The Girl from the Corner Shop

by Alrene Hughes

  ‘Why aren’t you in room sixteen?’ he demanded.

  She couldn’t believe what he was saying. ‘I’m not there because I’m not a prostitute even if you want to turn me into one.’

  ‘Don’t you get uppity with me, like butter wouldn’t melt in your mouth.’

  Helen was aware that the noise of conversation in the room had fallen away like a wireless when the volume was lowered. People were looking at her and there was Pearl coming towards her looking concerned.

  She took Helen’s arm. ‘What is it? What’s going on?’ Her voice was low.

  ‘You know what’s going on. You and Mr Fenner sent me to room sixteen so that one of your supper club friends could take advantage of me.’ The anger was rising in Helen’s voice.

  But those watching looked at her and smiled, some laughed and a man called out, ‘Did you not fancy him, love? I’ve a room down the corridor too, I’d give you something to smile about.’

  Helen cried out in frustration and pushed her way out the door.

  Pearl caught up with her at the top of the stairs. ‘Helen, listen, please.’

  ‘Go away, I never want to see you again!’

  Pearl ran in front of her and held up her hands. ‘Wait, please, I need you to listen.’

  ‘Oh, and what are you going to tell me? That I should forget about Jim and be somebody’s mistress? I trusted you and now I know why you wanted to get me into this whole supper club thing. Dressing me up like some kind of doll and giving me to a man for his plaything.’ She felt the tears ready to fall.

  ‘I promise you, Helen, I had no idea that this would happen. I’m not a part of that. I wouldn’t do that to you.’

  ‘You sent me there!’

  ‘I thought I was sending you with some sandwiches for a meeting, I swear it. It must have been Harold; he’s thick as thieves with Charles.’

  ‘I don’t believe you. He wanted me to be his mistress. “Like Pearl,” he said. Are you going to deny that too?’

  She bowed her head. ‘No, I’m not. I’ve been his mistress for twenty years.’

  ‘And I suppose you think there’s nothing wrong with that?’

  Pearl looked her in the face. ‘He’s kept me from poverty. It’s my decision and, believe me, I’ve had to take the rough with the smooth.’

  Helen shook her head and walked away.

  ‘Helen, please,’ Pearl called after her. ‘Don’t hold this against me. It’s not my fault.’

  But Helen was already running down the stairs.

  Chapter 11

  Pearl was upset on the way back home from the supper club. As if the blackout wasn’t bad enough, she had to endure both Harold’s erratic driving, mounting the pavement several times, and his ranting.

  ‘What kind of a girl is she, turning down one of this city’s most successful businessmen? Not to mention she’s made a bloody fool out of me. I wanted to get in with Charlie Brownlow; he’s well connected, you know, and that piece of skirt has scuppered all that.’

  Pearl said nothing. She knew it was a one-sided conversation. Better to let him vent his anger. He’d assume she agreed with him anyway.

  Once inside her house he sprawled on the sofa: waistcoat unbuttoned, fat belly hanging over his flies while she undid his boots and set them to the side. ‘Give that fire a poke and get me a stiff drink.’ He lit his cigar, puffing and puffing until it glowed red and he began again. ‘Who does she think she is anyway? I gave her a job and let her come to the supper club. She could have had any of those men there. Oh, I saw the way they looked at her, but I set her up for Charlie.’ He blew several smoke rings towards the ceiling. ‘Bitch!’

  Again, Pearl held her tongue, but he wasn’t having it. ‘You’re her bloody godmother. Why didn’t you take her back to Charlie?’ It was clear he wanted an answer this time.

  ‘Because you can’t make a woman—’ She stopped. That was the trouble, women could be made to do what men told them, given that the alternative was worse. ‘Harold, she only buried her husband a few months ago. She’d have been shocked at the man’s advances. She didn’t want to be his mistress.’

  ‘It did you no harm.’

  Before she could stop herself, a half-hearted laugh escaped her lips.

  ‘What the hell are you laughing at?’ He pushed himself out of the chair and lunged towards her. The fist caught her across her eyebrow.

  ‘Don’t, Harold, please. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it.’ She flinched as he lifted his hand again, but he thought better of it.

  ‘Get out of my sight,’ he yelled.

  She didn’t need to be told twice. She ran upstairs, her heart still thumping as she undressed, and slipped between the cold sheets. She was getting too old for this.

  It hadn’t always been so bad. He had been handsome once, a caring lover, and generous to a fault. She hadn’t been working at Fenner’s Fashions for very long when he began to take an interest in her. A few weeks after that, she was promoted out of the basement, where she packed the orders, into the office as a junior clerk. Soon after that, she was sleeping with him in various hotels around the city, when he could get away from his wife and family. He couldn’t get enough of her then, so he bought the house and set her up as his mistress. He could come and go as he wanted. In those early years, they’d even nip out of work at lunchtime and drive to the house. He thought nobody knew, but she’d seen the look in their eyes and the sniggering when they came back. She brazened it out for a roof over her head and a comfortable life.

  But there were regrets even then… the babies, two of them. He paid, of course, and she pretended to be grateful. It was a trade-off – he didn’t want the little bastards, he said, and she didn’t want to be out on the street. Even now she couldn’t think of them without a tear – she wiped it away.

  These last few years he’d grown tired of her. She’d seen the way he sniffed round some of the younger women at the supper club and she had no doubt that he’d bedded them in the same hotels where he’d courted her. Then there were the beatings. He’d hit her a couple of times over the years, but it was more frequent this past year. The trouble was they were locked together and the key was lost. She wanted to leave him, but she’d lose the house and her job. He wanted to be free of her, but he needed her to run the business.

  Her mother’s words came back to her: ‘You’ve made your bed, now you’ll have to lie in it.’

  As if on cue, she heard his footsteps on the stairs and turned her back to the door as he came in. He fumbled about taking off his clothes and she felt the heavy weight of him on the mattress. The smell of whisky and stale smoke wafted over her as he turned her on her back. His hands were clumsy, but as usual he was impatient and climbed on top of her. She guided him, then let him spend himself. It was nothing to her.

  Afterwards, he sat up in bed and complained about indigestion. She went to the kitchen for the Milk of Magnesia and gave him a dose.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about that goddaughter of yours,’ he said. ‘Maybe Charlie was too eager. What I want you to do is to go and see her this weekend and talk her into going out with him, you know, to get to know him. Tell her he’s a nice man – very wealthy – she could land on her feet there. All right?’ he said.

  ‘All right,’ Pearl answered.

  Satisfied, he turned on his side and was snoring within minutes. Pearl lay there seething. Who did he think he was, sending her to persuade Helen to become a kept woman? Anyway, it was clear that she wasn’t as naive as people might have thought. She had guts too and could stand her ground. No, she wouldn’t go to her house; Helen would still be angry at her. Instead, she’d write a letter explaining again that she’d had no idea about the plan for Charlie to proposition her and she would never have allowed it to happen if she’d known. She might even add that becoming a mistress was the worst decision of her life.

  Chapter 12

  Helen had no reason to get up early, now that she had no work to go to. Besides, she had hardly s
lept for the last few nights, what with the worry of finding a new job and her anger at Pearl thinking she would ever contemplate becoming some man’s mistress. She was shocked, too, at learning Pearl was Fenner’s mistress, although she had been suspicious about their relationship. She had thought Pearl was so kind when she got her the job at Fenner’s, but looking back she could see the web of deception surrounding the sleazy supper club and how she’d been drawn in. She had been completely mistaken in thinking that Pearl was an ally and her mind was made up, she would have nothing more to do with her.

  The thought of having to search again for work was daunting, but come Monday morning she woke up determined to have a job by the end of the week. After all, this time she had some experience as a clerk. Men were being called up every day, surely there would be vacancies. She had also thought about joining the police, but then she recalled Frank’s words. ‘It’s no job for a woman… and Jim would tell you the same thing.’ He was probably right.

  After breakfast she nipped out to the paper shop and bought the early edition of the Manchester Evening News. On her way back, Ada was outside her door gossiping to a neighbour and both women gave her a cold stare. Helen walked quickly by and up her path then stopped. There on her doorstep was a large bouquet of flowers.

  Ada shouted over to her. ‘A man left them, not five minutes ago. He were in a car.’

  Helen ignored her and fumbled for her key. Ada persisted. ‘I’ve been thinkin’. You’re supposed to be a widow, but you had a man with you when you came to look at the house. Next thing you moved in – on your own – and since then you’ve not been short on fancy men, have you?’

  ‘How dare you speak to me like that!’

  ‘Listen, love, I’m a God-fearin’ woman, with a child to bring up. I don’t want to live next door to a—’ She stopped herself, thought better of it. ‘Anyroad, if it’s a man, or men, payin’ your rent, you’ll be out on your ear when the landlord finds out.’

  ‘I’ll have you know I pay my own rent,’ Helen shouted and she picked up the flowers, opened the door and went quickly inside. She threw the flowers on the table and screamed in frustration. Her heart was racing at the accusations of that horrible woman. She’d really got it in for her and no doubt she’d been spreading the gossip. Come to think of it, the woman in the paper shop had given her a funny look. She sank into the chair and closed her eyes. ‘Oh, Jim, help me please. I can’t do this anymore,’ and she let the tears slip down her face. She could have stopped them, wiped her eyes, told herself not to be silly, but instead she let the silent tears turn into sobs, then howls, and she wept until she was drained and her eyes closed.

  The bouquet, all cellophane and red ribbons, full of its own importance, was still on the table when she woke up. It wasn’t hard to guess who they were from, but she read the card anyway. My dear Helen, forgive me, I’m a fool. Please let me make it up to you. Charles Brownlow.

  The nerve of the man! She went out the back door and threw them in the bin then paused. Ada had seen the man leaving flowers on her doorstep, but had she been nosy enough to read the card? Helen shrugged. She can think what she likes. This is my home, she told herself, and I’m not going to be pushed out of it by a spiteful gossip. She filled the kettle and had just struck a match to light the gas when the realisation hit her. Brownlow wanting to see her again was bad enough but – she let out a scream as the match burned her fingers – he knew where she lived.

  She spent the next three hours writing letters applying for half a dozen jobs advertised in the paper. Then in the afternoon, she went into town to deliver them to the newspaper office where they would be sorted into the PO boxes to be collected later by the advertisers. It was a beautiful spring day and she wandered over to Albert Square to sit in the sunshine. True, there were sandbags piled high in front of the town hall, but the tubs of daffodils lifted her spirits.

  She sat on a bench next to a young woman, not much older than herself, an empty pram beside her. It was a moment before she realised that, inside her coat, the woman was holding a baby to her breast. Helen looked quickly away, shocked to see such a thing in public.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ the young woman said, pulling the coat closer to hide the child’s head. ‘I don’t like to do this, but I’ve nowhere else to go and he’s so hungry.’

  ‘That’s all right,’ said Helen and she tried not to look at the suckling child.

  ‘I come every day to the housing people in the town hall to see if they’ve got a house for me,’ she explained. ‘We were bombed out at Christmas. My husband’s in the army and I was living with my granny. We lost everything and ever since then we’ve been staying with my parents and sister. It’s only a back to back and we’re so overcrowded. I was in a rest centre for a while, but it was no good with a baby. He was waking people up and he kept getting sick. I feel sorry for those people still living there.’

  Helen had given very little thought about the people who had been bombed out of their homes. She had read about the rest centres in the paper, but she never imagined that people would still be there four months later. She felt really sorry for the mother and might even have taken her in, except that her front bedroom was damp and she didn’t have a spare bed.

  ‘They say I’ll get a house soon, but till then I’ll come every day to mither them. I won’t give in.’ She took the baby from her breast and handed him to Helen, while she buttoned her blouse and coat.

  ‘He’s lovely,’ said Helen.

  ‘Yes, he’s my pride and joy.’ She laid him in the pram and covered him with a blanket. ‘The men are fighting this war for the kiddies like him, but if you ask me, the women are fighting it too and, God willing, we’ll come out the other side, stronger than before.’ And she smiled. ‘Ta-rah then, love.’

  Helen sat a while longer and thought about the mother and her child. It was true what she had said about the women – she had seen poverty and hardship every day when she served in the corner shop as women tried to eke out an existence. She’d had a sheltered upbringing; she knew that now. Jim’s death had knocked her sideways but, somehow, she had just about coped. The chances were, she would get a junior clerk position and that would be it. She would settle into the life of a widow with only herself to think about. But how selfish and boring would that be?

  Somewhere in the distance a bell was clanging.

  She wanted to do something worthwhile. Why shouldn’t she join the police? Hadn’t Ken said the WAPC worked with women and children?

  The bell grew louder.

  She knew it would be hard seeing people in distress, but to be able to help them… There was a screech of brakes and she turned to see a fire engine racing across the square and, in the time it took for the sound of the bell to fade she had made up her mind.

  Bootle Street was just around the corner and she stood in front of its impressive façade with the nerves tightening in her stomach. How can you join the police, when you haven’t the nerve to go into the building? She chided herself and almost walked away, but in a sudden rush of bravado, she ran up the steps two at a time and pushed open the door. Inside, a desk and behind it a surprisingly old-looking policeman. She explained that she wanted to join the WAPC.

  ‘Is that so?’ he said, looking her up and down, then he told her to wait while he got someone to speak to her. The entrance hall was very grand with a marble floor and elegant wall lights, nothing like the other police stations she’d been in. She waited and waited, her courage seeping away. What am I thinking of? I couldn’t be part of this, I wouldn’t know what to do. Just then, a lad in a black uniform rushed in and almost collided with her. ‘Sorry, missus.’

  ‘Hold on a minute, it’s Tommy, isn’t it?’

  His face lit up. ‘Helen? I didn’t think I’d ever see you again. They said you’d run away from your mam and the shop.’

  ‘I just moved out, that’s all, I’ve got my own house now. And what about you, in uniform?’

  He stood tall. ‘I’m workin�
� for the police – I’m an auxiliary messenger.’

  ‘I didn’t think you’d be old enough.’

  ‘I were fourteen last month, joined up on my birthday. You have to have your own bike, you know. I’ve been all over deliverin’ important messages: ARP posts; police stations; hospitals… Anyroad, what are you doin’ here?’

  ‘I’m thinking about joining the police, came in to ask if they’re taking people on.’

  ‘Oh, you should do it, Helen. It’s smashing.’

  There was a shout from behind them. The policeman had returned. ‘Hey you, young whipper-snapper, you know you’re not supposed to come through the main door. Away with you.’

  Tommy bolted for the door. ‘Sorry, sarge!’ and Helen called after him, ‘Don’t tell my mam you’ve seen me.’

  ‘Are you the one wanting to join the WAPC?’ Helen’s heart skipped a beat and she turned to face a policewoman – middle aged, grey hair, stocky.

  ‘Ah, yes, I heard about it and I was just wondering if… if you’re taking people on?’

  The woman seemed to scrutinise her. ‘Sure, why would you want to join the police?’ She sounded Irish.

  The question threw her. Was it enough to say she wanted to help people? She took a deep breath and tried to explain. ‘I know the war has been hard on women and their children. I’ve seen their bombed homes and their struggle to put food on the table.’

  ‘We’re not do-gooders doling out tea and butties, love.’ The woman looked so severe. ‘You’d be better off in the WRVS, they’ve a nicer uniform too.’

  Helen felt like she’d been slapped in the face, but somehow that spurred her on. Why shouldn’t she join the police? She wouldn’t be put off that easily. ‘A policewoman told me she found a child outside a pub. Her father was inside while she was begging for his beer money. She warned the man and took the child home. The mother was at her wits’ end living hand to mouth, but the policewoman managed to get the local church involved and the vicar helped the family.’