by Sheila Riley
‘Well, you are one in a million, Danny,’ Evie said. ‘Not many men would be so thoughtful.’
‘You’re not wrong,’ Danny replied, knowing his own mother had worked all her life, yet his father never lifted a finger to help her. The thought tightened his grip on the steering wheel. It was probably best he didn’t think about Da right now. ‘Aunt Meggie told me you were starting in the office on Monday,’ Danny said, catching a quick glimpse of Evie’s shapely legs. He wasn’t one for ogling women, but sometimes Evie’s trim calf could brighten this bloke’s day a treat. ‘Susie will be thrilled to bits.’ He kept his eyes on the busy road, but Evie could see he had a twinkle in them.
‘I’m sure she won’t,’ Evie replied, ‘especially when she finds out I’m the office manager in charge of accounts.’
Danny nodded as they pulled up outside Number Two Reckoner’s Row.
‘I’d love to be a fly on the wall when she does find out.’ Danny smiled and then, as Evie pushed the handle of the passenger door, he touched her arm. ‘Hang on a minute, I’ve got something for you.’ Reaching down the side of his seat, Danny held out a package wrapped in newspaper and tied with string. ‘I meant to give this to you before, but I didn’t see you.’ What he should have said was I was trying to pluck up the courage.
Evie took the package as if it were about to explode in her hands. She was not accustomed to accepting presents from men. In fact, she couldn’t remember a time when she had been offered one gift, and today she had been given two.
Danny looked ahead, apparently fascinated by a pigeon bobbing about on the bridge steps. He didn’t offer a reason for giving her a present.
‘What is it?’ Evie asked, watching the creeping colour rise up to his throat. ‘It isn’t my birthday or anything.’
‘Open it later, when you get in the house,’ Danny said with a casual flick of his hand. He didn’t fancy having the gift, which he had managed to buy with the help of Meggie, thrown back in his face.
7
‘What kind of a girl does he take me for?’ Evie felt her face grow hot when she opened the parcel.
Lucy, fastening young Fergus in his pushchair by his blue leather reigns looked up, was full of curiosity.
‘Nylons!’ Lucy cried. How she wished she were old enough to wear nylons.
They heard a call from the front door and Connie’s voice sailed up the long passageway.
‘Cooee, it’s only me,’ Connie was a welcome visitor and called in every day, or even a few times a day, depending on how much she wanted some respite from her meddling mother, Mim.
‘Come in!’ both girls replied in unison, and when Connie entered the kitchen, Lucy couldn’t wait to tell their neighbour about Evie’s present.
‘Danny’s repaying the ones that got ruined when she fell in the road,’ Lucy said, ‘but I’ll have them if she doesn’t want them.’ Lucy, more sparky than her older sister admitted, ‘I’m not too proud to accept nylons from a good-looking fella.’
‘You are your mother’s daughter,’ Connie said. Although she could see Evie’s lips set in a straight line, and winked at Lucy, knowing that neither of the girls would take offence at her remark because they knew how fond she had been of Rene. Their mother had worked alongside her at the Tram Tavern and was a close confidante when she was alive.
‘I think I’ve got the legs for nylons,’ Lucy said, striking a pose she had seen in a magazine advert.
‘You will not have them!’ Evie stood wide-eyed, hands on hips, outraged at the very thought. ‘Thirteen years of age. What would people think if I let you run around in nylons. We’d be the talk of the wash house.’
‘Hark at you having time to go to the wash house.’ Lucy laughed and Connie, pragmatic as ever, was in her element, resting her bump against the kitchen sink. She loved the Kilgaren family like her own. These two sparked off each other like Aztec warriors and amused her no end. Having no sister of her own, their rapid repartee was a breath of fresh air. ‘Our Evie in the wash house? Perish the thought!’ Lucy howled with ready laughter. ‘And since when did you give a rat’s gasp what other people think? Never. That’s when.’
‘If I catch you wearing them, there will be words, lady,’ Evie warned, and Connie could not help herself but laugh.
‘She wants the nylons for herself,’ Lucy whispered to Connie.
‘And why shouldn’t she? Danny knows if anybody deserves a treat she does.’
‘I am here, you know,’ Evie said, ‘and I can hear you both.’ Her smile broke out and Evie could not feign irritation much longer.
‘So you take those nylons, ma’am, and you go flaunt your shapely pins!’ Lucy waved her hands with the swagger of a snake oil salesman and in minutes the kitchen was full of female laughter and Evie’s pale freckled complexion took on a rosy glow which Lucy was glad to see. In fact, Evie lit up every time anybody mentioned Danny’s name. And, if he came to speak with their Jack, she beamed like the Liverpool lighthouse.
‘I can’t believe Danny would give me something like this,’ she said, still holding the packet of stockings.
‘Maybe he felt responsible for ruining your last pair?’ Connie reminded Evie of the sprained ankle incident, as it was now called. ‘After all, it’s only a pair of stockings, it’s not a proposal of marriage.’ She laughed when she saw Evie’s jaw drop and her eyes widened in obvious alarm.
‘I’ve got it on good authority from Mersey-mouth Ada, who told my mother, Mersey-mouth Mim, that Danny has no intentions of walking down the aisle. Marriage is not for him,’ Connie said. Then, she lowered her voice and said in a conspiratorial tone, ‘well, he only has to look at Ada and Bert to see that wedded bliss is a myth in that family.’
Evie felt a zing of electricity shoot through her body and the kitchen was silent for a moment. ‘Well, all I’m saying is you’re too young to wear nylons, Lucy… And what are you two laughing at?’
‘Nothing,’ Lucy and Connie answered in unison, ‘nothing at all.’ They both knew how much Evie liked Danny, even though she had never said as much. The attraction between them was obvious to everybody – except the two people it mattered to most.
In their humble opinion, Evie was more than a match for Danny, who fought in the war and had the medals to prove it, but did he have the backbone to take up with Evie Kilgaren? Time would tell.
‘I’ll save the nylons for my new job,’ Evie conceded.
‘Tell me how your last day at D’Angelo’s went.’ Connie, as interested as any loyal friend, followed Evie into the front kitchen and sat down at the table near the sash window, while Lucy followed with a fresh pot of tea. Anybody who visited was offered a nice cup of tea.
‘They gave me this lovely book of poems,’ Evie said, glad to change the subject, ‘and starting at Skinner’s on Monday means I’ll be here to get you up for school, my girl,’ she told Lucy, knowing her sister was inclined to turn over and go back to sleep when the weather was not as warm as it was lately.
‘Oh it’s you.’ Susie looked up from filing her red-varnished nails with the rough edge of a matchbox, and even though it was only nine-thirty on Monday morning didn’t look happy at being interrupted when Evie entered the office after collecting business files from Mr Skinner. ‘If you’re looking for your Jack, he’s out on a delivery.’ Susie sounded bored, sitting behind the enormous mahogany desk that Evie had cleaned a week ago and which was now covered in a thin film of dust.
‘I haven’t come to see Jack,’ Evie answered, seeing the other girl too engrossed in a Tit-Bits magazine to raise her head. Obviously, she had no intentions of doing any work as she licked the tip of her finger and flicked another page.
‘Skinner’s down the stables.’ Susie remained glued to the magazine. ‘Take a seat. I’ll get one of the stable lads to get him in a minute.’ Evie sat down on a straight-backed chair near the green wall and studied the girl opposite, wondering how long it would take Susie to show any interest in starting work. It was gone nine thirty and she h
adn’t even taken the cover off her typewriter. So no time soon, Evie thought when Susie showed little interest in answering the ringing black Bakelite telephone.
Mr Walton would have wiped the floor with Susie for showing such unprofessional behaviour. On the third ring, she deigned to answer it.
‘Skinner’s.’ Susie’s jaded tone was an obvious sign this business needed shaking up.
First impressions are everything in business. Evie could hear Mr Walton’s voice as if he were standing in the room. But they would fall on deaf ears with Susie as when Danny came into the office her eyes lit up and she cut off the caller, leaving the receiver off the hook so whomever was on the line could no longer get through.
Flicking her bleached-blonde hair, Susie stood up, pulling down her low-cut, tight-fitting sweater to show off her curves and perched on the edge of the desk, ignoring Evie.
‘Hiya, Evie!’ Danny grinned. ‘You made it then.’
‘Made it?’ Susie shot her usual superior expression. ‘Am I missing something?’
‘I think you might be.’ Evie’s voice was steady, her eyes unflinching when she looked at Susie. She had waited a long time for this. ‘I’m here for the job.’
‘We don’t need a skivvy, thanks very much,’ Susie said in that haughty way Evie remembered so well, sweeping her hand in a semicircle to take in the whole office, ‘as you can see, the place is spotless.’
Evie put down the old newspaper she had been half-reading, not much interested in contraband jewels smuggled through Liverpool docks, wondering what Susie would say when she found out her work-shy days were over.
‘The office is spotless because Evie cleaned it.’ Danny held Susie’s stony glare. ‘Although it looks like it could do with a regular dusting to keep it looking the way she left it.’
Susie’s dark-pencilled eyebrows puckered, and she looked from Danny to Evie and the atmosphere between the two of them grew tense.
Unflinching, Evie looked back at Susie and wondered if she had made the biggest mistake of her life. However, she didn’t have the luxury of being choosy now. She promised Jack and Lucy she would work closer to home and she had no intentions of breaking that promise.
‘Well, I must admit we need a cleaner, and even though I say so myself, I haven’t met a better cleaner than Evie,’ Susie said, while Danny shook his head in disgust and left the office without another word. ‘You can start by putting the kettle on,’ Susie told her. ‘The staffroom could do with a once-over, too.’
Evie cocked an eyebrow. Did this daft mare believe she would come here in her best skirt and blouse to scrub the staffroom? However, she didn’t have time to speak her mind as, a moment later, Danny and Jack came in and were heaving a heavy-looking desk through the office.
‘Do you mind telling me what you’re doing?’ Susie asked, pointing to the desk and it drew Evie’s attention to her long talons, wondering how she typed.
‘We’re planting daffodils,’ Danny said straight-faced as they positioned the desk near the window.
‘What do I need another desk for?’ Susie’s beady eyes watched every action. The way Danny smiled at Evie, like they were the best of friends. Nodding as if asking her approval about where the new desk would be situated. If there was any nodding to do, she thought, she should be the one doing it, not the skivvy.
‘This one is mine?’ Evie stroked the mahogany desk. Her very own desk.
‘Yours?’ Susie’s neck took on a mottled red appearance, a sure sign she was looking to battle as she picked up the slim packet of five Senior Service cigarettes. The hostile atmosphere broke only when Susie struck a match with such force it broke in two, causing the lit end to fly across her desk and fizzle out. ‘You’re telling me you are a clerk now, is that it?’
‘I didn’t say that.’ Evie’s spirits soared.
Susie thought the Kilgarens were as unpleasant as horse muck on the soles of her high-heeled shoes. And even though she only lived next-door-but-one, she gave a good impression of someone who thought she was better than everybody in Reckoner’s Row – except the Harrises and that was because she had her eye on Danny.
‘So, let me get this right, you’ve gone from office cleaner to office clerk?’
‘I’m not an office clerk,’ Evie said, savouring every word as she skewered Susie with an unflinching glare. She had longed to say those words for such a long time and now that she had she felt ten feet tall. Recalling the compliments she had received from her colleagues at D’Angelo’s had given her confidence, and she refused to let Susie intimidate her. That ship sailed long ago.
Danny and Jack shot each other a look. ‘Right, well, we’ll leave you to it, shall we?’
Evie noticed that they couldn’t get out fast enough, thankful that today she could hold her head high and be proud of what she had achieved. And looking at Susie’s desk, littered with magazines, bits of paper and cup stains, she noted that the girl had not changed her ways since working at Beamer’s. Although one thing had changed, Evie thought, Susie no longer had the power to intimidate her. In fact, she had no power at all.
The air fizzed with unspoken animosity when Evie replaced the receiver on the hook and an immediate piercing ring of the telephone broke the stifling silence.
‘Skinner’s!’ Susie barked the introduction down the receiver. ‘No, Mr Skinner is not here, you must ring back later.’ Susie slammed it down with such force, Evie winced.
‘That might have been important,’ she said, but Susie remained tight-lipped, rolling her eyes, her posture stiff. ‘That is not the way to introduce the company to a prospective customer?’ Was it any wonder the business was failing.
‘Why should you care?’ Susie asked as Henry Skinner bowled into the office, followed by Jack, who was now carrying a black heavy-looking typewriter.
‘Good morning, ladies,’ Skinner said as Jack put the typewriter on Evie’s desk, ‘Susie, I believe you already know our new office manager.’
There was a moment’s silence, and nobody spoke as Susie digested his words.
‘Office manager?’ Her disbelief rose to a high-pitched squeak. ‘Office. Manager! I can’t believe I’m hearing this right. I’ve worked here for nigh on three years. Nobody told me anything about managing the office.’
‘I was…’ Evie began but was silenced by Mister Skinner’s large work-worn hand.
‘I’m sure Evie would be modest about her skills, but let me tell you something,’ Henry explained in his usual forthright manner. He came across as abrupt, but Evie could tell he was a good, kind man. ‘She is a first-class auditor. I have it on the best authority…’
‘She knows the law and everything,’ Jack interrupted, giving the desk a wipe with the cuff of his jacket.
‘Jack!’ Evie whispered, feeling her face grow hot, not used to blowing her own trumpet, aware that a minute later she could be flat on her arse in the gutter.
‘Susie, you haven’t got the qualifications that this job needs,’ Henry said without a hint of his usual cheeriness. ‘Evie will instruct you from now on, and if you don’t pull your socks up, you may well look for another job, so think on.’
Susie’s black-lashed eyes widened, and her jaw dropped, taking a moment to recover her voice. ‘I don’t want to speak out of turn, Mr Skinner,’ she was finding it hard to control her emotions, ‘but if you think I’m taking orders from a jumped-up skivvy, you can think again.’
‘That is your choice,’ Henry said with a shrug of his burly shoulders, ‘but them’s the rules. If you don’t like the situation, you know where the door is.’
‘You’re sacking me!?’ Susie watched Jack slope out of the office.
‘No, I’m not sacking you, I didn’t say that. There have been some irregularities with the finances and Evie is here to fix them. Evie, you need only report to me,’ he said turning back to Evie, ‘and if Susie doesn’t like it…’
Without saying another word, Susie scooped up her magazine, her bag and dragged her coat from the back
of the door. ‘You haven’t heard the last of this!’ she said, her eyes blazing. ‘I can work anywhere.’ Marching out of the office, she slammed the door behind her.
‘Looks like she’s in a right twist,’ Evie said, and Henry gave a low chuckle.
‘I expect she’ll be back tomorrow, have no fear on that score,’ he said.
‘I can manage,’ Evie smiled. ‘I’ve got plenty to keep me occupied.’ The telephone rang, and she picked up the receiver.
‘Good morning, Skinner and Son Cartage Company…’
‘I’ll get those other files you asked for.’ Henry felt the office was now in the best hands. When he returned to drop an enormous cardboard box on Susie’s desk, he said, ‘They don’t make for exciting reading, and I’d appreciate it if you said nothing to my Meggie. She’ll only fret.’
‘They might not look interesting to you,’ Evie assured him, ‘but they’ll keep me happy for a long while, Mr Skinner.’
‘Just Skinner will do, we don’t stand on ceremony here.’
Evie knew she could never call this man by his surname, any more than she could have called her boss in the D’Angelo Shipping offices Walton, it sounded so disrespectful and high-handed.
‘Let’s hope you can spring-clean my accounts the way you cleaned this office,’ he said, and the obvious look of appreciation told Evie he was more than pleased with the new cleaner version of the business.
‘Being saddled with that flighty mare,’ Evie glanced over to Susie’s desk that looked like the corporation tip, strewn with neglected files, ‘was doing you no good at all. If you give her a minute, she’ll take a month. I know, I’ve worked with her before.’ She had no idea why anybody would choose to keep the girl in a job.
‘Talking of saddles,’ Mister Skinner grinned, ‘I’ll be next door in the tack room sorting out the horse brasses for the Netherford Parade.’
Evie had never been to the Netherford Parade. She managed the Mayday parade, when workers all round the world went on a day’s unofficial strike, recognising the work done by manual labourers and was celebrated by decorated floats following a marching band.