after all, the film industry had made great strides in the eight years since John and I had sat in the pennies, dry mouthed as the shadow moved across the wall to clobber one of the unsuspecting actors.
After two hours of heavy sighs and wet eyes ‘The End’ appeared on the screen and the lights in the auditorium came up, bringing us all to our feet as the drum roll eased into the National Anthem…no talking, no fidgeting, simply a mark of respect for our King and Queen.
From the cinema we made our way eagerly to the next port of call, the chippie at the top of Coldhurst Street, for our customary fish and chips sprinkled liberally with salt and vinegar, and salivated to the top of Belmont Street, where Bobby Hall lived. Conversation was on hold as we stood in a circle, the steam of the hot fish and chips mingling with our clouds of breath on the cold night air. Finally with sighs of satisfaction we saw Bobby to his door, and then Jack and I made tracks through the darkness to 36 Leslie Street.
Sunday evening was just as interesting. Our little gang met as usual and made our way down to Union Street, where hordes of people strolled down one side of the street to the end, crossed over the road and walked up the opposite side. It was habitual, the Sunday night paseo. Chatting and larking about, we joined the parade, just a few young blokes without a cogent thought between them, but this was not so—we were all of the same mind: GIRLS, GIRLS, GIRLS! We were growing up; it was the April of our lives. Should we come upon a linkage of girls we immediately locked on behind them, a decent space between us lads and our quarry. The girls threw covert glances over their shoulders and for our part we pretended to be oblivious to them, Bob and I laughing at nothing, and Jack staring ahead with what he perceived to be a steely glint, which didn’t quite work because his eyes were slightly crossed to start with. And another weekend hit the dust.
The offices of the Rutland Mill were palatial, with high ceilings in the boardroom and the general office; these were separated by a washroom, which had two gleaming taps above the basin and at the far end a toilet. All the office doors were either mahogany or rosewood, with shiny cut-glass door knobs; the windows were long and curtained, the bottom half of frosted glass so that the workers would be unable to look in on their betters, and more importantly, we wouldn’t have to look at them. In the first few weeks I felt embarrassed by the cheapness of my suit—Vernon had always been taller than me; but I did polish my shoes so that at least I could walk about the office with more confidence. Filling most of the space were two long desks. On one desk was a girl at one end and me at the other, and at the opposite side an older man facing me and a woman facing the girl, both more important than us; on the second desk a clerk even more important and facing him the big panjandrum, the boss man of us all, the secretary Edmund Taylor. From where he sat we were all within the orbit of his baleful gaze. As he looked at us over his glasses, we doubled our work rate. He never smiled and I surmised that he was either unhappy at home or nursing a grievance that he was grossly underpaid.
My duties were not too taxing. Most of my time was spent entering crate numbers of cops into an enormous ledger. The sheer size of this book gave me a sense of importance. Another duty of mine every week was to take the wages in a huge tray up to the mule room, where the big and little piecers queued for their hard-earned pittance. That was the only occasion I had to go into the mill, and for the first time my heart went out to my father, who was a big piecer at the Standard Mill in Rochdale. The treadwheel in old prisons would have been preferable to a few days in the mule room, where workers, barefoot on the oily, uneven floor, continuously walked up and down between the in-and-out movement of the mules piecing up cotton strands that broke with monotonous regularity; the heat was stultifying and the noise horrendous. Another regular duty of mine was to top up all the inkwells and distribute new blotting paper to the other members of staff.
When we acquired electricity at home is a mystery. It seems that one day we were holding the taper to the gas mantle to bring soft light to the room and the next we clicked a switch on the wall and a brighter light shone from a sixty-watt bulb. I can’t recall any major upheavals in our lives at 36 Leslie Street—no electrician tearing up the skirting boards for wires and connections. Now we had a wireless plugged into the mains no less, and you can’t do that with gas, but our listening was rationed because of the expense, unless it was something special; and on Sunday 3 September 1939, a fine, warmish day, sitting on the steps to the backyard, face turned upwards to the sun to take advantage of the passing summer, I heard Mr Neville Chamberlain, our Prime Minister, informing us all that from today we were at war with Germany. I was only sixteen years old, so I accepted the news with equanimity; I didn’t honestly believe it concerned me. The next day the air-raid sirens wailed over the land and I still wasn’t convinced it was real; in any case it was common knowledge that it would all be over by Christmas. Here a very strange thing occurred. Aunt Marie received a letter from her brother, Uncle Ernest, who was in the navy, assuring her that there would be no war. It was dated 21 August 1939, but ironically the letter was delivered the day after war was declared. In his letter Uncle Ernest told Aunt Marie that he was now serving on HMS Adventure, which in the past had been in reserve but now was commissioned on active service.
Contrary to popular expectation, the war was not all over by Christmas, and war in the air and on the high seas was taking a heavy toll of British lives; and at home Uncle Ernest was constantly in our thoughts.
During this moment of history, when I was still filling inkwells at the Rutland Mill, only once was I in trouble. Next to me, the girl on my desk was new, a little older than me but very self-assured. I didn’t really get on with her, as she treated me like a minion—‘Bring this’, or ‘Pass me that’ or, once when I sneezed, ‘For heaven’s sake, use a hankie’; and while I appreciated the fact that she was slightly superior in office seniority, she had been with us only for a few days whereas I was an old hand. Anyway, one dinnertime I happened to mention that the cotton mill was a frightening place at night, especially now that the war was in full swing and all the windows were blacked out. Ken Smith, the senior clerk, was about to leave the office and as he was passing he said that the mill was a frightening place during the day. Clever Clogs snorted. He looked at her and continued. ‘Some time ago, he said, when he was doing my job, as he was about to enter the passage a man walked towards him carrying an arm on a piece of paper, followed by two other workers who were supporting the man who had lost it. He’d had an accident with a fan belt and there was blood all over that passage, and that was in the middle of the morning, he said, and some say that his ghost still comes along the passage at night. The story scared the pants off me. A cotton mill at night is never silent: it creaks and groans, and somewhere in the factory something falls to the floor. But when he’d gone she said she wasn’t afraid of the dark.
‘You’re pathetic,’ she said.
That did it. ‘All right,’ I replied. ‘Go up into the mill tonight, then.’
She said she couldn’t tonight as she was going to the pictures and that was that.
But the following night when everyone else had gone and the factory was deserted apart from us, as she was stamping the mail she gave the last stamp a violent thump, turned to me and said, ‘I’ll be back in ten minutes.’ As she stormed out of the office, I thought, What’s the matter with her? Then it all came back to me—my challenging her to go into the empty black mill. I dashed after her to the beginning of the long stone passage that led to the steps up to the card room and stared into the blackness, but it was too late: there was no sign of her. I hadn’t a torch or anything—it had never really occurred to me that she would take up the dare. I gulped. Then again, she was so cocksure and I hadn’t forced her. Tentatively I called her name. The silence was deafening, so I called again, louder, but to no avail. So I shrugged and wondered if she’d gone home, leaving me standing there like a bridegroom wondering if it isn’t too late to call it off. But when I went back to the safety of the bright office, I saw her coat over the back of the chair, so I knew she had gone into the card room. Suddenly I’d had enough. If she wanted to play silly games, that was up to her. I had a tram to catch, and when she returned to the office full of triumph I wasn’t going to be sitting there to applaud, and she could put that in her pipe and smoke it.
However, when morning inevitably came there was a strained atmosphere in the office when I arrived. The girl was not there, but more remarkably the secretary