Tara

by Lesley Pearse

  The Empire, Leicester Square, on New Year's Eve 1945 was packed solid with revellers, and Amy Randall was overwhelmed by it all.

  Everyone looked so sophisticated. So many of the men were in uniform – soldiers, sailors, airmen and Royal Marines. Recently demobbed men in those all-too-obvious ill-fitting suits danced cheek to cheek with marcel-waved girls. A huge mirrored globe turned slowly on the ceiling, making snowflake patterns on bare arms and dark suits. Smells of scent, lavender hair oil, starched shirts and cigarettes mingled with the sounds of the big swing band, lifting her into a new world of intense excitement.

  'Stop looking like a scared rabbit!' Flossie shook her arm. 'Let's have a drink and eye up the fellas.'

  Amy was fifteen, a seamstress at Modern Modes in Aldgate, and two older workmates, Flossie and Irene, had insisted she came with them to see the New Year in.

  They looked like film stars. Flossie, with her dyed-red hair curled and swept to one side like Ava Gardner, wore a tight green satin dress that showed off her voluptuous figure. Irene had a red crepe dress with padded shoulders and flattering niching across her curvaceous hips. Her black curls shone like tar under the spinning globe, and black pencilled eyebrows gave her a permanently surprised look.

  Amy's mother would have had a fit if she could have seen her daughter in such company. Girls like Irene and Flossie who came from Cable Street were sluts or worse. But she believed Amy was babysitting for her employer in Stoke Newington, staying the night in his guest room, not sharing a bed with Flossie in a rooming house down by the docks.

  'What do you want to drink, then, Amy?' Flossie leaned closer and shouted above the music. 'A drop of gin to liven you up?'

  Amy had been staring at the band, watching the fifteen men in white tuxedos swaying with their instruments, but as Flossie spoke she saw him.

  He was leaning on the bar, one foot up on the brass rail, talking to another soldier, and Amy's heart lurched dangerously. He could have been Clark Gable. The same shiny black hair, dark brooding eyes, a small moustache over a wide smiling mouth and even the cleft chin.

  'Steady on, girl.' Flossie's eyes travelled to where Amy was looking. 'Don't try to run before you can walk, he's a bit old for you!'

  Amy was a small, slender girl in a childish blue dress with a sweetheart neck, blonde hair curled and loose on her shoulders, wearing her first-ever pair of nylons and a borrowed pair of shoes, in a place she wasn't even old enough to be. But as the man turned and smiled at her, she knew nothing would ever be the same again.

  Her mother had told her a thousand times how dangerous men were. They told girls lies to get their way with them, then ditched them as soon as they'd got what they wanted. She'd pointed out girls with swollen bellies and frightened Amy half to death with terrible stories about what could happen to a girl who let herself get into that situation. But as he stood up straight, smiled and held out his hand, she forgot everything her mother had told her.

  'I'm Bill MacDonald. Can I buy you a drink, have a dance, anything so you'll stay with me?'

  Maybe if she'd had some experience of men she would've laughed at that line and doubted its sincerity. But instead his words went straight to her heart.

  She didn't know how to dance, but somehow she managed it in his arms. His hand on her waist gave her the funniest feeling inside, and his deep voice gave her goose-bumps of pleasure.

  He did most of the talking. He told her he'd just got back from the Far East and that he came from Grafton Buildings in Limehouse. Then she remembered why his face seemed so familiar. She'd read about him in the local paper, he was the sergeant who'd escaped with six of his men after being captured by the Japanese. Without any weapons or provisions, his survival tactics had kept his men alive. For two months they'd trekked through dense jungle, bitten alive by mosquitoes, delirious with fever, wounds turning septic, but somehow Bill managed to lead them back to the coast where they were rescued by some Americans. He just laughed about that, made out it was like a Sunday-school picnic.

  'Any man would have done the same.' He shrugged his wide shoulders and grinned. 'It's what I was trained for. Anyway, the newspaper exaggerated it.'

  Flossie and Irene were with two of his friends, but Bill monopolised Amy. He asked her about her job, her home and sympathised because her father had died.

  'One of my brothers copped it there, too. Ma's still cut up about it. Mind you, she thought I'd bought it, too. Got the letter to say I'd been captured, then the Red Cross couldn't trace me so everyone reckoned I'd died and been buried somewhere on the march. She got the shock of her life when she heard I was coming home!'

  Bill had everything – looks, charm and yet a sensitivity which made her skin prickle.

  She knew the part of Limehouse he came from only by reputation; knew it had slum dwellings that made Durward Street look almost desirable. When he spoke of wanting more than what he'd been brought up with, she guessed at the grimness and poverty of his childhood.

  'I want a clean life now. Green fields, fresh air and space. I've seen enough crowded bars, fighting and drinking. I want a girl like you, Amy.'

  He told her he'd once had a pet rabbit called Alice.

  'You remind me of her.' He smiled, his perfect white teeth brilliant against skin still tanned from the Far East. 'She was so nervous when I first got her, she would buck and squeak to get away. But I kept stroking her, talking to her all soft and gentle, and eventually she'd come to me of her own accord, and lie in my arms like a cat.'

  At midnight, the whole dance hall went crazy. A huge net of balloons was dropped from the ceiling, hooters went off, whistles blew and streamers flew through the air. Among all the popping balloons and people singing' Auld Lang Syne', Bill kissed her for the first time.

  He held her face in his hands and stooped to kiss her, his lips gentle, yet with an underlying strength that suggested he was biding his time.

  'I knew as soon as I saw you,' he whispered. 'You're my girl, Amy. I just know it.'

  Irene disappeared, and Bill's friend had to shoot off to pick up a lift to go home to Yorkshire, so Bill took her and Flossie home in a taxi. It was foggy as they got out in Cable Street. A lone lamp on the street corner sent out a murky yellow light, heightening the menace of the old railway arches and bombed houses like broken teeth.

  'Don't you keep her out here long,' Flossie warned Bill, waving a reproving finger at him as she pointed out her room in the house. 'She's only a kid.'

  Amy didn't feel like a kid when he kissed her again. He put his arms around her under her thin coat, and pulled her tightly against his hard body, his lips touching hers with such passion and sweetness that she never wanted the moment to end.

  'This is no place to make love to a princess,' he said softly against her neck. 'You're so little and so beautiful, Amy. There's got to be a place for us somewhere.'

  Amy stirred in her chair.

  'Here's a cup of tea, Mum.' Tara was leaning over her. 'Were you asleep or just daydreaming?'

  'I don't know,' Amy replied. She wasn't pleased to be brought back to the present. She wanted to stay in Bill's arms, keep inside her the wonderful elation of being in love.

  'Gran suggested I brought out your embroidery.' Tara opened the half-finished tablecloth to show her. 'You wanted to get it done in time for Christmas, but you never managed it.'

  Amy obediently took the cloth on to her lap, but made no attempt to examine it. She had embroidered so many altar cloths, vestments, even church banners. Back in 1946, just days after she'd met Bill, that was what mother had her doing night after night until her fingers were sore.

  Amy picked up her tea and sipped at it.

  She was in the parlour at Durward Street. On her lap was a red altar cloth, and she was stitching gold crowns along the edge.

  It was icy outside. When she came in she had to put her hands in warm water to thaw them out, and all there was for tea was Spam and bread and marg. There ought to have been enough money for good food now s
he was on higher wages, but Mother just gave the extra to the church.

  The parlour was austere. She remembered it being bright with colour and cluttered with knick-knacks when her father was alive, but her mother had swept away all reminders of the frivolous past. No piano hid the damp patch now, all her mother's water-colours had been burned, with only dark patches of wallpaper to show where they'd been. The china shepherd and shepherdess on the mantelpiece that her mother once laughingly put together 'for a kiss' were long gone, replaced with a jam jar holding a few spills to light the fire. All the framed photographs of her parents had been burned. There had been one of her mother in a long fringed dress, a long cigarette holder in her hand; another of her father in top-hat and tails, taken at a race meeting. Now there was only the one of Arthur Randall in uniform, taken just six months before he was killed. The frame was draped in black crepe and her mother polished the glass every day.

  The room badly needed redecorating. The wallpaper had once been a light beige with small roses, but now it was brown with vaguely pink blobs, and the coal fire had turned the ceiling dark brown. Everything else was scrupulously clean – the lace chair-backs were washed almost weekly, the hearth rug taken out and bashed with the bamboo beater daily. A dark green chenille cloth covered the round table in the window. On it stood an aspidistra in a glazed brown pot, and the Bible.

  Mabel read her passages every night while she sewed, but tonight for some reason she hadn't picked it up and instead sat in her chair looking into the fire.

  Amy was dreaming of Bill. Each time she closed her eyes and thought of his kisses a tremor of bliss ran through her.

  'What on earth are you doing?'

  Amy started as her mother's stern voice woke her from her reverie.

  'Look at the mess you've made of that one.' Mabel reached forward and snatched the altar cloth from her hands. 'You'll have to unpick it, it's all crooked.'

  Amy looked down. To her surprise it was a mess, with loops of embroidery silk sticking out all over the place.

  'The light's so bad,' she said weakly, glancing up at the gas light above the parlour table. 'And I'm tired.'

  She started work at Modern Modes at seven-thirty and tonight she hadn't arrived home till nearly seven. Of course she hadn't been working all that time, but she didn't dare tell her mother that Bill had met her outside work at five-thirty – just an hour to hold hands, kiss and talk, yet it seemed like five minutes. Tomorrow he was going back to camp as his leave was up and she didn't know how long it would be before she saw him again.

  'If you're so tired you'd better get to bed,' Mabel snapped at her. 'It seems to me, though, that you're getting into bad company in that workshop. I've a good mind to come along and have a word with Mr Cohen.'

  'I don't get into any company,' Amy said quickly. 'I'm the youngest, no-one talks to me much. I've told you that before.'

  As soon as she was sixteen in April she'd own up about Bill, but until then she'd better keep her mother sweet.

  Amy was never sure how she felt about her mother. Love and hate, fear and affection were all mixed together and at different times each one struggled for supremacy. She accepted having to hand over her entire wages each week, yet she resented never being allowed to have any fun. She still felt bitter about her terrifying experiences during the Blitz, although she understood her mother had been through some kind of breakdown.

  The girls at work said she should pack her bags and leave. Neighbours said she should stand up for herself. But Amy's compliance was partly due to the belief that, now the War was over, Mother would put aside her religious fervour and regain her old personality.

  She went off to bed then, glad to be alone so she could dream about Bill. She had fallen in love with him completely and he with her, and every moment away from him was torture. Just lying in bed thinking about him made her pulse race and a hot flush creep all over her body. He was twenty-five, and experienced with women, yet despite his background he was a gentleman. Not once had he tried on anything that frightened or embarrassed her. The truth was that if an opportunity arose where they could be alone, somewhere warm, then she knew that it would be she who would forget herself. Only tonight he had slid his hand inside her blouse while they were kissing. As his fingers squeezed her nipple she found herself pressing hard to him, understanding perfectly well what that hard lump in his trousers was, even though no-one had ever explained such things to her.

  They had written to each other secretly for almost a year while Bill was in Germany. During that time Bill urged her continuously to tell her mother the truth and prepare her for when he was demobbed.

  It was late November in 1946 when he finally came home and she remembered so well that reconciliation when he took her to see Gone with the Wind.

  'I'm coming round tomorrow night, when you get back from church,' he insisted. 'I didn't come through fighting the Japs just to cower before your mother, Amy. I love you. I want to marry you. Where's the shame in that?'

  But Bill didn't know what her mother was like. She saw all men as representatives of the devil, ready to draw girls into evil. She even seemed to have forgotten she ever loved her husband.

  In church on Sunday evening Amy offered up frantic prayers for support when Bill arrived. They had only been indoors long enough for Amy to rake the fire into life again and put the kettle on when the knock came on the front door.

  'Who on earth can that be?' her mother snapped, getting up from her armchair. Amy froze in the kitchen, praying silently. She heard the heavy wool curtain swish back, the bolts drawn and the door creak open.

  'Good evening, Mrs Randall,' she heard Bill say. 'I'm a friend of Amy's. Might I have a word with you?'

  Amy took a peep round the door, her heart in her mouth and her legs turning to jelly. Bill was wearing his dark grey demob suit and a striped tie, his hair neatly slicked down.

  'Amy?' Mabel turned towards her daughter with a look of consternation. 'Do you know this man?'

  Amy patted her hair and took a deep breath.

  'Yes, mother, this is Bill MacDonald, he called on Mr Cohen the other day.'

  Bill's lips were set in a strained smile, and he held out a bunch of chrysanthemums.

  'These are for you, Mrs Randall. I wanted your permission to ask your daughter out.'

  If Amy hadn't been so frightened she might have laughed at Bill's demeanour. He was speaking correctly as if born to it, the polite, slightly servile smile more in keeping with a man in a hatter's than a tough docker's son from Limehouse just out of the Army. Mabel took the flowers and opened the door wider.

  'You'd better come in.'

  Amy quickly made the tea, adding another cup for Bill, but her hands shook so much the tray rattled as she carried it in.

  Bill made the parlour seem tiny. He looked even bigger in a suit than in his uniform. The wide reveres made his shoulders huge, his white shirt accentuated his golden skin and his neat moustache added a note of distinction to his fine bone structure. He stood awkwardly, twisting the brim of his hat in his hands.

  'Take Amy out?' Mabel sat down heavily by the fire. 'She's much too young for that.'

  'She's sixteen.' Bill shrugged his shoulders and his easy smile showed perfect white teeth. 'My mother was married then.'

  'Sit down,' Amy whispered to him, guessing her mother would never suggest it. Bill sat on the edge of the couch.

  'I've just been demobbed,' he said. 'I'm taking a job as a motor mechanic, starting tomorrow.'

  'How old are you?' Mabel spun round in her seat, fixing her eyes on Bill.

  'Twenty-five.' He smiled warmly, dark eyes fixed on her mother's face. 'I wouldn't keep her out late or give you anything to worry about.'

  A chilling silence fell. Amy poured the tea and passed it round, guessing what her mother was thinking. Why hadn't Amy said something about this young man? Why the haste to call on her at home?

  Bill's hands looked too big for the dainty cup. He held it awkwardly, but kept his e
yes resolutely on her mother.

  'Please, Mum,' Amy whispered.

  Still no answer. Mabel's mouth was pursed and her back stiff with disapproval.

  Bill was shocked. He had prepared himself for a frail old lady, imagined himself overcoming her resistance with charm and chatter. But Mrs Randall was an attractive woman who didn't look a day over forty, despite her black clothes and her hair scraped back off her face. Those strange amber eyes worried him, though, they were studying him minutely, and he felt she'd already decided he was lower than a cockroach. His eyes wandered to the black draped photograph of her husband in uniform.

  'I'm so sorry about your husband. The War took a great many good men. My brother was killed at Dunkirk, too. I know how you must feel.'

  For a moment Amy thought Bill had found the right opener, his remark was so kind and sincere it was bound to touch her mother's heart.

  Mabel turned her head slowly towards him, studying his face intently.

  'Get out, you snake in the grass,' she hissed suddenly. 'I don't need to be patronised. I know what you're after.'

  Bill's face turned pale. 'I'm not after anything, I just want to take Amy out.'

  'Don't use that tone with me,' Mabel screeched. 'My daughter will not be going out with anyone.'

  'Mum, please.' Amy dropped on to the floor in front of her mother's chair and grasped her hands. 'I want to see Bill, but I want it with your blessing.'

  'You hussy,' Mabel dragged her hand from under Amy's and slapped her hard across the face. 'How long has this been going on?'

  'Don't hit her!' Bill was on his feet instantly, knocking his tea on to the floor in his haste. 'I only came back from Germany last week, we've done nothing to be ashamed of.'

  Amy moved back from her mother in horror, holding a hand over her stinging face. Mabel's eyes blazed insanely, the corners of her mouth twitching as if she were possessed. Had Amy seen sadness or fear she might have felt sympathy, but instead all that sprang to her mind was how much misery this woman had put her through.

  'I will go out with Bill,' she shouted. 'If I'm old enough to work, then I'm old enough to choose my friends. I'm not going to stay here alone with you and end up an old maid.'