by Nancy Revell
‘Just stand still,’ Kate said. She was on her knees, pinning the hem of Charlotte’s new skirt.
Charlotte didn’t seem able to stay still for more than thirty seconds.
‘There! All done.’ Kate got to her feet and scrutinised the skirt.
‘It looks lovely.’ Charlotte twirled in front of the full-length mirror.
‘No attempts at a pirouette, please,’ said Kate, walking over to the curtain that divided the shop from the back snug. ‘And don’t fling the skirt about. Hand it to me as soon as you’ve taken it off.’
Charlotte tiptoed into the make-do-and-mend changing room as though pretending to wear high heels.
‘Do you think you could do the hem while I wait?’ Charlotte said from behind the curtain. Her hand appeared, holding the skirt.
‘It depends how long I have the pleasure of your company, Charlie.’ Kate smiled to herself. She loved Charlotte to pieces, but she wouldn’t want to swap places with Rosie. She couldn’t be getting a moment’s peace.
‘Rosie said she’d be an hour – at the most – with her new friend next door, but that you just had to come and get her if you’d had enough of me before then.’
Kate had to laugh.
‘Come on then, I should be able to get this hem done in that time.’
A few minutes later Kate was sitting in front of her beloved Singer, carefully laying out Charlotte’s new blue skirt. She’d love to be able to tell Charlotte that it had once been Helen’s dress, but, of course, she couldn’t. Kate afforded all her clients complete privacy.
‘So,’ Charlotte said, walking slowly around the boutique, inspecting whatever item of clothing, fabric or haberdashery fell into her vision. ‘You know when there’s an air raid?’
‘Mmm,’ Kate said, concentrating on threading the machine.
‘Do you all go down to the basement?’
‘No, Charlotte,’ Kate laughed, ‘we all go out and have a party in the backyard … Of course we go into the basement. Why are you asking?’
Charlotte ignored the question.
‘And do you all go to bed straight afterwards?’
Kate chuckled.
‘Lily’s not a great believer in beauty sleep – she claims not to need it.’
‘So,’ Charlotte mused, ‘if there’s an air raid, she’d probably stay up afterwards.’
Kate pulled the thread through the needle.
‘What’s that expression you love so much – “Is the pope a Catholic?”’
Charlotte smiled and picked out a blue ribbon from a basket on the side, waving it around in the air.
‘And does Lily have many visitors during the day?’
Kate stopped what she was doing and looked at Charlotte.
‘Not really.’
‘I didn’t think so,’ Charlotte said, putting the ribbon back and touching a roll of fabric that was leaning against the wall near the front door.
‘Then why do you ask?’ Kate tried to keep her voice casual as she started sewing the hem.
‘Oh, no reason.’
A pause.
‘It was just a while back, when Marjorie was visiting, we were going to call in on Lily on the way to the yard, but we didn’t.’
Kate remembered the day. Rosie had been furious about it. She’d managed to keep a lid on it so as not to make Charlotte suspicious, but as soon as she’d been free to let rip, she hadn’t held back.
‘And?’ Kate asked, manoeuvring the skirt around carefully, ensuring the hem was perfectly straight.
‘And we saw some bloke come out the front door. He looked a little worse for wear. As if he’d just woken up, but it was nearly midday.’
‘You never know with Lily,’ Kate said, keeping her eyes on the fabric. ‘She might have been helping someone out for the night. Someone down on their luck. For all her brash exterior, she can be a right softie at heart.’ She stopped and looked up at Charlotte. ‘Lily took me in when no one would even have spoken to me, never mind fed me or given me a bed. She’s always taking in waifs and strays.’
Kate knew Charlotte felt comfortable with her. Connected. Perhaps because they came from the same village and were orphaned at around the same age. Thankfully, Charlotte had not found herself being looked after by the likes of Sister Bernadette and some of the other nuns who had made Kate’s life so hellish that she had sought solace on the streets rather than within the four walls of Nazareth House.
‘Did you know my uncle Raymond?’ Charlotte suddenly asked.
‘No.’ Kate’s reply was curt. ‘He died before I met up with your sister again.’
‘What? He’s dead? Rosie didn’t say.’
Kate cursed silently.
‘Sorry to disturb you, Rosie.’ Kate snuck round the door and into Rosie’s office.
‘Come in, Kate,’ Rosie said, looking up from her ledger. ‘I could do with a break. What’s up? You look worried.’
Kate walked over to the chair and sat down. Clasping her hands together as though in prayer, she told Rosie about her conversation with Charlotte earlier that day.
‘Oh dear,’ Rosie sighed. ‘I think I’ve been kidding myself that Charlotte would lose herself with new friends at her new school. Lose interest in me and Lily and our lives. But she hasn’t. She just wants to be with me all the time. Or Lily. Or you.’
‘I think she’s trying to make up for lost time,’ Kate mused.
Rosie furrowed her brow in a questioning look.
‘For all those years she was on her own, with no family, no one to love and no one to love her back. Now she’s got the sister she adores, an eccentric mother figure who is nothing like her own mam, so she doesn’t have to feel guilty … And then there’s me, her connection to her old, happier life. I probably fall into the role of the middle child. Not quite an older sister – more of an equal.’
Rosie felt like pouring herself a cognac but didn’t. She never liked to drink in front of Kate when it was just the two of them.
‘I think you’re right.’ She sighed and sat back in her chair. ‘But can you imagine if she finds out the truth?’
Rosie stood up and walked over to the mantelpiece.
‘Her whole world will be destroyed.’
‘You really think so?’ Kate turned to look at Rosie.
‘I do,’ Rosie said. ‘She’s so innocent. I’ve kept her so sheltered. She has no idea about places like this.’ Rosie looked around. ‘Can you imagine her shock if she found out what really goes on at Lily’s? And worse still, that I didn’t always just do the books here?’
‘But,’ Kate said, ‘like all the women here, you did what you did for a reason. You did what you did to keep her safe. To keep her at Runcorn and away from certain people.’ Kate never liked to say Raymond’s name.
‘But that’s the point.’ Rosie walked over to the chaise longue and sat down. ‘If she finds out why – that she was the reason I did what I did – it would destroy her. I know Charlotte, and even though she tries to make out she’s very hardy, she’s far from it.’ Rosie exhaled. ‘Honestly, I don’t know if she would ever be the same.’
Kate looked at her friend. The friend who had saved her life. She loved her so much. Her heart broke for her, for she knew that there was only one way this was going to end.
‘Rosie, you’ve managed to keep Charlotte safe her whole life. You’ve protected her like a lion does her cubs. And here you are now, still trying to protect her. But I think you have to realise that Charlotte isn’t a cub any more. She needs to be able to survive on her own.’
Kate looked at Rosie.
‘I think it’s time you stopped protecting her.’
Chapter Forty-Three
‘Why didn’t you tell me that our uncle had died?’ Charlotte was sitting at the kitchen table while Rosie made the hot chocolate. ‘Kate told me this afternoon.’
‘I know she did.’ Rosie turned around, her back to the stove. ‘She told me she felt bad about it. She presumed I’d already told you.’
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br /> ‘So why didn’t you tell me? I remember asking you about him after Arthur’s funeral.’ Charlotte was genuinely perplexed.
‘Well, that was exactly why I didn’t tell you then,’ Rosie said. ‘Because the day was sad enough already without me adding to it by telling you about someone else who had died.’
‘Yes, but I wouldn’t have been that sad,’ Charlotte argued. ‘I mean, I didn’t even know him, did I?’
Rosie turned back to the stove. She took the pan off the hob and poured the milk into a mug.
‘So, what happened to him? What did he die of?’ Charlotte asked.
‘He fell into the river and drowned after having one too many,’ Rosie said.
‘Really? Gosh, that’s quite a dramatic way to go, isn’t it?’ Charlotte was intrigued.
‘It is,’ Rosie said, handing her the hot chocolate.
‘So, was there a funeral or anything?’ Charlotte asked, wanting to know more.
‘The Borough buried him,’ Rosie said; she was working hard to keep her voice steady.
‘What? So, he had a pauper’s funeral?’
Rosie nodded.
‘Poor Uncle Raymond,’ Charlotte said, taking a sip of her drink.
Rosie banged the pan into the sink and turned on the cold water full blast. ‘Oh, I think he was old. He’d had his life.’
‘Still,’ Charlotte said, fascinated by such a bizarre death, ‘it’s a pretty grisly way to go, isn’t it? Drowning in the middle of the night. In the Wear.’
Rosie forced herself not to say anything.
‘Funny that Mam never mentioned him to us, isn’t it? That we only got to know we had an uncle when he turned up for the funeral?’
‘I don’t think Mam and him got on,’ Rosie said. She’d expected a grilling, but still, it was excruciating having to stop herself from telling Charlotte that their sick and perverted uncle did not deserve one iota of her kind thoughts or sympathy.
‘Actually,’ Rosie said, determined to change the subject, ‘some good did come of it.’
Charlotte looked at her sister, surprised.
‘How’s that?’ she asked.
‘Well, it was Peter who came to tell me, as next of kin, that he’d died. Peter was the detective sergeant in charge of the case.’
‘The officer in charge of the case?’ Charlotte’s eyes widened. ‘Why was there a case?’
‘Well, there’s always a case if someone dies unnaturally,’ Rosie explained.
‘So, they didn’t think anyone had pushed him in the river?’ Charlotte’s eyes widened even more. ‘They didn’t think he’d been murdered?’
‘Honestly, Charlie.’ Rosie forced out fake laughter. ‘You have such a vivid imagination. Of course Peter didn’t think anyone had killed him. It was just a process they have to go through. Legally.’
Charlotte sipped her hot chocolate, her mind churning over what she’d heard from Rosie this evening – and earlier on from Kate.
She suddenly perked up. ‘It’s a bit morbid though.’
‘What is?’ Rosie asked.
‘Meeting your future husband when he comes to inform you someone’s died.’
Rosie laughed.
This time it was genuine.
Charlotte looked at her sister and thought she had a strange sense of humour.
Half an hour later, after finishing off her homework and saying goodnight, Charlotte was up in her bedroom, looking through her wardrobe. She pulled out the hanger with her new skirt and looked at it. She couldn’t wait to wear it next time she went out. Lily had promised to take her into town and give her a tour of the best places to shop.
She put it back on the rail and pushed some of her boring old clothes aside so she could look at her red dress. Her favourite dress. Now her only dress, after she’d convinced Rosie she’d grown out of all her old ones and foisted them off on Kate.
As she got ready for bed she kept thinking about her sister. Why did she keep feeling that Rosie was lying to her? Or at least keeping things from her. Like about their uncle Raymond. Why hadn’t Rosie told her he’d died? And in such unusual circumstances.
It seemed odd she’d held back from telling her at Arthur’s funeral. Did she really think she’d get upset about someone she didn’t even know? Someone she’d met just the once? Someone she could barely recall.
Then there were the white lies about Lily. Rosie had told her that Lily went to bed early, yet it was clear from Kate’s reaction that this was most definitely not the case. And knowing that Lily was a night owl, why had Rosie refused to seek sanctuary there that night of the air raid? It would have been much safer than running all the way back home.
Even the other night, when they’d gone to check Lily and everyone else was all right after the really bad air raid, Rosie wouldn’t pop in for a quick cuppa. It was as though she was trying to hide something from her – something to do with Lily, or the house where Lily lived.
Jumping into her bed, Charlotte reached under the mattress and pulled out her diary. She turned to the back, where there was a page full of arithmetic. Lots of additions and subtractions. The final figure showed a big minus sign with an equally large number next to it. Thanks to Marjorie, or rather Marjorie’s parents’ openness about their personal finances and the cost of their daughter’s private education, Charlotte had been able to work out roughly how much it cost Rosie to send her to the Sunderland Church High School. This included extras such as a new uniform, overalls and gym kit.
So much didn’t add up.
There was her wage at the yard (she had seen Rosie’s wage packet so knew exactly how much she got paid with and without overtime), plus the money she reckoned she got paid for doing Lily’s books. (She had asked her teacher at school one day about jobs and what kinds of wages one could expect to get paid for certain jobs. Her teacher had commented on how impressed she was that Charlotte was thinking so sensibly about her future. She had even been inspired to dedicate a whole lesson to the subject.) The total of both jobs still fell short of the amount needed to pay for her schooling. Even if she had underestimated Rosie’s earnings, it was still not enough to pay for her education and keep them both fed and watered.
The only way her sister could just about scrape by was if she was making money on the flat she owned. But it sounded as though that was more of an investment and any money she got for rent went straight to George to pay off the money he had loaned her.
Charlotte sat back and chewed the end of her pen.
She looked at her open wardrobe.
At her lovely red dress.
The red of the material was the same red she had seen at Lily’s that day.
She had only managed to glimpse the room for a few seconds, but what she’d seen was unforgettable. Amazing. Red embossed wallpaper, a red and gold Persian rug, a huge gilt-framed mirror, and a massive brass four-poster bed piled high with plush red cushions. Charlotte had had to force herself not to run and jump on it.
The more she thought about that red room, the more she wondered whose bedroom it was. She knew Kate had the top attic room, which Lily often lamented was more a ‘seamstress’s sweatshop’ than a bedroom, and that Lily’s ‘boudoir’ was on the second floor – as were Vivian’s and Maisie’s.
So, whose bedroom was it?
Chapter Forty-Four
1940
At around the same time as the first bombs were dropped on British soil, Rosie was given the task of training up a mishmash group of women welders – half a dozen women, aged eighteen to forty, whose backgrounds ranged from selling china in the town’s most high-class and exclusive department store to serving cakes at a seaside café. There had been opposition to the town’s womenfolk working in the yards and doing such traditionally male jobs, but in the end concerns about gender had had to be pushed aside. Too many men had marched off to war, leaving too few to build the ships that were desperately needed to win it.
It was around this time that someone else made an appearance in Rosi
e’s life. Someone she had hoped and prayed she would never have to set eyes on again.
Raymond Gallagher had just spent the last few years incarcerated in HMP Durham. His sentence, handed down to him after he’d been found guilty of raping several women in the town, had been cut short after he’d been given a ‘ticket of leave’ due to the outbreak of war.
Strangely enough, it had been Bel who had, unwittingly, been the first to make Raymond’s acquaintance when she was working as a clippie on the number 66 Durham-to-Sunderland service. He’d made her skin crawl with his leering manner and sinister ram’s-head walking stick.
Arriving back in his old hunting ground, Raymond had gone straight to Thompson’s. He was unsure whether he would recognise his niece; after all, she had only been fifteen when he had seen her last. He needn’t have worried, though, for the woman he spotted hurrying out of the gates at the end of the shift – haversack and gas mask slung over her shoulder, hair wrapped up in a patterned headscarf – was the spit of her mother, his sister Eloise.
Hidden from view, he’d followed Rosie back to her bedsit in Grange Terrace, and then a little later to the leafier suburb of Ashbrooke.
He’d watched her enter the house in West Lawn through the back door and his heart had lifted when he’d spotted the little red light shining through the partially drawn curtains.
On seeing Raymond standing in the drawing room at Lily’s, Rosie had thought she was back in one of her nightmares. The ones that featured his face, his rancid smell, the wet of his spittle as he spat threats into her ear.
Thank God Charlie was miles away from this place. Safe in her all-girls school.
‘Monsieur Gallagher, you didn’t tell me you knew Rosie personally? Perhaps we should all retire to the kitchen so I can hear more about your former acquaintance.’
Rosie heard Lily’s words, saw her look across at George, and felt her hand guiding her out of the reception room, where the other girls and clients were socialising.
Staring at him – unable to speak, her legs like jelly – she realised her instinct had been right. She had tried to run and hide from this man for years, but he had found her, as deep down she’d always known he would.