The Songbird

by Val Wood

  Poppy blushed scarlet. ‘No,’ she gasped. ‘No, I haven’t. I’m – I’m seeking work, that’s all. I’ve just come from Yorkshire,’ she lied. ‘And I got lost coming from the railway station. Someone was supposed to meet me and didn’t turn up.’

  The woman’s face told her she didn’t believe a word, and no wonder when Poppy had arrived without luggage, but she turned away. ‘Not much work round ’ere,’ she said. ‘You’ll ’ave to go up west if you want anyfink decent. What do you do? I thought your face looked familiar. On the stage, are you?’

  ‘N-no,’ Poppy stammered. ‘I – I’m a seamstress. Thought I’d try my luck in London.’

  The woman nodded and went downstairs, leaving Poppy wondering if she really had recognized her or if she was only fishing for information.

  When she had given the shilling for the extra rent, Poppy had realized that she hadn’t much money left, only enough to last until the end of the week if she should stay. She pondered. Do I go back with my tail between my legs? Everyone will be worrying about me. She stifled a sob, and her mouth trembled. But go back to what? I always had the hope that Charlie would love me and I suppose that kept my spirits high. But now I know that he does not, and I feel so low, so depressed, how can I sing when I have no happiness left in me?

  She poured the tepid water that stood in the earthenware jug into the bowl and rinsed her hands and face. There was no soap, and she looked into the cracked and spotted mirror that hung above the marble washstand. Her eyelids were swollen, her eyes like slits, her cheeks were puffy and her nose was red. ‘What a mess I look,’ she snivelled. ‘How can I go back looking like this? What will everyone think?’

  I’ll go out for a walk, she decided. I can think better when I’m outside. The small room was beginning to feel oppressive and she felt as if she was in prison. She wrapped her scarf round her head to hide her hair, picked up her purse and went out.

  She walked aimlessly, glancing now and again to look in shop windows, which were mostly selling old clothes or second-hand furniture. She crossed the street on seeing a confectioner’s and bought a slab of chocolate, for she hadn’t eaten, apart from the stale meat pie. She ate the chocolate and huddled into her coat, wondering what she should do. I have no option, she thought. I must go back, yet I’m reluctant. I’m so ashamed at having come away without telling anyone.

  She passed a shop with a revolving rack containing postcards outside the door, and she stopped to look. Most were coloured views of London; others were comic cards of hen-pecked husbands, or cats and dogs dressed up in hats and scarves. There were also some of theatre personalities: Marie Lloyd, Vesta Tilley and George Robey.

  The shop doorbell tinkled as she went inside holding four postcards, all of them showing a view of London that would tell her father, Mario and Rosina, Dan, and Mrs Bennett that she was still in the capital. She bought stamps from the shopkeeper, determining that she would go back to the room and write them, explaining that she needed some time to herself but that she was perfectly well.

  She stood for a moment outside the shop. It stood on the corner of a crossroads. But which way had she come to it? She looked up and down the four streets. They all looked the same, dark redbrick buildings containing offices, houses and shops. Poppy bit on her lip and frowned. She had walked aimlessly, crossing and recrossing roads, turning corners into narrow streets, and now once again she was lost. What’s more, she couldn’t recall the name of the road where the rooming house stood.

  She took the road on her left but she couldn’t remember having walked along it, so she turned back, crossed over and walked the other way. She didn’t remember anything on that road either, but she continued, hoping for recognition of some landmark. There were horse-buses going past, hackneys and growlers, and she wondered whether to hold out her hand for one and ask to be taken to King’s Cross station where she could start again.

  But I don’t remember the name of the street and I don’t think I could find it again, she thought miserably. What am I to do? She put her hands to her face and wept. I’m so stupid! Stupid and wretched. I want to go home and I haven’t enough money for a ticket!

  ‘Now then, dearie, what’s all this?’ A smiling, florid-cheeked man stood near her. ‘Lost your way, ’ave you?’ he said unctuously. ‘Tell me where you want to be and I’ll take you.’

  She stared at him. He wore a shabby greatcoat, and a bowler hat which had turned green with age. His beard was dark and stubbly and he had a twisted grin on his face. ‘Go away!’ she shouted and started to run. ‘Leave me alone!’

  Now she was totally lost. She found herself in a road of model houses built for the working classes, with inns and taverns tucked away in small courts. She looked up as she heard the clatter of hooves and saw a horse-bus trundling towards her. There were three men sitting on top; she couldn’t see if there was anyone inside but she ran towards it, putting out her hand for the driver to stop.

  A conductor in a buttoned jacket, striped trousers and top hat stood on the step at the rear and he jumped down to let her on. ‘Where to, miss?’ he asked, and she glanced at the side of the bus. Sloane Street, Piccadilly and Strand was written on the side.

  ‘Strand, please,’ she said breathlessly and in some relief. At least I shall be in familiar territory, she thought as she took a seat inside. Then I can make up my mind what to do. If I decide to go back I can walk to St Martin’s Lane from there.

  The route was busy with traffic: horse-buses, cable-drawn trams, private carriages, hackneys and wooden drays. People spilled out of the Underground exits adding to the masses: working men, men of the law, gentlewomen with their escorts and beggar women with children at their feet. As the bus clattered into the Strand and continued on towards Chancery Lane, Poppy remembered her triumph and then the blow she had received at the Savoy Theatre just a few days before.

  The thought of it made her weep again and hurriedly she rose from the seat and made to get off. I can’t go back, she wept. I can’t face anyone! She ran down a street off the main thoroughfare, turned down narrow lanes in an attempt to get away from the crowds, then leaned against a wall and wept. She wiped her cheeks and blew her nose, and then put her hand to her throbbing head. I don’t know where to go!

  She heard the sound of shouting, a man’s voice and a woman’s. The man was berating the woman, telling her to get out and not come back. Poppy turned to where the commotion was coming from, and saw a woman emerging from a passageway close to where she was standing. She was stout and poorly clad, with ruddy cheeks and straw-coloured hair. She picked up a stone and threw it at whoever was rebuking her. ‘Keep your bleedin’ job,’ she shouted. ‘I can find work anywhere in London town.’

  She passed Poppy and muttered, ‘Finks I need to work in that fleapit! I’m not that ’ard up.’ She glanced at Poppy. ‘’e’ll miss me, I can tell you. ’e’ll not get anybody else working for ’im in an ’urry. They all know ’im too well. Black by name, black by nature, that’s what ’e is.’

  Poppy stared after her, still wiping her reddened eyes, and then peered down the alley. It opened up into a courtyard and at the bottom was a tavern with beer barrels standing outside. An irate, middle-aged barn door of a man in a landlord’s leather apron was gesticulating to two elderly men with tankards in their fists, who were silently nodding their heads.

  ‘I’ll soon find somebody else,’ she heard him shout. ‘Bitch! Needn’t think she can come back ’ere.’

  Poppy nibbled on her fingernails. I wonder what the woman did? A saloon maid? Charwoman? Then she shrugged and looked round to find her way out. Nothing to do with me, she thought; I have troubles of my own. Nevertheless, something niggled at her mind. I need some money if I’m not going back straight away, and I’m not ready to, not just yet. I will, of course, she told herself. When I’m ready. She sniffed and gave a heaving sigh. I just need to gather myself together. Put my thoughts into perspective and try to think of living a life without love or music.

&n
bsp; She was in the middle of theatreland where hundreds of theatres catered for those who loved melodrama, opera or serious plays. The music halls had developed from the singing rooms of inns and taverns for those whose tastes were less subtle and who liked to join in a sing-song whilst enjoying a glass of ale. Some of these singing halls still remained.

  This was theatreland, and on her way back to the Strand Poppy paused outside a shop selling second-hand theatrical clothing. It had in its window elaborate satin gowns, red military uniforms that had never seen service, false moustaches and beards, daggers and rifles, shiny tin medals and a selection of tawdry looking wigs. ‘Used only twice,’ a notice above a scarlet flounced gown pronounced in misspelled letters, ‘by the Selebrated Madam Brissini.’

  Shall I go in? Only to look, not to buy. She pulled her scarf round her head and pushed open the door, for an idea was emerging. The shopkeeper was attending to a customer and merely glanced at Poppy as she pinned a waistcoat round the waist of a stout man who was wearing a full periwig and knee breeches. Poppy headed toward the counter where there were piles of sheet music, and wig stands where a curly red wig and a black wig were displayed. She looked round. A cubicle with a curtain was in the corner of the shop.

  ‘Can I try these?’ she asked, picking up both wigs.

  ‘Yes, darlin’,’ the woman said, her mouth full of pins. ‘There’s a mirror in the cubicle. Be wiv you in a minute.’

  Poppy closed the cubicle curtain and took off her scarf, then screwed her hair into a tight bun on the top of her head and put on the black wig. She gasped. Transformation! She teased her fingers through the ringlets. It was thin hair, not like her own, but it was shiny and from a distance . . . from a distance, she breathed. No-one would know me.

  She kept it on and handed the shopkeeper one shilling and sixpence for it, which was the price on the ticket. ‘I’ll take this one,’ she said. ‘The red one doesn’t suit me.’

  ‘Righty-ho.’ The woman put the money in her pocket. ‘The red one’s a better quality,’ she added. ‘But if you’re ’appy with that? It suits you,’ she said. ‘Fair, are you?’

  Poppy nodded and made her escape, back the way she had come. She took a breath on coming to the alleyway and impulsively went down it towards the tavern. I need to earn some money, she thought, but more than anything I need a chance to think about my future: to make up my mind about what to do. Here is an opportunity right in front of me. The landlord was still outside, this time with a yard brush in his hand, sweeping the doorstep.

  ‘Yes?’ he said abruptly as Poppy approached him. Then he glanced at her again, and added, ‘What can I do fer you, miss?’

  Poppy cleared her throat. ‘I, erm, I’m looking for work. Just to tide me over, you know,’ she said. ‘I wondered if you had anything? I’ve worked as an assistant in a grocery shop and in a café,’ she went on. ‘Or I can clean.’

  He sniffed. ‘Yer don’t look like a cleaner to me. Where’re you from?’

  ‘I’m – I’m from the north. I came looking for work as a seamstress, but there doesn’t seem to be any. I’ve spent all my money.’ She continued with her white lie. ‘I can’t go home until I’ve made enough for the train fare.’

  ‘Huh,’ he said. ‘So you’d not be stoppin’ long?’

  ‘Depends,’ she said. ‘I might.’

  ‘Well it just so happens that I do need somebody.’ He leaned on the brush and stared at her. ‘You’d ’ave to live in. I want somebody to clean the place every morning and serve in the tavern every night.’

  ‘I’m used to getting up early,’ she told him, ’and working at night,’ and she considered that serving ale couldn’t be much different from serving coffee.

  ‘All right.’ He leaned the brush against the wall. ‘I’ll try you. But if you’re no good then you’re out! Understood?’

  ‘Yes, thank you, Mr Black.’

  ‘’Ow do you know me name?’ he barked.

  ‘Oh! Everybody round here knows you,’ she said nervously.

  He gave a grim laugh. ‘And they didn’t put you off?’

  She shook her head. ‘I really need the work.’

  ‘What’s your name?’ he grunted.

  ‘P-Paula,’ she stammered. ‘Paula Ma— Mason.’

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  Black was dictatorial, brusque and domineering. He shouted at everyone, from his customers at the Pit Stop and his neurotic wife, to the lad who worked in the cellars and attended the hydraulic beer engines which brought up the beer into the saloon. He’d led Poppy into the tavern, which was dark and low-ceilinged and reeked of tobacco smoke. There was only one room and that had a bar counter, long wooden tables and rough deal benches, so that the customers sat side by side to drink their ale or gin and play dominoes. On one side of the room was a hearth with a fire burning and opposite was an upright piano with sheet music on the stand.

  ‘Who plays the piano?’ Poppy had asked tentatively.

  ‘Anybody who can bash out a few notes,’ he’d said curtly. ‘Can you play?’

  ‘A bit,’ she’d answered and followed him up to the room which was to be hers. It was at the top of the building, small, cold and damp, without a fireplace to warm it. There was a narrow iron bedstead and a wooden chest of drawers with a jug and washbowl. A towel rail stood empty.

  ‘Ask my wife if you need anyfink,’ he’d said, and then, glancing at her, remarked, ‘I expect you’re used to somefink better, ain’t yer? Come down in the world?’

  She’d only nodded, and then asked him what her duties were. Now she was into her third week and her hands were sore with washing glasses and tables. She swept and washed the saloon floor, scrubbed the doorstep and cleaned the windows, for Black was quite particular about the cleanliness of the place. But she didn’t mind; the fact that she was kept so busy meant that she didn’t think too often about Charlie and his betrayal. When she did think of him she was sunk into misery.

  What she had objected to were the impertinent comments she had endured on her first night serving the customers. Because everyone sat at the long tables, it was her duty to go up and down with jugs of beer, and the difficulty wasn’t in leaning over the customers and pouring without splashing, but in avoiding the wandering hands of many of the men, who fumbled with her skirt and bodice and made various suggestions. She had complained to the landlord and told him she wouldn’t put up with it, and he had immediately warned everybody that if they did anything untoward, they would be banned from the hostelry. ‘This isn’t Dora,’ he’d bellowed. ‘She didn’t mind, but this wench does.’ And sheepishly they had listened and complied.

  The postcards were sent off to her father, Dan, Mrs Bennett and the Marinos telling them not to worry about her, she would come back when she was ready. On the day she posted them, she had passed the costumiers where she had purchased the wig, and on seeing the shop was empty she had gone in to look at the sheet music.

  ‘Take what you want, darlin’,’ the woman had said. ‘I’m sellin’ off the old stuff at a ha’penny a sheet, but there’s some new music there as well that’s just come in.’

  Poppy had bought several song sheets which looked interesting – not to sing, she told herself, but just to familiarize herself with the words and the music; she sat down now on her bed with the printed sheet music for ‘Greensleeves’, which had been published by Schott and Company. She was looking for the arranger’s name, for although it was a very old song, various adaptations had been made of it. Hah, she breathed. Marino. You’ve followed me here, Anthony. She folded it up and put it in her apron pocket and went downstairs.

  There was just one old man in the saloon and he was asleep at one of the tables, his head cradled in his arms and a tankard of ale in front of him. The landlord was nowhere to be seen, and Poppy sidled over to the piano. She had heard it being played, very badly, by several of the customers, mostly in burlesque style. The tone was quite mellow, though the instrument was in need of tuning. She wasn’t a pianist, but she
could play a few chords and pick out a harmony, and had a good ear. She took the sheet for ‘Greensleeves’ from her pocket and saw that she had inadvertently picked up another song sheet with it. She read through it and her pulse quickened.

  ‘Anthony again,’ she whispered, seeing his name at the bottom of the sheet. She noticed how he had written ‘affettuoso’ and ‘amoroso’ above some of the notes. ‘With feeling,’ she murmured, remembering her piano lessons. ‘Lovingly!’

  Poppy glanced round again. The old man was snoring. She sat down on the stool, lifted the piano lid, placed the music on the stand and with the lightest of touches and the softest of voices began to play and sing.

  ‘In the town where I was born there flowed a river

  Its rolling tide was swift and deep and strong.

  In the town where I was born there lived my lover – he stole my heart

  He stole my love when I was young.

  ‘He kissed my hand and I was blithe and bonny

  He kissed my lips, his words so soft and sweet as honey

  My heart, my life, is thine for ever and never will there be another.

  In the town where I was born there flowed a river

  Its rolling tide swift and deep as a maiden’s dreams.

  ‘In the town where I was born once lived my lover

  On these deserted moon-lit banks I stand and grieve

  He stole my love, my heart, my tears and did deceive, drowning them by his treachery.’

  Poppy bent her head as her tears fell. Anthony’s words and music always touched her emotions. She groped in her pocket for a handkerchief to blow her nose and was suddenly aware of other people. The old man was sitting up and both the landlord and his wife were standing in the doorway to the living quarters. He had his arms folded in front of him, and she was fiddling with a corner of the apron she always wore.