Dream On

Contents

About the Book

About the Author

Also by Gilda O'Neill

Title Page

Dedication

Book One

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Book Two

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Copyright

Ginny has a dream. Of getting on and getting out. But trapped in a loveless marriage to Ted – handsome, charming and a violent bully – and trying to survive in a shell-shocked, post-war East End, she sees little chance of it.

Then she meets the glamorous Leila in a West End club and is introduced to a brave new world. A world she never knew existed. And Leila shows her how – if she plays her cards right – she could make her dreams come true.

Gilda O'Neill was born and brought up in the East End. She left school at fifteen but returned to education as a mature student. She wrote full-time and continued to live in the East End with her husband and family. Sadly she died on 24 September 2010 after a short illness.

FICTION

The Cockney Girl

Whitechapel Girl

The Bells of Bow

Just Around the Corner

Cissie Flowers

Playing Around

Getting There

The Sins of Their Fathers

Make Us Traitors

Of Woman Born

Rough Justice

Secrets of the Heart

Lost Voices

Lights of London

NON
-
FICTION

Pull No More Bines: An Oral History of East London Women Hop Pickers

A Night Out with the Girls: Women Having Fun

My East End: Memories of Life in Cockney London

Our Street: East End Life in the Second World War

The Good Old Days: Crime, Murder and Mayhem in Victorian London

East End Tales (Quick Reads)

For Tanja Howarth

All too many writers gush their thanks to their agents and their publishers as almost a knee-jerk reaction, but seeing as my agent (and dear friend) Tanja Howarth was clever enought to get me published by Louise Moore, what else can I say but thanks?

As with all my previous novels,
Dream On
is set in a real place during a real time, but I have created the characters and some of the street names especially for the story.

‘
GINNY? GIN? IT'S
only me.'

Dilys Chivers was shouting at the top of her voice as she barged, uninvited, through the open street door and along the narrow passageway of number 18 Bailey Street.

‘Come on, you lot,' she went on, throwing her coat over the end of the banisters, ‘if you don't get a move on, you know what'll happen. That greedy mare from number 20 will have stuffed all the grub. She'll be dancing with all the fellers. And you'll all still be—'

As she stuck her head round the kitchen doorway, Dilys quite uncharacteristically shut her mouth and stood stock still in puzzled silence.

Sitting in the kitchen, hunched over the little scrubbed table, nursing a cup of tea, was a miserable-looking middle-aged woman. ‘All right, Dilys?' she muttered.

‘Whatever's the matter, Nellie?' Dilys, recovering her composure, pulled out a chair and sat herself down opposite the woman. It looked as though there might be a story to glean here and, young and pretty as she was, Dilys was as partial to a bit of gossip as any of the elderly battleaxes of Bailey Street.

‘Honest, Nell,' she went on, pulling off her hat and tossing it on to the table between them, ‘you look just like you wanna go for a' – she flashed her eyebrows – ‘
you know
. But you've gone and lost the key to the lavatory door.'

‘It's this party, ain't it?' Nellie answered, her lips pursing in self-pitying anger. ‘I can't go, can I?' She tilted her head to one side and stared sorrowfully into the middle distance over Dilys's shoulder. ‘And after surviving all them years of war an' all. Putting up with the Blitz, and what with the doodlebugs . . .'

Dilys might have relished a bit of scandal, but putting up with Nellie Martin's tale of woe was a price she wasn't prepared to pay. Dilys had never been a patient sort of person, and while she wanted the full story, she didn't fancy the boring moaning bits that looked like going with it.

‘You just forget all about them bad memories, Nell,' Dilys said briskly, slapping her palms on the table. ‘You just tell me what this is all about.' She paused, then added firmly: ‘Briefly, like.'

Nellie's lips twitched. ‘It's her, ain't it?'

It took Dilys a moment. ‘D'you mean Ginny?'

‘Yeah,' spat Nellie, unable even to speak her daughter-in-law's name.

‘What on earth's she done to get you into this state?' Dilys's forehead pleated into a frown; this was getting really confusing.

While there wasn't exactly any great love lost between Nellie and Ginny, they usually managed to rub along well enough together. With Ginny keeping her mouth shut and doing as she was told by her husband – Nellie's son – and with Nellie not giving a bugger about anyone but herself, in its way, the household functioned. So all this upset, especially on a day like today, well, it just didn't make sense.

‘If you must know, she's shut herself in the bloody front bedroom and won't come down, that's what.' Nellie spread her hands in wretched supplication. ‘How am I meant to go to the party by myself, Dilys, eh? You tell me that. I'll be a laughing stock. Everyone'll have their families with them – except me. And I can just see that Florrie Robins . . .'

Nellie paused for a moment, visualising the woman who was her oldest friend and, therefore, her oldest rival. ‘I know her. She'll be sitting round there at her daughter's street party in St Stephen's Road, with all her grandchildren round her, acting like flaming Lady Muck, while they all wait on her, and fuss over her, and make sure the old cow's got everything she wants.'

Nellie's face puckered in on itself until she looked exactly as though she was sucking a lemon. ‘And you know what everyone'll be saying, don't you? I can just hear 'em. But I swear on my life, Dilys, he never so much as touched—'

‘Hang on, Nell,' Dilys interrupted, ‘why're you so worried about Ginny not going with you? You can go with your Ted, can't you?'

‘Him!' sneered Nellie, astonishing Dilys by showering her son's name with almost as much venom as she would probably have trowelled on to her daughter-in-law's – had she allowed her name to pass her lips. ‘You wanna ask
her
about
him
.'

Nellie lifted her chin and stabbed her thumb ceiling-wards. It was a gesture reminiscent of the one that the minister from the local evangelical hall used when he admonished the sinners, telling them they should be listening with their hearts to the Lord of Heaven, and not with their throats to the landlord of the Prince Albert. But it would have been obvious, even to the unbeliever, that Nellie's reference was not exactly reverential.

‘Go on,' she hissed, ‘you go up and see if you can get any sense outta the snivelling little mare, 'cos I'll be buggered if I can.'

‘Gin. Gin, it's only me, babe.' Dilys's voice was tender and wheedling as she tapped gently on the door. ‘Come on, girl, let me in, eh?'

A muffled sob came from inside the bedroom.

Dilys stuck her ear to the door. ‘What was that?'

There was another low whimper.

‘What?' Dilys knelt down and squinted through the keyhole, as though it would help her hear more clearly. ‘Speak up, Gin. I mean, I can't help you if I can't hear you, now can I?'

Ginny blew her nose loudly, then croaked in a tear-sodden voice: ‘Leave me alone, Dil, please. Just leave me.'

‘As if I'd do that, you dopey cow.' Discarding the softly-softly approach, Dilys gave the doorknob a good rattle. ‘Now you either open this door, Ginny Martin, or I'm gonna go along to Tommy Fowler's and borrow his ladders. And then I'll stick 'em up against your front wall and I'll climb in through the bloody bedroom window. How'd you fancy that!'

She paused, listening for a response. ‘I mean it, Ginny. You know me.'

Ginny did indeed know Dilys – for as long as either of them could remember, in fact – and Ginny also knew that once Dilys Chivers had made up her mind about something, there was no stopping her. And Ginny didn't much relish the idea of having her clambering up the outside of the house and messing up all her VE-Day decorations. Especially not in full view of the neighbours, who had all been out in the drizzle-slicked cobbled street getting the party ready since first light.

With weary resignation, Ginny decided she had no choice. ‘Hang on, Dil,' she sniffled, ‘I'm coming.'

‘I knew you would.' Dilys grinned in self-satisfied triumph as she straightened up from the keyhole. She smoothed the silky fabric of her new dress down over her thighs, tossed her head and patted her dark, shiny, permanently waved hair back into place with a little sigh of contentment.

The bedroom door opened and Ginny stood there, her head bowed and her arms dangling loosely by her sides.

‘Blimey, Gin, will you just look at yourself,' chirped Dilys without a trace of compassion in her voice. ‘You look worse than Nellie and that's saying something. Whatever's got into the pair of you?'

Without even pausing for a reply Dilys executed a neat little pirouette on the tiny lino-covered landing, flung out her arms in best pin-up style, dropped her chin and peered seductively through her lashes. ‘Well?' she demanded. ‘Ain't you gonna say nothing about me new frock, then?'

Before Ginny had the chance even to wonder how Dilys had managed to get something as expensive-looking as that – when they both knew she'd used up all her clothing coupons ages ago – Dilys was shoving her back into the bedroom.

‘So,' she whispered conspiratorially, rolling her eyes and jerking her head towards the door in the general direction of the stairs, where Dilys presumed Nellie would be standing earwigging – just as she would have been doing in her position – ‘what's been going on with her down there, then?'

Ginny slumped on to the double bed she shared with her husband and started picking at a loose quilting stitch on the pink satin eiderdown.

‘Come on, Gin, you know you can tell me.'

Ginny shrugged. ‘I dunno, Dil, do I.' She shook her head, making her soft blonde curls bounce around her face. ‘I really don't.'

‘For Gawd's sake, Ginny, pull yourself together girl. You're like looking at a bleed'n' wet weekend. Even Violet Varney's making more effort than you.' Dilys gestured dramatically towards the window and the street beyond. ‘That woman was out there last night till all hours doing up her front with a bit o' bunting.'

‘So was I.'

Dilys huffed dismissively. ‘Yeah, but her old man's in a bloody prisoner of war camp.'

Ginny looked up at her pitifully. ‘At least she knows her Bert'll be home soon.'

‘Whatever you on about now?'

Ginny turned her head so that Dilys couldn't see her tears. ‘Look, Dilys, I know how much Nellie's looking forward to the party and I really hate letting her down, 'cos I know it ain't her fault, it's mine. And I feel terrible. But I can't go out there. I just can't.'