Doreen was much happier talking to complete strangers. She spoke to anyone and everyone, usually in queues for things: in the post office; in the self-service; at the bus stop. But the doctor’s was her favourite. You had more time to get a monologue going. Dr McCartney’s National Health patients weren’t entitled to a proper appointment like the private ones. Instead they had to sit round the edge of the uncarpeted waiting room on Tuesdays and Thursdays, bumping their germs on to the next chair every time another person got their turn in the consulting room. Doreen would usually start with the weather (too hot; too cold; too bleeding wet) and then shift her complaint to London Transport, the Co-op; or Dr McCartney. Her victim would then chime in with the responses: ‘Oh dear’ or ‘That’s nice’ (usually ‘Oh dear’). If it was a woman – which it almost always was – she might move on to the birth of her children or even her hysterectomy but never, strangely, the two dead baby girls. Jane once got stuck next to some old dear in the doctor’s (gall bladder and funny turns) – who’d obviously had the full Doreen treatment.
‘Your aunt’s had a very hard life.’
She knew all about Kenneth’s adenoids, Uncle George’s false teeth, June’s athlete’s foot but when Jane wondered aloud about what it must be like to have a baby and yet not keep it the woman looked mystified. It obviously wasn’t in the authorised version. Nor was Jane’s scholarship. Or her poetry-reading certificates. Jealous, that’s why.
Uncle George wasn’t jealous. Uncle George knew about having friends. So why was he spoiling it about Suzy and the flat? What difference if it was Park Lane or Park Royal?
‘It’s all completely above board, honestly it is.’ Was it? ‘You’d really like Suzy. She’s smashing. I’ll give you a tinkle once we’re straight and you can see for yourself.’
Mercifully there was a bus coming. The conductor, dazzled that such a taxi-looking woman should be waiting for a bus in Norbury, took the holdall from Uncle George and stowed it under the stairs. Like a porter. Jane waved goodbye – ‘Goodbye, George’ rather than ‘Uncle George’. Not in that shirt.
She sat on the long seat by the entrance and put her overnight bag at her side. It exactly matched the red coat as if the whole outfit had come pinned to a card – like dolls’ clothes.
She played up the part of a Persian lamb lady who wasn’t quite sure how buses worked.
‘Do you go anywhere near Oxford Circus?’
‘Stop right there.’
‘Super. How much is that?’
She counted the change out of her purse and her kidskin fingers held on to the ticket as if it were all a big novelty. She looked around the lower deck of the bus as it whizzed through Brixton and peered out at Big Ben, smiling excitedly at the three other passengers as if she were on a great big merry-go-round.
It was already getting dark and she was dreading the long, wobbly walk from the bus stop at the other end but what Doreen would have called a Well-Spoken Young Man stopped in Portland Place on his way to work at the BBC and offered to carry her bag and was she busy that evening? She wasn’t sure. As far as she could tell there was only lobster bisque and stale Ryvitas in the cupboard.
She couldn’t very well let him carry the bags up the stairs – though he did ask. She imagined his face at the sight of the flat. This nice clean Oxbridge boy with his brainy tweeds and college scarf.
Jane explained about the elderly aunt she was lodging with using a wealth of Suzy-style detaiclass="underline" arthritic; war widow; very old-fashioned. But she did let him have the telephone number. He might not be Mirador material but he’d be all right to practise on.
Chapter 13
The all-male gathering can be a hearty
occasion. The female equivalent – a poached
egg on toast listening to the wireless with
a friend – is simply an evening wasted.
Suzy, now smoothed, plucked, varnished and moisturised, was tricked out in a rather natty weekend get-up: dogtooth-checked slacks and a black cashmere polo neck. She looked very pretty but much younger without her face on. She was lying on the three-legged sofa after a long day of self-improvement, reading a copy of Queen and smoking her way through a packet of Woodbines – she saved the good fags for going out.
‘That was quick. Did she cut up rough?’
‘No. Not at all. She helped me get all my things together.’
Suzy arched her body into a long, pin-up stretch.
‘God, I’m starving! I’ve had nothing but black coffee and cheese footballs all day.’
‘I know how you feel. I decided against staying for lunch. Auntie was just having something on a tray.’ She pictured Doreen with a bit of smoked haddock and a glass of hock. ‘I wish I’d said yes to the dinner date now.’
‘Not on your life, darling. Kiss of death.’
Suzy had run out of coins for the meter and the flat was freezing again. Jane clunked her last two shillings into the slot and gingerly lit the gas before slipping reluctantly out of the red coat and hanging it up on the rail that Suzy had wheeled into the passage. The shoes had all been pegged into pairs and bundled into one of the three tea chests. The other two were full of cashmeres, underwear, handbags and hats. The whole arsenal of Suzy’s charm. They had made the place look a tip but without all those glamorous things lying about, the flat was as dirty and sordid as Doreen’s back kitchen.
‘Well it’s much too cold to stay indoors.’ Suzy went through to the bedroom and started work on her face, blotting it out with a grubby little bottle of make-up base, then drawing the whole lot back on again. She scrabbled in an old tobacco tin for a matching pair of false eyelashes, pulled off the snotty strings of old gum, squeezed a skinny worm of glue on to each one from a tiny tube, and patted the lashes into place, beefed up with two coats of automatic mascara.
‘Your turn.’
Jane slid into her place on the piano stool and Suzy repeated the whole process.
‘Where are we off to then?’
‘Well we can’t stay here eating Twiglets. I was thinking we could treat ourselves to a sherry and nuts at Claridge’s and see what develops.’
She helped Jane put the finishing touches to her face and gingerly ran the comb over last night’s hair-do – when Big Terry pleated your hair, it stayed pleated.
Jane had her eye on a gorgeous fuchsia-pink corded velvet cocktail dress but Suzy knew better.
‘Not on your own in Claridge’s, darling. They’ll take you for a tart and chuck you out. We’ll have to pretend to be meeting someone to be let in the bar at all.’
Apparently unaccompanied Sunday night drinking in a West End hotel – always supposing they let you in, unchaperoned – called for smart tweeds. Not too mumsy but nothing to frighten the horses.
Jane was about to slip into her Hardy Amies when the phone rang.
‘Oo? Oh you mean Mrs White’s niece. Oo wants her?’
The posh voice stammered feebly.
‘Er. It’s Michael. Michael Woodrose.’
Jane covered the receiver with her hand.
‘It’s the man I met at the bus stop. He was rather sweet. Works at the BBC. He’s about to finish his shift. Wants to know if I fancy some supper.’ Supper sounded cheaper than dinner.
‘Get him to take us both out for a Chinese,’ stage-whispered Suzy. Claridge’s was certainly smarter but might yield nothing on a Sunday night in January.
‘Well. I’m meant to be going out for supper with my friend Suzy. Would you mind if I brought her along?’
Snookered. He couldn’t very well say no but it was nice to hear the disappointment in his voice. They arranged to meet at Ley-On in Wardour Street at eight.