‘Mam, are you listening? Me an’ Gwen’s goin’ job hunting. Ain’t you goin’ to wish us luck?’
‘Sorry, queen, I wasn’t really attending,’ Jess said apologetically. ‘But I can’t see any shopkeeper employing a couple of twelve-year-olds, not even on a temporary basis. There’s an awful lot of unemployment in Liverpool right now – the Depression isn’t over yet, even though things are looking up. But before you go off job hunting, you will do the washing up and clear away the crocks, won’t you? No need to do anything for Pennymore and Barker; if they’re hungry they’ll make themselves something. But they may go straight to bed; I always do when I’m on nights. Oh, and peel a pan of spuds for supper, would you? And I’ve left you a list of messages, and the housekeeping purse, on the kitchen table. All right?’ Jess gave a rueful laugh and pushed a strand of hair behind her ear. ‘If you
do
get a job, heaven knows how we’ll manage, because you work so hard for me. You get all me messages as well as seeing that the lodgers are fed when I’m not here. Still an’ all, we’ll tackle that problem if it arises. And in the meantime, I know you’ll do everything I asked you like the good girl you are.’
Debbie yawned again, then nodded so vigorously that her mop of hair bounced. ‘All right, Mam,’ she agreed. ‘I’ll get the meal. What’s it to be, anyroad?’
‘Lamb chops if you can get ’em, and spuds, carrots and peas,’ Jess said rapidly. ‘And a marmalade roll for pudding; I cooked it after I got in last night, but you’ll have to warm it through. Okay?’
‘Yeah, fine,’ Debbie said. She licked her lips. ‘I just love marmalade roll. I wish I could get a job in one of the big posh restaurants, waiting on. Then they’d have to feed me and I’d have marmalade roll every day . . . twice a day!’
Jess laughed, and turned back to the kitchen. Sister Thomas was a tartar; she did not simply take it out on you if you were late, she took it out on the patients too, slamming around, insisting that truly sick patients were dragged from their beds and made to walk through to the ablutions, refusing to fetch bedpans unless the old ladies were desperate. ‘Got to run,’ she shouted over her shoulder. ‘It’s Sister Thomas today, so . . .’
‘So you’re going to ask for a transfer . . . I don’t think,’ Debbie shouted, tauntingly, after her. ‘You may hate Sister Thomas, but you love your old ladies, even when they’re gaga. See you later, Mam!’
An hour later, Debbie and her best friend, Gwen Soames, were walking up the Scotland Road, their arms round each other’s waists, gazing hopefully into every shop window that they passed. Cash, as usual, was short, and neither Mrs Ryan nor Mrs Soames was in a position to hand out money to her offspring. Gwen’s mother had been widowed four years ago, when her husband, a seaman, had been killed in a drunken brawl, and since Gwen had three younger sisters and two brothers Mrs Soames was, if anything, worse off than the Ryans. The girls were of an age to yearn for pretty clothes, hair ribbons, a trip to the cinema and similar things, all of which had to be paid for, and their growing sense of independence made them long for a wage packet of their own, however small.
In the past, Debbie and Gwen had been happy enough to earn a few pennies running messages for neighbours, or keeping an eye on younger children, but such small tasks no longer satisfied them. It was boring work for a start, and badly paid, when they considered what they might earn as relief workers during the summer holiday, so they had determined to spend as long as it took in the search for decently paid work.
Suddenly Gwen slipped her arm out of her friend’s and pointed at a small card in a window. ‘Look! That’ll be a job, I bet!’
It was a job – a sales assistant was needed – and after some giggling and pushing the two girls went in together. They came out very promptly, however, the proprietress having looked them up and down scathingly before saying that she was already suited and had meant to remove the card earlier that day.
‘Lying old biddy,’ Gwen said scornfully, as soon as the shop door clanged shut behind them. ‘Why didn’t she just say we was too young? Still, at least we tried.’
‘And I don’t think she was a lying old biddy, because she did say she wanted someone full time,’ Debbie said, a trifle reproachfully. ‘I were listening to Pennymore and Barker talking a couple of nights ago . . . you know, about this here war they keep saying is going to come, and they said there will be well-paid jobs at some of the big factories, making uniforms and guns and that. They said that girls in them factories earn more than shop girls and that means that shop girls will be applying for jobs in factories. It’s no use us doing that because we’re too young, but it made me think someone might be glad to employ us in a shop during the summer holidays. But there isn’t going to be a war, is there? It’s too soon after the last lot, my mam says. But if there really is a war, she doesn’t want me to go nursing, like she did, so I might as well get some experience of shop work if I can.’
‘Well, I dunno,’ Gwen said doubtfully, and Debbie realised that her friend had been somewhat shaken by the proprietress’s instant dismissal. ‘I don’t reckon they’ll give us work in a posh gown shop like that one, even if they’re desperate. Women working in shops like that have their hair permed and they wear smart black dresses and high-heeled pumps.’
‘There’s deliveries,’ Gwen said hopefully. ‘Shops will pay girls to deliver dresses ’n’ that because girls aren’t so careless as boys. As for your mam worrying about who’ll get the messages, that’s one good thing about living in Ogden’s. There’s dozens of kids what’ll carry any amount of stuff for a penny or two.’
Debbie nodded abstractedly. She knew that the flower streets close to her own Wykeham Street were known as Ogden’s because of the number of people who worked at Ogden’s tobacco factory who lived there, but she didn’t comment because just then they were passing the Dining Rooms frequented by a good many office workers and she was remembering her conversation with her mother that morning. ‘There’s no sign in the window but there’s no harm in trying,’ she said to her friend.
Jess was bustling back and forth, doing the bedpan round which, on the geriatric ward, sometimes seemed to go on all day and most of the night. She and Nurse Wardle swished curtains back and forth, stood either side of the beds to assist the occupants to get on and off the big bedpans, then shoved the used utensils on to the trolley and wheeled it to the next cubicle. It was tiring work, for though some of the old ladies were feather light others were very heavy indeed and it took the combined strength of both nurses to move them up and down the beds. What was more, the doctor would be doing his rounds in ten minutes and heaven help the patient who wanted a bedpan when a doctor was on the ward!
Accordingly, Jess and Wardle hurried round the ward, and then Jess left Wardle emptying bedpans in the sluice whilst she returned to tidy the patients. Sister Thomas was prowling up and down the aisle, much like a sergeant on parade. Two little probationers, both of whom were terrified of the sister, scuttled back and forth, doing her bidding. They took old Mrs Brown’s knitting away and pushed it into her bedside locker. They folded another patient’s newspaper and popped it into her bedside drawer, tidied away glasses and jugs and made sure that, even beneath the beds, there was not so much as a speck of dust on display. Sister Thomas swept regally down to the door, then stopped short, her head swivelling sharply to the left. She stared accusingly at the patient in the nearest bed and Miss McTaggart, a retired head teacher, stared equally accusingly back. ‘Yes, Sister?’ she asked. ‘Is anything wrong?’
Sister pointed a trembling finger at Miss McTaggart’s bed. There was a neat pile of papers upon the coverlet and Miss McTaggart, pen in hand, was writing on the topmost. ‘What is that?’ Sister Thomas enquired, her voice trembling with annoyance. ‘All beds should be completely cleared for Doctor’s rounds.’ She marched across the small intervening space and seized the papers just as Miss McTaggart also grabbed them. ‘I shall confiscate these,’ she said grimly, ‘until Doctor has left. And you should think yourself lucky that I don’t throw them in the nearest rubbish bin.’
She tugged impatiently, but Miss McTaggart hung on, her thin old cheeks reddening. ‘Kindly take your hands off my papers, Sister,’ she said, with only the tiniest quaver in her voice. ‘I am employed to mark examination papers and these are my most recent batch. I’m afraid no one may look at them . . . and that includes you. However, if you’d like to place them in my locker, then I’ll not work on them whilst the doctor is present. But I cannot allow you to—’
Sister tugged; Miss McTaggart tugged. And then, with astonishing suddenness, the sister released her hold on the papers and before anyone could stop her she had slapped Miss McTaggart so hard across the face that the old woman nearly fell out of bed. Even so, she retained her grasp on the examination papers, though her hands were trembling so violently that the papers shook like leaves in a gale.
Naturally, the whole ward had been riveted by the drama, and now Jess acted without a second thought. Sister was reaching out to snatch the papers with her left hand, her right hand coming up as though she intended to strike the old woman again. Jess seized the upraised arm and twisted it up behind Sister’s back in a half nelson, causing the older woman to give a muffled shriek and release her hold on the papers, which fluttered to the floor. Jess jerked her head at the nearest probationer. ‘Pick up those examination papers – don’t look at them – and return them to Miss McTaggart, please,’ she said authoritatively. ‘If the patient gives her permission, then you may put them in her locker until the doctor’s round is over.’ She released Sister and turned to Miss McTaggart. ‘I’m so sorry that you should have been – er – reprimanded for doing your duty,’ she said gently. ‘I’m sure Sister acted in the heat of the moment and will be happy to apologise . . .’
But by now, Sister Thomas had regained her equilibrium. She tossed her head and gave Jess a glance so full of malevolence that Jess flinched back, half expecting the older woman to strike her as she had struck Miss McTaggart. However, the sister merely addressed her through thinning lips.
‘Go to my office, Ryan,’ she said. ‘I’ll deal with you there.’
As Jess moved along the central aisle, she saw that every face she passed was smiling and thought that her treatment of the sister was being greeted with approval. Most of the patients on the ward were long term and all had suffered both from Sister’s rough handling and from her bitter tongue. Seeing the hated despot brought low, if only for a moment, must have given them a good deal of pleasure, and as she got nearer to the end of the ward Jess could hear the comments: ‘Well done, queen! You showed her, nurse . . . you’re a good gal, you are . . . why didn’t you break her arm while you were about it?’ – this last from a patient who had suffered continually from Sister Thomas’s spite since she was very overweight and was thus a butt for the sister’s nastier remarks. As she pushed through the swing doors, Jess saw the doctor and his team approaching along the corridor. She hesitated, wondering whether she should tell them of the fracas which had just taken place, but it was too like tale-clatting, so she merely smiled politely and continued on her way. After all, she had seen the scarlet weals on Miss McTaggart’s cheek and no doubt the doctors would notice them too. Indeed, she hoped they would, because it would serve Sister right after the way she had treated the patient, Jess thought grimly as she pushed open the office door. And what could Sister Thomas do to her, after all? She could scarcely complain of the way she had been treated without revealing the reason for her nurse’s action.
So Jess picked up a copy of a nursing paper and began to read.
Debbie approached the flat triumphantly, having struggled round the markets and done all her mother’s messages after finishing work. It was not the glamorous job for which she had hoped, but she had been taken on as a washer-upper and general dogsbody for a large Dining Rooms on the Scotland Road to start that very day, though she had been allowed to leave early after explaining to the manager that she had messages to run for her mother and must be home in time to cook a meal for their lodgers.
‘But you said you’d be willing to work eight till eight,’ her employer had pointed out. ‘I can do wi’out a gal what skives off every time she fancies a break.’ He was a weaselly little man with thinning hair carefully arranged over a pointed, pink head, a tiny toothbrush moustache and eyes which darted about even while he was speaking to you. Debbie had explained again that this would not happen once her mother knew about her job and he had appeared to accept her assurance, though he had not admitted it. ‘We’ll see how you shape,’ he had said grudgingly, as she had taken off the enormous overall in which she had been swathed and reached her coat down from the pegs which decorated the office wall. ‘And don’t you be late in the mornin’ or you’ll find yourself out on the street, pronto. This place is busy from the moment we open until well after closing time, and we don’t suffer lazy layabouts – can’t afford to, ’cos their work gets purron the rest of the staff.’
Debbie had murmured that she would be in on time, though she was beginning to wonder whether she had done the right thing in taking the job. For hour after hour she had stood before the great stone sink, cleaning the debris off hundreds of greasy dinner plates, knives, forks and spoons. When the water had grown cold – and thick with bits – she pulled the plug, cleaned the sink and filled it afresh with water from the big brass tap which was fed by a temperamental gas geyser on the draining board. Then she had added soda and begun all over again. Another girl, Polly, was supposed to scrape the remaining food off the plates before piling them up on the left-hand draining board, but she was careless, not bothering to check the underneath of the plates, so that Debbie had often found herself washing up in water that resembled vegetable soup. Now and then, she had taken a tea towel from the rack above their heads and dried huge quantities of dishes, cups, saucers and cutlery, though this was really Polly’s job. But the other girl was slow, and it had been easier to do it herself rather than allow the dishes to pile up.