The Shop Girls of Chapel Street

by Jenny Holmes

  ‘No, don’t say anything.’ Alice Barlow closed the door and came back into the shop with a strained expression, her eyes flitting from the displays in the shop back to the rain-splashed pavement.

  ‘Please, Mrs Barlow …’ Thrown off balance, Violet struggled for a response.

  ‘He likes to see me suffer, he takes pleasure in it. A snide remark here, a public snub there – that’s nothing to Colin.’

  ‘Please don’t talk like this.’

  Alice Barlow put her hand to her mouth but it was an ineffectual gesture. She was incapable of holding back the confession that rose from deep within and in her despair had run straight to Violet. ‘You’ve seen him. You know what he’s like. Behind closed doors it’s ten times worse. I’ve put up with his bullying and pushing me around for years – what else could I do? But now … now we’ve reached the point where Colin says he’s sick of me and ready to throw me aside like – like a worn-out shoe.’

  ‘Come through to the kitchen and sit down,’ Violet offered. She thought tears would have been better than this wild-eyed, wailing torrent of words.

  ‘No – I don’t want your pity.’ Alice Barlow resisted Violet’s proffered hand. ‘You heard him the other day – he says he’ll chuck me in the gutter. Then what will I do?’

  ‘Would that really be so bad?’ Violet said earnestly, her true feelings about Barlow coming through. ‘To stand up to him and be rid of him?’

  ‘You don’t understand. Where will I go? What will I do?’

  Violet had no time to find an answer before the door was flung open and Colin Barlow himself strode in. ‘Oh, very nice!’ he mocked. ‘I might have known – not only does my wife create another scene in front of my dispenser but she high tails it over here to wash her dirty linen in public. I won’t have it, Alice, do you hear me?’

  Violet felt her loathing for every inch of the man – his sneering mouth beneath the trim moustache, his groomed hair, his swagger – boil up inside her. As he advanced towards his wife with a raised hand, she thrust herself between them. ‘Stop that or I’ll call the police,’ she warned.

  He laughed again as he shoved her aside. ‘Showing your true colours now, eh, Violet?’ Making a grab for Alice, he caught only the lapel of her coat, allowing her to twist free, duck under his arm and run towards the door. ‘Damn and blast, girl, get out of my way!’

  The bell jangled and Alice had escaped onto the wet pavement. She fled towards Thornley’s, turned the corner and was soon out of sight.

  ‘I said – get out of my way!’ Barlow seized Violet by the shoulders and shoved her aside. She crashed against the counter and onto the floor, bringing display racks crashing down. Then he was gone from the shop, chasing after his wife, leaving Violet breathless and calling for help.

  ‘What is it? What’s happened?’ Ida had flown downstairs at the sound of the fracas below. Muriel was close behind. They helped Violet to her feet.

  ‘Lord knows what Barlow will do to her if he catches her – call the police!’ Violet gasped. Without stopping to explain or to dust herself down, she too ran onto the street and set off after the warring couple.

  She reached the entrance to Thornley’s in time to see the back view of Colin Barlow disappear down a set of narrow steps leading to Canal Road. Violet followed and came out onto the thoroughfare opposite the Victory. Picking out Alice Barlow’s brown raincoat amongst the hubbub of delivery boys, shoppers, taxi men and street cleaners, she realized that a desperate Alice was intent on reaching the empty Daimler parked outside the chemist’s before her husband caught up with her. Violet paused. Surely someone would see what was happening and step in? But no – a butcher’s boy moved aside for Colin Barlow to continue his pursuit and a woman at the bus stop merely shook her head at the sight of a drenched Alice wrenching at the handle of the car door.

  This wasn’t fair – she knew now that Barlow was a brute who wouldn’t hesitate to use his fists against his wife. Sure enough, it only took a few seconds for him to reach the car and lay his hands on her, clamping a hand over her mouth as she began to scream.

  ‘Steady on.’ A car mechanic carrying a spare tyre was the first to intervene. He put down the tyre and tapped Barlow on the shoulder. Barlow used his elbow to shove the man off but stumbled backwards over the tyre.

  The interruption gave Alice the chance to break free. She hadn’t been able to take refuge inside the locked car so now she darted down the alleyway beside Brinkley Baths. Barlow yelled at the mechanic then pushed him aside. Again he ran after his wife. Violet’s heart was in her mouth as she reached the alley and followed them onto the deserted towpath.

  A more miserable scene was hard to imagine. The narrow, overgrown path was littered with rusty tin cans and old newspapers. The canal water was slate grey and pocked by raindrops. A hundred yards to the right there was a lock gate and the sound of trickling water, to the left a dark tunnel under the main road. Violet searched frantically but at first saw no sign of the Barlows. They couldn’t have gone towards the lock because they’d still be in view, she reasoned, so she chose the direction of the tunnel. As she ran she slipped on the slimy flagged surface, dislodging a can and sending it over the edge of the path into the murky, weed-choked water. She steadied herself against a wall that towered over her, glanced up at the traffic trundling across the road bridge and ran on into the tunnel.

  Violet heard water dripping from the roof then muffled voices but it took a while for her eyes to get used to the gloom.

  ‘I’m sick to death of you.’

  ‘Colin, let go of me!’

  ‘You hear me!’

  ‘Let go!’

  Violet made out two figures. Alice crouched against the wall of the tunnel. Barlow stood over her. A slap followed each word. ‘Sick – to – death!’ Then he pulled her upright.

  ‘Stop that!’ Violet edged forward. She lost her footing a second time.

  Barlow held Alice by the wrist and swung her away from the wall. They stood on a ledge just wide enough for one person and the momentum brought Alice to the very edge. He held her teetering there. Her free arm flailed as she tried to keep her balance. Violet was ten yards away. Barlow used both hands to pull his wife back towards him so that their faces were an inch apart. There was no sound, only the dripping water and Violet’s muffled footsteps. Then, without a word, Barlow thrust Alice backwards into the canal.

  There was a loud splash, and Alice Barlow sank beneath the black surface. Seconds passed. Then, with a swift brushing together of his palms, Barlow passed by Violet, who pressed herself against the curved wall of the tunnel just out of his sight.

  He was gone, striding back the way he’d come and Alice had floated to the surface, her face a pale blob, her mouth open and gasping for breath. She reached up towards Violet who had gone down onto her knees, but Alice failed to catch hold of Violet’s outstretched arms then sank a second time.

  Seeing that the gap between the towpath and the water was anyway too great for her to haul the drowning woman to safety, Violet knew there was only one way to save her.

  Without thinking, she held her breath and plunged headfirst into the filthy canal, breaking its cold surface and groping her way underwater. It was impossible to see anything. Her fingertips touched the soft sludge at the bottom. She kicked and turned sideways, still reaching out. There was something square and solid – a metal frame, perhaps – then more slime and sludge. She must go up for breath. She’d turned her face upwards, ready to rise, when a soft weight drifted against her. Violet tried to catch hold of it. There was an arm, a hand clutching at her. She kicked her legs and swam deep enough to wrap her arms around a woman’s body, raise it up and break the surface. She dragged air into her lungs, struggling to keep Alice afloat.

  ‘Hold on tight, Vi – we’re here!’ a voice called.

  Hands reached down.

  ‘Lift her up towards us – that’s right, higher!’ Alice was lifted clear of the water and it was only then that Violet recog
nized whose voice it was. ‘Eddie – Barlow pushed her in!’ she cried. ‘He tried to drown his wife.’

  ‘Explain later.’ Eddie’s grim face appeared at the edge of the towpath. He lay full length, reaching down for Violet. ‘Come on, Vi – grab my hand. Hold tight.’

  Eddie was strong enough to raise Violet onto the towpath. While Stan carried Alice from the tunnel, Eddie gave Violet his jacket. The grey October light revealed two policemen running towards them, whistles blowing. On the bridge above their heads and on the steps from Canal Road, onlookers had gathered.

  Eddie supported Violet towards the steps. ‘Are you all right? Can you walk or shall I carry you?’

  ‘Walk,’ she insisted. With Eddie – one step in front of another to safety.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  There was a flurry of activity on Canal Road. An ambulance stood by to take Alice Barlow to hospital. A policeman dressed in civvies arrived and spoke to his officers. He pointed to Barlow’s shop then the two uniformed men hurried inside.

  ‘Do you want me to take you to the King Edward’s for them to check you over?’ Eddie asked Violet.

  She shook her head. ‘I just want to go home,’ she whispered.

  But the senior policeman approached them and pinned them to the spot. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Butterworth. We had an emergency call from Jubilee Dressmakers – a lady by the name of Muriel Beanland.’

  ‘Yes. I work there. I asked them to ring you.’ Wet and shivering, Violet clutched Eddie’s jacket across her chest. ‘He pushed her in the water. He must have known she couldn’t swim.’

  ‘You mean Mr Barlow?’ The inspector ignored the hubbub that arose when the two policemen escorted Colin Barlow out of his shop and concentrated on the facts.

  ‘I saw him,’ Violet insisted. ‘He was beating her and then pushed her in. And just walked away.’

  Barlow wrenched free of the escorting officers. ‘That’s a lie. Alice slipped and fell. Neither of us knows how to swim. I ran to fetch help.’ He was still arguing, fending off the two officers with his elbows until one of them took firm hold of him again. ‘This girl has a grudge against me.’

  Violet noticed Glenda Morris standing stony faced in the shop doorway, watching the police trying to drag her boss towards a Black Maria. Her gaze flickered towards Violet and she gave an almost imperceptible nod. In that instant an agreement was reached and an alliance formed.

  ‘I’m telling the truth,’ Violet said. ‘Mr Barlow chased Mrs Barlow out of Jubilee down Chapel Street. She was frightened out of her wits. That’s why I asked Muriel to call the police.’

  ‘It’s a good job she did,’ Eddie said stoutly. ‘Then Ida rang me. She knew I was at the Baths with Stan. We dashed over here as fast as we could.’

  ‘It’s the girl’s word against mine.’ Barlow struggled with the officers until one brought out handcuffs and snapped them around his wrists. ‘She’s making all this up. My wife was hysterical. I tried to calm her down but she fell.’

  ‘Take him to the station.’ It was clear that the facts were falling into place and telling the inspector a different story. He turned his back as his men dragged Barlow away to their waiting car.

  ‘And take this young lady home before she catches her death,’ the inspector advised Eddie. ‘There’ll be time later on to make a formal statement.’

  So Eddie and Stan pushed through the crowd, each with an arm around Violet’s shoulder.

  ‘Plenty of people saw what went on,’ Violet murmured. She was so cold that her teeth chattered. Her legs felt heavy, the inside of her head light. ‘A butcher’s boy, a woman at the bus stop, a man with a car tyre …’

  ‘You heard Inspector Butterworth – we’ll concentrate on that later,’ Stan insisted.

  Eddie agreed. ‘Right now we have to get you back to Jubilee.’

  To Jubilee where Ida and Muriel were waiting with hot tea. Muriel ran upstairs to fetch a dry blanket from Violet’s bed. Ida sat her down by the kitchen range.

  ‘Stan, Eddie …’ Muriel indicated with a meaningful look that it was time for them to make themselves scarce while she and Ida helped Violet undress, sponged her down and gave her clean clothes.

  They were slow on the uptake – two tall, ungainly men getting in the women’s way in the cramped kitchen.

  ‘You’ve done your bit,’ Ida insisted as she showed them the door. ‘I take it Barlow’s in clink?’ she added.

  ‘Where he belongs,’ Stan vouchsafed.

  ‘And between us we’ll make sure that’s where he stays,’ Eddie swore.

  All the next day the shop bell tinkled.

  Lizzie called in during her dinner break to buy half a dozen horn buttons for her father’s sports jacket but really to quiz Violet, the heroine of the hour.

  ‘What was the water like? Was it freezing? Alice Barlow must have been a dead weight – how did you manage to drag her out? Goodness gracious, Violet, you’re a blooming marvel.’

  Lizzie had heard the story from Marjorie who had seen Stan and Eddie bring a dripping Violet back to Jubilee. Marjorie had waited all of two minutes before haring across Chapel Street to Sybil’s shop to find out if Evie knew what Stan and Eddie had been up to. Evie ran to the telephone box on the corner of Cliff Street to speak to Emily Thomson in her box office at Brinkley Baths and so the cat was out of the bag – Violet had saved Mrs Barlow from drowning! And now everyone must call in to see if Violet had survived her dip in the canal unscathed. First Evie dropped by with a fresh sachet of sweet-smelling lavender to pop under Violet’s pillow and take away the nasty, lingering smells of the canal. Then Marjorie herself sailed in, convinced that Violet needed building up with beef tea, marvelling that such a slip of a girl could drag Alice Barlow up from the murky depths single handed. In and out of the shop neighbours came to gossip and praise, to learn of the part that Eddie had played then criticize and condemn.

  ‘Colin Barlow tried to kill his wife – fancy that.’

  ‘I never liked the man. Nor her either, for that matter.’

  ‘She can thank her lucky stars that you risked your life to save her. A lot of people wouldn’t have bothered.’

  Violet listened and smiled, sticking up for Alice Barlow when necessary. Though she was looked after by Muriel and Ida who fussed around like mother hens, by teatime she was worn out. After a short visit from Eddie to see how she was coping, she was in bed by eight o’clock, breathing in lavender and falling straight asleep.

  On Friday she was asked to go to the police station to give her account. Inspector Butterworth, inscrutable as on the previous day behind a pair of silver-rimmed glasses, tapped a pencil on the table and listened carefully while a police constable wrote down every word Violet said. Afterwards Butterworth told her that Alice Barlow was still in the hospital but that she was on the mend.

  ‘You’ve no need to worry – she’s already backed up your version of events,’ he told Violet calmly. ‘We’ve charged Barlow with attempted murder for a start. There’ll be other things to add to that, I shouldn’t wonder.’

  Violet left the police station with a spring in her step. At last, she thought, the man will get what’s coming to him!

  Walking along Brewery Road, on her way back to work, Violet ran into Sybil, who insisted on shaking her by the hand.

  ‘Winnie would have been proud,’ she said with the warmest of smiles. ‘I don’t know the full story of what Colin Barlow got up to behind his wife’s back – only what I’ve picked up here and there from Ella Kingsley and the like. But we all knew he was a bully and a cheat. It takes courage to stand up to a man like that.’

  Violet thanked her and would have hurried on, but Sybil kept tight hold of her hand.

  ‘Now, Violet.’ She spoke with a mischievous twinkle in her eye. ‘You’ve probably heard that I have room for a new seamstress at Chapel Street Costumiers.’

  ‘I have.’ Violet looked steadily at Ida and Muriel’s inveterate rival.

  ‘Whenever your name
comes up, Evie never fails to sing your praises.’

  ‘She does, does she?’ Violet raised her eyebrows.

  ‘Yes. And I know from past experience that you make a good job of hems, buttonholes and suchlike. So, I’ve been turning it over in my mind – well, let me get to the point. I don’t suppose that you would think of applying for the vacant position?’

  A smile appeared on Violet’s lips and she spoke with confidence. ‘You suppose right. I’m very happy where I am, thank you.’

  Sybil released Violet’s hand and smiled back. ‘It was worth asking, at any rate,’ she called over her shoulder as she walked on, heels clicking smartly along the pavement.

  ‘She only did it to annoy us!’ Ida exclaimed when Violet reached Jubilee and told her what had happened.

  ‘You weren’t tempted, were you?’ Muriel gave Violet a searching look.

  ‘Never!’ Violet swore. ‘I’m only just getting started as a dressmaker but believe me, I’m a Jubilee girl through and through.’

  Saturday came and an invitation from Eddie via Ida for Violet to meet him at the Assembly Rooms at seven o’clock.

  ‘He said I should tell you that he was sorry he couldn’t pick you up as usual – and very mysterious he was about it too,’ Ida commented as she closed up for the day.

  Violet didn’t mind. ‘I’ll walk,’ she decided. ‘It’s a nice night. The fresh air will do me good.’

  So she dressed warmly in her red hat and best coat over her green dress and set off at a sprightly pace up Chapel Street in time to see what was left of the sun sinking behind clouds on the far horizon. She faced the biting wind and walked along Under-cliffe Road. On Violet went in the autumn evening, past the cemetery gates then the entrance to Linton Park, looking straight ahead along the busy road until she could see the lights of the Assembly Rooms and Eddie waiting for her on the steps outside.

  Her heart quickened as the man she loved came to meet her, his hand in his jacket pocket, a nervous smile on his lips. Strains of music – the introduction to a waltz – drifted from the hall.