by Pip Granger
He was puffing himself up to answer me when a friendly voice boomed out of the darkness. ‘Zelda, my flower, is good old Perce upsetting you in any way?’ Ronnie strolled into view, with five large friends bringing up his rear, like a small flotilla of Thames barges.
Percy Robinson accurately assessed the situation. ‘I was doing no such thing,’ he blustered. ‘It was just a misunderstanding, that’s all.’ He tried to look earnestly at my saviours but failed miserably, and appeared furtive instead. He knew it was time to squelch away as rapidly as his slippery shoes would take him over the rubble.
Hysteria overtook me. I almost split my sides laughing with relief. I hadn’t realized just how frightening the strange hand in the dark had been.
When my escorts and I found a street lamp that was actually working, we surveyed the damage. Ronnie’s hands flew to his face and he gasped: ‘Oh sweetie, your poor batts! They’re ruined.’
It was true: a vat of ink couldn’t put my poor peep-toes right. They looked like clapped-out blotting paper – only worse. My eyes filled with tears as I explained about the farewell dance, and sympathy etched itself on Ronnie’s homely mush. ‘The drag looks tres, tres bona, dolly. It’s just the batts.’ He eyed my shoes for a moment, then said thoughtfully, ‘Ma’s got loads of shoes from the Twenties that’ll never be worn again unless they’re passed on. Troll round for a look, dolly, you might find something.’
He turned to his friends. ‘I’ll meet you lot in the pub later. I’m just going to nip home with Zelda for a minute.’
Poor Mrs Rigby: the look of sheer joy when her beloved Ronnie walked in with a girl was a bit sad. Especially as the girl in question was only me, and she knew I was married. But any girl would do for Mrs Rigby. It allowed her to carry on with the fiction that one day soon her Ronnie would make her a proud granny. Nobody liked to tell the poor old darling that Ronnie wasn’t going to found any dynasty in this lifetime, on account of her being such a poppet we didn’t want to disappoint her.
Mrs Rigby’s shop was a wonderful dark and dusty cave filled with teetering piles of mismatched china. More than a dozen old washboards stood propped against the wall, next to stacks of picture frames, some empty, some sporting elderly, spotted prints of The Stag at Bay, Morecambe Bay by Moonlight or The Hay Wain. A cardboard box of unmatched, blunt knitting needles – a good rootle about was necessary to find a pair – stood next to another, filled to the brim with odd buttons, on a table by the door. Nestled next to them was a third, crammed with cutlery, and a shoe box filled with nutcrackers. Other, larger boxes held second-hand overalls, work boots with strong toe-caps and a fine selection of string bags. Shelves were lined two deep with tatty old books; lampshades with fringes and bobbles hung from hooks. Children’s clothes and footwear, too tired to be passed on or unpicked and resewn, were stuffed into two old prams. A fancy gazunder held dozens of zips torn from their garments and baring their often broken teeth. It’d take a while to find one that worked, but find one you would, if you didn’t mind rummaging about in a chamber-pot, that is. I’m certain it would have been thoroughly scrubbed before the zips were dumped in it. Mrs Rigby was thoughtful that way.
Several enamelled bowls were piled one inside the other in a corner; the top one was filled with enormous, wooden laundry tongs. Ornate Victorian vases and plant pots, along with dozens of glass oil lamps in all the colours of the rainbow, with or without their chimneys, cluttered a shelf above a huge, battered mangle that somehow completed the picture. The thing about Mrs Rigby’s was that you could find virtually anything you needed if you were prepared to delve deep enough. That shop proved an absolute godsend during all the years of rationing and was rarely empty of foraging females.
However, it wasn’t the stock of shoes in the shop that Ronnie had been referring to when he suggested I might find a pair. It was his ma’s own private collection, left over from her heyday as a flapper in the 1920s. She must have had almost a dozen pairs, each wrapped separately in a shoe bag or a length of soft cloth. Her dad had been a master cobbler at a posh bespoke shoemaker’s in Bond Street and he’d made all her shoes from scraps right up until the day he died.
I was in ecstasy as I unwrapped each pair to reveal another beautiful silk or kid leather creation. The stitching was tiny and the colours were gorgeous. ‘He made them to match my clothes,’ Mrs Rigby told me, eyes shining with pride. ‘My mum was a seamstress, so I was always well turned out. I’ve never thrown any of my shoes away, even though my poor feet are too swollen to wear them now.’
I could quite see her point: the shoes were works of art and it seemed like sacrilege to wear them, let alone dump them. I was hesitant about borrowing a pair in case they were ruined, but Ronnie and his mum would have none of it.
‘My dad would be thrilled to know his shoes were seeing a dance floor again after all these years. Choose a pair and wear them in good health.’ There was a pause. ‘But bring ’em back when you’re done.’
In the end, I chose a navy blue kid leather pair, with a cross-bar and low, elegantly shaped heels. If I stuffed a hanky in each toe, they fitted me fine, and the bar across my instep helped to keep them on. I was in heaven and I couldn’t thank the old lady enough. But I made up my mind to try, with a hefty sample of the very next meat delivery to the canteen and some vegetables from the allotment.
29
On Friday, I hurried home after work for a soak in a tepid bath before Dilly and Ronnie came for our pre-dance hairdressing session. As a bath required boiling up kettles of water on the gas hob and pouring it into a tin bath, it was a lengthy process. So was emptying the bathtub afterwards. If I didn’t get a move on, all I’d get was a lick and a promise, not the relaxing soak I’d hoped for.
I was dressed and emptying my bathwater, a bucket at a time, down the kitchen sink, when Dilly turned up, closely followed by Ronnie. They grabbed a saucepan each and helped until it was shallow enough to lift up and tip. I mopped the lino while Ronnie took the bath downstairs into the yard and hung it on its hook by the back door. A small, makeshift porch put up by Charlie on one of his leaves saved it from the worst of the weather and serious rusting. Galvanized tin would only take so much punishment before the tell-tale orange rust started and, along with virtually everything else to do with cleanliness, tin baths had been hard to come by during the war. No wonder we’d hummed a bit at times. Even hot water was rationed.
‘Tut, tut, dolly, you’ve been cheating and taking long, hot and, worse yet, solitary baths,’ Ronnie said, wagging a large finger at me.
‘I cannot tell a lie, governor!’ I told him. ‘I am almost guilty as charged, although it wasn’t that hot. However, tomorrow I shall have one right up to me neck, piping hot and scented with a whole gardenia bath cube – so there!’
Dilly gasped. ‘You jammy baggage! Just for that you can make me a cup of tea.’
‘And me,’ Ronnie said. ‘And while you’re at it, some water to wash our barnets. I certainly can’t set yours without a shampoo first. And it just so happens, ladies, I have shampoo and setting lotion, thanks to the sainted Zinnia Makepeace. Plus she sent a chamomile rinse for the blonde and rosemary for the brunette. She says it will give a gloss to our locks and make us smell divine. She recommends the rosemary for me, despite the golden threads among the mouse, says it smells more butch. So, we’ll do our riahs tonight, pop a hairnet on to sleep and all we’ll have to do tomorrow is comb it through.’
Dilly laughed. ‘And I didn’t come empty-handed either. I’ve still got some of Chester’s records. I thought we’d get in the mood for dancing by playing a few. You’ve still got Charlie’s gramophone, haven’t you?’
‘Yes,’ I told her, grinning. I was forbidden to use Charlie’s gramophone when he wasn’t there, on pain of death, so of course I used it all the time. I liked music. It cheered a body up, especially a drop of Swing. Once we’d heard Glenn Miller, Artie Shaw, Tommy Dorsey and Benny Goodman, our own home-grown music suddenly lost its shine – and how! Wh
o wanted to polka when they could jitterbug? ‘Show us what you got, Dill.’
I sorted through the modest pile carefully. It wouldn’t do to break any. If Chester was going to do a runner, and his stubborn silence on all matters to do with the dance suggested he might be working up to it, they might be among the few things she’d have to remember him by.
‘Any more news on the Chester front?’ I asked as casually as I could.
Dilly shook her head, eyes filling up with tears. ‘I haven’t even heard from him in over a week. I think he must be ashamed to be seen with me among his mates or something,’ she said sadly.
‘If that’s the case, then it’s good riddance to bad rubbish, dolly,’ Ronnie said firmly. ‘You’re certainly not the kind of girl to be ashamed of. You’re good looking, well turned out and any bloke should be proud to have you on his arm – unless of course he prefers other blokes, in which case the cove should never have dallied with you in the first place. Mind you, he wouldn’t be the first to use a pretty young girl as a camouflage … But still, it’s never right. Feelings get hurt.’
Not for the first time, nor the last, I thought what a poppet Ronnie was. Being a sea queen wasn’t easy, but the hardships never seemed to sour him, and I sincerely hoped that one day he’d meet the man of his dreams and settle down. He deserved to be happy. But then, so did we all.
We pored over Chester’s records. Some were real treasures. Records, gramophones and gramophone needles weren’t so thick on the ground, money being tight and the bombs being merciless, that we could afford to be careless with the few records that came our way. I looked at the familiar red, white and blue labels: Count Basie, Louis Armstrong, Jack Teagarden and the V-Disc All Stars. What wonderful, exotic names they all had. What’s more, I knew for a fact that Count Basie, Nat King Cole and Duke Ellington weren’t landed gentry at all. In fact, they didn’t have a family seat between ’em, on account of being Americans. Dilly explained to me that a lot of American GI Joes thought these blokes were the aristocrats of the music world and when I’d heard them, I really couldn’t argue with that. They were wonderful.
Chester’s records were really something, too. He played the trumpet in his own band, according to Dilly. She said he was pretty good, but then, she’d have been impressed if he’d been cleaning his fingernails. Everything he did or said was impressive, or so she thought. I reserved judgement against the day I finally heard him, if it ever came.
I put Hot Lips Page and His Hot Seven on the gramophone and we listened to Mr Page’s strange but wonderful singing and velvet trumpet in ‘Uncle Sam’s Blues’. It was impossible to get excited about poor old George Formby’s ukulele when you’d heard that trumpet! The saxophones, pianos and the fabulous rhythms of American bands completely bowled me and all my mates over. Even Vera Lynn’s bluebirds paled to boring when you got earfuls of voices like Lena Horne, Ella Fitzgerald and that girl with a boy’s name, Billie Holiday. It was a whole new world of sound and it brightened up grey old England no end.
The lazy melody of ‘Uncle Sam’s Blues’ dragged me round in a slow, dreamy dance, and Dilly and Ronnie just had to join in. Then I noticed the time. If we didn’t get a move on, we’d never get our hair done. Terry and Lenny Hobbs were dropping in to pick us up for a swift drink at the King’s Head before closing time, and as Dilly worked all day Saturday, and I had to take Tony to Soho, if we didn’t do our hair that evening, before the chaps turned up, we’d never get it ready for Saturday night.
Ronnie was all business. ‘Right,’ he said to me, ‘let’s get that riah of yours set toot sweet, ducky, while Dilly washes hers. Once I’ve crimped you both, I’ll wash my own.’
The next couple of hours flew by in a haze of setting lotion, gossip and music. Well, Ronnie and I gossiped, while poor old Dilly grew ever more nervy and anxious. ‘What if Chester brings another girl?’ she asked for around the nine-thousand-and-twenty-third time as Ronnie pinned her curlers into place.
‘You’ll hold your head up, dolly, and dance the night away with the three handsome devils in your party. That’s what you’ll do,’ Ronnie told her bracingly.
‘I’m not sure I’ll manage,’ Dilly quavered.
‘You’ll manage, even if we have to hold you up in turns. Now, that’s your riah shushed, let’s get cracking on your make-up. Nothing like a practice run with a bit of slap, to see what suits. I’m all for putting a brave face on things, ducky. You often find you live up to it.’
By the time Ronnie’d finished with us we looked like film stars, faces and hair immaculate. The man was a genius! Our fingernails had been shaped too, and would be polished a vibrant red on the night. We couldn’t risk doing it too soon then chipping it, because bottles of nail varnish did not grow on trees.
It was only when you saw some colour that you noticed how little there was in our everyday lives. We were even going to wear proper stockings on the night, and wouldn’t have to resort to a covering of watered-down gravy powder and the stub of eyebrow pencil to draw in the seams. The trouble with gravy powder was that it was difficult to get a uniform tan colour. It tended to get blotchy unless applied by an expert with a steady hand and a precious lump of cotton wool. Ditto the seams; they could wobble disastrously if you tried to do ’em yourself, or had a shaky helper.
Dilly had given in to pressure and extreme shyness and decided against the revealing black dress that Molly Squires had offered on loan especially for the occasion. Instead she had finally chosen to wear a plain midnight blue, short-sleeved but higher-necked number she’d had for years. It had a neat, scooped, scalloped neckline, a self-coloured belt and a full skirt. Ronnie had, as promised, fished out a pearl choker and some long, pearl drop earrings and had brought along a pair of his mum’s long, white evening gloves to perk it up a bit. Like mine, Dilly’s blond tresses had been piled up high in large curls. She looked lovely.
I didn’t look bad either, even if I say so myself. I had my dark hair piled up in a mass of curls on top and held up by combs and craftily hidden hair grips. Thanks to Zinnia’s hair rinse, it glowed and smelt of rosemary. Vi’s earrings and necklace were shown up a treat when my hair was out of the way, and my dress, although simple in style, looked crisp and fresh thanks to its obvious newness. Several petticoats made the skirt full and my cinched-in waist looked tiny. In the end, I’d cut the bodice like a sun dress. Mum’s fur cape would see me all right if the night turned chilly.
I have to say, Ronnie was a handsome man when he scrubbed up. His shirt was blindingly white, his dark blue suit was immaculately pressed and his blue and red striped tie had a fat, neat Windsor knot. His black brogues glistened, his brown hair shone and the cowlick at the front made him look positively boyish. He was tall and well-built and it was hard at that precise moment to remember that he was a self-styled sea queen and proud of it. As he said, if he hadn’t been running the risk of arrest or a severe beating, or probably both, he’d have indulged in a little slap himself. ‘But I believe the butch look is the order of the day for this engagement, dollies. We don’t want bloodshed. Claret might get on those lovely frocks, and we can’t have that, can we, girls?’
We agreed that we certainly couldn’t.
There was a knock on the street door: Terry and Lenny had arrived. Dilly and I changed back into our usual clothes as quickly as we could, while Ronnie entertained our guests. We’d had our dress rehearsal and were satisfied we would look our absolute best on the night. What’s more, we’d had a nice evening giggling, playing with our hair, faces and clothes, just like when we were kids. It had made us forget our troubles almost completely, which was a boon and a blessing for all concerned. Even Dilly managed to have a good time, and that was saying something.
30
The Yanks had really pushed the boat out for their last dance and several units had clubbed together to hire the local town hall. It was at some place almost in the sticks, a fair way out of town on the District Line as I recall, but to be honest, I was too excited to take
much notice. I didn’t get out much beyond East London as a rule.
We’d all met at my place, Dilly, Ronnie, Lenny, Vi, Terry and me. The only people missing were Molly Squires, Beryl from work, who had decided to join us at the last minute, and Mavis. We picked up Molly and Beryl at the Star and Garter; Mavis had told Vi to carry on without her, she’d catch up later. We had a convivial drink and then set out for the dance. It didn’t do to arrive too early, before the thing had got going. We were all chattering like a flock of starlings as we made the long trip on the tube. All except poor Dilly, of course, who was very quiet.
‘Why are you so worried that Chester’ll come to the dance and bring another girl?’ I asked. ‘Has he said anything?’
Dilly shook her head. ‘No,’ she admitted. ‘He never said a word about it, even though I hinted like mad.’
‘So, why do you think he’ll turn up? It doesn’t make sense if he showed no interest at all.’ To tell the truth, I was getting a bit irritated with her.
‘I dunno; it’s more what he didn’t say and the way he didn’t say it,’ Dilly tried to explain.
‘What do you mean, for goodness sake? You’re not making a lot of sense, Dilly dear.’
‘I see what she means,’ Ronnie chipped in. ‘Silences can be very informative. Just ask the Gestapo.’
We laughed nervously. The Gestapo had been operating far too recently to be seen as anything but terrifying, even by those of us who had never had anything to do with them and were never likely to now.
‘Well …’ Dilly hesitated. ‘It’s the way he ignored my hints, and just changed the subject or talked over me about something completely different. He kept doing that. When someone talks over awkward questions, you know they’re being dodgy. Then, when I kept on, I stopped hearing from him altogether.’ I thought Dilly was going to cry, which would have been terrible, on account of the lashings of mascara Ronnie had applied before we left my place. She’d have black streaks down to her knees. ‘And if he wanted to give me the brush-off, what better way to do it than to bring another girl to the dance?’ She had a point, but I didn’t want to come out and say so.