“I’ve got a boyfriend,” I explained. “His name’s James Atherton and we’ve been going out for a year. He’s twenty-nine, and his father owns three garages on Merseyside. James manages the Southport one.”
“Is it serious?” Bel enquired gravely.
“On his side, not mine.” I thought about what James had said last night on the sands outside the nightclub.
“He’s been going through some sort of crisis for an entire week.”
“Poor bugger,” Bel said laconically. “Fellers wouldn’t recognise a crisis if it crept up behind and threw them to the ground.”
“It’s all my fault.” I wrinkled my nose.
“It shouldn’t do him any harm. Men generally have it too easy in relationships with women.” “Where did you meet Flo?” It was time she answered a few questions.
“Birkenhead, luv, a few months before the war began.
She was a year older than me. She lived in Wavertree in those days.”
“Did Flo join the forces like you?”
“How did you know . . . ?” Bel began, then nodded at the photographs on the table. “Of course, the photo of yours truly getting hitched to dear ould Bob. That was me in the ATS. No, Flo stayed working in the laundry during the war. I was posted to Egypt and it was years before I saw her again.” She glanced sadly around the room. For the first time she looked her age as her face grew sober and her eyes darkened with sadness. She appeared to be slightly drunk. “She was such a lovely girl. You should have seen her smile—it was like a ray of sunshine, yet she buried herself in this place for most of her life. It’s a dead rotten shame.”
“Would you like more sherry?” I asked. I much preferred the cheerful Bel, even if it meant her getting even drunker.
“I wouldn’t say no.” She perked up. “The bottle’s nearly gone, but there’ll be more in the sideboard. Flo always had half a dozen in. She said it helped with her headaches.
Is there anything to eat, luv? Me stomach’s rumbling something awful. I would have had summat before I left, but I never thought I’d be out so long.”
In the kitchen, I found several tins of soup in a cupboard.
I opened a tin of pea and ham, poured it into two mugs and put them in the microwave to heat, then unwrapped the ham sandwiches I’d brought with me. I didn’t realise I was singing until Bel shouted, “Someone sounds happy! You’ve been listening to Flo’s record.”
It was totally different from how I’d spent Sunday afternoons before and I wasn’t doing anything that could remotely be considered exciting, yet I felt contented as I watched the red figures count down on the microwave. I wondered if Flo had bought the microwave and other things like the record player and the television on hire purchase. During my rather pathetic forays into drawers and cupboards, I hadn’t come across any papers. Flo must have a pension book somewhere, possibly an insurance policy, and there were bound to be other matters that had to be dealt with; electricity and gas bills, council tax, water rates. I was being negligent in dealing with her affairs. This was the second time I’d come and the flat was no different now than it was when Flo died, except that there was less sherry and less food. As soon as Bel went, I’d get down to work, clear a few drawers or something.
I searched for a tray and discovered one in the cupboard under the sink. There was salt and pepper in pretty porcelain containers—“A Gift from Margate”. I put everything on the tray and took it into the living room where Bel was half asleep.
“Who paid for the funeral?” I asked.
Bel came awake with a furious blinking of her thickly mascaraed lashes and immediately attacked a sandwich.
“Both me and Flo took out special funeral policies. She showed me where hers was kept and I showed her where to find mine. We used to wonder which of us would go first. Flo swore it would be her. I never said anything but I thought the same.” She made one of her outrageous faces. “I’ll have to show someone else where me policy is, won’t I?”
“Haven’t you got any children?”
“No, luv.” For a moment, Bel looked desolate. “I was in the club three times but never able to bring a baby to term. Nowadays, they can do something about it, but not then.”
“I’m sorry,” I said softly. In fact, I was so sorry that a lump came to my throat.
Unexpectedly Bel smiled. “That’s all right, luv. I used to joke with Flo sometimes that we were a barren pair of bitches but, as she’d say, kids don’t automatically bring happiness. Some you’d be better off without.” She went on tactlessly, “How’s that sister of yours, the sick one? I can’t remember her name.”
“Alison. She’s not sick, she’s autistic” I shrugged. “She’s the same as ever.”
“And what about your other sister? And you’ve got a brother, haven’t you?”
I was being cross-questioned again, I told her about Trudy. “As for Declan, he just drifts from job to job. He’s getting nowhere.”
Bel screwed up her face in an expression of disgust.
“There’s not much hope for young people nowadays.”
She sipped her soup for a while, then said casually, “How’s your gran?”
I had the definite feeling that Bel had been leading up to this question from the start. “She’s fine. She was eighty in June.”
“Is she still in the same place in Kirkby?”
“Yes.”
Bel stared at her ultra-fashionable boots: lace-ups with thick soles and heels, not quite Dr Marten’s, but almost. “I don’t suppose,” she said wistfully, “you know what that row was all about?”
“What row?”
“The one all them years ago between your gran and Flo.”
“I don’t know anything about it,” I said. “We were always led to believe Flo had done something terrible, and Gran never spoke to her again.”
Bel pulled one of her peculiar faces. “I heard it the other way round, that it was Martha who’d done wrong and Flo who’d taken umbrage. More than once she said to me, ‘Bel, under no circumstances must our Martha be told if I go to meet me Maker before she does—at least not till the funeral’s over,’ but she’d never tell me why, although she wasn’t one to keep secrets from her best friend. We knew everything about each other except for that.”
At six o’clock, Bel announced that she was going home, but changed her mind when Charmian arrived with a plate of chicken legs and a wedge of homemade fruitcake. By then I was a bit drunk and gladly opened another bottle of sherry. At half past seven we watched Coronation Street. It was hours later that my visitors left, and I was sorry to see them go. Charmian was natural and outgoing, with a sharp wit, and I felt completely at ease, as if I’d known them both all my life. It was as though I had inherited two good friends from Flo.
“I’ve had a great time today,” Bel said, with a satisfied chuckle when she was leaving. “It’s almost as if Flo’s still with us. We must do this again next Sunday. I don’t live far away in Maynard Street.”
I was already looking forward to it, forgetting that I was there to sort out Flo’s possessions, not enjoy myself.
Charmian said, “Our Jay’s twenty-one this week, Millie, and we’re having a party on Saturday. You’re invited if you’re free—bring a boyfriend if you’ve got one.”
“Of course she’s got a boyfriend, a lovely girl like her!”
Bel exclaimed. “A party might be just the thing to help your James through his crisis.”
Charmian rolled her eyes. “It’s a party, not a counselling session.”
“I’ll ask him, but I’m sure he’s already got something arranged.” I was convinced that James would hate the idea.
The flat felt unusually still and quiet without Bel and her loud voice, though it still smelt strongly of her perfume. A police car came screeching round the corner, the flashing blue light sweeping across the room through the thin curtains. It made me realise that I’d had more glasses of sherry than I could count. If I was stopped and breathalysed, I would lose my licence, and I couldn’t afford that: a car was essential to my job. I’ll have to stay here tonight, I thought.
The idea of sleeping in the soft, springy bed was appealing. I made coffee, put it in the microwave and went into the bedroom to take stock. There were nightdresses in the bottom drawer of the chest. I picked out a pretty blue cotton one with short puffed sleeves and white lace trimming on the hem. A dramatic quilted black dressing-gown, patterned with swirling pink roses, was hanging behind the door, and I remembered the pink furry slippers under the bed. I undressed quickly and put on the nightie. It felt crisp and cold, but the dressing-gown was lined with something fleecy and in no time I was warm. I shoved my cold feet into Flo’s slippers. Everything smelt slightly of that lovely scent from the Body Shop, Dewberry! It seemed odd, because I kept thinking of Flo as belonging to another age, not someone who frequented the Body Shop.
It didn’t seem the least bit odd or unpleasant to be wearing a dead woman’s clothes. In fact, it seemed as if Flo had left everything in place especially for me.
There wouldn’t be time in the morning to go home and change, and George disapproved of jeans in the office. A quick glance in the wardrobe showed it to be so tightly packed with clothes that I could barely get my fingers between them. There was bound to be something I could wear.
I collected the coffee, took it into the bedroom and climbed into bed. I switched on the bedside lamp and picked up the book Flo had been reading before she died, turning to the first page. I was deeply involved when my eyes started to close, although it wasn’t yet ten o’clock, hours before I usually went to bed. I turned off the lamp, slid under the bedclothes and lay in the cool darkness, vaguely aware of the saints staring down at me from the walls, and the crucifix above my head.
There were shouts in the distance, followed by a crashing sound, as if someone had broken a window. A car’s brakes shrieked, there were more shouts, but I scarcely noticed. I thought about James. Perhaps I was too hard on him. I resolved to be nicer in future. My thoughts drifted briefly to Bel, but she had scarcely occupied my mind for more than a few seconds before I fell into a deep, restful and dreamless sleep.
“That’s a charming dress,” said George. “You look exceptionally sweet and demure this morning.”
“So do you,” I replied tartly. I always resent men considering it their prerogative to make comments on a woman’s appearance. “The dress belonged to my aunt. I stayed the night in her flat.”
George looked at me askance. “That’s a bit risky, isn’t it? I hope you weren’t alone.”
“I was, but seem to have survived the experience.”
The extension rang on my desk and George disappeared into his office. It was James. “Where on earth were you last night?” he demanded crossly. “I rang and rang and left increasingly desperate messages on your answering-machine. Then I called early this morning and you still weren’t there.”
I frowned in annoyance. What right had he to know my whereabouts for twenty-four hours a day? “I had visitors at my aunt’s flat and we drank a bottle of sherry between us. It didn’t seem safe to drive.”
“If I’d known what number your aunt had lived at, I’d have come to William Square in search of you.”
“If you had, I’d have been very cross,” I said coldly.
James groaned. “Darling, I’ve been out of my head with worry. I thought you might have come to some harm.”
I remembered that I’d vowed to be nicer to him, so bit back another sharp reply. “I’m perfectly all right,” I said pleasantly. “In fact, I had the best night’s sleep in years.”
Even Diana had remarked on how well I looked. “Sparkling” was how she had put it. “You never usually have much colour, but your cheeks today are a lovely pink.”
“Shall we meet tonight, catch a movie, have dinner? Leaving Las Vegas is on at the Odeon.”
“Not tonight, James. I really need to get on with some work at home. I haven’t touched my report in ages.”
George had muttered something earlier about having found an ideal site in Woolton for the new office.
“Perhaps Wednesday or Thursday.”
“Okay, darling.” He sighed. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
I hadn’t time to worry if I’d hurt him because the phone rang again immediately I put the receiver down.
The Naughtons wished to view a house in Ormskirk; they’d received the details that morning. This time they’d make their own way there, and I arranged to meet them outside the property at two o’clock.
The phone scarcely stopped ringing for the rest of the morning. I ate lunch at ray desk, and remembered my appointment with the Naughtons just in time to avoid being late. Snatching the keys off the wall, I told George I’d probably be gone for hours. “They take for ever, wandering around discussing curtains and stuff.”
“Humour them, Millie, even if it takes all day,” George said affably. He grinned. “I must say you look a picture in that dress.”
I stuck out my tongue at him because I knew he was teasing. Flo’s dress was a pale blue and pink check with a white Peter Pan collar, long sleeves and a wide, stifFbelt.
The material was a mixture of wool and cotton. It fitted perfectly and didn’t look in the least old-fashioned.
Neither did the short pink swagger coat that had been tucked at the back of the wardrobe, though I’d had an awful job pressing out the creases with a damp teatowel.
Even Flo’s narrow, size seven shoes could have been bought with me in mind: the clumpy-heeled cream slingbacks went perfectly with everything.
Until I reached the countryside, I hadn’t noticed how miserable the weather was. Mist hung over the fields, drifting in and out of the dank wet hedges. The sky was a dreary grey with blotches of black.
When I drew up outside the house the Naughtons were waiting in their car. It was a compact detached property on a small but very smart estate that had been built only five years ago.
I got out and shook hands with the rather homely middle-aged couple. Their children had left home and they were looking for something smaller and easier to clean. The trouble was, they were unwilling to give up a single item of furniture and seemed unable to visualise life without their present curtains. “Let’s hope this is it!” I smiled. They were registered with several other agents and had been viewing properties for months. “The vendors are both at work, so we’ll have the place to ourselves.”