The Dressmaker - Beryl Bainbridge [53]
‘I’ll call again, Mam,’ he said, very polite, not smiling; and she shut the door after him and put her hand to her heart to catch her breath.
She was so agitated on the tram, in the audition, over Ira and his boldness, that she hardly noticed her voice singing, ‘We’ll meet again. Don’t know where, don’t know when’. She clasped her hands together, opened her throat and sang. They accepted her at once; they said she would be an asset. She felt very little satisfaction.
Nellie was furious at Marge going out like that. Thinking her safely in bed, she hadn’t bothered to take a key. She had to wait for half an hour on the step until Rita came home from work.
‘God knows what came over your Auntie Marge,’ she said. ‘I left her ill in bed. Wait till I see her.’
Rita was so happy she peeled potatoes and made Nellie a cup of coffee.
‘Sit down,’ she said. ‘I’ll get the tea.’
All her face was light and curved. Gone the morose set to her mouth, the desperate look in her eyes.
‘Ira rang,’ she said, unable to keep it to herself. ‘He’s busy training. He can’t see me this week, but he rang me up to see how I was. He’s been chosen for some course – they’re sending him to Halifax for three days. He’s going to write me a letter.’
She was a different girl; it was amazing the effect a man had on a woman. Nellie had seen it before in Marge, the fluctuations of mood, as if the man held the reins and drove as he pleased. It left her cold. She had been too busy nursing Mother to experience that sort of thing – blacking the grate, preparing the food, seeing the boys went off to work decent.
Time had gone like the pages of a book flipping over.
When Marge came in she never said she was sorry for gadding off like that. She wasn’t contrite about being late home.
‘Auntie Nellie was locked out,’ said Rita. ‘She had to wait on the step.’
‘I wasn’t to know you didn’t have your key,’ cried Marge, belligerently.
She tried to get Nellie off to bed early so that she could talk to Rita. But Nellie wouldn’t budge – taking her stays off and sitting by the empty grate for an age, yawning, stirring her tea. In the end Margo went up first – she was that worn out – falling asleep without a thought in her head.
The following night Nellie went to the Manders’ to give Valerie a fitting. As soon as she was out of the door, Margo asked Rita what Ira had said to her on the telephone.
‘How d’you know he phoned?’ asked Rita. ‘I never told you.’
‘I know, he did, that’s why.’`
‘He’s been chosen for some course. I’ll probably see him on Saturday.’
‘He’s not been chosen for any course,’ said Margo. She couldn’t put it tactfully – it wasn’t the way – it had to be done like a bull in a china shop. She watched Rita’s face, like smooth glass, not a line on it.
‘He called here yesterday.’
‘He what?’
The glass splintered. Furrows appeared on her high forehead, her mouth puckered in surprise.
‘He called. He called to ask me to—’
It wasn’t that simple. She felt like Jack, slashing the throat of a young pig, letting its life’s blood soak into the sawdust.
After a time Rita said: ‘Asked you to what?’ Her voice was hard like a stone.
‘He feels you’re too young. He minds about you.’
‘Too young?’
‘He doesn’t want to commit himself.’
‘What did he come here for when he knew I was out?’
‘He wants to do what’s best.’
‘I told him you were off work.’
‘He’s a nice lad.’ She felt like Judas, giving the signal for young Rita to be cut down by swords.
‘He’s going to ring me tomorrow – he said so.’
Margo didn’t have the strength. The malice drained out of her. It wasn’t competition – it was little Rita, without a mother and father. She wasn’t even angry any more about the dirty book gone from her drawer. Jack and Nellie had moulded Rita, cramped her development, as surely if they had copied the Chinese, binding the feet