Something Wholesale (9 page)

‘Mr Topper,’ I said, with as much dignity as I could muster in a teashop. ‘I must confess that your daughter had a most stimulating effect on me when I first met her. Nevertheless I must tell you that I never had the opportunity to do anything that could have made her pregnant. You must have realised that your daughter is an exceedingly popular young woman. The Manager of our Counting House, Miss Gatling, will testify that she has an extraordinarily large following.’

Whilst saying this I looked Mr Topper straight in the eye. Doing so I began to feel sorry for him. He ceased to be a pompous ass or a potential blackmailer; suddenly he was just a worried father.

‘You too,’ he said gloomily, alienating me for the second time, ‘I didn’t know you were in it too.’

‘Will you kindly pass the sugar,’ said the third occupant of the table, an elderly person who had been so entranced by our conversation that he had allowed his tea to grow cold.

‘I think we had better continue in the street,’ said Mr Topper.

We stood in a light drizzle in Oxford Street, elbowed by shoppers, most of whom seemed to be armed with ice-cream cornets.

‘Mr Topper,’ I said, ‘I object to the expression “in it too”.’

‘I thought it was Mr Wilkins. Your Traveller,’ said Mr Topper. ‘He had the opportunity, didn’t he?’

‘Have you ever seen Mr Wilkins?’

‘I waited outside your premises at closing time the other night until he came out. He’s the one whose got a gammy leg, isn’t he?’

‘What does your daughter say about all this?’

‘She doesn’t say anything. All she does is to complain about her stomach and she’s sick every morning. It’s been going on like this for a week now.’

‘Mr Topper,’ I said, ‘I have only returned to this country in the
course of the last twenty-four hours. Before doing so I was abroad for six and a half months. The symptoms you describe are those of the onset of pregnancy, not those one would expect to find in someone who will shortly be delivered of a child. I suggest that you obtain a competent medical opinion. And what about Mrs Topper? What does she think?’

‘She’s been CARRYING ON,’ said Mr Topper, ‘AS USUAL.’

‘Frankly,’ I said, ‘I think your accusation against Mr Wilkins is absurd. Do you wish me to communicate it to him?’ (Conversation with Mr Topper was making me as pompous as he was.)

‘Don’t trouble yourself,’ said Mr Topper. ‘I didn’t really think it was him. I certainly never thought it was you. The trouble is,’ he said, nearer the mark than usual, ‘it might have been anybody. The telephone goes all day now she’s at home – always men.’

‘Why don’t you take the receiver off?’

‘Can’t,’ said Mr Topper, ‘I’m an undertaker. We live over the shop.’

The next morning I was called to the telephone to take a call from a Mr Potter.

‘This is Mr Topper,’ said Mr Potter. He sounded embarrassed. ‘I am telephoning, in the interests of security, from a public call box. You will be happy to know that we have had my daughter examined. There are no signs that she has been “interfered with”. She is still “virgo intacta”.’ He pronounced the words with relish.

I said that I was delighted. I asked him what had been wrong with her.

‘Chocolate creams. Those ones with little violet flowers on top. Eating them in bed, right under our noses. Might have killed herself. We’ve decided to keep Lola at home for a bit,’ he went on. ‘The journey from Muswell Hill is too much for a young girl. She won’t be coming back to Lane and Newby’s any more.’ This with a sudden resurgence of spirit, by which he continued to make the
firm sound a den of iniquity. ‘She’s taking a local job, in the telephone exchange.’

‘Huh, Huh, Huh!’ said Mr Wilkins when the news was broken to him, officially. ‘That’s just the job for her. Round pegs in round holes. Even she can’t go wrong. Should suit her down to the ground. And better for us in the long run. Don’t you think so, Mr Eric?’

He gazed at me impassively through his spectacles.

^*
Nevertheless he did write to the War Office. The citation, which he received after an interval, left no one in any doubt of the merits of the decoration, and re-inforced his own opinion of bureaucracy.

‘It’s all very well your father telling you to stay in the showroom, Mr Eric,’ said Miss Stallybrass. She was still suffering from the effects of the rocket she had received on my behalf from Mrs Crosse-Smythson. ‘But it’s difficult to know what to give you to do. You’d better sit over there.’ She indicated a small piece of furniture that was more like a prie-dieu than a desk. ‘At least you’ll see what happens. Miss Axhead from Manchester is coming in at ten to put down her season’s order. But I warn you she takes a long time to make up her mind.’

On the first stroke of ten Miss Axhead arrived. She was a powerful-looking woman of about fifty dressed in what I was later to recognise as a buyer’s cold-weather uniform; a Persian lamb jacket that was almost completely square; sheepskin boots worn over patent-leather shoes and an incredible hat with bits of Persian lamb on it, the left-overs from the sacrifice that had produced the coat, and a ‘little’ black dress. Escorted by Miss Stallybrass she sank down on a sofa and, with a good deal of puffing and blowing, proceeded to take off her overboots. I was introduced by Miss Stallybrass. I then hid myself as best I could behind my inadequate prie-dieu.

‘That’s a pretty brooch,’ Miss Stallybrass said, by way of opening
gambit, admiring a hideous marcasite ornament in the form of a sealyham’s head that Miss Axhead had pinned to her little black dress.

‘That’s my little Boy-Boy,’ said Miss Axhead, betraying a depth of emotion that would have been difficult to deduce from her appearance.

An hour later Miss Axhead was still sitting on the settee. During this time she had discussed with Miss Stallybrass the Government and Sir Stafford Cripps; the sealyham which, by the sound of it, was ripe for destruction; the play to which she had been taken the previous evening by one of her suppliers, a rather gentle intellectual who, before the purges, had been a professor at Göttingen University, which she had not enjoyed; Christian Science;
The Robe
, which she was reading in bed and was thoroughly enjoying; several unpleasant ailments from which her friends were suffering; the discomfort of the hotel in which she always stayed when she came to London; and the iniquity of the Dress Buyer, her lifelong friend, who was cutting in on her territory by buying dresses with jackets and with whom she was no longer on speaking terms. Apart from the Dress Buyer there was no mention of business at all.

It was now eleven o’clock. Mrs Smithers appeared for the second time with tea and biscuits. She had already produced a snifter for Miss Axhead when she arrived, which had kept her going until the main supplies were brought up. Mr Wilkins emerged from his fox-hole to pay his respects to Miss Axhead. Adroitly, he asked a number of questions to which he already knew the answer, having been privy to the entire conversation. ‘Delighted to see you, Miss Axhead,’ he said, and withdrew with the air of a trusted counsellor.

My father arrived. He also discussed the political situation, going over the ground that had already been covered by Miss
Stallybrass, but with more conviction, and told her one of his little jokes which made Miss Axhead laugh. He was followed by the head of the Costume Department, who had been hovering anxiously at the door under the impression that Miss Axhead might escape her. Miss Axhead was also the suit buyer. During this time other coat buyers who arrived unannounced, without appointments, were siphoned off into Gowns and Costumes and Rosie and Julie made long and circuitous journeys backwards and forwards between the Coat Stockroom and Costumes, by-passing Mantles completely so that Miss Axhead should not be disturbed.

At twelve-thirty Miss Axhead was offered a gin and tonic, which she accepted gratefully, and at a quarter to one she went upstairs ‘to make herself comfortable’ before going out to lunch with Miss Stallybrass.

Miss Stallybrass was dressed to the nines in a suit with a very pronounced stripe and a large fur cape. The effect was a little top-heavy and when she went to collect some petty cash from the Counting House to pay for the lunch, Miss Gatling asked her if she was ‘bombed out’.

‘I always enjoy coming to Lane and Newby.’ Miss Axhead said as they were leaving. ‘It has such a homely atmosphere. I feel I can really let my hair down.’

At two-thirty they returned. I thought Miss Stallybrass looked a little tired, but she was still game and her laugh was as hearty as ever. Miss Axhead was full of beans and described her summer holiday at Torquay in some detail. At three o’clock Mrs Smithers arrived with more tea and Dundee cake and at three-thirty Miss Axhead telephoned to another supplier, who had been waiting for her since two, to say that she was ‘held up’.

She now began to talk about her ‘specials’. These were customers who were either so rich that nothing sufficiently splendid could be found for them amongst Miss Axhead’s stock of ‘models’ or
else were so misshapen that they needed something that was made-to-measure. All the details of these difficult customers were written down on several crumpled sheets of paper and from time to time Miss Axhead looked at them despairingly.

It was obvious that unless Miss Axhead saw the collection very soon she would become bogged down among her specials and we should never get an order at all. Miss Stallybrass sensed it too.

‘I think it would be better if we showed you the collection and then we can put down the specials afterwards,’ she said in her fruitiest voice.

It was a tense moment. I knew that if Miss Axhead decided to deal with her specials first we were doomed.

‘All right,’ she said, finally, after a long pause. ‘Only I must do my specials and time’s getting on.’

We showed the collection. Occasionally Miss Axhead spotted something that would do for a special and the proceedings ground to a halt while Miss Stallybrass hunted for suitable patterns. At the same time Miss Axhead was suggesting alterations.

‘If you could use the collar of “Dawn” and the back of “Snowdrop” that would be just right for Mrs Bean. Then you can do it the other way round for Mrs Woodcock. They can’t have the same style, their husbands belong to the same golf club. You remember Mrs Bean. She’s the one who …’ Miss Axhead’s voice sank to a whisper as she launched into blood-curdling details of the private life of the Beans.

‘Special order “Bean”,’ Miss Stallybrass wrote in her flowing hand. ‘Velour 477 Colour Ruby. Collar as Dawn. Back as Snowdrop. What size did you say Mrs Bean is, Miss Axhead?’

‘Ooh, she’s a size!’ said Miss Axhead, with relish. ‘I’ll have to send you the measures. You’d better send me a sketch for Mrs Bean and for Mrs Woodcock, she’s an awkward shape too. We like our pudding in the North.’ ‘Send sketches,’ Miss Stallybrass wrote.
I wondered how she was going to cope with this one. ‘Dawn’ and ‘Snowdrop’ were made by different tailors who detested one another.

At five o’clock the workrooms shut. There was a sound like an avalanche as the girls thundered down the staircase to the cellars where they kept their coats. Julie left, ostensibly to catch a train. Bertha and Rosie remained. They looked as displeased as they dared in the presence of Miss Stallybrass.

With maddening slowness the order was written down. When it was complete it amounted to two thousand five hundred pounds, but it was so peppered with codicils inserted by Miss Axhead, all of which necessitated complex modifications of the original models, that it was doubtful if it could ever be executed and still show a profit. A large part of it was conditional on the dozens of ‘specials’ being acceptable to the Beans and the Woodcocks, most of whom appeared to pass their time in playing a grown-up version of ‘I spy with my little eye’ whilst their husbands were on the golf course.

At six-forty-five Miss Axhead was taken into the office for a final little drink with my parents. ‘It will be nice to have a chat,’ she remarked as she rose from the settee, which groaned as if in thankfulness at her departure. ‘I don’t think any of my girls realise what a hard job we have of it.’

‘I entirely agree,’ said Miss Stallybrass. As always it was impossible to tell what she was agreeing with.

‘Are all our customers like Miss Axhead?’ I asked Miss Stallybrass when finally she had been taken away.

‘Some of them are a damn sight worse,’ she replied unexpectedly. ‘Poor old Mary Axhead. As well as that dear little dog she’s got a sister who’s not very well.’

‘I didn’t know you liked dogs,’ I said.

‘Me!’ she said. ‘I loathe ’em!’

‘It wasn’t a bad order,’ I said.

‘Half of it won’t be confirmed and she’ll go around getting sketches and patterns from other suppliers for the specials before she makes up her mind. Most of them we shan’t hear of again,’ said Miss Stallybrass.

There was a tense moment when the Head of the Costume Department, who had been waiting all day to intercept Miss Axhead, confronted Miss Stallybrass. Not only had she waited but she had been forced to accommodate Miss Stallybrass’s other customers in her showroom, none of whom bought suits. She was justifiably incensed. She too was remunerated on a salary and commission basis.

‘I’m awfully sorry, dear,’ said Miss Stallybrass, in a tone that showed that she was not really sorry. ‘But after all,’ smiling sweetly at her colleague who was quivering with barely suppressed fury, ‘it doesn’t really matter, does it, as long as she puts down an order with one of us. It’s all for the good of the firm.’

In the succeeding weeks, from my vantage point in Miss Stallybrass’s showroom, I saw the Buyers as they passed before me in a phantasmagoria of shapes and sizes and in their various sexes.

There were old, experienced Store Buyers as battered as sea captains, who knew exactly what they were going to buy before they even set eyes on the collection because they had been buying the same sort of things from us for twenty years. For them the fashion of a season had little significance. What they wanted was something to cover the nakedness of their well-hipped customers. Confronted with a coat with a hint of a current trend in it, something that was the pride and joy of the Model Workroom, they smiled knowingly at Miss Stallybrass and asked her for something ‘more sensible’. The orders they placed could be calculated in advance to the nearest fifty pounds. It was lucky that
this was so. They were the solid foundation of the business of Lane and Newby.

Then there were Central Buyers, who bought for great groups of stores instead of individual branches. They usually arrived with an assistant in tow to do the dirty work. They came armed with crocodile handbags like small portmanteaux and big black kalamazoo note-books in which the details of what they saw were noted down meticulously. Either this, or they completely ignored the collection and talked about some ancient wrong that had been done to them by Miss Stallybrass’s predecessor ten years before the war. One male Buyer carried a slide-rule, presumably as a weapon of intimidation. Some of the men were invincibly rude, mistaking a show of ill-manners for business acumen. These Central Buyers were much-travelled. To my untutored imagination they seemed to offer the possibility of orders beyond the dreams of avarice, but I soon came to realise that so far as Lane and Newby were concerned this was a delusion. Even when the combined effort of Miss Stallybrass and Mr Wilkins was successful in extracting an order from a Central Buyer it was so hemmed in by conditions and the terms which they offered were so cut-throat that it was scarcely possible to execute it and at the same time show a profit. Sometimes they insisted on a sample being produced in advance. Having accepted the sample, when the bulk of the order was ready for delivery they would contrive to discover some minute variations from the original which gave them the excuse to cancel the order in its entirety. They would then suggest taking delivery at an even lower price in order, as they put it, ‘to help us out’.

In some stores the management had split the fashion departments into many sub-sections, under the impression that by so doing they were helping their customers. Then the Buyers were forced to travel about in a body, rather like a travelling circus, in
the charge of a Fashion Co-ordinator, a strong-minded woman who acted as ringmaster. Her job was to make sure that they didn’t all buy the same things. Confronted with a collection as modest as ours the Buyers of departments with arch-sounding titles –
Teen-age and Twenty, Not So Young
and
The Twilight Room
, sometimes took the easiest way out and bought nothing at all.

There were Buyers who were also proprietors. Most of them owned ‘Madam Shops’. Often they were younger than the Store Buyers. They carried what seemed to be a large part of their stocks on their own backs and great wads of bank notes, which they thumbed impressively. Some Madams had been set up in business by admirers, preferring this tangible but precarious asset to the more conventional rewards. Madams could put down orders that would have been very welcome from store buyers, but as many of them only employed a book-keeper on a part-time basis, if at all, their financial stability was often open to question. The confirmation of the order meant little if, as Mr Wilkins said, they were ‘rocky’. Mr Wilkins had a fine nose for a potential bankrupt. And there were Buyers from old-established family businesses in the provinces. Sometimes they brought the entire family with them: the Proprietor, usually an elderly gentleman in a cheviot suit who knew my father; his wife, who nearly always wanted something for herself; the daughter, a kittenish creature in twin-set and pearls; and a son. Mostly the sons looked despairing and lost. None were as awful as young Mr Fumble of Throttle and Fumble.