The Girl From Seaforth Sands (29 page)

‘Well, it was a gamble that paid off,’ Minnie observed, chosing a bun covered in virulent pink icing. ‘The rose garden is really beautiful, the scent of those big, dark-red ones made me feel as drunk as the bees. And the palace is most impressive, from the outside, that is. Our tickets allow us to go inside, only it’s such a glorious day . . . but I suppose we ought, don’t you think?’

‘I think we oughter have another go at the maze,’ Ruth observed, taking a bite out of her own bun. ‘We very nearly got to the centre last time, you know, and I’d rather do that than go inside a palace, no matter how impressive.’

‘It’s too hot,’ Amy moaned. She picked up her straw hat which she had laid down beside her on the grass and fanned her face vigorously with it. ‘Only fancy if the weather is like this tomorrow! But at least we
shan’t spend the night huddled under our umbrellas. That wouldn’t have been much fun, would it?’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Ella remarked, finishing her bun and rolling on to her back once more. ‘It seems to me we have fun whatever we do, us four. Don’t you agree, girls?’

It was true, Amy thought, remembering life in their large but crowded room in Huskisson Street. Having spent the first years of her life in a male-dominated household where women were expected to do all the jobs, save for such things as the bringing in of fuel and water, she appreciated more than the others how good it was to share household and domestic chores. Everyone did their own washing and ironing – sometimes the lines of washing crisscrossing the yard seemed to belong solely to the girls in the large front room – and took turns at practically everything else. Shopping and cooking were arranged on a rota basis, but it was a free and easy rota. If you were down to cook the Sunday roast and wanted to go out with a young man, or visit a relative on that particular day, you simply swapped with someone who was not so engaged. If doing the messages meant a visit to the dairy and another of your room-mates was going in that direction, then a simple request would be enough.

‘If we’re going to try and solve the puzzle of the maze again, then we really should be moving,’ Minnie observed, standing up and beginning to dust crumbs off her long grey skirt. With varying degrees of reluctance the others joined her and, passing a bench where trippers had been picnicking, Amy spotted a copy of the
Evening Standard
and pounced on it.

‘A free paper! And it’s last night’s, too,’ she announced. She began to flick idly through the pages as they made their way towards the maze and presently, her eyes caught by the word Liverpool, she stopped short, a hand flying to her mouth. ‘Hang on a minute, girls. You’ll never guess what it says here! There’s been trouble at the docks, a strike or some such thing, because they wanted a ten bob a month rise and the bosses turned it down. Good lord, aren’t we the lucky ones? There’s bound to be more fuss and we’re out of it. It says here that there’s been unrest in the streets, whatever that may mean.’

‘Ooh, perhaps they’ll stop the trams running, then I shan’t have to go and tell me family all about the coronation,’ Ruth said, grinning at Amy. ‘Mind you, I’d walk to Seaforth sooner than miss telling Mam and the kids all about London and the King and Queen and everything. What’s more, there’s the souvenirs. The kids will be that eager to get their hands on what I’ve bought them, they’d probably walk into the city centre theirselves.’

‘Good thing they aren’t striking in London, that’s what I say,’ Ella remarked, as they stopped outside the maze. ‘Still, as you say, it will all be over by the time we get back. Now, shall we tackle the maze separately or in pairs?’

It was still fine that evening when the girls made camp on the pavement along the procession route. They were by no means the only people so disposing themselves and, by the time they began to eat their sandwiches and drink tea from the bottles with which they had provided themselves, they were already on friendly terms with the people camping on either side of them. Both parties were Londoners,
large family groups with what seemed, at first, like a dozen children apiece, all of whom raced up and down the road carrying news and gossip from one group to another, and being rewarded with sweets and fruit.

‘This’ll be the fourth night this century as I’ve spent on the pavement,’ the mother of the family on their left informed Amy. ‘Fust there were Queen Victoria’s funeral, then King Eddie’s crowning, then poor old Eddie’s funeral and now young George’s coronation.’

Amy would not have described King George as young, but she was intrigued to learn that her new friend – Mrs Potter – was such a connoisseur of royal events. As the night drew on, she encouraged Mrs Potter to talk about her previous experience of royal processions and was very moved to hear how, at King Edward’s funeral, his charger was led behind the coffin with King Edward’s riding boots reversed in the stirrups, and all the girls wept over the fate of the King’s little dog, Caesar, who followed the coffin, searching constantly for his master.

‘He were only a little mongrel,’ Mrs Potter informed them, ‘but on his collar it said “Caesar: I belong to the King”. Oh aye, there’s no doubt Teddy adored that dog; Caesar went with him everywhere – he’ll be lost wi’out Teddy, poor little chap.’

It was after midnight before the excited, chattering crowd began to settle. Amy wrapped herself in her blanket and, using her bag as a pillow, managed to snatch a few hours’ sleep. She guessed that the other girls had done the same, but woke slowly and grudgingly as a grey dawn crept across the sky, with a nasty taste in her mouth and her elbows and hips as stiff as boards. She sat, knuckling her eyes and
looking around her. Presently someone further up the line lit a primus stove and boiled a kettle of hot water. She served her companions first, then came along the pavement edge, offering hot water to anyone who, as she put it, was ‘dyin’ to wet their whistle’. The girls eagerly proffered their enamel mugs and made themselves milkless tea, which greatly refreshed them and, as Ella put it, ‘woke them up with a vengeance’.

Behind the pavement on which the girls had camped lay a park and on the previous evening they had noticed a drinking fountain on a small circle of gravel. Accordingly they went to it in pairs and had as good a wash as was possible in a public place. They combed their hair, pinned on their hats, shook out their jackets and brushed down their skirts, then made their way back to their camping site where they ate bread and margarine and apples for an early breakfast.

They recognised several of the women camping on the opposite pavement as members of the suffragette movement whom they had seen in the Albert Hall, and exchanged waves and smiles, but it really did look as though they were the only Liverpudlians, in this part of the crowd at any rate.

As soon as it was light enough, various entertainers began to stroll along the sides of the road. There were men with mouth organs, concertinas and penny whistles; there were tumblers who performed amazing acts, climbing upon each other’s shoulders to form a huge pyramid, tightrope walkers who brought their stand and rope with them and danced as merrily along it, six feet above the roadway, as though they were performing on a stage. They got a great reception from the waiting crowds and were
doing quite well when the police began to clear the roadway – obviously something was about to happen.

‘We’ve got an excellent place here. We shan’t miss much,’ Ella remarked to Amy, as the first of the carriages containing the dignitaries began to arrive. The upper ten thousand, as Amy remembered Isobel calling them, would take their places in Westminster Abbey long before the royals arrived and Amy wondered what would happen should one of them wish to use the privy. There were public lavatories in the park and the girls had made use of them in the early hours, realising how crowded they would become later. But a lord or a lady, dressed in heavy ermine-trimmed robes of state, would be in no position to make a dash for the outside world, no matter how urgent his or her need.

By the time the young princes had driven past Amy felt quite hoarse from cheering, but when the King and Queen arrived, in an open carriage drawn by six cream-coloured ponies, she managed yet another cheer and waved her little Union Jack with as much enthusiasm as, five days earlier, she had waved her ‘Votes for Women’ banner.

‘Oh, ain’t I glad we came,’ Ruthie said rapturously when the last of the colourful companies of soldiers had marched past. ‘I won’t ever forget today, our Amy. Are we goin’ to wait until they come out? Only if we’re goin’ to catch our train . . .’

‘I think we ought to be getting back to our lodgings,’ Amy said regretfully. ‘Judging by the newspaper report, we may find Liverpool in a bit of a state when we reach Lime Street, even though the strike will probably be over by now. What’s more, I could do with a proper wash and a good meal. What do you say, Ella, Minnie?’

The girls all agreed that they had best begin to think about their journey home and turned, rather regretfully, back towards the environs of Euston Station.

The station was crowded, as they had guessed it would be, but not, Amy thought, as crowded as it would probably become later in the day, when the procession had returned to Buckingham Palace, shouted and cheered every foot of the way. She and her friends settled down with their baggage on one of the green wooden seats provided by the railway company, but as soon as their train came in they made a dash for it, hoping this time to be able to sit together.

They found a carriage in which two young men were piling their cases on to the luggage rack and settled themselves in a row. The young men finished with their luggage and one of them turned courteously towards them and offered to help them heave their belongings on to the string rack above their heads. For a moment Amy stared at the young man, wondering where she had previously seen him. But before she could say a word he suddenly beamed at her and, seizing her hand, shook it vigorously. ‘It’s Amy Logan, by all that’s wonderful! Well, I’m darned, I’ve not seen you since you were a scrubby little kid with your skirts hiked up to your knees, helping to haul a fish ashore on Seaforth Sands. Don’t you remember me? I’m sure you’ve changed a great deal more than I have.’

‘Philip!’ Amy said, considerably astonished. She thought he had changed greatly, despite his words. He was wearing a boater tilted at a rakish angle, which he raised momentarily to reveal his light-brown hair, and he had a moustache which, in Amy’s view, completely changed his appearance, making him look years older.

‘Yes, it’s me,’ Philip agreed, grinning. ‘My goodness, Amy, how you’ve grown! You’re quite the young lady – but what in heaven’s name are you doing in London? Don’t say you’ve left home?’

‘Yes, I have left home,’ Amy admitted, ‘but I don’t live in London, we just came up for . . . for the coronation, me and my pals here.’ She indicated her friends with a wave of her hand. ‘Come to that, what are you doing in London yourself, Philip? Or do fellers watch coronations as well as girls? And what are you doing on this train? You live in Manchester, near where my sister Mary used to work; she said so in her letters. Oh, I suppose you’re getting off at Crewe and catching another train, is that it?’

Philip laughed. ‘You aren’t the only one who can leave home,’ he observed, sitting down opposite Amy and leaning forward. ‘I’ve been living and working in Liverpool for almost a year now. My father’s firm has its head office in Manchester, I know, but two years ago we decided to expand and started up a branch in Liverpool. You could say I was in charge of it.’ He suddenly struck his forehead, looking abashed. ‘But whatever am I thinking of? Amy, this is Mr Maynard, one of my colleagues and a very good friend. Dick, this is Amy Logan, the sister of my pal Albert. Not that I’ve seen either of them for years. After my grandfather died the family sold the house in Seaforth, which meant Laura and I didn’t visit there any more. A pity, because I loved the place, but life’s like that.’

‘I should have introduced you to my friends,’ Amy said, conscience-stricken. ‘This is Miss Morton, sitting next to me, Miss Miniver on her other side and Miss Durrant in the corner. Girls, this is Mr Philip Grimshaw and Mr Maynard.’

The girls murmured polite greetings just as the train jerked violently, causing Ella, who was sitting on the edge of her seat, to fall forward, landing almost in Philip’s lap. This broke the ice in a way which nothing else could have done and presently the six of them were chattering away as if they had known one another all their lives. Amy took advantage of the situation and leaned forward to tap Philip on the knee. ‘Philip, do you see much of our Mary? She’s done well for herself and risen in the world. She used to work for a family who lived near your parents so I dare say you saw her now and again, but she’s working in a departmental store on Deansgate now. She’s in ladies’ hats and doing ever so well, only she hardly ever comes home and we’ve never met her young man.’

‘I do remember seeing Mary two or three years back,’ Philip said slowly, after giving the matter some thought. ‘Yes, now you mention it I did see her with a young man more recently. Well, not young exactly. In his mid-twenties I would say, but then she may have had several young men since then.’

‘No, I think she’s been going steady with Roderick ever since she moved to Manchester,’ Amy said. ‘He’s in a bank and doing most awfully well, Mary says. She often mentions him in her letters but, reading between the lines, I don’t think they mean to marry until they’re in a really good financial position.’

‘Marry? But she can’t be more than twenty-two
or three?’ Philip asked. ‘They’ll want to be able to afford a decent place of their own and also be able to do without Mary’s wages before they wed. At least,’ he added hastily, ‘I imagine they will, because once they’re married and the little ones come along . . .’

Amy giggled. It seemed strange to think of Mary marrying some unknown young man, let alone having children. Without fully understanding why, she realised that Mary had never talked about a home and children, only about marriage. Her sister was ambitious and the young man with whom she was going steady had his whole mind fixed on advancement. Perhaps, she thought now, they would never marry but would continue to keep company for years, until each attained the height of their ambition.