at the memory of it. Fifty little girls in organdie dresses and white socks. And Mattie, with her hair up in a French pleat, done up in a bright blue shiny low-cut dress of her mother’s, with wedge-heeled peep-toe shoes, and real nylons. Most of the little girls giggled at her. It didn’t occur to them that Mattie might not have a party dress of her own to wear.
There was a talent contest. Most of the contributions were piano duets, or recitations. And then, at the end, Mattie had jumped up on the stage to sing a song.
The song was ‘Ma, He’s Making Eyes at Me’.
Mattie’s singing voice was unremarkable, but the enthusiasm of her delivery made up for that. She went through the volume range from whisper to shout, with a supporting repertoire of winks and smiles. The performance was absurd, but her confidence and a hint of real talent carried it off for her.
The last line of the song, delivered at full-throated roar, was ‘Mama, he’s kissing me!’ In the crescendo of chords that followed as her pianist tried for her share of the limelight, Mattie pursed her red lips and blew a lingering kiss at the girls and teachers.
There was a terrible silence.
‘It was Julia,’ Mattie remembered, ‘who jumped on to her chair and clapped her hands until they nearly fell off. It was after that that we made friends.’
‘And slid down together all the way to here.’
They looked so young, and fresh, and pleased with their loucheness, even to Johnny who was hardly any older, that he laughed and draped his arms around their necks and kissed them.
‘C’mon, you two. I can’t handle you both. Let’s have another drink. By the way, who won the talent contest?’
They stared at him, and then dissolved into giggles. ‘A girl with pigtails and glasses. Who recited Walter de la Mare.’
Later, they weren’t sure how much later, they saw Jessie being helped to her feet, supported by two waiters from there favourite Italian restaurant. Julia was ready to run forward to help her, thinking that she must be overcome by heat or vodka, and then she saw that Jessie was beaming with pride. She held up her hand.
‘Albert’s asked me to sing. I couldn’t say no, could I?’
There was an instant storm of cheers. Freddie Bishop wriggled forward and cupped his hands to his mouth yet again.
Jessie sang.
She loved all the old songs, of course, ‘We’ll Meet Again’, and ‘Tipperary’, and ‘Pack Up Your Troubles’. Everyone, all the people crowded in the smoky rooms, sang with her. Felix saw the rekindled light in her face, and he knew that in her heart she was back in her club bar, with the curtains tightly drawn, and her friends and customers around the piano. He looked across the room, and his eyes met Julia’s.
‘Thank you,’ he whispered to her through the singing, and she dipped her dark head at him.
Jessie held up her huge, pale arms. ‘I’ve got two new friends,’ she called out, ‘who made this party for me, with my Felix. Come over here, both of you, and sing with me.’ She beckoned to Julia and Mattie. When they reached her Julia whispered, ‘I can’t sing. Mattie’ll do my bit for me. Jessie, do you know “Ma, He’s Making Eyes at Me?” ’
‘Of course I know it,’ Jessie roared.
They sang it together, the two of them, as if they had been rehearsing it for years. Julia saw that Mattie had grown into the ripeness that she had caricatured at Blick Road. The eyes of every man in the room were fixed on her. Of everyone except Felix, because Felix was looking at Julia. Julia didn’t feel even a tremor of jealousy. She closed her eyes, and let the ridiculous song bridge the years back to Blick Road school. She loved Mattie. This was her family now, she thought, prophetically. Mattie, and Jessie, and Felix.
‘Mama, he’s kissing me!’
There was no terrible silence this time. There were whistles and shouts and applause. Near Felix a small, thin man with a little thin moustache was clapping too.
‘That girl packs quite a punch,’ he murmured, to no one in particular. ‘She can’t sing, but she must have plenty of other talents. What can I find for her to do?’
Two important things happened that evening, although at the time they seemed hardly more important than the other snatches of talk, promises and pleas and evasions, that rose with the plumes of cigarette smoke.
Mr Mogridge’s friend eased Felix into a corner. He had looked carefully around the flat, and now he said, ‘Did this place up yourself, didn’t you? Tommy Bull told me. Made quite a nice job of it, I must say. Listen, I’ve got a proposition. I’ve got some flats, I want ’em done up and furnished for letting. Quality letting, mind. Tasteful, but nothing too fancy. Like this place. Do you want to take the job on for me? I pay well.’
Felix studied the man. He didn’t like him any better than he liked Mr Mogridge or Mr Bull, and when the man said quality letting he knew that he meant No Blacks or Irish, like the signs in the landladies’ windows. Then he thought about the life studio, and the art school exercises languishing in his portfolio.
‘All right,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ll take the job on for you.’
The man with the thin moustache went over to Mattie when the storm following her song had died down. He took a card out of his wallet and handed it to her. Mattie read the name, Francis Willoughby, and the title, Manager, Headline Repertory Companies.
‘I’ve got three companies on the road at the moment,’ he said grandly. ‘I need a girl Friday to help me out in our London offices. All aspects of theatre work, on the administration side. You interested?’
‘Yes,’ Mattie whispered. She reached out for the card as if it was the Holy Grail.
‘Give me a tinkle, then.’ The man peeled his lips back in a smile.
Jessie fell into her sudden sleep not long after that, and the crowds began to trickle away.
Julia stood with Johnny’s arms around her. She wasn’t sure that she could hold herself up without his support. His mouth felt very hot on her neck, and he was excited. She could feel him pushing against her. Over his shoulder, she saw Felix. He bent down to pick up an empty glass, and then he walked away.
This wasn’t what she had planned for tonight, Julia realised. It shouldn’t be like this. But she was too tired now, and too drunk, to change anything.
‘Come on, darling,’ Johnny begged her.
‘No. I can’t. Tomorrow.’
‘Okay.’ He sighed. ‘Not tonight. But tomorrow, or sooner. You can’t keep me gasping for you like this, baby. Look. It’s bad for me.’
Julia shut her eyes.
Johnny picked her up and carried her to her bed. He laid her down and pulled the covers over her, kimono and all, and left her there.
Julia opened her eyes once more and saw that she was safe, although Felix wasn’t there. The room was spinning around her but she shut her eyes again anyway, and plunged down into the revolving tunnel of sleep.
