Chapter 1
Chapter one
...a singular, modest apartment, only furnished with the necessities. That is all I need. My wage will be a decent one, thanks to my qualifications and most recent references secured in London. I will furnish the rest of the establishment on my own and, given time, will make it quite respectable. You may even wish to come and visit me sometime! Until then I shall endure my temporary exile with grace and dignity. I hope that someday, you may understand why I must do as I do. Until then, I hope you are well.
Your loving daughter,
Delphine Margaret Price.
A singular, modest apartment, only furnished with the necessities. My father had received the assignment, but it seemed, had not followed through with it. Probably on the orders of my dear mother. We’d always known that it was really her who wore the trousers in that relationship. Father could appear blustery and standoffish when he needed to be but behind closed doors, mother always had the final say on the matter. Yes, walking into my ‘modest’ apartment, a flat on the most respectable street this town had to offer, I could see touches of her all over the place. The pressed flowers, encased in glass, gilded frames all over the pale-pink walls. The rose-printed silk upholstered on the dining chairs. And-lo and behold! The hideous, paisley vases on either side of the pristine, white sofa. Those would have to go. I didn’t care if they cost hundreds of pounds; I might give them to one of my new neighbours and they could do with them as they wished. I just didn’t want to look at them any longer than I had to.
Closing the door behind me, I placed my trunk and carpet-bag on the floor and tentatively explored the rest of what was to be my new home. Now, there were some things about this place that I did like. Even a few things about it that I loved. The pressed flowers, though they were my mother’s addition, were the result of her skill and efforts. Pressing flowers and making them into works of art was one of the only things she would ever do by herself. A hobby, she said, left over from her girlhood days. The teal colour of the parlour was very nice too. On the walls in the hallway were portrait photographs of my family and myself, as well as the odd snap of my closest friends. At the end of the hall, towards the bathroom, was the picture taken on my last day of school. Me, Stella Shaughnessy and Ella Jamieson. My two best friends. I was so glad they’d chosen to include that picture. My parents didn’t approve of my friends but they recognised how important they were to me.
And then, just as quickly as the appreciation for my parents had rushed in, my confusion at them quickly replaced it. Three bedrooms? Why on earth did I need three bedrooms when I was to be the only person here? They were all well-furnished and decorated, and the one meant to be my room was quite clearly decorated as such, but why the other two? Oh God, they didn’t expect me to house any of my siblings, did they? It wasn’t as if I was going to expect any of my sisters to want to visit. All three of them were married now with lives and social obligations of their own. I wouldn’t mind my brothers so much if they were around often enough to visit but the eldest two were married and Michael, the closest to me in age, was gallivanting about England, doing whatever it was that he did to earn our parents ire.
So with my numerous siblings out of the equation I could only assume it was down to sheer impressiveness that drove my parents to this decision. I might’ve been the black-sheep of the family (or rather a deep grey, as I would always rank second to Michael in that department) but even the black-or grey sheep had to be seen as respectable. And respectable members of the aristocracy must appear impressive.
So, I had two extra bedrooms and my very own bathroom at my disposal. What was I to do with them? Why, fill them, of course! And what better time was there to do that than tonight? My first night in a new town where my new job would be waiting for me this coming Monday. Of course I’d planned on celebrating. My best friends did too. Stella and Ella. Our classmates used to call us ‘Stel, El and Del’. We were planning on meeting tonight anyway, at a club called ‘Pink Poison’, for Ella’s first solo performance, but why wait that long? This flat certainly did have a telephone, already connected, so I dialled for a connection to Stella’s digs on the other side of town. And by digs, I meant the servants line within the Desmond’s household where Stella served as Mrs. Desmond’s personal maid.
“This is the landline for the Demond’s household staff. You’re speaking with Mrs. Phillips.”
“Hello Mrs. Phillips! This is Delphine Price.”
“Ah! Delphine. How are you? I trust the journey went smoothly?”
“As smooth as a train-trip from Paris to London can possibly go, thank you. Is Stella available to talk? I wasn’t certain when she would finish for the night.”
“She’s not done yet but she won’t be far off. She’s just finishing with her Ladyship’s hair. They’re hosting the Fitzpatricks tonight for dinner.”
“Ah yes, the Fitzpatricks.” I sighed in commiseration. Everyone within my family’s society knew how…difficult they could be. “Good luck to all of you. I recalled Mr. Fitzpatrick was a very…projectile eater.”
“We have napkins on standby. Do you need to speak to Stella right away?”
“Oh no! But if you could pass on a message, I would greatly appreciate it. Seeing as she has the night, and the following Sunday off, I wanted to know if she would like to stay the night at my place, alongside our other friend Miss Jamieson. My new flat is much bigger than I had anticipated so there’s plenty of room.”
“I’ll be glad to pass that on. I think she’d rather like that; since we took on a new scullery girl, the quarters here have been rather cramped.”
“Thank you Mrs. Phillips. I’ll let you go now; I understand you’ll want to prepare for supper tonight.”
“Luckily I am not the one who’ll have to serve dinner.” She laughed, “good afternoon Miss Delphine.”
I smiled as I placed the receiver down. Now, where could I reach Ella? She used to rent a room on the other, less respectable side of town but Stella had told me that she’d left that place about two months ago. The club? Perhaps, but I didn’t have a number for the club. For good reason too. By all accounts, or at least by Ella’s, Pink Poison wasn’t exactly what you’d call a respectable establishment. Often opened much later than other places with excellent cocktails, liquor you couldn’t get anywhere else and music that played until dawn, it was every bit the opposite of ‘respectable’. But it sounded damned fun.
This was where we were to meet tonight. The first time we’d see each other in nearly a year! Naturally I was excited. After finishing my grammar schooling, I opted to do what was far from expected of me; I applied for a place in a good secretarial college in London. My father was shocked but that was nothing compared to the reaction of my mother. Michael telephoned me the day after they received my letter, advising me to keep to myself in London until mother had calmed down. That had apparently taken just over a week with her becoming bedridden with ‘emotional distress’. All because I wanted to work for a living.
I could laugh at the thought now, but at the time I was terrified that I might be disowned entirely! As much fun as I’ve poked at my family, I did care about them a great deal. Even my sisters, who could be the meanest kind of women I’d ever known, still held a spot in my heart. Thankfully, just as Michael advised, the trouble did pass and mother has had plenty of time to get used to the idea. Father was the first to reach out, sending his congratulations after I’d finished my degree. Next it was Michael, who’d come to surprise me in London with greetings from the entire Price clan. And believe me, that is a large number of relatives; close and distant. Even my sisters sent me the odd letter. They got used to the idea of me going out to earn my bread. They didn’t approve entirely, but they got used to it.
My friends, however, not only approved of my venture into the working-class; they were the first to take me out to celebrate. At the same time, introducing me to the world of night-clubs and all the illicit fun that came with them. They weren’t something I frequented much on my own, but that was alright. A reunion with Stella and Ella was the perfect excuse to return to it. Especially since Ella would be singing at the club herself! Admittedly, I was apprehensive when Ella announced to the two of us that she was going to become a singer. It was a tough industry, entertainment, and Ella was a tough girl, but was she tough enough?
Apparently so. Over extensive letters, distant telephone calls and postcards, Ella had documented her journey as half of a singing duo; The Nightingales. She, along with a girl she’d met at her singing lessons, Jane Rothwell, decided to combine their talents as they were often told that duos or bands had better chances of securing regular spots than they would as solo acts. She would send me postcards from all the places she and Jane had travelled to in England! I held that collection sacred in one of my many photo albums. From the beautiful fields of Cornwall to the cliffs of Dover. Granted she’d only really see the insides of music halls and night-clubs on her travels but the postcards were pretty. And the more she’d send, the further her popularity as a singer seemed to climb.
Now, she assured me, it was all going to pay off at last. While she was keeping fairly tight-lipped about this business, I was a little apprehensive about believing this. Ella loved what she did and did it damned well, but I knew how fanciful she could be. I remembered when we were just fifteen and she became convinced that my current beau at the time, Daniel Ripley, was in love with her. From ‘stolen’ glances across the shores of beaches to a polite compliment about the colour of her dress, which she was convinced was his ‘disguised passion’ for her.
Should I have kept a closer watch on her? Probably. But it was harmless, for the most part. Except when it wasn’t. No, Daniel didn’t cheat, but he didn’t welcome her attention either. After one encounter at a party had gone horribly wrong, he delivered me an ultimatum. Cut off contact with Ella or break things off with him. When I didn’t give him an answer right away, he made that decision for me. It was easier to blame him at the time than it was for Ella. I might’ve been his sweetheart and Ella’s friend but it was unfair to make me choose between them. And it wasn’t as if Ella had set out to steal him either! She had just, in true Ella fashion, gotten carried away with herself. I knew her too well by now to think it was anything else.
Seeing as I had a good few hours before we were all due to meet at Pink Poison, I started by unpacking up belongings. First was my vanity bag, well-stocked with good face-powder, some cheap but pleasant-smelling perfume, my coveted supply of Lux soap, shampoo and, my favourite thing in the world; lipstick. Well-one of my top ten favourite things in the world. I fell in love with lipstick when I was a precocious sixteen year-old, looking for lots of small ways to further my journey into womanhood. What started as a miracle-stick of waxy, red stuff became something between a symbol of liberation and a form of battle-armour! Once I started earning my first wages, meagre though they were, I used those earnings towards building up a sizable collection. Pinks, peaches, purples and above all, reds.
Red was my best colour. Of all the things I’d inherited from both of my parents, I was fortunate enough to get my mother’s looks and colouring. When a young Prudence Plymount made her debut at the age of eighteen she was considered one of the prettiest young women of Edwardian London, and for good reason. Not only did she have one of those fair, delicate faces you only saw in story-books about princesses and fairies, she had the sort of colouring that one distinctly remembered for a long time after seeing them. Rich, auburn hair, naturally wavy and soft to the touch, nearly flawless, alabaster skin and eyes so bright and green, they tended to penetrate you deeper than you could’ve ever expected. All of these traits she had passed on to me and my elder sisters after she married my father, Albert Forsythe Price. They weren’t passed down to the men, funnily enough; Michael, Benjamin, Andrew and Alfred (the latter two being twins) all inherited various shades of brown hair and brown eyes. The more common traits from my father’s side. Us women, however, were different. We stood out.
Now, as for my version of standing out, my mother and sisters would argue that my way of doing things certainly wasn’t the expected, or the right way. They employed two weapons to stand out at a ball. One being the influence the Price name brought about in upper-class society. The second was the sheer expensiveness of their attire. Gowns made in only the finest fashion-houses in England, Shoes that could pay half a year’s worth of grocery bills. Jewellery that seemed so precious, so beautiful, it had no business even seeing the light of day. Prosperity and wealth was how they stood out. How did I stand out? By making sure that nobody could look away from me. No, it didn’t always involve revealing gowns or heavy makeup. It didn’t always need to. But to be noticed anywhere, it didn’t always pay to look like some delicate flower. Unless of course, that was your intention.
Well, that certainly wasn’t my intention tonight. I fully intended on being noticed and danced with. So after I was done with putting away my toiletries, I opened my bigger trunk and pulled out the ensemble I’d chosen. A baby-pink cocktail dress with gold leaf's dancing around the waistline, golden T-bar shoes to match and a rose-clip for my hair. Not exactly dripping with diamonds, but that was somewhat of a relief. Jewellery attracted too much attention and poorly-planned thefts. Besides, I was under strict instructions from my parents to wear my good jewellery only on formal occasions. Formal being only the ones they were present for. For somebody who was supposed to live an independent life I was still, quite conveniently, under my parent’s thumb.
“Delphi?” It was Stella! How long had it been since I telephoned the Desmond’s house? “Where are you?”
“In the bedroom, Stella. The biggest one!”
She found me fairly quickly, squealing as she ran to me for a hug. She hadn’t changed one bit since I last saw her! She’d been discretely pushed out of her last job for getting the ‘racy’ bob-cut she now sported like a dark, crowning glory. Still dark brown (she’d chosen to dye it from the ‘miserable mousy’ it used to be), still enviously glossy and still framing her soft, oval face just perfectly. Still the same, reliable Stella who didn’t merely walk through life but danced through it in sparkling high-heels. I wished sometimes that I could be more like her. That I could care much less what others thought of me.
“Look at you!” She said, as she always did when she saw someone she hadn’t seen in a while. “Dressing a bit more like the working class. Kitted out in cotton-but hey! Still Egyptian cotton. And you still smell like Park Avenue! What is it this time-Roses of Paris?”
“Attar of roses, thank you very much!” I said, giggling. “You didn’t take long. I think I only rang Mrs Phillips half an hour ago.”
“I was coming over anyway. I had your address jotted down and I was popping in to see mum before I came here. She wanted me to give you this.”
I smelt the cinnamon and cardamon before I even opened the box. Biscuits! When we lived in London Mrs. Shaughnessy used to send boxes of homemade, burnt-butter biscuits to Stella, which she would kindly share with Ella and me. Coming from two generations of service cooks, Mrs. Shaughnessy held an entire cavalcade of good techniques, family recipes and good, old-fashioned knowledge to her name. She made excellent pot-roasts, steak-and-kidney pie, Irish stew and Yorkshire puddings, but nothing could beat her desserts or baking. Especially those beautiful biscuits.
“Thank you, Mrs. Shaughnessy.” I sighed, feeling quite happy and nostalgic at the trigger of the aroma. “Remind me again why you never trained as a cook?”
“Because I detest cooking!” Stella retorted, rolling her eyes. “I hate it, just as much as you can’t do it. Which was why we had to rely on mum’s weekly treats to act as the sunny beacon amongst endless cans of baked beans and Campbell’s soup.”
“Oh, right. But at least twice a week we could have cheese on toast! And on the odd occasion, we could even go out for a meal.”
“Granted it was usually one of the cheaper establishments that did fry-ups and scones.”
“Oh, but they were good fry-ups and scones! Especially when they drowned them in melted butter and raspberry jam.”
The very thought of them made my stomach grumble!
“How long since you had lunch? Knowing you, you would’ve turned down a reservation at some showy hotel, just to spite those parents of yours. By the looks of it, it hasn’t worked.” She said, pointedly, sweeping her eyes around the spacious, well-furnished bedroom that we both stood in.
“As a matter of fact, I took some tea before I came here.” I said, “but we all know your mum’s baking is on another level. Even my mother would love it! Provided she eats it with a blindfold. I swear she could tell if something was made by a member of the working-class, just by looking at it! It’s as if the hard-wiring is imprinted into the dough itself.”
“Yeah, but we know at this point that your mother is a mystery to us mere mortals. I don’t even think your dad fully understands her!” Stella laughed, sitting down on the bed. “I take it that those pictures on the wall are hers?”
“Yes. One of the few things she’ll actually do by hand! At least, that we know of. She’s very much a mystery to me as well! You’d think that having the ability to make achievements would be an endearing quality, but she’s never really seen it that way. Of course we can have these abilities, but very rarely will she let us show them.”
“It’s a belief as old as time Delphi! Proper girls should be seen and not heard. A whole load of codswallop, I know, but it’s been that way for ages.”
“Well, I don’t intend to let it stay that way. Tonight I intend to be both seen and heard. And danced with and wooed. Even if it is just for one night, I’m going to have myself a little fun before I settle into my demure, little life of work and social exile.”
“Social exile? Surely they didn’t mean that.”
“They did. Or at least, from any engagements they’re invited to.”
“That’s not immature or telling at all.” She scoffed, “are you going to heed it?”
“For their sake, I’ll behave. For a while. But they’ll know that they cannot bar me from social engagements forever. People are going to know that I’ve got a job on my own volition sooner or later and I’m not going to cower and hide when they do. That just cements the belief that I’ve got something to be ashamed of. But why should I feel ashamed, hmm? I chose to earn my living instead of holding my hand out. Shouldn’t that be considered admirable? Humble?”
“Oh it is-but you knew that not everyone would see it that way.”
“Yes, I knew.” I sighed, flopping back onto the counterpane. “I knew that people would take it differently. I knew my sisters would see me as some sort of alien and I knew my brothers would find it amusing. I knew what to expect-that doesn’t make it any less frustrating.”
“No, it doesn’t.” She patted my hand, as Stella would, before jumping up again to launch on with another prerogative. “But you made your bed; now you can lie in it and rest easy, knowing that you bought the sheets, the blankets and the pillow yourself. Now come on! I’ve bought some of those good scones. Let’s see if those parents of yours have stocked those kitchen cupboards with some butter and jam!”
They had, as it happened. With two pounds of fresh butter and a jar of raspberry and rhubarb jam, personally made by their own cook, Mrs. Dobbs. We warmed those scones on a tray in the oven, slathering them with as much butter and jam as we desired before scoffing the lot! There. That hit the spot just perfectly. I might have put on a pound or two but I could work that off tonight, dancing. Provided I could find a willing partner or two! Well, by the time we finished getting ready for tonight, that shouldn’t be too difficult. But it would be quite a process.
We started with baths. Well-I did. Stella already had one before she came here so she settled for a quick wash with the bathroom sink. Nothing really needed to be done with her hair; just an egg-rinse, a towel-dry and a good brushing. After indulging in a good, long soak I stepped out of the tub and started tying off my hair with the satin-rags. An ingenious method of hair-curling that almost anyone could do! Well, if you could get your hands on a satin pillow-case, second-hand, that is. I loved the way my hair came out afterward. It did have a natural wave but I had to go to some effort to achieve the shingled curls that seemed almost timelessly fashionable.
“Exactly the reason why I bobbed my hair.” Stella remarked smugly from her perch atop the lavatory. “Far less fuss and bother.”
“Even if you did it five years too late.” My reward for that was a fine-tooth comb, flung from Stella’s side, missing my head by an inch. I laughed.
“And who’s the one that needs to spend an extra hour tying satin rags into their hair? Not me.”
Nonetheless, my hair did spring out from the rags an hour later, silky, springy and ready to be styled. After fixing the shingled curls into place with nearly a dozen pins, I slid the rose-clip into place, smiling at the effect in the mirror. Next came our makeup. An arduous, yet necessary process in which we used powers of the feminine to transform ourselves. To shed the appearance of the polite, diligent working-girls and slip on the mask of the party-girl. Not quite flappers, having longer hemlines, higher necklines and some feelings of displacement since the crash.
Almost everyone I knew tried not to think about it. It had robbed almost the entire world of something or another. Just because my family came out relatively unscathed, that didn’t mean that others have had our luck. Friends, cousins, even aunts and uncles had suffered some sort of loss; few of them even lost everything, because of this current depression, being forced to beg and borrow from their wealthier relatives just to get by. Perhaps that had some sway in my current lifestyle. It didn’t feel like so long ago when we all felt as if nothing could hurt us. Not laws, not poverty nor even the lack of rights us women had in the world. But then it took a market crash to make me realise that the foundation we danced on was never solid. Anyone could suffer and if you weren’t prepared for it, you could fall through the cracks just as easily as our poorer relations. That terrified me, ten times more than disappointing my parents ever could.
I had to laugh at myself when I caught my expression in the mirror and saw how dour I looked. Shaking my head, I forced myself to giggle again and joined Stella once more in our getting-ready routine. Tonight, Stella chose to play her darker hair and olive skin-tone to her advantage with her ocean-blue, beaded frock that swished and jingled as she moved in it. This was complimented by a slightly darker palette of aquamarine eye-shadow, dark kohl and her blue, glass beads dripping down her plunging neckline. A perfect, dark beauty. Just like the Tudor Queen, Anne Boleyn. And stylish to boot. The most stylish ladies maid I’d ever known.
“Glamorous, as always.” I said, “you did a marvellous job at adjusting it. How did you manage the waistline?”
“I lengthened the skirt with a black petticoat underneath. After that it wasn’t too much trouble. The pattern on the top-half is designed so you don’t much notice a few inches up from hip to waist.”
“Lucky! That’s the trouble with more expensive gowns. They’re designed so intently that when you need to change it according to the style, you get all sorts of obstacles. My sewing skills are barely passable as it is, but working with a stubborn gown? Impossible.”
“Even more so when the seamstress herself is equally stubborn.” This time, I flung the comb at her. “But I see your point. These Haute Couture designers are so obsessed with making their gowns stand out, they can’t and won’t consider the changing times. Well, I suppose they can afford not to, can’t they? The way they see it, if you want a dress that’s in, you should just pay for another. Altering them yourself? Far too common!”
“Well it’s going to be their necks on the line if they don’t budge even just an inch. People can’t afford Haute Couture anymore! Especially with…well, with how things have been. They’re going to department stores more and more because that clothing is quickly had and more easily adjusted. If they’re not careful, they’ll find themselves out of business.”
“Oh, did you hear that? The shivers of a dozen Parisian designers. You just stomped all over their graves!” She cackled.
“I’ll dance on their graves if they keep charging what they do for blouses alone! Speaking of dancing, how do I look?”
“Gorgeous Delphi, as you always do! You always say that you wish you had my colouring but I’d kill to have yours! You stand out. Especially in that dress with those shoes.”
“Well then, let’s go stand out together! I’ll telephone for a cab. I’d rather spend the extra shillings on a night out this late than risk the tram. After all, we’re two young women, alone in a strange town. Who knows what might happen?”
“Yes; I might snatch a poor, young man from the alleyway and have my way with him in Mrs. Phillip’s bed!”
“Not if I get him first.”
I called for a taxi to come at seven O’clock sharp. Five minutes beforehand I made sure everything was switched off before locking up behind me. Regardless of the terms discussed in my correspondence with my father, it was still my very own flat and I intended to take care of it. I had to prove that I was responsible, ready for this completely independent life. Well, I would be more than responsible! I would be nothing less than the very model of independence and responsibility. I would show them, all of them, that I was perfectly serious about my decisions. That I wouldn’t just back away once things got hard and run back to them with my tail between my legs. Tonight I would go out and paint the town red. But from then on, I would tackle the reality of being independent head-on and succeed. I had to.
