Did Jane like babies? No she bloody didn’t. Yet Carol and Eileen could hardly wait. Carol had actually tried knitting a bonnet and matching bootees. Ideal if it turned out to have a club foot . . .
‘My mother was only nineteen when she had me.’
‘Same here, darling, but that doesn’t make it right.’ Suzy’s mother was dead, so she said. There was a picture of her (was it her?) on the grotty makeshift dressing table wearing Molyneux and gazing poshly into space. ‘Poor old Lorna.’
Suzy seemed to have washed Lorna from her mind: she’d offered to help the only way she knew how but if Lorna wanted to ruin her career, her figure and her life with a screaming brat, that was her funeral.
‘Up early tomorrow, darling. I’m showing evening and bridal at Green’s Gowns. Nine sharp. Henry said he’d meet us at Fortnum’s at half one and take us to look at my nice little flat. I’ll need the blue holdall for work but there should be room for your stuff in one of the tea chests.’
She frowned critically at the smoke-stained wallpaper, at the cobwebby cornice and the threadbare orange and brown chenille curtains as if noticing them for the first time.
‘This time tomorrow, Janey darling! Aren’t you excited?’
She looked at Jane’s face but it had been switched off. Jane quickly pulled herself together.
‘This is so kind of you.’ Would that do? Probably. Suzy was picturing her new life.
‘This time tomorrow, darling. Central heating; wall-to-wall carpet; fitted wardrobes and big, fat king-sized bed. Each.’
She’d only been between the starchy new king-size sheets a couple of minutes when the telephone rang.
‘Were you in bed?’
‘Mmm.’
‘Asleep?’
‘I can’t seem to get to sleep.’
‘Me neither.’
She tried to imagine him, stretched out on one of those big dimply leather settee things, a balloon of brandy in his other hand. She pictured his lips whispering into the receiver.
‘I’ve got the car again tomorrow.’ Not his car then. ‘There’s a nice place on the river.’
‘Dancing?’
‘Dancing.’
‘Sounds super.’ Super.
‘Sweet dreams.’
Chapter 16
Most men are on the lookout for a
bargain and like to see a sizeable return
in gratitude for a very small outlay.
It was a dogtooth check sort of day. The weather had turned milder and the pair of them hit the sunny street at a quarter to nine: eyelashed; powdered and tricked out in sixty guineas’ worth of novelty tweed suiting. The hair was still holding up reasonably well after a quick tickle with the comb and a burst of lacquer. Suzy had the crocodile bag neatly tucked into the crook of her arm.
The pair of them catwalked round the corner to Green Gowns, a thriving wedding and after-six business in Great Portland Street. Unusually for a rag-trade showroom, there was a large window display: a huge fashion drawing of a skinny, supercilious brunette in a sheath of nasturtium silk and the actual dress itself, thrown elegantly across a gilded show chair with a sign saying ‘one of last season’s creations’ (you didn’t want rivals nicking any of your new ideas). Mr Green always reckoned that buyers were just like anybody else: they might have an appointment elsewhere but you never knew who might be walking past or what might catch their eye.
The showroom was on the ground floor. The office was on the first and the upper storeys were packed with machinists French-seaming their way through mile after mile of organza, dupion, paper taffeta, duchesse satin, silk damask. Not to mention the Tricel, Vilene, Rayon and Banlon required by the budget lines and Junior Dream collection. The basement stockroom was forested with great bolts of material and huge dress boxes ready to receive the finished gowns that travelled down in a creaking old goods lift.
Suzy gave Jane a final once-over as they rang the bell and smiled smugly at the pretty picture she had made.
‘You’ll do, darling.’ Thanks a bunch. ‘Walk your best walk and he’ll snap you up.’
Jane sashayed into the showroom which was still extra chilly after a whole weekend without heating. It smelled expensively of hothouse lilies and floor wax. Jane’s tidy suede toes crossed the floor, then did a half turn towards the waiting Mr Green. He smelled nice and expensive too. He wore a single-breasted blue Savile Row suit and Turnbull and Asser shirt and tie. His cufflinks were plain yellow gold knots. Every detail beyond reproach. Like a spy. His (actually rather sexy) brown eyes followed Jane closely.
‘This is my cousin Janey. She’s going to give me a hand getting dressed, if that’s all right. Janey James: Lawrence Green.’
He took her hand and came straight to the point. Suzy wouldn’t have brought her in unless there was a reason.
‘Ever done any modelling, Miss James?’
‘Do call me Janey, everybody does. I’ve only done a little modelling, I’m afraid.’ She smiled shyly and slyly at him from under her heavy, brown-black automatic eyelashes. ‘Why do you ask?’ As if they didn’t both know.
‘Lots of gowns to show this morning, Miss James, lots of gowns. Tell you what, the first client won’t be here for half an hour. Why don’t you slip one on for me right now and show me what you can do. You know where to go, Suzy.’
Their heels pick-pocked their way across the shiny parquet, behind a fancy screen and through a polished mahogany door.
You could see why they kept the screen in front.
The models’ dressing room was a chilly little cubby-hole with manky black and white lino and a single sickly striplight on the peeling ceiling. The morning’s models were ranked on a dress rail next to a full-length looking glass and there was a yellow Formica table with a dressing-table mirror, a desk lamp and a Watney’s ashtray still overflowing with lipsticked fag ends from last week’s shows. There was a used corn plaster stuck on the mirror.
Suzy was already slipping her suit on to a spare hanger, flicking along the rail with the other hand.
‘That ought to do it.’
Riviera Secret was strapless sapphire blue with a duchesse satin bodice and a tiered lace skirt. It had built-in support and Jane was just stripped down to stockings and panty girdle when Mr Green’s handsome dark head popped round the door. Jane’s hands flew to her breasts. So did his eyes.
‘All right, ladies? My first buyer will be here in ten minutes. Get your drawers on.’ He flashed a smile. He had beautiful, very real-looking teeth. They might even be real. There was one missing round the side. And a snazzy gold one at the back. You didn’t see that with dentures.
Jane swanned out from behind the gilt screen. Mr Green had now been joined by a thin but handsome woman with honey-brown tweeds, marmalade hair and tiny lizard shoes the colour of Marmite. This was Mrs Green and nothing was ever really going to happen without her say-so. Goldie Green would commère the show but she was never introduced as the wife and there wasn’t a spark of life between them. In office hours Lawrence had eyes only for his buyer.
Jane crossed the floor then risked a full basic turn. There was nothing basic about it. Pivot on the balls of both feet. Go back on your right foot, which must be at right-angles to the left. Pause. Then step off again with the left foot. Just as she completed the manoeuvre she saw that Suzy had entered the room having somehow managed to zip herself into the identical dress in white satin. She was wearing the white pumps from her kit bag. They were slightly grubby but then so was the frock after umpteen showings. They passed each other then both did a full turn and faced the Greens. Mrs G walked up to Jane and checked the fit of the bodice.