The Wedding Dress Maker

by Leah Fleming

  Netta’s mind was racing with the fear they might shut her away in an asylum again. ‘I’m sorry,’ she kept whispering. ‘It seemed the only way to ease the pain.’

  In her heart she felt such a failure. She could not even take her own life. Yet there was a strange relief that someone had rescued her in time. If someone had bothered to save her, perhaps she was not meant to die yet.

  When the lights were dimmed and she was half asleep Netta could see shadows flickering at the end of her bed. She could make out Sister’s triangular headdress and a man in an overcoat standing looking at her.

  ‘How are you?’

  ‘I don’t know, Doctor.’

  ‘I was just on my rounds, thought I’d pop in to see how it was going. You nearly made it! We had to break down the door. There was just something in your eyes, making alarm bells ring. I couldn’t settle after our consultation. An instinct warned me about you and I had to check. You owe your life to giving me the right address, telling the truth. Don’t waste your second chance.’

  ‘What’ll happen to me now?’ Netta felt small and vulnerable, looking up at Sister who was checking her pulse and tutting.

  ‘I’ll be giving your a good talking to before we send you out of here,’ she said darkly.

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be too hard on the lassie, there’s quite a story behind all this. She’s not a soul in the world to turn to. I think she was just at the end of her tether. Mrs Hunter will come and see me again and we’ll talk it all through. Promise?

  ‘I promise, and thank you.’ They left her bedside and went into a huddle out of earshot. Netta strained to hear them. Dr Anwar had understood her pain. He had saved a stranger, followed her to drag her back to life. At least there was someone who believed in her enough to think her worth saving.

  In the morning she stood on the balcony of the day room, looking out at a misty blue sky and hills in all directions. They were not the gentle green hills of home but dark high Bronte moorland with black stone dykes running in all directions, sooty sheep dotted like boulders amongst the last of the purple heather now burnt into a burnished coppery hue. Where the heather burnt were rainbows and Rae. ‘Set the heather on fire, my darling.’

  His last words scorched her heart with shame. How could she have forgotten his precious orders, abandoned her bairn and given in to such temptation? How could she think so little of her life when he had had to give up his?

  I’m sorry, dear heart, she cried silently. I’ll never do it again, I promise. I’ll try to set the heather on fire for you and make our baby proud of me. I don’t know how I’ll do it but if Netta Nichol could find a way to end her life so determinedly and fail, there must be a way Mrs Hunter can find it again and succeed!

  Nothing To Write Home About, March 1946

  The other women left her to it each lunchtime. Netta pored over her sewing machine, finishing off the tailored coat and leggings she was rushing to finish for baby’s first birthday. The shoulders were padded expertly and she was attaching a velvet collar just like the little coat she had fingered so carefully at Matthias Robinson’s store in Leeds; the coat she would have bought if only she could have afforded their prices. This replica was made from factory floor offcuts and lined with satin from the market stall. It had to be done in her own time, secretly, and parcelled off before his birthday.

  She was trusting it was the right size, preferably on the big side for him to grew into. The fact that her neck ached and her back was stiff after a long shift with no break must not spoil her workmanship. Nothing was too much trouble for her son. How she wished she could be there on the day but it was too soon and she had no money to spare for fares. It was a comfort to know he wouldn’t know much about his special day either.

  This temporary job at Saloman’s garment factory was nothing much to write home about. It was a glorified sweatshop making skimpy coats with thin linings like tissue paper for the cheaper end of the rag trade. She lived now in the heart of the Yorkshire textile industry with mills on every street and factories up every back alley, churning out demob suits and coats by the thousand. Somewhere in the midst of the shoddy there must be quality clothing factories but she was grateful for any job in this grim climate.

  Most of the girls came to work in iron curlers and headscarves, with overalls to keep the oose of their own clothes. It got up your nose and in your hair. They kept their distance from Netta since the job had been found for her as a favour from the boss to a relative and they considered she’d stolen someone else’s job. She was an offcomer, not one of them, and therefore probably a spy. Netta kept her head down, working fast and efficiently, gave no bother or lip and was politely ignored.

  So much had changed since her long talk with the Egyptian doctor. Taking her courage in both hands she had caught a bus to Leeds and found Rosamund Street where Vida Bloom was still living. The door was opened to her with surprise but the stranger from Scotland ushered in warmly. Number five was one of a line of back-to-back terraced houses on four storeys: cellar kitchen, living room, bedroom and washroom, attic with a roof light in the ceiling. The houses rose up in a sprawl from the city towards the University with its grand steps and clock tower, up to Woodhouse Moor and another warren of terraces: these like sooty lichen clinging to black walls, stretching ever outward to the river valleys and green fells lying just out of sight over the horizon. The names of these posher districts were listed on bus destinations: Headingley, Lawnswood, Adel, Cookridge, Bramhope, Otley, Ilkley and the Dales beyond.

  Vida had aged since she was widowed suddenly at the end of the war, her dark eyes heavy and ringed with shadows. Arnold, judging by the line of proud photographs of him in uniform, had shot up several inches, filled out and was fast becoming a mother’s boy, destined to replace Isadore Bloom as Mummy’s favourite companion. He had left the Army Pay Corps and was now articled to a firm of Chartered Accountants in Leeds. How Vida’s face lit up with delight as he pushed his bike through the door. ‘Arnie, you’ll never guess who’s turned up on our doorstep?’

  He looked at Netta with disbelief, taking in her shabby coat and ankle socks, her battered hat. He nodded shyly, a look of resignation on his face. Netta recognised the mark of the beast, another offspring who shared duty as their middle name. He shook her hand weakly. ‘Pleased to see you, Nettie. What brings you to our grand city?’ His Scots lilt had been overtaken, flattened by northern vowels.

  ‘It’s a long story.’ She gave them a sanitised version of events, skipping over the usual difficult areas. Being an unmarried mother, having a breakdown, sent packing from her homeland to find her fortune. ‘Fancied a wee bit of a change. I’m looking for work. I always said I wanted to be a dress designer, didn’t I, Mrs Bloom?’

  ‘You won’t find any openings for that here, love, just factory work. But what about your baby? You wrote me such a long letter when he was born, so full of plans. How can you leave him behind?’

  ‘I have to start somewhere. He’s staying at home until I can find suitable accommodation. Do you know of anything?’

  ‘Leave it with me. We may not be the richest end of the family but Blooms, Frankls and Levys have connections in the trade from buttons to handbags, carpets to threads. Where are you staying?’

  ‘A hostel in Hunslet, an old army barracks. Not exactly the Ritz but a roof over my head. It’ll do for now.’

  ‘You could stay here but you see how it is… What with the sewing, the bike and our rules, it would be difficult. But you must come whenever you like. We go to concerts, perhaps we can all go together?’

  ‘I’d like that. And if you hear of anything, I would be grateful.’

  The city of Leeds went about its business briskly despite bombsites and rebuilding, gaping terraces with wallpaper hanging off the bedroom walls, crowds of shoppers packing the market hall each Saturday when Netta took herself out of the grim coke-fumed Nissen huts and lines of damp washing steaming over the stove, to lose herself among the fa
bric stalls. For a time the novelty of theatres and cinemas, music halls and concerts, distracted her from the sadness of being without Ray. The return to barracks each night, to the loud wireless music and the smoke and the coarse chatter of strangers, brought back the grim reality of her situation, pierced the bubble of all the colour and sounds of theatre fairyland.

  It was sewing that kept her sane. Each weekend she browsed among the fent stalls for cheap offcuts from the textile mills to sew into rompers and smocked shirts for her son. She lost herself in the smells and sights of rolls of printed cottons and shirtings, woollen tweeds and suitings, fancy brocades and satins, velveteens and corduroys, fingering the textures, sniffing colours graduated like crayons in a Lakeland pencil set. Who could be sad at such extravagant sights: bold patterns, stripes and polka dots, checks and ginghams, florals and chintz?

  There were boxes of offcuts for cushion covers and curtains too. How she longed for a place of her own to furnish with cushion covers and curtains, bedspreads and table napkins. She always saved the best until last to fortify herself for the bus ride back to the dingy hostel, wandering in a trance around the bridal fabrics and dress velvets, stroking the pile, silky smooth like the ears of a dog; comforting like the top of a baby’s head. Sheer organza and silk netting, all the colours of the rainbow at her fingertips.

  Close by were the trimmings stalls, Aladdin’s caves, cluttered with cards of ribbons and braidings, hat trimmings, artificial flowers and cherries, neat drawers of buttons, zips, embroidery silks and displays of cottons. There were dress trimmings with glittering sequins in wondrous shades like jewelled brooches, instant glamour for a few pence to garnish the plainest of garments. Netta’s fingers were itching to play with all these treasures so she bought packets of sequins to satisfy the urge, a treat better than a teacake in Fuller’s for it was still there when she got back to Hunslet.

  Sometimes she felt as if she had been whisked up and plonked in an alien planet among foreigners and wept for the hills of home and the sea breeze. This was exile indeed. Vida Bloom, true to her word, had quickly fixed her up with work at Salomon’s but she and Arnie were no substitute for Galloway folk. The Blooms had their own community, faith and friends. Netta would always be an outsider there.

  She kept her promise to Dr Anwar, giving him regular progress reports, returning to the little back street surgery and the warmth of his interest. He listened to her sadness with a kindly nod of the head, his strange accent oddly comforting. He liked to talk of his time in Scotland. He had seen far more of it than she had ever done and assumed she knew Skye and the Cairngorms, the Trossachs and the Western Isles intimately.

  ‘When I first went to your country, it was so wet and damp, I could not get warm. I did not think I could live in such a climate but there were a few fellow countrymen scattered in the University, as lonely, cold and miserable as I was. Enough to make a friend or two, enough to make it bearable. We talked of home and kept our festivals. It is true that you must find your own amongst strangers. Follow what you love and it will lead you where you need to go. It’s the only way for you to survive here, young lady. You must find a bit of your own country here, in music or books, I ken not, but you’ll recognise it. Keep yourself busy with your sewing. Be hopeful and on the look out for that bit of sugar to sweeten the bitter pill.’ He smiled at his little phrase. ‘Enough is a feast, as you say?’

  Netta looked gratefully at the man who had saved her life. He spoke of hope like the soldier in Park Royal before he fled over the wall in search of liquid gold. How strange she should think of him now. The two men had talked sense in such different ways. ‘Thank you, Dr Anwar, you give me hope. How can I ever repay you?’

  ‘By putting one foot in front of the other, slowly, until a path opens up before you. One day this strange journey will make sense to you but not now. It is too soon. Remember, a mountain is climbed from the foothills. Find some of your own people, they will help you.’

  Homeward Bound, July 1946

  Netta was so relieved when she boarded the Thames Clyde Express at last. The factory was shut for the annual Wakes week and she had saved hard for her first holiday back home. She had treated herself to a new hair cut. Off went the Victory roll in favour of a soft bob framing her freckled face. She’d made up a linen two-piece suit in beige, two cotton skirts with bibs and braces and a pair of slacks copied from a Claire McArdell original in the Vogue magazine that she shared with Vida, poring over it like a Bible.

  Staggering from the hostel under the weight of cases full of sewing to the bus stop, she paused for breath. Every spare penny from her wages was spent on making clothes for Ray. She was going to arrive home looking chipper, not a down-at-heel factory girl. She pressed her nose to the window as the train drew into Kirkcudbright station to see if anyone was waiting to greet her. There, to her amazement, stood Peg on the platform with the baby who was toddling on his own, bow-legged around his thick nappy. He clung to Peg, eyeing Netta with suspicion again, a reminder of that first visit home from Park Royal.

  The coat she had sent for his birthday was discarded in favour of a summer coat that looked shop-bought not home-made.

  Netta tried to enthuse about her new life in Leeds but it sounded hollow. The only truthful bit she could add was how she was going to help make another wedding outfit with Vida Bloom for one of the girls in Saloman’s office. She gave them all the gen about Arnie, and the Blooms’ house, but no one seemed very interested.

  Peg sifted through all Ray’s new outfits with a sniff. ‘Dinna waste yer money on all this fancy stuff. He cannae muck about the place in these frilly shirts. He’s a laddie not a lass. He disna want printed cottons at his age. Dungarees and overalls, something more serviceable if you want to make him anything – and make them the right size. Yon last lot you sent him for his birthday were awful skimpy. I passed them on. We can take care of his clothing, you know.’ It was never going to be an easy visit after that.

  The worst moment was when Father dangled the baby before the mirror and whispered, ‘Gus.’ The toddler watched his lips intently and spat out, ‘Gust!’ All hopes of ever giving him his original name were quashed now but Netta swallowed her fury and disappointment. Nobody must see how this rejection of her choice was hurting her.

  She wanted to spend every precious moment with her child: going on walks to the shore, paddling by the sea, getting to know all his funny ways. It would be a long route march to New Year and her next official visit. On the way to it she must pass through all the ‘this time last years’. The anniversary of Ray’s death had left her weak and Remembrance Sunday would be painful to observe again. She still had no picture in her head of where Rae was buried but Father gave her a certificate of condolence from the King which had arrived for her at Brigg Farm.

  As Netta pushed the go-chair back to the farm along familiar lanes, pointing out landmarks and flowers to her baby; she wondered if she dare ask to have Ray to stay with her for a while, but in her heart felt it was hopeless even to venture such a suggestion. The hostel was no place for a bairn. She must work all hours if she was to find herself a proper home for him. And who would care for her baby all day? Besides, Peg scarcely let him out of her sight when she was around. The days rushed by and soon it was time to hand him back and kiss him a tearful farewell.

  That second journey south went quickly and this time she got off at Leeds Station determined to find proper lodgings with open spaces to wheel a pram, somewhere closer to fields and trees where the sprawling suburbs thinned out into the country. Within two weeks she had found a room and kitchen close to Kirkstall Abbey and the River Aire where she could walk among parkland and over the hilly streets to Rosamund Street and the Blooms.

  She cheered up the room’s shabbiness with a flurry of curtain making and cleaning, covering the dull moquette of the sofa with covers and cushions made from offcuts. It kept her hands from shaking with the yearning to hold Gus, as she must now call him. The name choked in her throat but she
must thole it. Her room overlooked open spaces, the nearest she would ever get now to countryside. Only Dr Anwar’s words kept her from crumbling. Step by step she would shift herself further out from these black sooty streets towards green hills. One day she would have her own place with a garden where her son could play and roam safely, a place where she would be proud to entertain her relatives, set high above the twinkling lights of the town. One day she would make them all proud of her.

  *

  It was Arnie’s birthday and Vida had a streaming chesty cold. She was anxious he didn’t catch it and suggested he took Netta to the pictures instead as a friendly gesture for helping with Edna Gresty’s wedding dress.

  ‘You do understand, Netta, I’m trusting you with my boy. He’s not for you, I hope you realise there can be no matchmaking? He’s spoken for. He must marry into his faith with a suitable girl, someone who can share his interests. He’s still got a lot of exams, there must be no distractions.’

  Netta smiled to herself at this broad hint. Arnie had raised his thick black eyebrows in her direction once or twice but she had soon cooled his interest with little sisterly put downs and teasings. He was not on her hit list of possible suitors. Interest in him could never exist in her scheme of things for there was only one man in her life and he was two hundred miles away in his cot!

  He seems so tired with it all. No time for his music now and he was so good at his clarinet,’ Netta ventured.

  ‘Just a hobby, Netta, music’s his hobby. Business is where the money lies: qualifications, articles and charters. He’ll make his mother so proud! When your boy grows to be a man, you’ll understand. You want only what’s best for them and mother knows best! I hope you don’t mind being disappointed? I wondered when you came at first if it was to see my son again, you were awful pally in the war?’