Opal Plumstead Read online

  ‘It’s so bizarre,’ said Patty. ‘We don’t often see Kingtown in the newspapers. My pa pointed it out to me. He reads the newspaper from cover to cover. This column here is all about someone called Plumstead. Now there’s a familiar name!’

  ‘Our Opal Plumbrain?’ said Nora. ‘Tell, Patty!’ She laughed, thinking Patty was about to invent some outlandish story.

  ‘Stop your nonsense now, Pattacake,’ said Geoff.

  ‘It’s not nonsense, Geoff. It’s all here in black and white – see: page seven, column three. All about this Ernest Plumstead chap. Oh, what a bad boy he’s been. Cooking the books at his office for years, but now he’s been nicked. He was up for trial yesterday and he’s got his come-uppance. A year’s hard labour!’

  ‘Stop it,’ I said. My throat was so dry my voice cracked.

  ‘Who is this Ernest Plumbrain? He has to be some swanky relation of yours. A cousin? Maybe an uncle?’

  ‘He’s my father,’ I said hoarsely.

  ‘Your father?’ For a moment Patty looked surprised, and then she burst out laughing.

  It was enough. I ran across the room, snatched the newspaper and pushed her violently in the chest. She gasped and then slapped me. I sprang at her and we both fell to the floor, screaming and punching and kicking, knocking over a whole pile of starch boxes.

  All the girls yelled, and Geoff and George shouted and tried to drag us apart, but nothing could stop me now. Patty was bigger and stronger than me, but I was filled with such fury that I couldn’t stop hitting her, even when she took hold of my head and banged it on the floorboards. I scratched her face and pulled her hair free of her cap and tugged it as hard as I could. I was suddenly aware that the yelling all around us had stopped. There was an ominous silence in the room.

  Patty suddenly gasped and let me go. She scrambled to her feet. ‘Sorry, missus,’ she mumbled, tucking her hair back under her cap.

  I leaned up on one elbow and peered blearily through the clouds of starch. A woman was standing in the doorway. She was tall and dignified, wearing her white overall with an air of authority. She was the beautifully spoken woman I’d once met in the ladies’ room.

  ‘What on earth is going on here?’ she said.

  ‘Beg pardon, Mrs Roberts,’ said George. ‘Just a bit of a scrap between the girls.’

  Mrs Roberts? Oh my Lord, the Mrs Roberts who owned Fairy Glen?

  ‘I can’t have this sort of behaviour in my factory,’ she said. She looked at Patty. ‘How dare you attack a little girl half your size?’

  ‘I didn’t, missus,’ said Patty.

  ‘I saw you with my own eyes beating her head on the floor.’

  ‘Yes, but Opal hit her first!’ said Nora – and half the other girls echoed her.

  Mrs Roberts shook her head.

  ‘I reckon it was six of one and half a dozen of the other. Young Opal might have started the rough play, but she was severely provoked,’ said Geoff.

  ‘Did you start the fight, Opal?’ asked Mrs Roberts.

  ‘Yes I did!’ I stood up, rubbing my eyes. My hair had tumbled down, my overall was torn, and my nose was bleeding. ‘I hit her and I’m not one bit ashamed of it. I’d like to hit her again and again and again.’

  ‘That’s enough,’ said Mrs Roberts. ‘You two girls, tidy yourselves. I’ll see you in my office in five minutes.’ She turned and walked off, briskly brushing starch from her overall.

  ‘Well, you’ve really been and gone and done it now, young Opal,’ said Geoff. ‘Whatever’s got into you?’

  ‘Why did you have to goad her, Patty?’ said George. He picked up the pieces of the tattered newspaper and tore them to shreds with his big hands.

  ‘I didn’t twig it was her father,’ said Patty. She was gingerly feeling her face. ‘I didn’t think she’d go for me like a wildcat.’

  ‘You’ve got a scratch this long, Pats! She wants locking up, that one,’ said Nora.

  ‘Poor Patty,’ said Edith, offering her own rather grubby handkerchief.

  Beeston came rushing in, his hat at a slant, out of breath from flying up the stairs. ‘What’s happened? I’ve just seen Mrs Roberts. Who was fighting?’ He looked around. It was easy to see it was Patty and me.

  ‘I can’t believe it. You two of all people! You’re my senior girl, Patty Meacham, with all the privileges – and you’re supposed to be the bright quick learner, Opal Plumstead. I had high expectations of both of you. How dare you let me down like this! And to have the stupidity to pick a day when Mrs Roberts is doing an inspection. I’ll never live it down. Well, don’t just stand there gawping at me, you pair of ninnies. Get yourselves to her office, pronto.’ He shook his head so hard he nearly dislodged his hat.

  I didn’t know where Mrs Roberts’ office was. I had to follow Patty down the stairs and across the factory floor. The men and women downstairs stared at us. They’d obviously heard all the shouting and thumping. Freddy was white-faced and stricken.

  ‘Oh, Opal, you’re not going to get the sack, are you?’ he wailed.

  I shrugged at him, trying not to cry. It was all very well feeling triumphant that I’d held my own against hateful Patty. What if I did lose my job? I couldn’t stand it at Fairy Glen, but I knew enough to realize that it was the biggest and best factory for miles, with the fairest conditions and the highest rates of pay. If I got dismissed without a reference, I’d be totally stuck. We needed my wages to survive.

  I followed Patty off the main factory floor, along the corridor, then down to a door at the end. She turned to face me. She was biting her lips, her eyes desperate. Perhaps she was terrified of losing her job too. She was very white, so the scratch on her face stood out lividly. I wiped my nose, which was still bleeding. Look at the pair of us! How could she not dismiss us?

  Patty took a deep breath and then knocked on the door.

  ‘Come in,’ Mrs Roberts called. Her voice was severe. This was far worse than being sent in disgrace to the headmistress.

  Patty opened the door. I started to follow, but Mrs Roberts stopped me.

  ‘One at a time,’ she said. ‘You wait outside.’

  I had to stand by myself in the corridor, waiting. I leaned against the wall, my head throbbing, my whole body sore and hurting. I had to keep sniffing fiercely to stop my nose dribbling. Eventually I used my overall cuff, and it came away smeared with blood.

  I couldn’t believe how my whole life had changed in just a few short months. I hadn’t realized how happy I’d been back at school with Olivia. I had often wasted time feeling miserable or restless when I actually had everything: my scholarship, my dear best friend, my own family of four. Oh, Father, I thought wretchedly. I couldn’t bear it that he was in the national newspapers. The Daily News was ripped to shreds now, but perhaps I ought to buy another, just to see how his case was reported. Then I would tear that up too. I’d buy all the newspapers in the shop and destroy them. I had a sudden mad vision of rushing from shop to shop all over the country, tearing up newspapers until my hands bled.

  Patty was in with Mrs Roberts a long, long time. I tried creeping right up to the door and putting my ear against it, but I couldn’t hear properly. There was just a low murmur and then a sound of sobbing. Patty sobbing? Then Mrs Roberts must have dismissed her!

  I loathed Patty. But even so my stomach lurched. Patty was hateful to me, but she was tolerably good at her job. She took care to come in late as a matter of pride, but she could mould faster and more neatly than most, and she kept her eye on the other girls and made sure their work was up to scratch. She was a spiteful bully and yet they all looked up to her. I’d heard them talking about her family. She was the eldest of eight and had an invalid father, so her wages were vital. How would they manage now that Patty had lost her job?

  She came out at last, her face blotchy, her eyes red. She didn’t even glance at me. She ran down the corridor towards the ladies’ room.

  ‘Patty?’ I called, but she ignored me.

  I knocked on