The Golden Chain

by Margaret James

  ‘Or Hi There, New York,’ said Daisy dryly.

  ‘Yes, that’s it!’ cried Jesse, as Ewan came back carrying some drinks, and glowered to see Jesse sitting in his place. ‘They’d love you in New York.’

  ‘How do you know?’ Julia asked him, pursing scarlet lips. ‘You’ve been there, have you?’

  ‘No, but I’ll be going one day,’ Jesse said, as Ewan forced himself into the space between them and sat down next to Daisy. ‘Daisy, you and me on Broadway, eh?’ he added, leaning forward to catch Daisy’s eye.

  ‘Maybe.’ Daisy smiled and drank some lemonade.

  ‘But in the meantime, the Majestic, Doncaster.’ Amy took her glass of gin and lemon. ‘Thank you Ewan darling,’ she added, in a carrying whisper. ‘You’re a gentleman. You stand your round and pay your way.’

  After Christmas, when almost every theatre in the land was doing pantomime, and so the company had no bookings, Mrs and Mrs Curtis gave them all a few days off.

  Ewan said he should go and see his mother, and would Daisy like to go to Scotland? ‘Come with me?’ he said, his green eyes soulful and beseeching. ‘Let’s go and see some proper snow?’

  But Daisy said she didn’t think that she and Mrs Fraser would get on, and in any case she should go home and see them all in Dorset.

  She found Rose in a most peculiar mood, distracted but affectionate, interested in everything Daisy said about the company, but still preoccupied. Daisy was sure that if she tested Rose on what she’d just been told, Rose would not remember anything.

  ‘It’s money, I suppose,’ she told the twins, as they dragged her off to see the cows, who were warm and dry in their luxurious new cowshed.

  She was pleased to find that Rose and Alex had spent a bit of the insurance money on the bailiff’s cottage, too. So now it was a comfortable if cluttered little home, with bright new curtains, modern furniture, and a decent kitchen with an efficient range which was nothing like the old Victorian horror they’d had at Melbury House.

  All the same, they surely couldn’t mean to live in it forever? One day, they’d move back to the big house?

  ‘It’s always money these days.’ Robert stroked a golden, docile cow, who gazed at him with liquid, dark brown eyes. ‘Dad’s spent a fortune sorting out this place. Mum’s always going on about the bank, and saying how are we ever going to pay the interest on the loan.’

  ‘There’s something else as well,’ said Stephen.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I was in the kitchen one Sunday morning and they were coming across the yard. Dad told Mum she’d have to do it some time.’

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘What did Mum say then?’

  ‘She told him she’d get round to it eventually, and there was no hurry. She’d waited long enough already, and a few more months would make no difference.’

  ‘Then what happened?’

  ‘They saw me at the window and clammed up.’

  ‘Do you think she’s ill?’ asked Daisy, thinking back to when the family first arrived in Dorset, and Rose had been in bed most of the winter.

  ‘She isn’t ill,’ said Robert. ‘Well, she doesn’t cough or anything. But we can see she’s worried.’

  When the twins had gone to bed that evening, Daisy asked Rose if anything was wrong.

  ‘I don’t think so, darling.’ Rose looked up from her everlasting mending, shook her head and smiled. ‘The twins are doing well at school, you’re happy acting, and your father’s sure he’s going to make it as a farmer. So I’d say everything is fine.’

  The middle of January saw the company on tour again, fighting off the coughs and colds picked up on crowded trains and draughty stations, making their way through snow and slush and wondering aloud why anybody chose to be an actor.

  When asked what he’d been doing on his break, Jesse said he’d been to see his parents, and Daisy thought how sweet and how forgiving. ‘I saw mine as well,’ she said.

  ‘I’m sure that made their day,’ said Jesse in his usual mocking drawl. ‘So we’ve both done our duty, haven’t we?’

  One evening, they stood together watching Ewan from the wings. ‘Fraser’s yelling at them again,’ said Jesse, as his right hand lay on Daisy’s shoulder, idly massaging her collar bone. ‘Listening to him, you’d think this audience was deaf as well as stupid. They might be, I suppose. All mill hands have cloth ears. But Fraser should be playing in a field, not on a stage.’

  ‘I think he’s very good,’ said Daisy, not adding that in her opinion Jesse often mumbled, that she had heard old biddies in the front row of the stalls complain they couldn’t hear him.

  ‘He could be good,’ said Jesse. ‘But he doesn’t watch, he doesn’t learn. He thinks that since he was the star of all his school productions, he knows it all already.’

  ‘What about me, should I be in a field?’

  ‘I don’t think so, Daisy.’ Jesse leaned towards her and looked deep into her eyes. ‘You’re a natural – even that old idiot Curtis says so – watching you lifts everybody’s heart.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Daisy looked away, blushing red beneath her number 5.

  ‘When this season’s over, and I’ve got a bit of cash saved up, I’m going to go to London, try to get into revue,’ said Jesse. ‘Why don’t you come with me?’

  ‘You’re going to do a song and dance act? I didn’t know you could sing?’

  ‘Oh, I can sing,’ said Jesse. ‘I can do all the serious stuff as well, but that’s not what people want today. This country’s in a deep depression. Millions are out of work or on short time, absolutely everyone’s fed up, so when they go out they want to have a bit of fun. You and I could make their hearts grow lighter. At the moment, musical comedy’s the coming thing.’

  ‘I’m on now,’ said Daisy, straightening her skirt.

  ‘So take it fast,’ said Jessie, ‘then we can all go to the pub.’

  As Daisy lay in bed that night she wondered – could she go to London, and could she go with Jesse Trent? As for revue, she’d love to do revue. She’d love to sing and dance like Ginger Rogers.

  But if she went with Jesse, what would Ewan say?

  Their next engagements were in theatres in Birmingham and the Midlands, but after that the company would break up.

  Frank and George were going to Skegness to do a concert party season, in boaters, Oxford bags and stripey blazers. ‘All the old widows love us,’ they told Daisy. ‘We do the ragtime standards, and they sing along.’

  Mr and Mrs Curtis said they hoped to get hotel work – comedy sketches, piano duets and poetry recitals in palm courts in places like Torquay and Bognor Regis. Julia and Amy would be unemployed. Jesse was wearing Daisy down about trying her luck in London.

  Yes, she said, to shut him up and stop him buzzing round her like a hornet, she would definitely like to go. Yes, she’d be his partner. Yes, they’d put an act together. Yes, they’d try to get into revue.

  But, if she went with Jesse, she’d have to break the news to Ewan, and she didn’t quite know how to do it.

  It was a rest day, and Ewan was determined to have Daisy to himself.

  So, since he knew she needed shoes – he’d heard her saying so to Julia – he suggested going shopping in Birmingham city centre.

  Daisy said she’d love to, in fact she’d been so sweet to him just recently that he had begun to hope she’d got over Trent, and everything would be all right again.

  The devious bastard had casually announced the previous evening that he was going to Cheltenham to see a family friend, and he’d cleared off at crack of dawn. Frank and George had gone to see a manager in Walsall who might have some casual work for them, work which they would definitely need, because a run of concert parties wouldn’t make them rich. Mr an
d Mrs Curtis were doing the accounts, so that just left Julia and Amy. He hoped they wouldn’t decide to tag along.

  Luckily, they didn’t. They said they were going to get their hair done, to try one of those softer, less unpleasant-smelling permanent waves.

  ‘Go on, take her out to lunch,’ Amy had added, grinning at him and winking. ‘Then go and see a talkie, kiss her in the dark and tell her all about your Scottish plan.’

  ‘You think she might come with me?’

  ‘I reckon it’s a certainty.’

  So now they were in Rackham’s restaurant, eating shepherd’s pie and watching as the rain poured down on Birmingham, making it look even more depressing.

  But Ewan was feeling happy and relaxed. They’d bought the shoes, and Daisy had let him also buy a beautiful silk scarf, provided he let her buy a tie for him.

  Then, as they started on their pudding, she dropped her bombshell.

  ‘You’re going to London?’ Ewan stared. It was as if she’d told him she was going to the moon. ‘You’re going with him?’

  ‘I’m going with Jesse, certainly,’ said Daisy, reddening. ‘But it’s a professional arrangement, nothing more.’

  She reached across the table, took his hand. ‘I’ll still see you, Ewan,’ she promised. ‘I’ll still be your girl. Why don’t you come to London, too?’

  ‘I can’t,’ said Ewan, and jerked his hand away.

  ‘Why, what will you be doing?’

  ‘I’m going back to Scotland to join a company in Glasgow. It’s called the Comrades. I’ll be doing Shakespeare, and some modern drama, too.’

  ‘You never said!’ cried Daisy.

  ‘You never asked,’ retorted Ewan.

  ‘When did you go to Glasgow?’

  ‘When we had those few days off in January, and I went to Glen Grant to see my mother. I wrote to the manager of the Comrades and asked if I could meet him. I read some stuff for him, and he engaged me on the spot.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Daisy, looking winded. She pushed away her pudding. ‘I think you might have told me.’

  ‘You’ve been so busy with Mr Jesse Trent that you’ve not had time to speak to anybody else.’

  ‘So there’ll be five hundred miles between us.’

  ‘Yes, so it would seem.’ Ewan felt a miserable sort of satisfaction. ‘What do your parents have to say about this London scheme?’

  ‘I haven’t told them yet.’

  ‘I’m not surprised. I don’t suppose they’d be delighted to hear you’re going to London with a man.’

  ‘Maybe not,’ admitted Daisy, fiddling with a teaspoon. ‘Ewan, will you write to me?’

  ‘If that’s what you want,’ said Ewan, looking for the waitress to ask her for the bill.

  ‘I don’t want us to part like this,’ said Daisy.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You’re angry with me.’

  ‘I’m not angry.’

  ‘So why are you scowling?’

  ‘You want it all ways, don’t you?’ The monster opened one red eye and grinned. ‘You want both me and Trent dancing attendance. Well, make your choice. It’s him or me.’

  ‘There’s no choice to make!’ cried Daisy, standing up and throwing down her napkin. ‘You’re the man I love!’

  ‘It looks like it,’ said Ewan, and now he caught the attention of the waitress. ‘Miss, may I please have the bill?’

  ‘Ewan, you’re impossible!’ Daisy turned and stormed out of the restaurant.

  The monster winked and said, I told you so.

  Alex had decided Phoebe must be asked if she would like to come to Dorset, and said that if Rose didn’t write, he’d do it anyway.

  So Rose gave in and wrote to Phoebe, inviting her to visit them in Charton. Phoebe sent a wire to say she’d booked her ticket on Cunard.

  After Rose had panicked quietly for a day or two, she went to see Mrs Hobson in the village, and told her what had happened.

  Mrs Hobson said while she wasn’t bothered about what Mrs Rosenheim might think, they couldn’t let young Daisy down, could they, Mrs Denham?

  ‘She’ll have Daisy’s bedroom, will she?’ added Mrs Hobson.

  ‘There’s nowhere else,’ said Rose. ‘I don’t imagine she’d want to bunk up with the twins.’

  ‘Maybe not,’ said Mrs Hobson, grinning. ‘Mrs Denham, please don’t look so worried. You’ve made that old cottage look so nice. Anybody would be pleased to stay there, even somebody from New York City.’

  ‘I’m not so sure,’ said Rose.

  They polished and they painted. They cleaned up bits of furniture they’d taken from the ruins of Melbury House. They washed and starched and ironed. They went to Dorchester and bought some pretty bedclothes and a fat, pink eiderdown. They managed to make Daisy’s bedroom look like something from a magazine.

  Or so Rose hoped.

  Daisy couldn’t decide what she should do. Go with Jesse to London? Go with Ewan – not that he had asked her, so she’d have to talk him round, and hope this Comrades lot would offer her a job as well? Or – as a last resort – go back to Dorset?

  ‘What’s the matter, Daisy May?’ asked Amy, as Daisy frowned and fretted, trying to decide what she should do. In spite of what she’d said to Ewan, and what she’d said to Jesse, it wasn’t too late to change her mind.

  While she’d been in Dorset, she had seen how hard her parents worked, and she had mucked in, too. Alex had Mr Hobson and the twins to help him with the cows, and Mrs Hobson came up every day to help her mother, but Daisy felt she ought to help them, too – either she should be there, or she should be sending money home.

  She found three bits of paper. London, Dorset, Scotland – she wrote one place on each, and then asked Julia to pick one.

  ‘What is this, a raffle?’ said Julia doubtfully. ‘What am I going to win? I don’t want any bath salts.’

  ‘Just choose a bit of paper!’

  ‘Oh, all right, the pink one.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Daisy said. ‘I’m going to London.’

  ‘Yeah, I thought you might be.’

  The guest arrived in Charton, but instead of being delighted by the bailiff’s cottage and saying it was cute, she was appalled.

  ‘Rose, whatever ’appened?’ Phoebe stared round the kitchen open-mouthed, as if she couldn’t believe her eyes. ‘This place is a slum! You look like some old cleanin’ woman in that jersey two-piece! It’s all saggin’ round yer arse! Rose, what are you doin’, dressed up like a charlady, an’ livin’ in a slum?’

  ‘There was a fire at Henry’s house, and we lost almost all our things.’ Rose had been brought up to be a lady, and now she did her best to smile politely as her visitor ranted on.

  But having Phoebe standing there and wailing about charladies and slums, when enormous efforts had been made to make the cottage bright and welcoming – Rose was mortified.

  ‘There was some insurance money, of course, but we’re ploughing that into the farm,’ she went on, gamely. ‘If the farm does well, we’ll think about rebuilding Melbury House.’ She glanced down at her cheap brown knitted skirt, ‘and buying some new clothes.’

  ‘But Rose, you was so rich!’ cried Phoebe. ‘You ’ad all them things! All them silk dresses, all them jewels, all them furs!’

  ‘But then she married me.’ They hadn’t heard Alex come into the kitchen. As they turned, he smiled in welcome, bent to kiss Phoebe on the cheek, and then stood back to take in all her splendour.

  ‘You’re looking very well,’ he said. ‘That’s a most extraordinary hat! You’re quite a bobby-dazzler these days – wouldn’t you say so, Rose?’

  ‘ ’Ello, Alex, love. It’s good to see you.’ Phoebe preened and smirked, smoothing the expensive, soft material of her smart
, black coat. ‘I – listen, you wasn’t meant to ’ear me goin’ on. I don’t mean no offence.’

  ‘I know you don’t,’ said Alex. ‘What about some tea? Or coffee, as you must drink nowadays?’

  ‘A cuppa would be wonderful.’ Phoebe sat down and started to unskewer all her hat pins. ‘I takes it strong an’ black, two sugars, please. They don’t know ’ow to make a decent cuppa in the States. They just pours warm water over teabags. God, I ask you!’

  Rose moved Phoebe’s feather and net creation to a safe place high up on the dresser. She put the kettle on the hob. ‘Where did you get your gorgeous hat?’ she asked. ‘One of those expensive New York stores?’

  ‘No, I got a hat shop of me own, didn’t I say?’

  ‘Oh, yes, you did,’ said Rose, remembering. ‘I hope it’s doing well?’

  ‘Not ’alf it’s doin’ well!’ Phoebe grinned delightedly. ‘Listen, I got four girls in the workroom, an’ a lady in the shop itself. She speaks so nice, she does the business with the toffs like I could never do.’

  ‘I was just thinking, you haven’t lost your accent.’

  ‘Well, you know what they say. You can take the girl from the East End, but you’ll never take the East End from the girl! So where’s my Daisy, Rose? One of your letters said she was goin’ to dancin’ classes, didn’t it? Must ’ave been a while back now? I’d love to see her dance.’

  ‘She’s not here at the moment. She’s followed in your footsteps, actually.’

  ‘She – Rose, you don’t mean to say she’s ’ad a kid?’ demanded Phoebe, looking shocked and horrified.

  ‘No, she’s on the stage,’ said Rose. ‘She’s very talented. She can act and sing and dance. Do everything, in fact. She’s had some lovely notices. I’ll go upstairs and get them.’

  ‘Later, Rose,’ said Phoebe. ‘She don’t take after me,’ she added, in a smaller voice. ‘Yeah, I wanted all the glamour, people lookin’ at me and clappin’, but I didn’t ’ave no talent, not a stick of it. Took me years to admit it to meself.’

  ‘But Phoebe, you enjoyed it, you were probably very good.’

  ‘You never saw me, Rose.’ Phoebe shook her elegantly-coiffed head. ‘All I did was stand there, twitch me arse and show me drawers, get those poor buggers up on stage to take the shillin’. Rose, I could use a drop of brandy, if you got it.’