Hettie of Hope Street

‘So, minx,’ John teased Hettie expansively. ‘What charity is Miss Brown supporting this time? I dare say I shall have to buy tickets for it, even if I don’t get to come along and hear you caterwauling.’

‘It isn’t for charity and it isn’t for Miss Brown,’ Hettie answered him indignantly. ‘It’s a proper singing job, and in public, so there!’

‘Singing in public? What do you mean?’

The good humour vanished from John’s expression. Sensing her brother’s disapproval, and seeing Hettie begin to pout, Ellie was about to explain but Hettie spoke first.

‘I shall sing for the ladies of Liverpool whilst they take tea, and they will love me and I shall become famous,’ Hettie trilled giddily, oblivious to the shadow that had crossed John’s face.

‘What Hettie means, John,’ Gideon explained hurriedly, ‘is that Miss Brown is recommending her for a recently advertised position as a soloist to be accompanied by the pianist at the Adelphi Hotel.’

‘Oh John, just imagine.’ Hettie clasped her hands together and stood in front of him, her whole face alive with happiness, her eyes full of dreams. ‘It will be just as though I were on a stage. Only, of course, I shall not be because it is only a hotel, but who knows what it may lead to?’

‘I can’t see that any good will come of it, Hettie, other than filling your head with even more nonsense,’ John told her so sharply that her face flushed.

‘What are you saying?’ she demanded hotly, but Ellie hurriedly intervened before John could answer her.

‘Hettie, love, I was looking at your blue dress this morning and I thought we might re-trim it.’

‘Thanks for agreeing to home this little lass for me, Gideon,’ John said gruffly a few moments later, bending to rub the collie bitch’s ears. They had moved down to the kitchen so that John could introduce Gideon to his new charge before leaving, Ellie and Hettie having remained upstairs.

‘I’m sure both Philip and Richard will enjoy keeping her company when they’re at home,’ Gideon replied with a chuckle.

John smiled. Philip was the youngest of the Pride children, the baby whose birth had resulted in his mother’s death, and who Gideon had firmly insisted Ellie’s aunt hand over into Ellie’s care to be brought up alongside their own children.

‘Gideon, are you sure it’s wise for Hettie to go to this audition?’ John asked abruptly. ‘After all, she’s still so very young. Hardly more than a child.’

Gideon shook his head. ‘You may not be aware that she has become a young woman, John, but I can assure you that she believes she has, and so too do the young men who hang around after church on Sunday hoping to be introduced to her. She’s eighteen now, you know.’

‘Even so, she has led a very sheltered life, and for all that she claims to want to sing on the stage, I believe she has no real idea of what such a life entails.’

‘Maybe not, but I would far rather she discovers that in the safe environment of the Adelphi hotel, where she has Connie close at hand should she need her, than risk having her do as Connie herself did and run away from home.’

‘Connie left our aunt’s because she was ill-treated there, and fancied herself in love,’ John protested.

‘Well, whilst I hope Hettie will never feel that she has been ill-treated, she too is passionately in love, you know.’

‘What? She might fancy herself in love with some lad, but she’s too young even to know what love is.’

John’s voice was grim. ‘What I meant was that she feels very passionately about her music, just as you do about your flying machines. Besides, it may be that she is not called to audition for the post. Miss Brown, her singing teacher, believes there will be many applicants.’

Gideon was wrong in thinking he was not aware of how much Hettie had grown up, John reflected sombrely as he left the house. He was only too aware of it, and had been for some time. But it had been most obvious to him that, whilst his feelings for her had undergone a change, the old companionable affection he had always felt for her replaced by a man’s longing and love, Hettie’s feelings for him had remained as they always were. And nothing could have proved that more than her behaviour today, he admitted bleakly.

TWO

The much longed for and awaited letter from the Adelphi hotel had finally arrived, and as she watched Gideon opening it Hettie hardly dared to breathe, her breakfast left untouched as she waited in almost unbearable anxiety.

Whilst Gideon silently and slowly read the letter, Hettie looked appealingly at Ellie.

Loath as she was to lose Hettie’s company, Ellie couldn’t help but feel for her. ‘Gideon, please tell us what it says,’ she begged her husband.

‘It says,’ Gideon answered her, ‘that Miss Henrietta Walker is to present herself at the rooms of Mrs May Buchanan on Thursday of this week in order that Mrs Buchanan may assess her suitability to sing for the Adelphi’s guests.’

‘Oh!’ Such was the intensity of her emotions that Hettie was completely unable to speak. Instead tears poured from her eyes and, with a small choked sob, she got up from her chair and ran to Ellie’s side to bury her head against her shoulder, her whole body shaking.

‘I still can’t believe that I am actually to be auditioned,’ she confided to Miss Brown two hours later, having begged Ellie’s permission to visit her teacher to give her the good news. ‘And it is all down to you,’ Hettie told her teacher earnestly. ‘Mrs Buchanan must have taken note of your recommendation.’

‘I wrote no less than the truth, Hettie,’ Miss Brown assured her. ‘Nature has granted you a very special gift and given you a truly excellent voice.’

‘But it is because of you that I have learned how to use it,’ Hettie replied earnestly.

‘When is your audition?’ Miss Brown asked her excitedly.

‘It is this Thursday. I’m already feeling nervous. My mother has a sister who lives in Liverpool and so we are to take the train Wednesday to be there in plenty of time and stay with my Aunt Connie. What do you think Mrs Buchanan will ask me to sing?’

‘I am sure that she will expect you to have a piece ready prepared,’ Miss Brown answered her. ‘So we must choose something that both shows off the range of your voice and which will fall pleasantly on the ears of ladies taking afternoon tea. This is not a situation where I would recommend the singing of a complicated aria.’ Miss Brown pursed her lips thoughtfully and then said shrewdly, ‘Perhaps something pretty and sentimental would be best.

‘Oh, and I would advise you to wear something smart but loose, so that your voice is not constricted in any way. You will be apprehensive, of course, and anxious, that is to be expected. It is Monday already so we must decide quickly what you will sing so that you can practise it. What about “Auf Wiedersehen?”’ she suggested. ‘After all, Vivienne Segal was just your age when it made her a star.’

Hettie nodded in agreement. She was far too excited to be able to speak. She could hardly believe that in three days time she would be singing at the Adelphi!

The bus had set them down at the corner of the road, and Hettie moved closer to Ellie’s side as her apprehension grew. She had felt more and more nauseous and fearful with every minute that had passed since leaving her Aunt Connie’s.

The rooms where Hettie was to have her audition were in a street off Lime Street, not very far from the Adelphi. The house itself was halfway down the street, and like all its neighbours it had a clean if somewhat austere appearance, its front step donkey-stoned and the doorknocker well polished.

‘Oh, Mam…’ Hettie whispered shakily.

‘What is it, Hettie?’ Ellie asked her gently. ‘Have you changed your mind?’

Immediately Hettie shook her head, missing the faint sigh Ellie gave and the look of anxiety in her eyes.

A small, neatly dressed maid in a crisply immaculate apron and cap opened the front door to them and directed them to a dark back parlour, its furniture heavily festooned in dark brown material. Ellie and Hettie perched awkwardly on a bulging sofa.

The faintly worn areas in the turkey carpet made Hettie wonder just how many anxious feet had paced across it whilst their owners waited in the room’s sombre silence. Thick net curtains obscured what light could have entered the room, making it seem even more gloomily oppressive.

She reached out and placed her hand in Ellie’s. She wanted this more than she had ever wanted anything in the whole of her life, more than she would ever want anything ever again. She wanted it so much that it physically hurt, she told herself dramatically.

The door opened, making Hettie jump. The parlour maid announced, ‘You’re both to go in now, if you please.’

‘Good luck, my love,’ Ellie whispered to her as they both got up, kissing her lovingly whilst Hettie gripped her hand.

Hettie had never felt so clumsy, nor so awkward. Her face was burning, and her throat had gone so dry she was afraid she would not be able to sing at all.

The maid escorted them to the door of the front parlour and then whispered, ‘Knock on the door and then wait until she says to go in.’

When her step-mother’s knock went unacknowledged, Hettie cast her an anguished look. ‘Perhaps she didn’t hear,’ she began and then stopped as a firm contralto voice from the other side of the door called out commandingly.

‘Come.’

With Ellie pushing her firmly ahead, Hettie stepped in to the room. Here there was no overstuffed sofa but instead a row of uncomfortable looking hard-backed chairs. But it was the piano and, more dramatically, the woman seated at it, that commanded Hettie’s attention.

Mrs May Buchanan was almost the complete opposite of Miss Brown, being tall and stately where Miss Brown was small and thin; and her jet-black hair, unlike Miss Brown’s untidy grey bun, was drawn back into a formidably elegant chignon. Miss Brown’s manner was fussy yet gentle, whilst Hettie could tell, even on this first meeting, that Mrs Buchanan was chillingly distant.

Hettie could feel herself tremble as Mrs Buchanan’s merciless gaze focused sharply on her.

‘Your teacher has some very complimentary things to say about you, Miss Walker. She seems to think that you have a soprano voice of surpassing excellence.’

Hettie looked towards Ellie for reassurance, not sure how she was meant to respond.

‘Do you have the same high opinion of your voice as your teacher, Miss Walker?’

‘I know that I love to sing,’ was all Hettie could find to say. Mrs Buchanan was making her feel very small and unimportant; she was even beginning to wish that she had not put herself forward for her criticism.

‘Very well then. Please stand up.’

Obediently Hettie got to her feet. She felt sick with nervousness, and she just knew that she was going to do everything wrong.

As she sang the opening bars of the song, she could hear the uncertainty affecting her voice and her heart sank with distress and panic. The song was so familiar to her that she knew it by heart, and yet in her agitation she almost missed a note. But then, as always when she got into the song itself, the music began to take her over and she became lost in its enchantment and the role it had cast for her.

As she sang the last few notes she saw the emotional tears in Ellie’s eyes, and her spirits soared upwards in triumph and pleasure. But she was brought quickly back to earth when Mrs Buchanan commented coldly, ‘You were off key in the first bar.’

‘I was nervous.’

‘If you are nervous about singing in front of me then how do you think you will be able to sing in front of an audience of a hundred?’

Hettie did not dare look at her mother. She knew if she did she would burst into tears of shame and disappointment.

THREE

‘You have been gone such an age. What happened?’

‘Poor Hettie was very nervous,’ Hettie heard Ellie answering as Connie ushered them both into her cosy parlour.

‘I was off key in the opening bars,’ Hettie added, watching as Connie’s expression grew grave and sympathetic, and then laughing and saying, ‘But I am to have the job because Mrs Buchanan says that I am the best of all the applicants.’

‘Oh, you terror, letting me think that you hadn’t got it!’ Connie chided her, laughing back.

‘And I am going to board with Mrs Buchanan’s sister, aren’t I, Mam? She lives in the same street and only takes in female lodgers. I will have lessons with Mrs Buchanan every morning for a month and then I shall sing at the Adelphi hotel every afternoon. Except, of course, for Sunday, which will be my day off. Then after that I will have two days together off each month, which means I can go home to Preston.’

‘Well, inbetween times you must come here to us, then. You will enjoy listening to our school choir, and it will be so lovely to have you. Dr Kenton, the school’s music teacher, is very proud of them, and says they are far superior to the Bluecoat School boys.’

Connie’s husband Harry was the headmaster of a private boys’ school and he, Connie and their children lived in the headmaster’s house right next to the school. In addition to her responsibilities as a headmaster’s wife, Connie was also still very involved in the nursery for children whose parents were out at work or who, in some cases, had no parents to care for them at all. She had set up this nursery prior to her marriage to Harry.

‘So, when do you start your new job, Hettie?’

‘Next week, but I shall need to have a new dress first, shan’t I, Mam?’

‘Yes, my love, you will. Mrs Buchanan has told us that Hettie will need a proper tea dress to wear when she sings,’ Ellie explained to her sister.

‘Well, you will be certain to find something here in Liverpool. We shall go out together tomorrow and look.’

‘Connie, I wonder, would you mind taking Hettie to get a dress without me? Only I have already arranged to see Iris tomorrow.’

Hettie stared at her step-mother in consternation. ‘But you must come with me,’ she protested. ‘Please, Mam, I want you to,’ she pleaded desperately. For although she wanted her new life and its independence, inwardly Hettie felt vulnerable and uncertain, and very much in need of Ellie’s love and support. How could she think of putting seeing Iris before something so important as helping her to find the right dress for her new job? Even Connie was frowning at her.

‘Hettie, I am sorry,’ Ellie said, seeing the disappointed look on Hettie’s face. ‘But Iris is only in Liverpool for tomorrow, and it is important that I see her…’

‘But I need you to help me choose my dress.’ Hettie was ready to burst into tears.

After one look at her pale face and tear-filled eyes, Connie attempted to placate her by saying calmly, ‘Of course you are disappointed that your mother can’t go shopping with you, Hettie. But I can come with you and I’m sure between us we shall be able to find the right thing.’

Somehow Hettie managed to swallow back her tears and nod her head, but it just wouldn’t be the same fun without her.

Even worse was to come!

At four o’clock, the whole family, including Connie’s three young children and her husband, all sat down together to eat a traditional high tea as a treat. Afterwards, Hettie entertained the children by playing spillikins with them, and telling them jokes, until it was time for them to go to bed.

‘You’ve made a rod for your own back now, Hettie,’ Connie teased her when she returned to the parlour having tucked her children up in their beds.

‘They are already demanding to know when they will see you again, and I can see that from now on Sunday will definitely be their favourite day of the week.’

Hettie smiled. It was a comfort to know that Connie, Harry and the children were just around the corner. It made the whole move to Liverpool a little less daunting.

‘Connie, I’ve been thinking.’ Ellie broke in to her sister’s conversation. ‘It seems foolish for Hettie to return home to Preston with me, only to have to travel all the way back to Liverpool again within a matter of days. Could she possibly stay here with you until she moves into the lodging house next week?’

‘But Mam, I will need to go home with you to pack my things,’ Hettie protested anxiously. Her pride wouldn’t let her behave like a baby and say that she had just discovered she wasn’t quite ready to leave home so very quickly and that she wanted to say goodbye ‘properly’ to all her favourite things and, more importantly, her favourite people. An uncomfortable, unhappy feeling was lying like cold stone in her chest. For virtually all her life she had taken Ellie’s presence and love for granted. Now she was both hurt and shocked that Ellie should talk about parting with her so easily and casually.

‘It is just as easy for me to pack them for you, Hettie, and have your trunk sent direct to Mrs Foster’s,’ Ellie told her.

‘Of course Hettie is welcome to stay here,’ Connie said, smiling.

But Hettie couldn’t smile. A huge lump of misery was blocking her throat. At first, Mam hadn’t wanted her to leave home at all, but now it seemed as though she couldn’t wait to be rid of her. Hettie had to concentrate very hard to squeeze back the tears threatening to fill her eyes again. The dizzyingly intense feeling of happiness that had filled her when Mrs Buchanan had told her that she had got the job had been replaced by a forlorn sense of loss.

‘Ellie, you aren’t asleep yet, are you?’ Connie whispered, opening Ellie’s bedroom door and stepping inside. She looked questioningly at her sister as she lay in bed, propped up against the pillows. ‘Only it’s been such a busy day we haven’t had time to talk to each other properly.’

Ellie smiled as Connie sat down on the side of her bed, and put down the book she had been reading.

‘Hettie is very disappointed that you aren’t going to be able to go with her to choose her dress,’ Connie began, watching as a small shadow darkened Ellie’s eyes. She sighed. She too, in truth, had been surprised. She knew how much Ellie loved Hettie, the only girl in her family, whom she had brought up as her own from a very young age.

‘I know. I’d love to be able to go with her, Connie, but I have to see Iris.’

The shadow was there again and Connie’s heart missed a beat.

‘Ellie, something’s wrong. I can tell, what is it?’

‘I’m going to have another child.’

Connie frowned. ‘But, Ellie, surely that’s good news?’

Ellie gave her a wan smile. ‘Connie, I’m thirty-five, and my youngest child is ten. Gideon and I wanted there to be more children, but after so long without there being one…’ Ellie paused and looked at her sister. I can’t say any of this to Gideon because he is already worrying enough…because of our mother.’

‘Our mother? But she was older than you and had been warned not to have any more children,’ Connie protested, and then looked anxiously at her. ‘Ellie, tell me you have not been given the same warning?’

‘No, no. Nothing like that. But…This time somehow it feels different – not right in some way. I can’t explain it properly, Connie, but I just feel so worried, and I thought if I could see Iris and talk to her about it…The problem is that she’s been away, and she’s only going to be in Liverpool for a few hours inbetween journeys. I’m to see her at her father’s Rodney Street Chambers. Naturally, I don’t want to say anything to Hettie about my reasons for wanting to see Iris. She would worry and feel that she had to stay at home with me and the last thing I want is for her to have to carry the same burden of guilt our mother’s death left to me.’

‘But Ellie, you are not our mother, and you must not think such dreadful things. There is no reason for you to fear there is anything amiss,’ Connie told her bracingly, causing a small smile to flicker across Ellie’s face. How very typical it was of Connie’s training as a nurse that she should adopt such a stalwart and reassuring manner! ‘You are right, though, to see Iris. She is a wonderful doctor and very highly thought of. I do think, though, that it might be better if you explained to Hettie why you want to see Iris. She’s feeling very hurt.’

‘It isn’t as straightforward as that, Connie. At first when Hettie said that she wanted to apply for this audition I was against it. And I admit that a large part of me would still prefer her to remain at home. I had looked forward to having her at home with us until she marries, to be my friend as well as my daughter. But Gideon is concerned that if we refuse she might…’

‘Run away as I did?’ Connie suggested before shaking her head. ‘Hettie loves you and Gideon, Ellie, and is loved by you – you needn’t worry that she is going to flee the nest and cut her ties.’

‘I know that, and I know too that if she felt I needed her she would stay, but it would be wrong of me to allow her to do that when I know how much her singing means to her. And it is because of that I cannot tell her why I need to see Iris. Please don’t tell her, I beg of you,’ Ellie beseeched her younger sister.

‘Very well, Ellie, if that is what you wish,’ Connie agreed, unwilling to add to her sister’s distress by telling her of her own belief that nothing good could come of keeping something so important a secret from Hettie. With reluctance, Connie agreed she would remain silent.

Alone and unable to sleep in the pretty guest bedroom her new grown-up status had entitled her to occupy, instead of sharing the nursery with Connie’s children like she normally did, Hettie sat up in bed, wrapping her arms around her knees. A tear trickled down her cheek followed by another. She had been so happy hours before but now she was so unhappy, and all because Mam had told her that she wouldn’t be going back to Preston.

Didn’t Mam care about her any more? Didn’t she love her any more? Suddenly Hettie longed to be a little girl once again, able to pad barefoot from her narrow bed in the nursery downstairs to the big bedroom Mam and Dad shared, and then to find her way through the darkness to Mam’s side of the bed where somehow she was always awake and waiting for her, ready to lift her up and tuck her against her side. There, secure in Ellie’s arms and Ellie’s love, Hettie had easily forgotten whatever it was that had woken her and gone contently back to sleep.

Hettie looked hesitantly towards the door, wondering if she should go and find Ellie now. But she was not a little girl any more, was she? It was time to stand on her own two feet.

FOUR

‘We’ll go straight to Bon Marche, I think, Hettie,’ Connie decided vigorously as the three of them sat around the breakfast table. Harry had already left for work, whilst the children had been despatched to the nearby park for some fresh air in the charge of the young orphan girl Connie had taken in who helped her with them.

Hettie forced herself to smile and nod her head, knowing that normally she would have enjoyed the thought of a shopping trip with Connie, and not wanting to be thought rude. But both Connie and Ellie noticed how strained she looked and how her mouth trembled as she tried to smile.

‘We don’t want to lose any time so if you’ve finished your breakfast I think we should make an early start. If we do, we will have time to go into Bon Marche. They have all the very latest fashions in that department store,’ she added importantly. ‘Not that I am suggesting you should have anything from there, Hettie, it would be far too expensive, but there would be no harm in just looking round to get some ideas.’

Obediently Hettie pushed back her chair and stood up.

‘What time are you meeting Iris, Ellie?’ Connie asked her sister.

Ellie put down her teacup and said lightly, ‘Actually, Connie, I’ve changed my mind about that, and decided to come along with you and Hettie instead. Your shopping trip sounds too much fun for me to miss and I know that Iris will understand. I’ll telephone her, though, if I may. She’s staying with her parents, and I was going to see her there.’