Mother Knew Best (27 page)

Being so high up I used to feel very Swiss and would not have been surprised to hear a yodeller, although I knew the performers of such two-toned singing would not be either my landlord or his wife for they were very serious people not given to intoning of any description. They were both very tall and slim. He reminded me of Mephistopheles or Punch, for he had that kind of shaped face, rather cruel-looking, and I was pleased, on the rare occasions that I saw him that he wasn't a conversationalist. His wife, who was quite pleasant, possessed a strange gait; she seemed to fall forward as though her feet were powerless.

My unmarried friends thought me very lucky in obtaining such an attractive flat so that I could be married. Indeed I felt I was lucky too, for at that time the underlying fear of maidens was the worry of being ‘left on the shelf'. When a girl became engaged (and later married) there was really no need for two gloves, for these girls would wear a glove on the right hand only and carry the other glove, the left hand which bore the carats of the chosen being casually displayed on buses and trains.

‘Those who go a-borrowing go a-sorrowing' had so been drummed into us by our elders that Chas and I had saved hard and gone without pleasures, indeed necessities, to purchase our home for cash. We possessed a ‘walnut' bedroom suite with a ‘his' and a ‘her' wardrobe. The ‘her' was an immense bow-fronted affair smelling permanently of varnish; my clothes seemed sadly lost and dangled limp and lonely in its vast cavernous interior. The ‘his' was smaller, possessing less hanging space because it was shelved. My husband's clothes filled it to capacity so that many garments creased immediately after being carefully ironed. But it never occurred to me to let him share my enormous wasted space and it was definitely sex segregation of garments in our love-nest.

The dining-room suite of light oak had four beige leather-seated chairs and the sideboard had little squiggles on each corner (ersatz carvings really). The sideboard contained half a tea service, half a dozen cut-glass tumblers and a canteen of cutlery. This canteen, marked ‘stainless' had looked lovely when it was presented to me by the staff of the London Transport office where I worked and the Superintendent had made a pretty speech saying that my fiancé's gain was the London Transport's loss. He had waved a spoon in the air and hoped we would always have time for loving, then he did the same with a fork and a knife but I could never remember what he had said about them. Sadly, however, the cutlery soon became discoloured and began to peel. Two leather armchairs and a rug from Chiesman's of Lewisham (where the gentry used to shop according to my mother) completed our home, plus of course the imitation parquet lino and the regency striped curtains. I thought the curtains lovely, setting off the high ceilinged bay-windowed room, but Chas always detested curtains and dragged them as far back from the windows as he possibly could after I had arranged them in neat folds.

I was like a new broom in my intentions to keep our home sparkling and I worked to the point of exhaustion obtaining a bright polish on the ‘parquet' floor and furniture. It wasn't long before I became utterly bored with my luxurious home and my married-woman status. I suppose I was lonely, for our friends and relations lived ‘over the water' in Poplar and Chas, a waiter, seemed to be permanently away working and permanently tired during the short time he spent at home. I once had a daytime visitor and I was thrilled at hearing two rings on the bell that indicated it was for me. By then my brother-in-law Philip had become a salesman and because my dear ma-in-law knew I was lonely she had asked him to call on me when he was in the district. I was delighted at the thought of a social occasion.

Philip arrived in a van which coughed hot water and spluttered steam from an overheated radiator so I helped him lug pails of water up and down stairs to quench the thirst of his chariot. He then enquired for the daily paper with which he disappeared into the bathroom. I thought I would busy myself with preparing a nice meal for him and he would then report to ma-in-law what a wonderful cook I was and what a lucky fellow his brother was. He might also rave about the shine on floor and furniture. I knew that would please my husband's mother for she always kept a bandbox house and her cooking was superb. But the time went by and no Phil emerged from the bathroom. I kept creeping to the bathroom door and listening. From the sounds within he was having a bath! Finally he emerged, slipped on the floor, remarked, ‘You want to be careful, Dorothy, polished floors can be dangerous and cause nasty accidents.' He then gulped down half a cup of tea, knocked over the jug of milk, said, ‘I must dash now, I'm behind already,' and tumbled down the stairs. He shouted from the doorway, ‘The Old Lady said you were lonely so I'll pop in again when I am round this way.'

As he drove away in clouds of blue smoke from his exhaust I went slowly back to survey the chaos in bathroom and kitchen. My landlady appeared at the bottom of the stairs and gave me such an odd look that I stammered, ‘That was my brother-in-law.' ‘Oh,' she said. ‘I thought he was a strange man because his hair was soaking wet.' ‘That happened in the bathroom,' I stuttered and she returned slowly to her quarters, ready, I was sure, to report to Mephistopheles that I was not the innocent young bride I appeared to be. To make matters worse my young brother-in-law had taken my newspaper with him and I had been looking forward to the highlight of the afternoon – filling in the crossword.

But there, although on the surface I appeared lonely and my relations might have thought I needed company, actually in my own home I really only wanted and felt at ease in the presence of my Charlie, and he seemed to return only to eat and sleep briefly. He had only one day off each week and the six working days were divided into short days and long days. On the long days he would leave home before ten a.m., returning home in the early hours after midnight, and on the ‘short' days he would leave home at about noon and return again in those awful quiet, ghostly and unearthly hours when all good citizens were asleep in their beds. Sometimes he turned a short day into a long day in desperation at his life-style, thinking that the more money he could amass while he had his health and strength the better would be our future.

He never even had an afternoon off so I was quite excited when he told me one morning that he would be home at six-thirty p.m. We would have a rare evening meal together, just like other working people. There would be a good play on the radio, a lovely fire in the grate, and for once a mate not prostrate (with exhaustion). I went about the flat singing with joy. When it was shining to my satisfaction I went shopping. We would have a different meal, a celebration dinner. I bought an Ostend rabbit deciding to roast this with onions and mushrooms. I made asparagus soup with real asparagus. Chas was always talking about cranberries and I made a cranberry tart which looked just like the pictures in the magazines. I felt quite the county lady shopping at all the best shops; for once money was no object. We didn't drink wine, that was still for people from another world from us, so the ginger-beer rather let the side down I thought, but that too was from a good store and labelled ‘home made'. I bought a jar of ginger and thick clotted cream, ever Chas's weakness. The jar was so beautiful I was longing for it to be emptied.

At six o'clock all was organised. By the time he rang the doorbell at six-thirty everything would be done to a turn. So far disaster had not struck at my culinary or other preparations, although it was a near thing when I was making a final inspection of the golden brown rabbit with the delicious smell, for I had changed into a green and gold housecoat one of my brothers had brought home from the Orient. This being a bit long I had nearly tripped over and shot the rabbit up the wall when returning it to the oven after its final basting. I thought I must remember to hold up the hem when dashing down the stairs to let my darling in.

Six-thirty came and there was no sign of a returning husband. Seven o'clock, the rabbit now looked a bit dry and shrunken. By seven-fifteen my lovely feeling of excitement had gone and I knew he must have had to give up his afternoon for some reason and carry on working. I was nearly in tears when the bell rang. Warmth flooded through me again. I was always the eternal optimist. If he sat down within five minutes the meal could be salvaged.

I opened the door to a dirty, grey-looking man with clothes torn, face cut and smeared with dried blood and a hand wrapped around with several stained handkerchiefs. ‘You poor darling, I cried. ‘Was there a train crash?' And this is where Charlie went wrong. Had the positions been reversed that question from him would have been the opening for me to come out with a dramatic excuse. But no, everlastingly honest he had to blurt out the whole story to me.

It had been his day off (since his days off were different each week I hadn't been suspicious, in any case I would never have dreamt my husband could be so heinously deceptive), and he had been so eager to see a special football-match that he had queued up all the morning to get in. When nearing his goal and the ticket-office the crowd had rushed the gate, he was swept off his feet and his hand was thrust through a window. He bravely sat through the match (he said he wasn't well enough to leave the ground at that stage!) and then on the stairs of the railway-station on the way home the crowd had surged forward again. Once more he was lifted off his feet and this time his clothes were torn and his head cut on a broken window. I listened stony-faced to his pitiful story. He was obviously expecting tea and sympathy from me, but my day had been ruined, all my efforts had been for nothing. He was telling me, in effect, that he preferred to spend his free time at a football-match rather than have a rare romantic interlude with me his loving bride. I was choking with fury, misery, self-pity and murderous intent, but pleased the story was told he continued more cheerfully, ‘Oh, what a marvellous smell and I see that dinner is ready,' gazing at the beautiful table-cloth and flowers. ‘Could you get me some water to bathe my hands and face, perhaps you could put some disinfectant in it.' I fetched the water, wondering why although I could cheerfully have stabbed him I still didn't want his wounds to become septic!

The next night he arrived home with a sheaf of beautiful tea-roses. Now these were out of season and I knew they must have cost the earth. I was already regretting the expense of the previous day, and instead of placating me Chas's extravagant gesture made me angrier still. ‘However much did they cost?' I asked. This put him in a flaming mood. ‘What does it matter what they cost, they're for you!' he yelled. Already regretting my enquiry I said, ‘Well, if we want to save up it is stupid of you to waste money on expensive flowers.' He snatched the lovely roses from me and saying, ‘I will never buy you flowers again,' dashed to the bathroom. I followed him and there he was, bashing their heads up and down on the lavatory-seat. Some days later I learnt from the wife of another waiter that an American visitor had given the roses to Chas because he had always served him so well in the restaurant and they were for ‘his dear wife'. Perversely I was more furious than ever that Chas hadn't spent the earth on the flowers for me!

Before then I hadn't been aware that I had married a man with a temper, but just after the battle of the roses I was to witness it again. It was the week of the coronation of King George VI so his restaurant would not only be extra busy but have special customers from abroad. It would be a week for rich tips and Chas wanted to look specially smart and immaculate. He wore stiff white shirts with special little slits for the studs and there was a monster at our laundry who was employed just to watch for these special slits and extend them further to the edge of the shirt so that the studs would fall out and the shirt pop open at inconvenient moments, perhaps just as Chas was bending solicitously over a customer. It was my job to inspect these shirts fresh from the laundry so that there would always be one undamaged and ready for Chas to wear. Every day he reminded me of the Coronation and every day I said, ‘Don't worry, I wouldn't dream of not checking your dress shirts,' but during the week of the Coronation I collected some marvellous books from the library, and books have ever been to me what alcohol is to the addict.

So I lied when I said I had checked his shirts for the great occasion, thinking of course that I would check them before
der Tag
. I didn't check them that fateful week and on that important morning the laundry slasher had really gone to town like a frustrated Jack the Ripper and every shirt was ruined. ‘You said you had looked at them,' screamed my husband agitatedly pacing the room in his long johns. ‘You've got nothing to do all day and yet you are too lazy to do even one small thing for me.' I could have cried with guilt but I still would not admit that I had forgotten about the shirts. ‘The ones I looked at are in your wardrobe,' I said mysteriously thinking that surely in his wardrobe there would be a couple of non-slashed stiff shirts. He was then, I knew, very sorry that he had accused me falsely and he tore round the bedroom whilst I stood paralysed, praying for salvation. He re-appeared like a man berserk, his teeth clenched and trembling with rage, for the time was getting on and he would be given the worst part of the floor of the restaurant if he was late, a long walk from the kitchens, the part where customers were popping in and out all the time. There was not one shirt in the house which had not been mutilated by my unseen enemy. Chas threw them all in a pile on the rug. ‘Admit it, admit it, you are lying, you never looked at the shirts.' ‘I must have looked at the wrong ones,' I said stupidly.

Now, more furious that he had a non-admitting wife than that he had no shirt, in his temper, he began to jump up and down, up and down on them. Relieved that he wasn't jumping up and down on me in his rage, the sight of this long-johned creature with a popping open stiff shirt and a bow tie drunkenly round his neck, started me laughing hysterically. I thought, this is why murder is committed but even though I thought each laugh would surely be my last I just couldn't stop and suddenly Chas too realised the ridiculousness of the situation and collapsed with laughter. He put a muffler round his neck and dashed off to buy a new shirt in the Strand but as he left the house in hysterics he decided to come back and tell me he was still annoyed with me. I kissed him fondly good-bye. This seemed to annoy him and he said, ‘That's enough of that.'