Radio Girls

by Sarah-Jane Stratford

  Maisie had never heard an insult delivered with such sunny politeness.

  “I . . . No,” Maisie said. “I’ve just been brought on by Miss Shields.”

  “You’re American!” the Chanel cried, with all the pleasure of having discovered Tutankhamen’s tomb.

  “Canadian,” Maisie grunted obstinately, attempting to get up while gripping the gathered papers. “I mean, that’s where I was born.”

  “I say, Beanie, look sharp!” the man bellowed. “Can’t have dead air, you know.”

  “Hopping, skipping, and jumping over!” she chirped.

  “Wait!” Maisie cried in desperation. “Sorry. Can you, I, er, I actually am looking for the Talks Department, please.” She wrestled any hint of interrogation from her tone.

  “Second floor, just down the end. Can’t miss it—always a hotbed of activity. Shame the Talks are so soporific, but I’m for the jazz and drama. Not everyone can like action, I do understand. No need to be ashamed. Cheerio!”

  She pranced away after the two men. Maisie, despite her anxiety about the time lost, couldn’t help but stare after her. She ran on her toes in an elegant little trot that would be the envy of every dancer in the Ballets Russes. Her skirts bounced around her hips and knees, demonstrating to any naysayers that the modern fashions could indeed show a woman’s figure to its finest turn under the right circumstances.

  Dazed, Maisie wended her way to the Talks Department, clinging to the mad hope that she could sort out the papers without anyone knowing she’d dropped them. Miss Shields undoubtedly considered such an offense to merit the cutting off of hands before being bowled into the street.

  For all the Chanel-clad “Beanie” had described Talks as a hotbed of activity, the department was church-like quiet, and Maisie slowed to a tiptoe.

  Her reward at last, a crisp, polished sign on a door, glistening with newness: DIRECTOR OF TALKS—H. MATHESON. She took a deep breath, rehearsing an apology as she crept to the office.

  The door was ajar. Maisie peered in and saw a severely tidy desk. There seemed to be a building block in the in-tray, but as Maisie drew closer, she realized it was only correspondence stacked so meticulously as to appear smooth. A half-written letter in a rather scrawly hand lay on the blotter. A pile of books. A green leather diary. Maisie chewed her lip as she studied the desk, wondering where to lay her burden.

  “Hallo. Is it anything urgent?”

  Maisie shrieked, and the papers went flying again. She whirled to see a woman sitting on the floor by the fireplace, smiling up at her.

  “Are you off your nuts?” Maisie cried, surprising herself both by the decidedly American expression she hadn’t realized she’d ever known and the volume of her speech, which showed that she’d learned one thing from Georgina: how to project to the upper balcony.

  “Steady now,” the woman advised, her smile broadening. “Carry on like that and you’ll be part of the transmission. Indeed, they’d hardly need the tower.”

  The head of a grim-faced young man in tortoiseshell glasses slithered around the door and glared at Maisie.

  “What was all that ruckus? It’s not a mouse, is it?”

  “Hardly,” the woman on the floor responded, her gaze boring into Maisie.

  “So what’s the matter with you?” the man scolded Maisie. “Pick those up. Don’t you know how to deliver things? I’ve always said girls have no place working in—”

  “Now, Mr. Fielden, do calm down. You’re in danger of being ridiculous,” the woman chided. “The young lady was simply startled by my presence, and you must agree, I am astonishing.”

  Fielden’s thin lip, unimproved by his haphazard mustache, curled. Maisie could feel how much he longed to keep scolding her.

  “I shall handle this,” the woman concluded. Her voice was pleasant, cheerful, but rang with an absolute command that would not be countered.

  Fielden nodded obediently, and his head slid back around the door.

  The woman chuckled. Maisie couldn’t understand her ease. If she had been caught lounging on an office floor—not that she would ever contemplate such an action—she’d be lucky to retrieve her hat and coat before being shown the door. But this woman took a luxurious sip of tea, set her cup on a lacquered tray, and swung to her feet with an almost acrobatic leap.

  “Now, then, what were you delivering?”

  “Er . . .” Maisie bent to gather the papers, now far beyond hopeless and well into disaster.

  Why didn’t I just look for work picking potatoes?

  The woman helped her up, and Maisie balanced the papers on the desk.

  “Are you . . . ? I, er, I thought the director of Talks didn’t have a secretary,” Maisie said, her hands still shifting through the papers to hide their trembling.

  “Not as such, no, and that’s something that badly needs rectifying,” came the jaunty reply. Maisie had the uneasy sense of being read from the inside out, despite the placid sweetness of the huge blue eyes. The woman was rather lovely, with soft blond hair cut into a wavy bob and an elegant figure shown to advantage in a practical, and obviously bespoke, tweed suit. Her skin was the pink and white of first bloom, but Maisie felt sure she was in her thirties. It was just something about her bearing. This was a woman who had seen and done things.

  And now she had seen the interoffice envelope, addressed to the director of Talks.

  “Ah!” she cried, catching it up and opening it.

  Maisie was galvanized. “No! That’s for Mr. Matheson, Miss Shields said.”

  “I know of two Mr. Mathesons, and neither are here.” The woman grinned. She had the air of an infinitely patient teacher.

  Maisie had the horrible sense she was being set up for a joke. That any second, Cyril, Beanie, Rusty, and the boys were going to swarm around the door and laugh at her. That the story would fly through the whole of Savoy Hill and follow her wherever she ran, even if she fled to deepest Saskatchewan.

  “You . . . Are you . . . the director of Talks?” Maisie whispered, hoping everyone waiting to laugh wouldn’t hear.

  “I am,” the woman announced with a pleased nod. “Hilda Matheson. Miss. And you are?”

  “Maisie Musgrave.”

  “Aha!” Hilda pumped Maisie’s hand, her eyes snapping with delight. “My new secretary! Or as much as Mr. Reith and Miss Shields are willing to spare you. Thus far. Marvelous! Now, don’t you mind me sitting on the floor by the fire. It’s a grand way to think and just one of my quirks.”

  “I didn’t mean to—”

  “You most certainly did, and don’t you apologize for it. It was glorious.” Hilda laughed. Her musical laugh was very unlike Beanie’s. It was boisterous, rolling, and deep—Maisie found it a touch alarming.

  “I expect you thought I was a secretary,” she went on, not waiting for Maisie’s embarrassed nod. “Wouldn’t I get into the hottest water for such impropriety? Well,” she added, eyes twinkling with an unsettling roguishness, “I might anyway at that. But it is chilly and one must stay warm. I appreciate your looking after me, Miss Musgrave, though I might suggest in future moderating your tone just a nip.”

  Maisie could hear an echo of that laugh.

  “Of course, Miss Matheson,” she whispered.

  “That’s going to the other extreme. But quite all right. It’s always useful to try a few possibilities. Else how can you be sure what’s right?”

  “I . . . I don’t know, Miss Matheson.”

  “Well, we try, try again. Now, are all these for Talks as well?” she asked, indicating the folders.

  “Er, yes, but I’m afraid . . .” Maisie squeezed her eyes shut, both to avoid seeing this exacting woman too closely and to stop the tears from spilling more freely than the papers. “Oh, Miss Matheson, I’m so sorry, but I’d already dropped them, even before now. They’ve got to be put all back together and I don’
t know—”

  “Folders dropped twice, and on your first morning, no less! That is a feat. You don’t make a habit of tossing paper thither and yon, do you?”

  “Oh, no! No, I was . . . Well, I ran into a tuba.”

  “Occupational hazard in Savoy Hill. But you’re all right? Good. Now, let’s have at these papers and see how quickly they submit to order.”

  Could she possibly be facetious? Maisie thought with yearning of Miss Shields’s disapproving candor, which was at least comprehensible. She gazed, fascinated, as Hilda organized the papers, small neat hands flying through them, nails manicured, left finger brazenly unencumbered by a wedding ring, a silver-and-enamel Mido watch clamped around her wrist.

  “There!” She patted the neat folders with satisfaction. “I shall let you in on a little secret I’ve unearthed, having been here only since September myself. Few of these papers are of the earth-shattering consequence they’re considered by some. It’s all about what’s going to happen, Miss Musgrave, not what’s already been and done. Which isn’t to say I don’t like to keep very complete and tidy records. That is something I do expect, along with a strict attentiveness to all that goes forward. But I daresay Miss Shields and Mr. Reith wouldn’t have approved you if you weren’t sharp.”

  At the moment Maisie had no idea why she’d been approved. Miss Jenkins at the secretarial school always withheld from giving her full marks. “You’re the most technically proficient and capable, Miss Musgrave, but the best secretaries have brio, dear.” Does anyone ever use the word “dear” when they aren’t insulting you?

  Maisie was grateful to Miss Matheson, who in any case was a good deal more pleasant than Miss Shields, but now, the emergency over, she felt deflated. She’d been expecting a man. A clever, charming, well-spoken man who would intimidate and dazzle her. Under his influence, she would learn how to behave in such a way that would allow a man’s genius to flourish. Such skills would hopefully attract another clever and exciting man (dark blue eyes and freckles came to mind) who might be enticed to become her husband.

  But a woman. As director of Talks. That seemed to be taking the BBC’s audacious modernity a bit too far.

  “We have some time before the meeting,” Hilda announced. “Let’s discuss the department. I’ll detail what we’ve been doing here and some thoughts I have towards the future and how to implement some plans. We’re very small as yet. You’ll meet us all by tomorrow. You’ve already had the pleasure of meeting my junior, Lionel Fielden, very good at his job but rather willfully bad-mannered—you’ll get used to him. He’s handy, but it’s not the same thing as having an energetic, clever young woman to really organize things and keep us all well oiled.” She studied Maisie, assessing those oil reserves. “We’re a bit short on time. What say we be wild and I send out for some sandwiches? Anything in particular you’d like?”

  “Er . . .”

  For heaven’s sake, at least use a different syllable!

  Hilda grinned.

  “Can a person ever go wrong with egg and cress in one hand and ham and cheese in the other? Do sit down.” She waved at the room as she pressed a button to summon a page, another brisk and eager adolescent boy.

  Hilda’s office was larger than Miss Shields’s, more militantly well ordered, but also more inviting. Slivers of gold-and-blue walls peeked around bookshelves, which were stuffed with the sort of books Maisie had always wanted to own. It was a struggle not to reach out and run her finger across them, feeling each embossed leather binding sing under her skin. What wall space remained was decorated with pictures; an Italian landscape, the Scottish Highlands, Paris on a lavender spring evening. A water jug and two glasses sat on one trestle table, the tea tray on another, next to a tempting plate of biscuits. Maisie wanted to hug the room, kiss it, swallow it whole.

  “Why are you standing on ceremony?” Hilda asked. “I wasn’t intending for you to sit on the floor, you know, though of course you’re very free to do so.”

  Maisie sank into a chair. A fat round cushion with a red-and-blue Italian print cover nestled into her back. Its fellow was on the floor, having performed its good service for Hilda. Just as Maisie was reaching for it, Hilda caught it up, set it on her own chair, and turned to Maisie.

  “I don’t want a fetch-and-carry sort of secretary. We’re far too busy. Now, then, I’ve been organizing Talks into series. I think regular programming is useful and builds an audience, but of course we don’t want anything so routine that it becomes dull. I like to keep things in categories. So, literary Talks, political, scientific, educational, artistic, household, general, those are what I’ve put into motion thus far, and I think will form a useful frame within which to operate, but of course it’s really only just the springboard for launching any manner of interesting broadcasting. From one person speaking, to interviews, to a series of debates, wouldn’t that be splendid?”

  Maisie nodded, concentrating on her shorthand as Hilda rattled off names of people she was hoping to persuade to broadcast. Maisie recognized some of them—T. S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf, George Bernard Shaw. But she was soon drowning under the scientists, mathematicians, writers, artists, politicians, butchers, bakers, candlestick makers. Hilda talked as if she knew every one of them, her giddiness catapulting her from her chair so she paced the room, both it and Maisie shrinking to accommodate her expansive vision.

  The sandwiches arrived, along with two bottles of ginger beer.

  “Ah, excellent,” Hilda crowed, pressing a large coin into the happy page’s hand. “Bit outlandish, sending for victuals from the pub when it’s just our little meeting, but first days must be marked.” She busied herself finding napkins.

  Maisie’s gratitude mingled with mortification. Hilda shouldn’t be spending her own money like this. It made Maisie feel indebted to her before she’d earned a penny.

  “I mean to make ‘efficiency’ our byword here in Talks.”

  Hilda was so efficient as to be able to eat while talking and somehow remain elegant. Maisie’s attempt at combining efficiency with elegance was far less successful. She wrote with her pad balanced on her knee, leaving her other hand free to shovel in food, and hoped Hilda was too absorbed in her soliloquy to notice.

  Women notice everything, though. I bet she’s seen every mend in my stockings. I bet she knows I have to cut my hair myself. I bet she thinks she’s drawn a straw so short, even Thumbelina couldn’t drink out of it.

  Hilda dabbed her lips.

  “Terrific challenge, talking about new art on the radio. Let’s schedule a meeting with Sir Frederic at the British Museum and Charles Aitken at the Tate—very able man, Aitken. We’ll explore some possibilities . . . I think it might be really compelling to have a curator or art historian speak with an artist about a current piece. Wouldn’t that be thrilling? Paint a picture, if you see.” She smirked.

  The glossies also said that men didn’t like women making jokes, but perhaps it was different when there were no men present. Maisie didn’t want to laugh. That would imply she was relaxing.

  “You’ve done fine justice to those sandwiches, Miss Musgrave.” (Was that a compliment?) “Before we segue to biscuits, do tell me something of yourself.”

  “Er, well, there’s nothing much to tell,” Maisie demurred.

  “Nonsense. And if you don’t mind me saying so, that’s a very bad habit, playing yourself down. We all have a life story, age notwithstanding.”

  Maisie didn’t want to talk about herself. She did, however, badly want biscuits.

  “What made you apply to work here?” Hilda asked.

  “There was an advertisement,” Maisie answered, surprised.

  “There are always advertisements. Why the BBC?”

  “I . . . er, well, I . . . It was a job I thought I could do. And it, er . . .”

  Blissful distraction wheeled in with the basket post. Hilda glowed with Christma
s joy.

  “Ah! The second round!”

  “Here you are, Miss Matheson. Enjoy it.” Alfred balanced another foot-tall pile of papers in Hilda’s in-tray. He started even more violently than before on seeing Maisie again, and she was too busy inhaling a biscuit to greet him.

  “Have you met Miss Musgrave, my new secretary?”

  “Hallo.” He nodded, and shook his head all the way back out the door.

  Hilda moved to tidy the letters. Maisie hoped that wasn’t going to be one of her assignments. It looked as though it would be lethal simply to breathe too close to the pile.

  “You look alarmed, Miss Musgrave. Correspondence comes in by the veritable hogshead all day long. Didn’t Miss Shields tell you?”

  It seemed rude to say no.

  Hilda gave the now-symmetrical mound an approving pat. “I call it my Tower of Babble. Though in fact nearly all of it is interesting. Or useful. And some of the criticism is downright entertaining.”

  The white-and-pink guilloche enamel carriage clock perched in pride of place on top of the desk sang out the hour. Hilda glanced at it and tossed back the last of her ginger beer.

  “Time to face the DG! Director-general,” she clarified, seeing Maisie’s blank face. “Our master, Mr. John Reith, director-general of the British Broadcasting Company. But nearly everyone here calls him ‘the DG.’ Are you finished?”

  Maisie nodded, her longing to see Mr. Reith eclipsing her desire for another biscuit.

  Hilda plucked the green leather diary from her desk and glanced at a bookmarked page. Maisie shifted her gaze downward, noticing Hilda’s smart mahogany shoes, low-heeled, with three straps and a double-stitched edge. They gleamed like new, though they might have been several years old. This was what Georgina meant about buying good quality. Hilda, though she obviously had money, didn’t seem the extravagant type, or one to buy every latest thing, leaving still-good items to languish in a cupboard or be dispatched to a church’s charity box. Perhaps she rubbed saddle cream into the leather every night to keep her shoes so fresh.