Opal Plumstead (6 page)

I went to look at the painting sets in the toy department, but they only had little tins of eight colours, the same as my one at home.

‘Don’t you have any bigger tins?’ I asked the young male shop assistant.

‘Of course, madam,’ he said.

This nearly started me giggling like a fool, because it was the first time anyone had ever addressed me as ‘madam’. I struggled to compose myself as he gave me instructions on how to get to the art department.

Oh, that art department! It was total heaven. I wouldn’t have been surprised if I’d spotted great celestial beings with wings gliding about the easels and sketching pads and the huge boxes of paints.

I was tempted to try oil paints like a real artist, but I knew Mother would never stand the smell in our small house. I looked at water colours – glorious boxes of Landseer and Winsor & Newton. I fingered the japanned tins, but then I was distracted by gleaming mahogany boxes with brass clasps. They had
thirty-six
pans of paint, with fine brushes and a water glass and a fat tube of Chinese white. There was a nine-shilling box, the exact sum I had in my pocket bar the sixpence I needed in bus fares to get home. It seemed like an omen. I
had
to have that paintbox.

Another assistant wrapped it carefully for me. ‘It’s quite heavy, madam. If you’ve other purchases to make today, you could always use our delivery service.’

‘No thank you. I shall carry it easily,’ I said.

I didn’t want to be parted from my glorious paintbox for a second. I’d paid for it and it was truly mine.

I’d planned to do a little sightseeing while I was in London, but my skirt seemed to have got even tighter, hobbling my knees, and my best boots were a little small for me now so that my toes were crammed painfully against the leather. I was hungry and thirsty, but I didn’t have enough money left for a cup of tea and a currant bun in an ABC. I needed to go to the lavatory too, but didn’t even have a spare penny.

If I’m honest, I was also a little scared of wandering too far. I didn’t have a map and I’d been to London only half a dozen times in my life. I was pretty certain I’d get lost if I set off on foot for Liberty’s Eastern Bazaar or the National Gallery or the Zoological Gardens. So I caught the three buses back home, clutching my precious parcel to my chest, and arrived just after lunch time.

‘I thought you were staying at Olivia’s for the day?’ said Mother. ‘I hope you’ve had lunch, because there’s hardly any cold meat left. I gave your father an extra slice because he’s been working so hard, bless him. And what’s that great big parcel you’re lugging around? Have you gone and bought yourself a sewing box too?’

‘It’s a paintbox,’ I said.

‘A paintbox? But you’ve got a perfectly good paintbox already,’ said Mother. ‘What a waste of your father’s money!’

‘It’s not at all a waste if it’s what Opal wants,’ said Father, sliding his slice of corned beef onto an extra plate and adding some beetroot and a tomato. ‘Here, Opal, have a bite of this. Is it a good paintbox, dear?’

‘It’s the best,’ I said. ‘The very, very best. Oh, Father, thank you so much.’

‘You’re more than welcome. You enjoy your paintbox.’

I painted my first picture for Father in gratitude. I painted him on a splendid throne, dressing him in a crimson smoking jacket, Prussian blue trousers and viridian Turkish slippers. He had a pen in his hand and was writing in a magnificent manuscript book. Mother stood looking up at him on his high throne. Her hands were clasped in admiration, her eyes rolled upwards in ecstasy. I’d made her look a little ridiculous, so I clothed her in her coveted blue silk in compensation. I drew Cassie and me kneeling at each side, looking suitably awed. I painted flowers in Cassie’s long hair and had her stitching busily at a preposterous hat on her lap. I painted my own new paintbox by my side, and myself painting on a sketching pad – a tiny version of the portrait of Father, with a pin-sized me painting a minute picture. I drew Billy the budgie flying over Father’s head, like a cobalt-blue representation of the Holy Ghost. I put the title of the painting right at the top in scarlet lettering:
Happy Days
.

Cassie came banging in and peered at my painting. ‘You’re so weird, Opal,’ she said. ‘And you’ve got the hat all wrong. Ladies don’t care for huge great hats all over flowers and fruit and feathers. Small is chic now, you silly girl.’

But when I shyly tapped at Father’s bedroom door to show him my painting, he was delighted.

‘Darling girl, it’s a witty little masterpiece. You’ve got all the likenesses just so, and it’s such a clever idea. You’ve got the most singular talent, Opal. I’m so proud of you.’

I felt as if I were growing blue feathers on my back like Billy’s, ready to fly me up to the ceiling. When the painting was completely dry, Father took down one of Mother’s insipid kitten lithographs, prised it out of its frame, and inserted my
Happy Days
painting under the glass.

He went to hang it above the mantelpiece in the living room.

‘Are you sure, Ernest?’ Mother asked.

‘Of course! Our Opal’s painted a little masterpiece,’ he said.

‘She
has
painted it very well, but I’m not at all sure about the composition. It looks a little like a copy of a holy picture,’ Mother said, lowering her voice.

‘Exactly!’ said Father. ‘That’s the whole point.’

‘But won’t visitors think it blasphemous?’

‘I should hope they’d appreciate its inventive homage.’ Father carefully hooked the string at the back of the frame over the nail in the wall. ‘There, in pride of place!’ he said.

Mother still looked extremely doubtful, but she didn’t like to argue with Father nowadays. It wasn’t worth fussing about visitors’ opinions because we very rarely
had
any visitors. Both Mother and Father had always kept themselves to themselves. Cassie had a whole gaggle of girlfriends, but she generally went to their houses or met them in the town after Sunday lunch. I just had my one friend, Olivia, and she liked my paintings.

Father went back to his work. He said he had finished the corrections and adaptations already, but he was copying out a new neat version to make it easier for the publishers to read. This took him many days. His wrists swelled painfully and his fingers were rubbed raw with the pressure of his pen, but he persisted industriously, and at long last finished it. He called us all to watch him write
The End
with a flourish. Then we all cheered and hugged him.

Mother took the precious manuscript to the post office in the morning and sent it off. ‘I actually kissed the parcel for luck!’ she said.

Then we started waiting. Waiting and waiting and waiting. We hoped Father might hear in a couple of days, a week at the very most. How long could it take to read a manuscript, after all? Another week went by, and then another.

‘Oh Lord, do you think Pa’s rewritten manuscript got lost in the post?’ said Cassie.

‘It couldn’t have. I sent it by express delivery,’ said Mother.

‘You
did
put your address on it, Father?’ I asked.

‘Of course he did! Don’t treat your father like a fool,’ Mother snapped. ‘Perhaps they’re very busy at the publishers, dealing with hundreds of manuscripts. We simply have to be patient.’

‘Unless . . .’ said Father. He looked very pale. ‘Unless they’ve decided they don’t want to publish it after all.’

‘Don’t!’ said Mother, putting her hands over his lips, as if she wanted to push the words back into his head. ‘Don’t you dare say that, Ernest. Of course that’s not true. Oh Lordy, I couldn’t bear the disappointment. We must be totally positive. Why, I’m sure the publishers’ letter will arrive first thing tomorrow, with a wonderful cheque attached.’

But we still heard nothing. Father sat down the next night to write a letter of enquiry to the publishers. He laboured over it for hours, sipping the whisky and water that had become a habit.

‘I have to get the tone right. I don’t want to appear querulous and demanding,’ he said. ‘But on the other hand, I don’t want to seem too meek and humble.’

He made half a dozen attempts but tore them all up. He drank another whisky and then thumped his fist on his knee. ‘I’m not going to write. I’ll go to their offices first thing tomorrow and ask, man to man.’

‘Oh, Ernest!’ said Mother. ‘Do you really think that’s wise? And how can you go to their offices during work hours? You don’t want to get another warning.’

‘I shall find a way,’ said Father grandly. ‘You told me to be positive, Lou.’

‘Oh, Ernest!’ Mother repeated, but there was more admiration than exasperation in her tone.

I didn’t think Father would go through with it in the clear light of day when he was stone cold sober. He was late coming home from work. Very late.

Mother and Cassie and I sat and gawped at each other in the kitchen, glancing at the clock every now and then.

‘Father’s late,’ Cassie said eventually, stating the obvious.

‘Perhaps if he was late into the office this morning, he had to stay later this evening?’ I suggested.

‘He’s not a naughty child doing detention at school,’ said Mother. She didn’t add
like you
, but it was clear that’s what she meant. She went to turn down the oven as far as she could. The roast beef spat inside, filling the room with its rich smell.

‘That beef’s going to be dry as a bone if I leave it in much longer,’ Mother moaned. ‘And it cost a small fortune at the butcher’s. I’ve run up such a bill lately. I don’t see how we’re going to pay it off if we don’t get that cheque soon.’

‘I’ve been offered another salon-soiled dress, the softest, subtlest shade of strawberry pink,’ said Cassie. ‘I know red-heads aren’t supposed to wear pink, but Madame Eva says it looks pretty on me even so – and I do think she’s right. She’s a friend of Madame Alouette so she’s offering me the dress at half price. It’s a wonderful bargain, but I’m still paying off the green gown and—’

‘Oh, Cassie, for goodness’ sake, don’t you ever think of anything but your wretched dresses?’ I said sharply.

‘Don’t start an argy-bargy, girls – my nerves can’t stand it,’ said Mother. She poked at the cabbage and carrots boiling on top of the stove. ‘These are being done to death too. Oh, I
did
want it to be a lovely meal. Your poor father has worked so hard. And he’s looking so very pale. He needs some good beef to give him a little boost.’ She looked at the clock again. ‘He’s never been this late before. Opal, run down the road and see if you can see any sign of him. Ask some of the gentlemen coming back from the City if there’s been any trouble with the buses.’

I ran out into the street, right down to the bus stop. I waited ten minutes for the next bus, and then glared at the gentlemen alighting, willing each and every one to change into my dear pa.

‘Please, sir, I’m waiting for my father and he’s very late. Has there been an accident anywhere? Have any of the buses been diverted?’

They all shook their heads in unison, giving me no comfort. I waited for the next bus, and the next. Still no Father. I knew I should go home, but I couldn’t bear the idea of being cooped up in the kitchen with Mother and Cassie again. I started marching up and down the streets just to give my legs something to do, walking all round the block in between each bus.

I walked past Victoria Park, where Father used to take Cassie and me to feed the ducks when we were little. I saw a man hunched on a bench beside the pond who looked a little like Father. I stopped, blinking hard. It was Father, sitting there all by himself, staring into space.

I felt my heart beating hard beneath my tunic. I hurried towards him. He must have heard my footsteps on the stony path, but he didn’t look up. I sat down beside him on the bench. He still stared straight ahead.

‘Father?’ I whispered.

He started and then turned towards me. ‘Hello, Opal! What are you doing here?’ he said. He looked paler than ever and his eyes were bloodshot.

‘Oh, Father, we’ve been worried about you. It’s so late!’ I cried.

‘Late?’ Father pulled his pocket watch out of his waistcoat pocket. ‘Oh my goodness, so it is! I expect your mother will be wondering where we are.’

‘Yes, she has supper all ready.’ I swallowed hard. ‘So why are you sitting here? Why didn’t you come straight home?’

‘I just took a fancy to have a little stroll first. I’ve always loved this park. Remember when you and Cassie were children?’

‘Yes, you always took us to feed the ducks with stale bread.’

‘
Very
stale – but you would always have a little nibble on a crust too,’ said Father. ‘I used to call you my Jemima Puddleduck, remember?’

‘And I’d go
quack, quack, quack
,’ I said.

We both chuckled, but the laughter didn’t sound right at all. I reached out and put my hand over Father’s. It was a warm evening, but his hand was icy.

‘You’re so cold, Father! Have you been sitting here for ages?’ I said.

‘I suppose I have,’ he said. He tried to squeeze my hand reassuringly. ‘Don’t look so worried, Opal. I’m perfectly fine.’

‘Oh, Father, don’t! Has something dreadful happened?’ I couldn’t hold back any longer. ‘Did the publishers tell you they don’t want your novel after all?’ I felt the tears running down my cheeks because I was so sad for him.

‘Hey, hey, you mustn’t cry, little Opal,’ said Father, gently dabbing at my tears with his cold fingertips. ‘No, you’ve got hold of the wrong end of the stick. The publishers love my book. They think it’s vastly improved now I’ve done all the corrections. They all clapped me on the back and called me an excellent chap.’

I stared at Father. He had tears in his own eyes but he was smiling determinedly.

‘Is that really true, Father?’ I whispered.

‘Yes! Yes indeed.’

‘Then why didn’t you come rushing straight home to tell us?’

‘Oh dear, you sound like a little Sherlock Holmes now! I suppose I just needed a bit of peace and quiet to let it all sink in. I couldn’t concentrate properly at work. Oh Lord, what a day! The happiest day of my life. Our little Billy bird is so right.
Happy days, happy days.
’