Jam and Roses

by Mary Gibson

  She slammed the kitchen door behind her and Mrs Colman began to cry, Milly suspected more out of frustration than hurt, then Marie joined in, and Jimmy poked his head out from under the table. He had pulled the saucepan tight down over his ears and now emerged as though from a bomb shelter.

  ‘Mummy, Jimmy want to go home!’

  Milly did too.

  After reassuring her mother and soothing Marie, she set off for Stork’s Road, looking forward to the peace of her own home. When she arrived, Bertie was already back. Sitting in his chair by the dimly glowing fire, he looked up at her as she came in, with Marie in the crook of her arm and holding Jimmy’s hand. She noticed there were two Seville oranges on the kitchen table. He smiled. ‘Ah, there’s my beautiful girl, you’re late!’

  ‘Oh, there was a to-do with Amy.’

  Bertie got up to help her with the children. ‘What’s she done now?’

  ‘Hoppin’ the wag and going to the soup kitchens, and Mum thought the soup kitchen was the worst of it!’

  ‘Well, it’s not something we’d want for our two, is it?’ he said, lifting Jimmy for a kiss. ‘Think how she must feel, living off charity.’ He looked down at his black boots.

  ‘Oh, don’t look so glum. Everyone’s in the same boat,’ she said briskly.

  ‘But don’t you see how guilty we feel, Milly? All of us, not just your mother. We’re all sponging off you!’

  He put Jimmy down and reached out for an orange. ‘Here, this is all I’ve got to show for a day hanging about at the docks, two oranges! A boy with a barrow load tossed them my way while I was waiting for the call on. I didn’t earn a penny today.’

  He sat back down. ‘Oh, Milly, this is not what I wanted for you.’ He rubbed his forehead. She lay Marie down on a blanket next to Jimmy and, exhausted as she was from her own day at the factory, she went to comfort him, putting her arms round him.

  ‘It’s all right, Bertie, you know, it’s easier for the likes of me. I’ve been brought up to work hard, I don’t expect anything else. I’m not one of your Dulwich ladies. Tough as old boots, me!’ She tried to make him laugh, but the familiar whimsical look refused to be conjured.

  ‘That’s tosh and you know it. There was a time you had dreams of being something different than a jam girl; it’s just you had to ditch them earlier than most.’

  He was looking down at Jimmy, who was trying to interest Marie in her rattle. Milly didn’t like this bitterness; it wasn’t like him. She wished she could explain to Bertie just why his luck at the docks had been so bad of late, but it was something she would rather he never knew. For Barrel had told her it was Pat Donovan’s doing, but the boy had also assured her he knew a way to stop him. He had asked her only to be patient. She straightened up.

  ‘The oranges will come in handy. I’ll take one to Mum’s tomorrow.’

  Not that Milly felt like handling oranges; she spent her days up to her elbows in the bitter fruits. She was sick of the sight of them.

  Milly hadn’t repeated last year’s painful visit to Elsie. Her mother reported that she seemed resigned to her life in the asylum and had refused to listen whenever Mrs Colman suggested there might be a chance of her getting out of Stonefield when she reached eighteen. Milly tried to put Elsie out of her mind altogether. She’d once vowed that she would get her sister out of the asylum or die trying, but all her attempts had failed and she blamed herself for not doing more.

  It was the beginning of spring when she was forced to think about Elsie again. Milly and Bertie had been invited to Kitty Bunclerk’s wedding. Her friend was apologetic, she would have liked Milly to be bridesmaid, but as she explained, with so many sisters who wanted that honour, there simply wouldn’t have been room enough in the aisle for them all. So instead she asked Milly to be one of her witnesses.

  The service was at Dockhead Church, and though Freddie wasn’t a Catholic, he had easily been persuaded on that point. His sister Nellie and her small family sat on one side of the church and the extended Bunclerk clan packed out the other. Milly noticed that the Clark side nervously looked at the Bunclerk side throughout the service for their cues as to standing, sitting and genuflecting. Afterwards in the Folly, where there were drinks and sandwiches for all the guests, there was no such confusion, and both families mingled happily. Freddie looked handsome, with his fair hair neatly swept back, and a new suit showing off his impressive physique. Milly thought he looked more like a film star than a lorry driver, and she was pleased for her friend because Freddie clearly adored Kitty. The only awkwardness in the whole affair was that Pat had been invited too.

  She found herself looking away whenever there was any danger that their eyes might meet, and throughout the day he had seemed as careful as she was to avoid any contact. Now she had wedged herself behind a table with Bertie and a few of the jam girls, hoping that, here, she could enjoy the rest of the evening without bumping into him. But it was Bob Clark, Freddie’s brother, who came over to them.

  ‘Milly, can I have a word?’ He leaned over, a little unsteadily she thought, for he’d obviously counteracted his best man’s nerves with a few pints before and after the ceremony.

  Bertie, deep in conversation about the slow retail trade with Peggy Dillon’s butcher, looked at her enquiringly as he moved his chair to let her pass. Bob led her nervously to the side of the bar. Milly knew that Bob still worked at Stonefield and she could only assume there was news of Elsie. The young man pulled anxiously at his tie and carefully put his glass on the bar. His hand, holding the pint glass, was trembling a little, and Milly, suddenly alarmed, imagined the worst.

  ‘Is it about Elsie? Has she had an accident?’

  He put his hand on her arm. ‘No, nothing like that. Honest, there’s nothing to worry about, but... well, I know she gave you the cold shoulder last time you visited, but I just wanted to say, don’t give up on her. She needs her family more than she lets on.’

  He seemed so uncomfortable she felt sorry for him, but she was glad too that he seemed to care about her sister’s well-being.

  ‘Bob, I’ve tried with her. There were good reasons why I couldn’t visit, but she seems harder on me than anyone. She never gives me an inch!’

  A small smile played on his face. He wasn’t so robust or handsome as his brother, but he had intelligent, gentle eyes which put her at ease.

  ‘I don’t want to put you in an awkward position, but...’ He blushed. ‘If you could just stick by her, she’s going to need you, whatever she says now.’

  ‘Of course I’ll stick by her. She’s my sister after all, and you can tell her that from me, if you like.’

  He smiled, thanking her and looking relieved as he went back to join the Clark table. Milly wished it hadn’t been such an ordeal for the shy young man to speak to her. God knows what tales Elsie must have told him about her, but she let herself be comforted by the idea that her sister had a friend in that awful place. She sighed and went looking for Bertie.

  Her mother had offered to look after the children, insisting she and Bertie should have a night out enjoying themselves. Milly had been looking forward to having Bertie to herself for once. But when she returned to their table, she found it deserted. Bertie and the butcher had gone to the bar, while Peggy and the other jam girls were dancing to the latest jazz song that Maisie was belting out on the piano. The glass of beer on top of the piano jumped and slopped, and the floorboards of the old pub bounced to the rhythm of the Charleston. Milly sat down at the empty table, watching them with a smile on her face, when a handful of beefy constables came crashing through the old door of the Folly. One constable blew a whistle, while the other lunged across the small dance floor, scattering jam girls and bringing down Pat Donovan in a rugby tackle. Wedding guests grabbed their beers and cleared out of the way as more police piled on top of Pat, who was screaming, ‘Yer breaking me fuckin’ arm!’

  As the police hustled Pat to his feet, he kept his head low, but at the doorway he turned suddenly and grinned a
t her. ‘See you in a couple of years!’

  But she heard the constable holding him mutter, ‘You’ll be lucky to get away with ten for this one, Patsy.’

  And out of the corner of her eye, Milly noticed a face peering through the grimy pub window. Barrel grinned at her, winked, then ducked out of sight.

  Suddenly Bertie was at her side. ‘Strike me dumb, that’s livened things up!’ he said, putting his arm round her, and Milly leaned against him, filled with relief that Pat and his money could no longer do Bertie any harm.

  The proceedings seemed to have given new life to the evening. Guests rearranged tables and chairs, glasses were refilled, Maisie started up on the piano, and soon the story was passing from table to table. It seemed that the police had raided the Donovans’ on a tip-off, and found several thousand pounds of stolen banknotes and two handguns, hidden in the outside lavatory. ‘The beauty of it was,’ Barrel told her later, ‘old Ma Donovan was sitting on the privy at the time!’

  That year Amy started work. Her dream of making moisturizer and California Poppy perfume did not come true. Atkinson’s was laying off women, not taking them on. With money scarce, housewives were choosing to buy cheap bread and jam to feed their families, rather than cosmetics. So Southwell’s didn’t turn Amy away, and she became a jam girl, just like Milly. In the end, she was glad of the seven shillings and sixpence a week. Seven shillings went to her mother; the extra sixpence, more than she’d ever had to spend on herself, she kept. Amy seemed to flourish outside school. The jam girls appreciated the rebellious ways that had scandalized the nuns, and soon her wicked impressions of the foremen made her even more popular.

  Milly had taken Amy to Southwell’s on her first day, showing her the cloakroom, standing next to her on the picking line, showing her how to sharpen the knife, teaching her what fruit was good enough to go into the jam and what needed to be discarded. Though Amy soon baulked at being in Milly’s shadow and switched to a team of her own friends, she and Milly would still walk to and from work together, and one evening as they returned to Arnold’s Place, Amy broached an idea.

  ‘Look at the state of this frock, Mill. I need more than sixpence a week if I’m going to look decent,’ she began. ‘And all my mates can afford to buy make-up and face cream. Look at me. I look like a bleedin’ nun!’ She pointed to her unmade-up face.

  Milly knew she’d started to go out in the evenings with other jam girls and she’d seen her a few times in make-up borrowed from them. Her sister had turned from a street urchin into a burgeoning flapper almost overnight, and was relishing the new role.

  ‘It’s hard, love, but Mum needs every penny, you know that.’

  Her mother, as she had threatened, now joined Milly for an early morning office-cleaning stint. Jam and chars were always in demand it seemed, and while jobs for men were disappearing, lower-paid women were holding on to theirs. Many more men were to be seen around Arnold’s Place during the day as unemployed men stayed at home, looking after the children, while the women worked.

  ‘Yes, I know that. I don’t want to keep any more of me wages. I was just thinking perhaps there’s a way I could help make more money on your clothes sales.’ The two sisters cut down tiny Farthing Lane and crossed Wolseley Street, rounding Hickman’s Folly.

  ‘How would you do that?’ Milly asked, not quite seeing how Amy, who was all thumbs when it came to sewing, could help.

  ‘Remember that time you bought a load of shirts from the wholesaler over the City?’

  Milly nodded. ‘It made me a bit extra, but I just haven’t had the time to go back to De Jong’s. I’ve got to rush home for my shift after the charring. And then there’s the outlay to think of.’

  ‘Well, I was thinking I could go to De Jong’s Saturday afternoons for you... and I’ve got a bit put by I could use for outlay.’

  Milly looked at her sister in astonishment. ‘A bit put by! When did you ever have any money to put by?’

  ‘Christmas sixpences and that...’ Her sister blushed as Milly scrutinized her. ‘And I used to run errands for Mrs Carney.’

  Milly wasn’t sure she’d got all the truth, but daren’t probe further, for fear she might hear something about the neighbours’ gas meters.

  ‘So how much have you got?’

  ‘Five pounds.’

  ‘Five pounds! How long have you been saving up?’

  ‘Oh, ages, I was keeping it for me escape fund, in case the old man ever come back.’

  How was it possible to live in the same house as someone for all those years and never really know them? She had to give it to Amy – she might have been the smallest of the set of jugs, but she was definitely the canniest.

  ‘Well, we could all do with the extra money... all right then, go and buy half a dozen shirts, but I can’t afford to hire a stall this week.’

  As they turned into Arnold’s Place Amy grew more animated. ‘I’m not just talking about shirts. I thought I’d get a couple of men’s suits as well while I’m there. How many men do you know can afford a new suit straight off? But they might be able to pay two bob a week!’

  ‘But you’re talking about sixty bob for a suit, that’s all your money gone and more.’

  ‘No, it’d be nearer thirty wholesale, we could sell them for fifty-five and nearly double our money!’

  ‘But if they paid back two bob a week, we wouldn’t make anything for ages.’

  ‘Not on the suit, but the shirts wouldn’t take so long and the money from your clothes would tide us over.’

  ‘And what about the stall?’

  ‘We don’t even need one! We’d run it like a clothing club, Mill. We’ll just tell Mrs Carney and the neighbours’ll be round to Mum’s the next day, asking what we’ve got!’

  Milly was trying to find something wrong with Amy’s plan, but she really couldn’t see any flaws. Amy had the money just sitting there and with her father long gone, there was no need for escape from anything except poverty.

  ‘Well, love, you said that money you’ve been saving was for your escape fund. Looks like we’ll all be escaping with you!’

  30

  Daughters of the Flood

  January 1928

  It was a steel-grey January morning in 1928. Milly had been up all night listening to a storm tearing over the rooftops and heavy rain beating on windows. That morning, peering out of the front-parlour window, she was alarmed to see a small river rushing down the road, overflowing the gutters with murky bubbling water. Bertie came to join her at the window and advised her to wait before leaving for work. In spite of her venture with Amy into the clothing club, she still desperately needed the eighteen shillings a week from Southwell’s, and she wouldn’t jeopardize that by being late, whatever the weather.

  The Common Thread Clothing Club, as the sisters had decided to call it, had grown during the summer of last year, and by Christmas it had become a surprising life-saver, not only for Milly and her family, but also for many of the residents of Dockhead who’d been saved from the shame of being without a new suit for weddings or funerals. Many young factory boys had cause to bless the Common Thread too: those who’d worn ragged shorts to school were able to start work with a new pair of long trousers, or a hard-wearing working man’s jacket. Mrs Carney was proving to be an excellent saleswoman and was paid in kind for getting the word out, either with a bottle of gin or a made-to-measure dress from Milly. Amy’s five pounds was soon doubled and their profits, though small and intermittent, had been the difference between staying above the breadline or dipping below it into a life of misery and handouts. Bertie with his shopkeeping experience was the one who kept the books and opened a bank account in the name of the clothing club, and soon Milly had enough for a monthly stall as well.

  She never ceased to be amazed that it was madcap Amy who had made it possible. True, it had needed her own desperation and skill with a needle to launch the endeavour in the first place, but without Amy’s nous and her escape fund, it would have stayed a me
re life raft, instead of an ark to float them all above the floods of privation. They weren’t quite up on the mountain top yet, but Milly was hopeful that one day soon the dove would return with an olive branch and they would all reach dry land.

  She threw on her mac and tucked the children warmly into the pram, with the hood up and the waterproof cover on. As she set off for Arnold’s Place, the rain seemed to be easing, but at Jamaica Road she was brought up short at the edge of the pavement. She had to wipe rain from her eyes to make sure she was seeing properly, for spreading out before her, as far as she could see, was a vast sheet of water. Olive-green and evil-smelling, it blocked her way at every turn, all the way across Jamaica Road and beyond, into the low-lying riverside streets. The whole of Dockhead seemed to have turned into a flood plain. She looked around to see what other people were doing and began to run with the pram to the end of Jamaica Road, searching for any way across. Many people in the same predicament began wading out into the road, shouting encouragement to those on the pavement to follow them. She was wearing her wellington boots, so with no thought but to get to Arnold’s Place, she pushed the pram forward. Soon the water was halfway up the pram’s big front wheels and as she pushed further out, she was alarmed to see the water getting even deeper. Now it had reached the top of the wheels and the pram was in danger of turning into a boat. She couldn’t risk going further; she had to turn back. Quickly pulling the pram back the way she’d come, she suddenly felt the swirl of the current tugging at the pram wheels. What a fool she’d been to blindly follow the others! She yanked at the pram handle, desperate to get back on to the dry side of the road, fighting the surging current with all her strength till she was back at the kerbside. Shaking with exertion and relief, she checked the children, making sure no water had found its way into the pram. Trying to quieten her panic, she stood still, breathing deeply, forcing herself to stop and think. But she could see no way through the flood to Arnold’s Place. Opposite her was Neckinger Street, named after the lost river that had once run into St Saviour’s Dock. For generations, the river had been nothing but a subterranean stream, running deep beneath Dockhead. Now, overnight, it seemed to have risen once more to the surface.