West End Girls: The Real Lives, Loves and Friendships of 1940s Soho and Its Working Girls (8 page)

By the time the day was about two thirds over, I was really getting into the swing of things. I even had a little notebook of tear-out pages in which I could jot down the takings. I was sure that once I got the place clean, everything would run on oiled wheels.

Mae came tramping up once more, this time with a sad and worried-looking man in a Homburg hat. I stationed myself outside the bedroom door, waiting for the money to be passed through, and complimented myself that I was already acting like an old hand at the game.

Why, I thought – somewhat prematurely as it turned out – there’s nothing to it.

There was some discussion going on inside the bedroom, and I waited for longer than usual for the door to open its accustomed six inches and Mae’s undraped arm to come out.

‘He’s staying for a bit,’ she hissed. ‘There’s fifteen bob for you there and a fiver for me.’ Then she shut the door.

Ah, I thought, a chance for me to get a few jobs done if I’m lucky.

I unpacked my cleaning materials as lovingly as if they had been pieces of Spode china, and made the beginnings of an onslaught on the dirty crockery. In the midst of all this happy domesticity, I heard footsteps mounting the stairs, and presently a man rounded the corner. He was very large, with a red face, and he looked as though he belonged to a road gang. Breathing adenoidally, he entered the little hall.

‘Where is she, then?’ he asked in a hoarse whisper that shook the walls.

‘In there,’ I answered, pointing to the bedroom door. Turning on my best maid’s manner, I added, ‘She’s busy. Will you come back again later?’

‘Not going down there again – fed up with hanging around in the street. I’ll wait.’

With that, he pushed past me into the little kitchen and, with a gusty sigh, lowered himself into one of the chairs.

My self-assurance was gone: this was something I wasn’t prepared for. To be closeted in a small space with a large man who was waiting for sex just didn’t feel right, even in this new world of mine. I felt flustered, and turned back to my washing-up, only to feel my neck crawling as I felt his eyes on me. I thought about escape: all of a sudden, the banisters on the landing seemed to cry out for my new feather dusters. But lead settled in my stomach as I realised I couldn’t very well leave him alone in the room where the money was. I feared he might clobber me while I wasn’t looking. Nervous, but putting on a brave face, I turned to face him again. So far, he hadn’t taken his eyes off me. Suddenly, he spoke.

‘You’re new,’ he said, as though I was guilty of a wilful deception. He returned to his oafish staring. After a while, he made another discovery: ‘Bit young, ain’t you?’

I was trying to think up a suitable answer when I heard stealthy movements on the stairs.

Oh Lord, not another one! I craned my neck round the kitchen door, just as a timid little man wearing glasses and a raincoat appeared at the top. My relief was palpable; I was no longer alone, and at least this one looked inoffensive.

‘Is she in?’ he whispered, darting little nervous glances about the place.

‘Yes, but she is busy,’ I answered, in a voice that I hoped would be loud enough for Mae to hear.

I was lucky. There were movements from the bedroom, and Mae’s voice sang out, ‘That someone for me? Tell him to wait a few secs. I’m just coming.’

I ushered the little chap before me into the kitchen. At the sight of the other man, he froze, and would have bolted except that I was behind him, resolutely blocking his exit.

So there we were: jammed like commuters in the rush hour, trying not to look at one another – until Mae got rid of her long-playing customer.

‘What’s this, a bleeding orgy?’ she exclaimed when she saw us. ‘Well, who’s first?’

The large man managed to squeeze his way through, and after taking a deep breath, I asked the timid one to sit down.

He spent this waiting period studying his nails and casting surreptitious fleeting glances in my direction whenever he thought I wasn’t looking. My jangled nerves began to calm down, and something akin to confidence took over as I lit a cigarette.

When the two men had been seen to and dispatched, I rushed into the bedroom, where Mae was pulling on her skirt.

‘Did I do the right thing?’ I asked anxiously, feeling very inadequate. ‘Or if there’s two, should I send one away and tell him to come back later?’

‘Just stick one of them in the waiting room,’ she replied, zipping herself up.

‘Waiting room!’ I gasped. ‘What waiting room?’

She stared at me, nonplussed. ‘Didn’t I show you the waiting room? I must be going round the bend.’

She went into the kitchen and I followed her. Opening a meat safe, she stuck her head in, fished around a bit and finally emerged triumphant, holding a mortise key.

‘Here, follow
me-ee
,’ she said, in deep, sexy tones. She made her way in sinuous style across the landing to the battered door on the other side. This she unlocked and threw open with a loud crash.

‘Voila!’
she announced.

She stood back to allow me to peer in. My eyes took in a room of about eight feet by ten. I couldn’t help but wonder at the odd contents: a fitted cupboard, open and stuffed with ropes, strange old garments, a few tattered books and a number of rather bizarre objects. I decided to ask about this another time. Taking up about a third of the total space was a large office desk, and though I hadn’t exactly expected anything resembling the dentist’s or the doctor’s, I was glad to see that the waiting room did at least contain various chairs for those who would have to wait: a real granny’s armchair, covered in grubby chintz, a basketwork chair and a wooden stool. There was also an oil stove and an electric fire. In here, as in the bedroom, the curtains were closed.

‘Well that is handy!’ I said at last. I was relieved that at least the crush in the kitchen need never be repeated.

‘I should say it’s handy. Don’t know what we’d do without it some Saturdays, and as for kinks and things, well . . . !’ She paused eloquently.

My growing confidence wilted somewhat with her last sentence. There were innuendoes there that I didn’t understand, and I had a nervous feeling that it wasn’t all going to be as simple as I had supposed.

As the second day melted into the third, I gradually became acclimatised to the conveyor-belt system. I was glad I now had a key, as it was evident that during the working day, I could do nothing but attend to Mae; the sink was still crammed with the same crockery it had held when I arrived. Numerous cups of tea seemed necessary to her existence; they were mostly left untouched, though, as they served largely as an excuse for a pause and a chat. I became a tea addict myself, and found something comforting and basic about making and drinking a pot. Basic comfort was needed in this new life of mine.

While we were having a rare proper tea break, with the door to the flat shut, we heard a gentle but steady tramping of feet on the stairs. It sounded as though we were being invaded by an army of orderly soldiers. The steps halted outside our door and were followed by a polite knock. We stared at one another, then both made for the door, Mae slightly ahead. When she opened it, over her shoulder I saw a row of anxious choirboy-like heads, each surmounted by neatly slicked hair and balanced on top of a tidy navy-blue serge suit. There was a long silence as we all gazed at one another. The leading alto tried to say something but failed. Mae broke the silence.

‘Look, duckies, I’m just having a cup of tea.’ She paused. ‘Come back in a couple of years.’ She closed the door and leaned against it weakly.

‘Well, did you see that? Can’t have been more than sixteen years old, any of ’em. One would have been bad enough, but four! Blimey!’ She brooded over her tea for a bit. ‘I don’t know what kids are coming to these days. It’s bloody disgusting!’

At the venerable age of twenty-one, I agreed.

Seven

The next day I arrived almost at the crack of dawn. First I examined the wallpaper along the hallway, and decided there was so much of it missing already that there wasn’t much point in trying to stick back the loose bits. So I had a jolly quarter of an hour ripping it all off. While I was doing this, for the first time I noticed the array of ancient fuse boxes high up towards the ceiling. They hung off the wall, dangling a plethora of bare cables and cobwebs – surely they couldn’t work in that state. Then my eye caught sight of the thick black electric wire running along the angle of the ceiling and disappearing through a small hole in the wall into the building next door. So that was the secret! I shook my head and returned to my work.

It was eerie, alone there in that large derelict building with all its locked rooms. Even the shop on which it all rested was boarded up and empty. But for the sound of a dripping tap somewhere, it was as quiet as the grave. The noises I made with my cleaning seemed out of place, and I could feel the ghostly inmates of the past watching my efforts. The pigeons on the window ledges outside didn’t help my nerves much either: several times I jumped with fright as, in sudden clattering batches, they launched into flight.

Amongst the litter on the hall floor were a number of flyers in varying stages of decomposition, the tattered remains of a rates demand and a couple of mildewed Inland Revenue envelopes, optimistically addressed to ‘The Occupier’. I swept them up with the rest of the rubbish, then scraped away at the numerous lumps of chewing gum. Finally I scrubbed the stairs and passageway with strong pine disinfectant. I had just had time to wash the grime off myself when Mae arrived.

‘Crikey!’ she gasped. ‘I thought I’d come to the wrong house – smells like a bleeding hospital!’

‘By the way,’ I said, ‘did you know that we are using next door’s electricity?’

‘Go on! Is that a fact?’

I took her down to show her the disappearing flex.

‘Well, what d’you know!’ She stared up at it for a while, then burst out laughing, ‘What a stinker ! That bastard Charley has just had twenty-five quid out of me for electricity.’

During the course of the following mornings, I spring-cleaned the bedroom and waiting room, polishing the furniture and the floor, shampooing the rugs and cleaning the paintwork. What had appeared to be brown lino in the little hallway and kitchen turned out to be cream tiles.

With rubber gloves and a strong stomach, I turned out the cupboards and drawers in the kitchen. I found milk bottles with thick mould swimming on an inch or two of liquid; potatoes rotting among their own tendrils; smelly, lumpish dishcloths and other things I couldn’t even put a name to.

After cramming all this into other people’s dustbins along the alleyway, I scrubbed everything in the kitchen and arranged my new cleaning materials on the shelves under the sink. Of provisions I found nothing, beyond the half-empty packet of tea, the tin of milk and the tiny amount of sugar that were in use, so I wrote out another shopping list and presented it to Mae.

‘You’ll break me!’ she said affably.

The next time she went out, she dropped the order in at the nearest grocer’s. He soon turned up in person to satisfy his curiosity as to what had prompted this unprecedented demand.

His first words were, of course, ‘You’re new here, aren’t you?’

He scrutinised me carefully. ‘Haven’t seen you around the area before neither, I don’t think,’ he said, continuing his bird-like examination. I made no reply, and he rambled on. ‘Well, let me tell you, you’re on to a right gold mine with that one. They call her the Queen of Soho round here, you know. They say she can earn more than any other two of ’em put together. Must say, I’ve never known anything like her – and I’ve been around a good few years. Heart of gold, too: real ray of sunshine. Oh well, better be off; this won’t buy the baby a new bonnet, as they say!’

With this, he nimbly trotted off down the stairs. Though I made allowances for exaggeration, I felt impressed and pleased with what I’d heard. To me, Mae had seemed to be special from the start, and it gave me great satisfaction to know that others regarded her that way too. So I, with my complete lack of credentials, was working for the Queen of Soho!

Still musing on my new position in life, I began stacking the groceries into the meat safe. As I put the last couple of things away and stood admiring the effect, I heard Mae’s voice behind me:

‘You’re just like a bloody squirrel, you are!’

I swung round in surprise. She had crept out from the bedroom and had been watching me. The way I saw her then is the way I so often see her now in my memory. It was such a characteristic pose: she was leaning against the door jamb, pulling on her gloves – she never went out without them – and squinting through her cigarette smoke. I will never forget her careless elegance. She was wearing a beautifully cut suit of mushroom gabardine, but whereas most women would have chosen a smart frilly blouse or a turtle-necked sweater to wear with it, all Mae had on underneath was a bra; between the immaculate lapels, her wonderful creamy cleavage was visible. Consequently, although she was dressed in the clothes of a lady, she looked like a tart – which, after all, was what she intended.