There was a huge television in the corner, boxed away to look like an antique chest of drawers. A man in an Argyll cashmere slipover was watching Grandstand and trying to get his bookmaker on the phone.
‘What do you mean “no each ways on this race?” All right. Thirty bob to win. Bastards.’ He growled as he put the phone down and sat back for the race.
Reggie asked Jane to put another record on to drown out the sound of Peter O’Sullevan. There was a big teak gramophone unit with dozens of records racked in wooden compartments. Jazz mostly. She’d never heard of any of them so she chose the one with the prettiest cover. All the others had coloured men on the front.
‘Jazz fan, eh? Girl after my own heart.’ Reggie put his hand round her waist and pulled her against him for a dance. His other hand was behind her, stroking her cashmere and wool backside. He smelled of brandy and cigars and dirty twinfold poplin. This was all too much for Iris. No one was stroking Iris’s backside (not that she had much to stroke) and she wanted an explanation.
‘Reggie! I need to ask you something!’ Jane escaped and had a bit more lobster and a sip from the wine glass Dougie had given her. Lobster was lovely. Chablis wasn’t so lovely but it was what you had with lobster, apparently, so who was she to argue.
Suzy was now sat on Pete’s lap telling the other men the elephant’s foreskin story which went down a storm although Iris’s daughter had to be patted on the back when Tizer went down the wrong way. Suzy left ’em laughing and got up to pour herself a drink at the dinky little bar. Jane watched her do it. She tonged a few ice cubes from the ice bucket (this one was shaped like a beer barrel) and tipped up the gin bottle as if pouring herself a good strong measure – only she hadn’t taken the top off. She then filled up the glass with tonic water. She caught Jane’s eye and pulled a sheepish smile.
‘I’d get pie-eyed otherwise but they hate it if you don’t keep pace. Ted the barman at Carpenter’s looks after me as well – holds the glass up to the measuring thingy but doesn’t push. What are you up to this evening, Janey?’ Janey. It was nice. Janey.
‘Nothing special.’ Or, more probably, Dixon of Dock Green and Billy Cotton’s Band Show followed by half an hour pulling faces in the dressing-table mirror.
‘I’m going out for dinner with a friend of mine but he could easily get a date for you if you like and we could all go dancing.’
Why was she being so friendly? What was she after?
‘I’d have to go home and change.’
Girls do wear their daytime skirts and jerseys in smart restaurants but they will need to be extremely pretty to pass muster. Jane thought glumly of her only evening dress: full-length chartreuse velvet. She’d bought it in a panic for the firm’s Christmas party. It was a swine. Doreen said she looked like a streak of snot in it.
‘Where’s home?’
‘Well. I’m living with an aunt in Norbury at the moment.’
Life with Doreen sounded a lot better put like that. And it sounded suddenly, miraculously, temporary.
‘Oh God, that’s miles. Look, I’ve got stacks of evening things you could wear. And the flat’s ankle-deep in shoes. What size are you? That’s amazing! Glenda used to model shoes but she’s gone to Spain with the boyfriend. Bit of a spiv, but he paid three months’ rent in advance and she didn’t have to take a stitch with her. You can sleep in her room if you like. Come on, let’s go. I’ve had about enough of this.’
‘Who’s going to help Dougie clear up?’ worried Jane. There were empty glasses everywhere.
‘Oh don’t worry about that. Iris does it. It’s the only reason she gets asked. That and the cabaret. Ooh look. Here we go.’
Iris had started. The eighth gin had done it.
‘They’re all parasites, Dougie. You just don’t see it: drinking your drink, wrecking your mummy’s beautiful flat. They make a lot of noise but really your life is empty, Dougie. Empty. Like mine.’ She squinted sorrowfully into her empty glass of gin but perked up at the sight of Jane and Suzy.
‘And look at those four tarts! Suck you off for the price of a dinner at the Caprice. You deserve better than them, Dougie my darlin’.’ Iris’s accent was slipping down and her skirt was riding up, showing the tops of her scrawny white thighs and the grim, net-curtain grey of her nylon panty girdle. Research tells us that seventy-five per cent of women never launder their corsets. Little Virginia saved the day.
‘Mummy. I’m really sorry, Mummy, but I think I’m going to be sick.’ Iris magically pulled herself together and reproachfully bundled little Virginia off to the bathroom.
‘We’ve got to go, Dougie,’ said Suzy, kissing him firmly on both cheeks and letting him cop a quick farewell feel as he helped her on with her coat. ‘A man’s coming to cut my hair at half five. Crew-cut. Very Zizi Jeanmaire. What do you think?’
Jane came next. ‘I’ve had a wonderful afternoon. Such a nice surprise.’ A big smile. A bit of work with the eyelashes. Like shooting fish in a barrel.
‘Oh it’s pretty much like this every Saturday – give or take poor Mrs Moore. Sorry about that. You must come again.’
She let him have a brief grope. It seemed rude not to.
Alpaca Pete called out his goodbyes from the telly – he had a £5 yankee going.
‘Cheerio, girls. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’
‘That doesn’t exactly narrow it down!’ Screeches of laughter.
They finally got downstairs. Suzy lived ‘near Cavendish Square’ she said. Jane knew the West End inside out. She had one of Kenneth’s bus maps and she used to pore over it, working out the best route from Derry and Toms to Swan and Edgar (9) or from Gamages to Selfridges (8). Jane was still running through possible bus routes in her head – 159? 13? where was Kenneth when you needed him? – when Suzy hailed a taxi.
‘Bourne and Hollingsworth please.’ She’d gone very Celia Johnson all of a sudden.
The streets were already dark and the taxi hurtled along Wigmore Street and on towards its destination. Suzy pulled the cabbie’s window to one side.
‘We don’t really want Bourne and Hollingsworth as such, darling. If you could take the next right, St Anthony’s Chambers is first on the left.’
It was nowhere near bloody Cavendish Square.
‘Have you really got someone coming round?’ Jane sensed that Suzy didn’t always tell the exact truth.
‘Oh yes. Big Terry.’
The taxi driver, who’d been eyeing up the pair of them in his rear-view mirror, raised his eyebrows.
‘Why’s he called Big Terry?’ wondered Jane.
You could see the cabbie straining to hear Suzy’s whispered answer. She passed a handful of silver through the window.
‘Keep the change,’ she said then looked him right in the eye. ‘And none of your business, cheeky.’
Chapter 8
These tiny details of personal grooming
might appear mere trifles when taken
one by one. But add them together and
they can make the difference between rich
and poor, married or single, happy ever
after and a miserable broken home.
If Bourne and Hollingsworth had been a bit of a let-down after the promise of Cavendish Square, St Anthony’s Chambers was a serious kick in the teeth. It was a large mansion block built of dirty red bricks with no lock on the street door and stone stairs that smelled of piss. Although there were lights on each landing, most of the bulbs were missing and you had to feel your way up the wrought-iron banisters in almost total darkness. Suzy’s flat was on the second floor. It wasn’t a luxury flat.
There were, or had been, about six locks on the front door which was scarred with the screw holes of old bolts that hadn’t quite made it.
‘Used to be burgled nearly once a week – the trouble some people will go to for the thirty bob in the gas meter – but Glenda met this very obliging locksmith. Banham deadlocks, steel plate, the works. Like the Crown Jewels, darling and very
, very reasonable. I only moved here last summer. It’s a bit of a dive but it’s only four quid a week for the three of us and so central. I can be in most of the showrooms in half an hour from a standing start.’
She twisted the third key in the lock and the door swung open, releasing a terrible smell of dry rot, wet nylons and Chanel No 5. ‘Sorry about the pong. Glenda smashed a bottle of scent on the kitchen lino.’
The pay telephone on the wall of the passage had been ringing the whole time she was unlocking the door.
‘Can you smell gas, darling?’ sniffed Suzy, striking a match and lighting a fresh cigarette. ‘God, it’s cold in here. Do put the fire on. There should be some shillings on the chimneypiece.’ Chimneypiece. Swank.
Suzy slipped out of her Persian lamb coat just as smoothly and foxily as if she were trying to sell you what was underneath. She hung it up carefully on a wooden coat hanger marked Trust House Forte which was dangling from the picture rail. The phone rang on while Suzy kicked off her shoes and switched on a few lights. Finally, finally she picked up the receiver.
‘I don’t think so.’ She said this in a strong South African accent. ‘She maht be upstairs. I’ll jist chick.’
She left the phone hanging off the wall and disappeared into the kitchen to fetch a glass of water.
‘Ah’m sorry. Miss Saint John is still not beck yit.’
She smiled at Jane as she hung up the receiver.
‘No one’s ever actually seen inside the flat so you can say what you like: “I think I saw her go out into the garden” or “She may be downstairs in the billiard room” – anything. No one’s ever in, by the way: always check who it is first or run your eye down the list.’ There were men’s names written in lipstick and eye pencil on the wallpaper by the phone. ‘Oh, and if the Dreaded Arnold rings I’ve just got a job in Hong Kong and you don’t expect to see me back. Ever. Ghastly little man. Canadian. Do get the fire on, sweetie. Big Terry will be here in a minute and I need to ring the boyfriend. Have you got any pennies? It’s all very grand saying “keep the change” all the time, but you never have money for the telephone.’
Jane scrabbled in her purse for fourpence and Suzy hooked the receiver lazily over her shoulder and dialled the number, watching herself in the full-length mirror on the opposite wall – Hang a looking glass by your ’phone so that you can keep an eye on your expression.
‘Hello, my darling. Yes of course I am. But listen, I have a lovely, but love-ly little friend staying and I hate to leave her at home alone with nothing but the Black and White Minstrels for company.’ A pause while he spoke as Suzy batted her eyelashes at her own reflection. The naked lightbulb in the passage cast big, smutty shadows across her powdery cheeks. ‘You’ve got a very dirty mind, Henry Swan. Now then, the question is do you have an equally love-ly friend who might like to join us?’ More chat his end. ‘No,’ she eyed Jane thoughtfully, ‘no I don’t think so. Not yet anyway.’ Another pause. ‘Extremely. Good. Well bring him along and we’ll expect you at around nine. Me too.’ She purred the last two words. A voice that Jane didn’t yet have.
Suzy hung up the receiver then skipped off to the kitchen while Jane found another fourpence to ring Doreen. They’d only got connected a couple of years ago. Doreen had almost been tempted by a white wrought-iron telephone seat she’d seen in the Green Shield Stamp catalogue but she decided that would just run up bills. Instead the phone was perched precariously on the arm of the hall stand so you had to answer it stood up in the draughty front passage. Doreen was very suspicious of the telephone, often not saying hello at all until the person on the other end had spoken. God help anyone who had dialled a wrong number. This time she was more forthcoming as Jane had caught her in the middle of the wrestling and if she stayed away from the set too long Uncle George would switch over to Robin Hood.
‘Wot?’
‘It’s me, Jane. I’m over at Joy’s and she’s asked me if I want to stay overnight so I said I would if that was all right with you.’
Doreen just grunted and hung up, the quicker to get back to the telly. Suzy had stepped back into the corridor so Jane carried on talking, pretending to be having a normal conversation with a normal bloody human being.
‘Oh I expect I can borrow a nightie. All right, Auntie. See you tomorrow. Bye.’ She even blew a kiss. And then hung up the dead phone, ready for the grand tour of the flat.
The sitting room had bare floorboards covered by a peculiar offcut of carpet that had been woven with a fancy monogram of Ps and Hs (when they redecorated the Portland Hotel the landlord had done a deal with one of the carpet fitters he’d met in a local pub after finishing the job). The only furniture was a three-legged chaise-longue propped up on a pile of old Vogues, an armchair and a row of six red plush tip-up cinema seats. The dingy striped wallpaper had half a dozen clean, gaily coloured patches where pictures had once been. A naked light socket hung from the chipped rose in the middle but there was no bulb in it. Instead Suzy zipped round the room switching on three lamps with pink nylon shades on stands made from old dimple whisky bottles. There was only one electricity point in the room and the long flexes had all been crudely spliced together with fluffy black knots of insulating tape. The three plugs all met in one corner in a terrifying tangle of wires and two-way adaptors.
The only ornaments on Suzy’s huge old plaster chimneypiece were a row of blue china elephants linked together by trunks and tails and a Moët and Chandon ice bucket full to the brim with ritzy little matchboxes. Jane selected a Claridge’s bookmatch and crouched down to light the gas, waving the flame along the bottom row of charred white mantles until the whole thing stopped hissing and woomfed scarily to life.
‘Would you like a glass of water?’ called Suzy. Jane wandered out to the kitchen. It was a largish room about twelve feet square with a utility dresser, an old stone sink, a grimy gas stove and a huge, gleaming white roll-topped bath tub.
‘Mad, isn’t it? Not all the flats have got one. Most of them head off to some cosy bath-house place down in Soho. You know, special occasions: Jewish holidays, Queen’s birthday, Grand National, that sort of thing. The lavatories are all down on the half landing. There is one for each flat but it’s still a frightful pain. We usually wee in the bath, quite honestly. Quite hard finding anyone to share. Most of them just curl up and die when they see the kitchen. Glenda just used the place as a wardrobe really and we only got Lorna by dropping her rent to a quid provided she did all the cleaning and washing up. Which worked brilliantly for about a fortnight but as you can see . . .’
The bath was the only clean thing in the room. The kitchen floor was covered in black and blue fake marble lino tiles but the blue ones were almost black with grime, except for a cleanish path polished back to their original colour by passing feet. Doreen kept a pretty hairy kitchen floor but she did at least run the mop over it occasionally.
‘I could clean the floor if you like.’ Jane wasn’t sure she could face stepping barefoot on to that filthy old oilcloth. Beetles, said Doreen, Germs.
‘Don’t be daft, sweetie. Life’s too short. You can put some newspaper down, if you like. There’s even a bathmat somewhere.’ Which there was. It said Grand Hotel and there was dried blood on one corner.
The sink was overflowing with coffee cups and glasses, the gas stove was brown and sticky with long-forgotten fry-ups and the walls, which had once been painted a sort of school-corridor blue, were encrusted with strange little yellow worms, each about two feet long. Jane picked at one of them very, very cautiously.
‘Spaghetti. You can tell it’s cooked when it sticks to the wall – so Lorna says. Bit of a dark horse, Lorna. Works in the British Museum, sensible shoes and all that but she spends most of the week shacked up with one of the Egyptologists in his rat’s nest in Gordon Square. He goes home to the family on Friday nights but the wife and kids have gone to her mother’s in Reigate so Lorna’s off to Brighton for a nice dirty weekend. Let’s hope she brings back a new bathmat.’
The cupboard was nearly as bare as Doreen’s – but in a much tastier way: a jar of powdered coffee; a box of cornflakes; a long blue paper tube of spaghetti; a large box of Fortnum’s chocolates (unopened); a packet of Ryvita; a box of Biskoids; three tins of Carpenter’s lobster bisque; a jar of stuffed olives and yet another huge catering tin of Twiglets; Cheeselets and cheese footballs (someone, somewhere was obviously very generous with these). There was no fridge but two bottles of Veuve Clicquot and a waxed carton of milk-machine milk were sat outside on the window sill.
A heavy knock on the door meant Big Terry had arrived. He wore tonic trousers, a red Carnaby Street shirt, a navy-blue Crombie and suede shoes. He was about five feet four.
‘Terry, thank God.’ Suzy, now down to bra and panty girdle (No girl is ever too thin for a girdle), planted kisses on both cheeks. ‘This is Janey, by the way. Please say you don’t mind doing both of us. We have to do something about her.’ Like it was nothing to do with Jane.
A Vision of Loveliness Page 7