The Surplus Girls

by Polly Heron

  Belinda flushed. ‘I applied for a position, but I didn’t get it.’

  Miss Kirby brightened. ‘So you’re interested in bettering yourself? That’s why I’m here.’

  ‘Mrs Sloan,’ Auntie Enid murmured, forestalling Grandma Beattie. ‘Let’s hear what Miss Kirby has to say.’

  ‘Friends of mine, two very respectable maiden ladies, are about to set up a business school and I wondered if Belinda might be interested in taking lessons.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Belinda.

  ‘And how do you propose to do that when you’re out working all day?’ asked Auntie Enid.

  ‘It will be a night school,’ said Miss Kirby, ‘with classes in the evenings. One of the Miss Heskeths goes out to work herself, in one of the Corporation offices.’ Her glance flicked round, landing on each of them. ‘I’ve written down the address for you, if you wish to make enquiries. I’ll leave you to discuss it as a family.’

  ‘I’ll see you out.’ Belinda showed her to the door. ‘Thank you for this.’

  ‘You’re welcome, dear. I hope…’ Miss Kirby’s gaze darted past her into the cottage. ‘Never mind.’

  Belinda shut the door and returned to the others.

  ‘Well, I don’t know,’ grouched Grandma Beattie. ‘First that material and now this. Look at her face, Mrs Sloan. She’s already made up her mind, and never mind what we think. She leaving us behind.’

  It was as if the breath had been snatched from her body. She threw herself on her knees at Grandma Beattie’s feet, grasping the knobbly old knuckles and peering up into her face.

  ‘I’d never ever do that. You’re Ben’s nan and that means you’re my nan too.’ Twisting, she reached a hand towards Auntie Enid. ‘And you’re my mother-in-law. I know how much you want things to stay the same – and I do an’ all, here, in our home, in our little family. But I’m the youngest and one day I’ll be on my own. I won’t be able to keep End Cottage on my mill money. I’ll have a better chance of supporting myself if I have an office job.’

  Annoyance shot through her. She was tired of being the obedient daughter. Ben’s death wasn’t just the loss of the boy she loved. It had also robbed her of proper grown-up status. As a wife, no matter how young, she would have been accorded respect that was denied her as an unmarried girl. Was she destined to go through life not being taken seriously?

  ‘Well, if you put it that way,’ said Auntie Enid. ‘But you’re not going round there today. You must sleep on it. We all must.’

  The thought of it hung in the air all afternoon and evening. At cocoa-time, when Grandma Beattie trotted out her determination not to go to bed on an argument, Belinda fiddled about inside her collar and drew out the dainty locket Ben had given her. It was warm from her skin.

  ‘I remember our Ben giving it to you.’ Auntie Enid smiled sadly. ‘I remember him bringing it home when he bought it. “D’you think she’ll like it, Ma?” Eh, what girl wouldn’t?’

  ‘He thought the world of you, our Ben did,’ said Grandma Beattie. ‘We think the world of you an’ all.’

  Her heart swelled and warmth filled her. ‘I wear this locket every day, but you’re the only ones that know. To me, it’s a private thing between me and Ben. I wear it under my clothes, next to my heart. I don’t parade round the streets with it on show; I don’t invite people to say, “That’s pretty. Where did you get it?” I know it’s important to wear black and show respect, but I don’t need to dress in black from head to toe to keep Ben’s memory alive. I’m not asking to wear sunshineyellow, just a touch of mauve. It’s still respectful, but it’s a bit of relief from all the black and it would make me feel better.’ She gazed into their careworn faces, yearning for their approval. ‘You want me to feel better – don’t you?’

  Chapter Seven

  PATIENCE TOOK THEIR small joint of lamb out of the oven. It had reduced in the cooking. Would there be enough for rissoles tomorrow? It didn’t matter if there wasn’t quite enough: they would still have rissoles. It was important that the Sunday joint stretched to Monday. It was a question of standards.

  She had set the table with the best china, the so-called good stuff that Evelyn had claimed, rightly, they never used. Well, why not use it? Why keep things for best if suitable occasions never arose? They didn’t live a ‘for best’ kind of life. She had dug out the cut-glass tumblers and matching water jug as well, washing and polishing them before adding them to the table.

  ‘Goodness, are we expecting visitors?’ said Prudence, coming into the dining room.

  ‘It’s a waste, keeping the best things in the sideboard. A few days ago, I thought Lawrence and Evelyn were going to waltz off with them, so now I want to enjoy them.’

  Afterwards, Prudence returned to the sitting room while Patience cleared away and washed up. She was responsible for all the housework, cooking and shopping, and always had been. Keeping house was what she had dreamed of as a child, though of course she had imagined keeping house for her husband and children.

  She joined Prudence in the sitting room, where their small fire crackled away. Instead of reading, Prudence was jotting in one of Pa’s notebooks.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Planning lessons.’

  A frisson ran through Patience. Would Prudence’s plan work? And if it did, what of their relationship with Lawrence and Evelyn?

  Patience picked up her tapestried sewing-bag and withdrew her current piece; a tray-cloth she was working in crewel embroidery in a Jacobean design of curving stems and subtly shaded flowers and leaves. Sometimes it felt as though their house was covered from top to bottom in crewel-work.

  The doorbell rang.

  Prudence frowned. ‘Who can that be? Sunday is meant to be a day of rest.’

  ‘Says the person scribbling away at her lesson plans,’ Patience said mildly.

  Prudence made a tsk sound and carried on.

  Loosely folding the tray-cloth, Patience left the room, the chill in the hall hitting her as she went to open the front door.

  A girl stood outside. She seemed familiar – but where from? How could she possibly know a person of this sort? Her puzzled gaze took in the black shawl, the black collar and blouse-front underneath, the black skirt. Older shawl-women habitually dressed in black from head to foot, but not young ones like this. She must be in mourning. Poor thing.

  The next instant, Patience placed her.

  ‘It’s you!’

  ‘Miss Softer!’

  ‘I beg your pardon? You’ve come to the wrong address, dear. Our name is Hesketh.’ She glanced up and down the cul-de-sac, putting names to residences. ‘I know no one of that name.’

  She took a step backwards, ready to shut the door, but the girl spoke up.

  ‘Please, miss. I’m sorry to get your name wrong. I’m here about the business school.’

  ‘Who is it?’ came Prudence’s voice from behind and Patience stepped aside.

  ‘This young lady has come to enquire about our business school.’

  Prudence’s raised eyebrow said Young lady?

  ‘Our first enquiry.’ Patience wasn’t sure what to do with her voice. Sound pleased? To have a working-class shawl-girl on their doorstep? And yet – it was an enquiry. Already!

  Prudence’s features hardened. ‘I know you. You’re from Grace, Wardle and Grace. Have you been sent to spy on us? I’m not standing for this. Lawrence has gone too far.’ But her annoyance melted into a pained stare. ‘If he already knows about the business school, we haven’t a hope.’

  ‘To spy?’ The girl sucked in a breath. ‘Honestly, miss, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Anyroad, I don’t work for them.’

  ‘Don’t tell lies,’ snapped Prudence. ‘We saw you in their office. We thought—’

  Patience nudged her: no need to insult the girl with their assumption she was the cleaner. ‘You offered us a drink. Only an employee would be permitted to do that.’

  ‘I were there for an interview – for the position o
f office junior,’ she added.

  ‘Really?’ Impossible not to sound surprised.

  ‘Yes, miss, really.’ She lifted her chin. ‘Or do you think girls in shawls have no business wanting better jobs? I’m sorry to have wasted your time.’

  She started to turn away. What was the right thing to do? Prudence made all the important decisions, but this one felt somehow too important to leave to her. Patience bit her lip. The kindness this girl had shown when she was distressed deserved something in return, surely?

  ‘Come in and we can talk about it.’

  Prudence glared at her, but at least she had the common courtesy to turn her head away from the girl as she did it. Patience lifted her eyebrows in answer, feeling a flicker of uncertainty at what she had done. The girl looked clean, but you never could tell.

  Prudence stalked to the sitting room. Patience stood aside, giving the girl an encouraging smile as she followed, bringing with her a swish of cold damp air. Entering the room behind her, Patience caught the girl’s hesitation. Not a bold piece, then. How must their sitting room look to this girl? The crimson velvet curtains in the bay window may have hung there for donkey’s years, but their fringing and lining testified to their quality. Did the armchairs in this girl’s house have antimacassars and arm-caps, with a spare set in the sideboard? Her house wouldn’t have a carpet, let alone one that covered most of the floor; and it probably had whitewash instead of wallpaper.

  The girl’s lips parted. ‘You have electricity!’ A rosy flush swept across her cheeks. ‘I’m sorry. First the muddle over your name, and now your electric light switch.’

  ‘First impressions are important,’ said Prudence, ‘and so far…’

  ‘You’re probably nervous, aren’t you?’ Patience gave Prudence a fleeting frown. ‘Sit over here and we must perform introductions.’

  ‘I’m Miss Hesketh,’ said Prudence, ‘and this is my sister, Miss Patience Hesketh.’

  ‘I’m Belinda Layton.’

  ‘How do you do, Miss Layton?’

  ‘Very well, thank you.’

  ‘That is the reply to “How are you?” The correct answer to “How do you do?” is “How do you do?”’

  ‘Prudence!’ Patience exclaimed.

  ‘What?’ Prudence gave her a look. ‘If a girl doesn’t have the social graces, she can’t work in an office. It’s my intention to give instruction in the skills necessary to office work, not to teach deportment and elocution.’

  ‘If a girl is in need of a little polish, perhaps I could provide it.’ The idea popped out of Patience’s mouth. ‘It makes sense when you think about it.’ It would be good to contribute something. The teaching of business skills would be solely down to Prudence. Patience didn’t have any skills to speak of, beyond the domestic. ‘Then it will truly be our school and Lawrence will never be able to claim you pushed me into it.’ She hadn’t even known she was worried about that.

  ‘Well, we’ll see.’ Prudence turned to their visitor. ‘You aren’t the sort of person we were expecting. It’s all very well to present yourself on our doorstep claiming that girls in shawls deserve a chance, but so far I’ve seen no evidence of it.’

  Miss Layton straightened her shoulders. ‘My teacher wanted me to go to high school, but my dad wouldn’t let me. She’s the one who suggested I come here – Miss Kirby.’

  ‘Miss Kirby?’ Patience looked at Miss Layton, seeing intelligence in her expression and quiet resolution in her upright posture. She glanced at Prudence. Could she see it too?

  ‘I was meant to get married,’ Miss Layton continued, ‘but my fiancé was killed in the war.’

  ‘Oh, my dear,’ Patience murmured.

  ‘I’ve worked in a mill for a few years and I was expecting to stay there for ever, but Miss Kirby told me about surplus girls.’

  ‘So sad,’ said Patience. ‘All those girls facing life alone. No husbands, no children.’ She knew how that felt. The hopeless dreams; the love, unused and unwanted. The gnawing loneliness. The fear of an empty old age.

  ‘Working in the mill is a good job,’ said Miss Layton, ‘but I don’t want to stay there for the rest of my life, not if I’m capable of better. I’m a surplus girl and that means I need to think about my future and do the best I can for myself.’

  Prudence leaned forward. Surely she wasn’t going to tear the girl off a strip?

  Prudence said, ‘Thank you, Miss Layton. You’ve given me a jolly good idea.’

  The rain slashed against the windows. Belinda had already placed pans around the cottage beneath the places where the drips came through, adding the smell of damp to the lingering aroma of lamb chops and mint sauce, mingled with the sharp-edged pungent smell of coal. For tea, they had feasted on oven-bottom muffins with grated Lancashire cheese – well, as grated as it could be when it was so crumbly – and appleand-marrow chutney. It had been comforting to come home on a dark, rainy evening to something warm and tasty, even if Auntie Enid and Grandma Beattie weren’t exactly jumping up and down with glee at her being offered a place at the business school.

  ‘I have to go to Mum and Dad’s,’ she said. ‘The Miss Heskeths want everything done properly; so, being as I don’t get the key of the door until June, I need parental consent.’

  ‘What’s the hurry?’ said Grandma Beattie.

  ‘It’s raining,’ said Auntie Enid. ‘You’ll catch a chill.’

  ‘If I wait for an evening in the week, there’s no saying Dad will be there.’ It was a polite way of saying he would be down the pub.

  She pulled on thick woolly socks over her stockings and forced her toasty-warm feet into her ankle-boots before wrapping her shawl round herself.

  ‘Here. Have mine as well.’

  Auntie Enid put her shawl over Belinda’s head and round her shoulders. Belinda examined her expression. Had she softened? No, she was just being a good mother. Guilt pierced her. Auntie Enid and Grandma Beattie had been nothing but kind to her and they didn’t deserve to be upset. Should she back down? What, and continue with their lives the way they were? No. It was hard fighting for something when no one was on your side, but she mustn’t cave in.

  As she opened the cottage door, cold wind rushed inside, leaving her no choice but to hurry out at once, the door resisting as she pulled it shut. Rain splattered her face as she peered into the deep darkness. There was no such thing as a lamppost in Grave Pit Lane. She couldn’t stand here waiting for her eyes to adjust. Off she went – straight into the mud. She hurried to the cinder path, pulling Auntie Enid’s shawl down further over her forehead, holding it bunched under her chin. Reaching the end of the lane, she ran through the wet streets.

  In Cromwell Street, she thumped on the front door. It was unlocked during the day, but after dark someone turned the key. Belinda couldn’t imagine anyone in her family bothering.

  The door opened and there was Mrs Abbott from the first floor.

  ‘Oh, it’s you. Shut your noise.’

  As she opened her family’s door, Mrs Abbott shouted, ‘Let your own visitors in,’ and stomped upstairs before Mum or Dad could reply, though that didn’t stop Thad yelling, ‘Oy, you! Don’t you tell us—’ before George clipped him round the ear, prompting a different sort of ‘Oy!’

  ‘What brings you here?’ asked Mum. ‘Take off them shawls and sit by the fire.’

  She wove her way across the crowded room. Thad was at the table with George; Mikey was hunkered down in a grimy corner by the range, so either there had already been a scrap or else Dad was taking preventive measures. Jacob sat crosslegged on the hearthrug.

  ‘Budge up, Jacob,’ she said.

  ‘Jacob doesn’t live here. I’m Jake.’

  ‘You’re a pain in the neck,’ said George.

  Oh, this was just what she needed, frayed tempers and a grouchy atmosphere.

  ‘Is everything all right?’ Mum asked.

  ‘Actually, I’ve come to ask for Dad’s permission.’

  Dad sat up straighter. ‘Oh
aye?’

  ‘I want to go to business school. There’s one starting up in Chorlton.’

  ‘You can’t go back to school,’ said George. ‘What about your job?’

  ‘It’s night school.’ She looked at Dad, willing him to like the idea, to ask questions, to want what was best for her. ‘It’s so I’ll be able to get an office job.’

  ‘Why do you need permission?’ he asked. Then he scowled. ‘I’m not paying any fees.’

  ‘I’m not asking you to. I can pay for myself by working Saturday mornings. I have to get permission because I’m under twenty-one.’

  ‘You’ll earn more in an office job.’

  ‘Probably not right away.’

  He jerked his chin. ‘You can forget that, then.’

  ‘But, Denby,’ said Mum, ‘if she earns more in a year or two’s time…’

  ‘That’s no good in the here and now. She can stop where she is.’ He wasn’t even looking at her. It was as if she wasn’t in the room.

  ‘But, Dad…’

  His face swung round impatiently and he pinned her down with his gaze. ‘Hand over more of your earnings and I might consider it.’

  ‘No.’

  His answer was a shrug as he turned away.

  She left soon after. Why stay? Mum helped her on with her shawls. Her own was damp; Auntie Enid’s was positively soggy.

  ‘Sorry your dad said no, love, and I don’t mean because of the money. It were rotten on you, losing your Ben. If anyone deserves a chance in life, you do.’

  ‘Thanks, Mum.’

  They smiled at one another. Mum’s eyes were tired, but for once her mouth wasn’t petulant. Belinda felt a rush of love, but George bustled over, stepping in front of Mum, more or less pushing Belinda out of the door.

  ‘George,’ she objected.

  ‘I want a word.’ He pulled the door to behind them. ‘What’s going on, our Bel? You can’t pack in your job for summat lower paid.’

  ‘It’ll be better in the long run – or it would have been, if Dad had said yes.’

  ‘Good job he didn’t. Have you forgotten what I told you about moving back?’