A New Dream by Maggie Ford (world of reading .TXT) 📕

During the week they’d go to the pictures to collapse with laughter at Charlie Chaplin or Buster Keaton, or to squirm with longing at the dark and flashing eyes of Rudolph Valentino; lured back again and again to blush and giggle at the Latin Lover in The Sheik, or shrink in fear for him in The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

Standing near to each other behind the cosmetics counter, one eye on their supervisor in case they appeared not to be paying enough attention to any early-morning customer who approached, they conversed in whispers, managing not to exchange glances while maintaining the fixed, beckoning smile demanded of the counter staff by the management.

Stephie, as she’d become known to her friends, spent most of this quieter time talking about her sisters while Rosie listened with rapt attention.

‘You said modelling?’ she hissed surreptitiously from the corner of her mouth. ‘How can you expect a young girl of fifteen to model? I do agree with you, Stephie, you should have been asked first. I don’t know what your sister must be thinking of.’

As more customers approached the counter throughout the morning, conversation was brought to an end, but Stephanie felt better for having got it all off her chest though it still rankled. Perhaps she might still turn things her way once Virginia showed herself up modelling dresses far too old for her.

By Saturday night some of her chagrin had faded and her thoughts turned to dancing. The dancehall was already loud with the chatter and laughter of young people as Stephanie, Rosie and two other friends entered. The band was blaring out a recent jazzy number, ‘Margie’, and the floor was a gyrating mass of couples doing the one-step.

Rosie led the way towards a line of girls who stood hopefully waiting to be asked to dance. Within minutes two quite passable lads, apparently chums, appeared. The taller of the two approached Stephanie for a dance and his friend asked Rosie, to the disappointment of other hopefuls. Neither girl knew how to one-step properly but that hardly marred their triumph at being chosen. Stephanie’s delight faded somewhat though when she discovered that her partner could talk of nothing but football. As the number ended she made her excuses and escaped to the cloakroom.

Leaning towards the mirror to apply another coat of rouge to her cheeks, Stephanie glanced sideways at Rosie’s reflection. Like herself Rosie was rake thin, her sleeveless dress revealing slender arms as she smoothed the fine line of an eyebrow. With brassieres made to flatten rather than flatter, their short dance dresses fell straight down over their slim hips, with the skirt finishing just below the knees. Like her own, Rosie’s hair was cut short at the back, graduating slightly longer towards the front and combed forward to a point over each carefully rouged cheekbone.

‘What do you think of them?’ Stephanie asked, referring to the boys.

Rosie grimaced. ‘A bit juvenile, I thought.’

‘I did too.’ Stephanie laughed. ‘We’ll ditch them and find some a little more mature, shall we?’

‘If we can.’ Rosie laughed too.

‘We can only try!’ Stephanie observed, replacing her rouge in the beaded, green silk handbag that matched her taffeta dress. And, with heads held high, the two friends strode purposefully from the cloakroom.

It had been a wonderful evening. They had found a couple of mature young men who had suggested going on to a nightclub, an invitation which the girls had readily accepted. The only bug in the salad was that both needed to be home by an acceptable hour, a request with which the young men, Robert and Algernon – Algy to his friends he’d said – had complied with amused smiles. To the girls’ delight, the men had arranged to see them again the following Saturday at the dancehall.

‘I don’t see why we can’t be out a little later next week,’ Stephanie had said boldly as Robert and Algernon accompanied them to the number twenty-five bus that would drop her right outside her home.

Rosie had only yards to go to her home and as the bus drew away, Stephanie saw enviously that she was hanging on to Robert’s arm as if for dear life. She vowed that she would do the same with Algy when she met him next Saturday. She would also tell her mother that she wouldn’t be home until the early hours and that she was not to worry. She had no idea what her mother would say to that and nor did she care. If Julia could take the reins then so could she!

She would never have dreamed last year that a working life could turn out to be so good. She’d been a year younger then and under her parents’ keen eyes, but since their move she’d torn herself away from those Victorian restrictions. And, she thought proudly, she’d done it by her own endeavours. She preened herself a little, thinking of the wonderful position she’d obtained at Selfridges, when all around her were long queues of the unemployed, practically begging for work.

There were jobs to be had but not for the ordinary and the unskilled. There was money to be had too if you knew where to look. Businesses were thriving yet the dole queues continued to lengthen, which was strange. If you ran a business you were laughing. Like Julia, she thought, fancying herself with her big ideas.

And all from that material she’d calmly helped herself to from her own father’s warehouse. There’d been no guilty conscience, no grief at having lost him; she’d just grabbed what she could!

Yes, that’s where the money was, with those who helped themselves – like Julia.

Thirteen

It was two weeks to Christmas. The time had flown by, taking Julia by surprise. She still hadn’t got her modelling idea off the ground and now not much could be done until the festive season was over.

It was going to be a strange Christmas, she thought. In their