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‘Well, that’s a new one,’ she said. ‘I get Miriam Hopkins sometimes, I get Esther Ralston from the really blind boys, but never Mary Bryan before.’
‘I assure you, the resemblance is uncanny. You could be sisters.’
‘Go on, you old charmer. You say that to all the girls, don’cha?’
‘Well,’ I conceded, ‘only the exceptionally pretty ones.’
‘How long you been standing there in your big coat,’ she asked. ‘Poor old duck, you look like you’re going to melt.’
‘I am a little warm. Do you happen to know where one can find a water ice? I am enfeebled with dehydration. I fear I may soon expire in this parching heat.’
‘Come with me this instant,’ she said, ‘I don’t want to ’ave your death on my hands.’ She linked my arm in a forthright manner, as impetuous modern girls will, and led me up Edgware Road, as if we were adventuring friends. ‘I’m saving your life,’ she said, looking at me as though I were some sort of domesticated pet. ‘You and me’re going for a little stroll and I’ll find you a cool billet out of the sun’s rays, and you’ll buy us both a lovely ice-cream sundae. OK with you?’ I could hardly refuse this comely girl’s kind offer, couched though it was in the tones of a young gold-digger looking for a victim. But we conversed amiably enough en route to the Alhambra tea rooms.
‘Nice,’ she said, looking around her, unbuttoning her linen jacket. Beneath it she wore a white cotton blouse with charming blue, heart-shaped buttons. It was evidently a garment purchased some time ago. The buttons, when she leaned forward, strained against her newly maturing figure. A heady whiff of scent enfumed the café air.
I summoned the waitress, a bored-looking slattern in an unflattering ochre tunic. ‘Bring me a long glass of iced tea, my dear, as deliciously cold as your facilities will allow. And for my young guest’ – I waved my hand in choose-anything-you-like largesse – ‘perhaps an ice-cream sundae …’
‘Nah,’ she said, suddenly businesslike. ‘You got any lamb chops? I’m starving. Two, no, make it three lamb chops, and spuds and some veg, and plenty of gravy if you don’t mind. Bread and butter on the side. And a glass of milk, no, make that a beer, you need something more thirst-quenching in this blinking heat, don’t you?’
‘That all?’ said the waitress, scribbling with a stub of HB pencil. ‘Don’t fancy a few dumplings an’ lardy cake as well, do you?’ Her tone was indefinably hostile. Perhaps she wasn’t used to receiving such commands from a customer young enough to be her granddaughter.
‘If anything else takes my fancy,’ said my new friend coolly, ‘I’ll be sure to let you know.’
The waitress raised her eyes heavenwards and left.
‘This place,’ said the girl, ‘used to be all right. They’d let you come in an’ have a little sit-down with tea and a penny bun for an hour, when you was tired. Now they fire you out of here if you’re not spending a whole quid.’ She shook her head – such nostalgia from a mere child of –
‘How old are you, exactly, my dear?’
Her upper lip curled. ‘I’m old enough,’ she said. ‘I’m sixteen.’
‘And what is it that brings you strolling in Oxford Street in your best frock at two o’clock in the afternoon?’ I asked, as neutrally as possible.
She picked up the à la carte menu, a redundant gesture since her sizeable repast had already been ordered. ‘Same as you, I expect. Looking for a bit of company to while the hours away.’
‘Mmmm,’ I said, unsure of my ground. It was inconceivable that this lively, shining-eyed young woman could be a professional sinner. Yet she had clearly outgrown any institutions of learning. The confidence of her bearing suggested employment at some thriving business. Had I learned that she presided over a superior hat shop in Bond Street, I would not have been surprised.
‘What kind of company do you seek out in your lunch hour?’ I asked. ‘Have you a passion for the conversation of strangers?’
She sat back and made a lattice of her fingers. Blue nail polish made lapis lazuli jewels of their extremities. ‘I can talk to anyone,’ she said, with a hint of pride. ‘I’m very … flexible. My old dad used to say it’s the most underrated virtue, flexibility.’
‘Indeed so. I admire your father’s wise counsel. “If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, / Or walk with Kings – nor lose the common touch …”’
‘Come again?’
‘Kipling,’ I said. ‘Surely a well-educated lady like you must know “If”?’
‘Oh yeah. Course. A bloke asked me about him one day in the park. “Do you like Kipling?” he says. “I dunno,” I says right back. “I don’t believe I ever Kippled.”’ She laughed. ‘I didn’t make it up, though. I got it off a seaside postcard down Southend.’
The waitress returned, sulkily, with the food and drink. My cold beverage was a far cry from the Long Island Iced Tea I have enjoyed on occasion at the Savoy. Tea, undoubtedly. Cold, up to a point. An enterprising soul in the kitchen had added two spoonfuls of sugar, as if for a workman, and a slice of lemon floated like a shipwreck victim in its caramel depths.
When I looked up, two of the three lamb chops had been stripped to the bone and the girl was wolfing down mashed potato in sweeping forkfuls.
‘You seem to be enjoying that,’ I said indulgently. ‘God bless your appetite.’ I forbore to confide that I always found a hearty appetite an attractive trait in a young woman. A hunger to devour … strange that it should make the gentle sex more appealing than alarming.
Three minutes of silence passed. I have seen stevedores at Tilbury Docks, onshore after months at sea, demolish their meagre ration of Cornish pasty and greens with more decorum. I watched as a hunk of crusty bread was ushered back and forth through the lees of gravy and the detritus of lamb fibre and popped between her fleshy, pouted lips.
‘I trust it was to your liking,’ I said. ‘Can I interest you in pudding?’
She wiped her greasy mouth with a paper napkin and, still masticating the last of her lunch, delivered herself of this remarkable speech.
‘For afters, I have it in mind that we could get better acquainted. I got a room only a cab ride away in Camden Town. Ten minutes from now, you can come up the stairs behind me, looking at my fleshy arse in my tight skirt, and when we get to my room you can lift it up and look at my black stockings and these really nice white knickers I got on today, with little teeny pink roses on the front, and you can undo these blue heart buttons on my chest that you been staring at for the past half an hour and suck my big tits, only not too hard ’cause they’re real sensitive, and you can lay me down on the divan in my sunny blue room and fuck me hard as you like until you’re done. It’s two quid for an hour, ’cause after that I’ll have to kick you out. And if you’re real sweet beforehand and bung me ten bob extra, I could give you a chew before we get down to business, only I don’t take it down the throat because I’m a nice girl, and anyway you really want to finish up buried to the bollocks in my furry quim, don’t you, that’s what you gentlemen want, isn’t that right?’
Well, well. A harlot, after all. In ten years of dealing with ladies of the night, I have met the gamut – every age, every colour, every disposition, every temperament (even every class!) and I am no longer shocked to discover the base occupation of seemingly decent girls. But in this case I felt a distinct disappointment. My initial suspicion, that she was a lady of uncertain moral direction, was proved correct. But the suspicion had been eclipsed by a growing appreciation of her strength of character, her forthrightness. It is easy to grow close to prostitutes as friends, to feel fond of them as substitute children who have strayed from the Path. One never, however, feels admiration. Knowing the moral dereliction that is their daily choice precludes any possibility of such private approbation. Yet I had begun to admire this young woman, in our brief acquaintance – and to feel that, because I admired her, she could not be one of the sisterhood.
‘What is your name?’ I asked, a little sadly.
‘They call me lots of things round ’ere,’ she said. ‘But you can call me Barbara.’ She stretched out a hand. ‘Barbara Harris.’ Her cotton sleeve trailed across the table, soaking up tea spill and gravy puddle. ‘Pleased to meet you.’
‘Barbara,’ I said sternly, ‘as you can see, or should be able to surmise, I am not a man given to dallying with ladies of the street –’
‘All I can see,’ she retorted, ‘is, you’re a man, no different from any other, for all your long words.’
‘– and I wish only to befriend you. I would not dream of honouring your outrageous suggestion.’
Barbara took a swig from her beer glass. ‘You familiar with the music hall?’
‘Indeed I am,’ I said. ‘I used to perform on the public stage in my youth.’
‘You sound like one of them burlesque routines. D’you know the one I mean? The bloke’s tellin’ his pals – “She offered her honour. I honoured her offer. And all night long, I was on’er and off’ er.” D’you get it?’ She chuckled, a noise like perfumed bathwater escaping. ‘That’s all you really want, isn’t it?’
The grim waitress was back. ‘We’re closing,’ she said. ‘You want anything else?’
‘We’re just leaving,’ said Barbara, looking round for her jacket. Her self-assurance startled me. I could see in the fish-eyed glance of the slattern, how we must have looked. One well-fed lady of business and one middle-aged client, about to depart to consummate their lunch transaction. Her face was a mask of contempt.
‘Lamb chops three-an’-nine, veg platter sixpence, beer and tea one-aner and tea one-an’-six, that’s five-an’-ninepence, ta,’ said the waitress. ‘Sure I can’t get you anythin’ more?’ She rolled her eyes to heaven.
I paid the bill. Outside, the Edgware Road was bathed in strong sunlight. Motor cars puttered by with frightening celerity, myriad walkers bustled past, a man pathetically encased in a ‘sandwich board’ announced a sale of haberdashery at Selfridges, as we stood awkwardly on the pavement.
‘Well?’ she said.
‘Miss Harris,’ I announced, as plainly as I could, ‘I am sorry our first meeting has ended in this awkward fashion. I would enjoy making your acquaintance, but in a less, ah, businesslike context. I would like, if you allow me, to take you under my wing and find you a more congenial occupation than your current one.’
‘Oh yes?’ She raised an eyebrow. ‘So you want to be my pal. And what would be the point of that? What would be in it for you?’
‘I see in you a young woman who deserves a better life than you currently inhabit. A girl whose impulses towards decency have been fatally compromised by circumstance.’
‘What are you, some kind of sky pilot?’
‘I will tell you in due course. All you need know for now is that I wish you well, and will endeavour to improve your lot. I shall not accompany you home but, if you give me your address, I will call on you during the week to discuss your future.’
‘Number 14, Queen Street, Camden,’ she said. ‘Ground-floor flat. There’s lots of bells. Call any time. It’s pretty rare for me to entertain gentlemen callers after midnight, but you never know your luck.’
‘My luck?’ Once again, I was shocked almost beyond words. ‘I hope you do not imagine for one second that I –’
‘And while I’m partial to a little discussion, no praying, all right? Any suggestion we kneel down together, an’ I’ll kick you out. Got that?’ She smiled. ‘You can ’ave me kneel down in front of you, but that’s your lot.’
Mystified by her meaning, I made to search in my Stationery Pocket for pen and notebook, with which to inscribe her address. But the press of passers-by was so busy – and their looks so disapproving – that I stayed my hand. Anyone seeing this vivid strumpet by my side could only have their suspicions confirmed, were I to be seen taking down her address in the street. I committed it to memory, and we shook hands. A passing motor cab rattled dangerously close to the pavement, and I ushered her aside with a touch of my hand on her waist – a simple, Samaritan gesture that she greeted with a laugh, as though I were guiding her into a dance. Her lace-gloved hand came lightly down on my shoulder.
‘What you tryin’ to do?’ she asked. ‘Sweep me off my feet?’
‘I was merely trying to protect you from –’
‘OI, CAB!’ she cried, in the tone of a fishwife. The vehicle stopped dead, five yards away. ‘Got to go. Bye now,’ she said, looking at me with curiosity. ‘I get the feeling we’ll meet again soon, one way or the other.’
By the time I had divined her meaning, she had gathered her skirts into the motor cab and was gone.
London 9 August 1930
THINGS TO DO:
1. Visit Arthur Trench, Holborn, about Ladies’ Academy, ask re Esther and Matilda as poss. vocational students?
2. Boots pharmacy: talcum powder for Madge P, bunion cream for Sally A, sal volatile for Joanna D, deodorant for Bridget C.
3. Runaway Boys’ Retreat – talk to Eddie and Howard re funding.
4. Previews of Coward’s Private Lives at the Phoenix start soon. Cheap tickets on sale, Friday a.m.
5. Call on Emily M, Café Royal. Lunch at Bradley’s?
6. Sermon: Galatians 5:22 – ‘But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance …’
7. Lady Fenella R-Smith. Time for action re her rich Africa friends?
8. Somerset House for records of Lily Beane’s parents?
9. Sandra (Lyons C House) – speak to Marina re possible stage work?
10. Barbara Harris. 14 Queen Street, Camden.
Stiffkey 10 August 1930
Summer has filled the meadows with vivid primary colours, bright yellow oilseed rape, light green corn waving in abundance, red poinsettias blooming early, heady smell of jasmine. It is blissful to be out in the fresh air. Rose early and drove bike v fast to Sheringham in high spirits. Made 65mph around Weybourne. How speed invigorates a mind stupefied by London.
I have been looking at motor-bicycle catalogues, gazing with frank covetousness at the Brough Superior SS100, a wonderful machine with elegantly serpentine exhaust pipes curling sinuously all its length and doubling back. Its headlamps are a joy to behold. It is the Rolls-Royce of motorbikes. It is also £170, which I cannot afford. I shall go on riding my beloved 500cc Ariel Squarefour until something turns up!
Sermon well received. ‘Nice to find you in such a jolly, positive frame of mind,’ said Briony Jones. ‘It must be the weather.’
Mrs Willoughby hung back after 11 a.m. service to say how pleased she is to put into practice my ‘What Would Jesus Do?’ advice. When approached last Thursday by young pedlar from Gt Yarmouth on doorstep, selling dusters, tea cloths, kitchen paraphernalia, instead of sending him about his business with flea in ear, she invited him into kitchen, fed him tea and scones and enquired about his life. Discovered that he was student of philosophy, trying to raise enough cash to fund college studies for new term at Oxford. She bought frankly ill-advised number of clothes pegs, gave him £10 and kissed him goodbye on Welcome mat. Unfortunately, seen by troublesome neighbour, and soon her largesse was talk of village. Had he been a plausible crook, not Oxford chap at all? Husband not impressed, particularly by loss of £10, supposed to be put towards summer vacation to Hunstanton.
What could I say? Assured her she was on right track re spiritual impulses. 4.53 p.m., received telephone call from Emily Murray, in tearful state. Job at Café R not working out. ‘Horrible, horrible’ working conditions was all she would impart. Must visit her, get back on straight and narrow. Perhaps Friday? All she needs is a little fortitude.
London 15 August 1930
In Regent Street, looked in at the Café Royal to see what has become of Emily; she did not last long in the kitchens. I should have predicted this. I never liked the maître d’ here, a stern-faced bully who today looked at me with cold, jellied-eel eyes when I stated my business, listened with infinite ennui as I enquired after the poor girl, as though it could be no interest to him, then dismissed me with the words, ‘If there are no other relevant questions, I’m afraid you must excuse me.’ Relevant? As if the whereabouts of a suddenly penniless girl in London are of no moment when weighed against the vital importance of feeding Sir Ambrose This and Lord Benjamin That.
Asked in the kitchens, when MD’s back turned. Head shakes all round. No, we don’t know where she’s gone. She left on Wednesday, there were raised voices in the Hot Beverages area, a flung teapot, tears and shouts, a dented silver sugar bowl and a slammed door. No payment, sadly, because she was taken on as probationary. No forwarding address. I am aghast at the level of neglect in this once respectable establishment.
I decided to call on her, at her shared rooms in Maddox Street, where I saw her so recently – my birthday! – with Nellie Churchill.
Found Emily gone and Miss Churchill abed with fever.
‘Oh, it’s you, Reverend,’ she said. ‘I’m not well. Caught a chill from hanging about Vauxhall Gardens, and it went straight to my lungs. If it weren’t for the neighbours upstairs, I don’t know what I’da done.’ She coughed violently.
‘Where is Emily?’
‘Emily? She’s gone. Somewhere up on the north side, she said she was headed. Maybe to her sister Flo, who’s got a little place she rents, I think it’s in one of those Guinness Estate blocks.’
‘Why is she no longer here?’ I had to fight internally, to keep dislike and suspicion of this human icicle out of my voice.
‘Why’d you think?,’ said Nellie with a sneer. ‘She wasn’t enjoying it. They were nasty to her at the café, like I told her they would be, she done a bunk, came back here crying about having no future, and next thing I know, she’s gone.’
‘Would it be the case,’ I asked, ‘that you sent her away by crowing, in your unpleasant way, over her inability to keep a legitimate job? Would that be it? I can hear it in your voice. I can imagine how you would have jeered at her, and told her of her folly in – Oh!’
I startled myself with a horrible thought.
‘Oh what?’ asked Nellie, coolly.
‘She has not gone back to a life on the street, has she, Nellie?’ I was becoming very severe, and she knew it. ‘Tell me that she has not returned to the embrace of prostitution, spurred on by your jeers and scorn?’
‘No she ain’t,’ said Nellie, with a flounce. ‘Whatever’s happened to her, it’s not my fault. If it’s anyone’s it’s yours.’
‘Mine?’ I almost shouted. ‘How can it be my fault? All my energies are spent in saving girls like Emily from vicious ways.’
‘If you wanna see vicious ways, Reverend,’ said Nellie grimly, ‘you shoulda seen the way they treated her in the sinkroom at the Café. She was miserable as sin. She tried to come the kid, doing all that little-girly wide-eyed routine, and it went down bad, Rector. It might work with a gentleman client, but not with the bitch skivvies. Someone must’ve blabbed about her past, for they started calling her Skittles, after that royal mistress, and the boys would slip their hands round her waist and fiddle with her chest as she stood with her arms in the sink, and instead of giving them a sound wallop, she’d just weep, which made them worse. So it wasn’t much of a favour what you done her.’
‘It was work, Nellie, honest work for an honest wage. Better by far than taking money for intimate liaisons forbidden by the state and by God.’
‘If I remember,’ replied the foolish girl, ‘the only intimate liaison that’s forbidden in the Commandments is adultery. Everything else that’s forbidden was added on afterwards by people like you. No screwing, no kissing, no dressing nice for gentlemen, it all came under the heading of adultery, didn’t it? It doesn’t make sense.’
‘Nellie, you are a simpleton when it comes to scripture. I fear the delirium of fever may have rendered you more argumentative than you might wish.’
She seemed chastened. ‘You got anything for a bloody horrible cough? It keeps me awake all night.’
‘You must visit the physician in Glasshouse Street,’ I said. ‘He is called Dr Ledger and will help you. For your present needs, however, if you tell me where Emily has gone and where I can find her, I may have something here …’
I delved in my Pharmacy Pocket and from a mass of ampoules, pill packets and ointment tins extracted a tiny phial of tinct. Laudanum.
