Finishing Touches (19 page)

An hour later the personnel manager stood in front of the class with twelve white envelopes in his hand. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I’d like to congratulate you on completing a very
successful training course. All of you have the ability to do well and advance in your careers in Allied Isles Banks. I’d like to give you your assignments and wish you all the very best of
luck in the future. If you have any problems at any stage of your careers please don’t hesitate to get in touch with me. Good luck!’

He came around from his desk and handed each of them the envelope that would mark the beginning of their banking career and change their lives completely.

‘Hell!’ she heard Lou Mus grove mutter when he saw where he was being sent.

Heart thumping, Cassie opened her envelope and gave a little gasp when she saw the name of the branch to which she had been assigned.

Report to the manager in headquarters on Dame Street on Monday next at 9 a.m.

Cassie nearly died. The very place they had all, with the exception of Lou Musgrove, dreaded being sent to. And she had got it. She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
At least I’m staying in Dublin, she kept telling herself as she stood swaying on the packed train as it slowly left Amiens Street for the journey home. Some of them had been sent to branches
in the suburbs, others had been sent to branches in the country. Lou Musgrove had been sent to a small midlands bank and he was raging. A country bank did not suit the image he was planning for
himself.

‘What have you got that they sent you to Dame Street?’ he asked Cassie sarcastically. She glared at him.

‘Obviously something that
you
haven’t got!’ she said coldly.
She
would have been much happier to have gone to one of the suburban branches. They were much
less intimidating than Dame Street.

The following Monday morning found her in her new navy-and-white uniform, standing outside the huge wooden doors of the Dame Street branch. Hesitantly she knocked on the door. No answer! She
knocked again, feeling a bit of a fool as people passing by gave her sideways glances. The bank didn’t actually open its doors for trading until ten o’clock but she had been told to
report for work at nine. Cassie felt herself beginning to get a bit flustered.

‘Hi!’ said a pleasant voice at her side, and Cassie turned around to see a red-haired girl in navy uniform smiling at her.

‘Is this your first day?’ she smiled. ‘Honestly, they never tell new staff about the side entrance. I don’t know how many lost souls I’ve rescued from this door. My
name is Jeanne. Come on, this way.’ Cassie heaved a sigh of relief. Thank God for the attractive good Samaritan at her side or she could have been stuck there like an idiot until ten.

‘I’m Cassie,’ she introduced herself.

Jeanne smiled reassuringly. ‘It’s awful starting off on your first day. And here of all places. I was petrified at first but you’ll get used to it very quickly and
there’s a great staff here.’ She rang the doorbell at the small side entrance and a porter let them in.

‘Morning, girls. How’s the crack?’ he greeted them cheerfully.

‘Tommy, this is Cassie. She’s just starting so be nice to her – for a day or two at least. If you can manage that!’ Jeanne said, with mock severity.

‘Nice! I’ll treat her like a queen,’ Tommy laughed. ‘Red carpet and all!’

‘Tommy’s a great character,’ Jeanne laughed, as they walked along a carpeted corridor with doors on each side.

‘I was told to report to the manager,’ Cassie said.

‘You poor thing!’ teased Jeanne. ‘Mr Hurley is nice enough. He expects you to work. Doesn’t mind if you make a mistake once but won’t stand for the same mistake
being made twice. He’s strict, but if you’ve got a problem he’s very kind.’ They turned right and went up a grey-carpeted stairs. They stopped outside a door with the
manager’s name on it. ‘Here you are, Cassie. Good luck on your first day. I’ll see you around.’

‘Thanks very much, Jeanne.’ Feeling lonely, Cassie watched the other girl head back down the stairs. Her palms began to sweat and she was really nervous. This was it! This was where
it all began. Taking a deep breath, Cassie knocked on the door and was called to enter.

‘Good morning. Miss Jordan, isn’t it? We’ve been told to expect you.’ The tall grey-haired man came from behind his desk, hand outstretched. He was kind-looking and
quietly spoken.

‘Good morning, Mr Hurley,’ Cassie responded, giving him a firm handshake. He had a nice airy office with a window looking out on Trinity College. She observed this as her new boss
motioned her to sit down. He spoke to her for about ten minutes, telling her that Dame Street was an excellent branch to work in from the point of view of gaining experience. If she worked hard she
could expect promotion. Allied Isles firmly believed in equality for women and promoted people because of their ability and not because of their gender. In this respect they were streets ahead of
their competitors, most of whom expected women to retire on marriage and take the lump sum that they were entitled to. Allied Isles was a thriving go-ahead organization and Cassie could, if she
wished, go far.

Cassie knew he was not exaggerating. Allied Isles were the
crème de la crème
of the banking companies in Ireland and she was extremely lucky to have secured a position
with them.

‘I’ll just get a staff officer to have a chat with you now, Miss Jordan. She will show you the attendance book that you sign every day,’ Mr Hurley said pleasantly as he pressed
a buzzer on his intercom. A middle-aged woman entered the room and Mr Hurley introduced her as Mrs O’Brien.

‘This is our new trainee, Miss Jordan,’ the manager smiled. ‘I’ll leave her in your capable hands.’

By five o’clock, when it was time to leave work, Cassie didn’t know whether she was coming or going. Mrs O’Brien had shown her where to sign on, then brought her to the
locker-room, where she was given a key to one of the stainless-steel lockers. It would be hers for as long as she worked in Dame Street. Then she had been shown the ladies’ and then she had
been taken on a guided tour of the bank. It was really rather awesome. The public area was huge. Massive wooden counters ran around the walls behind which, at numerous grilles, dozens of cashiers
worked busily, dealing with the queues. Huge pillars stretched from marble floor to intricately carved ceilings, making the place look even more impressive.

In the ledger-room staff worked on twenty-five huge ledgers, painstakingly entering every transaction. Mrs O’Brien told her that Allied Isles were planning a huge computerization programme
and that the ledgers would be obsolete within the following eighteen months. ‘You’ve come in at a very good time,’ the staff officer remarked. ‘They’re going to spend
millions on modernizing and you’ll be here right from the start. If you want to get on, my advice to you is perhaps to start doing some computer courses in the autumn when the evening classes
start.’

Good advice, thought Cassie to herself, and perhaps a way out of her dilemma about leaving home. If she were doing classes to further her career, Nora would have no option but to agree to her
leaving. Stay at home until she was twenty-one indeed! Already she was heartily sick of commuting. It was tiring and such a waste of time.

She spent the rest of the day down in the bowels of the bank, filing cheques. It seemed to her that there were millions of them! And they all had to be filed numerically in hundreds of grey
filing cabinets. She was given a metal tray on castors and told to file the contents. A number of other staff were filing away, some of them quite middle-aged. Jeanne, who had met her in the
canteen at the afternoon tea-break, told Cassie that these were people who for one reason or another had never made management or got promoted.

‘There’s some great characters there, though. You’ll have a lot of laughs,’ the other girl assured her. ‘I spent my first six months there.’

‘Six months!’ exclaimed Cassie in horror.

‘That was good going,’ laughed Jeanne. ‘Some people have been left there for a year!’

As Cassie sat on the train going home, grateful for having been able to get a seat, she ached with tiredness. She had a pain in her back from bending, three of her carefully manicured nails were
broken and she was absolutely mesmerized by numbers. She didn’t think she was going to stick it! And this was only her first day!

After six months of filing, Cassie was brought upstairs to the typing pool, where she spent her time typing correspondence. She got to know a huge number of people at work and,
being outgoing and gregarious, fitted in very well. The social life in the bank was very good and there was an excellent social club that she had joined. The only problem was traipsing in and out
of Port Mahon and making sure to leave early enough to get the last train home. It made things very awkward.

After eight months of commuting, she finally told her mother that she was getting a flat! ‘I’ve got to start a computer course in the evenings next October and there’s no way I
can go to college at night in Dublin if I’m living in Port Mahon,’ she explained patiently to her mother.

‘Couldn’t you do a computer course here in the technical school?’ Nora demanded. ‘I don’t want you living up there, Cassie. Aren’t you fine here?’

‘Mam, I’ve got to do the course in Dublin. It’s one that’s been recommended by the bank and if I want to get ahead and eventually become a manager I’ll have to
study. When I become a senior bank official I’ll have to do banking exams to be promoted!’ She said this hoping to appeal to her mother’s proud ambition for her. The way Nora went
on in Port Mahon, you’d think Cassie ran the Dame Street branch of Allied Isles!

It wasn’t that she
had
to do the computer course, but of course she didn’t say that to Nora. But Cassie reasoned if she did the course, she’d have some idea about
computers when they were introduced and it would look good on her record that she had done some extra-mural study with a view to promotion.

More importantly it would finally mean that the girls could get their long-desired flat together. Laura, having completed her first year at UCD, was in America making as much money as she could.
She had acquired a J-1 visa and had gone at the beginning of summer after sitting her exams. Cassie had assured her that at the end of September when she came back they would definitely go looking
for a flat together.

Aileen had finally been called by the Corporation and was, as she described it, ‘rotting away’ in a dingy office in the inner city, filing little pink and green slips, invoices and
receipts. She hated it! However, once a fortnight she got a cheque into her hand and that made up for a lot. Sick to the teeth of getting the train into Dublin, she had bought herself a little Mini
a couple of months after starting work and now she and Cassie commuted in style! She too was determined to join the flat-hunting expedition when Laura came back. If Angela were going to have a
nervous breakdown about it, she’d just have to get on with it.

By the time September came, Nora had more or less resigned herself to Cassie’s going.

‘Lucky you!’ Barbara muttered sulkily. ‘I’ll be left to do everything.’

And about time too, thought Cassie unsympathetically. What Barbara would do around the place wouldn’t be noticed.

‘You’ll come home Friday nights for the weekends, won’t you?’ This was a statement rather than a question from Nora.

‘We’ll see, Mam. I could have classes on Friday nights,’ Cassie explained gently. She and Aileen had decided not to get into the trap of coming home every weekend unless they
wanted to. Start as you mean to go on was their motto.

In spite of herself Cassie felt a bit guilty. She knew it wasn’t reasonable, it was just that she realized how much her mother looked forward to her coming home in the evenings and hearing
about all the goings on at work. Still, when she had the flat maybe Nora would come up and stay a night or two and they could go shopping. When she put this proposition to her mother, she stared at
her as if she were mad.

‘And leave the children here on their own. You must be joking, Cassie!’

‘Some children,’ scoffed Cassie. ‘Barbara’s nearly eighteen. John’s fifteen. They’re not children any more, Mam; they’re well capable of looking after
themselves for one night.’

‘Well, we’ll see,’ Nora agreed, slightly mollified.

Laura arrived home from America towards the end of September and serious flat-hunting got under way. The three girls agreed to live either in Rathmines or Ranelagh. Ranelagh if
possible. This would be perfect for Cassie when she was studying for her banking exams. It suited Laura fine for UCD and Aileen didn’t care where she lived as long as she got out of Port
Mahon. Besides she had the Mini so she was mobile.

Aileen and Cassie both took a Friday afternoon off to look at the flats Laura had ringed in the paper. Laura had gone to a few places because she was not back at college yet, but she
hadn’t seen anything she liked. ‘The greatest kips, I can tell you. Some landlords have an awful neck!’ she moaned in disgust as they met up in Conways Pub in Parnell Street. They
were going to have lunch before heading off on the trail. Aileen had been waxing eloquent about the heavenly mushroom vol-au-vents they served for lunch so Cassie and Laura agreed it was time they
sampled them.

The place was crammed, the fog of smoke making it hard to see. It was an old-fashioned pub of great charm and always did a roaring trade at lunchtime. It took a while for them to be served but
they finally got a table and were soon tucking into a hearty lunch. Aileen hadn’t lied – the vol-au-vents were superb!

‘Mother’s not talking to me!’ Aileen informed Cassie and Laura as she popped a forkful of tasty pastry and mushroom into her mouth.

‘She won’t be able to keep it up,’ Cassie responded. ‘Don’t worry. Mam was like that at the beginning but she’s getting used to it now.’

‘You don’t know Mother!’ Aileen retorted gloomily. ‘Martyr of martyrs.’