I Ordered a Table for Six

by Noel Streatfeild

  Bill calmly went about his work quite unaffected by Claire’s moans. In fact he hardly heard them, he was so used to them, and knew that whatever she might say to him she smiled at the shelterers and apparently had not a grumble in her. But when the last of the dirty mugs was collected and the two of them washing up, he said to tease her: “You better lay off coming down until the weather’s better. The rain upsets you.”

  “I like rain better than I liked the snow; and you know damn well nothing’s going to stop me coming down here. I’m like the soldiers, I like my grouse.”

  Bill was washing the mugs. He paused, and if the hurricane lamp, which was all they had to work by, had burned brighter she would have seen his grin.

  “You work hard enough in the daytime. It’s a long way to get down here. I’ve told you before you ought to be working in Westminster, and get something close at hand, and dodge home if the raid’s bad.”

  She made a ball of her dish-cloth and threw it at him, then picked up a clean one and took the mugs he was drying to the canteen door.

  “Doesn’t it look lousy out there? God, how I hate the smell of rubble! It’s worse on a wet night.” She leant against the door. The moon was up and, though screened by banks of cloud, it was lightening the sky, and she could see something of the desolation. “Bubble, bubble, plop!” she said. “Rain gurgling down broken streets and along stopped gutters is perfect music for this scene.”

  Bill had finished washing the mugs. He came and joined her.

  “It was a night when this street copped it. I remember you when that big bomb fell up the road. I shouted to you all to lie down, and you said: ‘Don’t waste your breath, we’ve been blown down.’ Then you got up and got that Bovril, and then the next one fell. My word, you did say something. I laughed so much I could hardly get up. Then when you’d picked up yourself and the mugs, you suddenly saw your stockings.”

  “Silk! Real, beautiful silk bought in Paris. Quite unobtainable now. Christ, were they laddered!” She turned and dried the rest of the mugs. “We got time for some tea?”

  Bill held his watch under the lamp.

  “Yes.” Claire poured two mugs of tea from the urn and put some sugar into Bill’s; he took it and stirred it. “Funny, thinking of that night. It was a near thing. I remember thinking as that big bomb came screaming at us: ‘Oh, well, if it hits us, I’ll see my mother, and if it doesn’t, I’ll have a good supper.’”

  Claire gave a gasp.

  “Your mother! You don’t really think, if you were killed, you’d see her? Not actually see her!”

  Bill stirred his tea and considered.

  “Yes, I do. Not to say quite how, but I know we’ll meet and know each other.”

  “How odd it must be to believe that.”

  “Don’t you? I mean, you don’t think it’s just this world and finish, do you?”

  “Yes. Does that shock you?”

  “Not shock; it seems to me kind of foolish for a girl like you that’s educated. Why, if that was true, what would be the point in anything? Doing right and all that. If there’s no other world than this, what’s the harm in suicide and dying when you felt like it?”

  “I don’t think there is any. Not now, of course, in war-time. It would be a cad’s trick to nip out of things. Life’s so foul and there’s such a lot to be done.”

  “I don’t see that. If you’re going nowhere, there’s no such thing as doing your duty. What would you be doing it for?”

  “I don’t know.” Claire hesitated. “I’ve no logic; we . . .” She broke off. “It’s not that I don’t want to believe in another world, it’s that I just don’t.” She put down her mug. “Goodness, aren’t we serious? Come on, let’s go and feed the rest of our menagerie.”

  The rain was pelting down by the time they finished their round. They parked the canteen and stood together counting the takings, with the water clattering on the roof.

  “Sorry we were only two,” Bill said, piling up a pound of silver, “but we’ve got through in nice time.”

  “Sixteen shillings,” Claire murmured, and then out loud: “I’m rather sorry I said what I did about life after death. It must be marvellous to believe in it, and I’d hate to think I shook anybody.”

  Bill poured the silver in his hand into an Oxo tin.

  “You couldn’t do that. You keep your eyes open and it’s you that’ll be shaken. Everything’s planned, if you ask me, even this war, and there’s more shape to things than what you think.”

  “Shape! What shape could there be in all this idiocy? Look what we’re suffering. If it were planned, which I don’t believe, it would be by some frightful devil.”

  “No, there’s good as well as bad comes out of wars. Why, I’ve seen more to like in the people round here since the blitzes started than in all the years of peace.”

  Claire took off her overall.

  “Well, I won’t argue with you, and I’m glad I haven’t influenced you.” She collected her tin hat and gas mask from under the counter. “And don’t forget about Friday. Ring me if you’re short. Honestly, I’d rather come here than go to my aunt’s foul party.”

  It was mid-afternoon and the “Comforts for the Bombed” ladies stitched, and Letty cut up some odd-smelling semi-flannel material into lengths for three hundred women’s nightdresses. The material had attracted such unfavourable comment from the workers that Letty had slightly moved her cutting-out table so that she could stand with her body between the future nightdresses and the piercing eyes of those who would make them up.

  “I think it’s a sort of winceyette, isn’t it, Miss Smithson?”

  “Such a curious smell, it even reaches me here.”

  “I should think being bombed-out leads to a lot of divorces. My husband wouldn’t stay with me a day if I wore a nightdress made of that.”

  “Simply idiotic to buy the stuff, and it’s not necessary. There are beautiful materials in the shops.”

  Mrs. Brown glanced at Letty’s stolid, busy back with an amused twinkle. She tapped her with her scissors and spoke in a whisper:

  “Does it run off your back, or does it shame you?”

  Letty grinned over her shoulder.

  “To hear them you’d think I went round England trying to buy up unattractive stuff.”

  “Mrs. Framley out to-day?”

  “Gone to the hairdresser and to a committee.”

  “To-morrow’s the party for our Mr. Penrose, isn’t it?”

  Letty sighed.

  “Yes, and I wish it was over. I’m so afraid he won’t turn up after all the fuss. He’s rushing round while he’s over here, like Americans do, and you know what the traffic’s like.”

  “I expect he’ll arrive all right.” Mrs. Brown’s voice was consoling. “Is he coming to inspect us?”

  “Yes. Monday. I rang his secretary and found out, but that’s private for the moment because Mr. Penrose hasn’t what his secretary calls ‘approved Monday’s schedule,’ but he’s promised to let me know definitely to-night, and then Mrs. Framley will make an announcement about it to all the workers to-morrow, and I’ll ring up any who don’t hear it.”

  “You don’t want us all here, do you?”

  “Mrs. Framley does.”

  “Have we enough work on hand?”

  Letty patted her bales of material.

  “That’s what the nightdresses are for.” She went back to her cutting-out, while her mind ran over the next day. It was awkward that she had to be out meeting Meggie, for if Mrs. Framley was going to make an announcement to the workers, a little preparation helped. Letty had worked out a very smooth running technique for these occasions. She would hurry round the table and say confidingly to the biggest gossips: “Mrs. Framley’s going to have a word with everybody this morning.” Then, when Adela was actually coming in at the door, Letty would run to t
he head of the largest work-table and, catching the eyes of the gossips to whom she had talked, to show them the moment had now come, she would stamp loudly. A stamp, Letty had decided, was less obvious than clapping her hands. If she clapped her hands she might suggest that Adela’s mere presence was not enough to command attention, but a stamp was less noticeable and might possibly pass as unintentional. She had an unpleasant vision of Adela standing about trying to get silence and not getting it, and believing, as she so easily believed, that she had been deliberately slighted. To-morrow was not a day when Adela should be allowed to get upset, because it was Meggie’s day and nothing must spoil it. “Of course,” thought Letty, cutting off length after length of material, “if I wasn’t a selfish hog I suppose I’d stay here until just before Meggie’ s train, so that I could get Mrs. Framley’s talk over first, but I simply must have my hair done. Mrs. Hill is such a doubtful starter, and that dress really is too good to wear with one’s hair looking a mess.” She wished in a way that Claire had telephoned and said a definite yes or no. If she managed to get out to-night to The King’s Arms she would like to be able either to tell Jim that she wasn’t going or that she was, and have a row and get it over. As things were now, it looked as if they would be in for the same aimless argument as they had on Tuesday. She didn’t know really what she did want about to-morrow. Of course Jim was being a silly old thing to make a fuss about her going, if she did go, and of course she would like to see La Porte Verte and wear that good dress. Still, it wasn’t worth upsetting Jim for, especially now he was going into the Navy. “There’s one comfort,” Letty told herself, “the decision’s nothing to do with me. It’s all up to Mrs. Hill; if she doesn’t turn up I’ve got to go, and that’s all there is to it.” She turned to lay a large pile of lengths on another table. The workers, she was glad to hear, were no longer discussing the material. Someone had started the ever-fruitful topic of evacuees.

  “My dear, they were absolutely un-house-trained. Martha said, as far as she could make out, they preferred using the passage.”

  “My sister’s got an A.T., or should it be A.T.S., billeted on her. She says it’s too depressing. The girl does nothing but clean her buttons. She thinks perhaps it’s a sexual outlet.”

  “She got two aged, a man and a woman. Poor old things, they looked hardly fit to stand, so she put them straight to bed. It was only when they were in her double bed in her spare room that she found they weren’t a husband and wife at all, and had only met on the journey down.”

  “Of course people tell very funny stories about evacuees, and their dishonesty and all that; but when it comes to dishonesty I don’t think we need look so far as evacuees. I myself have lost three splendid pairs of scissors in this very room. Miss Smithson has lent me a pair to carry on with, but that doesn’t alter the fact that three pairs have gone. I should hate to use the word stolen.”

  Letty looked at her watch. It was a little early, but she wanted the workrooms closed early so that she could get to Gerda to have a final try-on of her frock. She went into the passage and found Gills.

  “You might make tea. It’s a little early, but I want to get them off early to-night.”

  Gills was pasting labels on to parcels. He left his work at once.

  “That’ll suit me too, Miss Smithson. I’ve got two women coming in the morning to do this floor, and I’d like to get things ready to-night. Of course it will be dark when Mr. Penrose comes to-morrow, but we want everything to look nice.” He lowered his voice and pointed to a pile of parcels and boxes in the corner. “Not one’s gone out to-day and, what’s more, I told the drivers that nothing would. Nor to-morrow either. ‘We’re having a big day on Monday,’ I said. I didn’t tell them why, but when they hear Mr. Penrose is coming, they’ll guess.”

  Back at her cutting, Letty ran her mind’s eye over her arrangements for to-morrow. Her hair appointment at 9.30. Meggie’s train should be in just after eleven, but that would mean just after twelve. Meggie’s hair and nails at 2.30. Meggie was sure to insist on walking home by an indirect route, so that meant they would only get back in time for tea. Mrs. Framley would be sure to want her for something or other, so she had better try to get dressed by six. The Daimler was ordered for 7.45; they were always reliable, thank goodness. Perhaps she had better put a call through to Mr. Penrose’s secretary about tea-time, just to be sure he got him and Andrew Bishop into a taxi at about 7.20. Gerda would see Meggie was dressed in time, and Mrs. Framley was always punctual. Of course there was Claire. She did not know what punctuality meant. Well, if she said she was definitely coming and then turned up late, she would have to follow on in a taxi. Then there was Mr. Deeves. Letty again felt uneasy, conscious of something happening of which she had not the facts. Who on earth was Mr. Deeves? Adela had said vaguely: “The son of an old friend; he’s in the Army,” but Adela had been lying. Letty had not been her secretary for over three years without knowing the names of all Adela’s old friends, nor had she failed to learn her tones of voice. Mr. Deeves had been spoken of in what Letty called her “I-don’t-wish-the-matter-discussed” voice. That sounded very much as if her first guess that he had something to do with Paul was right. But why should Adela, who had spent her whole time since Paul had been sentenced in running away, not only from contact with his friends but from places connected with him and even, Letty suspected, from thinking of him, why then should she suddenly produce someone who knew him and ask him to supper? It was most unlikely, but she was very shifty about Mr. Deeves, and that particular shiftiness of tone did link up with things to do with Paul. “Anyway,” thought Letty, thankfully laying down her scissors as she heard the clatter of teacups, “if he is a friend of Paul’s, and whatever her reason is for having him, I hope she keeps him away from Meggie; she’s too nice and too young to be mixed up with her brother’s murky friends.”

  The comforts covered with their dust-sheets, Letty sent up to Gerda. Gerda was sitting at her work-table rethreading a loosened silver thread into the neck of Letty’s frock. She looked, for her, cheerful, and her voice had more life in it than it often had.

  “This is almost finished. Mrs. Framley will wear the beautiful black chiffon. She has many lovely dinner dresses but that I find the best.”

  Letty sat on the edge of Gerda’s table and watched her work.

  “Do you like clothes all that much—I mean, even other people’s clothes—to be pleased that they are going to wear them?”

  Yes; clothes are very important. It is sad for me that I cannot now wear mine, but if Mrs. Framley will wear hers, that is something. I know that in war-time that is how it must be, but each day to be so the same—ach! This little dinner makes a change.”

  Letty strained her imagination to picture Gerda’s existence. Meals, shopping and commissions for Adela, and sewing, it was no duller than any one else’s day that she could see. Of course Gerda had not got a Jim in the background to make life exciting. Mrs. Brown had said that refugees liked being pitied, and missed it when they weren’t, but even if that was true Letty could not bring herself to start handing out pity to Gerda. Gerda’s fur coats stuck, as it were, in her gullet and choked sympathy. She often had a feeling, and she had it now, that if only she could find the right words she might jolt Gerda into being a more sensible person. It was silly, not to say sloppy, to feel cheered up because somebody else was going out to dinner. To counteract her aggravation she made an annoying suggestion.

  “You want to take up a hobby, Gerda. Did you ever ride a bicycle? I think Mrs. Framley would get you one, and then I could probably find a nice bicycling club for you. I dare say there’s an Austrian one.”

  Gerda looked gloomy. “That I could not do. I am now so thin I have not the strength.”

  “If you don’t mind my saying so,” said Letty, not caring if Gerda minded or not, “you look a lot better now you’re thin. I expect all those goose livers and things cooked with cream were very nice, but I
think they made you bilious. You’re a heap better colour than you were.”

  “To be too thin, that is not good. I have seen my doctor and he says that if I do not add weight soon I shall need many, many weeks lying down.”

  Letty, by thinking hard how kind Gerda had been about the dress, restrained herself with a great effort from pointing out that it was easy for foreign doctors to talk about many weeks lying down to foreigners, who would lie down on funds collected by the British, but that no one had so far collected such a fund for the British, who must, therefore, however thin, remain standing up. To keep her tongue in order, and because Gerda disliked the subject, she reverted to the question of bicycles.

  “You probably would get fatter if you had a hobby like bicycling, and besides, you wouldn’t find the days so long if you had something to amuse you.”

  Gerda looked gloomier.

  “I have no money for pleasure.” She gathered Letty’s frock over her arm. “This is ready for you to try on.”

  Muffled in folds of dress which Gerda’s kind fingers had stitched, Letty struggled to let her better nature come uppermost and allow a softer tongue to emerge with her head through the silver collar.

  “There’s one thing I’ve found, and that is that the people one works for make the days different. Why, even old Lady Falls, that I was with before I came here, had her moods; not often, but now and again.”

  “Ach, moods!” Gerda stood back to get a good view of Letty. She came to her and fiddled with one of her cuffs. “I have been troubled about Mrs. Framley these last weeks. She is very nervous, and I who suffer so myself know how it is to have nerves.”

  Letty did not care to discuss Adela with Gerda. She knew she was being unjust in not doing so, for Gerda was loyal and really cared far more what happened to Adela than she did herself. She could not even bring herself to admit that Gerda, like all personal maids, knew more about her mistress than any one else in the house. When it came to discussing Adela, all her Eltham upbringing rose in Letty and shouted that Gerda was foreign, and no foreigner was to be trusted.