Packards

by Patricia Burns

  A sob broke from Isobel’s lips, but she released her hold on her friend. Daisy looked at her. Her face drained of colour and her eyes dilated with terror. Anger began to overcome Daisy’s fear. She caught at Isobel’s wrist.

  ‘No, you stay here. You don’t have to do what he says. He don’t own you,’ she said.

  But Isobel was already standing up, shaking in every limb. She pulled away from Daisy and, holding on to the table for support, she did as she had been bid and moved away. Daisy stared back at Mr Edward. How much had he heard? Had he been listening when she told Isobel to take what she could and run? Even if he hadn’t, this was the end of all her ambitions. It was the sack for her now.

  ‘I know you, don’t I?’ Mr Edward was saying. ‘You’re another of the Ladies’ Sportswear sluts, aren’t you? The one I had to move. Phipps. That’s right. Phipps. And what, might I ask, are you doing here, Phipps?’

  Daisy swallowed. ‘I’m visiting my friend,’ she said.

  ‘Visiting your friend,’ he repeated. ‘And what makes you think you can do a thing like that?’

  Very clearly, Daisy foresaw what would happen. She would have to leave Trent Street. She would have no references. She would have to go back home and have her family crow over her failed dreams. No more Packards, no more warmth and cleanliness and beautiful things. No more Johnny. She looked at Mr Edward, and she hated him.

  ‘Why not?’ she said. ‘It’s a free country, ain’t it? She’s not your prisoner. And even prisoners get visitors. You can visit the Scrubs, so I’m visiting here.’

  ‘Not any longer. I don’t care to have anyone interfering with my private life, least of all sly little shopgirls.’

  ‘You can’t stop me,’ Daisy said.

  ‘I think you will find that I can. I shall simply tell Isobel not to let you in. Isobel always does as she is told.’

  ‘You can’t –’ she began.

  Edward ignored her. ‘So you can go back to Trent Street now – you are at Trent Street, aren’t you? – and pack your things. You will leave in the morning, and I shall let it be known that you have been dismissed for insubordination.’

  In the morning. By this time tomorrow she would be back in North Millwall, sharing a room with her sisters.

  ‘I – I’ll tell Miss Packard,’ Daisy threatened. ‘She’ll stick up for me. She won’t like it when she hears what you been doing to Isobel. She won’t like it a bit.’

  Edward’s mouth twisted into another unpleasant smile. ‘I don’t think she’s going to find out, do you? You forget, you will not be at Packards any longer.’

  ‘I’ll find out where she lives. I’ll go and tell her,’ Daisy said, not knowing how she was going to do it, but utterly determined to succeed. Johnny. Yes, that was it. She would get Johnny to help her.

  ‘Even if she were to listen to you, which is most unlikely, I’m afraid Mrs Rutherford no longer has any influence over what happens at the store. Now that she is married she has other interests.’

  There had to be something, someone he wouldn’t want knowing about what he was getting up to.

  ‘She could tell your wife.’

  For just a moment, she thought she saw a flicker of a reaction to that, but it was instantly gone.

  ‘I think not. And besides, if you were so unwise as to try to spread rumours, just think what might happen to your little friend.’

  It was spoken so lightly that she did not immediately catch the meaning. Then it sunk in. To underline it, Edward walked round the table to where Isobel was sitting. Before he even reached her, she whimpered and shrunk away from him. He raised an eyebrow at Daisy.

  ‘See?’

  Daisy saw.

  Edward placed his hands on Isobel’s shoulders and ran them along until they met in a collar round her neck. Daisy felt sick.

  ‘You leave her alone!’ she cried, jumping up.

  The chair toppled over. She lunged towards Edward, but a scream from Isobel stopped her in her tracks.

  ‘No – Daisy – don’t!’

  Daisy hesitated. Isobel’s eyes pleaded with her.

  Edward smiled. He ran his fingers up and down the front of Isobel’s throat.

  ‘I think your friend wants you to go now. Don’t you, Isobel?’

  ‘Yes,’ Isobel sobbed. ‘Please go, Daisy. Just go.’

  Edward took two quick strides across the room. He caught hold of Daisy’s arm and twisted up behind her back until she thought it was going to come out of the socket. She gasped and bit back a cry of pain.

  ‘You’ve been told to go,’ he said, his voice horribly near her ear.

  He began to march her towards the door. Unable to resist, Daisy was borne along, out of the room and along the hallway. At the front door, he stopped.

  ‘Remember,’ he said, ‘you leave Trent Street first thing in the morning, and if I find that you have said one word about this, one word, then your precious little friend will suffer for it. Understand?’

  He jerked her arm further up her back. Daisy yelped. Tears of pain stood in her eyes.

  ‘Yes,’ she gasped.

  ‘Good. And be assured that I mean every word.’

  Daisy believed it.

  He opened the door, pushed her outside, slammed it shut. Daisy found herself on the street in the pouring rain, shaking in every limb, churning with rage and a sense of failure.

  For several minutes she just stood there, unable to take it all in. It had all happened so quickly. She stared at the outside of the house, so ordinary-looking, just like all the others in the road. She groaned out loud at the thought of what might be going on inside there right at that moment. She had been useless. Instead of helping Isobel she had made everything ten times worse. She cast desperately about for a solution. The police. But her childhood experience told her that they would be no use. A man had to practically kill his wife before they would intervene in a domestic dispute. A mistress had even less protection. And even if they did investigate, Isobel would admit to nothing. Tell Miss Packard? She was concerned about her girls. She had wanted to know what had happened to Isobel when she left. She would wonder at Daisy’s being dismissed. But she was still away with her new husband and nobody knew when she would be back in London. Sir Thomas? Even as she thought it, Daisy knew it was useless to approach him. If by some remote chance she actually got to see him, he was not going to believe the accusations of a mere junior shopgirl. It was hopeless.

  And as she came to that conclusion, Daisy became aware of her own situation. She was wet and cold. Her hair was clinging to her face. Then she realised that her hat, her only jacket and her purse with her fare back to Trent Street were all on the other side of the closed door.

  ‘Oh God, no!’ she wailed.

  She sat down in the doorstep, utterly defeated. She had no power at all against the likes of Mr Edward. She was soaking, jobless and penniless. For a long time, she sat with her head on her hands, unable to move, until the cold bit into her bones. Then at last it occurred to her that if she did not get going, she would not get back to Trent Street by ten o’clock and she would be shut out for the night, her very last night in her beloved attic room. Stiffly, she got to her feet, and began the long trek across town.

  As she plodded along, she revolved the whole episode over and over in her mind, burning with impotent anger, trying to think of a way in which she could have made it turn out differently. As she did so, anxiety as to what was happening to Isobel gnawed at her, made worse by the fact that she could think of no way to help her. When she looked ahead to what was going to happen to herself, it was even worse. It was just as she had pictured it from that very first moment that Mr Edward found her there with Isobel. Without a reference there would be no chance of another job in a big store. There was nothing she could do but to go back to her family, to the overcrowded house and a job in a factory. Most of all, there was Johnny. She tried not to think about him at all, but it was impossible. She longed to see him, to tell him of what had happened,
to feel his sympathy and ask for his help, but she did not dare in case someone saw them and his job was put in jeopardy. She could not do that to him. It was bad enough that she had been sacked. She could not let him be ruined as well.

  She walked automatically, one weary foot after the other, her mind unable to find any hope at all. In a life that had known plenty of hardship, she had never been so utterly miserable.

  39

  ‘NOW THIS MORNING I really do have to go and put in some practice at the nets,’ Hugo said. ‘Shall you mind terribly if I leave you to amuse yourself?’

  ‘Of course not. I shall be perfectly all right,’ Amelie said, swallowing down the sense of rejection.

  ‘You are very good. Not every wife would be so forebearing on her first day back from her honeymoon.’

  ‘I know how much it means to you.’

  His foremost sporting ambition for that summer was to be picked for the MCC team. Amelie knew that if that was what he wanted, then that was very probably what he would achieve. Hugo might be every inch the gentleman amateur, but he worked at sporting prowess with all the dedication of a professional. She had no quarrel with him over that. She admired him for it. It was one of the things that singled him out from the generality of young men, people like Perry and his friends who did not put any effort into anything except amusing themselves. It was when he took the same attitude to his personal life that it hurt beyond bearing.

  Amelie looked across the breakfast table at him, tall and strong and handsome, the spring sunshine glancing on his blond head, and her heart contracted with love.

  ‘I shall come and watch you when you play. I want to see you score your first century for MCC,’ she said.

  Hugo frowned. ‘Don’t tempt fate,’ he warned.

  ‘Sorry,’ Amelie said. She kept forgetting how superstitious he could be about some things.

  ‘I’ll make it up to you this evening,’ Hugo said, returning to the day’s plans. ‘We could go to the theatre, if you wish.’

  ‘Yes, I’d like that,’ Amelie agreed.

  ‘And then tomorrow evening, I would very much like it if you were to come to a meeting with me.’

  Something in his voice roused her suspicions. ‘What sort of meeting?’

  He avoided her eyes. ‘The Eugenics Society.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘My dear, it would mean so much to me to be able to introduce my wife to the other members.’

  ‘Your brood mare, you mean.’

  She hated the Eugenics Society. It was because of them that Hugo had sought her out not for love, but because she would make a fitting mate, physically and mentally. It was because of them that every time they made love it was shadowed by the knowledge that he was eager to father the first of the super race he was set on procreating.

  ‘Darling, it’s not like that.’ Hugo leant forward, his blue eyes earnest. ‘I’m proud of you. I want to show you off to my friends. There is nothing wrong in that, surely?’

  He sounded so sincere. He was sincere. He was proud of her, she was sure of that. But – but it was the reasons for his pride that distressed her. She was a splendid specimen, one to match his perfection.

  ‘I will not meet those people and that’s an end to it,’ she stated.

  ‘Don’t you think that you’re being unreasonable to condemn them before you’ve even met them?’ Hugo asked.

  ‘I don’t need to meet them. I know what they stand for. That’s enough,’ Amelie insisted.

  ‘You’re condemning them out of hand on the basis of the little I have told you. I think that if you were to study their ideas rather more closely you would come to see, as I have, that what they say is extremely important. They hold the future in their hands.’

  ‘Not mine,’ Amelie said, and even as the words came out of her mouth she knew that it was not true. Through Hugo they did have a hold on her future and there was nothing she could do about it. It made her feel physically sick.

  Hugo stood up.

  ‘I have to go now. But I would ask you to reconsider your decision. It means a great deal to me.’

  Amelie kissed him goodbye, and was left feeling that she was being disloyal. The other members of the society would be sure to ask about his new wife, would wonder why he had not brought her along. He would be made to look weak and foolish if he had to admit that his bride of one month was refusing to accompany him. But she could not bring herself to do it. She could not associate with people who seemed to want to breed babies in the way that farmers produced prize beef.

  She stood at the window of the dining room of the house they had rented for the Season, and looked out over a garden bright with spring bulbs. She passed a hand over her stomach. She was two weeks’ late. Perhaps she was expecting already. She should be happy. Hugo would certainly be deliriously happy. But what if it turned out not to be the perfect child he wanted? What if, heaven forbid, it was lame or deaf, or worse still, weak in the head? These things did happen. Would he reject it? His friends at the Eugenics Society would. From what she could gather, such a child would be regarded as being somewhat less than human.

  She shied away from a prospect too painful to dwell on. She had the rest of the day to herself. Apart from giving her orders to the cook, there were no constraints on her time, no mother to arrange what she should do. She was a married woman now, and able to go where she liked without a chaperon. With a lift of the spirits, she realised that she could go to the store.

  On the pavements outside Packards, people were looking at her spring displays. Amelie got out of the cab and lingered amongst them, unashamedly eavesdropping.

  ‘Just look, how pretty!’

  ‘Like a tableau. Very tasteful. I do like that hat on the left there.’

  ‘The green one? That wouldn’t suit you at all.’

  ‘I know, but they will have other colours inside. Shall we go and see?’

  Amelie’s sore heart was soothed a little. She was right, and she would tell her grandfather so. People were attracted in by the windows despite there being much less in them now. What she must work on next was having far more goods out on display inside the shop, instead of all tucked away in drawers. She went through the main doors and stood for a moment in the marble entrance lobby, looking up at the great glass dome. She took a deep breath in. Packards. She was home. Her marriage may have turned out not to be the fairy tale she expected, but the store was still here.

  She progressed through the departments, looking at changes, speaking to staff, noting where goods could be set out to tempt customers. She was eager to get to her beloved Ladies’ Sportswear and see how well it was doing now that the sun was shining and women would be turning their thoughts to tennis and croquet and archery. Miss Higgs welcomed her as she passed under the archway.

  ‘Mrs Rutherford! What a surprise. We’re very pleased to see you, I’m sure.’

  ‘I’m pleased to be back, Miss Higgs. How are you?’

  She asked about the girls, then turned to general sales turnover, the popularity of her favourite lines and, most importantly, what the customers were asking for. As she talked and listened and wrote down points she wanted to remember, she watched the shopgirls serving. One customer went away empty-handed. Another just bought a tie.

  ‘We must see about getting Daisy Phipps back here. She was by far our most successful girl. She could sell to people without their feeling that they were being forced into buying what they didn’t want,’ she said.

  Miss Higgs pursed her thin mouth.

  ‘Phipps has been dismissed, Mrs Rutherford.’

  ‘Daisy? Dismissed?’ Amelie was stunned. ‘When, and whatever for?’

  ‘Last week, Mrs Rutherford. For cheeking one of the seniors, I believe. Can’t say as I’m that surprised She always was a bit above herself.’

  ‘How ri–’ Amelie began, then checked herself. She was about to say that it was ridiculous to sack such an able salesgirl, and one who was so loyal to Packards. If she had been cheeky, th
en a reprimand or maybe a fine would have been sufficient. Somebody had exercised very bad judgement, but she could not criticise the management in front of Higgs. ‘Well, I must say I’m very disappointed. I always found her to be very willing,’ she said, and resolved to find out more.

  When they had covered all that had been going on while she had been away, and Amelie had noted any problems that needed sorting out and orders that should be chased, she took her leave of Miss Higgs and the girls and made her way up to Baby Linens.

  Neither the floorwalker nor the buyer had much to tell her.

  ‘The first we knew of it was when she didn’t turn up on Thursday morning. Very inconvenient it was, too, with two of the girls already off with the influenza.’

  ‘So it was not one of you whom she upset?’

  ‘Oh no. She was a very useful girl. Very biddable. No, it was someone down on the ground floor.’

  ‘That’s not what I heard. I heard it was one of the managers.’

  Amelie thanked them and left. She would go to Mr Mason at Staffing and find out.

  Up on the fifth floor, the Staff Manger received her with badly disguised apprehension.

  ‘Miss Phipps, Mrs Rutherford? Er – yes. I did have to dismiss her. Apparently she was extremely offensive towards Mr Edward. Practically attacked him, she did. Had to be restrained. Terrible business. Naturally she could not be kept on after that.’

  ‘Naturally,’ Amelie said, but she was not satisfied. The whole thing sounded odd. ‘Were there any witnesses to this, Mr Mason?’

  ‘Ah – well, I couldn’t say, Mrs Rutherford. It did not occur to me to question Mr Edward on the matter.’

  ‘Of course.’

  He would not dare suggest to Edward that there might be any doubt as to the truth of his allegations. Amelie went off, more mystified than ever. What had Daisy Phipps been up to, arguing with Edward? The girl had enough sense to know that it would cost her her job, and she had always seemed so enthusiastic about working at Packards. One thing was certain, she was not going to rest until she found out the truth of it. She marched along the corridor to Edward’s office, past his secretary and through the inner door. Edward jumped up with every appearance of delight.