The Palace of Strange Girls

by Sallie Day

  Copyright

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Grand Central Publishing Edition

  Copyright © 2008 by Sallie Day

  Reading Group Guide copyright © 2009 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  This Grand Central Publishing edition is published by arrangement with HarperPress, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, 77–85 Fulham Palace Road, Hammersmith, London W6 8JB.

  Grand Cental Publishing

  Hachette Book Group

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  New York, NY 10017

  Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com

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  First eBook Edition: September 2009

  ISBN: 978-0-446-55819-8

  Grand Central Publishing is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  The Grand Central Publishing name and logo is a trademark of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  For Julian

  Contents

  Copyright

  1: I-Spy at the Seaside

  2: Red-Eyed Sandhopper

  3: Gannets

  4: Shore Crab

  5: Ice Cream

  6: Collection Box

  7: Thrift

  8: Piddock

  9: Stranded Objects

  10: Gypsy

  11: The Seaside at Night

  12: Brittle-Star

  13: Queen Scallop

  14 Weever Fish

  15: Venus Shell

  16: Sea Gooseberry

  17: Warning Notice

  18: Beachcombing

  19: The Big Wheel

  20: Mermaid’s Purse

  21: Donkeys

  22: Punch and Judy

  23: Pier

  24: Wreck

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  Reading Group Guide

  1

  I-Spy at the Seaside

  Hello, children! Welcome to your very own I-Spy book. In these pages you’ll be able to look for all kinds of secret, exciting things that are found only by the sea. As you spot each of the things pictured here—and answer the simple questions—you earn an I-Spy score. It’s fun!

  Blackpool, Tuesday, July 12, 1959

  Beth has had it with Jesus. She’s kicking the baseboards to prove it and she hopes He’s watching. Mrs. Brunskill at Sunday School says He’s watching all the time, even when you’re asleep. It’s amazing. You’d think He’d be too busy (what with all the cripples and foolish virgins) to be bothered with Beth. Thus assured of an audience, she pauses in her assault and eyes the heavily varnished wood. Beth is disappointed; the baseboards are as yet undamaged, so she changes leg and carries on kicking. Flakes of dirty cream paint and gray plaster spiral down from the wall above her head and the picture of a little boy crying rattles in its frame. Beth carries on kicking.

  “You big bugger,” she mouths on the off chance He’s listening as well as watching. Beth has learned the word from the dustbin man, Mr. Kerkley, who lives next door. Mr. Kerkley shouted “You little bugger” at Beth’s best friend Robert when he dragged a club hammer into their coal shed and reduced all the big shiny lumps of coal into powdered shale. Beth had repeated the story to her mother. Word for word. She’d hoped to witness a satisfying gasp of shocked disbelief and disapproval from her mother, but her tale had the reverse effect. Her mother took her by the scruff of the neck and washed her mouth out with soap and water for using dirty words. Since then the offending word has been a constant resource for the child, who mouths it silently on a daily basis.

  Beth woke early this morning. Wiping the sweat from her face, she sat up and dangled her feet out of the bed, waving them back and forth through air thick with the smell of bacon fat, unreliable plumbing and floral disinfectant. After a moment she slipped on her sandals (ignoring the shiny steel buckles that must always be fastened) and rummaged around under her pillow for the book. She has had the I-Spy book for four days now. Beth’s initial reverence for the volume has been replaced with an obsessive fascination. Its white pages have softened to cream under Beth’s sweaty-fingered perusal. It was purchased at the newsagent’s on the first day of the holiday and Beth will not be parted from it. By day she carries it around in her pocket or, failing that, inside her knickers. By night she sleeps with the book under her pillow and her hand on top of it. Beth is at a loss to decide which is the best part—the book itself or the codebook that came with it. And then there’s the membership card, the source of her present frustration.

  The green card announces in heavy type “Official Membership Card—Issued by Big Chief I-Spy, Wigwam-by-the-Water, London.” Underneath there are four dotted lines for the member’s name and address. Although Beth can write her first name easily enough, her surname is long and fraught with difficulties. It has to be perfect. Bearing this in mind, Beth reached reluctantly for her glasses. The pink clinic glasses have a plaster stuck over the right lens. It is there to correct a lazy eye. The flexible wires hook ferociously round her ears and the frames dig in across the bridge of her nose. The discomfort always serves to concentrate Beth’s mind. The “B” for Beth went down wobbly but correct, the “e” and “t” were easy and even the string on the “h” was almost straight. She paused before attempting her surname, Singleton. The task demands a deep breath before she starts and, in the face of her inability to write the letter “S,” something approaching a miracle. Where should she start? Does the snake go this way or that? Within minutes the virgin card is smeared with rubber and gouged with the swan-necked traces of continued attempts. It makes no difference how hard she tries, the “S” always comes out back to front. Beth cast around for a solution to her dilemma. An idea occurred. The verse she had to learn and recite at Sunday School last week was,

  Ask and it shall be given. Seek and ye shall find.

  The memory slipped back unbidden into Beth’s head as she surveyed the wreckage of her once pristine membership card. It might be worth a try.

  Beth placed her palms together and scrunched her eyes shut in an effort to attract the Almighty’s attention and asked. She then set the point of her pencil to the card. When she finally opened her eyes, eager for the promised miracle, she found yet another backward “S.” The letter lay fixed on the page. Eternally, immovably wrong. Beth stared at the card in disbelief. This is why she is now venting her fury on the nearest thing—the baseboards.

  The room that Beth shares with her sister is devoid of any luxury other than a dusty blue rug between the two single beds and a similar gray offering underneath the washstand in the corner. This is the Belvedere Hotel (“Families Welcome, Hot and Cold Water in Every Room, Residents’ Bar”). Management do not supply eiderdowns in their fourthfloor bedrooms, nor do they supply dressing tables, trouser presses, suitcase stands or any facilities for hanging clothes other than two hooks behind the door. Not that either girl is discomforted in any way. Save for the washstand and the film of dust, room forty-eight is exactly the same as their attic bedroom at home. Except that Beth wouldn’t dare kick the baseboards like this at home. Beth lands another almighty kick on the woodwork.

  The noise wakens her sister Helen who, aware of the damage that Beth, clad only in her undershirt, is visiting upon the toes of her new Startrite sandals, is quick to respond
. “For goodness’ sake, Beth! Stop that kicking. You’ll ruin your sandals doing that. What’s the matter?”

  “I can’t do it,” Beth shouts.

  “What can’t you do?”

  Beth gets down onto her knees by way of reply and searches under her bed. Helen yawns, scrapes her fingers through her thick blonde fringe and flips the rest of her hair behind her shoulders. Helen has been trying to grow her hair to shoulder length for over a year now but her mother, who considers long hair to be an open invitation to nits, has constantly thwarted her. Normally Helen would have had her hair cut at the beginning of the Easter term but her mother was distracted by other things and Helen escaped. It is now July and her hair has grown long enough for a ponytail. Her mother has told her that she will have to have it cut before school starts again in September. But Helen isn’t inclined to have her hair cut and she’d rather be dead than go back to school.

  At last Beth retrieves the card and wipes it down the front of her undershirt to dislodge the dust, fluff and flakes of discarded skin.

  Helen yawns again and says, “Is that all? Flippin’ ’eck, Beth. It’s just a membership card. Oh, for goodness’ sake! Don’t start crying. Give it here and get me something to rest it on.”

  Beth hands over the card and watches as her sister gets out her white clutch bag. There had been an upset when their mother had first caught sight of the bag. Helen had claimed that it was “soiled goods” that couldn’t be sold at the shop, so Blanche had given it to her for working late one Saturday. Ruth remarked that it didn’t look soiled to her but Helen insisted that it had been and she’d managed to get the mark out of the plastic with soap and water. The truth was somewhat different. Helen had purchased the bag from the brand-new spring range at Freeman Hardy & Willis. She’d have preferred leather but plastic will do—just so as it’s this season’s color: white. She’d got the money in the form of an unofficial cash bonus from Blanche. Blanche is keen to escape the attentions of the taxman and Helen is equally anxious to avoid her mother getting wind of the extra cash. Helen is expected to hand over her untouched wage packet to her mother every Saturday night. Ruth takes the little brown packet and, having counted out the ten-shilling notes, gives Helen the residue of change back as spending money. It’s called “bringing the old cat a mouse.” The sudden appearance of Helen carrying a brand-new bag rattled her mother, who would never dream of buying a white clutch. Ruth makes do with a more serviceable brown handbag with strap handles that she’s had since the war. She was suspicious of Helen’s explanation but limited herself to saying, “I don’t know why Blanche let you have a bag. You’ve nothing to put in it.”

  “I’ve got my purse and a handkerchief,” Helen replied, waiting until her mother was out of hearing before adding, “and the rest of my bonus.”

  Helen, stung by her mother’s dismissal, has made it her immediate ambition to fill the bag. Her first secret purchase with the hidden money was a miniature diary and notebook from Mayhew’s and she intends to buy a whole range of forbidden items in the future—a lipstick, mascara, powder, maybe even cigarettes. With one pound, two shillings and sixpence the possibilities are well-nigh endless.

  Beth is impatient. She pushes the I-Spy book into Helen’s lap and says, “Can you write my name and everything? Can you do it now?”

  The bag opens with a sophisticated click and Beth watches transfixed as Helen pulls out a tiny gilt case with matching gilt pencil topped with a rubber. The card is thin and creases easily under Beth’s clumsy fingers, but after Helen rubs the paper it’s so clean that there’s barely a trace of Beth’s abortive attempts. When she’s satisfied Helen asks, “Do you want it big?”

  Beth nods enthusiastically.

  Helen picks up the pencil and writes the word SPUTNIK in block capitals. Underneath, where it says address, she writes “COAL-’OLE-BY-THE-TOILET, BACKYARD, BLACKBURN.”

  Beth’s face is a picture.

  “What’s wrong? That’s your name, isn’t it? It’s what Dad calls you.”

  Beth clenches her teeth and her hands bunch into fists. Helen laughs. “Well, what do you want to be called then? What shall I write?”

  “Elizabeth Singleton.”

  “Oh, Elizabeth, is it?”

  Helen goes into her bag again for her mottled blue Conway Stewart pen with the fat gold nib and begins to write. Helen is nine years older than Beth and her handwriting is beautiful; she puts little circles over her “i”s and even draws little flowers inside the letter “B.” When she’s finished Beth’s name looks so pretty, so grown up.

  Beth is elated. She reads the card avidly until she reaches the space for her Redskin name. She looks up at her sister and points at the blank space. “I thought you weren’t supposed to fill that in until later,” Helen remarks. This is true. Beth must fill in every page of I-Spy at the Seaside and send it to Big Chief I-Spy who will send her a certificate and a feather to prove she’s a proper Redskin. Only then can she choose any name she likes. But Beth is impatient—she wants a name now.

  “What about ‘Little Cloud’ or ‘Laughing Waters’?” Helen suggests.

  Beth looks unconvinced. She wants to be called something frightening. “Wolf Teeth” would be good. Or “Growling Bear.” Beth needs to find another club member so that she can join their tribe instead of being by herself all the time. She’s been absent from school for a long time and all the friends she used to know are now friends with someone else. It would be better if Beth could join in at playtime but her mother has told the school that Beth is not allowed to swing, climb, skip or run. As a result Beth just sits and watches at playtime. Waiting for someone to play marbles with her.

  Of all the myriad rules there is one above all others that must not be broken. Beth must never, ever, for any reason take off her wool undershirt. As a result the undershirt (Ladybird age 5) is Beth’s closest companion. It is only removed once a week when Beth is bathed and is immediately replaced by another undershirt fresh from the airing cupboard and smelling of Lux soapflakes. In this manner Beth’s shame is kept from the sight of all but her mother.

  “For goodness’ sake, Beth! What are we going to do about your sandals?” Beth looks down at the scuffed leather. She has had the sandals for six weeks but has only been wearing them since Saturday, the start of the holiday. It seems that only Beth is subject to this particular rule. All Beth’s friends have been wearing their sandals since Easter and Susan Fletcher has been wearing hers even longer. All year round, in fact. But that’s because Susan Fletcher’s mum works and she “doesn’t care what state she sends her daughter to school in.” At least that’s what Beth’s mother says.

  “I hate these,” Beth complains, kicking off her sandals. “Only boys wear brown sandals. I didn’t even get to stand on the thing that makes your feet go all green like a skellington.”

  “You mean the X-ray machine. No one will notice they’re brown. Anyway they match your hair,” says Helen, in a moment of inspiration.

  They are interrupted by a sharp rapping at the door. Both girls jump.

  “That’s Mum! Quick, get your sandals on or we’ll both catch it.”

  Ruth Singleton, her arms full of clothes, waits in the hallway, her right foot tapping on the varnished floorboards. If her patience is short today it’s due to her husband’s ill-starred attempt at marital intimacy this morning. Surely he can see how she is after all these months of anxiety? But not Jack. No. Jack thinks a bit of early-morning sex is on the menu now they’re on holiday. Ruth had tolerated his caresses until his increasing insistence had forced her to push his hand away and say, “Don’t, Jack. I have to get up to get the girls ready.”

  He hadn’t said anything, had limited himself to a drawn-out sigh. Ruth felt an answering rush of anger. Does it always have to come down to this?

  Ruth is prized from the memory by the sound of the door finally opening. None of this palaver with locks would be necessary if it weren’t for her younger daughter’s recently acquired habit
of sleepwalking. This is bad enough at home, but there’s no telling what trouble the seven-year-old might get into in a hotel the size of the Belvedere. In a doomed attempt to allay Mrs. Singleton’s worst fears, the hotel manager has sworn on his mother’s life (a lady much missed since her demise three years previously) that the room locks are made by the same firm who supplied the MOD during the war. Even the “blasted Hun” couldn’t breach the security of the Belvedere’s rooms and thus Beth’s habit of going AWOL at night has been curtailed. This desirable state being attained not by the hoped-for Yale lock and chain, but by the effect of damp salt air on turn-of-the-century iron locks. All of which means that Helen must use the combined strength of both hands and the leverage of her shoulder to release the door.

  Though barely topping five foot six, Ruth appears much larger. Her face is scrubbed to a shine and her brown hair (already falling victim to the stealthy approach of gray) is brushed and fixed neatly into a Victory Roll that evokes memories of the war years and oppressive rationing. She is an energetic woman. A woman devoted to hard work. A woman reliant upon the writings of Elizabeth Craig to guide her through the minefield of domestic practice. Once in the room, Ruth dumps the clothes on the nearest bed and heads straight for the window to let in the sunshine. This involves coaxing, flicking, tugging and hauling the pea-green damask curtains to either end of a buckled and sagging wire. Halfway through this daily ordeal Ruth is distracted by the sight of the hotel yard, four floors below. It is lined with overflowing bins and a miscellaneous collection of mops, buckets and rusty chairs occupied by members of the hotel staff during their tea breaks. There, in full view, stands a line of sullen gray dustbins on an island of cracked concrete; the whole amply irrigated by the backwash of overflowing kitchen drains. Ruth’s whitewashed backyard boasts two bins, double the capacity of her terraced neighbors’. One (supplied by the local council) for ashes, and the other (privately purchased) for household waste. Ruth always wraps potato peelings and the like before disposal. Only by wrapping everything in fresh newspaper can Ruth ensure that the inside of her bin remains as clean as the day she bought it.