Tales of Pyrmont Road & Other Stories

Three Petticoats
by MaryAnn Brooks

London 1932

The not quite square patch of sky behind next door s chimney was gray. It was almost but not quite raining. And the chill in the air was enough to make you wonder what happened to April.

My mum, if she was still here, would have called this a rice pudding day.

Not that she made rice pudding every time it looked like rain: if that happened, we’d have been up to our ears in the stuff. But nine times out of ten, we’d come in from school and our large sized enamel pie dish full of rice pudding would be cooling on the range top.

Just seeing that creamy brown skin and smelling that crusty brown ring around the edge made you feel good.

Then after dinner, my brother Leonard, who always got the empty rice pudding dish, would spoil everything when he tried to scrape a bit more brown off the sides. Scrat Scrat. Scrat Scrrraat. Enough to put your teeth on edge.

I hadn’t planned on rice pudding today but the range was just right, the weather was just right, and Fred, for all he says he s not that partial to the stuff, always manages to empty his plate. And have seconds.

So I thought, why not? and mixed one up.

I’d just closed the oven door when Vi s familiar rat a tat tat echoed down from the front door followed by her usual “anyone home?” I called for her to come on back then pulled the kettle over the fire. Time for a cuppa.

“Look here,” she waved a piece of paper at me as she came into the kitchen, “a letter from some lady who lives up near the church. Remember that row of posh houses up the other side of Maynard s boat yard. Just before you get to where the road turns?”

“Those gray stone ones with lots of steps to the front door?” I hoped I was thinking about the same place she was.

“That’s them.” She unfolded the letter and held it out to read: like me, she’s getting a bit long sighted.

“She says,” by now we were settled with our tea and morning biscuit, “that she has several boxes of clothes that belonged to her,” Vi peered at the words, “recently deceased grandmother, and she would be only too happy to donate them for the jumble sale.”

“That mean someone has to go get them?”

“Looks like it,” Vi looked up. “Know anyone with a barrow?”

“No,” I said, “but young Lockerby across the street is always coming and going with his lorry. Maybe, if I ask nicely, he’ll oblige.”

“Say something interesting about young Vera,” said Vi, “and he’ll oblige alright.”

Vi was right there. Vera is our baby sister though she isn’t exactly a baby; she’s going on 25. But we think of her as that because she’s so much younger than the rest of us. Mum confided to me once that Vera was a mistake but you can take something like that two ways, if you know what I mean, so I’ve never repeated what she said.

“Say something interesting about young Vera,” said Vi, “and he’ll oblige alright.”
Vi was right there. Vera is our baby sister though she isn’t exactly a baby; she’s going on 25. But we think of her as that because she’s so much younger than the rest of us. Mum confided to me once that Vera was a mistake but you can take something like that two ways, if you know what I mean, so I’ve never repeated what she said.

Anyway, young Vera works as a housekeeper which she quite likes though she doesn’t seem to stay in one job for very long. That’s not really her fault though as the old men she house keeps for, do tend to die off rather often.

So she stays with us while she looks for another job and her and young Lockerby across the street see each other while she’s here. Which is as far as it’s gone but we have hopes.

I m Doris by the way and Fred, you heard me talk of him, is my husband. We live at number seventeen.

Vi, short for Violet, except everyone calls her Vi, is my sister, and she and Bill, that’s her husband, live at number eleven.

They have three kids. We have – just us. And gran who came to live with us after our mum died.

“The lady says,” Vi read on, “that they ll be away for a while but
Vi un the housekeeper will let us in any time.”

I proffered the teapot and Vi nodded so I topped her up, “So,” we went on talking while she stirred, “we just turn up?”

“Looks like it.”

“Think gran would like to go with us?” I asked.”

“I’don’t know about that,” Val looked dubious, “if we take her, she’ll be wanting this and wanting that and there ll be nothing left to sell.” Vi was on the jumble sale committee and took her job seriously.

Now our gran isn’t the most sociable of persons and there are times when she can be downright cantankerous but she’s old and you have to make allowances for old people.

She does though like clothes. Not the rubbish, her words, we wear nowadays, but the good, in her opinion, sensible stuff of when she was young: regardless of fashion, she still wears her skirt almost to her ankles. And these clothes we were going to collect once belonged to a lady; a real gentry type lady. I m sure gran would enjoy the trip out.

“Oh I’don’t think so,” I felt I had to defend gran a bit, “we’ll tell her she just can’t take anything and I think she’ll understand.”

“Since when did gran listen to anything we said?” When Vi gets a bit annoyed she also get a bit sarcastic.

But we did take gran, and young Lockerby did take us up there in his truck. He dropped us off on his way to a delivery saying he d pick us up on the way back; he wouldn’t be more than an hour.

I’d always considered those particular houses cold and empty looking. All that grey stone with nothing to relieve the monotony. And it was always so quiet. I mean, no curtain ever twitched if I stopped and stared which I’did now and then. No face appeared to question my right to be there. This was definitely not Pyrmont Road.

After young Lockerby had driven away, we crunched our way along a gravel path to the front door, sounding like a troop of invaders, we made so much noise. When we reached the steps leading up to the front door, we paused to take a collective breath and as we stood there, a voice called up from somewhere down to our right.

“I’d be very much obliged if you would come in this way,” a woman stood at the bottom of the area steps, “my rheumatism is playing up something awful today and those stairs?” she shook her head.

Always ready to oblige, we turned to the steps and climbed down. I had gran come down behind me, at least she’d fall on me if she tripped. But peculiar as she is, gran is not stupid and she held on to the rail firmly all the way to the bottom.

“Come in, come in,” the woman ushered us in out of the cold and as soon as she’d made sure the door was properly latched she led us into a large, comfortably warm kitchen.

“I’m Mrs Adams, the housekeeper” she introduced herself, “and I want to thank you again for being so understanding about me not wanting to do all those stairs to the front hall.”

I’didn’t answer immediately as I was too busy staring at the range, the biggest I’d ever seen. With two ovens, no less.

“It don’t worry me,” said gran, “I always went in and out this way.”

“In service were you?” the housekeeper s tone indicated interest and when she suggested gran stay in the kitchen while we went through to look at the clothes, gran suddenly lost interest in our project.

If there’s one thing our gran likes more than good jumble stuff, it’s good gossip. She can smell it a mile away.

So, while gran and the housekeeper cosied up to a warm fire and a more than likely hot cuppa, we were left to ourselves in this huge chilly room with a parquet floor and French windows that opened onto a garden that sloped all the way down to the water. Fred s dad loves gardens and he’d have considered himself dead and gone to heaven if he d ever seen this one with all its tiny box hedges set around huge beds of flowers.

But we weren’t here to admire someone else s garden, we were here to pick up boxes, except the clothes were all loose on a trestle table and four empty tea chests were lined up near the door.

“Looks like we’re going to have to do our own packing,” Vi looked at the clothes then at the tea chests, “so let’s sort the stuff now while we’re at it.” I agreed and we spent the next hour sorting and packing. All four tea chests were full by the time we finished.

We were just pushing the last piece in, putting a bit of weight on it to get it to stay down, when the housekeeper put her head round the door.
“Think there’s someone waiting for you,” she indicated the front of the house so we went back through the kitchen and looked up out of the window. We could just see a set of wheels; it was young Lockerby.

He hauled the tea chests up and loaded them onto the lorry and we came on home. But when we got to the corner of our street, gran told him not to stop at the church hall but to go on to number seventeen.

“Never got a chance to look at anything and if the old lady was as posh as that house, there should be some good pickings.”

“That’s jumble stuff,” Vi was outraged, “and you re not going through it until Jumble day.”

“And why not?” said gran.

“Because it’s not right, that’s why.” Vi was beginning to get really annoyed but by now the lorry was at the house and young Lockerby had set the brake and switched off.

“You might as well let her have her look,” he grinned, “if she’s anything like our gran, she’ll get her way in the end. You just let me know when you re ready and I’ll have one of my brothers take the boxes up to the corner for you.”

“Thank you very much young man,” gran smiled at him then climbed down, shook off my helping hand and went into the house.

“Gran!” now it my turn to complain as Vi had stalked off in a huff, “where do you think we’re going to put four tea chests?”

“In the front room of course.”

“There’s no room in there, especially with your old chair and besides, what if we have company?”

“You expecting anyone?”

“No, but… “

“Then what’re you crying about. As soon as I’ve looked it over, you can get rid of it. Just send word across the street and as young Lockerby said, someone will come and haul the boxes up to the corner.”

Gran went through that stuff with a fine tooth comb and from the look on her face each time I went in there – I wasn’t welcome but I went in anyway, after all it was my house – she was having the time of her life. Finally she called me in and pointed to a separated pile.

“Have Vi get someone to put that aside for me.”

“She’ll say that’s cheating.”

“Then you go and ask her if she’ll swear no one s ever had something put aside. That girl is incapable of lying so she won t be able to answer you. Oh and by the way, look what I found on the black dress,” Gran held up a pretty little brooch, easily missed it was that small.

“I think it’s a mourning brooch,” she peered at the back. “but the inscription is too small for me to read. Tell me what it says will you?”

I picked up the brooch, a gold mounted black and white cat s eye stone held with twisted gold threads that came together each end to form a solid bit for the pin and the hook. The inscription on the back was beautifully done with swirls and twiddles and lovely curved capital letters. But the words were so tiny I had to hold the brooch out full length and then squint a bit to read what it said.

“Walter Beddington,” I read out, “Obit, March 23rd 1903, Aetat, 44. Must have been her husband,” I put it down.

“Could have been a son,” said gran. “Lots of wars about then. Beautiful ain’t it,” she picked it up and ran a fingertip lightly over the delicate lettering, “would have been nice to have had one made for my Albert but we never had that kind of money. Silly old fool,” she was about to go off again about granddad and him getting himself killed in Zulu land.

“What you going to do with it?” I asked, hoping to shut her up before she really got going.

“Take it back of course,” said gran. “That’s a family heirloom and if it isn’t, it should be.”

“You going to walk all the way up there?” it was at least a mile away.

“Why not?” said gran. “On the way there, I’ll stop off and have a gab with granny Benting in the sweet shop, and on the way home, I’ll stop off and have a gab with old Mrs H in her new bed sit. I’ll be alright, don’t you worry.”

But I did worry. Gran often goes to see both of those old ladies but only one at a time. And only just there and back. This time she was walking twice as far. But she was determined so I shut up. The day I get upset is the day a policeman comes knocking at the door.

Gran was gone for three hours and for all I said I wasn’t going to worry, I was in and out the front door all afternoon until I saw her turn the corner. Then it was a rush to get Fred s dinner cooked for when he came home.

That evening, when I took her in her cocoa, I asked, very casual like, how her trip out went.

“Very nice,” she stuck her finger in the cocoa and nodded, it was just right, “and the housekeeper was that pleased to see the brooch. It seems they’d looked everywhere and had gone through the clothes so carefully. But as I explained to the housekeeper, it was caught up under one side of the collar. The old lady must have undone it and it caught and she forgot all about it.”

“What else did you do?”

“We had a nice long chat about the old days then I stopped in to see old Mrs H to tell her all about it. Then I had to stop off at granny B’s even though I’d already been there, and tell her all about it.”

“You ll be that stiff tomorrow,” I warned.

Gran didn’t answer. She d finished her cocoa and she was sleepy. I would have liked to tuck her in but I tried it once and got such an earful I’ll never do it again. So I left. I reckon she was asleep by the time I closed her door.

The jumble sale was a great success: the tables were piled high, we sold almost everything, and gran got her put aside stuff cheap. She had advised me to have a good look at some of the other pieces from the tea chests, “cos there’s a lot of real taffeta silk trim on the gray dress. You won’t like the dress but take off all the trimming and wait till you can match it up with something. Find a nice dark blue or maybe a dark green and you ll have a dress looks like it was bought in Harrods. And tell Vi to look at the blue dress. There’s enough material in the skirt alone to make a fine Sunday dress for young Annie. Also, she might consider the other one, the blue with cream stripe. Make someone a nice blouse, that would.”

After the excitement of the jumble sale, life settled down to it’s normal routine.

Wash on Monday. Make mince out of the rest of the roast beef on Tuesday. Clean the windows on Wednesday. As long as it’s not raining. Go to the lending library up by the post office on Thursday and exchange two books. Costs me tuppence a week but she’s got a good selection and it’s easy walking distance.

Friday I walk up to Kew Bridge and take the bus to the high street and look for a nice roast, some stewing beef and a kidney, a large one, and a piece of mutton. That ll give us steak and kidney pudding on Saturday, a roast on Sunday. And mutton stew and mince in the week.

It was the Tuesday after gran took the brooch back when the package was delivered. The first we knew of it was a bang on the front door knocker that near rattled the house it was that loud. I opened the door and there was this man in uniform with a large paper package.

“Delivery for Mrs Roud,” he held it out. I thanked him and said she was in her room but I would see she got it and he kind of saluted and left. That’s when I saw the big fancy car parked at the curb. He wasn’t a delivery man; he was a chauffer.

He was hardly round the corner when Vi appeared.

“Saw the car go by when I was doing the brass on the front door,” she was a bit out of breath from hurrying, “know who it is?”

“Haven t the slightest,” I said, “but you might as well come in; we’ll take this in to gran together.”

Vi liked that, she likes it when I include her in things. So we took the parcel into Gran who was sitting up in bed. Sometimes she doesn’t get up till late and this happened to be one of her mornings.

“Mind if we watch?” I asked. It’s good policy to be polite with gran though I would have stayed even if she said no.

“You’re here aren’t you?” Gran frowned at the pair of us but she accepted my scissors to cut the string on the parcel.

Inside the brown paper wrapping was a big white box, the kind you see in the movies when a gown or a fur coat or something like that is delivered. I helped her with the lid and folded back one side of the tissue while she folded back the other.

Laying there, all shiny, and definitely new, was a cream colored silk half petticoat. When I lifted it out for her there was another one underneath. And beneath that another one.

“Three petticoats,” gran couldn’t believe her eyes, “just like I used to wear.”

There was a note attached, hand written, and it said words to the effect that the writer wished there were more people in the world as honest as our gran. The gift was because she d taken the trouble to return the brooch, a valuable memento of the recently deceased relative.

“They do like to say recently deceased, don’t they?” said Vi.

“Why a petticoat?” I ignored her and spoke to gran, “and why three of them?”

“Well,” gran smiled in that funny way she had when she was in a really good mood, “when I gave the brooch to the housekeeper she said come in for a cup of tea so I did and we talked about the old days and we got around to talking about clothes and I said I always wore three petticoats on my day off. We laughed about that then got to talking about clothes and things and then I left.”

“So you’ve now got three lovely petticoats,” I said, “but whenever are you going to wear them?”

“Looks like I’m going to have to start going to church again,” was all gran said and that was the end of that.

She was right about the gray dress though. I got it for sixpence and I haven’t got around to looking for material to go with the silk taffeta trim but when I’do, I’ll have something that ll turn Vi green with envy.

Forget about Harrods.