‘They said that last year. But even if it is, I don’t want a baby yet.’ Jenny looked shocked. ‘Now you think I’m horrible, don’t you?’
‘No. I think you’re wrong. If I had a husband like your Bill, I’d have a dozen kids,’ Jenny laughed. ‘I’d enjoy making every one of them too.’
‘Jenny… You are terrible.’ Margaret gave her friend a gentle shove towards the door. ‘Come on, let’s go. It doesn’t look like Bill’s coming for me tonight. I’ll go home on the bus with you.’
It was handy for Margaret that Jenny lived in north west London. They travelled to work together most days and if Bill was stuck somewhere in the ambulance and couldn’t pick her up, she travelled home with Jenny. As a Londoner, Jenny had been riding on buses and underground trains all her life. Margaret admired her. She knew all the routes and showed Margaret alternative ways of getting to and from the West End without going on the underground.
‘I passed my driving test with flying colours, but I failed the medical,’ Margaret heard Jenny say as she opened the stage door. ‘I’m only working as an usherette until I find a driving job. So if they ever need an ambulance driver at St. Thomas’s you will think of me, won’t you, Bill?’
‘Er hum! Is that my husband you’re trying to lead astray?’
Bill laughed. Sitting astride his Triumph motorbike, he leant sideways and kissed Margaret full on the lips. ‘No such luck. Pretty girls have given up on me now I’m an old married man,’ he laughed, handing Margaret her motorbike helmet.
Every time Jenny saw Bill during the weeks that followed she pestered him about vacancies at St. Thomas’s. She played up to him, jokingly begging him to put her name forward if a driving job, or any job, on the ambulances came up. And her persistence paid off. Squealing with excitement, Jenny threw her arms around Bill’s neck. ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you!’
‘Thank you for what?’ Margaret asked, joining Bill and Jenny outside the theatre.
‘There’s a vacancy at St. Thomas’s and Bill’s put my name forward. Isn’t he wonderful?’ Jenny said.
‘Yes, he is wonderful. And I’ll have him back now, if you don’t mind.’
‘Sorry,’ Jenny said, giggling. ‘I got a bit carried away. What happens now?’ she asked, her arms firmly by her side.
‘Go down to Tommy’s tomorrow; they’re expecting you at eleven--’ Jenny squealed. ‘And fill in an application form. Write down your driving experience and don’t forget to tell them about your qualifications. Take anything you’ve got on paper. They’ll ask to see proof.’
‘I will.’ Jenny jumped up and down. ‘And then what?’
Bill laughed. ‘You wait. They’ll let you know if you’ve been accepted.’
The following week Jenny was offered a job as a trainee ambulance driver. The next week she took the driving course, the following week the advanced course – and passed both with flying colours. The week after that she left the Prince Albert Theatre.
Jenny’s replacement was another married girl. She brought sandwiches on matinee days, instead of going out for tea, and left the theatre as soon as the curtain came down at night. Without Jenny to pal up with, Margaret was bored between the matinee and the evening show and often stayed in the theatre by herself. She eventually got to know the other usherettes and one day while they were having their tea break in the cramped staff room she let slip her ambition to be an actress. ‘My stage name,’ Margaret said, pausing to make sure she had their full attention, ‘will be Miss Margot Dudley.’
The spinsters looked at Margaret as if she’d said she was going to be a Spitfire pilot.
‘You should have a baby,’ one of the married girls said.
‘You won’t have time for daydreaming then,’ her friend said, sarcastically.
‘I shall have a baby one day,’ Margaret told them. ‘When the war ends, Bill and I are going back to the Midlands. And as soon as we’ve found somewhere nice to live, we’re going to start a family. It’s just that I’ve always wanted to--’
Miss Smith and Miss Timmins, dressed in plain brown skirts and white blouses under knitted waistcoats, looked at each other, wrinkled their beaked noses and left.
That night as she was leaving the theatre, Margaret heard one of them say, ‘Who does she think she is?’ and the other said, ‘Miss La Di Dah, that’s who.’ She couldn’t tell who said what because not only did they sound alike, they were shrouded in dark overcoats and wore trilbies over their short grey hair.
They went off cackling like a pair of old witches. It was the first time Margaret had heard the spinsters laugh. And it was the first time she’d felt unhappy in her job.
‘Jealous! That’s what they are,’ she told Bill when he picked her up later. ‘In future I shall keep myself to myself like they do.’
Bill smiled, but didn’t comment. His wife couldn’t keep herself to herself if her life depended on it.
The afternoons and evenings ticked by without incident, and Margaret began to put her plan into action. As soon as the lights in the auditorium went out, before the curtain rose and the stage lights came on, Margaret turned towards her seat. Her eyes darted from one exit to the other, taking in the usherettes, to make sure Miss Lesley wasn’t with them. Then, quickly and quietly, she made her way to the back of the stalls. Beneath the overhang of the circle, along the walkway that ran parallel with the stage, Margaret was able to watch the show unobserved.
Tap, tap, heel tap – and arms like a windmill. And tap, tap, heel tap – and scoop and tap and scoop and tap. Tap, tap, heel tap… Every night, Margaret practised the dances until she
