Young May Moon

by Sheila Newberry

  Then they spotted the large black taxicab blocking the road at the other end of the bridge.

  ‘That wasn’t there a minute ago!’ Pomona cried. ‘One of us will have to back up to let the other through.’

  The door of the taxi opened, and Carmen stepped out. She hurried towards the trap, arms outstretched. ‘Oh, I am in time!’ she declaimed dramatically. She had obviously left the hotel in a great hurry, for they could glimpse her nightdress hanging below the hem of her white mackintosh cape.

  It was Pomona who scrambled down to meet her, to be enveloped in her hug.

  ‘I have something I forgot to give you, May,’ Carmen said, over Pomona’s shoulder. ‘Please come and take it from me.’ She waved a parcel in one hand.

  May climbed down, then stood holding the donkey’s collar. ‘Thank you, but we must get on, Mum. Please ask the taxi to move back to where the road widens.’

  ‘You disappoint me,’ Carmen said. She kissed Pomona, then gave her the package. ‘You take it to her, she spurns my embrace!’

  ‘It’s just that I didn’t expect to see you …’ May began, when the cab door was flung wide again, and Carlos appeared.

  ‘What is the problem?’ he shouted. ‘I ask your mother to come, so I can persuade you that your future is with us, May. You must join us soon and carry on with your training.’

  May returned to the driving seat. She hoped she was out of reach there. ‘Go away, Carlos! Mum, I’m sorry I was short, but I did tell you my plans, didn’t I? I’m not going to change my mind! Pomona, get back in the trap. Mum, please speak to your driver now.’

  ‘Carlos, no!’ Carmen yelled instead. Carlos was hauling himself up on to the parapet, looming above the two girls in the trap.

  ‘I don’t come down, until you agree with me!’ He looked ridiculous in his red brocade dressing-gown over silk pyjamas, the legs of which were flapping in the wind. Incongruously, he wore his spats.

  ‘Help!’ Carmen called to the taxi driver. He joined them reluctantly.

  ‘You’ll have to pay for all this wasted time, madam.’

  Carlos stretched out a wavering hand, clutched at May’s shoulder as she sat in the high driving seat. ‘You are the young Carmen; you and I, we will be the new partners in the dance!’

  ‘Rubbish!’ May said angrily. ‘How dare you cast off my mother like that! She is the one with the real talent – there must be plenty of better guitarists in Spain! The flamenco is a dance for a woman, it needs years of practice, I’m only a girl and I’m not nearly good enough, maybe I never will be. Look how she handles the puppets – she’s a real artiste! Let me go!’ She nudged him to make him release his grip.

  Later, May would say that what happened next, was rather like a sequence in a Buster Keaton film. Carlos wobbled, arms flailing, lost his footing and plummeted down into the river below with an enormous splash.

  Carmen was screaming hysterically, and Pomona said urgently to May: ‘Let me jump in and save him – I’m the only one of us who can swim!’

  May found her voice at last, ‘No need for that, Pom! See, Bobby Blowers is just downriver in his boat – he’s been to the harbour for the early morning catch. He’s spotted Carlos and he’s rowing like mad to get to him.’

  ‘He’s not coming back in my motor,’ the taxi driver said. ‘Nor are you, madam. I’m off. Don’t bother about the tip!’ He reversed the taxi, turned and drove off in the opposite direction.

  Carlos was brought, dripping, out of the water by Bobby’s boathook and laid, floundering, among the fish in the bottom of the boat. Bobby waved to the watchers on the bridge. ‘You’ll have to return to the harbour to collect him. I’ll row back now. I’ll cover him with a tarpaulin! He’s all right, he’s cussing in some foreign language!’

  ‘Make room for Mum in the trap,’ May told Pomona. ‘I’ll drop you off at the Swan. Ask Jenny to ring Aunt Min and tell her we’ll be later than we said.’

  ‘How can I smuggle him back into the hotel, dripping like that?’ Carmen worried.

  ‘You can borrow Smokey’s blanket to put round him,’ Pomona said cheerfully. ‘It needs a wash and smells of donkey, but Carlos’ll want a bath anyway, won’t he?’

  They didn’t turn into the Swan’s drive, but watched Pomona hurrying off, then they continued on down to the harbour.

  Bobby Blowers was just unloading his unexpected catch. ‘Here you are then! I must get back, I’m running late. He’s been ranting all the way; he ain’t lost his voice, anyway.’ He waved away a proffered coin from Carmen. ‘Keep it, missus. Done my good deed for the day!’

  They wrapped the smelly blanket round Carlos’s shaking shoulders, and Carmen pulled a strand of nasty green river vegetation from his oiled black hair. ‘Shut up!’ she hissed to him, as they made their way towards the hotel’s tradesmen’s entrance. ‘Thanks for your help,’ she called belatedly to May. ‘Keep in touch, as you promised!’

  May thought, with a smile she couldn’t suppress, that the squelching of Carlos’s shoes and the ridiculous spats would alert the hotel staff to his arrival.

  Back at the Swan she was welcomed as if she had been away for some time, not just an hour or so. There were big mugs of steaming tea, and scones, split and buttered. ‘It must seem a long time since your breakfast, my dears,’ Jenny said. ‘Give us your version of events – your sister’s good at elaboration, as we know.’

  May caught Paddy looking at her. He was smiling broadly. She could tell he was pleased to see her again so unexpectedly.

  ‘What did Aunt Min say?’ she asked Jenny.

  ‘Oh, she took it in her stride. Said, why not stay another day?’

  ‘I was hoping she’d say that!’ May was honest as always.

  Later, back in their little room, she opened her mother’s parcel. It contained the precious dress Carmen had loaned her for that special performance. Keep this with love was written on the accompanying note.

  ‘I will, oh I will,’ she said aloud.

  Fifteen

  Kettle Row, September, 1925

  AFTER A FEW days back at the farm it was as if they had never been away, as if the summer season in West Wick had been a dream. May looked back on the experience as her transition from a child to an adult. The reconciliation with her mother had been unexpected, but she was glad it had occurred. She hoped that their friendship with the O’Flahertys would survive the parting of ways and the distance now between them, but her priority must be her headstrong little sister.

  The trunk containing Punch and his companions was stored away in the spare room, which had been Jim’s bedroom. Aunt Min draped the trunk with a flowery curtain. ‘There – no one would guess what is inside!’ She was in her mid-fifties, for there had been a ten-year gap between herself and Jim, her only sibling. She was rather abrupt in her manner towards strangers, but fiercely protective of her family. She had a wiry frame, straight up and down, with her sleeves rolled up, whatever the weather, to reveal muscular forearms from all the humping of sacks and boxes. Min was not so keen on housework. The old house was shabby, inside and out, but the girls thought of it as home.

  Grandpa was in his early eighties and spent his days roaming restlessly around, as he had been doing since he recovered from a mild stroke some years ago. May could remember him as full of fun when he toured with the show, his lively fiddle-playing, and how he’d taught her to dance a jig, but Pomona was too young to recall any of that.

  ‘Glad you girls are back,’ Aunt Min told them. ‘You can run faster to catch him when he goes a’wanderin’ than I can.’

  They were soon immersed in the familiar routine: Pomona went off to school, reluctantly at first, wanting to be out in the orchard with Aunt Min and May, picking the early eating-apples and pears. Smokey might have retired from transporting the Punch and Judy, but was still needed to take the produce to the local market. They had the usual stall by the gate, and Grandpa greeted the occasional customer with, ‘Helloo, there!’ while Toby, home again, barked to ale
rt the pickers that the services of one of them was needed to weigh the fruit in the scales with the brass weights, and to take the money.

  The tall trees had been planted half a century ago by Min’s late in-laws. Min pruned them as best she could, but a ladder was needed to reach the topmost fruit. May was not too keen on heights, but she climbed the rungs to save the strain on her aunt’s arthritic knees. There was not an abundance of apples this year, but it still seemed an endless task – more of a chore May thought, once the excitement of plucking the first ripe fruit was over. It had been sausages and mash for supper most nights for a while, but now they were in for a treat.

  The fire crackled, spitting out a few smouldering twigs, which made them jump. The trees were in shadow. The smell of apples mingled with bonfire smoke and the compost heap behind them.

  The girls wore old, patched dungarees with wellington boots and shapeless jerseys knitted long ago, which had stretched and sagged in the laundering. If Paddy saw her now would he recognize her, May wondered? She realized, with a start, that this was the first time she’d thought of him, all day. She’d written twice to him, but he hadn’t found time to write back.

  ‘I must wash my hair before Monday,’ May said. She could do with a bath, too, but was too weary to contemplate that tonight.

  ‘You ought to put it up, to look the part of a lady typist,’ Aunt Min told her. ‘Or have it shorn, like me. The barber is cheaper than a ladies’ hairdresser.’

  May grinned, thinking: the barber’s too fond of the clippers. She said: ‘I’ll try plaiting it into earphones. I can’t afford a permanent wave. Anyway, I don’t think it would suit me, do you?’

  ‘Earphones are ugly!’ Pomona, crunching away at a toffee apple, added: ‘I like the lump of dark toffee at the top, where I pulled it off the tray.’

  Grandpa had to suck his, having lost his teeth. Brown dribbles ran down his chin. He dabbed at them occasionally with a sleeve.

  ‘You’ll get all stuck up,’ Aunt Min said with a sigh. She had most of her own teeth which she attributed to ‘all them apples’. She usually had one ‘on the munch’ as she put it, in her apron pocket. Toby watched out for the cores, held them between her front paws like a prized bone.

  They were startled when Grandpa began to sing. He’d once had a tuneful voice, but now it sounded rusty. ‘Show me the way to go home, I’m tired and I wanta go to bed….’

  ‘Now where did he learn that ditty? Has he dodged down the pub lately without me knowing it? I ain’t heard that before – must be a new ’un.… Come on, old dear, rise up and we’ll go indoors,’ Aunt Min said. ‘You girls watch the fire ’til it dies down. Have another toffee apple.’

  Before 1914 most secretarial and clerical positions in large firms were the prerogative of men. Due to the shocking loss of young males in the war there were many women, destined to remain single, entering the workforce. Being in service no longer appealed to this better-educated, ambitious new generation. Women had taken on responsible jobs, proved their worth throughout the war years. Now, in a time of recession, many ex-servicemen found it difficult to secure even menial or repetitive factory work, for this sector employed more females, who were paid less than the men. It was an ugly fact that there were now beggars in crowded city streets just as there had been in what were referred to as ‘the bad old days’.

  However, in the nearby market town, Kettle Row, on the Suffolk/Norfolk border, there was a general feeling among the local traders of pre-war prosperity, the reassurance of growth. The struggles of those in the surrounding rural areas were much the same as they had been for generations. Kettle Row itself had expanded from a hamlet with a so-called kettle pond which had been a source of clean water for a modest row of dwellings. The pond, railed off, was not dipped into with kettles nowadays but had a colony of colourful, sometimes quarrelsome ducks. It was the bus stop and main gossip area. ‘Meet you at the pond,’ was a familiar expression.

  The Central School, which May had attended from the age of eleven until she was fourteen, had a recent addition, a commercial and business studies block. Shorthand and typing were now included in the curriculum for the older pupils, and for adults, during the day, or at the evening classes, which were subsidized. There was also instruction in the use of the comptometer, that wonderful arithmetical machine. On her introductory tour May was amazed at the speed of the flying fingers of the lady instructor, who said proudly that all her pupils were expected to aim eventually for around 50,00 strikes on the keys per day! Somehow, May could not visualize herself as a comptometer operator. You couldn’t use your imagination, she thought, as you could when handling puppets.

  Learning to touch-type, as she shortly discovered, was a slow process and frustrating at times. She began her morning session in a room with rows of long tables at which sat young women, heads down, concentrating. Each typewriter had a cover positioned over the keyboard to ensure they couldn’t see the letters on the keys; a metronome on the teacher’s desk indicated the speed at which they were required to type. The students’ gaze must be directed at their copy sheets, at the simple exercises, not the print which appeared on the paper slotted in the machine.

  May was left standing in a corner until the teacher called for a break. Then she was ushered to a seat in the front row. She felt conspicuous in her summer frock, worn with a cable-knit cardigan and the ‘earphones’ which muffled what the teacher was saying. Most of her fellow typists had shingled hair.

  She positioned her fingers carefully on the hidden keys, silently reciting the sequence to herself: ‘a s d f g pause’ as she pressed her thumb on the space bar. The click of the metronome and hammering of the keys were the only sounds, apart from the satisfying ping of typewriter carriages at the end of each line.

  It seemed an interminable time before the next break, when their work was scrutinized. Remarks were more encouraging than critical, which was a relief to May.

  May bought a typing manual from the pile on the teacher’s desk. She would need to do quite a lot of studying at home, she realized. Pomona might help her make a dummy keyboard.

  On to the room where shorthand was taught. Here, May joined a small group of new pupils, with pristine notebooks and newly sharpened pencils. A larger group, including two earnest-looking youths, were taking dictation at the far side of the room, while the teacher with the novice group stood by a blackboard to explain the first simple strokes. ‘Thick and thin’ were now the key words.

  The point snapped on May’s pencil. She couldn’t stop to sharpen it, and she hadn’t a spare. A replacement was rolled along the desk top to her by the girl in the seat beside her. She didn’t have time to say thank you until lunchtime. She tapped her neighbour on the shoulder as they left the room ‘You saved my bacon – thanks!’

  The girl paused, smiled at May. ‘Have you brought a packed lunch?’ She wore gold-rimmed glasses and, like May, had plaited her hair in an unbecoming style, but the dimples in her cheeks were attractive.

  ‘Yes, I have.’

  ‘I thought I’d go into the park and sit on a bench there – care to join me? I’m Bea Wright, by the way.’

  ‘Oh, I would! I’m May Jolley. This is my first day.’

  ‘Mine, too. We moved to Kettle Row in July, when I turned sixteen and left school. I’ve got my school certificate, but all the office jobs appear to require shorthand and typing, so my parents enrolled me on the course.’

  ‘I finished school two years ago. I’m sixteen, too.’ May confided.

  ‘You’ve been at work already?’ They passed through the main doors and stood blinking in the sunshine outside.

  ‘Yes.’ May wasn’t ready to divulge more at the moment. They needed to get to know each other first, she thought.

  As they walked along to the park, which was at the end of a cul de sac off the main street, May spotted the new municipal swimming-baths, which had been built since she was at the school. A cluster of children emerged, clutching soggy towels, socks at half-ma
st after hasty dressing.

  ‘My sister will be pleased. It won’t be so far to come for a swim!’

  ‘The village schools round about, all have sessions here. D’you like swimming?’

  ‘Not much,’ May admitted. ‘I prefer dancing!’

  ‘So do I. Maybe we could go together to a local hop?’

  ‘Maybe.’ They found a vacant bench, and opened their lunch packs. Aunt Min and Bea’s mother obviously had the same idea. As they munched on their cheese sandwiches with thick slices of Spanish onion, Bea remarked: ‘We’ll have to sit beside each other this afternoon, too, as we’ll both have strong breath!’

  ‘Tomorrow,’ May said, ‘I’m going to tie my hair back; my sister was right, I look like an old fogey with these earphones.’

  ‘I shall ask Mum to let me have an Eton crop. I’m really glad to have met you, May. I was dreading today.’

  ‘So was I. Still, it’s nice to be called Miss Jolley.’

  They brushed away the crumbs, threw a crust to a hovering pigeon, then went back to tackle the amazing green machine, the comptometer.

  Sixteen

  THERE WAS A lot going on in Kettle Row of which May had been unaware before she embarked on her training in office skills. Bea, she soon discovered, despite her studious appearance, was a sociable girl and keen to introduce her new friend to societies and clubs which flourished in town. Best were the ones which offered free membership or reduced subscriptions for those not yet earning their living. There were the earnest debating societies, who provided weak tea and soft ginger biscuits; the church and chapel social evenings, where the tea was stronger and there was the lure of substantial rock cakes; the bellringers, who demanded dedication and muscles; and a recently formed group, the Singing Kettles. May had not yet confided to Bea her unusual background, but she liked the name, for a start. Pomona was keen to join the Brownies, but May and Bea considered that they were rather old to become first-time Guides.