Sally, Olive thought compassionately. The kettle had started to boil, the steam activating its shrill whistle. As she went to make the tea, tactfully Olive changed the subject.
‘I don’t know what you think but I’m to have driving lessons. Sergeant Dawson has offered to teach me. Our WVS group have been offered the use of a van. It belongs to the Lords, from the drapers in Norfolk Street, or rather it belongs to their son, Gerry, but he’s been called up. They don’t need it because Mr Lord has his own van that he uses for the business and Mavis, Mrs Lord, flatly refuses to learn to drive so Mr Lord has offered it to the WVS.’
‘I think it’s an excellent idea,’ Sally approved immediately.
‘Of course, it won’t just be me he’s teaching,’ Olive hastened to add, pouring them each a cup of tea. ‘There’ll be two of us. Me and Mrs Morrison.’
‘It’s a great opportunity – for you and for the war effort,’ Sally enthused.
* * *
‘Mum, can I have a word with you, just between us?’ Tilly asked her mother quietly as Olive checked on the dumplings she had added to the stew earlier.
‘Of course you can, love. Why don’t you go upstairs to my room and I’ll follow you up there in a tick?’ Olive told her daughter just as quietly.
With the wireless on and Dulcie complaining about the difficult customer she’d had in who’d insisted that Dulcie had sold her a shade of lipstick that didn’t suit her and that she wanted to change, Olive knew that the others wouldn’t have overheard, although what it was that her daughter wanted to discuss, she had no idea.
Wiping her hands on her apron, Olive went up and found her daughter, standing in front of the window in Olive’s own bedroom.
Sitting down on the edge of her bed, automatically smoothing the soft, slightly faded blue satin coverlet, she patted it and invited ‘Come and sit down here, Tilly. Is something wrong?’
When Tilly shook her head and answered firmly, ‘No,’ Olive admitted to feeling relieved.
‘So what is it that you want to talk to me about?’
‘It’s just, well, you know that there’s to be this dance at the church hall and you said that I could go, and Agnes is going to go too?’
‘Yes? Have you and Agnes fallen out and you don’t want her to go with you?’
Tilly laughed. ‘No, Mum, it’s nothing like that. I like Agnes, I really do. She’s so sweet and kind. No, what it is, it that . . .’ Tilly had bent her head and was plucking at the hem of her navy-blue cardigan – a little giveaway habit that was familiar to Olive from her daughter’s childhood and which meant that Tilly felt uncomfortable about something.
‘Well, it’s just that poor Agnes only has hand-me-down clothes. I know I’ve given her a couple of things, but what I was thinking, Mum, was how she is going to feel when we go to the dance and everyone else there is wearing something nice and she isn’t. And it isn’t because I’ll be with her and I’m bothered about what people think. Agnes is my friend now and it wouldn’t bother me if she went to the dance in that awful brown dress she first came here in. It’s for Agnes’s sake, Mum. I don’t want her to feel out of things and uncomfortable.’
What her daughter meant was that she didn’t want Agnes to be hurt, Olive recognised. Maternal love and gratitude filled her. She had been so lucky with Tilly. She’d grown from a happy loving baby into an equally loving young woman.
Modestly Olive gave no thought to the fact that she might have been instrumental in helping to form her daughter’s concern for others, instead taking Tilly’s hand in her own and giving it a loving shake as she told her, ‘You’re right, Tilly, and I’m cross with myself for not thinking of it.’
‘The thing is, Mum, I know that Agnes doesn’t earn very much and that she sends money to the orphanage because she feels she wants to help them for bringing her up, and I was wondering if we couldn’t perhaps get her a pretty frock as a bit of a present?’
‘Oh, Tilly . . .’ Olive hugged her daughter tightly. ‘You are so like your dad. He was generous to a fault and always thinking of others as well. Look, I’ll tell you what we’ll do. I’ll tell Agnes that I’m taking you out to get some material because you need a couple of new things since you’ve grown out of last winter’s clothes, which is true, and that I’ve been putting a bit of money to one side from Agnes’s rent because I thought that she’d probably need things as well but that she wouldn’t have thought of it with always having had the orphanage to provide clothes for her.’
‘Mum, can we really?’ Tilly’s eyes were sparkling as brightly as any stars, the delight and excitement in her expression melting Olive’s heart. The income from their lodgers was bringing in a modestly comfortable sum and, always thrifty, Olive had been putting money to one side just in case one or more of her lodgers left. She had more than enough saved to be able to afford to buy a couple or so lengths of fabric for both girls, and to get the clothes made up.
‘Yes,’ she confirmed with a smile, ‘we can.’ What she’d got in mind was a couple of lengths of woollen fabric, so that a nice costume could be made up for Tilly – perhaps with two skirts to make sure she got her wear out of the jacket – something she could wear for Sunday best now and for work next winter, along with a length for an everyday skirt for each of the girls, and then something pretty for winter frocks for them both, which they could wear to the Church’s socials and dances. If she went about it the right way she felt sure she could get Miss Thomas, the local dressmaker, who also attended their church, to give her a special price for such a good order.
‘We’ll go and have a look for the fabric tomorrow.’
‘Could we go to Portobello Market?’ Tilly begged her excitedly. ‘We could make a real day of it. That’s where Dulcie got the fabric for her skirt. She says you can get ever such a good bargain there if you know who to ask. We could ask her where she got hers.’
Olive forced herself to smile, pleased that, since Dulcie worked on Saturdays, Tilly would be unable to suggest that they asked her to go with them. ‘Well, I was thinking of somewhere closer. Portobello Market is a bit of a trek, I’d thought of somewhere like Leather Lane.’
Tilly’s disappointment was immediate and obvious as she pleaded, ‘Oh, please, Mum. I really would like to go to Portobello. We could set off early.’
Tilly’s plea tugged on Olive’s heart, and with a small sigh she amended, ‘Well, maybe, let me think about it and then we’ll see. Meanwhile,’ Olive stood up, ‘I’ll have a word with Agnes. I want to make it plain to her that it’s her own money that will be paying for her new clothes.’
When Tilly looked questioningly at her, Olive explained, ‘All Agnes has known all her life is charity, Tilly, and the need to be grateful to others for that charity. That was all very well when she was in the orphanage, but that sort of attitude in the wider world could lead to other people not treating her as respectfully as they should. It’s only right and fair that Agnes should be able to feel proud of buying her own clothes. Now, we’d better get back downstairs before those dumplings get too well done.’
Chapter Eight
Nearly six o’clock. At six Selfridges would be closing to customers, although it would be closer to half-past before she eventually got
