No Moon

by Irene N. Watts

  The coronation will be held next year, on June 22, 1911. Mother says if George had been another girl, she’d have named him after the new queen instead of after the new king, George V. It’s just as well he’s a boy, so he can share a room with the twins.

  Kathleen does not think Queen Mary is as beautiful and stylish as King Edward’s widow, Queen Alexandra. People adore her and say she is still the loveliest woman in London. But I like Queen Mary, with her shy smile and delicate complexion. Kathleen admires her “exquisite” taste in hats. I had to guess what that word meant!

  When Emily is asleep, Kathleen tells me how she’s got her life planned. Mine, too. She’s like Mother and Father–she doesn’t ask me if that’s the life I want!

  “Miss Jenny’s is a stepping stone, that’s all, Lou,” Kathleen whispers. “I won’t stay there forever. One day I’ll open a hat salon and a tea parlor, so we can serve tea and pastries to the grand society ladies–after they’ve bought their hats!” She jumps out of bed and swans up and down the room.

  “May I be of assistance, your royal highness?” Kathleen makes a deep curtsy. Emily stirs, threatening to wake up. I can’t help laughing at Kathleen. She jumps back into bed and tickles me until I beg for mercy.

  “We’ll call the salon the Gardener Sisters,” she says.

  “And who is going to serve your grand ladies and make fancy pastries?” I ask her, knowing full well she has decided that I am to stay in the kitchen. As if I don’t spend enough time there already!

  “You will, Lou. Naturally, you will be in charge of all that side of things. Emily can serve when she’s old enough; you’ll train her. You’re ever so patient with the little ones.”

  I remind her that Emily won’t be little forever, that she may have her own dreams, but Kathleen’s lost in a make-believe world.

  “We’ll all wear black silk dresses,” Kathleen tells me.

  Silk?

  Here I am, in the middle of a hot afternoon, day-dreaming just like Kathleen. Young George fusses, reminding me I’m supposed to put him down for his nap. I still have to cook carrots and parsnips to put in the cottage pie Mother is making for supper. Emily plays quietly under the kitchen table with her rag doll. I heat the water to start the vegetables cooking. Thank goodness our twins are not back from school yet!

  “I’ll take George upstairs, shall I, Mother?”

  She wipes her hand across her forehead, leaving a streak of flour. “Thanks, Lou, I’m almost finished rolling out the pastry.” She cuts a perfect circle, leaving a scrap for Emily to whisk off the edge and gobble down.

  “Now where did that bit of pastry go?” Mother says. “Is that mouse back in my kitchen? I’ll make a cup of tea before the boys get home.”

  I carry George upstairs, and he falls asleep at once. How can I persuade Mother to let me go out to work too? I’ve been teaching Emily to do all kinds of small chores. Wouldn’t it be better for me to bring in a bit of money to help with the rent? Father says the landlord’s raising it.

  I go back downstairs. Busy as usual, I mop up spills, finish off the last of the week’s ironing, and give the scullery a good sweep. Now I’m behind with the vegetables.

  The stewing beef has been simmering on the stove all morning. I chop the last potato and add more onions because that’s how Father likes his pie. Mother swiftly trims the now-tender meat before mixing it with the partly cooked potatoes, carrots, and parsnips and covering the lot with the pastry lid. She opens the oven door, and a wave of heat makes our kitchen hotter than ever.

  I wipe down the table, dry my hands on my apron, and set out two mugs. The tea’s steeped. Mother pours milk into the mugs and we sit down.

  Now’s my chance. I try not to sound too eager. I don’t want Mother to think I’m not happy at home.

  “A girl I know has been taken on at Black’s Glove Factory, and the foreman asked her if she knows of any others wanting work. The pay’s the same as Kathleen gets. I’d like to try. What do you think?” There, I’ve got it out at last!

  Mother doesn’t say anything. Her expression gives nothing away.

  “Kathleen started work when she was my age, and you were younger than me when you went into service.” Mother stirs her tea round and round. I hold my breath.

  “Louisa, I can’t spare you and that’s the truth. You do more than your share, helping with the young ones and the chores. I need you at home for now–helping me the way you do is good training for when you go into service. That factory is no place for you.”

  I can see Mother’s made up her mind, but I’m not giving up so easily.

  “Mother, ever so many of the girls from school are working in factories. Mrs. Bernardi’s granddaughters are at Pink’s Fruit Factory, so why isn’t a factory a place for me, if it’s good enough for them?”

  “You should hear what Rosa thinks of that. Those girls are barely fourteen years old. On their feet for ten, twelve hours a day, in a steamy room with no windows. They cough all the time, she says. They can’t scrub the red stains off their fingers, however hard they try. The foreman’s a bully and a brute. I won’t have you exposed to the likes of him! You’re too young. No, don’t tell me about Kathleen again. I need you here for the present, and I don’t want to hear any more. And there’s the back door. Surely that’s not Father home so early?”

  He clumps through the scullery and stands in the doorway, looking at us. I can tell by the expression on his face that he knows something’s going on.

  “It’s very quiet in here. Where’s Emily gone–off to Spain, is she? I’ve time for a quick cup of tea, Flo, before I pick up my last load of cabbages.” Father sits down, and I bring another mug and pour out his tea.

  “Who wants this?” he says, taking a shiny red apple out of his pocket. Emily comes out from under the table and clambers onto Father’s knee.

  “What’s Spain, Father?” Emily asks, her mouth full of apple.

  “It’s a country across the sea, where Uncle Alf and I get our oranges from, my little duck.”

  Mother sets Father’s mug in front of him, stirring in a big teaspoon of sugar–the way he likes it. She doesn’t say a word.

  “Is something going on that I should know about?” Father asks.

  Mother’s face doesn’t move a muscle. “Louisa wants to work in a glove factory. I’ve said no!”

  “Father, let me explain!” I know it’s hopeless. There’s no way I’d ever persuade him once Mother has made up her mind. If I was Emily’s age, I could wheedle the world out of him. But then, it wouldn’t be about going out to work I’d be asking for, only a sweetie.

  At that moment, the back door opens. Tom and Harry cross the flagstones I’d mopped only this morning. The twins are dripping blood–one from his nose and the other from a cut lip. Both their shirts are filthy and torn, and the pair of them look as if they’re going to burst into tears. I’m ready to join them!

  “What in the world? After all I’ve said, into the scullery. Lou, hand me that old towel, please,” Mother says. “It’s only a bit of blood. It looks worse than it is. Tom, stand still. If you’re big enough to fight, you’re big enough to put up with a bruise or two.” Mother sounds harsh, but she doesn’t mean it. She cleans their cuts gently.

  As I rinse the blood and dirt out of the towel, Father comes into the scullery. “Alright, who started it?” He looks from one twin to the other.

  The boys hang their heads.

  “If I’d come home looking the way you do when I was your age, I’d have felt your grandfather’s belt. And I’d have been sent to bed, without supper. I work hard to put those shirts on your backs, and now look at them!” He bends down to put his boots on again.

  “Sorry, Father,” they whisper.

  “Sorry is not good enough. You’ve got too much time on your hands, running wild the way you do. I don’t know what they teach you in that school. As if there is not enough trouble, with the price of fruit and vegetables sky-high. I hear talk of strikes down at the docks.
Women are throwing themselves in front of horses and demanding the vote. Whatever next? No one seems to know their place anymore.

  “This Saturday, and every Saturday from now on, you’ll both do a man’s work. Great big boys of eight should be a help, not causing trouble!”

  Father can’t bear to see Mother upset. He’s not angry about the boys fighting. He just wants everything to stay the way it is and he and Mother to decide what’s best for me!

  “You boys will be too tired, after you’ve loaded and unloaded a few sacks of potatoes at the market, to be thinking about fighting. Uncle Alf and I can do with some help.”

  “Yes, Father.” The twins nudge each other, all smiles again.

  “Good-bye, my little mouse,” he says, patting Emily’s cheek. “See you later, Flo.” At the door, he turns back towards me. “You’ll go into a factory over my dead body. No daughter of mine is going to slave over a machine and look like an old woman by the time she’s sixteen. I won’t have it. You’ll stay home until we decide otherwise. Mother is always telling me how she doesn’t know how she’d manage without you!”

  The door slams and George wakes up crying.

  “Can we go out to play until bedtime, Mother?” The boys look at her hopefully.

  “Hand me your shirts and go upstairs. See if you can keep George quiet for a bit, and then I’ll see.” She shakes her head as they pelt up the stairs, pushing each other.

  “Lou, Father’s right, and one day you’ll thank us for it. Next year, maybe you can be spared, and then we’ll look round for something suitable. I’m going to soak these shirts. Emily, it’s time to put your dolly away.”

  I didn’t really expect Mother and Father to say anything different, but why can’t I help out, like Kathleen?

  Miss Pringle told us last week in Sunday school that there are many different ways to help in the world. What I’d like to know is, why is it always the eldest who gets to do things first?

  Father says that life’s not fair, but that there’s always someone worse off than you are. Know your place in this world, and do the best you can. No one can ask more of you than that!

  How am I going to know what my place in the world is if I don’t get a chance to take a look at it?

  London, England

  1911

  3

  “Your turn will come”

  “I’ve never known it to be this hot, so early in June. The milk’s off, again. Emily, come out from under that table and pop round to Mrs. Bernardi’s. Ask her if she can spare us some milk for tea, until tomorrow. And don’t forget to say please and thank you. Here’s the jug, mind how you go, that’s my big girl,” Mother says.

  Emily, at four and a half, still thinks being sent on errands is a treat. She comes back in a few minutes.

  “I never spilt a drop. Mrs. Bernardi’s got a pretty plate with a picture of the king and queen on it, Mother.”

  “Has she, now? And who’s going to see their majesties ride in a carriage?”

  “Me!” Emily jumps up and down.

  It makes me hot, just looking at her. The coronation is in three weeks’ time, on a Thursday.

  “I’m thankful they didn’t choose wash day,” Mother says. Would the earth have swallowed us up if they had?

  We are all going, even little George. As Mother says, he won’t remember anything, but it’s fitting the whole family pays its respects.

  George will ride on Father’s shoulders. I know he’ll love the bands. Father plans to leave at dawn and has picked out a good spot along the route.

  Kathleen and I are hoping to go to a band concert in the park that evening. Mother says we’ll take sandwiches and a thermos of tea. “Everyone in the city will be out, so you’d better be ready. I’m not waiting while you girls fuss over your hats,” she says.

  “Let’s hope the weather stays fine. If everyone brings umbrellas, it’ll look like a funeral!” I tell Mother. Imagine, if I was at work and earning money, I could buy her a coronation plate, or maybe a mug.

  I slice the cold mutton for supper–the last of Sunday’s roast.

  “There are cold potatoes and pickles for your father,” Mother says. They’re what we have every week; I don’t need reminding. I’m slicing the loaf when Kathleen comes rushing in. She’s all flushed, and her eyes are bright. What has she been up to this time?

  “Sorry I’m late, Mother. It’s busy at the shop right now.”

  After supper, Mother takes the little ones off to bed. Kathleen rolls up her sleeves and washes the dishes; I dry and put them away. Father’s gone out for his evening pint at the Black Hart.

  When Mother comes back down, Kathleen asks, “Is it alright if Lou and I have a bit of a walk?”

  “Off you go then, but don’t be too long.” Mother picks up her mending.

  We walk down the street towards Vauxhall Bridge. As soon as we’re out of sight of our house, Kathleen stops and grabs my arm. “I’ll burst if I don’t tell you, Louisa. I’ve given in my notice!” She’s breathless.

  “You haven’t! Whatever will Father say? Kathleen Gardener, here I am, pining to go out to work, and you hand in your notice!” I must have spoken too loudly because anyone would think we were being followed, the way Kath shushes me.

  “Not so loud–people are looking. Keep walking. Well, of course I’m going to tell Mother and Father… at the right moment.”

  “What made you do it?” I ask her.

  “Last week, a customer left Saturday’s Daily Mail on the counter. On Monday morning, I took the newspaper to tidy away. Miss Jenny was serving a particularly fussy lady, so I guessed they’d be occupied for a while. She sent me down to unpack some new stock, and that gave me an opportunity to look over the SITUATIONS VACANT. I’m always hoping for something better. There was one from a milliner who needed an apprentice. I tore out the address and asked Miss Jenny if I might leave half an hour early. When I offered to make it up next day, she let me go.

  “Don’t you think it was an omen that I’d worn my straw hat that day–the one I’d just finished trimming? Lou, the milliner has the most elegant establishment! We’re going there now…”

  Kathleen and I link arms and cross the street near the Church of St. Savior. As we pass the cabman’s shelter opposite, we hear a whistle.

  “Don’t look up, Lou,” Kath says. She sounds exactly like Mother. We turn onto Lupus Street and walk up to the corner of Glasgow Terrace.

  “Here we are, Madame Claudine’s.” Kathleen points to the name above the shop. “Isn’t that a beautiful name? It’s French.”

  I stare at the window display: a delicate gray hat with a feather curling up from the brocade ribbon round the brim and a veil glistening with tiny pearls. The table is draped with a pearl-colored shawl, and a string of pearls lies gleaming between the folds.

  “That’s an ostrich feather.” Kath preens, as if she’d arranged the plume herself. “Madame serves tea to her clients, or lemonade. Our dream come true.” She sighs happily.

  I am just the least bit envious, pleased for my sister, but it is her dream, not mine. “However did you get taken on in such an elegant shop, Kath?” I ask her.

  “After I left Miss Jenny’s and found the salon, I waited. A lady came out, followed by a maid who carried a gold-and-white striped hatbox. A chauffeur opened the automobile door, and they drove off. I took a deep breath, straightened my hat, and went inside. A lady wearing a white tunic over a black silk skirt came forward. Her hair was black and shiny, coiled into a perfect knot, and fastened with a tortoiseshell comb. She spoke to me as nicely as if there were a chauffeur waiting for me too.”

  “‘May I be of service, Mademoiselle?’

  “I curtsied before explaining that I had come about the position of apprentice.

  “She asked my name and what experience I’d had. Then she wrote the answers down on a little notepad, with a tiny gold pencil.

  “I told her I’d always wanted to learn how to make beautiful hats and how much I admired
the window display.

  “‘What is it you admire?’ she asked me.

  “‘It makes me want to see more of your hats, Madame. It is as if you are offering a taste, instead of the whole meal at once.’”

  How does Kathleen find the right words to say?

  “‘I’ll work hard; you’ll never be sorry. Please give me a chance, Madame. I want to learn,’ I explained, and she seemed to approve of that.

  “She asked me to take off my hat and to put it on the counter. She turned it this way and that and asked if I had trimmed it myself. She must have approved because she took me into the little back room, where she works on her designs.

  “What a muddle! There were all kinds of fabrics–lace and muslins, silks and ribbons–tumbled about on the shelves. She’d dropped pins on the floor, and the sewing machine had no cover on it. Miss Jenny would have had palpitations if she’d seen it. I said I’d straighten it up in no time at all.

  “She waved her hands at me helplessly, jangling her bracelets, and shrugged her shoulders.

  “‘I have only recently opened the salon,’ she said. ‘I am an artiste, naturellement I create each hat uniquely for every one of my clients, but with no help…’ I could tell that she has never had to clean or tidy up after herself. A proper lady she is, from Paris, France.

  “I’m going to keep that place spotless. I’ll make myself so useful that she’ll wonder how she ever did without me! I am to start next week, and she will pay me a pound a month. That’s a whole shilling a week more than Miss Jenny gave me. Twelve pounds a year, Lou!”

  “What did Miss Jenny say when you told her?” I ask, when Kathleen finally runs out of breath.

  “I don’t think she minded. She said her niece wants to work in the shop. Well, she’ll come cheap, seeing she’s a relative. Miss Jenny agreed to give me a character reference, though Madame did not even ask for one!”

  “You talked too much to give her a chance. I am proud of you, Kath.” I give her arm a squeeze. “But you’re going to have to tell Mother and Father, before they hear that you’ve given in your notice,” I warn her.