The Glory Girls

by June Gadsby

  ‘Well, let’s not get you a black mark.’ He looked briefly about him, picked up a well-worn doctor’s bag and indicated to Mary to precede him out of the door. ‘Shall we go?’

  Heads were raised and curious eyes followed them as they made their way out to the street. Mary felt she ought to apologize in some way to the poor folk still sitting waiting to be seen, but she decided that a proud posture, with eyes to the front was more advisable. She had wasted enough time already.

  The doctor’s small black Morris looked as if it had seen many miles, though it was clean inside, and was surprisingly comfortable. It smelled of leather and polish rather than the stale cigarette smoke she had to put up with in Walter’s delivery van.

  ‘You work at Harper’s Drapery Store, don’t you?’

  Dr Craig turned the key in the ignition and the engine throbbed into life. He eased the car away from the kerb, waiting for a black-and-gold Rington’s tea van to get clear before turning and heading towards the High Street.

  ‘You seem to know a lot about me, Dr Craig,’ she said, smiling broadly. ‘You didn’t find those details in my medical notes.’

  ‘Ah, yes, well …’ He hesitated, slowing down to allow an old lady to cross the road in front of him without looking to left or to right of her. ‘I bought a lace tablecloth in Harper’s for my wife a few weeks ago and I saw you behind one of the counters. You wouldn’t have noticed me. I got in and out as quickly as I could. It’s not a shop that men feel at ease visiting.’

  She gave a hiccup of laughter, but she knew what he meant. Men were embarrassed at being seen within a mile of lingerie counters, even if they were as fine as Harper’s.

  ‘No, I must admit, we don’t get many male customers. Those we do get are usually dragged in screaming by their wives.’

  ‘Hmm, yes. The manager, however, seemed quite at home there.’

  ‘That’s Mr Harper.’

  ‘I’d watch him if I were you. I don’t think I would trust him with my wife.’

  ‘That’s one of the problems of working there,’ Mary said, her smile fading somewhat.

  She recalled the number of times she and the other sales assistants at Harper’s had found it necessary to dodge the owner’s wandering hands. No young woman, it seemed, was safe from the surreptitious gropings stolen in dark corners of the stock room or wicked pinches when he thought no one was looking. Not to mention the insidious remarks that were far from gentlemanly and often threatening.

  Dr Craig stopped the car outside the chemist’s. Harper’s Drapery Store was only two doors further down, so there was no problem, as long as the chemist’s wasn’t also full of customers.

  ‘Thank you so much, Dr Craig,’ Mary said, dimpling shyly.

  ‘Not at all.’ His forehead creased as he glanced at an address scribbled on a scrap of paper. ‘Before you go, you couldn’t put me right for Elsdon Street, could you? A Miss Croft?’

  ‘Oh, you’re going the wrong way!’ Mary exclaimed. ‘Elsdon Street is right at the top end of Split Crow Road. Is it Miss Frances Croft you’re going to see? I hope she’s not ill.’

  ‘Yes, it is, as a matter of fact. Do you know her? I’m afraid I can’t discuss details of any of my patients, but I believe she is quite poorly.’

  Mary nodded, chewing on her mouth, memories of her childhood flooding back. ‘Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. Actually, I was a pupil of hers, but that was a long time ago.’

  ‘She’s a teacher?’

  ‘Yes … well, no … not exactly. She does private tutoring and I used to attend her classes with Brigadier Beasley’s daughter. She taught us French and German, but we went to the grammar school for everything else.’

  ‘Really? I never thought I’d hear of that kind of thing in a small mining town. Felling is full of surprises.’

  ‘We’re not all peasants, you know, Dr Craig.’ She didn’t mean to make it sound scathing, but Mary was very protective of her home town and didn’t take kindly to people who ran it down as though it was in the back of beyond.

  The doctor did a double take and combed long fingers through his hair, clearly disturbed by her response to his careless words.

  ‘Sorry! I didn’t mean to sound condescending. Actually, I quite like the place … and its people. I just wish my wife would …’ He pulled himself up short. ‘Anyway, I’d better be off.’

  ‘Goodbye, doctor … and give my respects to Miss Croft.’

  ‘I will. Goodbye, Mary. Take care.’

  Then he was once again turning the car in the road and driving off in the opposite direction, leaving her staring after the smoking exhaust as he climbed back up the High Street.

  Fortunately for Mary the chemist shop was nearly empty. The only customer was a rather horsy-faced girl in military uniform, which was a surprise, because most people in uniform were men, either home on leave or just about to embark for parts unknown. This girl looked smart in khaki jacket and skirt, peaked cap, and stout leather brogues.

  She didn’t take long with her purchase of Aspro and a bottle of eau de cologne and, as soon as she left, Mary had the attention of the pharmacist, Mr Morrell.

  ‘Mary! What can I do for you, dear?’

  She handed over her grandmother’s prescription. ‘More of the same I’m afraid,’ she told him and heard him sigh.

  ‘Ah, poor Mrs West. I’ll just get this for you. You all right, Mary, dear?’ The pharmacist studied her closely, peering over his spectacles. ‘You look blooming, as usual.’

  ‘I’m fine, Mr Morrell, thank you. Fighting fit, actually.’

  He laughed and said, jokingly: ‘In that case, maybe you should join the FANYs. I hear they’re looking for girls like you.’

  ‘The what? The Fannies, did you say? What on earth is that?’

  ‘Well, didn’t you see that young woman just now? It’s a voluntary organization. Been going for more years than I care to remember. Started long before the Great War.’

  ‘Are they soldiers of some sort?’ Mary was more than a little interested, though she couldn’t imagine herself wearing a uniform of any kind.

  ‘Yes and no. They’ve changed over the years. Used to be auxiliary nurses and helped with the wounded out in Flanders and the Somme. I had a cousin in London who was a FANY – that’s short for First-Aid Nursing Yeomanry. Brave women, the lot of them. Brave or brainless. I never could make my mind up on that score, but then who am I to judge?’

  ‘And now they’re back at war?’

  ‘Yes, but it’s not just bandages and bedpans these days, apparently. They still drive ambulances, but now they’re expected to be mechanics and wireless operators. It’s all a bit masculine, but we’ll need all the help we can get when most of our boys are involved in the actual fighting.’

  ‘Yes.’ Mary nodded. ‘I hear there are quite a lot of women already working on the docks and in the shipyards.’

  ‘So much for a woman’s place being in the home bringing up the bairns and giving succour to the husband, eh?’ Mr Morrell chuckled and handed Mary a packet containing a bottle of tincture and some tablets. ‘There you are, dear. Tell your grannie to take this little lot three times a day and not to miss. She’ll be as right as rain in no time.’

  Clutching the package to her, Mary hurried back to Harper’s, her mind buzzing with what she had just heard. The shop was busy with lunch-time shoppers. Iris Morrison was looking harassed as she tried valiantly to cover both her counter, where she sold woollen garments, and Mary’s. When she saw Mary the look of relief on her face could be felt right across the shop floor. Unfortunately for Mary Mr Harper also saw it and turned on his heel just as Mary threw off her coat and slid behind the ladies’ underwear counter.

  ‘Miss West! You are five minutes late back from your lunch and I will not tolerate it.’

  Mr Harper was almost purple with rage and he displayed it in front of a host of shocked customers. One or two women decided to make a hasty exit rather than witness the embarrassing spectacle of the young sal
es assistant being dragged out from her post and marched back to the door, the owner ranting and raving at the top of his voice.

  ‘I told you last week that the next time you were late you would have to seek employment elsewhere and that’s exactly what I am telling you to do right now.’ Mr Harper gave Mary a push and she collided with a customer before she bounced painfully off the doorframe. ‘Out! I will have your wages sent out to you, if anything is owing.’

  He slammed the door in her face and Mary stood in the freezing street, shivering and not sure what to do. She didn’t like the idea of going back inside, but it was cold out and she had no coat. Not only that, her grandmother’s medicines were also in there, sitting on the counter where she had left them.

  She took a deep breath and started to push open the heavy glass door, but Mr Harper saw her and raised an accusing finger in her direction, his face as black as thunder.

  ‘Out, I said!’

  ‘But Mr Harper, I …’ Mary stamped her foot and gritted her teeth, no longer caring whom she embarrassed. ‘Is this because I won’t let you molest me? You, a married man?’

  Her loud words drew shocked gasps from the customers inside the shop and a string of women passing by.

  ‘Out!’

  She glared at him through the glass, then saw Iris grab her things and rush forward with them.

  ‘Miss Morrison, back to your post at once. I will not have you fraternizing with Miss West at any price. She’s a very bad influence and I won’t put up with it any longer.’

  There was a murmur of guarded conversation passing among the ladies queuing up to buy their lisle stockings and stays and bloomers. There were sympathetic comments, for Mary was well liked by all of Harper’s clientele.

  At the risk of losing her own position, Iris ignored her employer, though it would have been more unfortunate for Mr Harper had he fired her too. The shop was already functioning on reduced staff.

  ‘Here you are, Mary, love,’ Iris said, thrusting Mary’s coat, bag, and old Henrietta West’s medicines at her. ‘Mind how you go, now.’

  ‘Thanks, Iris. See you later.’

  As they exchanged smiles the air all around was ripped apart by the air-raid siren and the peaceful town of Felling instantly erupted into action. Feet slapped on the pavements as everybody rushed to get under cover. Had Mary been behind her counter at Harper’s she would have joined the rest of the staff in the stock-room, padded liberally with sandbags. Today, that wasn’t going to happen. Happily, the warning had been announced on the wireless and in the newspapers. It was just one of the many practice drills that were essential to keep everyone from getting too blasé about the war that was taking such a long time to get going and, therefore, never seemed real.

  ‘Hey, you…!’ Mary saw the khaki-clad girl from the chemist’s looking her way and beckoning frantically. ‘Come on. This way.’

  She hesitated, but behind her there was a kind of explosion and muffled screams. The noise spurred her on and she sprinted over the road, almost falling into the girl’s arms, tripping in her haste and thinking that the air-raid was real after all.

  ‘Steady on!’ said the uniformed girl in Mary’s ear as she pulled her firmly inside a makeshift shelter between the bicycle-shop and the ironmonger’s.

  ‘Was that a bomb?’ she said, disbelief making her want to laugh, but she didn’t think it would go down well.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ the girl said, then she bellowed towards the entrance of the shelter. ‘Come on, you lot. If that had been a real air-raid, you might be dead by now.’

  Mary saw the small band of Harper’s employees staggering towards them, shedding clouds of dust and coughing fit to burst. Dummy bomb or not, something serious had happened over there.

  ‘That stupid man!’ Iris said, spitting out dust as she came to join Mary. ‘He’d moved all his blooming antique furniture into the room above the stock-room. The whole lot came crashing through the ceiling. We were seconds away from being buried alive.’

  Mary smiled sympathetically, glad that no one had been hurt. She turned her attention back on to the girl soldier through the gloom of the shelter. There was something familiar about her. She ought to have recognized her in the chemist’s, but she had been too busy with her thoughts, worrying about her gran, agitating about getting back to work, and wondering curiously about Dr Alexander Craig. There were far too many distracting things going through her head these days.

  ‘Good heavens! It’s Anne Beasley, isn’t it?’ she exclaimed. ‘I’ve only just realized that it’s you.’

  ‘Oh, hello, Mary. Didn’t recognize you either. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?’

  ‘What on earth are you doing in that uniform?’

  ‘Goodness, didn’t you know? I’m in the FANYs. It’s jolly good. So much more exciting than life with Mummy and Daddy.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Mm. I was always so envious of my brother being in the Army. Well, now I have my own little army life and it’s wonderful.’

  Mary had thought that Anne was the very last girl in the world who would do anything that involved being part of a regiment and answering to orders. She had been such a quiet, withdrawn child, then a rather unlikeable adolescent with snobbish tendencies. However, she did remember how Anne used to be jealous of her brother’s adventurous life, free of parental restrictions. He had followed willingly in his brigadier father’s footsteps and became a professional soldier. He was very much his own man.

  ‘How is Alfred?’ Mary asked, feeling that there was a need for some polite conversation.

  ‘He’s a captain now and quite important. Daddy’s very proud of him, of course. I think he’s quite pleased with me too, in his own peculiar way. One can never tell with parents, can one?’

  Anne had spent two years in a Swiss finishing-school. It had left its mark on her accent, which had been a little plummy at the best of times, and which the snob in her always emphasized when speaking to people she considered beneath her.

  Mary watched her childhood companion organizing the people in the shelter, then went to talk to Iris, who looked as if she was in need of some moral support.

  ‘Come on, Iris,’ she said to the shaking girl with whom she had worked for the past three years. ‘There’s more room further inside. I hope you won’t lose your job too because of me.’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry, Mary.’ Iris squeezed her hand and gave a wobbly smile. ‘I was going to leave anyway. I told you about the interview with the War Pensions people, didn’t I? Well, they’ve told me I can start right away. It means I won’t get drafted if they start pulling us women into the war. You should think about it.’

  Well, thought Mary, it was certainly time to do some thinking and make a choice. Good Lord, the world was her oyster now that she was free of old Harper. She could get a job driving a truck at Reyroll’s, become a riveter in the shipyard, or a clippie on the buses. However, she thought that she would try for an office job, like Iris. She had often dreamed of being a secretary, ever since she had taught herself to type on Brigadier Beasley’s old Imperial typewriter when she was fourteen.

  Or, she thought with an amused smile, she could join the FANYs like Anne over there and look important in khaki. Anne had always liked uniforms, but usually when there were men inside them. It was so strange seeing her now, taking charge and being so efficient.

  Anne turned and caught her looking. She gave a half-hearted smile tinged with curiosity; the kind you gave to people you didn’t know very well. It was a long time since they had been friends and Mary wasn’t sure that she wanted to be Anne’s friend again.

  CHAPTER TWO

  DR Alex Craig parked his car outside the redbrick Victorian terrace house in Elsdon Street. Although there was a certain shabbiness about the paintwork, the house had an air of past elegance about it. The tiny, postage-stamp of a garden had once been full of roses, but was now sadly neglected.

  From the street he could look down over the Tyne Valley
for miles, and it was possible to see ships’ funnels moving up and down the river. With such a magnificent panorama it was no wonder they called the area Mount Pleasant.

  ‘Hey, mister, you lookin’ for Jerries, then?’

  The scratchy voice of a small boy with dirty, scabby knees and a runny nose made him turn.

  ‘Good heavens, no!’

  ‘Me da says it pays to be on the look-out, like.’

  ‘Does he really?’

  ‘Aye, but me ma says they’ll nivvor git up this far.’

  ‘Well, young man, let’s hope that your “ma” is right, but we’d better all be on the look-out anyway, eh?’

  ‘Aye.’ The boy’s eyes slid down to the black bag Alex was carrying. ‘You a doctor or summat?’

  ‘That I am.’ Alex started down the garden path of number twenty-eight.

  ‘Ye’re Scotch, aren’t ye?’

  ‘That too.’

  ‘Is the auld witch bad, then?’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ Alex hesitated, struggling to make sense of the lad’s guttural Geordie accent.

  ‘That Miss Croft wot lives in there. She’s a witch. You wouldn’t catch me gannin in hor hoose.’

  ‘I’m sure she’s a perfectly nice lady. You mustn’t believe all you hear about people.’

  ‘She’s a witch, I telt ye. Me grannie says.’ The boy nodded sagely. ‘Nivvor smiles. Just stares doon hor nose at folks and doesn’t say a word.’

  Alex glanced at the patient’s packet of notes, which he had at the ready in his hand, convinced that he must have come to the wrong house. The lady in question was purported to be fifty. Hardly the age to be taken for a witch, he thought. However, to a twelve-year-old that could seem pretty old.

  ‘Here!’ he said, delving into his pocket and drawing out a penny for the lad. ‘Start saving for your old age.’

  The boy gave the penny a round-eyed look, grabbed it out of Alex’s outstretched hand, grinned cheekily and hopped away down the street.