The Shop Girls of Chapel Street

by Jenny Holmes

  ‘Mrs Kingsley is looking for a new dressmaker,’ Alice explained. ‘She’s grown dissatisfied with the standard of service provided by Sybil Dacre higher up the street. I mentioned Jubilee because I know you will offer reasonable rates.’

  Violet smiled and nodded, trying not to let her objection to Alice Barlow’s hoity-toity manner show, though there was definitely something about the woman’s voice, with its over-careful pronunciation and nasal twang that set her teeth on edge. ‘We do our best to work satisfactorily,’ she assured Ella Kingsley.

  ‘That’s good to hear.’ The mill owner’s wife studied Violet for a while, as if trying to solve a puzzle. ‘I know – you were the Whitsuntide Gala Queen!’ she said at last. ‘And very pretty you were, too.’

  Violet dipped her head and smiled modestly, thinking it was time to bring in Ida from the kitchen. ‘Would you like me to fetch Miss Thomson?’ she offered. ‘She can tell you about our prices, and so on.’

  ‘No need – I’m here.’ Ida announced her appearance, allowing Violet the opportunity to slope off to the workroom. ‘It was decent of you to recommend us, Mrs Barlow. We’re much obliged. Now, Mrs Kingsley, what exactly did you have in mind?’

  ‘Flattery is the key,’ Muriel informed Violet as they sewed in the attic, putting the finishing touches to the dress for the window mannequin, whom Violet had dubbed Maud. It was two days after the visit from Alice Barlow and Ella Kingsley, which had resulted in a firm order for an autumn tweed jacket and matching skirt from the mill owner’s wife.

  ‘That’s right. We have to make them feel special,’ Ida agreed. ‘And whatever they say and do, you have to remember that the customer is always right.’

  Violet was as eager as ever to take advice from her new employers. ‘Even when they’re not?’ she queried.

  ‘Especially when they’re not,’ Muriel insisted. ‘The trick is to listen then steer them gently to what you know will work – a slightly longer skirt if the customer’s legs are nothing to write home about, a couple of extra darts inserted into the bodice to flatter the – ahem – shall we say, fuller figure?’

  ‘And then, of course, a dress-shop girl needs the patience of a saint,’ Ida reminded Violet as they dressed ‘Maud’ and got her ready for display later that day. Muriel had gone out to the bank to start an account that would take weekly payments from customers who chose to buy garments on the never-never. ‘Remember – yes, madam; no madam; three bags full, madam – that’s the road we have to go down, come what may.’

  Violet helped draw the mannequin’s dress down over its head then pull it straight.

  ‘Patience may not be my strong point,’ Ida admitted, turning down the corners of her mouth and warning Violet not to comment.

  Violet giggled and did up the zip on the dress. Together they lifted Maud into the window and out of the corner of her eye she caught sight of a slight figure running down the street. She frowned as Evie stopped outside and gestured to her. ‘I won’t be a sec,’ she told Ida, stepping down from the window and out into the street. ‘What is it?’ she whispered.

  ‘Sybil’s read the Jubilee advertisement in the Herald. She’s on the war path,’ Evie blurted out, only stopping to glance anxiously up the street before hurrying on out of sight.

  Violet went back inside, but before she had time to warn Ida what was afoot, a stern-faced Sybil appeared.

  ‘What’s this I read?’ the newcomer demanded, brandishing a copy of the local newspaper as she thrust open the door.

  Violet needn’t have worried – Ida was ready for her. ‘I take it that you mean our advertisement?’ she asked coyly as she stepped out of the window.

  ‘Come off it, Ida. You know very well that’s what I mean.’ Face to face with her adversary, Sybil Dacre was an imposing figure. She was equally tall for a start, with a natural dignity and she seemed fired up for a confrontation. ‘What do you mean by setting up in competition with us – and behind our backs, too?’

  Ida wasn’t intimidated, however. ‘Oh, so you’re the only ones who can work as costumiers round here – is that what you’re saying?’

  ‘I’m not saying that.’ Sybil drew herself up to full height, her face flushed and locks of auburn hair escaping from a neatly pinned French pleat. ‘But if I were in your place, I’d at least have had the decency to mention it before I put the announcement in the paper. And you know very well that two dressmakers on the same street can’t be good for business – not for either of us.’

  ‘Ah, you see – that’s where you’re wrong,’ Ida argued. ‘Muriel and I reckon we’re going after a different type of customer – girls with less money to spend, not your average factory or shop owner’s wife, which is who you deal with.’

  ‘And that’s why Mrs Kingsley has come to you, is it?’ Sybil asked with scarcely suppressed anger. ‘There’s no point denying it – Alice Barlow enjoyed telling me all about it when I ran into her earlier in the week.’

  Ida struggled to find an answer to this. ‘You’re probably well rid of Ella Kingsley, if Alice Barlow is anything to go by,’ she advised Sybil.

  ‘Come on – you can do better than that. We both know that any customer is better than no customer, however demanding they may be.’

  ‘Not if they don’t pay their bills on time, it isn’t,’ Ida said, expecting Sybil to read between the lines.

  It was the first either Violet or Sybil had heard about Alice Barlow’s tardiness over payment and it took them aback.

  ‘You don’t say,’ Sybil murmured, while Violet’s opinion of the difficult-to-please customer dropped even lower. ‘In any case, if I find out that you’re setting out to steal custom away from us, you’ll have me to answer to,’ Sybil warned.

  ‘Look, Sybil,’ Ida spoke more quietly than before, ‘I’m being honest with you when I say that isn’t our plan. Jubilee will keep on with the drapery business as usual. As for the dressmaking part, we’ll concentrate on customers like Violet here – young girls who will scrape by on bread and jam to save up their pennies in order to splash out on a summer dress every now and then. That will still leave room for you to attract the well-heeled customer.’

  Sybil listened then sighed. ‘It’s taken us three years to get where we are,’ she confided. ‘And it’s not been straightforward – not with Annie and Lily both leaving to get married and have their babies. Evie and I have had to work our socks off, I can tell you.’

  ‘Likewise,’ Ida told her. ‘There’s not much money to be made from selling small items of drapery – not any more. The world’s changing and that’s why we’re branching out from knicker elastic and hooks and eyes into dressmaking.’

  Watching from the sidelines, Violet judged that the two women were evenly matched and she could see it from both points of view. She was glad that Sybil’s frayed temper seemed to be subsiding.

  ‘I came out of a steady job at Calvert’s not knowing if I could make a go of sewing for a living,’ Sybil went on. ‘But I love the work and I’m good at what I do. And sure enough, we’ve built up a reputation for being quick and reliable – enough to buck the trend for women going into the town centre and buying their clothes off the peg from the big department stores, at least for the time being.’

  ‘Quick, reliable and costly,’ Ida reminded her. ‘That’s not a criticism – it’s the truth. You do excellent work for those who can pay higher prices and in a funny way your customers don’t mind paying the premium. They enjoy boasting to their friends that they go to Sybil Dacre on Chapel Street for the very reason that you’re expensive.’

  ‘Still,’ Sybil sighed as she grudgingly accepted Ida’s argument, ‘there was no need to go behind my back.’

  ‘I agree and I’m sorry,’ Ida conceded. ‘Muriel and I have been so busy making our plans that we didn’t stop to think.’

  Ida apologizing was something Violet hadn’t expected and she looked from one to the other with growing relief.

  ‘Apology accepted,’ Sybil said, rolling up her n
ewspaper and tucking it under her arm.

  ‘And do you agree that there might be room for both of us on the street after all?’ Ida asked tentatively.

  Sybil looked her in the eye for a long time before she nodded and made her final pronouncement as she departed. ‘May the best man win,’ she said.

  ‘Woman.’ Ida followed Sybil out onto the street and offered to shake her hand while Violet stayed inside to watch the rivals make up. ‘All’s fair in love and shop work, so may the best woman win!’

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  At the end of the rehearsal the following night Violet made a big point of waiting for Eddie to clear away his paints and clean his brushes while others went on their way.

  ‘Ta-ta, Stan,’ she said with a cheery wave. ‘Goodbye, Evie. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.’

  She and Eddie were the last to leave and it was poor timing on their part that they happened to bump into, of all people, Donald Wheeler, ready with his big bunch of keys to lock up the building for the night. Violet’s heart skipped a beat and she took a step backwards.

  He too seemed dismayed. ‘A change is as good as a rest, eh?’ he said with heavy innuendo and a curl of his lip, together with a nod in Eddie’s direction as Violet squeezed by.

  ‘Now, Donald, that’s not very nice, especially since Violet has done nothing to warrant it.’ Eddie jumped to her defence. ‘I won’t have you upsetting her like that.’

  ‘It’s all right, Eddie. Take no notice.’ Intent on hurrying off, Violet didn’t look back.

  But Eddie stood his ground and glared at her uncle. ‘No, it’s not all right. The way you’ve treated Violet since Winnie died isn’t fair. In fact, your rotten behaviour is the talk of Chapel Street.’

  ‘Is it now?’ Donald sneered.

  ‘Yes. And what’s the reason behind it? That’s what we’d all like to know.’

  ‘What goes on between me and Violet is our business, nobody else’s,’ Donald muttered, thrusting Eddie to one side and inserting the key into the lock. ‘And if, as you say, you don’t want me upsetting her, I’d warn her to steer clear of Hadley in future if I was you.’

  The push incensed Eddie, who grabbed the older man by the back of his collar and spun him round.

  ‘Don’t, it’s not worth it,’ Violet pleaded from a distance of ten yards. She saw how grey and ill her uncle looked and had an overwhelming desire to put as big a distance as possible between them. ‘Come on, Eddie – please!’

  ‘Count yourself lucky,’ Eddie said as he let Donald go. He leaned in and spoke in an angry whisper that he hoped Violet couldn’t overhear. ‘You’re a bully, Donald Wheeler. If it was left to me, I’d stay and teach you a lesson you wouldn’t forget.’

  Violet’s uncle squared up as if for a fight. ‘You and whose army?’

  The schoolboy bravado made Eddie laugh then he shook his head. ‘Violet’s right. It’s not worth it.’ He unlocked his gaze from Donald’s and backed off, striding to join Violet. Then he kick-started his bike and waited for her to climb on behind him. They rode out of the yard and onto the main street, leaving Donald Wheeler to secure the building and return to his lonely lodgings.

  Violet was still upset when they arrived at Chapel Street so Eddie went into Jubilee with her, through to the back kitchen where he sat her down at the table and made them both a cup of tea.

  ‘No sugar, ta,’ she said when she saw him dip the spoon into the bowl.

  ‘One won’t hurt,’ he argued as he went ahead. ‘You turned white as a sheet back there. I was worried about you.’

  ‘I’m all right,’ she insisted, though she couldn’t stop her hand from shaking as she raised the cup.

  ‘You don’t look it.’ Deciding to stay where he was until he was sure she was better, Eddie settled into a seat across the table. ‘Come on, why don’t you tell me what’s wrong? It’ll do you good to get it off your chest.’

  Everything’s wrong, she wanted to say. But her hidden suspicion about her mother and Uncle Donald was still too shocking for her to share.

  Eddie reached across the table to clasp her hand, which reminded him of a trembling baby bird discovered in its nest. ‘This is about your mother’s bracelet, isn’t it?’

  She gasped and tried to jerk her hand free. ‘Please, Eddie. I don’t want to talk about it.’

  ‘I knew it,’ he persisted. ‘I saw how much it meant to you when you found it in its box and yet you haven’t said a word about it since. There’s got to be a reason for that.’

  The initials inside the heart had wormed their way into every twist and turn of her brain. She woke up thinking about it and went through each day bowed by the suspicion that her uncle was, in fact, her father and that her whole life thus far had been based on a lie.

  ‘There is a reason.’ Hurriedly she took her hand away and rushed from the room. ‘Wait here,’ she pleaded, taking the stairs two at a time and returning with the blue box. ‘I haven’t mentioned it but it’s been preying on my mind and now I think it’s time to show you this.’ She gave Eddie the box.

  ‘Do you want me to open it?’ he asked.

  Violet nodded. ‘Don’t look at the bracelet, look at the note.’

  ‘“To dearest Flo …”’ he read with a puzzled frown. ‘Do you mean the fact that there’s no signature?’

  ‘Yes – that set me off thinking. Then, later, when I happened to mention the bracelet to Uncle Donald, he stormed off.’

  ‘That’s par for the course these days, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, but it upset me and made me take another look.’ Violet leaned over Eddie’s shoulder to open the flap of the envelope and point to the initials inside the heart.

  Eddie pursed his lips. ‘F and D,’ he said gently. ‘Christmas 1914.’

  ‘I’ll be nineteen in September.’ Violet’s voice was scarcely audible as she shared with Eddie her deepest fears.

  ‘The D here stands for your Uncle Donald – is that what you think?’

  ‘Yes.’ The secret was out and there was no getting away from the shameful fact that her mother had betrayed her husband while he was away at war. She had slept with her husband’s brother. The bracelet and the heart were proof.

  ‘We can’t be sure,’ Eddie cautioned. He saw how much Violet suffered and wanted to wipe away the tears.

  ‘No,’ she sobbed. ‘Let’s not kid ourselves, Eddie. I know in my heart it’s true.’

  Eddie came round the table and raised Violet to her feet. He held her so close she felt his strong heartbeat and the warmth of him, breathed him in and clung to him to stop herself from falling down a deep hole into despair, into a dark, empty pit that had no bottom.

  ‘It doesn’t make any difference now,’ he murmured. ‘It’s all in the past.’

  Safe in his arms, Violet’s resistance broke down and she started to sob in earnest. ‘But it still matters. Don’t you see? I’m not who I thought I was. I’m a different girl.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘I’ve discovered a past that I’m ashamed of. I can’t even bear to think about it. And – what do I call him now, “Uncle” Donald? – he can’t even look me in the eye. You saw what he was like.’

  ‘Because he’s in the wrong and he knows it.’ All Eddie wanted was to console Violet and hold her until she stopped crying. He stroked her hair and planted soft kisses on the top of her head.

  ‘It makes a difference, though, doesn’t it?’ Violet raised her tear-stained face to read the answer in his expression.

  ‘Not to me, it doesn’t,’ he whispered, looking deep into her pleading eyes. ‘Whatever’s gone on in the past, you’re still the girl for me.’

  Once more Violet rode the rough seas of her feelings about her origins – up and down the giant breaking waves of regret, shame and disappointment. Somehow, though, it seemed easier with Eddie’s help to banish the hurt and carry on ignoring the note hidden inside the velvet case, tucked away in the box under her bed.

  Then there was wo
rk that she loved to raise her spirits – pinning and cutting material that smelled of fresh cotton and starch, using scissors to shear through layers of crisp fabric, placing raw edges together then pinning, tacking, gathering and sewing until a finished garment emerged.

  In general, as the days went by, Violet found that she preferred being in the attic workshop to serving in the increasingly busy shop, but she dutifully took her turn downstairs, remembering to stick to the two main commandments of shop work – thou shalt not lose thy temper and thou shalt smile and flatter at all times.

  ‘We need a new outfit for Gertie,’ Ida decided on the Friday afternoon of their first week in business, standing behind the counter with Violet as they got ready to close for the day. ‘Gertie’ was companion to Maud whose blank gaze dominated the window of the recently re-titled ‘Jubilee Drapers and Dressmakers’. ‘She needs to be wearing something that will really brighten the place up.’

  ‘We could make a wedding dress for her,’ Violet suggested almost immediately. ‘White silk with a dropped waist and a scalloped hem, decorated with tiny artificial pearls.’

  ‘We could change them round and put Gertie in the window. We’d make quite a splash with that,’ Ida agreed and straight away they went to the pattern books and were so taken up by the plan that they ignored the tinkle of the shop bell and instead kept their heads buried in their fashion bible.

  ‘Shop!’ Colin Barlow’s loud voice and the rap of his silver-tipped cane against the counter startled them. He brought with him the stale smell of tobacco smoke, which overwhelmed the cologne that he must have applied after shaving first thing that morning. He wore a panama hat, a linen blazer over a pale blue shirt and striped silk tie – as usual, quite the dapper man about town.

  ‘Good afternoon, ladies. I take it you’re still open for business?’

  Violet jumped to attention. ‘Certainly, Mr Barlow. How can I help?’