Opal Plumstead Read online

  I knew just how hard it must have been for Mother to go out seeking work. I reached out and took hold of her hand. ‘Well done, Mother,’ I whispered.

  ‘No, it is not well done,’ she said, pulling away from me. ‘I’ve been unsuccessful. I’ve been to Beade and Chambers department store, Evelyn’s the draper’s, Maxwell’s the toyshop, Henley’s china emporium, practically every wretched shop in town, but without success. No one wants to take on a middle-aged lady with scarcely any experience. I even went to the Fairy Glen factory and asked for light work there, but they’re only taking on young girls.’

  ‘As if you could ever work in a factory, Mother,’ said Cassie fiercely, but Mother glared at her too.

  ‘We can’t take that attitude now, girls. We have to do what we can. So I’m going to be working at home making novelty rabbits for Porter’s toy factory. They’ll be delivering all the pieces on Monday. I’m to make three dozen a day.’

  ‘Three dozen?’

  ‘Apparently they have some women who manage up to a hundred, but even then I don’t think I’ll earn enough to pay the rent,’ said Mother, and a tear rolled down her cheek.

  ‘Don’t, Mother, I can’t bear it,’ said Cassie. ‘Look, I’ll get a job. Hang it, I’ll even work at Fairy Glen.’

  I stared at my sister, amazed at her heroism.

  ‘No, Cassie, I won’t hear of it,’ said Mother. ‘You’re halfway through your apprenticeship. You’ll start earning next year. It would be madness to throw up your position now.’

  Cassie slumped with relief.

  ‘But . . . what are we going to do?’ I said.

  Mother bent her head, not looking at me. She stirred her tea, though it had gone lukewarm.

  ‘I think you’ll have to start at the factory, Opal,’ she said.

  I was so shocked I could scarcely breathe.

  ‘Opal?’ gasped Cassie.

  ‘She’s fourteen. There’s many a lass of fourteen who goes to work,’ said Mother, still staring down at her teacup.

  ‘But I’ve got my scholarship!’ I said. ‘I’m going to stay on at school and take my exams. Father says I might even go to university.’

  ‘Yes, well, your father has no say in things now. And I can’t quite see the point of all that schooling – it doesn’t teach you anything useful. It’s time you started work, Opal. You can always catch up with your book learning later.’

  ‘Not at Fairy Glen, though!’ said Cassie. ‘Can’t Opal start an apprenticeship like me?’

  ‘No she can’t,’ Mother snapped. ‘She needs to start earning money.’

  ‘What about one of the shops in town?’

  ‘I’ve told you, there are no positions anywhere. The only place needing girls is the factory. So that’s where she’s going. Starting Monday,’ said Mother. ‘I’ve fixed it.’

  ‘But she’ll hate it. Opal will be so different from all the other girls,’ said Cassie.

  ‘It’s time she learned to fit in. Stop looking at me like that, both of you. I don’t want her to have to leave school. I tried to get a job at the factory myself, I keep telling you. There isn’t any other option. You’ll have to like it or lump it.’ Mother stirred her tea so violently that the cup tipped and spilled all over the green chenille cloth. She and Cassie mopped and wrung the cloth and dabbed at the wooden table underneath. I sat in a daze, tea all over my blouse and tunic.

  ‘Opal! Shift yourself! You’re sopping wet. It’s going to be the devil of a job to get those tea-stains out if you don’t soak those clothes immediately,’ Mother told me.

  ‘I don’t care. It doesn’t matter anyway. I’m not going to be wearing them again, am I?’ I said, and then I burst into tears.

  I went up to my room, took off my uniform, and lay on my bed in my underwear, howling. How could Mother say I had to leave school? If Father knew, he’d be horrified. He’d been so proud of me when I won my scholarship. I’d worked hard. I might wind up old Mounty sometimes, but I was still top of the class in every subject except art – and that was simply my pride, because I wouldn’t work Miss Reed’s boring way. I was clever. I was going to go on and come top in every exam and go to university. Intelligence was my only asset. I was small and plain and prickly, with lank hair, weak eyes and a sharp tongue. I was nothing without my scholarship. I couldn’t give it all up! Especially not to work at the Fairy Glen factory!

  It was at the south end of town, near the railway station, where the houses were terraced and tumbledown. The streets were so narrow the mothers slung their washing on lines across the cobbles and their children dodged in and out of the wet sheets, patterning them with sooty handprints. The women were big and blousy, with great swollen stomachs. The men wore cloth caps and shirts without collars and were drunk every night. I’d never seen them drunk of course, but Mother had given us dark warnings, especially about the young men. The young women were the most frightening – bold girls who wandered around with linked arms and whistled and shouted and swore. I had seen these girls. Once, when I was fetching shoes from the cobbler’s at the railway station, three brassy girls had mocked my accent and laughed at me. I’d done my best to ignore them, but I’d blushed furiously, and this had made them laugh even more.

  Now Mother wanted me to work in the factory alongside awful girls like that!

  ‘I won’t, I won’t, I won’t!’ I muttered. ‘I hate Mother. I hate Father, because it’s all his stupid fault. I hate them.’

  But that made me feel so bad I hated myself even more. I wanted to be good, to be mature and silently long-suffering. Perhaps I should go to the factory and earn enough to feed my family without complaint. I tried to stop crying and calm myself. I rehearsed it inside my head: I’d go downstairs, kiss Mother, and tell her not to worry any more. I knew it couldn’t be helped so I’d start earning my living and work hard. I’d be a dutiful daughter.

  I couldn’t make myself do it. I lay there sobbing instead, though I was hurting my eyes and giving myself a thumping headache. After a long while Cassie came in and sat down on the edge of my bed.

  ‘You poor old thing,’ she said, and she put her cool hand on my burning forehead. ‘I’ve been arguing with Mother, you know. It really isn’t fair on you. It would be better for me to go to Fairy Glen, seeing as I’ve left school already, but she won’t hear of it. I mean, I quite like it at Madame Alouette’s. She’s not a bad old stick, and it’s fun being in the fashion world and I’m actually getting quite good at making all the hats – but it’s not as if I’m going to be doing it for the rest of my life. Catch me ending up a fussy old spinster like Madame herself. As soon as the right man comes along I’ll be off like a shot. But it’s different for you, Opie.’

  ‘So I’m clearly destined to be a fussy old spinster . . .’ I said, blowing my nose.

  ‘No, I didn’t mean that! But you want to be one of these new independent women who work and campaign and all that other boring stuff. You’re a brainy bluestocking already. It’s hateful that you have to throw away all your chances. How are you going to cope at Fairy Glen? Those girls will make mincemeat of you.’

  ‘Shut up, Cass,’ I said, but I gave her a big hug all the same.

  I couldn’t come down and make my peace with Mother. When I eventually got to sleep, I had nightmares, dreaming of a vast rattling machine in a bleak factory. I was seized by a crowd of raucous girls and stuffed right inside it. I felt the machine crunching my bones, mangling me flat. I fought wildly and woke with my bed sheets tangled around my arms and legs.

  I spent most of the weekend in my room, painting pictures of dark satanic mills with towering chimneys, though I knew perfectly well that the Fairy Glen factory was a squat, white-walled building with no Gothic features whatsoever.

  I tried to read too, but for once I couldn’t concentrate on storybooks. My own life seemed to be veering outlandishly into melodrama, so that the troubled lives of the young David Copperfield and Jane Eyre seemed prosaic by comparison.

  I wasn’t used