The Dressmaker's Daughter

by Nancy Carson

  She laughed with him but, after a second or two, she was serious again. ‘I wonder what your mother’ll have to say about it when we tell her, Jesse? I’m dreading it.’

  ‘There ain’t a lot she can say, Lizzie. Whatever she might say won’t alter anything.’

  *

  The following Sunday at tea, Sylvia Atkinson picked out an egg custard from the silver cake-stand on her spotless, white damask table cloth and placed it delicately on her Minton Willow Pattern tea plate. She took a knife and cut it into segments, then put one in her mouth. As she tasted its sweet richness she refilled her elegant cup that matched the rest of the fine bone china adorning her table. She looked up at Kenneth.

  ‘More tea?’

  ‘Yes, please, Mother.’ He slid his cup and saucer closer to her, and she poured.

  ‘What would you do this evening, Kenneth, if I said there was no need for you to go to church with me?’ Sylvia asked, holding another segment of egg custard between her well-manicured fingers.

  ‘I might read.’

  She put down what was left of her egg custard and wiped her fingers on her napkin. ‘Well, you needn’t come to church if you don’t want. I have some sick visiting to do afterwards. I doubt if it will interest you at all.’

  ‘Grandma Sarah again?’

  ‘Not this time. You remember old Mrs Clancey? She’s long overdue a visit. She had a stroke months ago, and she’s still bedridden, poor dear. I’d like to see her again. I always got on well with her. Will you be all right by yourself?’

  ‘Of course I’ll be all right. I am fifteen you know. Will Edgar go with you?’

  ‘I was hoping he’d take me.’

  ‘And he won’t mind?’

  ‘Why should he mind?’

  Kenneth didn’t like Edgar very much, but he used to like Jesse Clancey enormously. Jesse always had such a casual, easy way about him, a far cry from the uppishness of his mother. Kenneth often privately wondered what Jesse used to see in Sylvia. They were so different. He was approachable, obliging, but she was always stand-offish and formal; he spoke with an accent like everybody else, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, while she always tried to sound posh like those people on the wireless. Jesse was cheerful, always ready to share a laugh and a joke, but she was usually serious, superior, as if laughing was common. It got on Kenneth’s nerves a bit that his mother was the way she was. She seemed so affected, so detached from real life. And Kenneth felt ashamed sometimes when other boys followed behind her in the streets, imitating her by swinging their backsides and thrusting their noses in the air.

  For years now Sylvia had been a regular churchgoer at St. Thomas’s at the top of the town. It was the church in which she had married, and it was more expedient to worship there than at St. John’s. There she was introduced, shortly after James’s death, to Edgar Timmins, a widower some ten years older than herself. They’d been on friendly terms ever since, both giving much time to the church, until Jesse Clancey once more let her down so badly, when the pace of their friendship seemed to accelerate and their meetings became more secular.

  Edgar was a businessman, with his own successful haberdashery shops in Dudley and Wolverhampton. He was well-spoken, which Sylvia much preferred, and he was, she knew, an honourable man. His wife had died tragically during surgery eight years earlier, and now his only daughter was married to a pit manager and living in Cannock. Edgar shared many of Jesse Clancey’s qualities, like affability and candour but, whereas Jesse was well read and didn’t manifest his culture, Edgar flaunted it. He was refined, smartly conventional and, perhaps even old fashioned, in his outlook as well as his dress; he still wore spats and a bowler hat for church. But more to the point, Edgar was seeking a wife. Coincidentally, Sylvia was seeking to give up the job she’d felt obliged to take in order to maintain the standard of living she’d grown used to. After all, work was unbecoming. Work did not befit a lady.

  Now she wondered what the dickens she had seen in Jesse Clancey all these years. Being her first real love wasn’t everything after all. Their differences were unbridgeable. Oh, she had believed that with some gentle coaching he could have been exalted to her standards, but she’d tried and tried, and Jesse resisted exaltation. Furthermore, she could not see herself swilling out milk-churns or washing down his milk floats in rubber boots and a cow-gown, nor living in that dilapidated mausoleum they called the dairy house. She could not see herself willing to be woken up at four in a morning when he roused for work. She deserved a more genteel, more civilised way of life, and with Edgar that’s exactly what she would get.

  It came as no great surprise to learn eventually that Jesse had finally taken up with her second cousin, Lizzie Bishop, although it riled her to contemplate it. Strange how she never thought of her as Lizzie Kite. She must be thirty-nine now. Funny how she never saw her. She was most likely fat these days, like old Aunt Eve, and held together by stout corsets. Good Lord, what must Jesse see in her? They lived little more than half a mile apart, and yet she had not set eyes on her for years. She wouldn’t know Lizzie’s children if she saw them, except for Herbert, of course, who used to collect the milk money.

  So Lizzie had finally got Jesse. Who’d have thought it after so long? Maybe she’d been carrying a torch for him ever since that New Year’s Eve at Joe and May Bishop’s, all those years ago. Sylvia didn’t have to remind herself that she was heartbroken then because of her. She had never forgiven Lizzie for it. Never could. Never would. It hardly mattered now, of course, now that she had Edgar. It was so long ago. Yet the bitterness lingered in her heart, like rancid butter lingered on her tongue.

  ‘Damn this weather,’ Sylvia exclaimed, throwing herself inelegantly into the passenger seat of Edgar’s black Clyno. They’d just left Evensong at St. Thomas’s. She shook her umbrella forcefully to rid it of the rain clinging to it, closed it up, and shut the car door. ‘You’re sure you don’t mind taking me to see Ezme Clancey?’

  Edgar adjusted his bowler hat, glancing at himself in the rear-view mirror, and pulled the starter. ‘Not at all. I’m curious to meet the old girl.’

  The engine rattled into life and they began moving forward, away from the church. Sylvia waved to the verger in his black cape as he pushed his bicycle across the shining, wet street in front of them, scurrying to get out of their way. Edgar switched on the windscreen wipers.

  ‘Oh, Ezme’s quite a character – or at least she was. Calls a spade a spade, and she’s not too concerned about who she might upset with her forthrightness. She used to be quite a pianist and organist, too. I remember she used to play the organ occasionally at St. John’s years ago, and I believe she was still giving lessons up until her stroke. Very active woman.’

  ‘You evidently liked her.’

  ‘I’ve always admired her. She liked me, as well. Just because I no longer have anything to do with her son doesn’t mean I have to forsake the friendship I had with her.’ She turned to look at him for reassurance. ‘Don’t you think so, Edgar?’

  He wiped the inside of the misting windscreen with the back of his leather-gloved hand. ‘Oh, I agree. If you get on well it’s a miserable shame not to keep in touch. Good relationships are often so hard to form.’

  ‘I wrote to her, you know, when Jesse and I realised nothing could come of our … relationship. I explained that although I would only be able to see her very occasionally I would often think about her.’

  But Sylvia, deep in her heart, wanted to know what Ezme thought of Jesse’s relationship with Lizzie. She knew Ezme had no love for Lizzie, nor Lizzie’s mother, and curiosity about how she was handling the situation was consuming her. After years of contempt, could Ezme suddenly turn and confess to liking the woman after all? Sylvia thought not, and it would give her immense satisfaction to know it for sure. It would give her enormous pleasure to be assured that never could any woman but herself be worthy of Jesse.

  ‘And she wrote back, Sylvia?’

  ‘Oh, yes, she
wrote back. Said how distressed she was that Jesse and I had parted. I wouldn’t be surprised if the stress of it all didn’t induce her stroke.’

  ‘You never know. But if Jesse is there tonight, are you going to mind?’

  ‘Oh, I’m a bit apprehensive, I have to admit. I don’t want that to get in the way of my regard for Ezme, though. Mind you, it all ended hugely amicably.’

  Edgar changed down a gear to turn into the wide, climbing street known as Waddam’s Pool. Spray from the narrow wheels was hitting the underside of the car and sounded like running water within.

  ‘Is Jesse stepping out with anybody else yet?’

  It was a question Sylvia did not welcome. She had not volunteered any information before because she felt it might reflect badly on her – that Jesse had rejected her for her cousin, who was as common as muck. But now, since she had been asked, she had to answer.

  ‘Oh, yes, didn’t I tell you? He’s courting my widowed cousin now, Lizzie Bishop.’

  ‘Ah, well. Keep it in the family I always say.’ Edgar laughed at his own joke as the car chugged up the hill.

  ‘Distant family, Edgar,’ she said scornfully. ‘I haven’t seen Lizzie for years. I wouldn’t know her now, and I don’t want to. Frankly, I don’t admire her … Never have … Take the next turning on the left, Edgar.’

  *

  Lizzie did not like Billy Witts when she met him. He was in his middle to late twenties – hard to guess exactly – but far too old and too experienced for Henzey. To his credit he was polite, even charming, and it was easy to see why her daughter was drawn to him. He was not a bad-looking fellow, she thought – not that looks were everything – but did he really have to show off his acquired wealth with a tasteless display of gold rings? He was much too flashy. And, of course, he had a motor-car; a rakish rag-topped contraption, which must be a waste of time in this weather. Herbert admired it covetously, as did Alice and Maxine. But Lizzie was apprehensive; Henzey was still impressionable enough to be seduced by the trappings of wealth.

  So she was pleased when Jesse arrived to accompany her to church. It wasn’t a common occurrence nowadays, but the banns were to be read at Evensong. Because of the wind and rain, which had not ceased all day for the second Sunday running, Billy nobly offered to drive them to church, to save them having to sit through the service soaking wet. Afterwards they intended to break the news to his mother that they were to be married on the last Sunday in April, and Lizzie was growing more nervous about telling her. She had not yet mentioned to her own family that there were to be wedding bells in a month; she wanted to survive the ordeal of telling Ezme first.

  As they left the church afterwards, the Reverend Mr John Mainwaring warmly congratulated Lizzie on the splendid news, and said how much he was looking forward to her wedding day.

  ‘Well, ’tis to be hoped the weather’s picked up by then,’ she commented.

  ‘Indeed, indeed,’ was the vicar’s stoical reply. ‘But April can be a treacherous month, weather-wise.’

  On the porch steps Jesse unfurled his big, black umbrella, and Lizzie took his arm as they began the puddle-ridden walk back to the dairy house. She told him of her concern and her mistrust for this chap Billy Witts, and that Henzey’s affection for him was worrying her.

  ‘Don’t be judge and jury yet, my darling,’ Jesse counselled. ‘The lad’s got some good points. Just ’cause he’s made a shilling or two don’t mean he’s a thief and a liar. He was thoughtful enough to bring us to church in all this rain, wasn’t he?’

  ‘I’d have been a sight more impressed if he’d been thoughtful enough to fetch us back.’

  Jesse chuckled. ‘And then you’d have sworn he was trying to get round you. No, the lad seems all right to me. If he’s come from nothing and made a pile of money I don’t begrudge it him. At least it shows he’s got a good head on his shoulders.’

  ‘Yes, but it’s not his head I’m worrying about, Jesse … I don’t want to see our Henzey blinded to his faults by money. I think he’s fly.’

  As they walked on the narrow footpath past Westley’s Brass Foundry, they saw a car pass along Cromwell Street at its junction with Price Street, the splashes from its wheels glistening momentarily by the light of the gas lamps.

  ‘He’s no more fly than that other chap she used to see. Him from Holly Hall.’

  ‘Jack Harper?’

  ‘Jack Harper. Except he was as poor as a nailer’s bribe. Your Alice was sweet on him, as well, I could tell. Couldn’t take her eyes off him.’

  ‘Oh, Lord. Alice as well. ’Course she’s getting to that age. I shall be well hoped-up with three daughters to worry about.’

  ‘Yes, and who knows you ain’t carrying another?’

  ‘Oh, let it be a lad, please, dear Lord. Lads are never such a worry. Look at our Herbert.’

  ‘Well, he gets more like his father every day. You can’t deny as he’s a good-looking lad. Works hard and all. I shall take him into the business. As a partner, I mean. When he’s older.’

  Rain was still drumming incessantly on the umbrella when they reached the top of Price Street. It was a shorter route than going by way of Brown Street, but a steeper climb at the end.

  ‘Two cars in our street, Jesse,’ Lizzie commented easily. ‘We must be on the up and up.’

  ‘Well, one’s that Billy’s – at your house,’ he reminded her.

  ‘And the other’s at yours, Jesse.’

  ‘It looks like the one what just passed across the top of Price Street.’

  ‘How can you tell? They all look the same to me.’

  ‘I wonder who it can be, Lizzie? There’s only the doctor as I know who’s got a car.’

  ‘Well, somebody’s paying you a visit. It means we shall have to put off telling your mother again that we’re getting married.’ She sighed with frustration. ‘Oh, Jesse, I did want to get it over and done with.’

  ‘Well it can only be somebody we know. If we tell her while somebody else is there, she won’t pull her jib quite so much.’

  ‘No, she’ll just make our lives hell afterwards.’

  ‘But we’ll have to tell her. The banns have been called. Folk will be talking about it to your children tomorrow.’

  They approached the dairy house without saying another word. When they drew level with the car, Jesse stopped to look at it.

  ‘Well, it ain’t the doctor’s car. The doctor’s got a Morris. This is a Clyno.’

  They walked through the entry and opened the verandah door. Jesse shook his umbrella outside while Lizzie took off her coat, leaving on her new cloche hat. She wore a knitted dress Jesse had bought her for her birthday, very fashionable, knee-length and like a tube. It was cream, a colour that suited her, with a row of small brown buttons at the back and a brown band an inch above the hem. The waistline was low, and her bosom was modishly flattened. Her slenderness, belying her years and the fact that she’d given birth to five children, gave her the look that all women were striving for. But of course, it would not be for long.

  She went into the scullery where Jesse had left the gas light to burn when he went out. He followed her, having shaken his wet coat and left it hanging in the verandah.

  ‘I’ll put the kettle on seeing as we’ve got company,’ he said, and went out to the brewhouse to fill it.

  When he returned, Lizzie said: ‘Whoever’s come must have let themselves in and gone straight upstairs to your mother. We ought to go up and say hello first, and make sure she’s all right.’

  So she followed him upstairs, across the landing, and he opened the door to Ezme’s room, which was unusually ajar. Normally it was left wide open.

  At first Lizzie did not recognise Sylvia.

  ‘Sylvia!’ Jesse exclaimed. ‘This is a surprise … I never expected …’

  ‘Hello, Jesse.’ Sylvia coloured up, but maintained a dignified smile. ‘I thought it was time I called to pay my respects to your mother. She looks well, I think … Oh, this is Edgar Timmins, a fri
end of mine … Edgar, Jesse Clancey.’

  Edgar got up from the wicker chair he was occupying and shook Jesse’s hand.

  ‘Nice to meet you, Edgar. And this is Lizzie.’ He turned to her and winked reassurance.

  Lizzie stepped forward. She smiled tentatively, and shook Edgar’s hand.

  ‘Delighted to meet you, Lizzie,’ he said pleasantly. ‘I understand you and Sylvia are related.’

  ‘We’re second cousins.’ Lizzie’s eyes met Sylvia’s for the first time. ‘Hello, Sylvia,’ she said uneasily. ‘It’s been a long time.’

  ‘A good many years, Lizzie.’ Her tone was impassive, giving nothing away as to her feelings. ‘And how are your family?’

  Sylvia studied her cousin briefly. But, for all her indifference, she couldn’t help but admire what she saw. She wanted to tell Lizzie she’d barely changed in all those years; she wanted to say that she expected she’d have aged considerably. Yet she said no such thing. Such compliments to Lizzie Bishop would never come from her lips.

  ‘They’re grown up now,’ Lizzie replied economically. ‘And yours?’

  ‘Kenneth’s grown up, too. All too quick.’

  Lizzie felt uneasy with Sylvia and did not really wish to pursue this forced conversation. Jesse sensed the chill and, to break the brief embarrassed silence, he turned to his mother.

  ‘I’ve put the kettle on, Mother. D’you want a cup of tea?’ He pretended to put a cup to his mouth so she would understand.

  ‘And a cheese an’ onion sandwich. I’m clammed to jeath.’

  ‘I’ll do it,’ Lizzie said, glad of the excuse to be away from Sylvia’s cold scrutiny. ‘Would everybody else like tea?’

  Sylvia looked at Edgar for his response. ‘I think maybe we should be going.’

  ‘You’ve only just got here,’ Jesse protested. ‘Stop for a cup of tea, at least.’

  ‘We’re in no rush,’ Sylvia said. ‘Thank you. That would be very nice.’

  Lizzie trotted downstairs and into the scullery, and started putting out the crockery and preparing Ezme’s supper. While she worked, she pondered Sylvia. The years had been kind to her. She was still lean, like Aunt Sarah, if a bit thicker at the waist and broader at the backside, but she had an undeniable grace. Her face was still attractive, although carrying a few more lines. Her nose was bigger than she remembered it, though, and emphasised by the way she wore her hair brushed back tightly and pinned in a roll at the back, in the old fashioned way. Her dress, too, was old fashioned and quite long, but redeemed by its excellent quality. Sylvia seemed to be stuck in the style of the days of the war when she was a younger woman, making few concessions to current fashion. In the same way, Edgar suited her. His appearance suggested he was stuffy, but he seemed pleasant enough, and Lizzie felt she could not dislike him just because he was with Sylvia.