Daughters of Liverpool (12 page)

Exhilarated by this success, Emily had gone on to inform Con that after her parents’ deaths Jenny had written to her begging her for help.

‘The poor girl had not only lost her parents, she had also been informed that her husband had been listed as missing at sea, presumed drowned,’ Emily informed Con, adding that she had often visited Jenny in the shabby boarding house close to the docks where she had been living, and that was how she had got to know Jenny’s little boy.

‘Jenny made me promise that if anything should happen to her I would take Tommy in. She’d even told Tommy that herself, but you still could have knocked me down with a feather when this police constable turned up last night to say that the house had been bombed and that Jenny’s last words had been that Tommy was to come to me.’ She embroidered her story now, returning her duster to her pocket and then removing it again when she spotted a few specks of dust on the mahogany-framed mirror that hung over the marble fireplace.

‘Well, if you ask me she’d got no right foisting her kid off on us. Kids are expensive, and we aren’t made of money.’

‘It’s my duty, Con, and I’d never be able to live
with myself if I turned the boy away. Mind you, I know what you mean about the expense.’

Con’s face brightened and Emily almost found it in her heart to feel slightly sorry for him. Almost.

‘We could easily cancel them two new suits you’ve got on order, and there’s no need for you to go on running a car. You could walk to the theatre from here, or catch a bus.’

‘Now hold on a minute, Emily. I need that car, you know that. We both agreed that it wouldn’t look good for the theatre if I was to be seen dropping me standards.’

‘No, Con, we did not both agree. You told me, just as I am now telling you that the boy stays.’

Con looked at her, and then gave her his most charming and coaxing smile, coming towards her and reaching for her hand. Emily let him take it, even though the sensation of him holding it between her own in a gesture of mock tenderness, reminded her of all those other times when he had used his charm and her vulnerability to it, his lack of feeling for her and her excess of it for him, to blandish and bully her into giving way to him. But not this time. This time she had something far more worthwhile to fight for than Con’s nonexistent love. This time she wasn’t fighting for herself, she was fighting for the boy.

Baffled as well as irritated by the fact that within such a short space of time his normally easy-to-manipulate wife had somehow conducted a campaign in which he had been well and truly routed, Con retreated behind a wall of sulky silence, which he had to break himself after ten
minutes of being totally ignored by Emily to tell her in an aggrieved voice, ‘If you’re not going to listen to reason then I might as well go back to the theatre.’

‘Yes, you might,’ Emily agreed unperturbed, mentally planning to take the boy straight down to one of the WVS rest centres as soon as Con had gone so that she could buy him enough secondhand clothes to tide him over until she could get him something decent. She could do with seeing that coal man as well. She was going to need some decent food to fatten the boy up a bit, rationing or no rationing, and if Con made a fuss about it, well, then she’d make a fuss about that car of his, and they’d see which one of them won!

‘Well, Katie, how are you settling in?’

Katie smiled politely at the supervisor, who had called her over to the raised table overlooking the rows of desks where the girls worked.

It was still early – not yet nine o’clock – and Miss Foster had the supervisors’ desk to herself.

‘I’m really enjoying the work, Miss Foster,’ Katie answered truthfully.

Miss Foster – Frosty Foster, as the others had nicknamed her – inclined her head.

She was taller than Katie, and very slim, thin almost, with sharp narrow shoulders and long hands that were unexpectedly large. Her hair was mousy brown and cut in a neat bob, her eyes a pale icy blue.

Typically, Carole said that it was no wonder she had never married. ‘She’d freeze a chap with one look,’ she had giggled.

No one was quite sure how old Miss Foster was, although Carole had said that she must be in her thirties. Like Katie, Miss Foster had been recruited into her censorship post, and had not
come to it, as so many of the girls had, from the original staff employed by Littlewoods.

Carole claimed that because of this the supervisor looked down on them, and there had been several small clashes between them, with Miss Foster trying to impose her authority on Carole, and Carole deliberately flouting it by pretending she hadn’t heard Miss Foster’s instructions. Carole defended her rebelliousness by saying that she wasn’t having Miss Foster bossing her about, but Anne had warned Carole to be careful, pointing out that whilst she was currently getting away with her behaviour it would not have gone unnoticed, and could rebound on her.

‘It’s obvious that Frosty Foster thinks she’s better than us, and I’m not putting up with that,’ Carole had told Katie.

‘Well, I suppose in one way she is, since she’s our supervisor,’ Katie had felt bound to point out.

‘No, I don’t mean that kind of better,’ Carole had told her. ‘I mean, you know, she thinks she’s “better” than us. Just look at the way she walks around like she’s got a bad smell under her nose.’

Katie knew what Carole meant and now she felt a small burn of anxiety as the supervisor looked at her for a minute before saying pointedly, ‘I would caution you, Katie, in your own interests, to be on your guard against certain of your fellow workers, some of whom do not take their responsibilities as seriously as I can see that you do. I shall not mention any names, but I think you can guess to whom I refer.’

Katie knew that Miss Foster must be referring to Carole but of course she didn’t say so.

‘A certain person could well find herself looking for work more suited to her nature before too long, unless she mends her ways,’ Miss Foster continued.

Katie wanted to defend her friend and tell the supervisor that, despite her outwardly careless manner, there was another side to Carole. She had shown Katie nothing but kindness, and was always ready to explain something that Katie didn’t understand and to answer her questions, but Katie knew as well that Carole had deliberately gone out of her way to bait and provoke the supervisor.

‘Don’t be led into trouble yourself out of loyalty to a friend,’ Miss Foster warned Katie, dismissing her with a brisk nod.

‘What was old Frosty Face saying to you then?’ Carole, who had arrived at work whilst the supervisor was still talking to Katie, asked once she had returned to their desk.

Katie hated having to be deceitful, but she could hardly tell Carole the truth and say that Miss Foster had been warning her against becoming too friendly with Carole herself.

‘Nothing much,’ she answered, but she knew that she was blushing guiltily as she did so.

‘Do you reckon the Luftwaffe will be over again tonight?’ someone further down the table asked worriedly, changing the conversation, much to Katie’s relief.

‘I hope not,’ Anne answered.

‘Me too.’ Carole smothered a yawn. ‘I need me
kip in a proper bed. I haven’t got over Saturday night at the Grafton yet, and tomorrow’s Christmas Eve.

‘Do you fancy coming down the Grafton with me again tomorrow night, Katie?’ she asked.

‘I can’t,’ Katie told her. ‘I’ve already said that I’ll go to midnight mass with the Campions.’

Carole pulled a face. ‘I suppose I’ll have to try and get me cousin to go with me then, only she’s courting now and doesn’t want to go anywhere without her chap. I was hoping that them army lads might be there again, especially that Andy, the handsome fair-haired one,’ she added wistfully.

‘I thought this time last year that it would all be over quickly, but look at us now: we’ve been at war over a year and no end anywhere near in sight,’ Jean sighed.

She and Katie were hanging up the paper chains that Katie had patiently spent the afternoon repairing.

‘Mind you,’ Jean shook her head and laughed, ‘I was just remembering how our Luke had got leave from France without us knowing and arrived home whilst we were all at church. You should have seen the twins’ faces when they saw that the mince pies we’d left for Father Christmas had gone. Of course, it was Luke who had eaten them.’

‘It must have been a wonderful surprise to have him home,’ Katie smiled, deftly dabbing glue onto another of the torn paper links.

It was next to impossible now to buy new decorations, or even to buy brightly coloured paper in
order to make them, because of the war. Paper of any kind was precious and not to be wasted.

‘Oh, yes, it was,’ Jean agreed. ‘I’m hoping that Luke will get leave this Christmas as well, even if it’s only for Christmas Day.’ Jean gave her young billetee a sympathetic look. ‘It will be hard for you, Katie, this being your first Christmas away from your parents.’

Katie didn’t say anything. Christmas had always been one of her father’s busiest times and Christmas Day had had to be planned around his work, so that Katie had never really known the kind of traditional Christmas Day that Jean’s children had obviously enjoyed, and whilst of course she knew she would miss her parents, a part of her was looking forward to experiencing Christmas Day at the Campions’ with almost childlike excitement and anticipation, although she felt too self-conscious to say as much.

‘There, I think this one will be long enough now,’ she told Jean, eyeing her handiwork.

The flames from the fire were sending out warm tongues of light that danced with the shadows, the occasional hiss of a damp coal a familiar and homely sound.

The Government had increased everyone’s food ration for Christmas, and Katie had insisted on passing on her rations to Jean to go into the ‘family’ pot.

‘It’s the least I can do,’ she had insisted when Jean had protested.

Katie wasn’t a spendthrift, and the wages she earned for her work seemed like riches compared
with the ‘pocket money’ her father had given her, and so she had been able to buy gifts for the Campions in return for their hospitality.

‘You’ve done a really good job on that, Katie,’ Jean approved, looking up from her own task of tying labels to the brightly wrapped Christmas presents spread out on the floor all around her, much of the paper carefully kept from the previous Christmas, as the war meant that paper was in short supply and could only be used sparingly. ‘And ever so quickly and neatly,’ she added with a warm smile. ‘If I’d have asked the twins we’d have ended up with glue everywhere and the paper chain in more of a state than it was before they started.’

‘I enjoyed doing it,’ Katie told her truthfully.

It was lovely and cosy with the fire lit, the paper streamers spread out on the floor adding an air of Christmas magic and excitement.

‘I’ll get the step ladders from under the stairs and we’ll make a start on getting them up. Oh, just listen to that.’ Jean looked up at the ceiling as they both heard the sound of the twins’ newest gramophone dance record coming down from their attic bedroom. ‘It’s just as well their dad isn’t here, otherwise he’d be going up there to tell them to turn it down.’

The music was one of the pacey new American dance tunes that were becoming so popular and Katie acknowledged that its rhythm was making her own feet itch to dance just a little, as she helped Jean with the step ladders, insisting that she should be the one to stand on them whilst Jean held the ladders.

Katie had secured one end of the first streamer to the room’s neat plain coving with two drawing pins, and they had moved the ladders over to the opposite corner of the room, only to discover that the garland might not quite reach it, when they both heard Grace’s voice calling out from the kitchen.

‘Hello, Mum, it’s only us.’

A delighted smile lit up Jean’s face. ‘In here, love,’ she called back, ‘putting up the decorations.’

Grace and her fiancé, Seb, appeared in the doorway, Seb’s arm around Grace, who was wearing a lovely coat in a soft mid-blue, with a darling little matching hat trimmed with petersham ribbon, which emphasised her lovely skin and strawberry-blonde hair.

‘You look very smart,’ Jean told her daughter, as she went to hug first Grace and then Seb.

‘It’s Seb’s Christmas present to me,’ Grace told her mother, giving her fiancé a glowing smile.

It was plain to see how much in love they were, and Katie could easily understand why Jean liked Seb so much. Tall and good-looking, he had a steadfastness about his smile and the way he looked at a person that made you feel immediately comfortable and aware that he was someone you could trust, Katie decided.

‘Katie, come down off the ladder and be properly introduced to Seb,’ Grace instructed her warmly.

‘I hear from Grace that you and I are in the same line of business,’ Seb told Katie as he shook her hand, adding in a very reassuring way, as Grace
went to take off her coat and Jean went with her, as though he had realised she was feeling a bit uncertain, ‘It’s all right, I know you aren’t allowed to talk about your work in any detail. It’s the same for me. I’m in the “Y” Section. We do what could be considered to be the equivalent of your work but in an airwaves form.’

Katie smiled in relief, admitting, ‘It’s difficult when people ask me what I do. I know we can say that we work at the Censorship Office …’

‘But you worry that you might accidentally say more than you should?’ Seb supplied.

‘Yes, that’s it exactly.’ Katie was relieved that he understood.

‘I felt pretty much the same myself when I first started, but after a while one develops an instinct that becomes second nature. If it’s any help to you I find that most decent sorts understand and accept that it’s your duty not to talk about your work. I tend to use that as rule of thumb, if ever I’m in any doubt. Anyone who tries to bully you into going against your own instincts is someone to treat rather warily, in my experience.’

What a kind man he was, Katie thought, to have understood her dilemma and found such a tactful way of offering her the benefit of his advice.

Jean and Grace had come back into the room, the fitted blue dress Grace was wearing showing off her neat waist so well that Katie was not surprised to see Seb’s glance resting lovingly on his fiancée, before he gallantly offered to take Katie’s place on the ladder.

Soon he was deftly pinning up the recalcitrant
end of a paper streamer, and somehow managing to make it stretch to the corner of the room, before moving the ladders to pin up the second garland.

‘Well, that looks lovely now,’ said Jean happily, five minutes later, standing back to admire the effect of the two red and green streamers going corner to corner across the room, crossing over in the centre above the light fitting.

‘I thought we were going to have a problem with the new tree lights that your dad got after the warehouse they were in was bombed, but, bless him, he managed to sort them out. Just as well, really, because the candle holders were on their last legs, and I always worried about them setting the tree on fire. We certainly had our money’s worth out of them, mind you. Your dad bought them the year the twins were born. That was the year you had that lovely smocked party dress, Grace. Ever so pretty you looked in it.’

Katie felt a small pang of envy as she listened to these reminiscences. Her own sharpest Christmas memory was of the terrible row between her parents the Christmas Eve they had promised to take her to Harrods to see the lights. Katie couldn’t remember now what the row had been about but she did remember that there had not been the trip to Harrods.

‘We can’t stay long, Mum,’ Grace warned her mother, ‘but like I said to Seb, it wouldn’t seem properly Christmas somehow if I hadn’t seen you.’

‘Go on with you, you softie,’ Jean admonished her daughter, but Katie could see that she was
pleased. ‘Your dad should be back any minute if you can hang on, and the twins are upstairs.’

‘I’ll go and tell them, shall I?’ Katie volunteered, thinking that it would also give her a chance to disappear tactfully and leave the family alone together, but once she had told the twins that their sister had arrived, they were insistent that she must go back downstairs with them.

By the time the three of them were down to the front room, Grace and Jean were busily exchanging brightly wrapped Christmas presents, and when Grace turned to Katie with a warm smile and handed her a small parcel, Katie was relieved that she had followed her own instincts and was able to say truthfully, ‘I won’t be a minute; I’ll just nip upstairs and get yours.’

Since she didn’t know Grace well, Katie had taken a guess that as a newly engaged girl she would be keen to start collecting for her bottom drawer, and when Katie had seen a pair of pretty pillowcases being sold off in a small shop that was closing down, she had taken the opportunity to buy them, and wrap them up just in case Grace included her in her own Christmas shopping.

‘No opening anything until Christmas Day,’ Jean warned everyone, firmly taking possession of the presents Grace was handing out, much to the twins’ disappointment. ‘And that goes for you too, Grace.’

‘Have you heard if Luke’s going to get leave over Christmas yet?’ Grace asked her mother.

‘No. He did say, though, that even if he hasn’t got proper leave he’d try to bob round just to say Happy Christmas.’