by Pam Weaver
Oh, my word, thought Bea with an inward sigh. That sounds riveting.
* * *
Wife and Home magazine
Our Agony Aunt, Audrey Hindley,
answers questions sent in to our problem page, ‘Ask Audrey’
Dear Audrey,
I am soon to be a mother and I am worried sick. I am currently looking for a reliable nanny and have interviewed several very respectable young ladies, but in view of the recent missing baby case, how can I be absolutely sure that the person I employ is completely trustworthy?
Yours sincerely, Worried of Hampshire
Dear Worried of Hampshire,
I completely understand your concerns and I would urge you first of all, for the sake of your unborn child, to stay calm. It might be less stressful if you found someone to help you with the interviews. Your mother, perhaps? As for making the right choice, it is better not to rely on first impressions. Ask for references from any previous employer, and contact that person in writing. Ask the prospective candidate where she trained, and make contact with the school. Organizations like Norland or St George’s train their girls to a very high standard, and persons of quality recommend them highly. I wish you luck in your newfound state, and I am sure that following my advice you will find a capable, conscientious and trustworthy nanny.
Yours sincerely, Audrey Hindley
* * *
‘You never said you were going to the orphanage.’
Ruby and Jim were alone in the house. Rivka and Elisheva had gone with Rachel to meet the other members of the Deborah Committee. The Derby family had left in the morning, and the Webb family weren’t arriving until tomorrow. Ruby had prepared a nice piece of plaice for their dinner and they sat together in the kitchen.
Jim played with his fish. ‘It was a spur-of-the-moment thing,’ he said, ‘and it was a bit upsetting, if I’m honest.’
‘That’s understandable,’ said Ruby. ‘They’re pulling it down, and you said you were happy there.’
‘It’s not that,’ said Jim. ‘I met up with one of my old masters.’
Ruby listened, her face agog as he told her about his bumping into Mr Brown. ‘That’s amazing!’ she cried. ‘You should have invited him over.’
Jim sighed. ‘The thing is, he told me I had a mother and father.’
‘We’ve all got one of those,’ she quipped and then, seeing the look on his face, she immediately regretted her flippancy. ‘Oh, Jim, I’m sorry. Is there something wrong?’
‘They paid to keep me there,’ he said simply.
Ruby stared at him. ‘What?’
‘Mr Brown remembered that they were well-to-do,’ said Jim. ‘Ruby, I stayed in that place all my life because they paid the fee.’ His voice broke as he came to the end of the sentence.
Ruby got up and stood beside him. She drew him close to her and wrapped her arms around his head and shoulders. For once he didn’t push her away, but sank into her welcoming embrace. ‘Oh, Jim, that’s awful.’
After a few minutes he said, ‘Why would someone do that, Ruby? If they didn’t want me, why not let me be adopted?’
‘I don’t understand it myself,’ she said, ‘and you’re absolutely right, darling. But if you had been adopted, we might never have met and married.’
‘Even that might have been better,’ he said, his voice muffled by her body.
‘You mustn’t think like that,’ she cried. ‘The day I married you, I did it because I love you. Life has given you a raw deal, but if I could go back, I wouldn’t do any different. I have no idea why your parents did such an awful thing, but it was their loss, not yours.’
He looked up at her, his eyes red and teary. ‘You are a remarkable woman, Ruby Searle.’
She smiled down and then planted a kiss on his forehead. ‘Have you only just realized that, Jim Searle?’
It didn’t take Ruby long to realize that teaching the German girls how to become good domestics wasn’t going to be easy. She had to start with very basic stuff, such as how to clean the carpet with the Vactric or a carpet sweeper, and how to dust shelves without breaking things. She was surprised that she even had to teach them how to wash up, but, when faced with a sink full of dirty dishes, Elisheva had thrown up her hands in horror. Left to her own devices, she failed to use hot water and, having handled the dishcloth with her finger-tips, was surprised to discover that it didn’t remove all the grease. What’s more, she started by washing the pans first, so she had to change the water to wash the plates. Ruby couldn’t understand why they were so inept, until Elisheva confided in her that this was the first kitchen she had ever been into in her life. She had no idea that she was supposed to put soda in hot water and plunge her whole hand underneath, with the dirty dish.
Ruby taught the girls how to store food – meat in the meat safe, vegetables on the dry stone floor, if there was no refrigerator in the house. She was aware that some people with posh houses, even if they had several servants, couldn’t always afford new gadgets.
‘Stand the milk bottles in a pail of cold water in the cool larder during the summer months,’ she said. ‘If it’s really hot, it might be better to boil the milk with a little saltpetre when it arrives. It won’t taste quite the same, but it will stop it going off.’
Some of the old home remedies were the best, so she showed them how to scrub larder shelves with sand in warm water, and how to clean and polish windows with vinegar and newspaper.
Even having to deal with Jim, with his tetchy moods, was quite helpful. Ruby didn’t bother to apologize for her husband’s behaviour. She knew that any prospective employer might be just the same, and the girls would have to learn how to deal with it.
‘You won’t get much time to yourself,’ Ruby warned them, as she introduced them to the tedious job of cleaning the cooker with bicarbonate of soda and vinegar. ‘I used to get one day a week off when I worked in Warnes, and I considered myself lucky. Some live-in domestics only have a half-day a fortnight.’
Rivka’s jaw dropped. Ruby touched her arm sympathetically. ‘It may not be as bad as that. My sister-in-law is doing her best to find you a really good situation.’
Rivka wiped away a tear with the heel of her hand. ‘I hate this. I wish I could die,’ she murmured.
‘Then you must go back home right now,’ said Elisheva, rounding on her, ‘and your wish will come true.’ Her chin quivered and she burst into tears.
It was an emotional moment for them all. Ruby felt helpless and, seeing their distress, she found her own throat tightening. All she could offer was a shoulder to cry on and a clean handkerchief. Then she needed one herself.
‘I’ll never remember all this,’ Rivka blurted out.
‘Then we’ll spend the afternoon together and you can write it down.’
Elisheva looked up with a tiny ray of hope in her eyes.
‘And don’t forget,’ Ruby said softly, ‘I am always here at the end of the telephone, or you can write me a letter. Although Rivka was her junior, Elisheva was older than Ruby, but their helplessness and vulnerability brought out her mothering instinct. Ruby could hardly imagine what they were going through: far from home, in a strange country and having to struggle to master a foreign language. They were constantly being asked to do things that were completely alien to them. On top of all that, they were frantic for news about their family and loved ones who had not yet reached safety. Every moment of the day the girls dreaded that they had already been sent to Hitler’s camps. They were all living in perilous times.
For the most part, Jim kept out of everybody’s way. Ruby couldn’t help feeling slightly irritated that he seemed to spend all his time reading the paper and doing crossword puzzles. The only time he ventured out was when he leaned over the back of the wheelchair to post a letter at the end of the road. Ruby wondered vaguely who he was writing to, but with all the pressures of the daily routine, she kept forgetting to ask him.
Almost two weeks later and by prior arrangement, Rachel
came round. She surprised Ruby by saying that she and Percy were about to move to Shoreham, about six miles away, where they had just bought a modest house near the docks. There was a plot of land nearby and Percy was busy creating a lorry park. He planned to run his fledgling haulage business from a small cabin on the site, and was busy looking for someone who could run a tea van for the drivers. Ruby was very excited at the thought of having them so close.
‘You must come over as soon as you can,’ Rachel said.
The real reason for her visit was to collect the two girls. Their work permits had arrived and they were to leave at once. Rivka was going to work for a businessman and his wife in Pulborough, and Elisheva was heading for a position in Goring.
Tearfully, the girls hugged Ruby and thanked her.
‘Don’t forget to write, will you?’ she said as she swallowed the lump in her throat and went to the gate to wave them off. Jim had shuffled out to the gate with them and shook hands stiffly, while Rachel put their cases into the boot of the car.
With the car loaded up, Elisheva sat primly in the front, while a tearful Rivka sat in the back. Jim headed off to the postbox.
‘When I get back,’ Rachel said to Ruby, ‘we’ll go to Brighton for that special shopping trip.’
Ruby glanced at her husband, who was already halfway down the road, leaning over the wheelchair. Silk knickers and perfume – what would he say to that?
‘I don’t suppose you and Jim . . . ?’ Rachel whispered in Ruby’s ear as she kissed her cheek.
Ruby lowered her eyes, blushed and shook her head.
Rachel winked. ‘You soon will be.’
CHAPTER 11
Ruby and Rachel went to Brighton the following Thursday. Rachel drove like a madwoman. They moved from the relative calm of Worthing along the seafront to Shoreham, where the traffic increased as they approached the port. Heading towards Hove, the houses were larger and people strolled along the waterfront. Brighton itself was teeming with life, a mixture of a modern seaside resort and genteel living. They passed large hotels, Victorian lamp stands and Regency buildings, before coming to the somewhat seedier part of the town. Several times during their car ride to Brighton, Ruby gripped the edge of her seat and prayed, as a sharp corner loomed or an oncoming lorry came perilously close to them. A couple of car drivers gesticulated and one man flashed his headlights, but Rachel seemed impervious to them all. She took Ruby to the heart of the shopping area and parked in a small side-street.
The shop, on the edge of the area called The Lanes, was down in the basement. They went down a steep flight of steps and the proprietress, a personal friend of her sister-in-law, greeted them warmly. As the two friends caught up with each other, Ruby gazed in wonder at the beautiful things hanging from the rails. Such delicate colours: silks and the new material she had read about that was all the rage – rayon. There were petticoats with delicate edging, nightdresses with matching bed jackets, and silk panties in fabulous colours like peach, pale blue and lavender; definitely not the sort of thing you would buy in Woolworths.
‘I want you to give my friend a complete wardrobe,’ Ruby heard Rachel saying. ‘Don’t bother about the price tag. I want her to look sensational.’
Ruby looked up, startled. What was Rachel saying? She could never afford all that. Having glanced at the price tags, she might manage a couple of pairs of panties and perhaps a petticoat, but that was all.
‘This is your twenty-first birthday present from Percy and me,’ Rachel said. ‘Now enjoy yourself.’
‘Oh, Rachel . . .’ Ruby began.
‘I mean it, darling,’ said Rachel. ‘Come on, where shall we start?’
Ruby could have wept. ‘I hope you’re not expecting me to show Percy first,’ she quipped.
The three women enjoyed the joke and set about choosing beautiful things. An hour and a half flashed by, and Ruby emerged from the shop weighed down with bags. She had chosen a nightie, a couple of brassieres, some panties, a petticoat and a silk dressing gown, and she couldn’t wait to see Jim’s face when she put them on. Surely now she would be irresistible.
‘I think I might keep it all in my drawer until my birthday,’ Ruby confided. ‘It would feel very special then.’
‘Why not,’ said Rachel. She winked and nudged her sister-in-law in the ribs. ‘You’re sure to get a real birthday treat then.’ Ruby felt herself blush a deep crimson.
They made the most of their time together by looking around the other shops, and ended up having lunch together in Hanningtons department store. On the way back home, although Rachel’s reckless driving meant Ruby found herself praying she would live long enough for Jim to see her in her lovely things, she began to ponder on bringing in some changes. She hadn’t thought about her husband or the guest house for a whole morning. It had been such fun – and fun wasn’t really part of her vocabulary any more. There were times, if she was honest, when she resented Jim. He couldn’t do anything about how things had turned out and she knew that, but the fact that he was such a drain on her life made it doubly difficult. Many was the time she wished for some respite from the drudgery of doing the same thing, day in, day out. She didn’t normally allow herself to dwell on it too deeply, because it upset her to think that was the way it was going to be for the rest of her life. This morning had made Ruby realize that she needed some time to herself. She had been behaving as if life had already passed her by, and it wasn’t doing her any good. She had to get a bit of balance back into her life.
‘We’re expecting some more girls in the next couple of weeks,’ said Rachel, interrupting her thoughts. ‘Do you think you could help me out again?’
‘No problem,’ said Ruby, ‘and there’s no need to worry about asking me again.’ She went on to explain that, with the help of Rivka and Elisheva, she had cleaned out the attic and made a cosy space up there. ‘If I already have guests,’ she continued, ‘the girls will have a place to stay whenever they come, even at short notice.’
‘You are amazing,’ said Rachel. ‘We are so grateful, and the fact that you are willing to teach them is an added bonus.’
Ruby dismissed the compliment with a wave of her hand. The fact was: she had loved doing it. Even though Rivka and Elisheva had been traumatized and afraid, she enjoyed the company of women and the opportunity to help those who were down on their luck. The best times were always in the kitchen. She not only taught the girls how to cook, but showed them how to carve a joint, prepare a crab and make a pouring custard. Custard was a completely alien food to the Germans, and although the girls both made up their minds not to like it, as soon as Ruby poured it out of the double saucepan and put it into a jug, everyone agreed that they never knew egg yolk, milk and sugar with a dash of vanilla could taste so delicious.
Elisheva, who had taken the English name of Elizabeth, had written to Ruby to say that her employers treated her well. But Rivka hadn’t fared so well. She had refused to change her name and worked long hours for an inconsiderate employer who, when Rivka didn’t understand what was required, simply shouted the same incomprehensible instructions over and over again. Ruby advised her to stick it out for a bit, to get a good reference, and then look for another job.
A week or so later, Worthing – along with every town, village and hamlet in the country – was in celebratory mood. The previous year had not only been a trying year for Ruby and Jim, but also a time of heartache for the country. It began in January, when the solemn news came that King George V had died. Once the old king had been laid to rest, the country looked forward to, and began preparations for, the coronation of his eldest son. But in December of that same year a surprise announcement had left everybody stunned. King Edward VIII had abdicated, because he was not allowed to marry a divorcee. ‘I have,’ the King told his people, ‘found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge my duties as King as I would wish to do, without the help and support of the woman I love.’
It was only then that everyone in
the country realized that although half the world knew what was coming, the British press had kept quiet until just two weeks before the announcement was made. At the cinema the audience scrutinized the face of the King’s lover, with varying opinions. Mrs Simpson was well groomed and attractive, in a rather austere kind of way. Because she liked the King, Ruby wanted to like Mrs Simpson; but once the secret was out, rumours abounded – the most bizarre of which was that Wallis Simpson was, in fact, a man.
Jim muttered darkly that the King should do his duty, whereas Ruby had a softer, more romantic view. ‘Everyone has the right to be happy,’ she said, but that was before the country was told about Wallis Simpson’s failed marriage (not one, but two) and her many other lovers. One mistake, most people agreed, might have been forgiven; but the nation shook its collective head in disbelief. The King was totally besotted by her and was actually giving up his throne to marry a loose woman.
The new king was Edward’s brother, the Duke of York. He was to be known as King George VI. He seemed to be a gentle man, nervous, fond of family life, but hardly the sort for public office. For a start, he had a terrible stammer. In this matter people kept their thoughts to themselves, but his speeches – peppered by long pauses and audible gulps – made uncomfortable listening. Fortunately for the King, everyone loved his wife, especially the people of Worthing. The Duchess of York had won the hearts and minds of the people of Worthing after she had opened the Queen Alexandra Hospital Home for disabled ex-service personnel, known as Gifford House, just around the corner from Ruby’s guest house in May 1934. These men were the forgotten casualties of war: men who could no longer look after themselves and were doomed to lie forgotten in lonely rooms. Gifford House offered them comradeship, companionship and a chance to enjoy their lives again, as well as giving them the very best care available. The country also loved the beautiful little daughters of the new King and Queen, the Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret Rose.