The Factory Girl

by Maggie Ford

  Geraldine felt little sympathy. It was their fault if Mavis was pregnant this quick after having Simon. They should have at least tried to be careful knowing their circumstances. To her mind people often brought their own troubles on themselves, but she thought better than to say so to her sister, already down in the mouth. In fact she wished she hadn’t spoken so quickly about her own condition, but she had been so happy about it that she hadn’t paused to give it proper thought.

  If only there was something she could do – like Tony offering Mavis’s husband a job. But doing what? There was no call for an assistant in the shop as it was seldom busy. She still wondered how Tony could make so much money when it was never busy and he still hedged about his father seeing him all right, as if he felt it put him down to admit it. There was no way in which she could offer Mavis money even though Mavis wasn’t as proud as Mum at taking it, but there was the same atmosphere there. She had offered her a dress or two in the past and Mavis had accepted them, grudgingly, as if to retain her sense of pride by making the giver feel put down rather than the other way around. It wasn’t a nice feeling, to offer help then immediately to be made to feel awkward where she should have felt nothing of the sort. Perhaps Mavis was saying that being given some cast-off dress wasn’t going to put food into her family’s mouth, that she had less need to dress well as a greater need to see her family fed. Yet even when she did chip in with something edible, as Mum did, there was the same negative response, a sideways look even while it was being accepted.

  Mum’s offerings – maybe a small basin of stew or a home-made cake, something she too could ill afford while Dad was in hospital – were always readily accepted above anything Geraldine had to offer and which she considered far better quality than Mum could ever give, and more of it.

  Time and time again she came away vowing not to bother any more, yet she could no more visit Mavis empty handed than fly in the air. If only she’d be a bit more grateful, or at least try to show it sometimes. But then, Mavis had always been hard to get along with.

  Only one consolation was that on one occasion Mavis accepted something from her with her usual begrudging thank you, but added, ‘You won’t tell Mum about this, will you?’

  Reassuring her that of course she wouldn’t, she had seen relief on her sister’s face. Mum’s enormous and at times senseless pride touched even Mavis into being wary of handouts from what Geraldine could only interpret as the better-off playing Lord and Lady Bountiful before their less fortunate relations, when all the time she was only trying to do her best for them. It hurt. It hurt very much, almost making her vow to let them get on with it.

  Geraldine let out a little giggle as, clinging on to Tony’s arm for support, the two of them stumbled into the flat. Three-thirty in the morning with the first grey glimmer of a late May dawn just beginning to show, and still the party when they’d left it had been going strong, probably wouldn’t break up for another hour at least.

  The party had been in Chelsea, Tony invited by a jeweller whom he’d dealt with from time to time – someone wealthy with a lovely apartment, beautifully furnished, a hired jazz pianist, a spread to die for, and drink coming out of their ears.

  ‘Why can’t we live somewhere like that,’ gasped Geraldine, ceasing to giggle as she let her handbag fall to the floor, struggled out of her hat and coat and flopped down into an armchair without hanging them up.

  She gazed a little bleary-eyed about the flat. After the brilliance of the party, the beautiful frocks, the rich décor, this place struck her as decidedly drab, cold and uninviting, for all the fine furniture it held. She shivered.

  ‘How much longer are we going to stay here?’ she asked, accepting the brandy and soda Tony handed to her.

  ‘Here?’ His gaze followed hers about the small living room and he grinned, taking a sip of his own brandy. ‘It is getting a bit cramped, come to think of it.’

  She stared up at him, trying to focus. ‘Then when are we going to remedy it? When are we going to move to something worth living in?’

  ‘I was going to talk about that some time or other.’ He was still grinning inanely through his drink. ‘But your father being laid up, you’ve had your mind more on that, so I thought I’d delay things until you asked again – sometime.’

  It was true, she’d been taken up with the state of her family with Dad not able to work after being discharged from hospital, and when he was well enough to go back to work, finding it hard to get back into the docks with so many men clamouring for jobs. It had been Wally who had managed finally to wangle him back in. In all that time, his family had lived virtually from hand to mouth and if it hadn’t been for Wally and Fred and Evie bringing in something, God knows what they’d have done.

  Geraldine had managed to dissuade Tony from offering his help. ‘They won’t thank you for it, darling,’ she told him. ‘In fact they might even get nasty about it. Best leave well alone and let them weather it out.’ His reply had been to ask whether she worried about them and he’d been taken aback when she’d flared at him that of course she was worried, but it hadn’t yet come to handouts. Tony had gone silent on her after that and the air had been a bit strained for the next few days.

  But that was all passed. Dad, back at work, was the one angering her now with his remarks that he’d got himself right without help from other people, that he didn’t need other people’s help in looking after his own family contrary to what some people thought, that he managed all right before they came along and would continue to do so. All of which she knew was directed at her husband who had done nothing to him except to make the mistake of offering a few quid or so to help him along. So as far as she was concerned, Dad could sink or swim and the rest of them along with him.

  She let out another little giggle and slipped down a fraction in her chair, returning her gaze to the room around her.

  ‘Then let’s talk about living somewhere really nice,’ she said. ‘So as to be all nice and settled by the time the baby arrives.’

  Anthony regarded her as best he could through the haze of the cigarette he had just lit. The baby. Coming up to five months, fortunately she wasn’t the sort to show her condition too much and had taken to wearing loose, flowing frocks, but soon she would and that would put a stop to their social life for a while. A couple of months from now she wouldn’t be able to kick up her heels as she did at the moment. He wasn’t unhappy about a baby and they could always get a nanny for it once she’d had it. He made enough to afford one. So long as Geraldine didn’t go all motherly on him – he liked her just as she was.

  She’d lit up too, one of her favourite Abdulla cigarettes, having fitted it clumsily into its ivory holder and even more clumsily lit it, blowing out a cloud of fragrant smoke to waft all over the room. He loved seeing her tipsy. It turned him on no end. It was turning him on now.

  ‘Let’s go to bed,’ he suggested and getting the message instantly, she stubbed the Abdulla out into a figured glass ashtray, drained her brandy glass and got uncertainly to her feet, laughing as she staggered.

  ‘You’ll have to carry me, darling,’ she murmured, which turned him on even more.

  After it was over, he heard her whisper into his ear, ‘We will start looking for somewhere nicer to live soon, won’t we?’

  He nodded into the darkness and felt her turn over, contented, ready for sleep, leaving him more sober now to think over what she’d said.

  They did need to find somewhere more fitting than over this shop. It would be difficult though, because this was where he was known, becoming more known by the day, the people he dealt with knowing where to find him. He would pick the best from the stuff they bought to his back door, discard the rest, pay them and get down quickly to the task of breaking the stuff up before it could be traced to him, if indeed it could be. Precious metals melted down into less traceable ingots, jewellery suitably parcelled up for trading on to one of the several dealers he knew and had become friendly with, like the one at whose p
arty they’d been this evening – he was becoming well respected by them – he would await the next caller.

  He told no one where he lived. His card bearing an address of some nondescript jewellery shop in Bow was all they had to go on – maybe a false address – so no one had any inkling that he actually resided above it, and let them continue to think of him as someone who lived well but preferred privacy.

  Since starting up this game he had become something of a mystery. He liked that. A couple of years ago people had begun to ask about him and his beautiful wife with the somewhat strange accent. He could sense the inquisitiveness as to what shadows the two of them melted into after leaving a party, a dinner, the theatre or nightclub. It was better that way, safer.

  But now he was beginning to sense a different atmosphere: was he after all not as kosher as he’d led them to believe? Had he merely come into a bit of money, maybe by unsavoury means? Not that such a thing bothered the sort of people he mixed with but did this mystery of where he lived mean he couldn’t be trusted? The time had come to find a good address to invite his friends to, and Gerry’s request had come at the right time. Tomorrow he’d start putting out feelers, perhaps look at one of the nicer London squares to see if he could afford it. Of course he would have to step up his other business as the shop wouldn’t provide. That had become a mere front. It was just as well to move, keep Gerry away from where she wouldn’t need to ask questions for it was only a matter of time before she did. He’d have to be there in the evenings, of course, which meant being away from home, but if she wanted to live somewhere nice, she’d have to make some sacrifice.

  ‘We’ll be moving, Mum, about two weeks’ time.’

  Mum eyed Geraldine’s thickening midriff with some scepticism, quite unaffected by the news itself. ‘Yer around seven months, ain’t yer? Not a good time ter go moving ’ouse. Yer won’t do yerself any good, strainin’ yerself an’ getting all churned up. You ’ave ter be careful around seventh months. Don’t want ter do ’arm to yerself or the baby.’

  Geraldine had told her early in June that they had begun looking for somewhere better to live and that too had been received with the same indifference as now. She had expected a more ready response such as ‘About time too,’ or even ‘That’ll be nice for you,’ but Mum had merely nodded and got on with brewing up the usual cup of tea she’d give any caller.

  It was now July and having found a suitable place far quicker than Geraldine had expected, one she had instantly fallen in love with, it seemed Tony couldn’t wait to move in.

  ‘I can let everyone know where we are, have parties, invite everybody.’

  ‘Hold on,’ she’d laughed happily. ‘By the time we’re settled in it’ll be nearly time for me to have this baby.’

  She was beginning to feel her condition now, though not as big as she’d expected coming up to seven months. Tony had remarked last week that he wondered where she was keeping it. ‘I’m beginning to think you’ve got it in a case somewhere in a cupboard!’

  The dry quip made her laugh, in fact made her proud of herself as though she and not nature had achieved something quite remarkable. She thought about Mavis whose missed period had indeed heralded the start of pregnancy, who was already as big as the half side of a barn and she a few weeks behind her. It meant having to suffer baleful glances at her own sylph-like figure with its little round football of a lump and the snide – and to her mind quite unreasonable – remarks that why should she have all the luck while her sister looked like a bag of doings, almost as if Mavis saw it as stemming purely from her sister’s more comfortable circumstances.

  ‘If you ’ad ter put up with what I do, you wouldn’t be so chirpy about lookin’ like yer do’, she said, again without foundation. It wasn’t her fault that she was carrying better, nor that she was comfortably off where Mavis still struggled with Tom not yet in work. She hadn’t planned it this way, it just happened to be.

  She had stopped offering Mavis bits and pieces. All she ever got lately was a begrudging ‘Thanks’ and downturned lips. Just a couple of weeks ago she’d made another attempt to help with a hat she’d had in a cupboard for ages, almost new but Tony had said it was out of date now; a neutral beige, large-brimmed, deep-crowned, just right for the hot summer weather and Mavis’s face looking flushed and mottled from her condition. Again, her own skin had remained unblemished, pale but for a gentle glow that increased Mavis’s jealousy, for that was all it was – jealousy.

  Mavis seemed to delight in appearing shabby as though seeking to draw attention to her wretched life, wheeling her dilapidated perambulator almost with pride, a bold statement that cried out, ‘Look what I’ve got to put up with while my sister flaunts her money left, right and centre!’

  ‘I don’t want your silly ’at,’ Mavis had said, the unexpected venom of the refusal knocking Geraldine back a step or two. ‘What would I look like pushing this pram, me in clothes what’s come off a second-’and market stall, and wearing an ’at what looks like it’s come straight out of some fancy West End store like ’Arrods. People would laugh at me, say I’ve gone off me nut!’

  The gift thus flung back in her face, Geraldine had vowed that Mavis could go to pot for all she cared, she wouldn’t offer another thing to her.

  Geraldine sat next to Tony in his car and watched the furniture van in front of them move slowly off.

  ‘Soon be there, darling,’ murmured Tony as he pressed the starter button and they too pulled away from the kerb. ‘Excited?’

  ‘Mmm!’ Geraldine accompanied the sound with an energetic nod. Her stomach was churning and it had nothing to do with the gentle kick she felt from the baby inside her. What a wonderful life she had. It occurred to her to feel thankful for just how lucky she was as she cast her mind ahead to the day Tony had taken her to see the house he’d chosen for them.

  It was the most delightful house she had ever seen, much less ever hoped to live in, painted white, terraced, narrow but with four storeys, oval doorways set behind railings, and with lovely narrow Georgian windows to the second floor. Mecklenburgh Square off Grays Inn Road was wide, quiet and withdrawn from the London traffic and adjacent to some delightful gardens. Inside, the hugeness of the rooms had taken her breath away, coupled with something like alarm.

  ‘But the cost! What’s the rent on this place?’

  ‘Let me worry about that,’ he’d said without the flicker of an eyelid.

  But alarm had refused to go away. ‘We can’t possibly afford anything like this.’ She’d gazed around the huge drawing room that would take a fortune to furnish, and had turned back to him in disbelief as though he’d lost track of his senses. ‘The shop can’t possibly pay for all this. Even I know it doesn’t earn enough to maintain anything near a place like this. Where are you going to find the money?’

  ‘I’m taking care of it, darling.’ He cuddled her. ‘I shall take care of everything.’

  Somehow his patronising got to her and she broke away. ‘Don’t treat me as though I’ve got no brains, Tony! I know and you know we can’t afford this on what the shop brings in. Where are you getting the money from?’

  For a moment or two he studied her, his face tight, then it relaxed. ‘I’m borrowing it.’

  ‘From your father, I suppose.’ She gave him no time to confirm or deny but ploughed on, angry at the time, angry and fearful. ‘How can you go on letting him support you? And how you let him go on financing you when we both know he and your mother have never liked me, believing that you married beneath yourself. Knowing that, how can you keep going to them cap in hand asking for support? Haven’t you any pride?’

  Her mind had flown to her own family who would never take a penny that wasn’t theirs. Suddenly they soared in her estimation, they had more respect for themselves than he could ever have, and even though she loved him dearly she had felt oddly ashamed that he could take off his father so lightly.

  ‘It doesn’t matter where I borrowed it from,’ he’d grinned at her, pu
shing away her accusations. ‘Maybe from the bank.’

  Obviously she’d judged him wrongly, but she’d still been unsettled by what she could only see as foolhardiness, trying blindly to impress her and going over the top about it, not realising how he was jumping in out of his depth. In all logic, she’d demanded, ‘So what collateral do they want?’

  He continued to grin. ‘Or maybe from a friend.’

  ‘And when do they want paying back?’

  ‘Or maybe I’ve had it secretly stashed away.’

  He’d been bent on teasing her, enjoying her anger. She’d told him to be serious, had asked again where the money was coming from and he’d replied, growing serious, that it was purely a business thing. When she’d asked what business thing, he had startled her with a glare, telling her that it was none of her affair.

  ‘Be content that I know what I’m doing, Gerry,’ he’d snapped. ‘You’re my wife and it’s my job to conduct a transaction and not for you to stick your nose in.’

  ‘Tony!’

  ‘I mean it, darling. There’s only one head of a family, one man to do the worrying, and I don’t intend to explain myself to you. It’s enough that I provide you with nice clothes, a decent roof over your head, and a social life you can be proud of. What more do you want?’ When she’d fallen silent, he went on more gently, ‘Leave the business end to me. I’ll do the earning, the supporting of you and the baby when it arrives. Isn’t that enough for you?’

  ‘Yes, of course it is,’ was all she could say, telling herself she was indeed a fool not to appreciate what he was doing. In future she would try not to question him but just be thankful for the pleasant life he was giving her. Silly to rock any boat that was on an even keel.

  Now they were leaving their cramped little flat, going somewhere where she could hold up her head. Perhaps that was why Mum and Dad hadn’t popped round to see them off but had stayed solidly ensconced in their own home. Perhaps she should forgive them – she was only moving a few miles away, not the other side of the world. Even so, she knew that for the few times they would ever visit her posh new home, it might well have been.