Eighty Not Out (6 page)

6

Work, Recreation and Liaisons

B
y the time I was fourteen the three-year disparity in age between me and my best friends was more apparent. Annie, temporarily in remission from anorexia, had been accepted by the
WAAF
. Celia, now a succulent young woman, had joined the Women's Royal Naval Service based on
HMS
Caroline
at Sydenham, under the command of the Earl of Kilmorey, whom she worshipped. We kept in touch by meeting for coffee either in Robinson and Cleaver's restaurant, or Campbell's Coffee Shop opposite Belfast City Hall. The latter was furnished with art deco scarlet upholstered chairs with tubular steel frames, grouped around low red metal-topped tables; the walls had been decorated by Rowel Friers, with cartoons of local characters. The coffee, served in mugs, was deplorable by today's standards, but Campbell's rolls, liberally filled with a mixture of bacon and mushrooms, chopped hard-boiled egg, sardines, or grated cheese and chutney, were deservedly popular and, at three pence, very good value. There was also a variety of sticky, fruit-spotted buns topped with a swirl of white icing. The first floor was favoured by artists, architects, playwrights, and the embryonic Reverend Ian Paisley, who even then, had a loyal circle of acolytes. The ground floor was where teachers from Inst and other grammar schools, my own included, socialised after school. Among them, Celia's mother, who had, to universal astonishment, a science degree, and had been recruited to fill a gap caused by loss of staff to the forces. Memorably, on spotting one of the few African students at Queen's, she was heard to say: ‘It's funny them being black and us being white.' By this time she was a widow. Celia's father, an imposing figure, always dressed in a fine tweed suit, was a Great War survivor, probably suffering from depression, though this was never mentioned. He drank heavily, about which his wife spoke in confidence to my mother, who otherwise seldom had much in common with my friends' parents. On one of his regular coastal walks, he fell to his death from the path onto rocks near Helen's Bay. There was a lot of gossip about whether it was suicide, or whether he had been drunk, and lost his footing. Celia had loved him very much, and I too had been fond of him.

Celia's plumply packed
WRNS
's costume gave her the edge over me in my navy blue and maroon sixth-form school uniform, although, after removing the elastic chin-strap, it was possible to adjust the brim of the maroon felt winter hat to a becoming angle, and in spring the beret, also carefully angled, could look almost Parisian. Such modifications, combined with copious amounts of lipstick, did not escape notice and one of my teachers, who must have spotted me in Campbell's Coffee Shop in central Belfast, reported them to our head. I was carpeted for degrading the image of the school, of which I should be a proud ambassadress, should be ashamed of myself, show some respect for tradition, and so on.

A group of international bridge players met regularly in Campbell's: these predators made a determined effort to tempt us with offers of lessons to take place in the evenings at a venue in Duncairn Avenue. We were not interested in learning this social accomplishment, although Celia was tempted by the fact that one of the pair had influence within the Group Theatre. I wonder, had they been more attractive, whether we might have succumbed. Most persistent were a portly, balding man in his late forties and his bridge-playing partner, who liked to be addressed as ‘Major'. The latter was sinister, with cold reptilian eyes and tinted glasses – a Bond film character. Our evasive tactics became transparent to the point that they finally got the message, blanking us thereafter.

Many factors led to Celia and me drifting apart: I had developed vague leftist tendencies and, in the absence of a Communist candidate, my first vote went to a Labour candidate at Sydenham. My mother must have been hurt by this break with Conservatism, which had been taken for granted in her family. Free love was in, Empire and the royal family were out, and I despised those dark-suited, bowler-hatted Orangemen with their Lambeg drums, twirling batons and banners of King Billy on his white horse. Celia was deeply wary of Roman Catholics, and habitually referred to working-class people in lofty tones: ‘What else can you expect from these people?' Obsessed by fear of ‘ending up on the shelf', her ambition was to marry early and bear many children. Having already seen off a number of ardent suitors, she regaled me with details of how far they had gone without actually ‘doing it'. She was determined to reach the altar a virgin. I had other plans.

Celia had not long to wait. The directors and trainee managers of Ewart's linen mills were habitués at Campbell's, and one of these, an ex-
RAF
officer, was not long divorced from the wife he had married in a whirlwind wartime romance. Tall, personable, socially well-connected, and an Oxford graduate, he was thirtyeight by the time he met Celia. She told me how much more secure she felt in the company of a mature man, compared with the callow youths she had gone out with in the past. Their engagement was announced, despite the social ostracism that still lingered where divorced persons were concerned. Celia's mother was none too pleased, nor was the prospective groom's ambitious American mother, who felt her son had learned little from his earlier experience. His father, on the contrary, was indulgent, having also fallen under the spell of Celia's pneumatic charms.

Meanwhile, in September 1945 I drifted into an apprenticeship with a commercial photographic firm in Belfast owned by the husband of a woman my mother had befriended at the group which met to knit balaclavas, scarves, socks, mittens and gloves for the forces. My mother paid £500 for the apprenticeship, which was to last three years: I was to be paid thirty shillings a week during the first year, £3 the second, and £5 in the final year. He got a good deal – an efficient slave for three years. The premises were Dickensian: a long, narrow slice of property fronted Howard Street; the gated porch, which it was my job to sweep, gathered litter and stray cats, and was sometimes used as a urinal – thankfully syringes and condoms were not yet commonplace. There was a display window, the dressing of which was also my responsibility; behind that, a reception area and waiting room, leading to the finishing room/general office, and then a warren of darkrooms, containing enlargers, sinks, cascade washers and flat-bed driers. A corridor shelved with negatives, both glass and celluloid, led to a recess for a mirror and hooks for outdoor clothing. At the end was the lavatory: lit only by a tiny cobwebbed skylight, it, like the rest of the premises, had neither handbasin nor ventilation. The pan was brownish yellow with age and worse; I do not recall there being a brush or tin of Harpic, but a charwoman sometimes appeared accompanied by the owner's wife.

I negotiated a higher salary, eventually screwing seven guineas a week out of him by the time, in 1951, I decided there must be more to life than spending much of it in a darkroom. I enrolled for a seven-month course in shorthand and typing; book-keeping was part of it, but after a week it was agreed this was a waste of everyone's time, so I concentrated on keyboard skills instead. This was probably the wisest decision of my life: I have used a keyboard, in one form or another, on an almost daily basis, ever since.

The tennis club, where I spent most evenings in summer, was in south Belfast, so I would go straight from work by tram to the Stranmillis terminus and walk along the Lagan towpath to the clubhouse. From September through to April many hours were spent at the ice rink at Balmoral – even more distant from home. At work I met colourful people, many of whom had escaped from Nazi Germany just before the war, and a few survivors of concentration camps. The Jewish community worked untiringly on their behalf, and many were talented musicians and artists. Heinz and Alice Hammerschlag were violinists belonging to the Music Society, but Alice was also a gifted artist who painted abstract designs in the early days of acrylic paints under her maiden name (Berger). I have one of her paintings and some hang in the Ulster Museum. Some, such as Zoltan Frankl, the art collector who established a knitting factory in Newtownards, were active in any local artistic enterprise: I was always on the fringe, having nothing to contribute, everything to learn, and despite good school French, being virtually monolingual.

Many of the girls at the club fitted Betjeman's description of Joan Hunter Dunn – wholesome, hearty, outdoor types and probably good breeding material. Though not unpopular, I did not fit the image. Derek, one of the male friends I made, was five years older, sang in a light-opera group, was interested in ballet and played a fair game of tennis; additional attractions were that his office was near my workplace and he drove an
MG
sports car. It made sense therefore to hitch a lift, rather than take the slow, clanking tram to Stranmillis. We went to many ballet performances at the Grand Opera House during the years 1945–47. Only when an indiscreet friend told me that Derek had confided that he did not seem to feel the same way as the rest of the men about women did I begin to understand why our relationship remained platonic. Twenty years were to pass before homosexual acts between consenting adults became legal.

On my miserable salary I maintained a fashionable image, devoting far too much thought and time thereto. The New Look arrived to lift female spirits after years of utility clothing. But evening dresses posed a problem, in that they now used yards of fabric, which was costly, and required clothing coupons. My mother really enjoyed making ball gowns, and was unstinting with her time and sewing skills: I wish I had expressed appreciation more than I did, but she had to be discouraged from adding ‘little touches' to otherwise plain styles. Sometimes she won: my first formal dress was pale blue taffeta, after Gainsborough's
Blue Lady
– at the final fitting an intricate panel of appliquéd silk flowers appeared at mid-calf level on the lower skirt. Economy still reigned in 1948, when I wore a black silk taffeta skirt inherited from Grandma Eileen who had died the previous year. Evening shoes were almost impossible to buy, and I remember painting, with limited success, a brown suede pair belonging to my mother with silver paint. Finally persistence was rewarded when I tracked down some gold brocade shoes with a high wedge heel and peep toes – they cost a crippling three guineas.

With various escorts I always enjoyed a visit to the Grand Opera House. A celebration of late Victorian exuberance, complete with gilded elephants, red velvet curtains and seating, during the immediate post-war years it hosted many ballet companies. Ballet Jooss proved too avant-garde, but Mona Inglesby's International Ballet, although not top grade, introduced a thirsty public to the great classics of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries:
Swan Lake, Les Sylphides, Sleeping Beauty, Coppélia, The Nutcracker, Don Quixote
, even
Scheherazade
. Dame Marie Rambert brought her own company with the young John Gilpin fresh from Sadler's Wells, when it was already clear that he would go far. I shall always remember his Albrecht in
Giselle
. Kenneth MacMillan had a commanding stage presence by the age of nineteen when he came to Northern Ireland with Sadler's Wells, which staged a brilliant performance of Bizet's newly discovered
Symphony in C
, and Kodály's
Dances of Galánta
.

I became friendly with a Royal Navy lieutenant who had seen active service but now had a shore job. He looked like James Mason, played reasonable tennis and, in addition, was a fair skater. He was musical and had his own violin, which he insisted on bringing to our house to give a recital. This did not go down well with Auntie Rosemary, who had ambitions of her own in that field, nor did the fact that he was thirty-eight, the same age as she. We went to cinemas and dances, and he taught me marksmanship at the Customs House rifle range. After dances, in the back seat of the car, he would cradle me in his arms, and maunder on about his working-class childhood in north-east England, how he had worked his way up from doing paper deliveries, through grammar school, ultimately becoming a lieutenant in the navy. He was fond of me to the extent of addressing notes to ‘Dearest Bluebell', and was generous with gifts. Transferred back to England, he disappeared from my life.

There were other men to whom I did not get so close. Then there was Douglas, also ex-Royal Navy, who had come to Belfast as an apprentice mill-manager at Ewart's. He too was twice my age, and lived in digs in Eglantine Avenue, where he would take me after skating, for which he made an acceptable dance partner. His orientation was not in doubt, as, given the opportunity, he would fling himself on me without preliminaries and thrust his tongue down my gagging throat, only detaching himself after a sharp knee jab in the groin. He was a pompous public school product, and parsimonious – using a tray purse when we went to the cinema – so I gave him the push.

Now, without a skating partner, I began to cast my net again. It was not long before another victim presented: this one had the advantage of playing tennis as well. The Canadian aircraft carrier
Magnificent
was undergoing trials at Sydenham Docks, and many of its officers lodged in the Malone or Stranmillis districts of the city. Harry, the chief engineer, joined my tennis club in the summer of 1947 when I was nineteen; he too was thirty-eight, and a dead-ringer for John Mills.

Soon he asked me to dinner at the Grosvenor Rooms – where the Europa Hotel now stands – then considered the most fashionable place to eat. At last I was catching up with Celia's sophisticated lifestyle, having too long envied her accounts of dinners eaten and drinks drunk – Pimm's was her favourite – at this restaurant. I do not remember much about the meals, apart from Harry asking for French fries, and the waiter not understanding what was required. He was not a culture vulture, so most of our outings were to cinemas. I brought him home to meet my mother and aunt. Rosemary was by now working for a radiologist in private practice; the fact that she was the same age as my swain was again not a plus point, although I chose to ignore it. His Irish ancestors had emigrated from Ennistymon not far from the Cliffs of Moher in County Clare; his childhood was spent in London, Ontario, before he went to university to study engineering, prior to joining the Royal Canadian Navy. None of us enquired, nor were we told much, about his extended family; his mother and sister sent parcels of fruit cake and other delicacies unobtainable or scarce in Northern Ireland, and he sometimes went to Donegal in the Republic on shopping expeditions, bringing back nylon stockings – this was before the life-transforming advent of tights – and lengths of Donegal tweed, destined for Canada, where it was regarded as very fashionable.