Opal Plumstead Read online

  ‘No! Billy, don’t! Please don’t!’ I screamed.

  Billy aimed his little blue body like an arrow. He flew straight through the gap in the curtains, out into the air.

  ‘Come back!’ I called.

  Billy flew away, so fast that I lost sight of him in seconds.

  I threw myself down on Father’s side of the bed and cried.

  WE HAD TO wait a whole month, but then we received a letter from Father.

  My dearest Lou, Cassie and Opal,

  I worry about you every minute of the day. I am so horribly aware that I have inflicted hardship and humiliation upon you. I will do everything in my power to make it up to you in the future.

  Until then, please remember that I am your very loving husband and father,

  Ernest

  The writing was shaky and sloped crookedly down the page. The letter seemed pitifully short for a man who had filled so many manuscript books with his stories. He didn’t tell us anything at all about his health or his circumstances. He didn’t answer a single one of my questions or give so much as a hint about his daily routine in prison or his diet or his companions. There was no personal message for me, though I was the only one who had written to him at length. As far as I knew, Mother hadn’t written to him at all, and yet Father had addressed her as, ‘My dearest Lou’. I was simply ‘and Opal’.

  I hadn’t told Father very much about working at Fairy Glen, so I couldn’t expect him to write extra sympathetically to me, but surely he must be aware that my whole life had changed now? Had he forgotten? Did he think I was still at school and that somehow good fairies paid the rent and made the food appear in the larder by magic?

  I took pride in my weekly salary, handed to me in a buff envelope every Friday morning – a ten-shilling note and a shiny shilling coin. A few weeks ago this would have seemed a fortune: enough for a storybook, a sketchpad and a tin of crayons, and several bags of Fairy Glen sweets. Now this sum seemed piteously small. After the rent money was put aside, we didn’t have much left for food. We chose day-old bread because it was a penny cheaper, fatty mince and scrag-end of lamb, streaky bacon and dubious market eggs. We ate endless mounds of potato because it was cheap and filling. It was fattening too. Cassie squealed in shock when she found she could barely do up the buttons on her beautiful green dress.

  ‘I shall starve myself for an entire week. I cannot bear being stout,’ she declared dramatically.

  She refused her Sunday roast lunch, the one good meal in the week, but became so hungry she ate five slices of bread and dripping at bed time.

  ‘I don’t suppose it matters,’ she said mournfully, her mouth full. ‘There won’t be any occasion for me to wear my wretched dress now. I’d better resign myself to being a fat old maid for the rest of my life.’

  But the very next day, when I trailed home from the factory, I found Cassie all of a twinkle, dancing around the kitchen.

  ‘Oh, Opal, such a lovely gentleman came to Madame Alouette’s today. Quite old, I suppose – at least thirty, but, oh so handsome – dark, with thick wavy hair, a little long, and the most wonderful warm brown eyes. You know the way some men can look at you and you simply melt!’ she said, whirling about.

  ‘No I don’t,’ I said.

  ‘He was dressed so exquisitely too, with a purple scarf and a velvet jacket cut in the most gloriously artistic way, but not at all foppish. Mr Evandale’s a truly manly man,’ said Cassie.

  ‘Why is a truly manly man frequenting a milliner’s shop?’ I said sourly.

  ‘Because he’s choosing a special hat for his younger sister, as a surprise. He persuaded me to model for him, as he said I was a very similar size and colouring. Well . . .’ Cassie went a proud pink. ‘He said I was a little prettier, but I’m sure he just said that to be congenial.’

  ‘Now, Cassie, you mustn’t let a gentleman like that turn your head,’ said Mother. ‘If he’s thirty he must be married – or a very bad sort. He definitely shouldn’t be flirting with a young girl like you.’

  ‘He behaved with complete propriety,’ Cassie said, but there were little dimples in her cheeks and she couldn’t stop smiling.

  ‘Now, now, aren’t there any nice young gentlemen around? Did you not say that Madame Alouette’s nephew was currently visiting?’

  ‘Philip. Or Philippe, as silly old Madame calls him. Now he is a fop. I’ve never known such a vain young man, peering in all the shop mirrors and asking me earnestly for advice about the cut of his new coat,’ Cassie said scornfully.

  ‘There! If he’s asking your advice, he’s clearly interested in you,’ said Mother.

  ‘But I’m not interested in him. He’s so pale and slender. He can’t even stand up straight without wilting. If we were ever to embrace, I’m sure I’d knock him over. Whereas Mr Evandale . . .’ Cassie was clearly imagining an embrace with this Mr Evandale, her twinkles and dimples even more in evidence.

  ‘You watch yourself, madam.’

  Although I had no interest in men whatsoever, it was a little galling to note that Mother did not feel it necessary to give me lectures about men, suitable or otherwise. She thought me far too plain to attract anyone at all. Strangely, she was wrong.

  I was becoming quite friendly with Geoff, but in the most platonic, big brother–younger sister way. He was very comforting, especially when Patty and Nora were especially tormenting.

  ‘They’re silly girls but they’re not bad. Try laughing along with them,’ he kept suggesting.

  ‘Why should I laugh when they’re being so horrid?’ I asked. ‘And why do they keep picking on me?’

  ‘It’s because you’re new – and you’re little,’ said Geoff. ‘It’s not nice, but it’s human nature. My little girl, Jenny, is barely two, but she’s desperate to play out in the alley with the big children. She frets and screams and kicks at the door until her mother gives in and takes her outside. She’ll only get five minutes’ peace, because there’s screams all over again. And when she goes running, she finds our Jenny tipped over in the gutter and the other children nowhere in sight.’

  ‘But that’s awful when she’s only a baby,’ I said.

  ‘It’s just the way of things. They don’t mean her any real harm. They’ll get used to her and let her in on their games soon enough. And then, when she’s bigger and there’s a new little’un sent out to play, I dare say she’ll tip it over and run away laughing with all the others,’ said Geoff. ‘Human nature, see?’

  ‘I don’t want to see, because it’s thoroughly depressing,’ I said. ‘I don’t like human beings.’

  But I did like Geoff and his gentle ways and his cheerful acceptance of his lot in life.

  I liked Mr Beeston too, once I got used to his dry sense of humour. He seemed popular with most of the factory folk, which was most unusual, according to Maggie and Jess.

  ‘Most factory managers are hated because they have such power over you – they can send you packing on a whim. But old Beeswax is a fair man, kindly even, though he can be firm too, and sharp. You wouldn’t want to cross him. But if you work hard, he’ll act like he’s right proud of you,’ they said.

  So I liked Mr Beeston and I liked Geoff. I didn’t like Freddy, the lad on the factory floor who whistled at me, but he certainly seemed to like me. He did that dreadful whistle every day without fail. It was shrill and high-pitched. After a week of cringing I went up to him and said, ‘Please don’t whistle at me like that, it embarrasses me.’

  He seemed embarrassed himself, his pale face flushing tomato red. He was usually colourless, his lank hair so blond it was almost white, and the fluffy whiskers growing above his lip white too. I felt mean for considering him a bit of a freak. I knew I was certainly no top-notcher. My hair and face and hands were grey by mid-morning, and even freshly scrubbed, I was lamentably plain – small and scrawny, with spectacles to boot. But Freddy seemed as moon-dazzled as Titania lusting over Bottom. ‘I whistle because I like you,’ he said, touching his red cheeks as if st