by Daisy Styles
‘There’s tea in the pot and the last of a tin of corned beef,’ Maggie called from the sitting room in a ‘take it or leave it’ voice.
Seeing Rosa with Maggie and Nora, who were sitting by the wood-burner smoking and drinking tea, Julia confined herself to the cold kitchen, where she made a corned-beef sandwich with two slices of dry white bread, which she hungrily ate with the strong black tea topped up with sterilized milk. Still hungry, but knowing there was nothing else left to eat, Julia slumped into her cold single bed, where she clamped her teeth tightly together to stop herself from shivering. With her feet pressed up against the scalding, heavy stone hot-water bottle, Julia muttered miserably under her bare bedding, ‘You’re back on the bomb line – damn well deal with it.’
Walking down the cobbled lane to clock on for her shift the following morning, Julia (self-consciously tagging slightly behind Rosa, Maggie and Nora) noticed green shoots sprouting up in Maggie’s allotment. She also saw and heard Polly the pig, rounder and fatter than ever, and squealing ecstatically at the sight of her friends. Nora as usual hurried over to chat to the pig and tickle her long pink ears before running to catch up with Maggie.
‘How are the wedding plans progressing?’ Julia inquired when she and Kit were sitting side by side at their bench in the filling shed.
Kit gave her a long, inquiring look. ‘You could ask Maggie yourself,’ she said pointedly.
Julia gave a shrug. ‘I think we both know that Maggie wouldn’t be too keen to chat through her wedding plans with me,’ she answered bluntly.
Kit paused to pick up gunpowder from the tray in front of her, and, as she rolled and smoothed the powder with her small, blackened fingertips, she said, ‘With not many weeks to go to the big day I’d say it’s going less than well.’
Julia looked up, surprised. ‘From what I saw on the allotment this morning, Maggie’s vegetables are doing well, and that pig of hers is fatter than ever.’
‘But the wedding dress hasn’t worked out,’ Kit said. ‘Maggie was borrowing one from the tall, dark-haired girl in the dispatch room, but it got ruined by moths, and poor Maggie’s distraught,’ Kit said with a sad sigh. ‘I feel sorry for the lass; after all her grand talk it looks like she’ll be wearing her best Sunday suit on her wedding day.’
Julia’s thoughts flew to Mildred’s white silk-and-lace dress, which was presently doing the rounds in London. She hadn’t planned to say anything just yet, but maybe here was her chance.
‘I do know somebody who might lend her a dress,’ she said cautiously.
Kit looked up from the file she was filling. ‘Really? But would it fit?’
Julia nodded. ‘My friend’s roughly the same size and height as Maggie, maybe an inch taller, and she’s big busted like Maggie too.’
‘That’s wonderful!’ Kit exclaimed. ‘Why don’t you suggest it, then?’
Julia blushed. ‘I don’t think Maggie would welcome charity from a “toff” like me,’ she answered.
Kit, who’d heard Nora and Maggie calling Julia a ‘toff’ and a ‘snob’ more times than she could count, nodded sympathetically. ‘I could mention it, if you like?’ she suggested.
Julia’s green eyes lit up with relief. ‘I think that’s a very good idea.’
A few days later, as they were setting the kitchen table for their tea, and Rosa was taking a bath, Maggie, who’d been edgy since she got in from work, surprised Julia by asking in a tight, embarrassed voice, ‘How was the filling shed today?’
Julia stared at her incredulously; if Maggie had informed her that she’d just circled the moon she couldn’t have been more flabbergasted. However, keeping her voice low, Julia managed a civil reply. ‘Oh, you know, same as ever.’
Maggie shuffled uncomfortably, then cast a nervous glance at Nora, who pulled a funny face. ‘Er …’ Maggie stammered.
Seeing that Maggie was having difficulty in getting to the point, Nora stepped in. ‘She’s got something to ask you,’ she said bluntly.
Julia knew what was coming but she waited, giving Maggie time to gather her wits, which she did when she finally asked the question all in one breath. ‘Kit tells me you know somebody who might lend me her wedding dress? Is it true?’
Continuing to lay the cutlery on the table, Julia couldn’t bring herself to look up, scarred as she was by weeks of rejection and hostility. ‘Yes, I do,’ was all she managed to say quietly in reply.
Unable to control her curiosity, Maggie, flushed with excitement, pulled out a wooden chair and sat down. ‘I can’t believe it!’ she gasped. ‘I never imagined you’d do something like this for me, not after …’ Her voice trailed away as she avoided saying, ‘Not after how rude we’ve been to you.’
An awkward pause followed in which Julia, undoubtedly pleased that Maggie had initiated the conversation but still lacking the confidence to respond with enthusiasm, nervously rattled the cutlery she was clutching. Maggie, on the other hand, was flushed and fizzing with enthusiasm. ‘Have you seen it? Do you know what it’s like?’ she eagerly asked.
Julia looked up at last. ‘I think I might have a photograph somewhere,’ she said, as she quickly laid down the last of the cutlery before moving off to her room. Once there, Julia leant against the closed door and panicked. ‘Oh, God!’ she breathed. ‘Have I done the right thing?’
The dress was very grand – would it be too grand for Maggie’s modest wedding? Would she upstage everybody by wearing such an expensive gown? Would they turn on her for being ‘posh’ and knowing ‘the right people’ and mock her as they had done in the past?
In the kitchen Nora too was having her doubts. Giving Maggie a sharp look, she muttered disapprovingly, ‘I hope you know what you’re getting yourself into?’ Casting a furtive look at Julia’s bedroom door to make sure she couldn’t be overheard, Nora whispered, ‘Are you sure you want to be indebted to Miss High and Mighty Julia on your wedding day?’
She stopped short when she heard approaching footsteps, and Julia returned holding the black-and-white photograph, which she handed hesitantly to Maggie. In the long pause that followed Julia held her breath. Would her generosity backfire and make her life in the cowshed even tougher?
But she needn’t have worried. Maggie gazed in rapt wonder at the photograph of Mildred’s wedding dress, and when she eventually managed to tear her big, blue eyes away from it she could only gasp, ‘Oh, Julia, it’s gorgeous! I can’t believe you would do this for me.’
Nora dashed to her friend’s side to inspect the photograph. ‘My God, it’s bloody lovely.’
Both girls turned – stunned – to a nervous Julia, who, feeling a little wobbly, quickly pulled out a chair so she could sit down.
‘Do you think your friend would really lend it to me?’ Maggie asked in a breathless voice.
‘She said she would,’ Julia replied calmly. ‘I could arrange to get it sent up here – as long as you’re sure it’s what you want?’
Unable to believe her luck, Maggie literally could not speak. Eventually, near to tears, she spluttered, ‘All my dreams have come true! How can I ever, ever thank you, Julia?’
The emotional silence that followed was broken by Nora, asking anxiously, ‘Do you think it will fit?’
‘They’re about the same size,’ Julia remarked. ‘That’s what gave me the idea in the first place. But if you need to make some minor adjustments I’m sure Mildred wouldn’t mind.’
Before she could even think about what she was doing, Maggie, completely overcome with emotion, threw herself into Julia’s arms and wept tears of gratitude on her shoulder. Quite overwhelmed by Maggie’s dramatic spontaneity, Julia was lost for words. She hadn’t made a mistake – far from it; she’d made a young bride-to-be very happy and seeing her joy filled Julia with sweet relief.
When Rosa walked into the kitchen after having her bath and drying her long, thick hair, which always took a tediously long time, she couldn’t believe the scene before her. What on earth was Julia doing clasping a weeping Maggie in her a
rms?
‘What’s going on?’ she demanded.
Julia instantly dropped hold of radiant Maggie, who told Rosa her good news. ‘Julia’s borrowed a beautiful wedding dress for me!’
Rosa simply couldn’t take it in; in the time she’d been in the bathroom Maggie and Julia had become as thick as thieves. Even Nora was smiling – and all because of a wedding dress! Scheming Julia had wrapped the gullible pair around her little finger; they seemed to have forgotten how she’d been betrayed by the very woman they were now talking to like a friend.
‘She’s going to get it posted up here,’ Maggie gabbled on.
Unable to hide her shock at her friends’ radically changed behaviour to the housemate they’d all previously agreed to loathe, Rosa turned away and hurried into her bedroom. Standing against the closed door, she realized with some irony that she and Julia had swapped roles: she was the one who’d slunk away, whilst now Julia was the one who stayed.
26. The Package!
Mildred, the good and generous soul that she was, faithfully kept her promise, and after her own wedding she parcelled up her bridal gown and sent it off to the address Julia had left with her. Once Maggie saw the large cardboard box wrapped in brown paper there was no holding her back.
‘It’s here, it’s arrived!’ she babbled to her friends, who’d all just clocked off and were bone weary.
Holding the precious parcel close to her chest like it was gold dust, she relished the moment; then, after asking Julia to unwrap the parcel, she tore off all her clothes apart from her bra and knickers. Trembling with awe, she held her breath as Julia slipped the white silk gown over her head, then gasped in delight as it slithered over her body and landed with a soft sensuous swish at her feet.
‘Oh, my God!’ Maggie exclaimed and promptly burst into floods of tears.
‘DON’T CRY!’ Nora screamed. ‘You’ll ruin your dress.’
Terrified of staining the pure silk with her salty tears, Maggie gulped hard to stop herself from weeping.
‘I’ve never seen anything like it in my life,’ she murmured as she gazed dreamily at herself in the mirror.
Meanwhile Julia was critically inspecting the dress from all angles. ‘The length’s good,’ she announced. ‘And it’s a perfect fit around the bust and shoulders,’ she added as she checked first the front of the bodice and then the back. ‘You might need to watch what you eat a bit in the next few weeks, Maggie,’ she said firmly. ‘It only just fits you on the hips.’
‘Are you saying my bum looks big?’ Maggie cried.
‘Not at all, it’s very shapely – Les will love it,’ Julia teased.
Nora, who was rummaging in the cardboard box, gave a loud yell, ‘Look at the veil!’
Nora reverently lifted the yards of veiling trimmed with Belgian lace, with a wreath of artificial blossom attached, and carefully arranged it over Maggie’s thick glossy hair, then stood back to admire the finished look.
‘You look like a princess,’ she murmured in wonder. ‘It could have been made for you – it’s just perfect.’ Turning round, she called out to Rosa, who was on the other side of the room building up the fire. ‘What do you think, Rosa?’
‘It’s lovely,’ Rosa agreed with a warm smile which didn’t extend as far as Julia, who was now urging Maggie to take off the dress and hang it up in her wardrobe so all the creases would drop out.
After she’d hung up her dress, Maggie returned to the sitting room, where Nora was pouring strong tea into pint-pot mugs for everybody.
‘It’s not fair!’ Nora protested. ‘Maggie will look like Princess Elizabeth in her posh white frock and I’ll look like her sodding secretary in my Sunday best suit!’
Seeing Nora’s stricken face, Julia couldn’t help but agree with her point of view; Maggie would indeed look breath-taking but really nobody had thought much about Nora, who was after all going to be chief bridesmaid at the ceremony. Hurrying into her bedroom she returned with the Vogue magazine she’d been keeping for the right moment.
‘Take a look at these,’ Julia said, handing Nora the magazine.
Total silence followed as both Maggie and Nora pored over the sumptuous magazine from the front page to the back. Eventually Nora gazed up at Julia and asked in complete innocence, ‘Do folks really live in a world like that?’
‘It’s a bit of a fairy-tale world,’ Julia agreed. ‘But some of the dresses are very nice.’
‘NICE?’ Nora cried. ‘They’re blinking smashing! I love this one,’ she said and pointed to a dress with tight-fitting sleeves and a fitted bodice from which flared a full skirt.
‘We could copy the pattern,’ Maggie said eagerly. ‘I’ve seen Mam draw dress patterns on sheets of newspaper.’
‘And what would be the point of that if we’ve got no material to work with?’ Nora asked forlornly.
Determined not to give up, Maggie thrummed her fingers on the arm of the sofa. ‘We could unpick the pink bridesmaids’ dresses that we wore for Kit’s wedding and reuse the material?’ Maggie suggested as she grabbed the magazine and scrutinized the design of the dress that Nora liked. ‘I’m sure we’d have enough material to make that.’
Nora still wasn’t convinced. ‘You know I’m no good at sewing,’ she reminded her friend.
‘Mam’s a really good sewer,’ Maggie insisted. ‘She’d help us.’
‘I could help with the hand-stitching,’ Rosa piped up.
‘And I’d do whatever I can to help,’ Julia volunteered.
‘So we have a plan!’ cried Maggie. ‘If we all pull together we can create a stylish new dress for Nora!’
Julia briefly caught Rosa’s eye and she knew they were both thinking the same thing: for Nora’s sake they would co-operate and work together, and for Maggie’s sake they would do it well.
27. The Family Visit
With everybody pitching in to make Nora a new dress, there was an unexpected happiness for Julia in working amicably alongside women she had previously avoided; but for Rosa it was different. She would keep to her work, do her best, not upset the apple cart, but, oh, the strain of being polite to Julia – apparently Maggie and Nora’s most favourite person in the world – nearly drove Rosa insane. If she heard Nora say one more time, ‘What do you think, Julia, should the train be longer or shorter?’ or ‘What would you do, Julia, have buttons or press-studs on the sleeves?’, Rosa really thought she might completely disgrace herself by saying something very rude and inappropriate.
It seemed to a cynical Rosa that Julia’s constant flow of bright ideas was a calculated ploy to pull the two gullible girls more tightly into her manipulative web. She certainly wasn’t fooled by Julia’s charms – quite the opposite – but for all her resentment Rosa kept tight-lipped. There wasn’t much to lighten the load these days. British Bomber Command were raging fury in the skies over Germany, but morale was low, people were tired and hungry, and though nobody ever said it there was always the gnawing worrying thought: ‘How long can we really carry on like this?’
No, Rosa thought, let Nora and Maggie enjoy themselves whilst they could, just so long as they didn’t expect her to join ‘The Julia Thorpe Appreciation Society’.
The timing for her to leave for Wiltshire was perfect: even though it was barely two days’ leave, Rosa was more than glad to pack her bag. In fact, she was so eager her previous nervousness about meeting Roger’s family faded away and she began to count the hours to her departure.
However, the train journey down South reawakened Rosa’s bitter resentment towards Julia, bringing back memories of her last disastrous trip when she got no further than London in her bid to find her brother because of Julia’s damned interference. Just thinking of her humiliating failure brought tears to Rosa’s eyes.
‘Come on, lass, give us a smile,’ said a cheery sailor who was sitting opposite Rosa. ‘Want a fag?’
After she’d gratefully accepted a Senior Service cigarette, which the sailor lit up for her, the young man said, ‘It ge
ts you like that sometimes, don’t it?’
Embarrassed that he’d noticed how upset she was, Rosa nodded.
‘I get emotional every time I think of my girlfriend in Doncaster,’ the sailor admitted. ‘I worry she might run off with some smart alec who dodged conscription,’ he confessed with a rueful smile.
Gazing into his honest open face, Rosa said reassuringly, ‘I think you’re worrying unnecessarily.’
The sailor smiled. ‘Glad you think so,’ he retorted gratefully.
The noisy arrival of several soldiers entering their compartment brought their conversation to a halt, and Rosa turned her attention to the changing landscape that was opening up to springtime. As the train travelled deeper into the countryside, newly leafed trees waved their boughs in the sunshine, and all along the railway embankments daffodils flashed bright and yellow. As her destination drew closer, Rosa, now in an empty compartment, took out her powder compact and examined her face in the tiny mirror.
‘Gosh! I’ve aged five years,’ she thought as she dabbed powder on the dark bags under her eyes.
Make-up improved her looks, as did combing her long, lustrous dark hair and applying red lipstick to her full pouting lips. Feeling more confident, Rosa reached for her suitcase in the overhead netted rack, then with butterflies swirling in her stomach she made her way along the corridor and disembarked. The minute she stepped on to the platform, Roger was at her side. Wrapping her in his strong arms, he drew Rosa close to his chest, where she inhaled the strong smell of soap and pipe tobacco.
‘Darling girl!’ he cried in delight, as he hugged her and kissed her over and over again. Tilting her smiling face up to his, he murmured tenderly, ‘You look wonderful.’
A rush of relief and happiness engulfed Rosa. ‘Yes!’ she thought, this was the man she had fallen in love with and agreed to marry; warm, open, laughing, strong and reliable Roger. She’d just had too long away from him – that was all.
‘It’s good to see you,’ she said, surprised at how much she really meant it.
