Chapter Seven
Now
Kay placed the cardboard box on one of the chairs and stared at its contents, wondering if she should tip the lot out on to the dining room table, or lift the photographs out one by one. They were all different sizes, from tiny snapshots to studio portraits. Some of them looked like stills from the films Lana had been in. Kay decided to get out a few at a time.
For a moment, when she saw exactly how many there were, she wondered whether she should take her mother’s advice and throw them all away without looking at them. After all, what could they mean to her? Two things drew her on. One: her godmother would not have left her these photographs unless she wanted her to look at them; and, two: she was suddenly filled with an overwhelming curiosity.
She put both hands into the box and took hold of a manageable amount. Inevitably their glossy surfaces made them slide about, and, equally inevitably, some of them fell to the floor. Kay put the other photographs on the table and then bent down to pick them up. Looking at the photograph that was uppermost in her hand, she recognised the façade of the Pavilion Theatre. She examined the snapshot more closely, focusing on two girls in stylish drop-waist shift dresses. They were waving at the camera with one hand whilst hanging on to their hats with the other. She had been a small girl when she last saw her godmother, so she wasn’t quite sure whether the taller of the young women was Lana. But the other girl, no matter that it must have been taken more than twenty years ago, was unquestionably her own mother. She hardly needed to turn the photograph over to see the words: ‘Northridge Bay, Summer 1925. My landlady’s daughter, Thelma, and me.’
Kay sank slowly on to the adjacent chair.
Then
‘Is that enough? Can I go now?’ Violet Saunders lowered the camera and looked at Lana hopefully.
‘No, just one more. And, Thelma, please try to smile.’
‘I was smiling.’
‘No, you weren’t. I sneaked a look.’
‘Lana, this breeze is cold and I can hardly hold my hat on. Can’t we go home?’
‘Yes, let’s go home,’ Violet entreated. With no spare flesh on her girlish frame, she had started to shiver. ‘I’m coming out in goose pimples.’
‘I’m not going back to the digs,’ Lana said. ‘Jack wants me to rehearse the new Chinese dance.’ She looked at her watch. ‘I said I’d meet him in the theatre in an hour from now.’
‘An hour!’ Violet began plaintively. ‘What are we supposed to do for a whole hour?’ Her big blue eyes looked as though they were filling with tears, although, in fact, it was the breeze that was making them water.
‘I said I’d treat you to a Sunday special cream tea at Bertorelli’s, didn’t I?’ Lana said.
‘Did you?’ Violet cheered up immediately.
‘I’m not sure if you did, and I don’t think I can,’ Thelma said. ‘I’ll have to go back and help my mother.’
‘Honestly, Thelma, don’t you ever get a day of
f
? You’re a married woman, for goodness’ sake. You must learn to assert yourself.’
‘I would, but you know my mother hasn’t been well lately. Now isn’t the time to upset her.’
‘OK, but let’s have one more snapshot for my album.’
‘Why do you want to keep an album?’ Thelma asked. ‘Most of the photographs you get people to take are very boring.’
‘Thank you very much!’ Violet said.
‘Do you really think they’re boring?’ Lana looked genuinely surprised. ‘But don’t you see, one day when I’m famous, these photographs will be a record of my early years. Someone may even need them when they write a book about me.’
‘Well, if that’s the case.’ Thelma smiled good-naturedly and posed for one last time.
Violet, whose camera it was, didn’t like to remind Lana that they hadn’t actually included her in any of the snapshots, and she rather hoped to be famous herself one day.
Despite Thelma’s protests, they went to Bertorelli’s, where Lana ordered three cream teas. She only picked at her own because, she told them, the Spanish dance she was about to rehearse was pretty strenuous.
A few moments after they had arrived Lana slipped away, quite forgetting to pay. Thelma, distracted because she was worrying about her mother, settled the bill without complaint. Violet looked at the remaining cream puff and decided against it. She tried to remember whether Lana had said a Chinese dance or a Spanish dance – perhaps the chorus would have to learn the same routine.
Jack Lockwood, waiting backstage at the Pavilion, wondered if Lana would have persuaded Thelma and Violet to go for the teas he had given her the money for, and whether she would come to meet him. And if she did, would a plate of dainty sandwiches and a choice of cream cakes for his wife suppress his conscience long enough for him to be able to make love to Lana?
Now
How attractive they look,
Kay thought,
and how happy
. They certainly seemed to have been great friends when this photograph was taken. Kay knew it was an unremarkable snapshot and yet the sense of place was overwhelming. If she closed her eyes she could almost smell the brine and hear the dragging of the waves across the shingle on the beach below, the laughter of children and the music of the merry-go-round in the amusement park.
Kay pushed the photograph to the other side of the table, hoping to find others that were similar. If she did, she might learn more, not just about Lana, but about her mother, too. Her mother, who never talked about the past, might be revealed to her in photographs. At that moment, Kay realised that she didn’t know which of the two, her mother or her godmother, was the most important to her.
She spread the photographs out on the table and scanned them curiously. There were two of Lana posing by herself. One of them showed her gesturing towards one of the playbills at one side of the ornate entrance. The print was too small and the shot too out of focus for Kay to read the names on the playbill, but on the back of the photograph were the words: ‘Lana dreams of being top of the bill!’
The next photograph had the same serrated edges as the others, but it had been taken from the street outside her own house and the people sitting on the garden wall facing the camera were her mother, her father and Lana.
Kay recognised her father immediately. She had loved him so much, she could never forget him. How striking he looked with his dark hair swept back from his handsome face, and how stylish in his white trousers and striped blazer. He was sitting in the middle with an arm around each girl, and all three of them were smiling. Her mother was wearing the same dress she was wearing in the other photograph, but Lana was in wide-legged slacks and a blouse with a spotted pattern. Neither girl wore a hat.
She was just about to turn the snapshot over to see what was written on the back when her attention was caught by something in the bay window in the house behind them. The lace curtain had been pulled aside and a pale, featureless face was staring across the small garden towards the three people sitting on the wall. Kay had the strongest feeling that this person must be her grandmother. Grandma Thomas had died before Kay was born, and her mother had been looking after the guest house ever since. When Kay turned the snapshot over, Lana’s flamboyant handwriting announced: ‘We three plus the spectre at the feast!’
It was probably a joke, Kay thought, and yet there was something mean-spirited about those words. She pushed the snapshot across the table to join the first one and decided to make herself a cup of tea.
Then
‘Thank you, Violet,’ Jack said. ‘Shall I take a shot of you three girls, now?’
‘We haven’t time,’ Lana said, ‘Poor old Mrs Bartlett will be sitting at the piano waiting for us.’ She smiled as she said this, but Violet, who, despite her childlike looks, was keenly observant, sensed her underlying tension.
‘Won’t take a mo,’ Jack said. ‘It’s only right that we should include Violet. After all, it’s her camera. Give it here, Vi. Right. Now, the three of you sit on the wall. No, stand. Lana in the middle. That’s right. Thelma, sweetheart, turn round. I don’t want a shot of the back of your head.’
‘Sorry. It’s just that my mother . . .’
‘That’s better. Smile, please. Lovely! Here’s your camera, Violet. Now then, Lana, make sure you bring your dancing shoes.’
‘Oh, of course.’
Lana hurried into the house and soon came back carrying her dance bag – rather ostentatiously, Violet thought.
While she had been inside, Jack had caught hold of Thelma’s hand and raised it to his lips. ‘I can’t wait until tonight,’ Violet heard him murmur. ‘Best bib and tucker, eh?’
Thelma had smiled distractedly and hurried into the house, barely pausing to acknowledge Lana’s departure. A moment later the lace curtain in the bay window fell into place and Violet could hear Thelma coaxing her mother to go upstairs and rest.
‘Have I missed it?’ The voice was young and breathless.
Violet turned to see Eve, the other lodger at the guest house, hurrying up the street from the direction of the promenade. She was very slightly overweight and was breathing heavily with the effort.
‘Missed what, exactly?’
Eve pulled a face. ‘You know what I mean. Lunch. Have I missed lunch?’
Violet glanced at her watch pointedly. ‘By about an hour. Really, Eve, it’s not good enough treating Thelma like this.’
‘Like what?’
‘Being late for a perfectly scrumptious Sunday dinner. She’s a wonderful cook, although I don’t know how she manages it with everything else she has to do.’
‘I didn’t mean to be late, but the sun was shining and the sea was actually warm enough to paddle in.’
‘You and the other carefree maidens of the chorus line, I suppose.’
‘Don’t tease. Do you think Thelma will have kept something hot for me?’
‘Of course she has, although you don’t deserve it. Come along in and I’ll get it out of the oven while you go and wash your hands.’
‘All right, Mother!’
The two girls smiled fondly at each other and Violet reminded Eve to shake her shoes free of sand before they entered the house.
‘Bye the way,’ Eve said. ‘I saw Jack and Lana hurrying towards the theatre.’
‘Yes, they’ve got a rehearsal with Mrs Bartlett.’
Eve looked puzzled. ‘I thought the old girl said she couldn’t work this Sunday?’
‘Did she? Jack must have persuaded her to change her mind.’
‘Why aren’t you getting ready?’
Thelma looked up at Lana. The Sunday newspaper was spread out before her, but if anyone had asked her what she had been reading, she doubted she would have been able to tell them. She was in two minds about what she should do that night.
‘You’ve finished the rehearsal?’
‘Yes. Jack’s clearing up, but he sent me home to tell you he won’t be long. But don’t change the subject. Why aren’t you getting ready?’
‘It’s no use, Lana, I can’t go,’ Thelma said.
‘Why not? I’m perfectly capable of looking after your mother for one evening, you know.’
‘I know that, and I’m grateful for your offer, but if she wakes up she’ll expect me to be there.’
‘She won’t wake up if you give her the sleeping draught before you go.’
‘I don’t like to do that.’
‘Why not?’ Lana was beginning to sound exasperated.
‘Because it seems dishonest, somehow, to give my mother a sleeping draught so that I can have an evening out.’
‘Why did Dr Davidson prescribe the draught in the first place?’
‘He said my mother needed the sleep.’
‘There you are then.’
Thelma smiled tiredly. ‘You’re very persuasive, Lana.’
‘Listen to me, Thelma, my sweet.’ Lana pulled a chair out and sat down facing her. ‘You work from dawn to dusk looking after your lodgers, and now you have to take care of your sick mother, as well. You deserve an evening out, and I happen to know Jack has reserved a table at the Grand. He’ll be so disappointed if you let him down.’
‘Do you think so?’
‘He’s your husband. You shouldn’t have to ask me that.’
‘No, I shouldn’t, should I? It’s just that we don’t seem to have time for each other lately. I’m busy here and Jack seems to be always at the theatre.’
‘I hope you’re not criticising him. The show at the Pavilion is better than it’s ever been in the past, and it’s all because Jack works so damned hard – working out new routines, cracking the whip with the less talented so that they can put on a halfway decent show, and encouraging those who have talent to become true stars.’
‘Those who have talent? You mean yourself, don’t you?’
Lana looked surprised, and then wary. ‘Yes, I do. Is that conceited of me?’
Thelma shook her head and laughed. ‘Conceited? You?’
Lana frowned and began to get up. ‘Well, if you’re going to be mean to me . . .’
Thelma reached across the table and took Lana’s hand. ‘Don’t go. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I would never have spoken like that if I hadn’t been so weary. Of course, you’re the only one of the players who has the talent to be a real star, and who can blame Jack for wanting to encourage you? Forgive me?’
Lana stared at Thelma crossly for a moment and then she relaxed and smiled. ‘Only if you go upstairs this very minute and start getting ready. And hurry up in the bathroom so that Jack can have all the time he needs.’
Thelma looked at Lana oddly for a moment and then rose and folded the newspaper. ‘All right. I’ll go.’
Lana smiled. ‘I’ve put the dress on your bed.’
‘Which dress?’
‘The black beaded silk. It will look fabulous with the little silver jacket.’
‘Those are your clothes.’
‘I wouldn’t have been able to buy them if you hadn’t lent me the money.’
‘That’s true. But you’re taller than I am.’
‘Don’t quibble. It will look just as good mid-calf on you as it does just brushing my knees. Now, off you go!’
‘All right. Just one thing: my mother might like a boiled egg for her supper.’
‘For God’s sake, Thelma. It might be hard for you to believe this, but I can actually boil an egg!’
‘Violet and Eve have had a meal, but if they want any supper there’s some cooked ham in the larder for sandwiches. For you too, of course.’