by Anne Doughty
She had taken off her coat and was changing her shoes in the staff-room when she heard the strident ring of the telephone at the back of the shop downstairs. Minutes later Susie hurried in, her face flushed, her eyes bright.
‘Poor Daisy,’ she began, ‘that was Frank. He says he thinks she’s got flu. He was out seeing her last night and she started sweating and couldn’t breathe. She got in such a state because she couldn’t breathe he asked if he could stay and he sat up with her all night.’
‘Oh dear, Susie. Is she any better this morning?’ asked Ellie anxiously.
‘No. He says he’s getting the doctor to be on the safe side,’ Susie said, bending down to change her shoes. ‘It must have come on terribly quickly, though she had a funny little cough yesterday. I thought it was just dust from some of the boxes …’
Susie broke off. Glancing up she’d discovered to her amazement that Ellie was as white as a sheet and had tears in her eyes.
‘Oh Ellie, Ellie, what’s wrong? You don’t think she’s going to die?’ demanded Susie, a stricken look on her face.
‘No, of course not,’ Ellie reassured her, coming and giving her a hug. ‘Daisy is perfectly healthy and Frank and her Ma will look after her well. I’m just being silly. I didn’t sleep very well …’
‘Something’s wrong. I know it is. Is it George? Has he killed himself up a tree?’
Ellie tried not to laugh, but she failed. As George had treated her like an idiot, perhaps it was a good thing if Susie returned the compliment on her behalf. But one look at Susie’s face and she knew she’d have to tell her the truth. There were rather a lot of people she’d have to tell, so she might as well start with those who knew her best.
‘Susie dear, George has got engaged to someone else. He doesn’t know that I know, so he tried to say that Canada might not suit me.’
‘Oh the so-and-so! Aren’t you absolutely furious?’
‘One bit of me is, but another bit is very upset with myself. When you talked about Frank sitting up all night with Daisy, I thought immediately of what George would have done, or rather, not have done and I felt I should have known better, or at least sooner. I’m blaming myself for being so trusting.’
‘For making a mistake you mean?’
Ellie nodded.
‘And what did you say to me about making mistakes when I first came?’ Susie demanded.
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘You said that unless you makes mistakes you can’t learn. That it’s all very well having rules and guidelines and all the rest of it, but the thing that really teaches you is when it goes wrong and you need help to put it right,’ she said, with a firmness and a fluency that left Ellie quite speechless. ‘Then you’ll remember next time and as well as that you’ll start to see a whole lot of other things as well, because mistakes often happen by doing the SAME thing when you need to do different things.’
‘Did I say that?’
‘Yes, you did. And it’s been a great help to me and to Joe. He used to be so afraid of making mistakes that he hid inside the books he read. Now he does all sorts of things. He’s really quite clever, isn’t he?’ she ended, shyly.
‘Indeed he is, Susie. I can’t believe how clever he is with those awful invoices,’ she said weakly, quite overcome by the idea that Susie had encouraged Joe to start using talents no one else had seen.
‘You need a nice cup of tea, Ellie. I’ll go and tell Joe and the boys that Daisy won’t be in and we’ll be down soon. They can start our jobs until we come. It was your idea, Ellie, that we all do as many of each other’s jobs as we can and that no one would be cross if we made mistakes. So you can’t be cross with you. I won’t allow it.’
Susie lit the gas fire, switched the kettle on and hurried off downstairs, leaving Ellie to recover her composure as best she could.
As Daisy said when she came back to work, she had no notion of dying, but never having been ill before, she’d been in a bad way. Fully herself again, she threw her energy into helping run the shop while her colleagues dressed the windows with spring fashion and fabrics and into planning her wedding. Frank had had his promotion and his formal transfer to Fivemiletown would come through at the beginning of May. They’d been told there was a police house available with the job so there was nothing now to stop them going ahead.
‘There’s only one thing I want from you as a wedding present,’ she said to Ellie, on a mild April day when they were both free to take their sandwiches to The Mall.
‘What’s that then?’ asked Ellie, cautiously.
‘I want you to forget all about George Robinson,’ she said firmly. ‘I know you say you’re over it, but yer not right. I don’t know when I last heard you laugh.’
‘Oh dear, I’m sorry. Have I been a misery?’
‘No, I didn’t really mean that,’ said Daisy more gently. ‘You do laugh and you can always take a joke, but …’
Ellie looked at her friend and saw her struggling to find words.
‘You are right, Daisy, I’m not feeling very happy these days,’ Ellie said quietly. ‘I don’t really know why. The more I think about George the more I know I’d never have been happy with him. He’s just not reliable. And the thought of being in Canada with him, even with Polly there, makes me shiver. Imagine being married to someone and having his children, yet knowing all the time you were on your own. Not physically on your own like women who lose their husbands, but knowing there was no help for you from the person you loved and who you thought loved you.’
Daisy looked at her closely as she crumbled up her last piece of crust for the sparrows who were watching their every move.
‘Ellie, you shouldn’t be thinkin’ about what might have happened. It didn’t happen. It wouldn’t have happened. If he’d have come home you’d have taken one look at him and known it wasn’t right. You’d have broken it off yourself.’
‘Would I?’
‘Yes, you would. Are you afraid you mightn’t have?’
Ellie nodded and brushed the crumbs from her skirt to the great delight of the waiting sparrows.
‘Then that’s what’s wrong with you,’ Daisy declared. ‘I know you wouldn’t make that mistake, but you don’t seem to know that. What are we goin’ to do about it?’
‘I honestly don’t know, Daisy, but I know what my friend Rose would say. Well, it didn’t work out but you’re that much further on. And I am, thanks to you,’ she said, nodding quietly. ‘It’s awfully hard to put something right until you know it’s wrong in the first place.’
‘Aye, d’ye mind the day we thought the bailiffs were comin’ to put us out? Sure it was you sorted that out. It’ll be all right, Ellie. You wait an’ see. You’ll not make the same mistake twice. You’re not stupid.’
‘Thank you, Daisy, I’m glad you think that,’ she said, beaming. ‘I don’t think I’ll ever get over George Robinson trying to tell me I was a poor wee thing that couldn’t leave her quiet wee place in the country.’
She said it with such unaccustomed vehemence that Daisy burst out laughing and went on laughing till Ellie herself started laughing too and so startled the sparrows that they made a hasty retreat to the railings nearby.
Daisy’s wedding was a small family affair. As neither of them had any significant church connection, they were married in the Armagh Registry Office late on a Wednesday morning, so that at least some of their friends could come for what Daisy called ‘a wedding breakfast at lunch time’ set out at her own home.
Ellie and Richard Sleator had been asked to provide the necessary witnesses to the marriage and Richard’s car provided transport. They arrived back at Daisy’s home to find Susie, Joe, Harry and Stanley had all managed to squash in to a somewhat larger vehicle lent by John Sleator and driven by Sam Hamilton.
It was not simply the bride who looked radiant in a new dress worn with Ellie’s close-fitting, going-up-to-Belfast hat, the groom beamed on everyone as he poured whiskey for the men and port for the ladies. The cold lunch
required two sittings in the farm kitchen, but afterwards everyone squeezed in to hear Richard and Frank’s speeches which were short but very witty. Full of food and good spirits of both kinds, they then trooped out into the well-swept farmyard where the cake sat on a borrowed milk-churn, all three tiers iced to perfection and decorated with silver paper good wishes and edible lucky horseshoes.
Stanley and Joe took photos with their Box Brownies and a friend of Frank’s who worked at the Allison Studio took four formal pictures with a large plate camera. The bride and groom cut the cake several times before he was satisfied and then he requested that every chair, stool, or wooden box, in house or barn, be brought out so he could take a picture of the whole wedding party.
One or two of the older people said, ‘Ach no, I’ve too many wrinkles,’ when what they meant was that there were not enough chairs, but eventually, everyone was accommodated, the smaller people standing on chairs at the back, the tallest in the middle and the immediate family sitting on either side of the bride and groom. Daisy’s brothers and a few small cousins obligingly sat cross-legged on the ground.
The cake was now taken into the kitchen, carved and distributed, none the worse for so many insertions from the borrowed silver knife. Under the crisp, white icing the fruit cake Daisy’s mother had baked was rich and moist.
‘Hello, Ellie,’ said Sam, handing her a piece on a tea-plate.
‘Hello, Sam,’ Ellie replied. ‘Where’s yours?’
‘I’ll have mine later. I came to see how you’re gettin’ home. You can’t very well go back with the bride and groom when Richard takes them to the train.’
‘And I haven’t got a taxi handy like the last time we met,’ she said laughing.
‘Well, actually I’m the taxi man here today, but I think I’m fully booked for the first few trips,’ he said soberly. ‘Richard’s organising it. Some need to get to Portadown. Some back to Armagh. Could ye wait till I’ve done those?’ he asked, looking somewhat anxious.
‘Of course I could,’ she said quickly. ‘I wasn’t going to leave Mrs Hutchinson with all the clearing up. Don’t hurry, there’s a fair bit to do.’
A little later, the bride appeared in her going-away outfit, a pretty summer dress with the very smart shoes she and Ellie had bought together in Thomas Street. In her hand, she carried the spray of flowers her mother had ordered specially from Blakeley’s nursery.
Richard looked up at the sky, decided the odd large cloud was harmless enough and put the top down on the motor before ushering the bride and groom into the back.
‘Remember to throw your flowers, Daisy,’ he said, as he walked round to the driver’s side.
‘Not on your life, Richard,’ she came back at him. ‘I’m not taking any chances with these. Come here, Ellie,’ she called, as she stood up and leant out, flowers in hand. ‘You were never much good at catchin’ things, but why bother when I’m puttin’ them right into your hand,’ she said, giving her a kiss.
There were shouts and cheers as Ellie took the flowers and Daisy’s younger brother hopped up on the running board of the motor to pour confetti liberally over the bride’s hair and down the groom’s neck.
Richard drove through the cheering guests at snail’s pace, still unaware that the same young man had managed in complete secrecy to do a thorough job of tying tin cans to his well-polished rear bumper.
The first thing Ellie did after Sam Hamilton drove her home late in the afternoon was to take Daisy’s bouquet carefully apart. Having sat in a bowl of water while the remains of the wedding party were being cleared up, the beautifully matched blooms were not even wilting. As she carefully removed the pieces of wire and the made-up bows and streamers of white and gold ribbon, she transferred the individual stems to a vase and a small collection of jam pots.
She studied all the containers closely and was delighted. On several of the creamy-white carnations and the two blending shades of heather, there were small side shoots just big enough to handle. With care, they were pieces she could root. She spent the evening finding exactly what she needed to encourage her slips to grow before putting them on the window-sill with the already vigorous cuttings of Hamilton’s Pink.
As she got into bed that night, she decided it had been the happiest day she’d spent for a long, long time.
There were many happy days to follow over the summer. To begin with, she was able to take her week’s holiday in June. She and Ruth went window shopping, took a bus tour to the Glens of Antrim and visited Belfast Zoo.
Ellie spent a good deal of time with Rose and was there for her birthday, a quiet affair, a special lunch cooked by the housekeeper. James teased them by insisting he had cut a meeting with Lord Brookeborough himself in order to be free to join them. He had been quite right about Hamilton’s Pink. The home grown cutting which had amused the bus conductor on the way up to Belfast, delighted Rose as much as he’d said it would. It looked so flourishing, a minute set of buds already in place. As she examined the little bush carefully, Rose said she agreed with her grand-daughter. Even if it wasn’t a successor to the one she’d tended all those years ago, then it was a cousin. It was, she said, still one of the family and a joy to have.
They mentioned George only briefly, the news of his departure and Ellie’s subsequent low spirits having been written about and despatched long ago. Instead, they talked about Daisy’s wedding, Ellie’s experiences buying for Freeburns and Rose’s most recent news from her family.
Sadly, they had to agree that Charlie Running was right. This man Hitler was on his way to the top. It seemed there was nothing he wouldn’t do to gain power and, worse still, no one was lifting a finger to stop him. But it did look as if Sarah and Simon would be coming home. They’d done their tour of duty in Germany with the so-called Trade Mission. Sarah said it would look suspicious if they weren’t replaced in the normal way and Rose confessed how grateful she was they’d be out of that country before anything worse could happen.
Back at work, Ellie began to encourage Susie to study fashion, not just read the magazines looking for things she’d like herself. She spent a lot of time too with Helen Adams, their new assistant, a pleasant, rather quiet girl who’d joined them straight from the High School at the end of the school year.
Helen had wanted to go to Queen’s University but her father had died suddenly in April and she had to get a job. Ellie felt so sad for her. It was just like Daisy all over again, except that, unlike dear Daisy, and particularly unlike Susie, Helen was bright. You only had to tell her something once and that was that. By the end of September, she had mastered all the routine tasks and procedures and was literally looking for new fields to conquer.
Susie continued to walk home every evening with Joe, talk to Joe in her lunch hour when the rota permitted, and play tennis with Joe several nights a week. She had finally prevailed upon her brother Richard to intervene on her behalf with the Club Secretary. Susie, he argued, was in her seventeenth year. More to the point she was a better player than many of their older women.
Always a reasonable man, Charles Merrick proposed a trial game. Picking names at random, he set Susie and Richard to play against Harry Wright and Mrs Edwards. The score in favour of Susie and Richard was six games to two and to Ellie’s great delight, Susie Sleator became the youngest member of the Club.
By tradition, the Annual Tennis Club Dance took place at the beginning of the season, but this year that had not been possible. The City Hall, was in need of routine repairs and redecoration and the summer was the best time for the work both indoors and out. So this year the last event of the season was not the tournament, but the Annual Dance, now to take place on Friday the seventh of September.
Ellie felt strangely apprehensive about the event and couldn’t think why she should feel so. It wasn’t that she hadn’t a rather nice new dress, blue again because it seemed to suit her so well, but different in texture and a completely different cut from her last one. Nor was it that she enjoyed dancing any l
ess than sixteen months ago. But some unease seemed to fill her with agitation every time she thought about it.
Sam was looking forward to it very much, however. Over the summer, they’d met often at the club and they’d gone to the pictures several times when the staff at Freeburns had organised one of their treats. Emily had asked Ellie to come and see them, but knowing it was a long way for her to cycle, she’d suggested Sam go and fetch her on a Sunday afternoon. It had been a most happy visit and they’d gone several times over the summer.
Ellie couldn’t help noticing that the first time Sam arrived on his bike at the forge house, he’d brought a windproof jacket for her in case she hadn’t one of her own. It was indeed far more effective than her warmest cardigan would have been. As for riding pillion, she was surprised at how much she liked it. But then, with Sam, she always felt safe.
As before, Mrs Sleator had invited Ellie to stay overnight for the dance and Helen as well. She was a very generous woman and Ellie saw as soon as she arrived that Mrs Sleator had already decided Helen would be made to feel as welcome as Ellie herself. For his part, John Sleator was only too happy to repeat his chauffeur duty, this time with a new Chevrolet.
It was after supper that Ellie decided she needed a little rest. She and Sam went upstairs, tramped down to the very front row of the balcony and peered over.
‘Look, there’s Helen,’ said Sam, nodding downwards.
‘And there’s Susie and Joe,’ she replied.
A silence fell between them then, each absorbed in their own thoughts. Daisy and Frank were certainly part of those thoughts for the news had just come that Daisy was expecting a baby in February. After a little while Ellie felt ready to break the silence.
‘Sam, there’s something I want to ask you,’ she began quietly.
‘Ask away,’ he replied.
‘If there hadn’t been a woman that hurt you and a man that let me down, do you think we’d be in with a chance?’
‘Ellie,’ he said, startled. ‘Do you know what you’re asking?’
