Two Penn'orth of Sky (10 page)

‘Then, if you’ve got the keys, all we need is directions . . . only it might be better if you came with us this first time, Mrs Wesley, in case anyone queries our right to be in the house,’ Carl Johansson said, interrupting her thoughts. ‘Or you could send the maid with us, if you’re busy.’

But Emmy decided at once to go herself. She was ashamed of the state of the house, ashamed that it was such a poor place, but the men were here to put that right. So she went with them, unlocking the door of No. 2 and ushering them inside. ‘It’s in an awful state,’ she said, trying to make her voice matter-of-fact and not apologetic, which is what she felt. ‘But you knew it was pretty bad, I dare say.’

‘We’ll see to it, missus,’ one of the ratings said. ‘Gawd, some people ruin everything they touch, don’t they? But it’s a decent enough little place, an’ in a couple o’ days it’ll be a palace, compared to what it is now.’ He smiled reassuringly at Emmy. ‘So just you take yourself back ’ome an’ start packin’ up, an’ let us get on here.’

Thanking him, Emmy looked at him properly for the first time. He was small, grey-haired and fatherly-looking and he had not been at all shocked by the size and state of the property; probably, she realised, because he lived somewhere very similar himself.

Emmy turned towards the door, bidding Mr Johansson farewell as she did so. ‘It’s most awfully
good of you,’ she said, in her best Lancaster Avenue manner. ‘I’m moving in, all being well, a week today. Do you really think . . . ?’

This time, Emmy did not miss the quick glance from Mr Johansson to the elderly rating, nor did she fail to note the rating’s emphatic nod. Mr Johansson was nice, and an officer, but it was this small, elderly man who would oversee the work and make sure it was done properly. However, it was Mr Johansson who answered. ‘Why, with a whole week to go, you’ve no fears that the place won’t be ready, Mrs Wesley. In fact, if you’ve linoleum which wants laying or curtains which want hanging, get them here in, say, three days, and we’ll put them up for you.’

‘Wharrabout shelves, missus?’ one of the other ratings asked. ‘I’m a chippy an’ I could put a row of shelves in the parlour, and there’s room in the kitchen for a load of shelving – unless you’re bringin’ cupboards an’ dressers an’ that wi’ you?’

Emmy looked rather helplessly from the carpenter to Mr Johansson. She realised she had not given any thought to the practicalities of living in a house without a servant. Oh, she had chosen the furniture she would bring with her, but she had assumed – wrongly, obviously – that a kitchen would have such things as cookers, sinks and cupboards provided. Now, looking around her, she realised that apart from the closed stove and the low stone sink and wooden draining boards, the room was empty. There had been shelves – she could see the nails still protruding from the wall in places and guessed that the Vaughans had either used the shelving to fuel the fire or taken the wooden boards when they did their moonlight flit. Conscience-stricken, she recalled the room as it had been in her childhood. What a
fool she was! Her mother had had a big old Welsh dresser on one wall, several cupboards containing crockery, pots and pans and the like, rows of hooks from which she had hung strings of onions and bunches of herbs, and, of course, the big kitchen table upon which she had done her baking. Then there had been the rag rug in front of the fire, the battered easy chairs, with their homemade cushions, the clock on the mantelpiece . . .

But the men were staring at her; hastily, Emmy burst into speech. ‘My present kitchen is a fitted one so I can scarcely bring it with me! But there is a dresser and a table, of course, and – and something called a maid-saver, which is a cupboard with glass doors so you can see what’s in it. I’ll bring all those things but I’d be very grateful for shelving and – and some hooks. I’ll pay for the materials, of course,’ she added.

‘Don’t you worry your head about it, missus; it’s all to be provided,’ the carpenter said. ‘Mr Johansson here says we’re a-goin’ to help you move your stuff over, so I’ll know where to put the shelves once the dresser an’ that arrive.’

Very pink-faced and mumbling more thanks, Emmy headed for the door. As she made her way back to Lancaster Avenue, she thought that she would really have to take herself in hand. I lived in Nightingale Court for the first nineteen years of my life, she reminded herself savagely, as she joined the queue at the tram stop. The trouble is that Mam did everything for me. For all of those nineteen years, I hardly lifted a finger in the house; why, I actually let my mam do my ironing, and she even darned my silk stockings when one got laddered. Then there was Peter, who saw to it that I never lifted a finger in my own house either. I had Mam to clean and
cook for me when I was first married, and when Diana came along Mam did things like nappy washing and making up bottles as well. Then, when she died, dear little Lucy did just about everything. She looked after Diana and managed the house and ran all my messages and treated me like a perishin’ queen, but now I’ve got to forget all that and start managing for myself. After all, Beryl’s coped for years and she’s a good friend. She’ll put me in the way of things, teach me how to keep house. Oh, thank goodness for Beryl!

‘Oh, Mammy, I love my bedroom, so I do! And isn’t Mr Reynolds kind? He’s put up all those lovely shelves along one wall of my room and he says next time the old
Queen
is in port, he’ll come back an’ put doors on so my toys won’t get dusty. Becky and me’s been ever so busy unpacking the boxes and putting my stuff on the shelves, but we’ve come down for elevenses, ’cos you get really hungry and thirsty when you’re working hard, don’t you, Mammy?’

Emmy had been washing china at the sink but swung round and smiled at Diana and Becky as they burst into the room. ‘I know what you mean and I could do with a cuppa myself,’ she admitted. ‘Just let me finish these cups and I’ll cut you some bread and you can butter it. I’m afraid there’s no milk, but if I give you sixpence, perhaps you could go down to the shop on the corner and buy yourselves lemonade.’

Even as she made the offer, Emmy felt guilty. She had always impressed upon Peter the importance of milk in a child’s diet, yet here she was, on her very first day in her new home, letting Diana and Becky drink lemonade because it was easier. She had asked about milk delivery – in Lancaster Avenue, the milkman had left three pints on the doorstep each day – but this had only caused Beryl to give a short laugh. ‘Milk delivery, chuck?’ she had said incredulously. ‘In the court? No one delivers here . . .
don’t you remember? That’s why most of us has conny-onny in our tea.’

Emmy had pretended to remember – she certainly did remember the conny-onny – but in fact, the delivery or non-delivery of milk had been her mother’s business. When she was in her teens, her mother had occasionally sent her to Jane McCann’s on Silvester Street to buy fresh milk, or butter, eggs or cheese. At the time, the young Emmy had not known about milk delivery, so had never thought to question it. Now, she thought crossly, she was having to learn things which she felt she should have known. But at least Diana and I are learning together, she consoled herself, handing the child a sixpenny bit. ‘Now don’t go further than the corner,’ she told her daughter. ‘You’re too little to go wandering the streets. It isn’t as if you had an older brother or sister who could go with you, see you across roads and so on.’

Diana, on her way to the kitchen door, turned back. ‘Charlie would go with us if we gave him a penny for his trouble, like Aunty Beryl does,’ she said persuasively. ‘He and Lenny do Aunty Beryl’s messages as soon as they’ve had breakfast. He’d do ours as well, Mammy, if we asked him.’

‘No, Diana. It’s only a bottle of lemonade, not a whole lot of shopping, and you and Becky won’t really even have to leave the courts, not if you go to the shop on the corner,’ she said. ‘Another day perhaps we’ll ask Charlie to get our shopping when he gets Aunty Beryl’s, but for today you and Becky can either go, or drink water.’

At this harsh remark, Diana’s eyes flew wide open in pained surprise, but she raised no more objections and the small girls clattered down the hallway and out through the front door. Emmy finished washing
the last of the china and turned to survey her new domain. The men had made an excellent job of it. The walls were snowy with whitewash and the shelving which Mr Reynolds had erected had been painted sunshine yellow, giving the room a far brighter appearance than most of the other kitchens in the court. They had done wonders in the parlour, too. They had distempered the walls in a pleasant shade which, one of the men had told her, was called deep cream. The carpet with roses on it from Lancaster Avenue had been reverently laid on the floor, after the boards had been sanded and then waxed until they shone pale gold. Emmy’s beloved chint-zupholstered chairs and sofa just about fitted in, and the china cabinet, which contained all the pieces Emmy most valued, stood by the fireplace, the empty grate hidden by a fire screen embroidered with roses.

Upstairs, the two bedrooms on the first floor were practical rather than pretty, though Mr Reynolds had done his best. Emmy’s double bed was flanked by a wardrobe and a washstand, which had been bought cheap from Paddy’s Market on the Scotland Road – there had been no room for Emmy’s bedroom suite – and Diana’s little room held her bed, another cheap washstand and the shelving which Mr Reynolds had put up for her toys. Because the houses were terraced and back to back, all the windows overlooked the court itself, and there was no denying that it was a pretty dreary outlook. Once, when the houses had first been built, they must have been a cheery red brick with whitewashed steps and, no doubt, sparkling windows, but now, getting on for a century later, the bricks were blackened, the windows usually dirty and the steps – or the steps opposite No. 2, at least – more grey than white. It wasn’t that no one
cared, it was the grime from factory chimneys, warehouses and the railway, which had blackened the bricks and made it impossible for whitened steps to remain so.

Emmy glanced once more round her kitchen, then decided she simply had to get out of here, if only for a few minutes. It was probably because there was no back door, no means of entering or leaving except through the court itself, which suddenly made her feel as if she was boxed up and someone was hammering the last nail into the lid of the box, but, whatever it was, Emmy grabbed her short jacket from its hook on the back of the door, jingled a few coins into her pocket and set off in pursuit of Diana and Becky. I’ll buy a few biscuits so we can have something to eat with our elevenses, she thought wildly, and then remembered that, though she had brought her tea caddy with her, she had not got any milk. Irritatingly, she felt tears rise to her eyes and despised herself for such weakness. She was determined to be independent, yet she suddenly felt she would die if she didn’t have a cup of tea. She was about to turn back, to borrow some milk off someone, when she remembered Beryl’s remark about condensed milk. Of course, she could buy conny-onny at any corner shop, and once the tin was in her possession she would be able to have tea as long as the tea leaves in the caddy lasted. Briskly, Emmy dashed her hand across her eyes, straightened her drooping shoulders, and made for the corner shop. Over the last few years, she had stopped taking sugar in her tea because she wanted to keep her slim figure, but what did that matter now? Peter had been proud of her looks, of her eighteen-inch waist and long, slim legs, but who was there to care, now, if she
drank tea with conny-onny in it and got as fat as a balloon? Come to that, the thought of a cup of hot, sweet tea was downright comforting and Emmy knew she needed comfort almost more than anything else.

‘Mammy! We’ve got the lemonade but why’s you out here? Did you want some more messages? Shall we go back to Mr Hedges’ shop? He’s a funny man, Mammy; he axed us if we wanted to put it on the slate and then he laughed and gave Becky and me an iced gem each.’ It was Diana, one cheek distended by the iced gem, both arms cradling the bottle of lemonade as though it were her dearest child. ‘If you take the lemonade, Mammy, we’ll go back to Mr Hedges for you.’

Emmy, however, refused this offer. ‘We’ll all go back together,’ she said, with a gaiety she did not really feel. ‘I’m going to buy a tin of milk so I can have a cup of tea and I thought I’d get some biscuits. You like biscuits, don’t you?’

Both children agreed enthusiastically and turned back towards the shop, rather to Emmy’s relief. She had just remembered that she had not locked her door behind her, and though she was sure no intruder would enter the place she had impressed upon Diana, three times already this morning, that they must never, never leave the house unlocked unless, of course, they were at home. It would clearly be best if her daughter did not discover that her responsible mother had ignored her own warnings and left the door on the latch. When they got back to No. 2, therefore, she made a pretence of unlocking and then herded the children before her into the kitchen. Once there, she made herself a cup of tea, poured the children’s lemonade into two mugs, tipped the biscuits
from their bag on to a plate, and looked around for her handbag. For an awful, heart-stopping moment, she could not see it and wondered, desperately, whether she had been wrong, whether someone had entered the house in her absence. But it was all right; her handbag had been partially hidden by the teapot and she pounced on it, drawing out one of the two keys to the house which she now possessed. ‘I’m going to put this key on a piece of string, darling,’ she told Diana. ‘It isn’t so important right now, because I haven’t got a job yet, but when I do you may want to let yourself into the house after school, so you’ll need a key of your own.’ She had been knotting the string into a loop as she spoke and now she held it out to Diana, expecting the child to be pleased at this sign of trust, but Diana was putting both hands behind her back and shaking her head violently.

‘No, Mammy. Everyone else in the court puts the key through the letter box, I told you they did, and that’s what we should do.’