by Maureen Lee
‘Shush!’ Alice put her finger to her lips and nodded towards the kitchen where her daughter could be heard washing dishes. ‘Me and John get on fine nowadays.’
‘Not all that fine,’ Bernie said in a hoarse whisper. ‘He still sleeps in the parlour. The kids must have guessed there’s something up by now.’
‘They think it’s his back, he ricked it and he has to sleep on his own.’
‘A likely story!’
‘It is a story, Bernie, and as long as the kids believe it, that’s all that matters. Anyroad, it doesn’t bother me, not much. I’ve got used to it by now.’ She gave her friend a little shove. ‘Stop trying to make me miserable. I love having me own salon. I’m dead happy, even if things aren’t exactly perfect at home. Now shove off and make yourself beautiful for Albert. Oh, and by the way, when you come to Christmas dinner tomorrer, try not to rile me dad. All you two ever do is argue.’
Bernadette opened the door. ‘Tell him not to rile me,’ she said pertly before closing it.
‘Phew!’ Alice locked the door and collapsed in a chair. ‘It’s been a day and a half, today has. Have you nearly finished, Fion?’ she called. ‘It’s time us two went home.’
‘I’ve only got to dry the dishes, Mam.’
‘Just leave them on the draining board to dry themselves.’
Someone tried the door. ‘We’re closed,’ Alice shouted, but the person banged on the glass. ‘Oh, Lord,’ she groaned. ‘It’s only your Auntie Cora.’
‘Tell her to sod off, Mam.’
‘Don’t be silly, luv.’
‘I’ve just come to wish you Merry Christmas and discuss the lease,’ Cora said when Alice reluctantly let her in. Her light skin was becoming sallow and her colourless hair was scraped back in its usual sparse bun. She wore an unflattering camel coat.
‘Merry Christmas, Cora,’ Alice said coldly. ‘What about the lease?’ The seven-year lease expired at the end of the month and was due to be renewed. No doubt Cora had come on Horace Flynn’s behalf to announce the cost of a new one.
‘It’s going up,’ Cora said.
‘I expected it would.’ It seemed only fair.
‘A new seven-year lease will be fourteen hundred pounds.’ The small eyes gleamed with pleasure. She clearly enjoyed being the purveyor of such grim news.
‘Fourteen hundred!’ Alice gasped. ‘I can’t afford that much, Cora! The rates went up earlier this year and the last electricity bill made me eyes pop.’
‘You’ll just have to cut down on expenses,’ Cora said. ‘Get rid of that assistant, for one.’
‘Not our Fion!’
‘No, the other one. That Patsy woman. You haven’t needed her since Fionnuala’s been full-time.’
‘I couldn’t possibly. She needs the money. Her husband’s dead mean and she’s desperate for their Daisy to go on the stage.’
‘There’s no room for sentiment in business, Alice.’
‘There is in mine,’ Alice cried. ‘There’s no way I’d get rid of Patsy. Anyroad, we’re often in need of three pairs of hands.’
Cora shrugged her narrow shoulders. ‘Take it or leave it – the lease, that is.’
‘We’ll leave it, thanks all the same,’ said a voice. Fionnuala came in from the kitchen. Cora shrank back. She wouldn’t have come if she’d known the girl was there. While she could wrap her gutless wonder of a mother around her little finger, she was nervous of Fionnuala who somehow always seemed to get the better of her. It was Fionnuala who, years ago, had demanded a copy of the agreement that her stupid mam had signed and pointed out Cora was only entitled to a third share of ‘the business presently known as Myrtle’s Hairdressing Salon’, so wasn’t due a penny from the upstairs flat: it was Fionnuala who made sure Cora bore her share of every single expense incurred by Lacey’s, down to things like lavatory paper and hairpins and even the tea the customers drank. Fionnuala had laughed like a drain when Cora tried to suggest that tips were part of the takings.
However, even Fionnuala couldn’t claim that ‘in perpetuity’ didn’t mean just that. In perpetuity. For all time. For ever.
‘But I asked you at the time, and you said “till the money’s paid back”,’ a shocked Alice had said, years ago, when she thought she had repaid the twenty-five pounds with interest.
‘I did no such thing.’ Cora had contrived to look indignant. ‘I assumed anyone in their right mind would know what “in perpetuity” meant. I didn’t just give you a loan. I invested in the business. A third of it’s mine. It ses so on the agreement.’
‘You’re not half an idiot, Mam,’ Fionnuala had groaned and Cora couldn’t help but silently agree.
Now, Fionnuala looked contemptuously away from her aunt towards her mother. ‘Mam, someone said the other day that Gloria’s in Marsh Lane is closing down. That agreement you signed was for Myrtle’s. If we moved somewhere else it would be null and void.’
Null and void! Alice wondered where her daughter had got such a grand phrase from. ‘That’s right,’ she said to Cora.
Cora’s lip curled. Fionnuala wasn’t quite as clever as she thought. ‘That’s funny,’ she said. ‘Mr Flynn holds the freehold of Gloria’s and he’s never mentioned anything about it closing down.’
Fionnuala was only momentarily taken aback. Her eyes flickered slightly. ‘Then maybe I heard wrong, but we could still move somewhere else.’
‘What, and lose all your custom?’ Cora sneered. ‘Don’t forget, if you upped and left, this place could still be let to another hairdresser. It doesn’t have to close down.’
‘Oh, no!’ Alice flung her arms around a dryer. ‘I wouldn’t want anyone else to have Lacey’s.’
‘Well, there you are, then.’ Cora smacked her lips. ‘As I said, you’ll just have to cut down on expenses. It’s much too warm in here, fr’instance, and you don’t need so many lights on, not now you’re closed. Get rid of that Patsy woman and stop being so free with the cups of tea.’ She eyed the single mince pie left on a plate and the remains of the sherry. ‘I bet women don’t get given stuff like that when they get their hair done in Mayfair.’
Fionnuala almost exploded with rage. ‘How dare you tell us how to run our business?’
‘Shush, luv. Goodnight, Cora,’ Alice said with false brightness. ‘I’ll tell you after Christmas whether I’ll take up the new lease or not. It needs some deciding, like.’
‘Honestly, Mam,’ Fion groaned after her aunt had gone. ‘You were dead stupid signing that bloody agreement.’
‘Horace Flynn could still put up the lease whether I’d signed the agreement or not.’
‘Yes, but we could afford it if we didn’t have to give Cora such a big chunk of what we earn.’
‘Hmm,’ Alice said thoughtfully. Her dad still maintained Cora did more for the landlord than keep his books. Alice wouldn’t have touched him with a bargepole, but there were more ways than one to get round a man like Horace Flynn.
Next day all the Laceys, along with Bernadette Moynihan and Danny Mitchell, sat down to Christmas dinner in the parlour of the house in Amber Street. It was a happy, festive occasion, occasionally hilarious. Bernadette and Danny pretended to be nice to each other – they’d even bought each other presents – a loud check scarf and a frilly pinafore.
From the head of the table, John Lacey beamed proudly at his family. The girls, once so similar, had acquired their own, singular features as they approached adulthood. Orla was dead pretty, the spitting image of her mother. A real heartbreaker, she already had a steady boyfriend of whom John disapproved. She’d got herself a job with the Crosby Star. At first, all she’d done was run messages and the like while she learnt shorthand and typing at night school. Now she was taking letters and had her own desk and typewriter. She was going to be a reporter one day, she said boastfully. ‘With a big London paper.’
Maeve seemed to have stopped growing at the age of twelve. Small, dainty, quietly self-assured, she worked at Bootle General Hospital in Derby Road, just ski
vvying to be blunt, but with the intention of training to be a proper nurse when she was old enough.
He sometimes worried about his eldest daughter, Fionnuala, who, at only eighteen, had become matronly stout and didn’t appear to have a friend in the world. She was an awkward, graceless girl, tactless – always saying the wrong thing – and over-effusive when there was no need. Perhaps it wasn’t good for her to work with her mother, mixing with women two, three, four times her age and not a lad in sight.
And Cormac! John beamed most proudly of all upon his son, eleven the day before yesterday and certain to pass the scholarship next year and go to St Mary’s grammar school. He used to worry that his lad, so quiet and studious, his head always buried in a book, would be bullied at school, particularly when he’d been moved up a class and put with children a year his senior. But Cormac, with his sweet smile and gentle face, never made a show of his cleverness, never bragged. And he was good at games, not so much footie, but his slight, fragile frame could move like the wind. If the school played rugby he’d be a star.
‘John, Bernie would like some more wine.’ Alice smiled. ‘You were in a little world of your own just then.’
‘Sorry, Bernie.’John refilled her glass. ‘Alice was right. I was miles away.’
Alice! His wife had ripened over the years. No longer gawky, her movements were confident, self-assured. And she was growing more and more confident by the day. He felt proud of Alice too. He hadn’t thought she’d had it in her to run her own business. But, he thought drily, perhaps he’d driven her to it. She’d been given the choice of Myrtle’s or staying at home and, like any sane, sensible person, she’d chosen Myrtle’s. He watched her, flushed and lovely, blue eyes sparkling animatedly as she discussed hairstyles with Bernadette. She had her own hair in something called a French pleat, which he didn’t like – it made her look sophisticated, a bit hard, he thought.
‘Not so much, luv.’ Alice put her hand on Fionnuala’s arm as she was about to take a third helping of Christmas pudding.
Did he still love her? John wondered. Probably. Probably just as much as he’d ever done. But now he felt they belonged to two different worlds – the world of the damaged and the world of the perfectly formed. He smiled to himself. And ne’er the twain shall meet!
The meal finished, the table was cleared and they played cards – Cormac could wipe the floor with everyone at poker.
At four o’clock John announced he was going out. ‘To the yard. I’d like to get a bit of painting done so it’ll be dry by tomorrer. I’ve got this urgent order, see.’
‘But it’s Christmas Day, luv,’ Alice wailed. ‘And surely you’re not working Boxing Day as well?’
‘I can’t let these people down, Alice. It’s the first time I’ve actually had an order from a big shop.’
‘And it’s dark, John. You should have done it this morning if it’s all that important. It’s blowing a gale out there.’
‘I didn’t want to miss seeing the kids open their presents. I’ll probably go for a drink later, so I’ll be late home.’
She fussed around, tying his scarf round his neck, buttoning his coat, and he tried not to show his impatience. Across the room his father-in-law was eying him suspiciously. He was so used to clandestine assignations himself that he automatically assumed John was off on a similar mission.
Alice came with him to the door, bemoaning the fact that he had to go all the way to Seaforth. ‘I’m surprised you couldn’t have found a more suitable place much nearer home in Bootle.’
‘I tried,’ John said and closed the door.
When Alice returned to the parlour, Bernie and Danny were in the middle of an argument. Why had he bought her a pinny? Bernie wanted to know. Had he done it deliberately to emphasise a woman’s place was in the kitchen?
Danny winked. ‘I might have.’
‘Well, it won’t work. I’ll never wear it.’
‘I’ll not wear that jazzy scarf. I don’t know what made you think I had such dead awful taste.’
‘You,’ Bernadette said furiously, ‘are the most maddening man in the whole world.’
‘And you’re the most abominatable woman.’
Bernadette wrinkled her nose haughtily. ‘It’s abominable, actually.’
Danny chuckled. ‘Whatever it is, you’re it, particularly with that hairstyle. It makes you look like a convict.’
The girls and Cormac were listening with interest to the inevitable squabble between Grandad and Mam’s best friend. They found them highly entertaining. ‘Why don’t you two like each other?’ Maeve wanted to know.
‘It’s a long story, luv.’ Danny shook his head resignedly.
‘They’re only pretending not to like each other,’ Cormac wisely said. ‘They like each other really.’
‘Don’t be so ridiculous, luv.’ Bernadette blushed beetroot red. Danny found something tremendously interesting on the back of his left thumb, and Alice stared at her father and her friend, flabbergasted.
‘It’s time for tea, Mam,’ Fionnuala reminded her.
‘Oh, yes.’ Alice came down to earth. ‘Mind everyone while I set the table.’ They had guests coming – Orla’s boyfriend, Micky Lavin, and two girls from the hospital, friends of Maeve.
While she prepared the sarnies, Alice tried to discern how she would feel if Cormac, clever little chap, were right. She’d always known Bernie was keen on her dad – not that she’d ever mentioned it – but it hadn’t crossed her mind the feeling was reciprocated. Danny was twenty-one years older than her friend, but still a vital, attractive man, a bit like Clark Gable, though not quite so tall and less broad – much preferable to the lacklustre Albert Eley. She’d not minded Danny’s never-ending stream of women in the past, because she’d always known they weren’t serious. But Bernie, only the same age as herself! Would she take her own place in her father’s heart?
Oh, what did it matter? Alice laughed out loud. They were two of the people she loved most in the world and it would be the gear to see them happy together. She began to plan what she would wear for the wedding.
It must have been a ten-force gale. John had to battle his way through the streets on his way to Seaforth.
These days, Alice wasn’t the only Lacey with her own business. Five years ago John had built bunk beds for his girls, which had become the subject of much interest. In an area of mainly small houses and generally large families, space was always at a premium. The Murphys down the street were the first to ask if John could spare the time to make them a set of bunk beds, or two sets if he had even more time.
John had obliged and the Murphys had insisted on paying, not only for the wood, but for his labour. Before long, orders for beds stretched ahead for months. Then he made a bed for himself in the parlour, because sleeping on the old settee was crucifying for a chap as tall as he was. It was a very simple design and he managed to upholster it himself – a settee, with a seat that pulled forward and a back that slid down to make a double bed.
With many a parlour used to accommodate growing children, ageing grandads and grannies, spinster aunts and lonely uncles, even married sons and daughters, John Lacey’s folding beds quickly became as popular as the bunk beds.
Instead of months, he was deluged with orders that would have taken years to complete. It seemed only sensible to give up regular employment and concentrate on making furniture.
He had rented a yard, an old dairy, and there was more than one reason why he’d chosen Seaforth, so far away from Bootle. It wasn’t only because he wanted to avoid the neighbours and his family dropping in for a chat, preventing him from getting on with his work.
The wind was less fierce within the shelter of the narrow streets of Seaforth. The yard was on the corner of Benton Street and Crozier Terrace, the latter a cul-de-sac. Next door was the shop that used to be the actual dairy where milk and eggs had been sold. It had been empty for years.
John undid the padlock on the double gates. There was no sign yet announc
ing the name of the company inside, but the heading on the order books and invoices he’d had printed was B.E.D.S. It had been Fionnuala’s suggestion and he thought the capital letters and full stops gave the name a certain authority – much better than just ‘Beds’.
There was another padlock on the two-storey building inside the yard that had once housed the dairyman’s horse. John used the top floor as an office and kept the finished furniture downstairs. He climbed the ladder, turned on the light and removed a paper carrier bag from beneath the table he used as a desk. Then he locked the stable, locked the yard gates and hurried away. He had no intention of doing a mite of work on Christmas Day.
The bag in his hand, John walked quickly along Crozier Terrace, his eyes fixed on the end house where light gleamed through the flowered curtains. The houses were even smaller than those in Amber Street, with only two bedrooms and no hall – the front door opened straight from the parlour.
The key already in his hand, John inserted it in the lock and went inside. The aroma of roasting chicken greeted him and music, which he had heard from outside – something classical and very grand.
Clare immediately rose from the chair in front of a roaring fire. The other chair was empty, waiting for him. She held a tiny baby in her arms. Another child, about two, with white-blond hair like his mother, was playing with bricks on the floor. He leapt to his feet.
‘Dad!’ He flung his arms round John’s legs.
John’s eyes met smiling grey ones across the room. ‘Merry Christmas, Mrs Lacey.’ He held up the bag. ‘Prezzies.’
Meg Lacey had been round for her Christmas dinner. Billy had gone missing the minute the meal was over and Cora did her utmost to encourage his mother to follow suit – Mrs Lacey still insisted on mauling Maurice, something which made Cora’s stomach curl.