondering if he’d make the 9.35 from Worcester. If he struck lucky and thumbed a lift straight away, he might. Last week it had been nearly two when he’d got back to Hinton, and he’d had to be up at seven for work the next day. But, Army life, Navy life, certainly life in the RAF was far more demanding, night after night with little or no sleep, and no break in sight, which at least Jim got from Tuesday to Friday. Count your blessings. Like everyone, he’d become practised in making the best of things.

His mother put down her spoon and tugged at the napkin Jim had tied round her neck.

‘Like a two-year-old!’ she muttered, or something like it. Officially her speech had been unaffected; in reality it was indistinct because the whole side of her face now drooped.

‘Come on, Mother, you’ve hardly touched it. It’s got to be better than Mrs Dawkins’s offerings!’

His mother gave a snort.

‘You get with Margaret, we’d be rid of that slut!’

Jim winced. The stroke hadn’t taken his mother’s powers of speech, but it had certainly made them cruder. The old, proper, Alice would never have used a word like that.

‘That’s not going to happen,’ he said firmly. ‘Margaret’s a very nice girl, but as I’ve told you, Mother, Lily and I are courting.’

His mother mumbled something under her breath which Jim feared was ‘hussy’, then pushed her plate away as if it was something from the cesspit.

‘Bed. Now.’

Jim sighed and stood up. At least once she was in bed, he could safely go. She still insisted on sleeping upstairs, painful as it was to see her haul herself up. His father slept on the settee, the stairs being too much for him. He was a much more compliant character, and Jim thanked his stars for that.

In her room, he settled Alice, looking away as he stripped off her dress and petticoat and handed her the flannel to wash herself, then quickly slipped her nightdress over her head before unrolling her stockings. She fell heavily back on the pillows, and Jim made sure she had a glass of water and her stick beside her to bang on the floor if she needed anything.

‘I’ll pop up again before I go,’ he told her, as he always did.

With any luck she’d be asleep and he could avoid having to kiss the grooved forehead, see the distorted mouth. Alice turned her face away.

Downstairs, his father was already unwinding the first of the mufflers he wore, the start of his bedtime preparations. Jim smiled ruefully at him and got on with clearing the table. In the scullery he scraped the leftover stew into a dish and put a plate on top of it while a kettle boiled for the washing up. There was something infinitely depressing about the greasy plates and he shook more washing soda than was needed into the sink, plunging his hands in the too-hot water in penance.

He was drying his stinging hands when there was a tap on the back door. No one ever called at night, and Jim stiffened. Not long ago the navigator from a crashed German reconnaissance plane had knocked on a cottage door in a neighbouring village, tied up the occupants and then stole money, food and clothes before being captured.

‘Who is it?’

‘Only me!’

‘Margaret?’

‘I came to see how you were getting on,’ she explained as he let her in. ‘I thought if I put your mum to bed, you could get off a bit earlier.’

‘You’re very kind,’ said Jim, moved. She was a nice girl, turning out like this after a long day of her own. ‘But she’s gone to bed early, thankfully.’

‘Oh.’

‘I’m leaving myself soon. I’ll walk you back. You shouldn’t be out on your own.’

‘It’s all right. Dad’s going to pick me up, he’s gone to an NFU meeting. So I’ll stay anyway and sit with her. And – look – I wanted to give you this.’

From the pocket of her old mac she produced a brown paper parcel.

‘For me?’

‘It’s nothing. Honestly.’

As she was talking, Jim was unwrapping the parcel. He brought out a dark blue knitted scarf, beautifully made with a tasselled fringe.

‘That’s … you shouldn’t have!’

Margaret blushed.

‘I noticed the one you had was a bit … tatty. In fact, your mum said it was a disgrace, and as she can’t knit any more …’

Jim grimaced. There was some truth in his mother’s opinion, but if she or Margaret thought the holes were wear and tear, they were wrong. That was just Lily’s knitting.

‘Now the nights are getting colder,’ smiled Margaret, ‘it’ll be chilly on those station platforms. I don’t like to think of you catching cold.’

‘I’ll wear it tonight,’ said Jim. ‘Thank you.’

He leant forward and gave her a peck on the cheek. She really was a very nice girl.

The journey back was no more lengthy or tedious than usual, but Jim’s mood was low. From what she’d said at supper, he knew his mother would never give him and Lily her blessing, and as her only son, that mattered to him, especially now she’d been robbed of so many other things in life.

As he sat on the final train, with Margaret’s scarf tucked against his chest, he felt complete despair. Even if Margaret had made it in all innocence, his mother had goaded her into it and made her a partner in her conspiracy. With every turn of the wheels, Jim worked himself up into a frenzy of guilt. He should never have accepted it. It was deeply disloyal to Lily. But it was very warm …

Exhausted, he dropped off to sleep, only woken by the train slamming against the buffers when they arrived in Hinton. Outside the station, he tore off the scarf as if it was choking him and stuffed it in the inside pocket of his coat. He extracted Lily’s holey offering from his knapsack and wound it round his neck. He felt the difference straight away: it was spitting with rain and the night air pierced his throat, but he set off walking smartly and swung his arms to keep warm.

Chapter 7

‘Who was that well-set-up fellow you swanned off with last night?’ demanded Gladys the next morning as she and Lily put their things away in the staff cloakroom. Gladys had been deep in conversation with Brenda from Books on their way out the previous evening, but Lily had felt her friend’s eyes on her like searchlights as she’d set off with Frank. She’d been expecting an interrogation.

‘His name’s Frank Bryant,’ she answered evenly. ‘He’s the new Ward and Keppler rep. I met him – well, he introduced himself – when Miss Frobisher and I went over there.’

Gladys made saucer eyes, agog.

‘You never said!’

‘Yes, I did. I said the new rep had looked in.’

‘You didn’t say he wasn’t much older than us! I thought you meant someone about fifty!’

‘Well, if that was your assumption, I’m sorry.’

Lily spoke more tartly than she’d meant to. But why hadn’t she said, actually?

‘So what was he doing looking you up here?’ persisted Gladys.

‘He’s on his rounds,’ shrugged Lily. ‘He’s seeing Miss Frobisher today. And calling on Burrell’s as well.’

‘So what did he want with you?’

Honestly, some days Gladys could have given the Secret Intelligence Service a run for their money. Lily shoved her gas mask case so fiercely into the back of her locker that the whole row rattled.

‘A bit of company, that’s all. We went for a cup of tea at Lyons.’

‘Company? Well!’

Gladys managed to invest the final ‘Well!’ with amazement, admiration, curiosity and a large pinch of scandal. Lily turned on her.

‘There’s no need to say it like that! He was on his own in a strange town. He simply wanted a friendly face.’

‘Are you sure that’s all he wanted?’

Enough was enough. Lily slammed the locker door.

‘Gladys! Not long ago you were walking me up the aisle with Jim! Who do you think I am, Mata Hari? We just went for a cup of tea, I’m telling you.’

‘He’s very good-looking.’

‘Is he?’ said Lily offhandedly. ‘Well, if he is, he knows it. He’s certainly rather cocky. Not my type at all.’

‘Even so. Are you seeing him again?’

‘I doubt it! I expect he went on to the pub. Someone like him’ll have hundreds of friends in Hinton by now.’

‘Hmm!’

‘There you go again! Why don’t you fold your arms and put a scarf over your curlers? Then you can really act like some scandalised old biddy. I’m not going to keep it from Jim, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

‘I’m surprised you went in the first place, that’s all. What time did Jim get back?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Lily firmly, beginning to move away. ‘Middle of the night, I suppose. He’d already left for work when I got up this morning, but his things were downstairs. Now come on, or we’ll be late on to the floor.’

Gladys followed obediently as they joined the throng making their way up the worn back stairs that the staff used, but still she wasn’t letting things drop.

‘Why did Jim have to get here so early this morning?’ she asked, trotting up a step behind.

To the annoyance of the staff surging up behind them, Lily stopped dead on the half landing.

‘He’d got stuff to do on The Messenger, all right?’ she said. She was fed up about it herself: she’d hoped they’d walk to work together. ‘He left me a note. Now you know as much as I do, OK?’

‘I was only asking!’

Shocked by her friend’s vehemence, Gladys went quiet, leaving Lily feeling guilty, needled and resentful. It was the closest she and Gladys had ever come to having words. And over something completely innocent! That’s what was so unfair!

Jim was trying not to yawn as his boss, Mr Hooper, droned on about developments in the Utility Furniture Scheme. On another day Jim would have been alert to the possibility of a piece for the next Messenger, but after typing up the final article of this month’s onto a stencil, then turning the handle of the mimeograph in the tiny cubby hole with the stink of printing ink, and all before his working day had begun, Jim never wanted to think about The Messenger again. He’d change his mind, he knew, and next month’s edition would have a tantalising piece entitled ‘Are You Sitting Comfortably?’ but for now, all he wanted was to do was crawl into a corner and sleep till kingdom come.

What’s more, his uncle was on his rounds.

Cedric Marlow toured the store every day. He greeted customers as they came in at the doors, then made his way through every department, speaking to staff, giving praise where it was due and withholding it when it was not. Rumour had it he’d once written his name on a cosmetics counter that hadn’t been properly dusted after a spill of face powder.

Worse still, today he had his son, Jim’s cousin Robert, with him. Robert had been first floor supervisor before Peter Simmonds but had left to work in the Birmingham stockbroking firm owned, conveniently, by his fiancée, Evelyn’s, father. He still occasionally popped back ‘for old times’ sake’ he said, but as he’d had no feel for shopkeeping, Jim always felt it was to keep an eye on his inheritance.

Jim watched out of the corner of his eye, but from Gramophones, Cedric and Robert proceeded to Radiograms so the fact that Jim hadn’t had time to polish his shoes to the mirror brightness his uncle required might not be noticed.

As soon as Mr Hooper had finished his tale, Jim signalled to Lily, who’d been watching for a sign since she’d arrived on the sales floor. Armed with a boy’s jacket she could claim to be brushing, she sidled over to where their departments butted up against one another.

‘Thanks for your note. How are you?’ she asked quietly.

She could see he looked drained, but that was standard after two days at home.

‘Ever felt like your eyeballs have been rolled in sand and put back upside down?’

Lily tutted sympathetically.

‘How were things?’

‘The usual.’

‘I’m sorry. You got The Messenger sorted?’

‘Thankfully. It should be coming round with the afternoon post.’

‘Well done. Early night for you tonight.’

There’d be no walk along the canal in the twilight, no scramble down the railway embankment for the clutch of blackberries she’d spotted on Sunday, no stroll to the cinema while the starlings circled.

‘I’ve got ARP.’

‘Oh, Jim … can’t you get out of it?’

‘I can’t let them down. I’m still paying back the nights I missed when Mother was first taken ill.’

He was so conscientious, drat him! But would she have wanted him any different? Not really.

‘If you say so,’ she conceded. ‘Look out, Mr Marlow and Robert are heading this way. We’d better get back. I’ll see you at half five.’

At least they could walk home together.

There’d been rain all afternoon, or so various damp customers told Lily, but it was mercifully dry when at last the long day was over and Lily and Jim could step into the street. Jim wound Lily’s scarf round his neck.

‘That’s a bit of luck, anyway,’ said Lily, determined to be cheerful. She tucked her arm through his. ‘Another rib on my umbrella broke at the weekend. I’ll have to see if I can get it mended, though I don’t hold out much hope.’

Jim gave a grunt of acknowledgement and Lily fell silent. She’d looked forward so much to seeing him, his lanky frame and his thoughtful face, but he was obviously tired out, and she couldn’t think of much to say. She didn’t think he’d want to hear about the only thing that had happened at work in his absence, a delivery of shampoo that had caused such a stampede in Toiletries that the commissionaire had had to come inside to keep order.

‘Nothing much to report at home,’ she said as they walked. ‘Not a peep from Sid or Reg.’

Another grunt.

‘Monty doesn’t seem to be making much difference in North Africa yet. That push to retake Tobruk came to nothing.’

Silence.

Of course, there was one other thing that had happened at work, or through work, but somehow Lily didn’t feel the time was right to mention her encounter with Frank.

They passed a jeweller’s, a tobacconist’s, a grocer’s. The shopkeeper was pulling down the blinds and it obviously reminded Jim of something.

‘Drat. There was some butter I meant to bring back.’

When she’d been well, Alice had always sent Jim back from the country laden with largesse – jams and jellies, rabbits, pigeons, cream. That was another thing that had disappeared at a stroke, so to speak.

‘Never mind,’ said Lily reassuringly. ‘We’ll live!’

They stopped at the corner to cross the road into the park and Lily noticed a fresh poster on a hoarding. ‘Is Your Journey Really Necessary?’ it barked. It gave her an idea.

‘Look, Jim. Why don’t I come with you next time?’ she suggested. ‘I could book the Monday off. I’d like to—’

‘No,’ he said abruptly, starting to cross. ‘It wouldn’t work.’

‘Why not?’ Lily hurried to keep up. ‘I’m sure there’s something I could do for your mum – and take the pressure off you. Anything. Clean the windows, scrub the floor, pick the apples, they must be past ready—’

‘No, Lily.’

They were inside the park now – or rather, the allotments it had been turned into – and he stopped to face her, unlinking their arms. A gust of wind shook the chestnut tree above them and a clutch of conkers thudded to the ground. Their cases looked, Lily thought, like naval mines.

‘I’m sorry,’ he went on. ‘It’s not a good idea. I … I don’t think it would help.’

‘Really? Why not?’

Jim looked as if he was about to say something, then he turned his face away. Lily felt something boiling up inside her, something she’d felt for ages.

‘Your mum doesn’t like me, does she?’

Jim turned back to face her.

‘It’s not that—’

She’d started now, so she might as well spit it out.

‘I think it is. I’ve been to your home precisely once, and that was a year ago. I don’t think I did anything to offend her – I don’t see how I could have – but I’ve never been asked back.’

Jim lifted his shoulders.

‘She wouldn’t want you to see her like she is.’

‘But she doesn’t mind Margaret seeing her?’

Where had that come from? Lily hadn’t thought about Margaret Povey since Jim had mentioned her weeks ago!

He looked startled.

‘Margaret?’

Suddenly he had a hunted look and Lily scented blood.

‘Did you see her?’ she asked. ‘Did you see her when you were home?’

‘Yes, I did as a matter of fact.’

He sounded almost shifty. Lily went in for the kill.

‘So she’s welcome, and I’m not.’

‘Lily, she called round. I didn’t invite her.’

‘Oh, that makes all the difference!’

‘You know she offered to keep an eye on my parents.’

‘Yes, when you weren’t there! She’d got no business being there when you are!’

‘What? Now you’re being ridiculous! What am I supposed to do, put her under curfew?’

‘Well? What’s the answer? What was she doing, coming round then?’

‘You answer me! I’m not going to tell her when she can and can’t call in, all out of the goodness of her heart!’

‘Oh, I get it! I’d been seeing her in the dairy, in a white coat and a hairnet. But she’s Saint Margaret in a white robe and a halo! No wonder I don’t measure up! No wonder you don’t want me to come!’