The Staircase Girls Read online

  Back home after the honeymoon, Hugh had refused to touch Maud again in the same way, and when she asked him why not he said that they needed to get to know each other better. ‘Let’s just try and be friends to start with, and then see what happens?’ After further rejections, Maud gave up asking for any form of physical affection.

  Then he announced they would have separate bedrooms, because, he said, ‘I don’t want you waking me up during the day when you get up, so it makes sense.’ Maud wasn’t convinced. Although he was doing shift work, he wouldn’t always be on at night and she would be out most of the day so how could he be disturbed.

  After a year of married but single life, Maud felt defeated and had no one to confide in about how she felt. She was determined not to prove her nan right and ask to move back there, and she didn’t want anyone to know that there were problems in her marriage. She went through a period of asking Hugh if the problem was her. ‘Is it because I’m not as clever as you? Is it ’cos I’m not pretty? Is it my clothes?’ She begged him for an explanation. ‘Tell me what should I do?’

  But Hugh replied, ‘I am very fond of you, Maud. We will always be friends, isn’t that enough?’

  For the next few years Maud tried to be a dutiful wife, but it was difficult when her husband was absent, which proved to be more often than not. When he wasn’t working nights Hugh went night fishing. When they took a holiday together – to the same caravan in Felixstowe every time – he spent all night down at the shore, fishing. ‘It’s totally different from river fishing, Maudie,’ he told her, ‘I can’t pass up the chance of it.’ The funny thing was, he rarely caught anything, and when he did he always brought a single fish home, already cleaned and wrapped in newspaper.

  So Maud and Hugh Ingram were never ‘happy’ in ways that she expected from the films she’d seen at the cinema. But then, they were never exactly ‘unhappy’, either, in that they never fought, rarely argued, and on Sundays often slept side-by-side on the sofa after lunch (cooked by Mrs Ingram), as the radio played.

  Finding work after her marriage had not been a necessity, since Hugh had his naval pension as well as his job. Maud had had to leave the radiogram assembly line at the Pye factory when she married, and she soon became bored and bewildered by days spent watching her mother-in-law do housework. It was not easy for Maud to find work. Many places wouldn’t take young married women on because they expected them to leave and have children (fat chance of that, Maud had thought, when she first heard the excuse for not hiring her), and anyway, it was a woman’s place to be at home and take care of the house for her husband, apparently. She couldn’t tell anyone that her husband didn’t need or want her at home keeping house for him; the shame would be too great.

  Maud searched wanted ads in newsagents across the city and eventually found work as a cleaner at a large house on the Grantchester Road. For a few months the novelty of going into the grand dark house filled with enormous Victorian furniture – one of the wardrobes was as big as the kitchen at her nan’s, she thought – kept her occupied, if not exactly happy. The work wasn’t hard but it was lonely. Mrs Kemp, whose husband was a bigwig at a museum, seemed either to go out when Maud arrived for work or keep to her study during the three hours Maud was there. There were no chats over tea and biscuits, and Maud wondered if Mrs Kemp even remembered her name sometimes, since when she did address her it was as ‘you there’, or ‘I say, Miss . . .’ There was a cook who did everything in the kitchen to keep it clean and tidy, but she made it clear from the start that Maud wasn’t needed or welcome in ‘her’ kitchen. The single solitary cup of tea Maud had on the two days a week she cleaned there would be left on the mantelpiece of the dining room at 11 a.m.

  After a year of cleaning for Mrs Kemp, Maud decided that she would learn to make dresses, for something else to do. She’d been pretty good at needlework and knitting at school – it was the only subject that she was really any good at – and with her pay from the cleaning job she began to buy patterns. It soon became clear to her that she’d need more than a thimble and some needles to do things properly, and so she asked Hugh to lend her the money to buy a new Singer sewing machine.

  ‘I’ll pay you back weekly,’ she told him. ‘I would rather borrow from you than go on the never, never.’

  ‘I don’t want your money, Maud,’ Hugh said, ‘I’ll buy you it.’

  He did, but every Friday evening Maud put three shillings in an envelope and slid it under his bedroom door. Since they didn’t live together as man and wife should, Maud didn’t think she could accept being kept by Hugh. She longed to feel loved and looked after by her husband, but since she wasn’t she felt that it was best if she didn’t depend on him for much.

  It wasn’t long before Maud became well known in Ditton Fields for being able to make do and mend just about anything, and for not charging a great deal for it, either. ‘Just give me what you can, I don’t really need it,’ she’d tell people who brought her a dress that needed lengthening, or trousers that needed letting out. ‘Hugh looks after me alright,’ she’d fib, and push their hands away if they tried to pay her what she thought was too much.

  But some of her customers wondered how Hugh looked after her, because Maud had stopped taking care in her appearance. She wore her work pinafore all the time while awake, she had no use for make-up or high-heeled shoes and thought she certainly didn’t need to look ‘done up’. ‘No point, is there?’ she asked Hugh when he commented on her unbrushed hair one weekend.

  ‘When was the last time you cleaned your teeth?’ he asked her, looking genuinely puzzled.

  ‘Would it make a difference?’ she shot back, to which he bowed his head and left the room muttering apologies. Hugh hadn’t kissed her since their honeymoon and Maud had never been taught by her nan that she had to brush her teeth regularly.

  Maud stopped looking in mirrors when she passed them, but when she caught her reflection in the window of Eaden Lilley one Monday after work, she felt something like shock, and was struck with a sadness that seemed bottomless. I look just like my nan, she realised with a sinking heart. Same dumpy figure, old-woman’s shoes and shapeless coat, I could pass for forty-five, not twenty-five.

  But what was the point anyway? she sighed to herself, as she headed from the department store to Woolworths. If Hugh didn’t want her, no one else would so there’s no need to bother trying to find anyone. What I need, she decided, as she pushed through the swing doors and onto Woolies lovely wooden floor, heading for the cottons and needle counter, is another job to take up more of my time. Then she bumped into Bertha Mizen, the mother of an old schoolfriend, coming round the underwear counter looking the other way.

  Maud politely asked after Bertha’s daughter, Marjorie, who had been in her class at school. Bertha, a little taken aback at Maud’s wild hair, bare face and unplucked eyebrows, dismissed Marjorie with a wave of her hand.

  ‘Oh hell, that girl,’ she said without a smile, ‘you know ’er, she’s not changed; never happy ’less she’s arguing with someone. The latest is her mate Doris, who Marj asked to be her bridesmaid for when she and Deryk get married in the summer. Doris agreed but she’s always slagging off Deryk, an’ says she wants to choose the dresses.’

  She paused and stared at Maud, who opened her mouth but nothing came out. ‘What’s wrong, Maud?’ she asked.

  Bertha always had a soft spot for Maud. Her daughter had told her one day that most children kept away from the poor girl at school. ‘She stinks,’ Marjorie had said, to which Bertha responded sharply, telling her not to be so nasty, it wasn’t Maud’s fault that the house she lived in was so damp. Poor Maud always smelled of mildew back then, and while she seemed healthy enough today, there was an air of desperation about her, and she looked as if she was on her way to the madhouse, just like her mother.

  ‘Come on, love, what’s up?’

  Maud explained how she was married and cleaning houses, but really wanted a job that would take up more of her time, because sh
e didn’t need to be at home as her mother-in-law did all the housework. (‘It is her house, after all.’)

  ‘Right,’ Bertha squeezed Maud’s upper arm reassuringly and told her, ‘I’m still working as a bedder, so just you let me talk to the housekeeper at my college and I’ll have you join me as my assistant in no time.’

  True to her word Bertha talked to Mrs George, her boss, about Maud the next day, telling her that, ‘She’s a grafter, just got married to a postman, and you know how it is, they’re just starting out, they’ll be saving for a house of their own, no doubt, and I can vouch for her. Honest.’

  Maud started working alongside Bertha a fortnight after they’d bumped into each other in Woolies. The work wasn’t hard, it was more of the same as she’d been doing at Grantchester Road (which she now did in the afternoons). Sweeping, dusting, making beds, emptying bins, setting fires. Cleaning up the gyp room was new, but it was tiny, almost as small as her kitchen at home, although with far less stuffed into it.

  The students were a bit intimidating, though, and she hardly knew how to talk to them, preferring to mumble and leave the room if she entered alone and there was already someone there. Bertha treated the ‘boys’ as if they were her own children, thought Maud. Some she scolded for making too much mess (although without swearing at them, Maud noticed), others she giggled with and let them off tidying completely.

  With certain students Bertha acted very properly, Maud noticed, and almost curtsied to two in particular. ‘His dad’s in the gov’nerment,’ Bertha said under her breath after they’d left the room of a tall, thin boy with owlish glasses and a long, floppy fringe. ‘That one’s proper posh, got a “right ’onourable” on his cheque books,’ she said about the other student, a rotund, oily-haired boy with piggy eyes and starched collars. ‘I know how to do ’is collars proper ’cos my dad had to wear them when he was a butler, an’ ’is lordship pays me sixpence extra for each.’ Maud usually stayed away from those rooms and let Bertha handle them, which the older woman was happy to do.

  The mention of extra ironing work made Maud wonder aloud whether any of the boys needed buttons sewing on or clothes adjusted, because she could do it if they did. Bertha told her to mention it to some of them, if she fancied it, but the May Balls were when Maud might make best use of her sewing skills.

  ‘What’s a May Ball?’ Maud asked.

  ‘It’s the end of exams parties that every college has,’ Bertha explained, ‘usually in their gardens, but sometimes on the greens. All the students get properly dressed up in top hat and tails like they’re bleedin’ Fred Astaire, an’ they invite their girlfriends, sisters and sometimes mum and dads, too. There’s dancing, music, lots of food, candles everywhere an’ naturally lots of drinking. ’Cos of the drinking and dancing the ladies and the gents are always ripping clothes, spilling things down themselves, losing buttons and their hems come down, straps break and all that. Every college gets a seamstress to sit in one of the tents and mend stuff as the party carries on.’

  ‘So you get to go to the ball, like Cinderella?’ Maud smiled.

  ‘Yeah, but you ’ave to work like Cinders at home, and there ain’t no glass slipper,’ Bertha snorted.

  ‘Well, May’s not very far off, who do I ask about being a seamstress?’ Maud could feel something like happy anticipation sending the blood to her face.

  Bertha laughed, gave Maud a gentle push and told her, ‘They’re in June, and you ask Mrs George. Give it a few weeks then ask. You’ve got lots of time, it’s only bleedin’ March.’

  The following weeks went by in a blur as Maud worked harder and made sure that Bertha noticed her extra effort. She did a few sewing jobs for students who expressed their thanks in words and pennies in envelopes (‘thruppence a button, sixpence a hem’, she’d tell any who asked), and gained a reputation at the college as the person who could sew, fix and adjust any item of clothing. Her sewing began to keep Maud from thinking too much about her failing marriage and earn her a good bit extra, too.

  When silent week started – ‘No talking to the students,’ Bertha told her as they travelled to work one morning in early May, ‘and only whisper to me if you have to when we’re at work ’cos they’re cramming for their exams’ – Maud took a chance and asked the college housekeeper if she could work as a seamstress at the forthcoming May Ball.

  The following day at tea break Maud found Bertha sitting, drinking tea with her back to the door in the gyp room. Tip-toeing up behind her, Maud whispered, ‘Coooo-ee!’ in her ear and Bertha jumped, spilling tea on the table. Maud stifled a laugh.

  ‘What the . . .’ Bertha dropped her voice, ‘hell, Maud! Creeping up on me like that, gave me the frights. Blimey, my old man puts his cold feet on me in the middle of the night and I jump out my skin and you’ve just had the same effect on me!’

  Maud covered her mouth to supress her laughter. Bertha’s husband had been a driver of a horse drawn hackney carriage and now he was gas lighter on Histon Road, igniting the street lamps at night; Maud had seen him emerging from the occasional pea-souper fog wearing two jackets, a scarf, two hats and hobnailed boots. The thought of him and Bertha in bed made her want to laugh even more.

  Bertha sat down again, her hand at her throat, and asked, ‘What’d you do that for?’

  ‘Oh, Bertha, I’ve asked if I can be the seamstress at the balls and Mrs George’s said yes, isn’t it great? Only, I’m worried that I may have to get up too close to them if I have to sew things on while they’re still wearing the shirt or whatever. You know, they’ll be able to smell my breath. Hugh’s mum says it’s really bad and I should have my teeth taken out. I don’t know if I could bear that, and I can’t do it now anyway, it’s too soon to the ball, isn’t it?’

  ‘Oh dear,’ Bertha patted the chair next to her. ‘Sit yourself down you poor girl and listen to me. You’ll be alright. You can ask ’em to take their shirts off, after all, they’ll prob’ly be wearing a vest or something underneath if they’re respectable. You ’aven’t got to get up close and personal, like. An’ you ain’t got to have your teeth pulled out. Seems a bit extreme unless you wants to, ’course. I had all mine taken out years ago but that’s ’cos they were falling out. Now, I always carry a tin of these around.’

  Bertha put her hand into the pocket of her overall and pulled out a red and white tin. The label said ‘Compound Glycerin of Thymol pastilles with AMC’. ‘They’re a godsend. You can ’ave my tin – it don’t ’alf freshen your breath. There you go.’

  Maud was grateful and thanked Bertha for the pastilles. ‘Just make sure you ’ave a good time, Maud, while you’re young enough to enjoy yourself,’ she laughed.

  Maud laughed too, nervously. She spent the next week alternating between feeling as excited as she’d ever been, but scared, too. As a child she’d barely noticed the approach of Christmases, and couldn’t understand the eager anticipation her classmates felt as December wore on. They’d talk about Father Christmas bringing them toys and fruit, and Maud would feel confused, bemused, even. Her nan had put her right about ‘Father Christmas’ almost as soon as Maud could walk, telling her, ‘You’ll be getting nothing from no one ’cos there’s only me and we ain’t got no money for presents.’ At the age of nine or so, though, Maud got herself caught up in the excitement of Christmas approaching, encouraged by her school friends, and she convinced herself that on Christmas morning, somehow Father Christmas would have climbed down their dirty chimney and left a stocking full of toys on their smoke-smudged, teacup-stained mantelpiece.

  Maud remembered her innocent sense of anticipation and excitement of that Christmas as she looked forward to the May Ball of 1950. She couldn’t help feeling excited, but equally, she couldn’t help feeling scared that she’d feel so let down on the day. Because, naturally, come Christmas morning when she was nine, she rushed downstairs in the freezing cold, predawn gloom to see her much-longed-for bulging stocking from Father Christmas – and found only a chipped cup on the mantelpiece and the
cold grey ashes of last night’s fire in the grate.

  ANN

  Cambridge 1945–47

  Ann wasn’t surprised by the announcement, nor by the manner in which it had come about. ‘I suppose we should get married,’ Barrel said to Bet one evening early in March 1945.

  It wasn’t the most romantic proposal that Bet could think of, but still, it was a proposal and she accepted.

  When Jack was told, he was happy for her. ‘Mrs Harry Reynolds of Cambridge,’ he said, ‘got a nice ring to it, that has.’

  Grace simply said, ‘’Bout time an’ all.’ Then smiled and added, ‘Well done.’

  Ann was almost as relieved as she was pleased about the announcement, because it meant that she didn’t have to accompany Bet to any more dances.

  Bet had changed their dancehall of choice to the British Legion, mainly because it was the only place that Ann could be persuaded to go and be confident that Peter Constable wouldn’t be there. They’d been out dancing twice a week since Barrel had come out of the services with a slight limp, and as Ann complained to Bet, ‘I’m always playing gooseberry to you and Barrel. I have to be up early you know. I hate late nights. I’m always tired.’

  Bet laughed and said, ‘Oh but you’ve got to admit he makes you laugh, Nance, doesn’t he?’ Which was true. Ann was also relieved that she wouldn’t have to go out in a foursome with Bet, Barrel and his friend Albert, any more. She knew that they had paired him off with her because they felt guilty about her tagging along with them, and although the few times they’d all gone out were pleasant enough, Ann didn’t dream of Albert at night, or think about him during the longest, dullest day at the brewery. For a few months, Ann was happy to stay home while Bet and her fiancé went out without a chaperone.