The Price of Love (34 page)

‘The contract you managed to get was more or less due to a stroke of luck because you happened to meet that chap on the quayside,’ Lucy said thoughtfully. ‘How are other companies supposed to contact you if their car or lorry breaks down?’

‘What do you mean?’ Robert frowned. ‘They’ll bring them in to the workshop when they need attention. If the vehicle isn’t driveable, then they’ll send someone round to tell us.’

‘Wouldn’t it be better if they could reach you by telephone, though? I know there’re not many ordinary people who have a telephone in their own home yet but most businesses do.’

‘Of course it would be an asset to have a phone but having that installed is going to cost us more money, isn’t it, and we can’t afford to do that yet,’ Robert pointed out.

‘I think you should,’ Lucy insisted. ‘It might mean us economising a bit more than we’re doing now for a few more months but in the long run it will pay off.’

‘I have a few pounds saved up towards when Sam and I get married. We don’t need it at the moment so you could use that,’ Brenda suggested.

‘Are you sure? I’ll make sure you get every penny of it back when the business starts to pay,’ Robert promised.

Over the next couple of months Merseyside Mechanics were so busy that Robert was even talking of taking on an apprentice to help out in the workshop.

‘I’m so busy helping Sam that I haven’t time to catch up with the paperwork and I’m even getting behind with ordering spare parts and supplies,’ he grumbled.

‘The answer to that is quite simple,’ Lucy told him. ‘Let me handle that side of the business for you.’

‘How can you do that when you have Anna to look after?’ Robert demanded.

‘Easily. You keep all the ledgers here at home and then in future bring me the invoices each night and I’ll enter them all up and you can stop worrying about them.’

‘It all sounds fine but if the accounts are all here, then I will find myself going through them in the evenings when I get home,’ Robert protested.

‘If I catch you doing that, then I shall hide them away so that you can’t find them.’

‘No,’ Robert shook his head, ‘it wouldn’t work. I need to keep them where I can refer to them any time I need to do so.’

‘All right. In that case, then, I’ll come down to the office once or twice a week and collect up the new invoices and the relevant ledgers and bring them back here. After I’ve entered them up you can bring them all back down here again the next day. When I call in I can also make sure that you have remembered to do all the ordering.’

‘I’ve already said that I think it will be too much for you to take all that on as well as running the house and looking after Anna,’ Robert protested.

‘I can make coming down to collect them part of our afternoon walk,’ Lucy told him. ‘It will make a nice outing for Anna instead of going to the park. Usually we time our walk so that on the way back we are near the school when all the children are coming out, to get her used to the idea of going to school, and we can still do that.’

‘School! I know she’s growing up, but surely we don’t have to think about school, not yet.’

‘All the work entailed in starting up this business has occupied your mind for so long that I don’t think you’ve noticed how the time flies by.’ Lucy smiled. ‘Only a couple of years to go and she will be starting school and then I’ll be able to devote a lot more time to helping you. There won’t be any need to bring the books back here. I can come and work in the office and answer the phone at the same time which will make things easier for you and Sam.’

‘Come here.’ Robert pulled her into his arms and kissed her tenderly. ‘What on earth would I do without you?’ he asked, stroking her hair and looking deep into her eyes. ‘Don’t you think it’s time to set the date for our wedding?’ he asked softly.

Lucy raised her face to his. ‘Yes, I most certainly do.’ She smiled.

‘I suppose, if we’re sensible, we ought to wait until this miners’ strike is over but heaven alone knows how long it is going to last.’

‘Perhaps we should live for today,’ Lucy murmured as their lips met again in a long sweet kiss that left her slightly breathless and her heart pounding with excitement at the thought of what lay ahead.

‘I suppose we ought to ask Sam and Brenda what date they have in mind,’ Lucy said as they finally drew apart. ‘Not a word in front of Anna, though, at this stage, she is excited enough as it is about Brenda and Fluffy living with us.’

‘We’ll discuss it later tonight after Anna is tucked up in bed,’ Robert suggested.

Brenda and Sam both looked at each other and then burst out laughing when Lucy mentioned the subject after their evening meal that night.

‘We were on the point of suggesting the same thing to you,’ Brenda told her. ‘We’d like it to be as soon as possible because I’m expecting a baby.’

‘You’re what!’ they both stared at her in surprise.

‘Oh, Brenda, that is wonderful news!’ Lucy exclaimed as she hugged her. ‘I know you’ve put on a bit of weight lately but I thought it was my good cooking,’ she teased.

‘Well, that hasn’t helped me to keep my figure, of course, but I am four months’ pregnant,’ Brenda said, smiling.

‘Now that the business seems to be safely established we were thinking that perhaps some time in late autumn would be possible,’ Robert told them.

‘I think that Sam and Brenda will want to get married much sooner than that,’ Lucy pointed out.

‘You’re right. It’s June now, so by then I’ll be on the point of having the baby.’

‘In that case, then, we ought to fix a date as soon as possible. Are we still going to let Anna be our flower girl?’

‘I’m not sure. Do they have a flower girl when the wedding is at a registry office?’ Brenda asked.

‘I’m not certain either, but if they don’t, then they’ll have to make an exception for us,’ Lucy told her.

‘She’d never forgive us if we didn’t include her in the celebrations in some way,’ Robert agreed.

‘Why don’t we try and make it some time next month? It will have to be on a Saturday, so what about the twenty-fourth of July? That will be a week before Anna’s birthday. Are we all quite happy with that date?’ Lucy asked looking at them in turn.

‘I will be, if I can persuade my boss to let me have the day off,’ Sam joked. ‘You do know it will mean closing for the day,’ he went on in a more serious voice.

‘Don’t worry, we’ll only be shut for one morning and we’ll give all of our customers plenty of notice.’ Robert grinned. ‘We probably won’t be able to stop talking about it.’

Once the date had been confirmed at the registry office their lives became even more hectic as they made their plans. Lucy and Brenda had the responsibility of making sure they all had the right clothes for the occasion even though they were well aware that they had to work to a fairly strict budget.

‘I’ve booked us all into Lewis’s restaurant for a celebratory meal afterwards,’ Robert told them.

When Lucy protested saying that it wasn’t necessary because she could do them a good spread at home at a quarter of the price he refused to listen.

‘That’s out of the question. Surely I don’t have to remind you that it’s a special day for you as well as for the rest of us, do I?’

Anna could hardly contain her excitement. She wanted to be involved in everything that was being planned. Lucy and Brenda promised to take her to Lewis’s to choose a new dress.

Anna took this very seriously indeed and even the assistant smiled indulgently as the little girl tried on dress after dress and pirouetted in front of the big mirror in each one of them before agreeing with Lucy on the one most suitable. It was in white georgette trimmed with bands of pale pink, green and turquoise.

Lucy and Brenda also bought new dresses for the occasion but they chose ones which, although they were in crêpe de Chine, they would be able to wear again on Sundays or special occasions.

Lucy’s dress was in a very pretty shade of blue that went well with her dark hair and Brenda chose one in the palest of green because of her red hair.

Lucy’s had a plain bodice with a scooped neckline and a dropped waistline and the skirt, which had flared panels of slightly darker turquoise inserted into it, ended just below the knee.

Brenda’s dress was loose and flowing and had the new handkerchief-style skirt that was rapidly gaining popularity.

Both of them decided to have fairly large hats with dipping brims and for Anna they chose a pretty bonnet-style white straw hat trimmed with artificial flowers.

Lucy was well aware that both men needed new suits for such an occasion. The ones they had were old and shiny but the cost was more than they could afford at the moment. She suggested to Robert that perhaps for once they could use a tallyman but he was very much against such an idea.

‘If I left it to you, then you’d probably turn up in your greasy overalls,’ she said crossly.

‘No, I know it’s an important day for you, for all of us, if it comes to that, but no tallyman. Once you get into their clutches you have months of them knocking on your door for their money and when you’ve finished paying your cheque then they pester you to take out another one. I’d sooner wear the suit I’ve got than deal with them. Give it a sponging and a good press and it will look like new.’

Lucy didn’t argue because she knew he was talking good sense but it worried her so much that in the end she decided they ought to hire suits for the two men. Brenda backed her up wholeheartedly.

‘I think that is a very good idea,’ she enthused. ‘I don’t want to spend a lot of money at the moment because I am going to need it for things for the baby,’ she confided.

Persuading Robert and Sam to hire suits wasn’t easy. In the end it was agreed that instead of doing that the two men would buy new suits from the Fifty Shilling Tailors and pay the money off each week.

‘I don’t really like having to do that,’ Robert grumbled, ‘but it’s better than going to a tallyman.’

Saturday 24 July was a beautiful sunny day. Anna was awake very early dancing around the house and singing ‘Today’s our wedding day’ at the top of her voice.

The ceremony was due to take place at eleven-thirty. One of their customers had insisted that he would be taking them in his car so Lucy made sure that they were all ready in good time.

All four of them were slightly nervous and Sam even muttered aloud, ‘I’ll be glad when all this fuss is over,’ as Brenda fixed his tie and fastened the cufflinks of his new white shirt.

Anna was too excited to be nervous and both Lucy and Brenda had impressed on her what she had to do when they were in the registry office. Their bouquets of pale pink rosebuds surrounded by greenery and tiny white flowers were small enough for Anna to be able to hold them both without any trouble.

Liverpool was sparkling in the summer sunshine as they drove to the registry office and to their immense surprise there was a small crowd of Merseyside Mechanics’ customers standing outside waiting to greet them.

‘Good thing there is,’ Robert muttered. ‘I didn’t want to worry any of you but we completely forgot to ask anybody to be witnesses. I’m sure we can find a couple of volunteers from this lot,’ he added with a smile of relief.

The civil ceremony went as smoothly as if they’d rehearsed it for weeks. As they emerged into the sunshine they were greeted by a shower of confetti and even one or two people taking their pictures with their Brownie Box cameras.

‘It makes me feel like a film star,’ Lucy whispered in Robert’s ear.

Their meal in the beautiful restaurant over Lewis’s department store was equally memorable. They toasted each other in sparkling champagne and enjoyed every morsel of the delicious food that was put in front of them.

It was all so lavish that Lucy was slightly concerned about what the bill was going to be when Robert asked for it. The waiter merely smiled and shook his head.

‘That has already been taken care of, sir. Is there anything else that you would like to finish off your meal?’

‘What do you mean by taken care of?’ Robert asked, frowning.

‘The gentleman sitting over there in the corner has already settled your bill,’ the waiter explained, nodding with his head to the far side of the room.

As Lucy turned her head to see who it might be her breath caught in her throat. She couldn’t believe it; she was sure the waiter had made a mistake because the man in question was Percy Carter.

Before she could warn Robert she saw that Percy had already stood up and was walking across the room towards them and she laid a restraining hand on his arm.

‘May I offer you all my congratulations?’ Percy smiled. ‘I heard on the grapevine about this momentous occasion. The motor trade has its spies, you know,’ he smirked.

‘Thank you for your good wishes,’ Lucy said quickly as she saw the blood rush to Robert’s face and was fearful about what he might say or do. ‘I don’t think you have met Sam’s new wife,’ she added. ‘Brenda, this is Percy Carter from Carter’s Cars.’

Brenda smiled politely at him. Like Lucy she was conscious of how embarrassed Sam and Robert were by Percy’s presence.

‘And whose little girl is this, then?’ he asked, patting Anna on the head.

For a moment there was an uncomfortable silence before Lucy took a deep breath and said in a quiet controlled voice, ‘This is Patsy’s little girl, Anna, remember?’

It was Percy Carter’s turn to look slightly uncomfortable but he swiftly recovered his composure. ‘Of course. Now, which one of you entrepreneurs handles the business matters at Merseyside Mechanics?’ he asked pompously.

‘It depends on what you want to know,’ Lucy said blandly.

‘I might have known it would be you, Lucy,’ he chuckled. ‘Well, I wanted to let you know that we had an enquiry a couple of days ago from a Merseyside freight company to service their fleet of lorries. As you know, we prefer to deal with top-of-the-range saloon cars in our workshops. In fact, we don’t carry the right sort of tyres or spares nor do we have the necessary equipment to deal with commercial vehicles. I passed your name on to them and I assured them that you would be able to handle their work.’

He paused and signalled to the waiter. ‘Can we have another bottle of champagne over here,’ he requested.