Diary of an Ordinary Woman

by Margaret Forster

  2 May

  Today, when the children had gone, I stayed in the classroom, intending to inspect the verse they had been set to write out this afternoon. Instead, I sat motionless, staring ahead. There was a thick beam of sunlight coming through the high window at the back and the motes swirled and danced in it. The battered desks, covered in ink stains and scratched names, were bathed in its light and no longer a dull brown but positively golden, and the black iron supports gleamed. I tried to picture the pupils who had just vacated them and it was impossible. I could not conjure up more than two or three faces and yet I have taught Standard Three now for nearly a year. Something has happened. The pride and pleasure I had in teaching have evaporated and I must get them back. It is too awful to think about.

  10 May

  Shall I go for the weekend to Tilda’s? It’s no use lying to myself. I know why I want to go. Two magazines have arrived from Matthew, sent on by Tilda, and they contained notes from him. He says circulation has increased, though he gives no figures, and that he is serious about wanting to engage someone to help him produce it and not simply in a clerical capacity. He says he can offer me a salary only slightly less than I told him I was getting as a teacher with the prospect of a substantial rise as the magazine flourishes. He says he is run off his feet doing everything himself and if I will not join him he must find someone else.

  He doesn’t realise that I am not a risk taker. I’ve always wanted to be, but I’m not. He doesn’t know what it’s like to be out of work and afraid of being penniless. But if I did give up teaching – not that I will – I could always go back to it, I suppose. I am trained, I have experience. It is not at all the same as when Father died and I had no qualifications.

  16 May

  I think I will do it. It’s madness, and Mother will be horrified, and I’m slightly horrified myself, but another part of me is excited. Matthew says life is about taking one’s chances when they are presented. Do you want to look back at your life at 60 when you retire from teaching, he asks, and think that is all that you have done. I defended teaching stoutly, when he said this, but I knew that the answer was no. I’m no longer sure that teaching really is my vocation. I have never thought of journalism as a career but Matthew makes it seem very attractive. I can try it.

  17 May

  I have given in my notice. I thought I would feel wretched but I don’t. Mr Williams was surprised but very understanding. He said I had not been myself this term, though he had no criticism of my work. He says he will give me a good reference so if, after my little adventure, as he put it, I wish to teach again I should be able to find employment. Far worse will be telling Mother. I hope that Tilda will back me up, though I cannot be sure even of that.

  20 May

  Mother is angry and distressed. She reminded me, as I knew she was bound to, that Father had made considerable sacrifices to pay for my training and that Harold had been very generous too. What kind of repayment is this, she asked, quite trembling with indignation. There was nothing I could say in my defence. I suppose there is a man at the bottom of this, she went on, Tilda tells me it is all to do with a man. I was furious and knew I was blushing. So much for Tilda’s support. I said it was true that a man had offered me the job but I had no attachment to him. Grace came in and saw her mother’s tears and went to her and hugged her and said I was naughty and I should go away and not be given any tea, and she said it so sweetly and amusingly – amusing to us not to her – that Mother and I could not help laughing. Yes, she agreed, Millicent is being very naughty but I love her all the same. I felt so ashamed then. Mother has had enough to put up with without my causing her anxiety. She so liked having a daughter who was a schoolteacher, boasted about it even, quite forgetting that at one time she had never wanted me to have a career at all. George, through no fault of his own, has been such a disappointment and now I am too – and it is my own fault.

  WHEN TERM ENDS in July 1924, Millicent goes first to Brighton then, at the beginning of September, moves in with Tilda and Charles, taking over two small rooms at the top of their house. This is meant to be temporary until she finds somewhere to rent but by mid-September when she is about to start working for Matthew Taylor’s magazine she is still there. Nowhere in her diary does Millicent mention the title of the magazine and I’ve been unable to identify it, though the proprietor, Alison Hooper, did later invest in Lilliput. But this was the era of small literary magazines, many of which ran for only a few issues before disappearing. During the 1920s and 1930s there were dozens of them, all produced on a shoestring.

  *

  12 September 1924

  I start work tomorrow. I am so nervous, and yet excited too, far more excited than when I began teaching. Matthew took me to his office today, just so I would know where to come and what to expect. I had trouble hiding my dismay and perhaps did not entirely succeed. The word ‘office’ to me means a business-like, efficient-looking place with filing cabinets and desks and typewriters. Matthew’s ‘office’ is above a café, run by Italians, and the uncarpeted staircase leading to it is perilous, the boards are loose and creak alarmingly, and at one point, on the turn, the whole staircase seems in danger of coming away from the wall. The room itself is tiny and smells, though I couldn’t identify what of. Something not quite healthy, maybe just damp. The walls have Russian posters on them. Matthew says they are not his, they were here when he rented the place, but he likes them and so he left them in place. I rather suspect that they cover crumbling plaster.

  I don’t know where I am to sit. There’s no desk, only a wooden table, with one chair in front of it. The floor is covered with untidy piles of papers and along one wall are piles of unsold copies of the magazine’s past issues, a great many of them. There is a telephone on the floor near the grimy window, out of which it is impossible to see anything clearly, and beside it there is a kettle but no sign of a gas ring or suchlike upon which to boil it. There is a minute fireplace, rather pretty, with blue and white tiles round the iron work, but all that lay in the grate today was some orange peel. Heaven knows what the room above, where Matthew lives, is like. He did not invite me to visit it, though he dashed up there to bring down another chair and made a great fuss of cleaning it with his handkerchief. I felt helpless standing there, and was filled with a growing dread that I have been taken in. If so, it is by my own vanity and I will have been taught a harsh lesson. There will be no point in wearing a costume, or worrying about clothes at all. I will be able to wear any old thing and will probably look as shabby as Matthew in no time at all.

  26 September

  Things are not so bad. Going to the office is a lot more interesting than cycling to school. I get a bus to Oxford Circus and then I walk, zig-zagging through Soho to Greek Street. The people in the café are usually just opening up when I arrive and they are friendly and cheerful and call me bella signorina without sounding impertinent. Matthew is never up at that time so I have my own key and for the first hour, before he stirs himself, I settle in and like the feeling of being in control. Already, in a mere two weeks, I have made a difference to the office. Everything is clean and tidy for a start. I have banished the left-over copies to a cupboard on the landing outside and Matthew has purchased another second-hand table, a long narrow one, which fits neatly along the back wall and upon it I arrange everything to do with the issue he is working on. I sit at the other table which I have covered with a bright yellow cloth brought from Tilda’s. And I have found an old jug in which I intend always to keep a few flowers. It is not office-like to do this, but since this room could never resemble a proper office it is of no consequence. Matthew doesn’t care what it looks like. He cares more about the standard of my typing. This is coming on but I still make so many errors. I think often of Mabel and her expertise and envy it. But as I have said to Matthew, I am not a secretary and made it plain before I accepted this job that I could hardly type. My job is to be an editorial assistant not a typist. What I do is read copy as it comes in
and mark grammatical errors and then, if necessary – and it is nearly always necessary – I cut it down for length. I like this part. I always enjoyed précis exercises at school and that is what it amounts to. At first I worried that the authors of the articles and stories would be furious at having their precious copy interfered with, and not even by the editor, but Matthew said none of them is important enough to mind; they are just glad to be published and paid. There are some very peculiar contributors who come to hand in their pieces. One man came in today wearing a long black coat right down to his ankles and buttoned right up to his neck even though it is a beautifully sunny and warm day. I remarked on this afterwards to Matthew and he said that very likely Vernon, the man’s name, was naked underneath. Vernon was in a great hurry, slapping his copy down and exiting without a word. It was written in an atrocious hand and my job was to type it all up. I thought Matthew should insist that all submissions be typewritten but he said Vernon was a special case and had had to pawn his typewriter and it was a brilliant article worth the bother of deciphering and typing up. My bother, of course, though I couldn’t see what is brilliant about it. It is about trade unions and what they should be doing. Vernon didn’t look as though he would know anything at all about workers. I noticed his hands were soft and very white. He is no horny-handed son of the soil.

  30 September

  Matthew was in a bit of a tizz today. His patron, Alison Hooper, came to inspect the premises, or maybe it was to inspect Matthew, or even me. She finances the magazine. Matthew says it is not just a plaything and that she is quite serious in wanting to be involved in a good, small literary magazine. She is a writer herself and has had a novel published under a pseudonym. I wonder what it is. Matthew doesn’t know. She writes short stories too and of course wants them to find space in her own publication. She uses a pseudonym for those too, but changes it all the time. They are quite good. She brought one with her today, already typed. It is called ‘The Lady and the Lap Dog’ – very Chekhovian, as Matthew commented – and is very sharp and sarcastic and sneers at the exaggerated affection women have for their pets. I liked it, but I cannot say I liked its author. She was disdainful and cold, I thought. She ignored me, though I saw her hard little eyes, and they are little, take me in. Matthew was nervous, and ingratiating, which I have never seen before, but then of course everything depends on Mrs Hooper’s willingness to go on advancing money. I wonder if he finds her attractive. She is not glamorous but she has good taste and she is slim. She was wearing the most beautiful day dress underneath her coat, I longed to see it properly but she never took the coat off. The dress was of a fine orange worsted material flecked with cream, and trimmed with black and white rayon braid and tassels. The skirt was quite narrow. I couldn’t, of course, see the sleeves. Her legs are excellent. She wears spectacles of a type I have never seen before, with red frames. And she smokes through a tortoiseshell cigarette-holder. She started questioning Matthew about expenses, but then stopped suddenly and said she hoped he was going to take her out to lunch. Matthew looked horrified, but said yes, of course. As they departed, I found myself wondering if he had any money in his pocket. Often, he hasn’t. I couldn’t imagine where he would take her, either. The only place he ever goes is downstairs, where he owes Franco a fortune, but I thought surely he would not take her there. She looks as though she is used to the Ritz. Turned out he took her to the Café Royal, where he had never been in his life. What daring! He had that morning drawn money to pay the printer and used that. He said it wasn’t so very expensive because all she wanted was a gin and tonic beforehand and then a thin slice of grilled liver. She is apparently pleased with the magazine and told Matthew she had heard several people at a party singing its praises and saying it was witty and the stories and articles lively and different. Best of all, she said these people thought the magazine had a point to it, unlike so many others around. I wonder what that point is. I cannot see it. I must ask Matthew if he can.

  1 October

  Matthew was offended when I asked him if there was indeed a point to his magazine. He said, very crossly, that of course there was a point or why would he be doing it at all. To earn a living, I said, which was why most people worked. He told me not to be so ridiculous and said there were easier ways of making a much better living and that he would never do anything just for the money. I said that was very high-minded of him but that it showed he had never been put to the test and then we got into a silly argument which went on and on and still he hadn’t told me what the point of his precious little magazine is.

  2 October

  There was an atmosphere between Matthew and me all of today. How funny we must’ve looked, Matthew huffing and puffing over the pages he was pasting up, his back turned to me pointedly, and I pretending to be relaxed, typing in a deliberately languid fashion which I know infuriates him. It is awkward when two people who spend all day together in one small room have had a disagreement. It was only about milk. Matthew had left yesterday’s in the bottle and it had gone off. He said there was nothing wrong with it and that I was too fussy. I refused to use it in my tea and he ostentatiously drank it from the bottle. I could tell from his contorted face that he then felt sick, and I laughed. He didn’t. We went out at lunchtime as we always do but I said I had some shopping to do and did not join him for a bowl of soup. I needed to be away from him. It bothers me that this is true. However much I like him, and I do, I am often relieved to part company. He likes us to go out together after we have finished work for the day and I like to go to the plays and concerts he suggests but sometimes I worry that he is making assumptions which I do not share. We went to a jazz club the other evening and he introduced me to someone as his girlfriend. Afterwards, I asked him why he had said girlfriend and not colleague, and he seemed surprised. He said girlfriend was accurate enough, wasn’t it, and friendlier than colleague, and I said the term girlfriend implied a connection between us which did not exist. He looked puzzled, and shrugged. Is he being naive, or am I being priggish? One thing I know, I am not attracted physically to him. He has begun kissing me goodnight and I do not enjoy it. I hope he has realised this. He would have to be dumb not to. Why else, pray, would I have turned up my coat collar, so that he ended up kissing hairy tweed? His mouth must be full of it.

  1 December

  I reminded Matthew that tomorrow my three-months trial period is up. He looked astonished and wondered aloud why I was mentioning it: did I want some sort of written contract, because if so he’d have to consult Mrs Hooper. I said it wasn’t that I wanted a contract but rather the reverse, that I was thinking of admitting I’d made a dreadful mistake and so it would be better to give in my notice and return to teaching which was humiliating but had to be faced up to. He asked if I were mad. What has brought this on, he said, I thought you were enjoying the work, you’re good at it, we have fun, don’t we? I said I had enjoyed it at first but now it had started to feel like playing, just a game, and I needed the sense of purpose that teaching used to give me even when it was monotonous. Oh for heaven’s sake, he said, and hit the table with his hand. I reminded him that I’d asked him a few weeks ago to tell me the point of the magazine which still eluded me and it was what I kept on missing, the point of it all. I felt no sense of mission or achievement, and I’d come to realise I needed to. Very well, he said, and began ticking off reasons why his magazine was of value and had a point. One, he said, man cannot live by bread alone, he needs cultural stimulation and our magazine supplies it. Two, it is full of outspoken and controversial views which cannot find an outlet in mainstream journals and which should be heard. Three, it is a cradle for the development of the talents of writers who will go on to influence our society. Is that enough, he said, enough point for you, madam? He was so cross his face was red and his eyes bulging, and he suddenly looked like a caricature of An Angry Man, the sort seen in Punch, with steam coming out of the ears. I said there was no need to be sarcastic. He had been provoked, I suppose, to speak very
sharply but then he changed tack and said he hoped I wasn’t serious about leaving because he couldn’t imagine how he would manage without me, we were such a good team. A team, I echoed? Well, he corrected himself, a partnership. No, I said, that’s not true. I am your employee and no longer comfortable about it. I would rather you were something else, he said, I would rather you were my wife.

  Oh God, I should never have allowed him to say that because once said it could not be unsaid and there was no way in which I could conceal my dismay. It seemed best to leave him quickly. Matthew, I said, I am handing in my notice and I want no more mention of, of what you have just said. That was what I said, or something equally stiff and formal, and then I bundled all I owned into my bag, though not Tilda’s yellow table-cloth, and rushed to the door. But he was quicker. He stood with his back against it now looking not so funny, but quite threatening, like a villain in a melodrama, and said he thought all girls wanted marriage and why was I so offended and hadn’t we been good friends and surely I had known what the natural outcome would be. I said not at all, that on the contrary I’d thought we were good friends and colleagues and I had in no way led him on. His reply was, I am only human. What that meant I cannot fathom. You are really just going to walk out and leave me, he said; and I said no, I would of course work out my notice. Don’t bother, he said, and suddenly stood aside and let me pass. Then I felt bad, as though I had wronged him, and now I am sitting here weeping without knowing why. I am not at all sad to have given in my notice. Worried and mortified but not sad. Yet I can’t help weeping. It is the mess, the way things have turned out, which makes me cry. What on earth is to become of me if I never settle to anything and never like any man enough. I have been such a fool and must face the consequences. I don’t know if I should go to the office tomorrow or not. Did he mean it when he said don’t bother? I think I should go, and show I am reliable and ready to work out my notice, but I dread it. I know I have hurt Matthew but I would like our parting of the ways to be civilised.