by Mary Gibson
‘No, I’ve got to wait for your aunt. And then I’ll go back home.’
‘To Belgravia?’
‘No! Home, where I belong – Bermondsey.’
‘Ridiculous. You don’t belong there any more either.’
But he knew nothing about being rooted to a place. His childhood had been spent at a boarding school and his holidays mostly with Aunt Violet. Since the war, he’d moved about London, living near galleries where he made his living, or setting up camp wherever the latest artists’ colony was flourishing – everywhere from Camden to Cornwall.
‘Bermondsey’s where I grew up – the river, the warehouses, the factories. I know it’s just an ugly jumble of slums to you, but to me it’s home.’
‘How can you say that? You had a horrible childhood there – and your home was a nightmare. Is it because John Bacon’s still there?’
‘What?’
‘Is he the draw?’
‘Don’t be an idiot, Martin. It’s just that in Bermondsey I know I can find somewhere to live and somewhere to work – and until last year it was all I’d ever known. It’s nothing to do with Johnny.’
She laughed at him, but he didn’t look convinced. She was puzzled that he was still jealous of Johnny. ‘It’s you I love.’ She went to him, putting her arms around his waist and looking up into his clear grey eyes.
‘Do you?’ he asked urgently. ‘Then why not make a new life with me? I’m going to see Mother tomorrow – shall I tell her I’m going to marry you? She’ll have to know sooner or later and I want to take you with me.’
Kate groaned. ‘It’s just not the right time, Martin. I’m not ready.’ He let go of her, sulking, but she pulled him back. ‘One day – when I’ve finished me elocution lessons and can speak proper!’
He laughed and spun her around till they tumbled together onto the chaise longue and he kissed her in a way that made her forget the crimes of her father and the tragedy of her mother, and she allowed herself, for a brief time, to be nineteen and in love with a prince charming who was everything Archie Goss was not.
*
She had, however, explained to Martin that he was to provide the carriage that would return her to Bermondsey. When Mrs Cliffe had done her part, his aunt would let Martin know and then he was to collect Kate in the Baby Austin. The following day she expected him to arrive soon after her father had left for the office. But after waiting all morning she began to worry that some legal problem had held things up. She sat in her workshop, pretending to sketch designs, jumping at every knock and dreading the charade she’d have to go through with her father that evening if nothing happened today. She was almost surprised when the maid came to inform her that Mr North was in the drawing room.
‘It’s done. Time to go!’ Martin looked flushed and excited.
‘I’m all ready.’ She hurried to the door and was met by Nora coming in.
‘I heard a knock…’ She noticed Martin and, looking at Kate, understood what was happening. ‘Mrs Cliffe’s sent the letter to Chibby? You’re leaving now?’
Kate nodded and was about to reassure her when Nora placed two hands on Kate’s shoulders. ‘Don’t worry about me, Kate. Don’t write, don’t telephone and don’t come back.’
Nora fixed Martin with a steady gaze and he blushed, and Kate saw he might still be a little in love with her. ‘Martin will be our go-between. Good luck, Kate.’ She put her cool cheek to Kate’s and whispered, ‘Thank you for making me brave.’
Kate gave her a final hug and collected the tin box and her toolbag. When the Baby Austin was on the road, she looked back at the stuccoed house, with its fancy railings and imposing windows, and, turning the corner, felt the dream of her new life fade away.
‘Why are you crying?’ he asked, taking his eyes off the road. ‘Are you having second thoughts?’
She flicked the tears away. ‘No. I’m crying for Nora. I don’t like leaving her with him.’
Martin set his jaw. ‘If he lays a finger on her, I’ll kill him.’
How he would achieve such a thing she couldn’t imagine. He’d be no match against Archie’s muscular frame. But she believed he would try.
‘But I don’t think he’ll turn on Nora, not yet. Once he’s lost your aunt’s backing he’ll need whatever’s left of Nora’s fortune. And I told her she must give it to him if he asks for it.’
‘You did what!’ Again, Martin took his eyes off the road, staring at her as if she’d gone mad.
‘If my mum had given up her little bundle of gold, she’d be alive today, but she wanted to keep it for me.’ Kate thought of the jewellery sitting in the tin box behind her. ‘I know which I’d rather have, Martin.’
*
‘Good gawd, you sound like Queen Mary! Where you been staying, Buckingham Palace? We’ll have to curtsy to her now, Conny.’ Marge laughed and made room for Kate at the soldering bench.
‘She can’t help it if she talks posh.’ Conny moved up too and Kate slipped into her old workplace as if she’d never been away.
Miss Dane jumped to her defence. ‘Leave the poor girl alone, it’s nice to have a bit of culture about the place. She’ll probably end up in the office!’ she said, coming to check that Kate had all her tools. ‘I know you’ve been making your own bits and pieces, Kate, but you’ll be out of practice. I’ll put you on the easy stuff.’
Kate smiled at the woman. ‘Don’t worry about me, I’ll be able to keep up.’
Miss Dane smiled too, patting her on the shoulder. ‘We’re not talking about your piddly pewter bowls. You’ve got to put your back into a two-gallon paint tin!’
Kate knew the objects were larger, but the process was similar and she didn’t argue. Miss Dane had been kind to give Kate her old job back without any argument and for now, she needed to find a way of fitting in again. It wasn’t until she’d been working for a couple of hours that she realized the supervisor was right. The ranks of coke ovens roared into life, sending the temperature soaring, and the harsh thunder from tin-stamping machines drowned out thought and speech. She’d forgotten what it was like to breathe choking solder fumes and soot, and before long the treacly thick air scorched her lungs as she took deeper and deeper breaths, searching for oxygen. Soon she was bathed in sweat and her back and hands were screaming for relief.
How could she have gone so soft in such a short time? But it wasn’t her body that was letting her down; it was her mind. Her imagination, now so full of the beautiful life she was to have lived, the beautiful things she was to have made. It had turned her into a fragile fugitive, thrown down from heaven into the pit of hell. She was so lost in her own painful musings that she hadn’t noticed Conny staring at her.
‘The hooter’s gone, ain’t you coming for your dinner?’
‘Dinner?’ Her brain felt so assaulted by noise and heat she wasn’t sure she’d pronounced the word correctly, nor even what it meant.
‘Did I work through lunch?’
‘Lunch? What have they done to you?’ Conny shook her head. ‘It’s dinner time – half past twelve!’
‘Oh, you mean dinner?’ And seeing Conny’s worried frown, she decided to lie rather than explain that she’d got used to eating ‘lunch’ instead of dinner and ‘dinner’ instead of tea. ‘I was only joking!’ she lied.
She walked with Conny to the dining rooms in the Methodist Central Hall and there Kate discovered that Conny’s troubles were even worse than her own.
‘Me stepbrother started again. I got too cocky, didn’t I? But he hid the bleedin’ soldering iron, come home blind drunk one night and there was nothing I could do. I’m up the duff.’
‘Oh, Conny, I’m sorry. What are you going to do?’
‘Don’t know. Marge says there’s someone that’ll get rid of it, but I’m not sure…’ Conny stroked her stomach.
‘Have you told him?’
‘Just laughed, said it was my fault for undressing in front of him. Well how can I help that when there’s me and them two dirty gits
sharing a bedroom? I pulled the curtain!’
Kate thought of her pretty violet bedroom back in Belgravia. If she’d stayed at Aunt Sylvie’s this might have been her.
‘I’ll help you, Conny.’
‘Oh, Kate. You don’t have to tell me what happened at your dad’s. But you’re back here… so you ain’t got no fortune coming, have you?’
‘No, but I can make things now and sell them. I’m earning good money for it too. And I’ll get my old job back at the bookshop. You can come and live with me.’
‘Where?’
It had been the safest place she could think of. He didn’t dare come after her there – not back to the place her mother had died. It hadn’t been hard for Aunt Sarah to get her the old place again. No one wanted to pay such an extortionate rent for a single attic room, and she said it had lain empty for most of the time Kate had been away. The only other tenant had been a hawker who’d lived there for three weeks and done a moonlight flit.
She hadn’t meant to ask Conny to live with her, nor to go back to cleaning the bookshop, but Conny’s need was great and at least she’d be able to help Kate with the rent.
‘Are you sure?’ Conny asked. ‘We might not get on.’
‘Do you snore?’ Kate asked with a frown, and it was good to see Conny laugh.
‘No. But you know you might be taking on one more than you bargained for, if I can’t face getting rid of it…’
‘Baby or no baby, you can’t live with your stepbrother any more.’
‘You’ve always been good to me. I don’t know why. Everyone used to think I was so stupid. But you never did, Kate.’
‘Don’t cry, Conny.’ Kate got up. ‘Let’s get back to the hellhole!’
*
At the end of the day she went to Miss Dane. ‘I’ve got an idea to make things better for everyone in this place.’
‘Oh, here we go.’ Miss Dane put down the piecework sheet she was filling in. ‘Not been back five minutes and you’re putting the world to rights.’ But her scorn was only skin deep and Kate stood her ground, waiting until the supervisor was forced to ask, ‘All right, what is it that the bosses with all their education haven’t already thought of?’
‘I realized today we might as well all be working inside one big chimney! No wonder everyone’s losing time with the fume fever. I think we should replace all the coke ovens with gas stoves and gas torches.’
Miss Dane laughed. ‘It might be better for our health, but it won’t do the profits much good. Too expensive!’
‘Not in the long run. I’ve been working with a small gas stove and a torch and you can get the temperature just right every time! Them coke ovens are either too hot or too cold, we lose hours firing ’em up and getting them to the right heat. The soldering work is much better quality using gas, it’s all even. Besides all that, we won’t be losing time with people off sick. I tell you they’d make back their investment in six months.’
‘Learned everything about business from your dad while you’ve been gone, haven’t you?’ Miss Dane gave her a quizzical look. She hadn’t asked what had gone wrong, but Kate knew that she and the other girls were curious.
‘No. I worked it out all by myself. Will you just put the idea to the bosses?’
Miss Dane took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes wearily; they were red-rimmed from the soot that hung in the air.
‘And gas ovens won’t irritate you like the coke does, you’ll be all bright eyed!’ Kate added.
‘You haven’t lost your cheek! All right, I’ll have a go.’
*
Kate threw open the garret window and stuck her head out. A mist had rolled up from the river, enveloping the warehouses and the turret on the school. The air felt damp as river ooze and bitter with soot. She breathed in deeply. She was back where she’d started, poorer by a dream, richer in knowledge. Now, she had to decide how she would live. She’d learned the folly of pinning her hopes on someone else to give her a better life, but she’d also learned her own power. At least her father had given her that; his Judas silver had woken a new dream, one that was within her own gift. She could make beautiful things – and she could sell them. She would hold on to that as she rebuilt her life. Perhaps it would be in East Lane and perhaps somewhere else. But she would remake it and it would have nothing to do with him.
However, she’d discovered that some things had improved in East Lane. She felt less persecuted. Once her aunts learned what she’d done, she found, for the first time in her life, that they approved of her. Aunt Sylvie, knowing that none of his profits would ever come to her, now took a vengeful pleasure in the ruination of her brother’s business plans. Stan, with a new suit and a car, had become far too important to worry about harassing Kate. Mr Smith had entrusted him with running all of his debt collectors and tally men.
Then there was Conny. The young girl had moved in with few possessions. She used one of the ancient built-in timber bunks as her bed and Kate added more clothes hooks onto the beams. She thought she would miss the peace and quiet she’d always found in the garret, but their evenings became companionable. Kate arranged one corner of the garret as a workbench, with her tools hung on the rafters. She set about making small tin objects, which she thought Martin could persuade the gallery to sell. She made all sorts of decorated tins for face powder, pins or cigarettes. She included repoussé designs of dragonflies, butterflies and geometric shapes. Conny spent her evenings sewing clothes for her baby. Which, as soon as she moved in, she decided she would keep.
During her first week back in Bermondsey Kate went to the bookshop. She was pleased to find Ethel there, in animated conversation with a contributor to The Bermondsey Book. She had been ill, but today her fizzing energy seemed undimmed and when she saw Kate her bright smile was full of sympathy.
The contributor returned to his proofs and Ethel came to greet her with both hands outstretched. ‘Welcome back, Kate. I hear you’ve returned to Bermondsey!’ She lowered her voice. ‘Mrs Cliffe told me. If there’s anything I can do…’
‘You could give me my old job back.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry, I had to employ another cleaner! She’s not so much fun as you were, Kate, but I don’t feel I can send her packing.’
‘No, course not. It was just an idea. But before I forget – I’ve got something for you. It’s a bit late.’ She got out the inkstand and presented it to Ethel. ‘Happy fourth anniversary!’
Ethel let out a cry of delight. ‘But, Kate, it’s beautiful!’ She examined the inkstand. ‘And you made it specially for the anniversary?’
Kate nodded, grateful for Ethel’s genuine delight, pointing out the Bermondsey Bookshop’s symbol, the torch of learning.
‘I made quite a few things while I was at Dad’s. Even a silver bowl.’
Ethel nodded. ‘I saw it, at Mrs Cliffe’s. It’s gorgeous.’
But the inkstand had given Ethel an idea and now she insisted on setting aside a table in the shop and another in the reading room dedicated to selling Kate’s objects.
‘I could make some fretwork bookmarks and copper bookends!’
‘Perhaps a simpler version of my inkstand?’
Kate felt a pulse of excitement. Already she could see the objects that might appeal to the bookshop crowd. ‘I’ll sketch some designs tonight and see if you think they’ll sell.’
Ethel smiled and beckoned her to a bookshelf. ‘Mrs Cliffe also told me you’ve actually been making secret use of our bookshelves!’ She pulled out a large-format book. ‘She says you’re particularly fond of William Morris. But you won’t have seen this one yet; it’s a new book about his designs.’
‘But I’m not a member and I can’t afford it yet,’ Kate said, eyeing the book with longing.
‘I’ll make you out a ticket and you can pay in instalments when your first object has sold.’
Kate held out both hands. Once she’d come to clean and not read, and now everything had been turned on its head, including this.
20
Bleedin’ Likely
‘Chibby took it very badly.’
‘Well, that’s good! What happened?’
‘He turned up at Aunt Violet’s in a rage. Demanded to know her reasons for dropping out and the game old girl stood up to him! Told him that she’d heard things about his character that made it impossible to have anything to do with his business. Of course, he played the innocent, asked what the accusations were, and she let him have it. Aunt Violet’s a dear, but she can be fierce as an Amazon in support of a just cause!’
‘What did she say to him?’
‘That she’d ignored for too long that he was a man who could abandon his child and beat his wife. But now something so heinous had come to light she’d been forced to act. She might have left it there, but he started screaming at her, demanding she tell him what it was. She told him she’d been informed, on good authority, that he’d robbed his first wife and been involved in her death.’
Kate hugged herself. ‘She didn’t pull any punches! But then I did tell her not to hold back. She was very brave.’
‘I’m appalled at both of you! It could have been handled without putting either of you in danger. As it was, poor Aunt Violet had a water pitcher thrown at her head. It missed, but she ended up very, very wet and she tells me her mauve silk dress will never be the same!’
Kate burst into laughter, which she quickly stifled when she saw Martin’s expression turn deadly serious.
‘I’m making fun of the dear old thing, but really it’s not at all funny. She could have been seriously hurt. Fortunately, she wasn’t alone.’
‘Who was with her?’
‘Me! I turned up just as the pitcher hit the wall.’
‘Did he say anything to you?’
‘I’m not sure he even registered who I was, he was in such a mad rage.’
