Secrets in Store
‘That doesn’t mean they’re going to give anyone else the chop – far from it!’
Jim shook his head.
‘Marlow’s can’t afford to carry extra members of staff, whoever they are. Margins are tight, profits are down. And why’s Simmonds been appointed? To be a new broom, right? Well, they sweep in corners. And there’s no dustier corners than in Furniture and Household. You know we’ve got hardly anything to sell!’
‘Who has? That applies to every department. And every shop in Hinton!’
‘Maybe,’ said Jim, ‘but I’ve seen the way Simmonds has been looking at me lately. He’s watching me all the time.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous! He looks at everyone, it’s his job!’
‘Hm. With that same shark-eyed stare?’
‘Shark? You’ve seen too many newsreels about the Nazis, you really have!’
But Jim wouldn’t be told.
‘He’s got to get rid of someone from our department,’ he reasoned. ‘There’s a limit to how long Marlow’s can still employ all five of us. I had a woman in this morning asking when we’d have lead crystal dressing table sets again. I felt like telling her a crystal ball would be more use.’
‘Fine. Get one. And what future do you see for yourself if not here? Another job? Where? And doing what exactly?’
‘Well, good question.’ Jim pushed his plate away, unfinished – unheard of. ‘I’m considering lots of options, actually.’
‘Are you?’ There was something in his tone, and Lily pushed her plate away too. It was one thing to dismiss his suspicions about Mr Simmonds, but this sounded serious.
Jim looked at his watch.
‘I should go. I’m due back soon.’
‘Jim!’ protested Lily. ‘You can’t leave it like that! Aren’t you going to tell me what these options are?’
‘Not till I’ve narrowed them down a bit.’
Lily made a conscious effort to stay calm. ‘Let me narrow them down for you. You stay here and get promotion after promotion till you take over from Mr Marlow.’
‘Hang on!’ Jim looked into the distance and pretended to shade his eyes against an imaginary sun. ‘What’s that I see? Oh yes. A flying pig.’
‘Well, why not?’ protested Lily. ‘His son’s not interested, and he’s got to hand it on to someone.’
‘Well, that’s a nice little fantasy.’ Jim tipped back on his chair. ‘You carry on with it. Maybe in your world, Lily, we’re not even at war – men, women, children dying every day while I’m telling our customers why we haven’t got any tray cloths.’
Like a round of mortar fire his words hit home. Suddenly, with horrible clarity, she knew. Idiot that she was! Why hadn’t she realised Jim wasn’t the sort to take ‘no’ for an answer?
‘You’re going to re-apply, aren’t you, to the Army? Tell them you want a desk job.’
‘Well, there’s enough of them,’ Jim said reasonably. ‘Someone’s got to keep things going behind the scenes.’
‘Pen-pushing?’
‘It’s still a lot more useful than what I’m doing here. And they can’t say I’m not suitable for that!’
Lily swallowed hard.
‘But Jim … it could be … you could be sent anywhere!’
‘That’s rather the point with work of national importance,’ said Jim, stressing the ‘national’. ‘Or there’s plenty of other kinds of war work. Factories, shipyards, the mines—’
This was getting worse.
‘The mines?’
‘They’ve lost a lot of men to the Forces. They’re going to have to replace them somehow, and it’s one job women can’t do.’
The vision of a blackened Jim humping coal was even worse than one of him jabbing someone with a bayonet.
‘You, a miner? You can’t be serious.’
Jim looked at her straight, sincere.
‘Lily, please. Put yourself in my shoes. In all conscience, how can I stay here selling tray cloths, day in day out – if we had any to sell? How do you think that makes me feel?’
‘Well, all right …’ It made him deeply unhappy, she could see. ‘But—’
‘If you don’t see me as a miner or a steelworker – and I’ll give you that, you could be right, then at the very least I could jack this in and go home. There’s plenty of work on the land.’
Of course! Jim had grown up in the country – his mother had moved away from Hinton and met his father there. She would be over the moon if he made that choice. And farming was a reserved occupation.
Jim suddenly tutted and looked at his watch again.
‘All this talking – you’ve made me late!’
He stood up and pushed his bowl of plums and custard towards her.
‘You can have this. I’m not hungry anyway.’
Lily looked up at him, speechless.
‘See you,’ he said casually.
He smiled briefly and walked away.
Lily looked down at the bowl in front of her. She found she wasn’t hungry either. In fact, she felt rather sick.
Surely he – she – hadn’t had a reprieve from the Army just for him to go off somewhere else?
Chapter 7
Dinner break over, plums untasted, Lily went back to her department with a heart that felt as if it was strapped into the Big Dipper at Blackpool Pleasure Beach – as if it hadn’t had enough ups and downs lately.
Instinctively she glanced across to Furniture. Jim was nowhere to be seen, but Gladys, busy straightening the rails, mouthed ‘Delivery’, which gave Lily some relief. At least that explained his absence. He wasn’t up on the management floor handing in his notice. Yet. Even so, Lily found it difficult – impossible, actually – to share Miss Temple’s outrage over the fact that Gentlemen’s Outfitting had received a quantity of caps when Miss Frobisher had had children’s pixie hoods on order since before Christmas.
‘It’s getting ridiculous!’ Miss Temple complained, but her indignation only emphasised Jim’s point. If they couldn’t get the goods to sell anyway, Marlow’s would be happy to let staff go. Why shouldn’t Jim take the decision for them?
The afternoon dragged. It more than dragged, it positively limped towards five thirty and going-home time.
At last the final customer had left, the department was tidy, and Lily could make her escape. Jim had returned to his department mid-afternoon, and her plan was to intercept him before he got to the back stairs and gave her the slip. She’d spent the hours since dinner, when she was pretending to listen to Miss Temple, formulating her plan. She might not have any hope of persuading Jim out of this notion of leaving, but she could at least urge him not to do anything hasty. It was her only hope.
But it was not her day. Before she was halfway across the sales floor, she saw Mr Simmonds approaching. Like an avenging angel he bore down on Jim, his famous clipboard turned, in Lily’s mind, into a flaming sword. She couldn’t tell from that distance whether he had a particularly shark-like look in his eye – which would have sat rather oddly on an avenging angel, she realised.
But whether he had or not, could Lily trust Jim not to take the chance to blurt out that he was thinking of resigning? Surely Mr Simmonds, ex-Army as he was, would heartily endorse it. The mood Jim was in, he’d probably convinced himself that Simmonds thought he was ducking his duty anyway.
Whatever, it was too late. Mr Simmonds steered Jim through the double doors to the stairs – and Lily’s chance was gone.
Miserably she trudged home. Even the first catkins on the alder trees in the park couldn’t cheer her, nor the blackbird chirping from a chimney pot as she turned into their street.
Inside the house, she found her mother pinning on her hat in readiness for another evening of rolling bandages. Wordlessly, but smiling, Dora nodded towards a postcard on the mantelpiece.
Standard Forces’ issue – and Sid’s writing!
Lily snatched it up.
Greetings, all! it began – a typically cheery Sid opener.
Sorry I couldn’t make it back when my darling brother was home, but I’ve finally managed to get some leave! It’ll be midweek, unfortunately, only 24 hours, and not quite sure when (here something was crossed out in blue pencil – more likely an expletive than a revelation about his travel plans) but before the end of the month for sure. Will write again as soon as I know. Toodle-pip! Sid.
Lily turned her eyes to the heavens and gave a sigh. Thank goodness! Maybe it was a sign. Maybe all Mr Simmonds had wanted to talk to Jim about had been that afternoon’s delivery. Maybe there was still time for her to urge Jim to take his time, and not to rush into anything. Then when Sid came back on leave she could get him on side. And if anyone could talk some sense into Jim, or at the very least jolly him out of the state he was in, it was Sid – lovely, funny, but still sensible Sid.
‘There’s only pilchards for tea,’ Dora said, hat now firmly anchored. ‘But there’s plums and custard for afters. I hope you didn’t have them for your dinner.’
Lily turned and gave her mum the first genuine smile of the afternoon.
‘No,’ she replied. ‘I didn’t.’
Dora had hardly been gone five minutes – Lily hadn’t even changed out of her work clothes – when she heard what were unmistakeably Jim’s footsteps coming down the entry. She certainly hadn’t expected him back this soon – his conflab with Mr Simmonds hadn’t taken long. Was that a good thing or a bad? Breath bated, she waited for the gate, the latch, the back door, bracing herself for what she might be about to hear.
She thought afterwards that she should have braced herself a bit more firmly, because the door was flung back on its hinges, and suddenly Jim was there, shouting ‘Lily!’ and almost cannoning into her.
Lily leapt back.
‘What is it?’
Jim was grinning from ear to ear.
‘Those shark eyes of Mr Simmonds? Turns out they see more than you or I could ever suspect! But I think you’ll like it!’
Pilchards had never been an especial favourite of Lily’s, but that night they could have been – what was it that posh people ate? – oysters? lobster? – well, whatever it was, they didn’t taste like pilchards usually did. Though that might have been thanks to the bottle of ginger beer that Jim had nipped to the outdoor to get.
‘Something to celebrate, eh?’ he said as they chinked glasses.
‘Definitely,’ Lily replied.
The crisis was over. Jim wouldn’t be leaving after all.
‘I hate to say “I told you so”, Jim,’ chortled Lily.
‘But you’re going to anyway. As if you haven’t already, about a million times.’
‘Well, it’s true—’
Jim sat back and folded his arms.
‘D’you know something? Next time I see a pub called “The Nag’s Head”, I’m going to pinch the sign and hang it outside your bedroom door!’
‘Now, now, children!’ Sid reprimanded them. ‘Behave, or you won’t get any pudding!’
It was the following week and Sid was back on his promised twenty-four-hour pass. As it was Wednesday and half-day closing, he’d arranged to meet Lily and Jim straight from work and treat them to lunch.
The reunion had been as ecstatic as Lily could have wished for. Jim had hung back, smiling, as Sid, grinning from ear to ear, had whirled her in the air so fast she’d almost lost a shoe, and the other Marlow’s staff setting off for their half-days had shaken their heads and smiled too.
On the way to the British Restaurant in the Mission Hall, Lily had rattled away non-stop.
‘No pudding’ was an empty threat, though, because they already had their puddings on their trays, all-in for a very reasonable 9d, so Lily graciously, with a mock bow, conceded. To be fair, it was Jim’s story.
‘So,’ Sid went on over the clatter at the trestle tables around them, ‘this Simmonds character, Jim, that you thought was going to give you the boot, practically begged you to stay?’
‘I wouldn’t put it quite like that—’
‘Of course he did!’ Jim’s story or not, Lily jumped in. ‘Never mind shark-eyes, Jim’s Mr Simmonds’s blue-eyed boy!’
(Funny, Lily thought, that after being turned down by the Army on account of his eyesight, eyes were featuring so much in Jim’s future career.)
Sid silenced her with a look.
‘And he and Mr Marlow just wanted some new ideas? What are you thinking of, then, Jimbo?’ Sid was off again, messing with people’s names. ‘Live mannequins in the windows? Roof garden with a Palm Court orchestra? How about slashing prices – I’d go for that!’
Lily was dying to supply the details – she was that proud of Jim – but managed with great restraint to contain herself. In preparation for her promotion, Miss Frobisher had given her the sales staff manual. It was very explicit on politeness, tact, and quiet dignity, none of which came naturally to Lily. Here was a chance to practise, and to let Jim have the limelight.
‘Honestly, Sid,’ Jim said now, ‘they’re nothing very special.’
Typical, thought Lily, annoyingly modest! He had tact and quiet dignity off to a ‘T’ …
‘Jim, that’s not true! Tell him!’
‘Oh come on, the first thing is just obvious.’
‘So obvious that no one else had thought of it!’
‘Lily, who’s telling this tale?’ asked Sid patiently.
Lily sat back. Keeping to the sales staff dictums was going to be a serious challenge, she could see.
Jim resumed. ‘Cedric Marlow’s done some amazing things. From one tiny draper’s shop, he’s made Marlow’s what it is today. When the war started, and the bombings, he was right on the button – air-raid shelter in the basement, fire-watching and plane spotters on the roof, bells and whistles – literally – to warn staff and customers about air raids almost before the sirens had started.’
‘He made space for a Red Cross stall,’ put in Lily. She just couldn’t help herself. ‘An interpreter’s desk, too, when the refugees started arriving from France and Belgium.’
‘That’s right,’ said Jim. ‘But he’s not daft. He’s nearer seventy than sixty now and he must realise he’s not quite up to the mark. So he’s asked me and Peter Simmonds to—’
‘Get that, Sid! Peter, if you please! And after all Jim said about him!’
Jim ignored her and carried on. ‘—to come up with suggestions. On three fronts. First, how can the store do more for the war effort, and keep the staff happy at the same time. And then he wants some ideas to bring in more custom.’
‘So this “obvious” thing is what? Don’t tell me – you’re going to suggest a Suggestions Box!’
They’d finished their main courses now and Sid reached for a cigarette: he’d swapped to Player’s Navy Cut from his pre-war brand the minute he’d joined up. He was very proud of being in the Senior Service – and never let Reg, still on Woodbines, forget it.
‘No. A Fowl Club,’ said Jim.
Sid paused with his cigarette halfway to his lips.
‘Hang on. Pig Clubs, yes, I’ve heard of them—’
‘Not very practical,’ said Jim, ‘on the roof of the store.’
‘You’re going to keep chickens on the roof of Marlow’s?’
‘It’s wasted space apart from the fire-watchers’ hut. And it’s only what we’re doing already at Lily’s but on a bigger scale,’ reasoned Jim. ‘Any of the staff that are interested will give up their egg coupons and get coupons for grain instead.’
‘Which will feed the hens, with some of the canteen waste from the store, instead of it all going in the pig bin,’ added Lily.
‘The store carpenters can knock us up some housing. And I’ll get the chickens a few at a time.’
‘Jim knows all the farmers in his village,’ supplied Lily helpfully. ‘He’s got all the contacts, and club members will get far more eggs this way than on ration.’
‘Incredible!’
Lily beamed so proudly on Jim he might have been her first-born who’d won a Bonny Baby Contest.
‘And? Tell him the rest, Jim!’
‘All right, I’m getting there.’ Jim had been hoping to get stuck into his jam sponge, but he could see Lily wasn’t going to let up. ‘Simmonds wasn’t convinced the staff were doing enough for Civil Defence. So he’s got the ARP in, and the Voluntary Fire Service and the Home Guard. To give talks and drum up some recruits. In fact, he wants to make it compulsory for anyone who’s not medically unfit.’
‘Huh, you can take the bloke out of the Army …’ mused Sid.
‘And for the girls—’
‘Women,’ corrected Lily.
‘Sorry. For women, we’re going to start sewing and knitting classes in the Haberdashery department. For staff and customers. Beginner, intermediate and advanced.’
‘And let me guess! They can buy everything they need at Marlow’s!’
‘Never entered our heads,’ said Jim innocently.
‘Well, well. I can’t wait to see you join those, Lil!’
Lily rolled her eyes. She’d told Sid in letters about her cack-handed attempts to knit something for Beryl’s baby, and how the wool had got so grubby and stringy with having to unravel it where she’d gone wrong that she’d had to give it up as a bad job.
‘I might try the sewing,’ she said. ‘But that’s just the “doing more for the war” bit, isn’t it, Jim? And for keeping the staff happy and involved. Tell him your ideas for the shop.’
‘No, no, that’s more than enough about me,’ said Jim. ‘Tell us what you’ve been up to, Sid.’
‘Oh, no, that can wait,’ said Sid dismissively. ‘It’s not much, and I’ll only have to tell it all over again to Mum. One thing’s bothering me about this Fowl Club of yours, though, Jim. The name.’
‘What about it?’
‘Well, it’s not very catchy, is it? In fact, it’s most unfortunate. How about … “The Feather Club” or … I dunno … yes, I do!’ He clicked his fingers. ‘“The Cluck-Cluck Club”! Wouldn’t that be better?’
Lily burst out laughing. Chicken keeping might have its mucky side, but Sid didn’t have to make it sound like a sleazy nightclub. Or, knowing Sid, perhaps he did.
Chapter 8
Gladys, meanwhile, had planned her half-day with care. Time off from work without some chore to do for her gran, who was a bit of a moaner and inclined to take to her bed at the drop of an aspirin, was too precious to waste. Today, a neighbour was sitting with her, and, joy of joys, the Gaumont was showing That Hamilton Woman! again. Gladys had loved it first time round – a proper two-hankie job – so, with a bag of penny creams, she was planning a cosy, if weepy, afternoon in the stalls. Lily might normally have come with her, but Sid’s leave had put paid to that, and it was only natural she’d want to spend the time with him. And in truth, Gladys didn’t really need any more company than Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh. The prospect unfurled happily in front of her as she walked towards the cinema. A lovely romantic weepie – and such pretty frocks too …
But then, there in front of her, leaning on a lamp post – all that was missing was the ukulele – was—
‘Bill! No! No! It can’t be! Is it really you?’
‘Hello there, Gladys. I’m real enough – pinch me if you like! Pleased to see me, are you?’
In films this was the point where the heroine would have fallen into her loved one’s arms, but Gladys was enough of a realist to know that she was no heroine, even in her own life. Though she was sure Bill would be quick and strong enough to catch her, she wasn’t at all sure she could manage the graceful, loose-limbed melting that others like, well, Vivien Leigh, say, could achieve. Instead she stared, dumb-struck and open-mouthed.
Bill grinned the gappy, jaggle-toothed grin that made her insides melt.
‘That’s a “yes”, is it?’
Leaving no room for doubt, he stepped forward and wrapped her in a close embrace.
‘Oh Bill! I can’t believe—’ was all Gladys had time to say before the rest of the sentence was lost in a kiss.
When their enthusiastic reunion had finally run its course, Bill tucked a lock of her disarranged hair behind her ear.
‘It’s good to see you, Glad,’ he whispered. ‘I’ve missed you.’
‘Not as much as I’ve missed you!’
It was what they’d said last time they’d met. He’d promised they’d say it every time – and he’d remembered! Gladys gazed at him adoringly. She hadn’t seen him since the good news about her forthcoming promotion, but she’d written to him about it, and he’d sent back not a letter but a card, a proper ‘Congratulations’ card, with a little bellboy in a frogged red uniform on it, carrying a basket of flowers. Gladys had been moved to tears. Not only had he gone to all that trouble to find a card, he’d written inside: ‘So proud of you!’. It was still up on the little mantelpiece in her room: in fact, she doubted she’d ever take it down.
‘But how did you get leave?’ she marvelled. ‘And why didn’t you let me know?’
Bill folded her arm through his, and, taking the outside of the pavement – such a gentleman! – led her off towards Lyons Corner House. (‘No point being in the Navy if you can’t push the boat out!’)
‘There’s no hiding it, Glad, I’m on standby now. I could be deployed any day. So any chance I get for leave, I’m going to jump at it. No time to warn you, though. Good job you weren’t strolling along with your other boyfriend, eh?’
‘Oh, you! But—’ she paused. ‘How did you know where to find me? How did you guess?’
‘No guess needed. You told me you were going to the Gaumont, silly. Don’t you remember? In your last letter.’
‘So I did!’ Gladys leant over, aiming for his cheek, but kissing his ear instead. It didn’t matter. ‘So you do read my letters, then?’
‘All of them, every line!’ Bill sounded indignant. ‘Why wouldn’t I?’
‘Well …’ Along with Gladys’s growing confidence had come at least some self-awareness. ‘I know I can go on a bit. And often I don’t have anything that interesting to say.’
‘It’s interesting to me,’ Bill insisted.
Gladys clutched his arm more tightly. She’d at least had a childhood filled with love. Bill had never had anyone – no hugs, no one to wipe his tears when he fell down, or to make a fuss of his smallest achievements. No one to take an interest in his school work, to buy him a toy of his own, or even a bag of sweets. It was the same when he joined up. Pals, yes, but no letters, no birthday cards, nowhere to go on his leaves. No one to feel special about, no one who felt specially about him, who cared about him as much as they cared about themselves. Well, I do, thought Gladys fiercely. She cared about him more than she cared about herself.
Her insides turned liquid again. It was a good job they’d arrived at Lyons and Bill was holding open the door. Gladys didn’t want to blub in front of him. She knew she would when they parted, but for now, all she wanted was for his whole leave to be happy.
‘You’ll never guess, but Sid’s home today, as well!’ she informed him as the waitress put their plates down.
‘Is he, the crafty beggar?’ Bill shook salt enthusiastically over his fish and chips. ‘Good job I didn’t run into him. He’d only have tried to persuade me to go for a drink!’
Gladys passed him the tartare sauce in its little silver sauceboat. So refined, Lyons.
‘I’d have turned him down, though, don’t you worry.’ Not so worried by the niceties, Bill slopped out a hefty dollop of sauce. ‘I know where my priorities lie!’
Gladys looked at him from under her eyelashes. On Beryl it would have been a flirtatious look, but Gladys could no more have been flirtatious than have ridden the winner in the Grand National. On her, it was a shy look of sheer incredulity at her good fortune.
‘I still can’t get over you being here,’ she marvelled. ‘This is such a treat. Thank you.’
‘And you needn’t miss the film,’ Bill assured her, tucking in. ‘We’ll go tonight.’
For himself, he’d have preferred something with a bit of humour or a lot of action, but there were advantages to seeing a romance with Gladys. They both fell silent for a moment, thinking of the pressure of his knee against hers, his arm round her shoulders, and the way he could nuzzle her neck when she clung to him in any especially sad bits.
‘Eat up,’ he said, waving his fork. ‘You know I can’t tell you what I’ve been doing – it’s all boring technical stuff anyway. So tell me all about this Mr Whatsisname, the new floor supervisor feller, and these changes he’s making.’