Forgotten Dreams (7 page)
Lottie thought her mother had stiffened when she had mentioned Rhyl, but as she chattered on she saw Louella relax and when she had described in detail how the young ladies in the rock factory created sticks of the sweetmeat simply by pulling, she was pretty sure that her mother would never again try to stop her visiting Rhyl.
‘Well I never! I don’t know where I got the impression that you were going to Llandudno, but I reckon Rhyl’s more fun for youngsters,’ Louella said when her daughter had finished her recital. ‘Did you see anyone you knew besides kids and teachers from your school?’
‘Norra soul,’ Lottie said cheerfully and with complete truthfulness, for the boy might have thought he knew her but she most definitely had not known him. ‘Mind you, we didn’t really go into the town. We were on the beach, the prom and the pier, and we had our high tea in the Seagull restaurant, so I don’t suppose there were many local people around, just holidaymakers. Where did we live when we were in Rhyl, Louella? Were we there for ages? Baz said something about a circus . . .’
Louella looked startled, then nodded slowly. ‘Yes, we were with a circus for a little while but we were mostly at the Pavilion theatre. And don’t say “norra”, darling; it’s common. We were in Rhyl for a couple of years, I suppose, and before that we were in several different places. I doubt you’d remember them, even if you hadn’t had the accident, because small kids don’t remember much, do they?’
‘I don’t know; I can’t remember,’ Lottie said, giggling. ‘But the doctor thought I’d remember one day, didn’t he? And you’ve helped me an awful lot, teaching me the dances and the songs and that, what I’d forgotten, and reminding me how I had a little travelling bed and slept in it beside you, whenever we were on tour. And how you gave me Golly when I was one, and Baby Susan when I was two, and Teddy when I was three.’
‘And don’t forget that your daddy gave you Raggedy Jenny, just before he died,’ Louella said, dropping her voice impressively. ‘Poor Daddy. He’d so looked forward to having a little daughter of his own, and was so excited when he heard you’d been born, that he bought the doll and ran into the road to hail a tram so he could come and see us in the maternity ward. Only he didn’t notice the brewer’s dray thundering down upon him until it was too late. His last act had been to buy you that rag doll.’
Lottie opened her mouth to remind her mother that the last time she had mentioned the fatal accident, it had been a Guinness lorry which had ended her father’s life, then bit back the words. Her mother was a true actress, she reminded herself, and a born storyteller, fond of embroidering every tale she told or incident she described. She simply could not help it, and already Lottie had heard several versions of her father’s sad demise, including the best one, when he had slipped off the roundabout at the fair just as the traction engine which powered the amusements had come trundling past, ending his life in a manner most dramatic and terrible.
Max had been sitting at the kitchen table, eating his porridge, but now he looked up and cleared his throat. ‘Lou, my dear,’ he said, and there was definitely a note of amusement in his voice. ‘I was under the impression that Denham was killed by a Guinness lorry. You really must keep your imagination in check, you know.’
‘Oh, didn’t I say it was a Guinness lorry?’ Louella said, looking surprised. ‘But of course I wasn’t there myself, I was still in the maternity ward, with my darling little daughter. When they came and told me that poor Denham was dead I saw the whole scene so clearly in my mind’s eye that it was as though I had actually been present, but I dare say I got things a bit muddled.’
‘To be sure,’ Max said mildly. He grinned at Lottie, a companionable sort of grin which said
we know how she is, but we love her anyway
. ‘And now what about getting a few sandwiches and some fruit into a basket and heading for Prince’s Park?’
we know how she is, but we love her anyway
. ‘And now what about getting a few sandwiches and some fruit into a basket and heading for Prince’s Park?’
‘Of course; and if you think Kenny would like to come, Lottie darling, then you’d best go round and tell him to get himself ready,’ Louella said lazily. ‘I’ve got plenty of pilchard and tomato paste and some cheese so I can make sandwiches in a trice.’
‘I’ll help when I get back from next door,’ Lottie said eagerly as Max lounged out of the room. However, thinking it over she decided that right now would be a good time to ask a few questions herself. ‘When we were living in Rhyl, Louella, did we know someone called Sassy?’
Louella had been collecting her sandwich ingredients on the big wooden table, but for a moment it was as though she had been frozen in one position. Then she reached for the bread knife and the loaf and gave an exclamation of annoyance. ‘Oh, dammit, we’ve not got nearly enough bread! Nip round to the corner shop, darling, and ask Mr Andrews if he can spare me a loaf.’
‘I’ll go on my way back from seeing Kenny,’ Lottie said, knowing that the remark had been made simply to divert her thoughts whilst Louella decided how to answer. ‘But Mrs Brocklehurst makes her own bread and usually has some over. Shall I ask her if she can spare a loaf?’ Out of the corner of her eye she could see the bread bin standing on the pantry shelf, see the big white loaf inside it as well, and decided to persist. ‘Mam, I asked you if we knew anyone called Sassy . . .’
‘So you did,’ Louella said with apparent placidity. ‘And now I come to think, I bought a loaf as we left the theatre last evening – Sample’s were selling them off cheap – so there’s no need to trouble Mrs B. But if you truly want Kenny to come with us you’d better go round there right away.’
‘Mam . . . Louella . . . Mrs Magic . . . I asked you a question,’ Lottie almost shouted. ‘Did we know someone called Sassy when we lived in Rhyl? All you have to do is say yes or no.’
Her mother turned and gave her a long, speculative look. Then, smiling primly, she said, ‘No. Why do you ask?’
It was a masterly table-turning, and for a moment Lottie could only stare. Then she spoke, her voice a nice blend of sulkiness and defiance. ‘Someone shouted “Sassy” in the street, and came over to us, then – then mumbled a bit, said I looked like someone called Sassy, and went away.’
‘Often happens,’ Louella said. She sounded pleased, Lottie thought. ‘Anyway, Sassy isn’t a name. It’s what Americans call a cheeky, uppity girl or boy. I believe it’s a corruption of “saucy”. So you see it’s not a name at all.’
‘Oh!’ Lottie said, considerably taken aback. Trust Louella to get out of answering any question which might embarrass her! She was tempted to continue, to describe the boy and repeat what he had said, then changed her mind. Louella was quite capable of telling a whopper if she thought that the truth would not be good for her daughter. But I will find out, Lottie told herself. One of these days I’ll go back to Rhyl and find that boy and learn what he knows. I will, I will!
Chapter ThreeIt was a fine summer afternoon towards the end of August. Lottie was standing in the wings, ready to go on when she heard her cue. She was wearing her frilly pink ballerina frock, long white tights and her pink satin shoes with the blocked toes. But instead of the familiar fluttering in her stomach at the thought of the performance ahead, she was feeling a trifle rebellious. After good weather at the start of the month they had had a great deal of rain, and now, on the first really fine day for ages, she would not be joining Kenny in a trip to Seaforth Sands, or her friend Betty, who meant to take some bread and jam and go down to the canal to watch the boats unloading at the wharf. Instead, she would be stuck in the stuffy theatre, performing before a hot and restless audience, smiling an artificial smile, and being sweet when she felt as sour as any lemon.
When her mother had called her in from the court where she had been playing skipping, she had suggested that she might be allowed to miss the matinée performance as it was a lovely sunny day for a change. ‘There won’t be much of an audience, norron such a nice day. Kids won’t come, ’cos in another ten days they’ll be back in school,’ she had pleaded. ‘Honest, Mam – Louella, I mean – no one will miss me. You know you can do the whole act by yourself. Kenny’s goin’ to skip a lecky out to Seaforth Sands, and, oh, I do love the seaside! Mrs B will make us a carry-out – she’s awful good like that – so you wouldn’t have to worry about feeding me.’
They had been in the kitchen by then, sitting opposite one another at the big wooden table and eating cold ham and salad. Max had already left for the theatre because the stagehands who took his magical apparatus into the wings at the end of his act had dropped the disappearing cabinet and the sliding panel had been knocked out of true. It had happened before but Max did not trust anyone but himself to put it right, so he had made himself a thick cheese and pickle butty and had left a good hour earlier. This was unfortunate since Max might have taken Lottie’s side – his own son did not work in the theatre, after all – but as soon as she had finished speaking, Lottie had realised that she might as well have saved her breath. Louella had been tapping her fingers on the table, a sure sign that she was not going to give in. ‘How can you suggest such a thing, Lottie?’ she had said plaintively. ‘I’m far too professional to miss a performance and you should be the same. And if I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a hundred times that you may call me “Mam” at home and “Louella” in the theatre. Are we in the theatre now, may I ask?’
Lottie had stuck a forkful of lettuce into her mouth and counted ten whilst she chewed it. ‘Sorry, Mam, but how about if I call you Louella all the time? Then I shan’t keep stumbling over what I say and you won’t get cross with me. You’ve no idea how difficult it is to remember where you are whenever you talk to someone!’
She must have sounded more plaintive than she had intended for Louella had jumped to her feet, run round the table and given her a loving squeeze. ‘I’m sorry, darling, I didn’t mean to snap at you. The truth is, I’d love to take an afternoon off and go with you to Seaforth Sands, but it wouldn’t be fair on the audience, would it? Some of them, particularly the old ladies and the stage-struck kids, come to the theatre ’specially to see Louella and little Miss Lottie. They pay their money and choose their seats and really look forward to our act, so we would be cheating them if we didn’t appear. Can you understand that?’
There had been a longish pause before Lottie had replied. ‘Ye-es, but I’m sure they come to see you more than they come to see me,’ she had said at last. ‘I mean, I try my hardest but I’m nowhere near as good as you.’
Louella returned to her own side of the table and sat down once more. ‘You’re good in a different kind of way,’ she had explained. ‘You’ve got a sweet little voice and you sing all the songs that children enjoy. You’ve come on no end at tap-dancing since – since we came to Liverpool, but most of all, you remind the old people what it was like to be young. They watch you doing the hopscotch dance, and the song you do with the skipping rope, and they remember the games they played, as long as forty or fifty years ago perhaps.’ She had smiled encouragingly across at her daughter. ‘Do you see, darling, why we must turn up for every performance and never disappoint our audience? And besides, management pay us extra for matinées, you know, and I won’t deny that the money is useful. Why, Max and I have been saving up and after the pantomime we mean to take you and Baz somewhere really nice for the whole two weeks. Max wants to go skiing in Scotland but I think it would be better to go to London because there’s so much to see there. Wonderful stage shows with famous people in the lead roles, to say nothing of museums and art galleries and exhibitions. But that’s for later, of course. So am I forgiven for insisting that the show must go on?’
She had glanced across at Lottie, her big blue eyes so appealing that in her turn Lottie had abandoned her salad and run round the table to give her mother a hug. ‘Of course you are,’ she had said, kissing her mother’s delicately rouged cheek. ‘I hadn’t thought about the money, though I know it’s important really. Why, Kenny often says how his mother likes working for us and how much easier their lives have been because of the extra cash coming in, and of course it’s the same for us. I’m really sorry I grumbled and I won’t do so any more. After all, tomorrow may be another sunny day and there’s no show, so Kenny and I could go to Seaforth Sands then.’ She had added, with serpentine cunning: ‘And since we’re better off than the Brocklehursts, you might give Kenny an’ me our fares for the overhead railway.’
Louella had laughed and, getting to her feet, had begun to clear the table. ‘OK, sweetheart, it’s a deal,’ she had said joyously. ‘I’ll give you some money for your train fares when the show finishes tonight, and make you some butties to take with you tomorrow. And now we must get a move on or we’ll be late.’
Now, standing in the wings and waiting for her cue, Lottie remembered that Kenny had not been too pleased when she had asked him to delay his seaside trip until the following day, though he had submitted with a good grace when she had explained that her mother would give them both a carry-out and their fares on the overhead railway. ‘And you can go today anyway, just in case it rains tomorrow,’ she had said persuasively. ‘You don’t mind going two days running, do you?’
Kenny agreed that he didn’t mind and Lottie had dashed back to No. 2 just as her mother had emerged from the house. ‘Kenny says thanks very much and we’ll go tomorrow,’ she had said breathlessly, falling into step beside her parent. ‘Can I have an ice cream in the interval, Louella? Because the theatre’s going to be like a perishin’ oven.’
And now here she was, standing in the wings whilst Jack went through his comic routine. She had been right as well, for it was extremely hot on stage and not a lot cooler in the wings. From where she stood, Lottie could see beads of sweat running down the back of Jack’s red neck, but that did not prevent him from giving his usual excellent performance, and the waves of laughter which greeted all his jokes made Lottie feel quite guilty for her earlier rebellion. Louella had been right: if Jack was prepared to do his act and the audience were prepared to spend a sunny afternoon in the stuffy auditorium, then she should be happy to go through her songs and dances and grateful that the management were prepared to pay her to do so.
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