Yew Tree Gardens

by Anna Jacobs

  Irene would definitely earn her promotion. It would be hard, but it could be the making of her, young as she was.

  It was very lonely, Renie found, doing something different from everyone else, something they resented. Oh, the others had stopped playing tricks on her, would even help if she asked, but they never started a conversation with her while working and didn’t include her in their fun.

  Daff was the only one who was unchanged by it all, but then Daff was such a cheerful person, it took a lot to upset her.

  ‘Rather you than me,’ she said frankly when they went out for a walk on the Sunday. ‘You’ll be going into the office later. Ugh! I’d hate to work with the men all day. They’ll try to treat you like a skivvy. Look at how they talk to us, even the youngest waiter, who’s not much more than a silly lad! All except Mr Greaves, that is. He’s lovely to everyone.’

  ‘I won’t let them be rude to me.’

  ‘You can’t say no to bosses.’

  ‘Mrs Tolson will tell them what my duties are and I’ll be answerable to her, so they won’t be my bosses.’ She hoped she was right in this, because she didn’t like the way one of the younger men in the office had started eyeing her.

  ‘Mrs Tolson won’t be around all the time. You’re even having a rough time with the women you work with. It’ll be worse with men. Think I haven’t heard you crying at night after everyone’s gone to sleep?’

  ‘Oh, no! Do you suppose anyone else has heard me?’

  ‘If they have, they’ve not said so.’

  Renie did a lot of thinking after that conversation, but she still wanted to seize this opportunity.

  In March she was feeling upset so wrote to ask Nell’s advice about whether it was worth trying to better herself, even though it wasn’t easy. She didn’t go into detail because she didn’t want to upset Nell.

  Her sister wrote back to say how proud their mother and Mattie would be of her and she must certainly keep trying, whatever the difficulties.

  They never mentioned their father in their letters, or even considered trying to contact him. Renie hoped she’d never see him again.

  But this month marked two years since they’d fled from Swindon so Nell said she would wait till he was in a good mood and then ask her husband about trying to contact his family, in the hope that Mattie had been in touch.

  But in her next letter, she said Cliff had again refused to contact them. Tears came into Renie’s eyes as she read that. What if Mattie was trying to contact them? What if they never found their eldest sister again?

  She tried to talk herself into a better mood. Concentrate on the job in hand. She was coping, wasn’t she? She had September to look forward to, when she’d have a whole week’s holiday. She’d already arranged to spend it with Nell. Where else would she go?

  If it was still hard going at work, they could discuss Renie’s problems then. Nell always had such wise advice. Of course, Cliff would be there, but he’d be out all day at work and half the evenings as well, because he was still going to the pub, Nell said. So there wasn’t much Cliff could do to spoil her time with her sister.

  It made you think, though. Even if you were careful about getting married, men could change, couldn’t they? Once they’d got what they wanted, most went their own sweet way, using their wives as servants.

  Well, that’s what it seemed like to Renie, anyway. She had two eyes in her head and knew what she’d seen in her own family and in the neighbours’ families. Except for one young couple who lived nearby, she remembered suddenly. They’d married and had two little children and still looked at each other so lovingly, it brought tears to your eyes to see them.

  Most people weren’t that lucky.

  As the weeks passed, Renie was tempted many times to abandon her new job. She wasn’t saving nearly as much money because of not getting a share of the tips, but worst of all, she was lonely. She went to the sitting room each evening out of pride and sat with the others, reading a book. If Daff was there, her friend still talked to her, which made her feel a bit better.

  Every now and then, Miss Pilkins would take Renie off the floor for a day or two to sit beside her and learn about the paperwork. Estimates for new bed linen and towels, not to mention keeping track of a myriad small items like soap. The lists of what was needed had to be submitted to Mr Greaves’ assistant in charge of accounts, and they had to be accurate to the penny, which wasn’t always easy.

  Miss Pilkins wasn’t good at figures, as she freely admitted, and it took her a lot of hard work to keep her accounts and balance sheets in order.

  Renie found she enjoyed doing the accounts and could speed things up for her supervisor. That was a surprise because she’d never enjoyed arithmetic at school. But accounts were different. They were real, as arithmetic problems had never been.

  She enjoyed writing numbers neatly in the long columns, proud of her penmanship, practising on odd pages that Mr Greaves provided, which had a few figures crossed out neatly at the top. She loved to see the way the money balanced out at the bottom.

  Such big sums of money! So many details to get right! It was even more complicated running a big hotel than she’d expected.

  Her love affair with accounts continued when she went back to the catering side. This time it was Miss Green who took her through the tea shop accounts and, when she picked that up quite quickly, said grudgingly that she could see she had little to teach Irene.

  After that Miss Green was a bit friendlier to her. It was as if the new assistant had passed some sort of test.

  Next Renie was passed to Monsieur Leduc, who ran the restaurant, but before she started, Mrs Tolson said she needed smarter clothes now. They found her a very attractive skirt and jacket, dark grey with black braid round the hem and jacket edges. There were also three white blouses. And she was told to pull her hair back into a severe bun at the nape of her neck. Wisps came out, of course, because her hair was fine and slightly wavy, but she tucked them in again whenever she noticed.

  All these clothes had to be paid for, but as they were second hand, they weren’t as expensive as Renie had feared. Apparently some people left clothes behind in their hotel rooms – either intentionally or by mistake, no one knew which – and they didn’t bother to send for them. Imagine having so many clothes you could lose some and not care, perhaps not even notice! She moved some of her well-worn old clothing up to her trunk in the attic.

  Renie hardly recognised herself in the mirror the first morning she wore the new outfit. Looking so smart gave her confidence. When she went into the staff dining room, everyone fell silent and stared at her.

  ‘You look lovely,’ Daff said loudly.

  ‘Thank you.’

  Another girl said, ‘I like the shape of that skirt.’

  Most of them gave Renie dirty looks, though.

  She was so nervous, she couldn’t eat her breakfast. When she pushed her food to the side of her plate and set down her knife and fork, Daff whispered, ‘Aren’t you feeling well?’

  Her voice came out as a croak. ‘I’m too nervous.’

  ‘I would be too, if I had to deal with His Majesty.’ She rolled her eyes. Mr Leduc was universally feared by the waitresses, for his scorn and his loud voice, his complaints and his tendency to tip a plate of food on the floor if they disturbed the food on it, and tell the waitress to carry it properly next time.

  Renie got to his office ten minutes early. She didn’t know whether to go back and wait until the exact time he’d specified, or whether to stay outside. In the end she stayed, because she was terrified of something making her late if she left the area.

  As it turned out, he seemed to sense that she was there because he poked his head out of the door and stared at her. ‘Why did you not knock, Miss Fuller?’

  ‘I’m too early.’

  He shrugged. ‘Come in. Punctuality is, at least, a proper start.’ He went to sit behind his desk and studied her. ‘You are a good girl?’

  She gaped at him, the
n drew herself up. ‘If you mean what I think, yes, I am.’

  ‘I ’ave not seen you flirting, that I will admit. See that you continue to behave yourself when you work with the men. I will not allow flirting in my area.’

  ‘Then I’d be obliged if you’d tell your cooks and waiters the same thing. We girls have trouble with them.’

  He became thoughtful. ‘It is natural for men to look.’

  ‘And touch?’

  His eyes narrowed. ‘They do that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘That is too much. I do not believe in women working as waitresses, but since the ’otel chooses to do this, I shall speak to my staff about you. You will ’ave no trouble in my area.’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Leduc.’

  ‘You will call me “Monsieur”. It is the French for “mister”. Just “Monsieur”.’

  ‘Very well. Could you say it again, please? I’d only read it in books till I came to the Rathleigh and I said it wrong in my head.’ She listened and repeated the word after him till he nodded.

  ‘Bien. You ’ave it perfectly correct now.’

  ‘Thank you, monsieur.’

  ‘Today you stay with me. You follow be’ind me, or you stand where I tell you, and you watch. Very carefully, you watch. Nothing more yet. You are to learn first ’ow the restaurants and kitchens operate.’

  ‘Yes, monsieur.’

  It was a long, tiring day. And to her embarrassment, she had to explain to him when she had to go to the lavatory because he allowed her no time for this. He didn’t seem embarrassed by it, but when she came back, he said, ‘I will give you five minutes every two hours to attend to your needs. Also, you will be provided with lunch and a cup of English tea or of coffee, as you prefer, whenever I myself take refreshment. Is that satisfactory?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you very much, monsieur.’

  That was only one of the embarrassing things about working in a man’s world. The men still looked at her. They might have been warned not to say anything or touch her, but they still looked at her in ways that made her feel uncomfortable, as if she had no clothes on.

  She couldn’t let this continue, so practised in front of a mirror to get the right expression on her face for dealing with them. She managed a cool, scornful look similar to one she’d seen a young lady use in the café when a flashy gentleman, who was trying to flirt with her, said something that made her draw herself upright and stop talking to him.

  It wasn’t going to be easy working with Monsieur, though. He wanted you to be perfect in everything.

  The trouble was, he seemed never to make a mistake.

  Chapter Nine

  Two weeks later when Renie was on the way back to the hotel after a brisk walk on her afternoon off, she noticed a man sitting in Yew Tree Gardens with his face turned up to the spring sunshine. It wasn’t really warm today, but she too was enjoying the brightness, which took her mind off her worries about her sister, so she smiled sympathetically.

  It was his smile that attracted her and the way he was enjoying the same simple pleasure she did. Then she couldn’t help noticing how handsome he was, a bit older than her, but still not all that old. From his clothing, he was a gentleman, so would never look twice at her. If he was a customer at the hotel, she shouldn’t be staring at him. Or was he a customer? She had a feeling she’d seen him before in the gardens, in the distance. Perhaps he lived nearby.

  She looked away and saw a flower bed filled with tulips. It was so pretty, she went across to admire it. She loved flowers, always had. Their colours seemed so much more alive than the same colours in magazines or dress materials. There had been few flowers in her life in Swindon, and even fewer in Lancashire.

  They had vases of flowers in the hotel, but she preferred the ones in gardens. They looked happier, somehow, and would surely last longer.

  As she turned to continue her walk, the man stood up and started off towards an older man, who had come along the street. She saw that the younger man was walking with a limp and there was something wrong with his arm, too. He must have been in an accident, poor fellow.

  But if you were rich, that wouldn’t make half as much difference to your life as it would if you were poor. He’d not lose everything.

  Suddenly she heard a newsboy calling out shrilly, followed by cries and shouts. She turned to see what had made the regular newsboy behave like that in front of the Rathleigh, because he surely knew better.

  Only this time the doorman didn’t come out to chase him away and he continued to yell.

  People in the street and park had turned to see what was going on and those closer began making their way towards the lad.

  The words he was shouting and those on his poster sank in and she too gasped.

  TITANIC DISASTER

  GREAT LOSS OF LIFE

  ‘The Titanic’s sunk!’ yelled a man hurrying past.

  She was shocked rigid. It was a brand-new ship and she’d heard guests talking about it, seen it in the newspapers. How could a brand-new ship sink?

  And, oh dear! Miss Cholmondley-Berne had been sailing on it. She was a dear old lady, a regular customer who always tipped well and was liked by the staff.

  Renie was so upset to think of her drowning, she didn’t look where she was going and bumped into someone. It took her only a few seconds to realise it was the man she’d been watching. She had to steady him because she’d hit him hard and caught him off balance. ‘I’m so sorry, sir! I wasn’t watching where I was going.’

  ‘I’m all right. Are you?’

  ‘Oh yes, I’m fine. I was just upset about the news.’

  He turned to look towards the news seller and called to the older man, who was now a few paces away. ‘Walter, could you get me a paper? I don’t want to risk myself among those crowds.’

  The older man went off and Renie lingered, wanting to see what the newspaper said. She looked at her companion uncertainly. If he seemed annoyed that she was still there, she’d move on. But instead he spoke to her.

  ‘Do you want to hear more about the Titanic, too?’

  ‘If you don’t mind, sir. One of our favourite customers from the hotel was sailing on it.’

  His face went suddenly white. ‘Dear God, my eldest brother was on it, too. How could I possibly have forgotten that? Not only him, but his wife and two little children.’

  Her heart went out to him. ‘All the passengers can’t have died, surely?’

  ‘I pray not. They do carry lifeboats on those big ships. It depends how quickly it sank, I suppose.’ He watched his friend join the queue and wait for a newspaper.

  He spoke to Renie again, but absently, as if his thoughts were elsewhere and he was only being polite. ‘What do you do at the hotel?’

  ‘I’m assistant to the housekeeper. It’s a new sort of job, to help our lady customers.’

  ‘What they call a new woman, are you, eh?’

  She smiled. She’d read that phrase but no one she knew had ever used it about her. Still, she liked the idea. ‘I hope so. As much as I can be. Times are changing, aren’t they?’

  The older man returned just then and her companion stopped trying to smile and make conversation.

  The two of them studied the front page of the newspaper, looking upset, searching for a certain name: Rycroft. From what they said, the younger man was called Gil. Short for Gilbert, probably. And if he had the same surname as his brother, it was Rycroft. The other was called Walter. They didn’t seem to want her to leave, so she waited, standing quietly next to them. She tried to work out what had happened as she listened to their exclamations and comments.

  ‘It says the early reports which stated that all the people on board had been saved were wrong,’ Gil said.

  Their heads bent closer to the newspaper.

  ‘Oh, no! It’s now believed that two-thirds of the passengers and crew have been lost!’ Gil stopped reading for a moment. ‘That’s shocking. Surely they had enough lifeboats for all? It was a modern, well-found
ship. Everyone was proud of it. My brother was excited to be going on its first voyage, said it would be an experience of a lifetime.’

  ‘They can’t have had enough lifeboats if they’ve lost so many people,’ Walter said. ‘Or else it happened too quickly.’

  ‘We must pray that Robert and his family were among the survivors. Poor Harriet! And those two little girls! What must they have gone through!’

  Renie laid one hand on his arm without thinking. ‘I’m so sorry, sir. I hope they’ll be all right.’

  She shouldn’t have touched a stranger like that, but she could see how upset he was.

  He patted her hand before she took it away, as if he found her sympathy comforting.

  She knew better than to linger and pester a gentleman, let alone a person facing such a terrible family tragedy. ‘Thank you, sir. I appreciate you letting me know more.’

  ‘Good luck with your new job.’

  Even in his distress, he’d tried to be kind to her. What a nice man! Pity the hotel guests weren’t all like him.

  Gil watched her go and admitted to himself that when she’d touched him, for the first time – the very first time since his accident – he’d felt a twinge of desire. And he hadn’t been imagining it, because it was the last thing he’d expected after hearing such news.

  He didn’t even know her name, but she was pretty and fresh-looking, with a lively, intelligent expression. Any man would find her attractive. In the past, he’d usually gone for pretty faces and soft, plump bodies, never mind whether the women were stupid, but this woman was … different somehow.

  Anyone could tell that she wasn’t a loose woman, so he could do nothing about his feelings. He didn’t believe in corrupting innocent young women, even if they were from the lower classes, whom some men of his acquaintance considered fair game.

  He’d enjoyed hearing her speak, too, a slower, gentler accent than you normally heard in London. Come to think of it, she sounded as if she was from Wiltshire, but with something else in her voice, as if she’d lived elsewhere.