All That Glitters (13 page)

‘Your mending’s done.’ Jane held up the bag.

‘Done!’ Judy shrieked in a theatrically loud voice for the benefit of a passing bank clerk. ‘You little darling. Can I see?’

‘Not here, Judy. Let’s go into the New Inn,’ Mandy suggested.

‘Good idea, we’ll order coffee.’

‘And sandwiches,’ Mandy added. ‘I’m starving.’

‘I don’t want anything,’ Jane demurred.

‘Nonsense, you’ll have coffee with us. Our treat.’ Mandy took hold of her arm and dragged her across the road.

‘But I can’t stay long, I have to get back. I’m helping out on a market stall.’

‘What time does your break end?’

‘A quarter to two.’ Jane gave herself five minutes to spare.

‘In that case you’ve all the time in the world,’ Judy insisted.

Judy couldn’t wait for the coffee to come before laying her hands on the parcel. Ripping off the paper she examined her body stocking while Mandy ordered for all three of them.

‘But this is perfect!’ she exclaimed as she tried and failed to find where the ladder had been.

‘I picked up the stitches with a crochet hook and secured them at the seam. It shouldn’t go again.’

‘You sweetheart. And just look at this blouse.’ Judy handed Mandy the silk blouse. ‘No one would ever guess that it had been torn. Where did you learn to sew like this?’

‘My aunt,’ Jane lied, grateful for the exacting demands of a tyrannical housemother, who’d insisted on all the girls in her care becoming proficient in both fancy and plain stitching.

‘How much do we owe you?’ Judy asked as the waiter returned with a silver tray loaded with coffee and hot-water pots, sugar bowls, milk jugs, plates, spoons and knives and a separate tray of daintily arranged triangular cucumber sandwiches.

‘One and twopence,’ Jane answered, her mouth watering at the sight of the sandwiches.

‘Here, I’ll pay you now, and get it off the girls later.’ Mandy dug into her purse and handed Jane four halfpennies and a shilling.

‘How do you like your coffee?’

‘I haven’t time.’

‘Of course you have.’ Mandy poured coffee into three porcelain cups and handed one to Jane together with the sandwiches.

‘I’m not hungry,’ Jane protested stubbornly.

‘You’d be doing Judy a favour,’ Mandy giggled. ‘After what she’s just been told.’ She glanced over her shoulder to make sure there was no one close enough to overhear. ‘A few more ounces of fat on you, young lady, and your price will drop.’

‘Mandy, you promised you wouldn’t say anything,’ Judy remonstrated.

‘It’s only Jane. And she’s practically one of us.’

‘You’re not in the least bit fat.’ Jane said quickly, wondering if they’d been in Station Yard. What did they mean by price?

‘I know what you’re thinking,’ Mandy gurgled, laughing at the expression on Jane’s face, ‘but it’s not like that. We’ve been in a photographer’s studio. He’s going to pay us for the privilege of taking our pictures. In our stage costumes,’ she said archly, with a lift of her finely plucked eyebrows.

Jane bit into a sandwich, too disconcerted to comment on their costumes, or rather lack of them.

‘It’s good work when you can get it,’ Mandy continued, blithely oblivious to Jane’s embarrassment. ‘Ten pounds for one afternoon beats the hell out of six pounds for a full week in a cold draughty theatre.’

‘Ten pounds!’ Jane’s jaw fell open.

‘And from a provincial photographer. Mind you, he’ll probably make a hundred from the negatives,’ Judy said philosophically.

‘And all you have to do is pose in …’

‘In a little less than our stage costumes,’ Mandy whispered. ‘He’s going to take quite a few of the girls. He’s looking for a couple of new ones too. He asked if we knew any young girls, really young ones. Apparently there’s quite a demand. I don’t know how old you are but with a little help you could pass for twelve or thirteen …’

‘I’m eighteen.’

‘There’s no need to sound offended. I believe you. He just said girls who look young. If you’re short of a few bob why don’t you try it?’

‘Me?’

‘Why not? I know you’re a bit on the thin side, but then young girls usually are.’ Mandy pushed back her chair and surveyed Jane analytically. ‘Even though you’re skinny, you’ve got nice legs by the look of your ankles. Your hair – well, you’ll need a wig, but we’ve plenty of those in props and costume you can borrow. Bit of make-up, especially rouge and shadow to plump out your cheeks. A couple of plasters to push up those small tits of yours, you’d probably look all right. What do you think, Judy?’

‘I think with a bit of coaching, may be you’re right.’

‘I have to go,’ Jane rose quickly from the table, sending her cup flying across the carpet with the edge of Phyllis’s coat.

‘We’re going back for another session next week. Why don’t you come with us? There’ll be nothing lost if he doesn’t want you. And a tenner’s not to be sneezed at,’ Mandy added tactfully, knowing Jane was paid a fraction of the Revue girls’ wages. ‘It’ll keep you in cologne and stockings for a year if nothing else. Think about it.’

‘I will.’ Jane said automatically as she walked towards the front door. Ten pounds! What an opening balance for the Post Office account she’d dreamed of owning. Security. Real security. No one would be able to return her to the workhouse once she had that kind of money. It was lodging money for half a year, and you’d have to have something really wrong with you if you couldn’t find work in six months of trying.

Feet sinking into thick carpet, head swimming with intoxicating images of pound notes, and surreal impressions of the gold and gilt ornaments and mirrors of the first hotel she’d ever been into, Jane made her way back to the market.

‘I like punctuality in a girl,’ Wilf said as she lifted the flap and walked behind the stall. ‘Now let’s see how good a salesgirl you are. That’s Mrs Jones from Top Road on her way over. The insurance money from her mother’s burial policy is burning a hole in her pocket. You sell her a going-out outfit as well as a mourning suit, and I’ll knock the price of the hat you’re wearing off what you owe me.’

Jane was tired but happy as she left the stall at ten minutes to four for the Town Hall. Mrs Jones from Top Road had been easy to persuade. She’d not only sold her the mourning clothes but two ‘chapel’ suits and a summer dress. A little flattery about colour suiting complexion here, a few words about quality there. Nothing too drastic or different from the methods she’d employed in the Children’s Homes to avoid a row or a slap.

‘You’re looking pretty tonight ma’am. Such lovely colour in your cheeks.’ She hadn’t always had to lie either. A couple of glasses of sherry in the evening was all that was needed to turn most of staff’s noses as red as Rudolf’s.

‘Well, have you decided?’

Mandy and Judy stood behind her.

‘Yes.’ she said boldly. After all, hadn’t she told Phyllis last night that she’d play in Revue if she could for six pounds a week? Ten pounds for an afternoon seemed far more, for far less effort and embarrassment.

‘Tell you what,’ Mandy whispered. ‘Saturday. Between the matinee and the first show, come to our dressing room. We’ll see what we can do to transform you into a star turn.’

‘And in the meantime eat as much as you can.’ Judy advised.

‘Especially cream, milk and butter. It puts inches on where men like to see them.’

Eddie walked slowly up the Graig hill. Not because he was tired. Anything but. Charlie was a good man to work for, easygoing as long as the work was done and the shop and kitchens kept spotless. And although the job involved a lot of physical work, humping, carrying, loading and unloading, it wasn’t taxing, not to him. Besides, days in the shop were generally shorter than those in the market. Cooked meats spoiled easily, and Charlie preferred to understock, which inevitably meant closing when the last slices and scraps were sold out of the door. Poor William was still working, setting up the Market stall for the morning, but Eddie didn’t feel too sorry for his cousin. Next week it would be his turn to work late.

He had a whole evening free and enough energy left to go down the gym and fight half a dozen sparring matches, but for once boxing wasn’t on his mind. Jenny was. Charlie’d paid him a small bonus for picking up three new customers on the meat round, and this week he’d promised to put his, and his cousin Will’s wages up from seventeen and six to a pound a week. Eddie knew William: his pay rise would be swallowed up in the tills of the town’s pubs. But he was determined his wouldn’t.

After work he’d changed out of his working clothes in Charlie and Alma’s small bathroom above the shop. Polished his shoes with his handkerchief, slicked his hair back with a ‘borrowed’ fingerful of Charlie’s hair pomade and bought a sixpenny box of chocolates from the sweet shop next to the New Theatre which was run by Diana’s boss Wyn Rees. He couldn’t stand Wyn, and was usually the first to apply the name of ‘queer’ to the man. But then, when it came to sweet shops, Wyn’s was the only one he could think of where his purchase would pass without comment. If he’d stopped off in the High Street shop run by Diana, he’d face an inquisition, and later, after Diana had imparted the knowledge to the entire family, endless teasing from Will. Ronconi’s café wouldn’t be any better; all the boys who couldn’t afford a pint, and most of the girls from the Graig, congregated there after work on a week night.

He stopped opposite Griffiths’ shop on the corner of Factory Lane and looked through the window. It had been much easier in the winter, when the lamps were lit, to see who was serving. Deciding it wouldn’t do any harm to go in, even if he found Harry Griffiths behind the counter, he walked across the road.

The shop was teeming with urchins, all with requests for last minute tea items to be added to their mother’s tab. Jenny was rushed off her feet, slicing the thinnest possible slivers of brawn, cutting pieces of cheese that could be more accurately called slices than wedges, fishing pickled onions out of an enormous jar and slipping them into cones of greaseproof paper. He hung back, pushing a child behind him to the front of the queue, while apparently studying the arrangement of cigars and matches laid out on the top shelf.

‘Tell your mam that’s all we have,’ Jenny said to a small girl as she tucked a bundle of newspaper-wrapped cabbage under her arm. ‘It’s a small one, but she can have it for twopence. Don’t forget to tell her the price now.’

‘I won’t. It’s twopence, Jenny. Ta.’ She bounced out, her string tied pigtails jerking comically behind her as she skipped past the shop window.

‘Eddie.’ Jenny’s enormous blue eyes finally looked at him and his knees turned to jelly.

‘Five Woodbines and a box of matches, please.’ He pushed a shilling across the counter. She reached up to the top shelf. Lost in admiration for her slim waist and the full curve of her breasts beneath the pinafore she was wearing, he forgot to pull out the box of chocolates he’d hidden beneath his jacket until she faced him again.

‘That’ll be …’

‘I bought them for you.’

‘For me, how kind.’

‘I had a stroke of luck today. A pay rise. I hoped, well …’ The Eddie who didn’t think twice about facing any opponent in the ring shuffled awkwardly from one foot to the other. ‘... I hoped you might come out with me to celebrate. I know we’re too late for the pictures, or the musical that’s on in the New Theatre, but we could go for a walk, or to one of the cafés.

Jenny looked up at the clock. ‘Second house in the Town Hall doesn’t start until eight o’clock.’

If it had been one of the boys who’d suggested the outing Eddie’d have taken him up on the offer like a shot, although he’d already sat through the opening night on the free tickets Haydn had dispensed. But despite the daring reference he’d made to the show in the shop yesterday, he had no intention of sitting through it again with any girl, especially Jenny. ‘You know what’s playing there?’

‘Course I do, we talked about it yesterday.’

‘Only men go there. No decent girl would want to go near the place.’

‘I would. But tell you what, to spare your blushes I’ll borrow my dad’s suit and cap. He won’t miss them. Come on, Eddie,’ she wheedled. ‘I’ll turn myself into a passable boy and it would be fun.’

‘We wouldn’t be back until after eleven,’ he said, remembering the lecture she’d given him about not being allowed out late.

‘It wouldn’t matter, not tonight. My mother’s visiting my aunt; she’s ill, so my mother’s staying over. My father’s taking over the shop, but he’s always in the Morning Star by half-past nine and never out of there before two in the morning. I’ll tell him that you’re taking me out. He’ll trust me to be in before time, but he won’t check. I can get his suit and cap now and leave them in the storeroom. I always go in and out that way. I’ll change on my way out, hide my dress, and meet you outside the back door, at – shall we say half-past seven. We can walk down Albert Road rather than High Street, it’s quieter, and by the time we come out of the theatre it will be dark, so even if we run into someone we know, they won’t recognise me.’

‘I don’t know …’

‘Oh come on, Eddie. Please.’

‘What if someone recognises you inside the Town Hall?’

‘Who, the vicar? He can hardly tell anyone he was there himself, can he? Besides, you know full well everyone will be too busy looking at the floor, terrified of being seen there by someone who knows them, to notice me.’

Eddie knew she was right. There wasn’t a man in Pontypridd who would freely admit to his family that he’d been to the show, but that didn’t alter the fact that yesterday’s houses had both been packed and the show was three-quarters pre-booked for the run. A record for the Town Hall. And if Haydn was to be believed, the Saturday afternoon matinee was usually a ‘special’ for church and chapel ministers, council members and the crache of whatever town they were playing in.

‘Will you take me?’ she demanded, ‘because if you won’t, I’ll find someone who will.’

The threat decided him. ‘All right.’ he conceded reluctantly.

‘You’ll pick me up then? In three-quarters of an hour, at the back entrance. I’ll be waiting behind the storeroom door. Call out so I’ll know it’s you.’