by Jenny Holmes
‘I don’t know – there’s something about her. It strikes me she’s not as desperate as most of them. She has more about her, somehow.’
‘You’re right – in my experience, few people do this unless they really have to. And it’s odd that Millicent is already pleading poverty, without waiting to hear if she’s lost her job for good.’ She made it clear that she shared Vincent’s doubts. ‘And there’s something else – she didn’t own up to being squeamish about what she saw here at the salon. That didn’t strike me as being quite right.’
Listening in, Cynthia felt a cold, creeping sensation of dread follow on from the first jolt of surprise and she failed to notice what was going on around her.
‘So?’ Poole prompted. ‘What do you want me to do?’
‘I want you to pick her up as arranged, but … don’t take her to the King’s Head. Take her somewhere else. I don’t need to know where.’
‘Fair enough. Then what?’
Cynthia found it hard to breathe. She leaned forward and clutched the edge of her desk with both hands, only to find her headset suddenly wrenched from her head.
‘Cynthia Ambler.’ Ruth clutched the headset and spoke with cold anger. She gestured for Molly to cover Cynthia’s calls. ‘Come with me.’
For Cynthia, the world tilted on its axis. One moment she was at her switchboard, the next she was sitting in the supes’ office and she had no notion of how she’d got there. She looked through the glass-panelled door at lights flashing on switchboards then at Ruth speaking to her in words that didn’t come together to make sentences.
‘Let me down … disappointed … serious matter.’
She shook her head helplessly.
Ruth stared at the silent, confused figure sitting opposite her, her face white, her body trembling. She considered what she saw and her tone softened. ‘All right, Cynthia – calm down. What’s this about?’
‘Millicent.’ The word tumbled from Cynthia’s lips as she breathed out. ‘They … I have to …’ She tried to stand up but didn’t have the strength.
Ruth came round, bent over her and patted her hand. ‘It’s all right. Take some deep breaths. What about Millicent?’
‘She doesn’t realize … They’re tricking her.’
‘Who’s they?’ It was impossible to grasp what was going on – only that Cynthia was shocked beyond words and needed to be taken care of. ‘Never mind, you can explain later. For now, I’m sending you home.’
‘No. You can’t. I didn’t mean to—’
‘I know, I know.’ Ruth’s thoughts ran ahead. She would pack Cynthia safely off home then find out from Molly the cords that had been connected and thus the two subscribers’ names.
‘Don’t suspend me, please!’ Cynthia was so desperate that she clutched Ruth’s hand and refused to let go.
‘Come along,’ Ruth coaxed as she raised her up then led her down the aisle between the switchboards. ‘We’re going to get your hat and coat. Brenda, run outside and find us a taxi.’
Amidst the babble of voices and the winking of red and yellow lights, Cynthia made her exit. Rumours flew the second the door closed behind her – Cynthia was feeling poorly, over-worked, not sleeping because of the Norma and Millicent fiasco, bad time of the month, et cetera.
A taxi arrived at the door of the exchange and Ruth and Brenda got Cynthia settled on the back seat, checking that she had her handbag and everything she needed.
‘Number ten, Heaton Yard.’ Ruth gave the driver – a man in his fifties with a bald head and a florid complexion – the address written down on Cynthia’s file.
‘Right you are,’ he said, pulling away from the kerb into a slow stream of traffic.
Ruth watched the taxi disappear with folded arms and lips pressed together. ‘Don’t worry – I’ll soon get to the bottom of this,’ she promised Brenda as she stalked back up the steps and through the revolving doors.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
To outside observers all seemed normal in Heaton Yard. Walter’s daughter Joan washed the windows of number 4 while Dusty Miller planed and shaped a strip of wood to mend his broken window frame. ‘I’d wait for ever to get it fixed by our blinking landlord,’ he complained to Millicent, who watched from her top step.
She seemed at ease but she hid wildly see-sawing feelings as she reflected on what she’d arranged to do. She was by turns excited and nervous, confident and afraid, and her way of coping after making the arrangement with Phyllis Parr had been to get stuck into the everyday world of washing and mending, cleaning and ironing, in preparation for her afternoon assignation. Now, however, there was nothing left to do except to hold steady and keep to her chosen path.
She was watching Dusty hack out the old, rotten wood from the frame when Cynthia ran down the ginnel. About time too, she thought with a little lift to her spirits. She was glad of the distraction. Now let’s see if we can sort things out between us.
‘Thank heavens you’re in,’ Cynthia gasped as she stumbled past Millicent into the kitchen. She saw a purple dress on a coat hanger suspended from the mantelpiece and the ironing board leaning against the wall. Millicent’s white sling-back shoes stood on a sheet of newspaper on the table waiting to be cleaned.
‘Come in, why don’t you?’ Millicent resorted to irony to keep a step ahead in this tricky situation. ‘To what do I owe this pleasure? Oh, I forgot – you live here.’
‘Millicent.’ Cynthia’s voice was cracked, her face white as a sheet. ‘I’ve got something to tell you.’
Millicent cut across her, taking quiet pride in how reasonable she was prepared to be. ‘Look, there’s no need to go on about this suspension business. Let’s wait until it’s all come out in the wash then we can sit down with Norma and have a heart-to-heart.’
Cynthia, however, was anything but reasonable. ‘It’s not that. Oh, Millicent, what were you thinking!’ The dress, the shoes, the empty packet for nylon stockings on the table – all showed that she intended to go through with what she’d planned.
‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’ Affecting carelessness, Millicent fetched the bottle of shoe whitener and a cloth from the cupboard under the sink. ‘Listen – I’ve been wanting us to have a talk, only you went to ground before I got the chance. I can’t say I’m happy about what went on at work, but I do know that Ruth Ridley can be a right bully. What I’m saying is – Norma and I don’t really blame you for doing what you did.’
‘Millicent, please …’
She unscrewed the cap then poured whitener on to the cloth. ‘There’s no need for us to fall out over it, is there? We can go on as we were before.’
‘Millicent, listen to me.’ Finding her voice at last, Cynthia sat down at the table. ‘This isn’t about work. This is about me listening in to a phone call from Mrs Parr to Vincent Poole.’
‘You – listening in?’ The idea struck Millicent as so unlikely that she failed at first to take in the rest of Cynthia’s sentence. She set the bottle down on the table and stared open-mouthed.
‘To Mrs Parr and Vincent Poole,’ Cynthia repeated, snatching the cloth from Millicent’s hand. ‘Listen to me. I heard them talking about you and what you’d agreed to do for them!’
‘Ah.’ Now Millicent saw what the fuss was about. Cynthia’s simple soul was suffering from a severe bout of moral outrage. ‘I understand why you’d be shocked, but keep your hair on – I’m only testing out the ground. I won’t actually go through with it.’
‘No, you don’t understand. It’s what they said about you. I heard them agreeing that you looked the part but they said something wasn’t quite right.’
Millicent faltered and for a second she let fear come roaring in. ‘What do you mean?’
‘They’re on to you, Millicent.’
‘How can they be?’
‘I don’t know how. But I do know that Vincent isn’t going to take you to the King’s Head this afternoon.’
‘Where then?’
Cynthia le
t out an exasperated sigh. ‘I can’t tell you that. Ruth caught me listening in before I could find out.’
‘But it doesn’t mean to say they’re on to me.’ Millicent quickly overcame her fear. ‘Perhaps the customer has changed his plans and wants to meet me somewhere else. Yes – that’s probably it.’
‘It’s not. I know it’s not. Anyway, why are you doing this in the first place, stepping into Clare’s shoes and running the risk of …?’
‘Ending up like her?’ Millicent supplied the conclusion to Cynthia’s unfinished sentence. ‘Don’t you see? I want to get to the heart of what went on the night Sidney Hall was murdered.’
‘By becoming one of them, you mean?’
‘By pretending to be,’ Millicent insisted. ‘Sooner rather than later they’ll let down their guard then I’m bound to pick up a clue that will prove that Clare is in the clear.’
Cynthia groaned. ‘People say I’m the simpleton. But take a look at yourself. The risk, Millicent – think about it!’
‘I already have.’ It was true and now she grew determined to convince Cynthia. ‘This is the way I look at it. I was the one who saw Clare in that room with Sidney Hall, not you or anybody else. Her face, her eyes – it was as if the life had drained out of them. I’ve never seen anything like it and I hope I never will again. The knife was on the floor and there was blood everywhere. And in all that mayhem I knew one thing – no, two things – for a fact.’
‘That Clare was innocent?’ Cynthia guessed.
‘Yes, and that someone else had been in that room with her and Hall.’
‘How?’
‘I sensed it, as if that person was still there. I couldn’t have been more certain. But a feeling like that doesn’t wash with the police. They need proof. So Clare is locked up in a prison cell and whoever did this has walked away scot-free.’
‘I see that – I do,’ Cynthia said quietly.
‘Besides, what have I got left to lose, really and truly?’ Millicent was on the brink of owning up to something she’d never put into words before. ‘I’m not talking about the job – I can sort out that side of things soon enough.’ She placed her right hand flat across her chest and looked deep into Cynthia’s eyes. ‘It’s the big hole I feel, here in my heart.’
‘Harold?’ Cynthia knew in a flash what Millicent meant.
‘Yes, Harold. When I ended things with him I tried my best not to show how I felt because I didn’t want anyone to feel sorry for me. But inside I went to pieces.’ Her long-time lover, for all his faults and failings, and for all the secrets and pretences surrounding their affair, had been the glue that had held her life together. ‘I loved him but I knew it had to end.’
‘I know it must hurt, but you’ll get over it – you will.’ People did. She, Cynthia, had got over the huge hurdle of having a selfish mother and a father ruined by the war. She’d survived a loveless childhood and the endless drip-drip of her uncle’s demands, had broken free and struck out on her own, so she returned the intensity of Millicent’s gaze with one of her own.
‘Eventually, I suppose.’ Millicent reached out across the table and took Cynthia’s hand. ‘But right now my heart aches. Don’t you see that helping Clare is my way of mending that and making a fresh start?’
Slowly Cynthia nodded. She did understand, but the dangers involved were still breathtaking.
‘I’ve already found out how Phyllis Parr runs her business. No money passes between the girls and the customers – it’s Vincent Poole who deals with that side. He’s the go-between who takes the payment then hands over the lion’s share to Phyllis. The girl gets paid further down the line.’
Cynthia felt her flesh crawl as Millicent talked. ‘Isn’t that enough proof to get them both arrested?’ she broke in.
‘For living off immoral earnings – yes. But it’s not going to make them come clean about what happened to Sidney Hall. That’s why I have to keep my ear to the ground until I pick up a clue that will seal things once and for all.’
‘And meanwhile you play along.’ Cynthia shuddered as she imagined the moment when Poole would take Millicent off in his taxi. She made one last appeal. ‘There are two things that could happen later today – either you’re right about Vincent Poole driving you to meet the customer at a new venue …’
‘Somewhere more private,’ Millicent agreed.
‘Or else I’m right about Mrs Parr and Poole having something more sinister in mind.’
Millicent shook her head. ‘Stop worrying. You know me – I’m more than a match for Phyllis Parr. As for Vincent Poole, I reckon I can pull the wool over his eyes for a while longer.’
There was no hope of winning the argument, Cynthia realized. She abruptly changed tack as Millicent retrieved the cloth and went back to the business of whitening her sandals. ‘Have you told Norma about this?’
‘No – she’s the same as you. She’d try to stop me.’
‘For good reason.’ Cynthia calculated that there was probably time for her to nip to Albion Lane and bring Norma back to Heaton Yard to make a last-ditch attempt to talk sense into Millicent.
She jumped up and made for the door. ‘Stay here, Millicent. Don’t go anywhere.’
She was gone without another word. The door banged. Millicent felt a heavy silence settle into the room so she turned on the wireless. ‘My old man said follow the van …’ An old music-hall song played as she sat down at the table and dabbed whitener on to her shoes, taking care to cover them evenly and bring them up like new.
It was a call from Phyllis Parr on 768 to Vincent Poole on 612 that had upset Cynthia so badly. Ruth found this out from Molly straight after she’d put Cynthia into the taxi.
‘Did you carry on listening in, by any chance?’ she quizzed, hovering behind Molly’s chair.
‘Hah!’ Once bitten, twice shy, Molly refused to walk into the trap that had been so obviously set. ‘You won’t get me a second time,’ she told the supe.
So Ruth waited impatiently for Agnes to arrive. She was already in the foyer during the change-over to the afternoon shift, tapping her foot and counting the seconds.
‘Blimey – someone’s eager to be off,’ Agnes commented as she came on duty.
Ruth didn’t waste time by replying. She barged past the short queue waiting to go out through the revolving doors then took one look at the street crowded with shoppers. There were more queues at the bus stops and every passing tram was full to bursting so she set off on foot to Albion Lane, pausing only to glance through the window of Sylvia’s as she hurried by. There was no sign of life in the refurbished salon.
On she went, out along Canal Road, past the police station, the Victory Picture House and the corporation baths, cutting up some narrow, worn steps on to Ghyll Road. At the Green Cross she turned left on to Albion Lane and rapped loudly on the door of number 7.
Ivy opened it and was confronted by a small, trim, well-turned-out woman in a white toque hat and a pale yellow poplin coat. ‘Yes?’
‘Is Norma in, please?’ As Ruth tried to peer into the kitchen, Ivy edged forward on to the step and closed the door behind her.
‘Who wants to know?’
‘I’m Ruth Ridley.’
Recognizing the name, Ivy planted herself firmly between her sister’s nemesis and the door. ‘She won’t want to talk to you, not unless you’re here to tell her she can have her job back.’
‘It’s urgent. Please tell her I’m here.’
The door opened again and this time it was Ethel who emerged. She’d been listening through the letterbox and had decided to enter the fray. ‘You’ve got a cheek,’ she told Ruth. ‘But you’re wasting your time – Norma isn’t here.’
‘Why, where is she?’
‘Don’t ask me. We saw her and Douglas at Clifton Street Market but we came home ahead of them.’
This was enough for Ruth to back down and be on her way up the hill. Ivy tutted at Ethel for giving too much away. ‘Trust you,’ she grumbled.
‘Who is it?’ Hetty called querulously from inside the house. ‘If it’s the insurance man asking for his money, tell him to come back next week.’
Walking swiftly, Ruth calculated the route that Norma was most likely to take and before long she was up on Overcliffe Road, hoping all the time to run into Norma and Douglas, but she arrived at the entrance to the covered market without success.
It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack, she thought with mounting frustration. Maybe I’ll wait until Monday and sort it out then. But no – she needed to have a word with Norma sooner than that. So she went into the cavernous building with its soaring cast-iron work and made her way down the rows of colourful stalls where traders called out prices for fruit, vegetables and meat – still without any luck.
It’s no good – I’ve missed her, she decided, retracing her steps out on to Overcliffe Road, straight on to a tram, which carried her back the way she’d come. She got off at the stop at the end of Westgate Road then nipped down an alleyway back on to Albion Lane, where she saw Norma and Douglas coming out of the pub at the bottom of the street.
‘At last – there you are!’ Ruth ran to intercept them before they disappeared inside number 7.
Norma saw her and frowned. ‘What do you want?’
‘This won’t take a minute. I’ve had to send Cynthia home early today. She overheard something on the line that sent her into a tail spin.’
‘What do you mean, “overheard”?’ If Ruth had come all this way to gloat about catching Cynthia out, Norma didn’t want to know. ‘Never mind – I know you’ll only be happy once you’ve got all three of us suspended.’
Ruth shook her head. ‘You don’t understand. I’m trying to help.’
Norma’s eyes opened wide with astonishment. She was ready to brush Ruth off and carry on into the house but Douglas put a hand on her arm.
‘Wait. Let’s hear what she has to say.’
‘The truth is, I couldn’t get any sense out of Cynthia so I’ve come to you to find out if you know exactly what Millicent has got herself mixed up in.’
The suspicious frown remained on Norma’s face. ‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about. Anyway, I haven’t seen much of Millicent lately.’
