The Shop Girls of Lark Lane

by Pam Howes

  * * *

  The following afternoon, Alice and Jack arrived home before the kids were due back. It was still the school holidays and Brian had previously told Alice he would be spending the Monday with friends. Marlene had offered to take Cathy shopping and was due to bring her back at tea time. Jack dropped Alice and their cases off and returned Arnold’s car to the Legion, telling Alice he’d just have a quick pint with Arnold and then come straight back.

  Alice took the cases up to the room she would now be sharing with Jack. Nothing had been said about last night’s episode on the way home. He had woken in a good mood and made love to her in a gentle manner with no sign of the manic Jack from last night. Alice had succumbed to his advances, afraid that saying no would end up causing another argument. He’d even taken precautions, so it was best to keep her mouth shut and go along with him. She would need to talk to him about taking painkillers with alcohol though, because she was sure that had been the cause of his mood swing. But she would have to choose the right time.

  Alice unpacked their clothes and found a white paper bag tucked into Jack’s case along with the newspaper he’d popped out to buy that morning. Two sticks of pink peppermint rock fell out of the bag. She smiled. He must have bought them for Cathy and Brian. She shook her head. Her new husband wasn’t all bad. There was a caring Jack in there, the one Winnie looked on as a son, and Alice planned to make sure he was more prominent in her life than the Jack from last night. It would take time and patience to change him to the sort of husband Terry had been, but she was in it for life and would need to find that time.

  * * *

  Alice stared out of the tram window, her thoughts miles away. It was Tuesday morning and she and Sadie were on their way into work.

  ‘So, how did it go?’ Sadie asked, nudging Alice’s arm. ‘You’re very quiet. Thought you’d be all bubbling over with happiness.’

  Alice sighed and shook her head. ‘It was very nice, for the most part.’

  ‘But?’ Sadie probed and looked closer. ‘Alice, your chin. What happened?’

  ‘Er.’ She looked around to make sure no one was listening but the tram was fairly quiet and people were engaged in their own conversations. ‘My chin had an argument with Jack’s fist,’ she whispered, her eyes filling as she remembered how and why. She hadn’t planned to tell anyone, but Sadie had caught her off-guard and she was feeling a bit low this morning and needed a confidante. She’d blocked her mind last night while they were all at home together and Jack and Brian were talking while she put Cathy in the bath and to bed. When she came back downstairs and joined them in the front room Brian had also noticed her chin. Jack had laughed it off, looked at her meaningfully and told her brother she’d walked into the open wardrobe door. Alice had left the room and gone into the kitchen. She’d stood by the sink and sipped a glass of water to compose herself. Would life always feel like she was walking on eggshells from now on? In bed later she’d asked Jack why he’d lied to Brian and he’d looked puzzled.

  ‘It was a white lie,’ he’d said. ‘No point in Brian thinking badly of me, is there? Bad enough that his sister does now. It was one mistake, and only because I had to take painkillers after walking around all day. I hope you’ll let it drop now.’

  And that had been it. Turning his back on her, he’d fallen asleep within minutes. This morning he’d left the house early, telling her he was going back to his old digs to pick up the rest of his stuff and then on to the Legion to help Arnold start his packing.

  Sadie’s jaw dropped and she clapped her hand to her mouth. ‘He hit you? Oh no, Alice, why?’

  ‘I’ll tell you at break time,’ Alice whispered as the conductor announced their stop. ‘It’ll be a bit quieter then. But if anyone else notices, the official story is that I walked into the open wardrobe door in Blackpool!’

  * * *

  Granny Lomax walked back to her bungalow, satisfied that she had the information she needed. She’d found Jack’s ex-girlfriend Susan, the mother of his child, easily enough. She lived in a street of neat and tidy terraced houses over the other side of the church. Getting her to talk had been the difficult bit as Susan had clammed up as soon as she’d heard why Granny was visiting her mother. She’d been out at the shops with her little girl when her mother answered the door. A brief explanation was all it took for the woman to allow her inside. Jack’s name was mud in that household.

  ‘So your ex-daughter-in-law has married him then?’ Margaret Law, Susan’s mother, had asked, shaking her head sorrowfully.

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ Granny Lomax replied.

  ‘Oh dear, well God help her, that’s all I can say.’

  ‘Exactly. I just needed something I can pass on to Alice, as I’m sure things will go downhill very quickly.’ She’d gone on to explain how Alice had sold her house and that she was helping Jack to obtain the licence of the Legion with her money. And how she was worried to death about her young granddaughter living under the same roof.

  ‘Tell her, Susan, tell her what he said and did when you told him our Lizzie was on the way,’ Margaret had said to her daughter and granddaughter who arrived back from the shops.

  Susan had nodded, giving the child a biscuit and telling her to go and play in the back yard for a while. Jack’s daughter was the image of him and a sweet little thing called Elizabeth.

  The little girl ran off and Susan sat down on an armchair by the window and looked at the floor. Granny was shocked to see how young she looked. The sunlight streaming through the window highlighted her fresh, clear complexion and glossy dark hair. She was a pretty girl, but with the dark shadows of worry beneath her eyes.

  ‘He told me to get rid of it,’ Susan began, wringing her hands, her voice breaking. ‘He gave me a bottle of gin and said I had to drink it sitting in a hot bath. It didn’t work, of course,’ she said as her mother snorted. ‘Then he said he’d push me downstairs if I didn’t do something soon.’ She shrugged. ‘I didn’t know what to do. I was scared of him, so I just went along with his suggestion to save argument.’

  Granny Lomax gasped. ‘It must have been very frightening for you if you were scared of him, Susan.’

  ‘It was,’ her mother said. ‘She wouldn’t tell me what was wrong the night she came home upset. She’d told us she was off to the Mayfair with her pals. That’s where she’d met up with Jack a few weeks earlier. Of course we knew of his family as he didn’t live far from here and I’d never have agreed to him taking her out if I’d known. He has a bad reputation. He pursued her and she went out with him a couple of times, and then once more on the night when he put her in the family way. She was only just eighteen when Elizabeth arrived. I confronted him but he laughed in my face, said he’d not touched her and the baby couldn’t be his.

  ‘He said he was incapable since his shooting injury, as the pain overrode every feeling in his body. He even said to consult his army medical officer for proof. He denied giving Susan gin and threatening to push her down the stairs; swore blind that she’d made it all up. I didn’t know what to do. I lost my husband a few years ago and my two sons were away fighting. They’d have killed him, but sadly they never came home from the war. We just had to get on with things on our own. Elizabeth is the spit of him, but he still won’t have anything to do with her or Susan. We haven’t had a penny from him. He told Susan that he hates kids anyway and would never bring one into the world for that reason. Hah, famous last words. There’s not many folks round here know he fathered Elizabeth; just the couple of ladies you met as they helped us out when she was born. Most folk were too busy with the war and their own problems to take much notice at the time. We pretend her father was a soldier that got killed. It’s easier that way.’

  After a cup of tea, Granny had left and felt more worried now with her new-found knowledge and the thoughts that her granddaughter was under the same roof as a man who claimed to hate kids. But would Alice believe her? She doubted it. She was smitten with Jack and seemed to think the sun shon
e out of his backside. Brian seemed to like him too. It was going to be difficult to be patient and see how things played out. But at least she now knew far more about him than Alice did, or any of his friends and supporters.

  19

  December 1947

  With just one week to go before Christmas, Alice placed her hands in her lap as Dolores Redfern, supervisor of the cosmetics department, cast an eye over her application form. Alice crossed her fingers and curled them inwards, her nails digging into her palm. She’d been waiting ages for a vacancy to arise and as soon as a girl she knew on the Max Factor counter had let her know last week that her colleague was leaving in January to have a baby, Alice had applied. She looked up from gazing at her hands as Miss Redfern cleared her throat and glanced at her over the top of her steel-framed glasses.

  ‘Well, Mrs Lomax, this all seems to be in very good order. As we’ve already discussed, you have plenty of experience in serving the general public and of course as a Lewis’s employee, you are quite used to the fact that the store is undergoing major rebuilding works and all the inconvenience and disruption this entails. I do have one other interview to conduct today and I will be making a decision early in the New Year. I will be in touch with you as soon as the store reopens following the New Year bank holiday closure. If you are the successful applicant, there will be a two-week training period when you will be taught how to demonstrate the application of the products, but that will all be done in the department and this vacancy carries supervisory responsibilities after a few months. So there’s plenty of room to further your career with us. Thank you for attending and I bid you a happy festive season with your family.’ Miss Redfern got to her feet and gathered up her paperwork from the desk.

  Alice jumped up and shook Miss Redfern’s outstretched hand, feeling hopeful that this interview would lead somewhere eventually. She looked at her watch as she made her way back up to haberdashery. The store was busy with shoppers and an excited queue of small children, clutching the hands of their mothers, were waiting by the temporary grotto – half the size it used to be before the war, due to lack of space – to see Father Christmas. Marlene had promised to bring Cathy down to see him later this afternoon and then they were going to wait in the café for Alice to finish work.

  * * *

  Alice dashed back up the stairs and took her place behind the haberdashery counter.

  ‘How did it go?’ Sadie asked, wafting a cloth over the ever-present film of dust on the glass tops. She had decided to stay put in haberdashery for now and keep applying for library vacancies.

  ‘Okay, I think,’ Alice replied. ‘Fingers crossed now. Miss Redfern has got another interview to do later and then she will let me know in the New Year. She told me the post carries a supervisory position eventually, so that will mean more money and the hours are full time. Just as long as Marlene can still help with Cathy, it should all be good.’

  ‘I’m sure she will. Marlene enjoys looking after her. Oh look.’ Sadie pointed to a small woman hurrying towards them. ‘Here’s my mam. Wonder what she wants? She didn’t say she was coming into town today. Hiya, Mam. What’s up? You look a bit mithered.’

  Sadie’s mother thrust an envelope towards her. ‘This came earlier. But it was addressed to me so I opened it to read. It’s from Luca. He wants to see Gianni before he goes back to Italy for the winter months.’

  Sadie’s face drained as she read the letter. Luca Romano, her estranged husband, didn’t want to cause any problems, he said, but he felt it was time that Sadie let him have some sort of contact with his son. He’d let Sadie do as she thought best during the war as he’d had no choice other than to go back to Italy with his family. But now the war was over and the fair would spend a lot of time in Britain over the next few years, he felt he had the right to get to know Gianni. Sadie chewed her lip and passed the letter to Alice. Luca was planning to come to the house on Christmas Eve for a short visit and hoped he’d be welcome. The following week they would be going back to Italy until the spring.

  Alice read the letter and handed it back to Sadie. ‘I don’t know what to say. But surely it can’t do any harm just to let him have a short visit?’

  ‘What if he insists on taking him away?’ Sadie said, her eyes filling. She dashed away her tears with the back of her hand. ‘I might never see him again if he takes him to Italy.’

  ‘How can he?’ her mam said. ‘Your dad and me and your two brothers will all be there. He won’t take him away with us lot on your side. But I can’t see the harm it will do, to be honest. A quick visit and then, like he says, he’s going back abroad. Gianni should really get to know his dad, love. After all, he wasn’t a bad man, was he? It’s just the lifestyle you didn’t like. But Luca’s a hard worker and he might want to give you a bit towards Gianni’s keep. Let him come, and see what happens.’

  Sadie sighed. ‘Seems like I haven’t got much choice as he’s arriving on Christmas Eve and there’s no address for me to write back and say don’t bother. But this is it. One visit and then no more. I will make sure I’m out of Liverpool each time that fair comes to visit, like I did last year. I’ll take Gianni to my aunt’s in Chester.’

  ‘That’s up to you, chuck,’ Sadie’s mam said. ‘Get this first visit out of the way and see how you feel. Right, I’d better get back. That tram was swaying all over the show coming down here. Packed to the roof it was. It’s really busy out there. Nice to see, mind, after the last few years when no one ventured too far from home. I’ll see you later, Sadie.’

  Alice served a customer who wanted red wool and knitting needles to make some last-minute gloves for a present and then turned to Sadie, who still looked pale and worried.

  ‘It’ll be okay, you know. At least Gianni has still got a dad that cares for him. My poor Cathy hasn’t.’

  ‘Yes, and look how Terry died. That’s exactly what I’m terrified of. I hate motorbikes, like you do. If Gianni gets wind of the fact his dad rides one, he’s bound to want to try it when he’s older. It doesn’t even bear thinking about. But like I say, one visit and that’s it. Luca can write to Gianni, send him birthday cards, whatever, but Gianni is not going anywhere near that fairground while I still make the decisions about his upbringing.’

  * * *

  Alice put the finishing touches to her makeup, brushed her brown hair until it fell into shiny curls onto her shoulders and did a twirl in front of the mirror. She smoothed the full skirt of her new red woollen dress that Jack had bought her for Christmas, swaying from side to side and imagining his arms around her. She hoped they’d get the chance of a dance together tonight when he took a break. She was really looking forward to the New Year’s Eve party they were throwing downstairs in the concert room. Cathy was staying over at Granny Lomax’s until tomorrow and Brian had gone out with his friends to celebrate the New Year and would be sleeping over at one of their houses. For the first time since the honeymoon, she and Jack had a night to themselves. Christmas had been so busy, both at Lewis’s and here at the club. She’d not had a minute to think for weeks now, what with the move and getting settled in at the new flat and Jack bringing in workmen to change a few things around. The concert room was looking lovely and they were busy nearly every night of the week. Better than he’d hoped, Jack had told her. Alice felt proud of him, the way he was managing the club and looking after the money she’d handed over. Her half of the house sale was now invested in the club and Brian’s had been put into a separate bank account for his future. He wasn’t allowed to draw any out without Alice’s co-signature, but he didn’t need to touch it yet, not until he went on to college and hopefully university in time. She couldn’t wait to find out next week if her interview to work in the cosmetics department had been successful. Life was certainly good at the moment, and after so many lean years of scrimping and scraping Alice knew for certain that marrying Jack had been the best decision she’d made since losing Terry.

  Since the episode in Blackpool, which they never spoke abo
ut, Jack had been okay. He’d been to see a doctor about getting some help to relieve the pain in his foot. After a day of working and rushing around it was at its worst and it made him short-tempered. His doctor had prescribed a drug called Meperidine, which he’d been taking for a few weeks now. He still wasn’t supposed to wash it down with alcohol but he did, though it didn’t have as much of an effect on him as the previous drug he’d had.

  Alice had hardly worked on the bar with him since the move. He worked alongside Sheila, the new barmaid, and another woman called Polly who just came in for the odd night, and if they had anything special on. He’d told Alice he preferred it if she just left them to it. With all the extra hours she was now doing, she was tired by the time she got home from work, cooked a meal and sorted out Cathy and Brian and homework, so it hadn’t bothered her too much and she’d do anything to keep him happy. He was worn out by the time he’d finished off and seen Sheila out and fell asleep pretty much right away. Alice was glad he did as he was always worse the wear for drink and she knew he might handle her roughly. He was gentle and loving when sober, but it was still not quite what she’d expected from a husband. He was nothing like Terry had been. But, then, no two people were alike and she did love him.