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As though he’s read my mind, he says, ‘I’m not sure about this alley, Fern. If somebody wants to come back to buy something, they might never find me again. I need a bigger unit. Somewhere with storage.’
I nod. As I’d been the one to tell him about the stall going free, I feel a certain amount of responsibility for the location. ‘Maybe it suits my needs better than yours,’ I tell him apologetically. I don’t add the main reason that it suits my needs is that it’s cheap.
He looks at my feeble display of dresses and gives me a quick smile. ‘I guess it does. Gigi’s been away for the weekend with more stuff than that.’
The smile softens it and he doesn’t say it in a mean way, but my doubts come flooding back. As my parents pointed out, I’m not a businesswoman, I’m a market trader. I’ve got little stock and even fewer customers and I’m running out of funds.
Feeling a bit sick about it, I say, ‘David, you know that day that we first met? And you said no good deed ever goes unpunished? Is that something you really believe?’
He looks amused. ‘Touch wood, I’ve been all right so far.’
I haven’t, though.
David goes back to his side of the canvas and sits down, stretches his legs and opens the book on astrology.
Without him, I’m at a loose end. I sit down, too, and write a list in my client book to distract me from my self-doubts:
Cato Hamilton
Church sale
Car boot sale
Tabletop sale
This list will be the foundation of my new strategy to get more stock.
It’s dead here now and the time is dragging. I need an energy boost, a sugar hit. ‘David, please could you watch my stall while I get myself something to eat?’
He looks up from his book. ‘Sure.’
‘Do you want anything?’
‘That’s okay, thanks, I’ve got a flask.’
‘Oh, fine.’ Obviously, he’s a practical guy with his dovetail joints and stuff. Of course he’s going to have a flask. ‘Won’t be long,’ I tell him and I make my way along the maze of cobbled lanes past the vaults, winding through the steamy stalls selling sizzling street food. It’s exciting, like being transplanted to another continent. Here, with the profusion of smells and multitude of languages, it feels like anywhere but England.
I cross Camden Lock Place and call in at Chin Chin Labs for a liquid nitrogen ice cream. I like the process, watching the chilly vapour freeze the cream, choosing the flavours and sprinkles.
Cutting through the West Yard, I lean on the humped black-and-white Roving Bridge to eat the ice cream. It’s a sunny day and the place is busy. Beneath me, clumps of green weed undulate gently on the surface of the sluggish canal.
By the time I finish off my cone I start to feel more optimistic. I’ll get new stock. I’ll message everyone on my mailing list. I’ll begin a new push for sales. I’ll make a name for myself.
David has started to pack up when I get back. It’s early, just gone five, and the market doesn’t close until seven.
‘How did you get on today?’ I ask him.
He looks at me blankly, as if he’s distracted. ‘It’s all relative, isn’t it?’ he says after a moment. His eyes are tired, but he smiles. ‘There’s no pressure, that’s the main thing. You can’t put a price on that, right?’
The way he says it makes me wonder what’s been going on in his life, because he doesn’t sound that convincing. I want to ask him, but before I can he’s gone back to packing away his stall.
The following evening I pick up the Camden New Journal from the doormat, where it lies surrounded by Pizza flyers and taxis offering trips to airports, to find Lucy and me on the front page, standing outside our house. She with her black towel wrapped around her looking amazing in a cloud of the photographer’s apple-scented billowing smoke and me looking shocked and enigmatic in my trench coat, my hair falling over my right eye, holding my beautiful dresses like a wartime heroine.
Compared with me, Lucy looks terribly underdressed. Compared with her, I look ridiculously overdressed. I’m not sure what prompted me to grab my raincoat, apart from it being Burberry. I had some vague notion of it being appropriate for an emergency, I think.
The important thing is, we look good and neither of us looks particularly traumatised, despite the headline: ‘Actress and Fashion Curator in Sauna Trauma’. I like my low chin-tilt. I don’t remember adopting it at all, but then I realise I was trying to keep the clothes from falling.
I go back outside, hurry up the steps and ring Lucy’s doorbell.
Lucy flings her door open. ‘Hey, Fern! Come in,’ she says cheerfully, picking up her copy of the Journal from the mat. The word ‘Welcome’ is really faded. It’s literally outworn its welcome.
‘We’re on the front page,’ I say, unfurling my paper to show her.
‘Oh, great!’ She looks at the photograph critically for a moment or two and reads the headline. ‘Actress? Actress?’
I try to look sympathetic that the paper didn’t call her an actor, but I’m secretly thrilled at being called a fashion curator in print. I read it aloud for Lucy’s benefit:
‘Actress Lucy Mills escaped from a blaze in her sauna on Saturday afternoon. Lucy, who’s currently starring as Lady Macbeth at The Gatehouse theatre, Highgate, said, “It’s a miracle we got out of there alive.” Fellow resident, Fern Banks, curator of wearable vintage fashion at Fern Banks Vintage in Camden Market, lost a sizeable amount of irreplaceable stock in the blaze. “I hope my company will survive this. I intend to be like a phoenix rising from the ashes.”’
I glance at Lucy. ‘Uh-oh. It sounded good when I said I’d lost a sizeable amount of stock, but now people are going to think I’ve got nothing left to sell,’ I comment gloomily. ‘And they’d be right.’
‘Don’t worry about it. What you have to do is give it a couple of weeks and call the Camden Journal to tell them you actually are a phoenix rising from the ashes. Get your name out there before everyone forgets it. They always like a good story for the inside pages. You can do an advertorial, with local people rallying around you.’
I like her optimism. ‘Good idea! Sounds expensive, though. But I’ll think about it, because as we’re on the front page,’ I point out, ‘they might put me rising from the ashes on the front page, too.’
‘Aw, Fern. Trust me, they won’t. Because a fire’s bad news. Rising like a phoenix is good news. They never put good news on the front page – who’d buy it?’
Which is a sad indictment of life today.
We study the article once more in silence.
‘Have you forgiven me yet?’ Lucy asks in a small voice when she comes to the end of the column. ‘I feel really bad about it.’
‘Yes, of course,’ I reply, giving her a hug. ‘After all, it was an accident. The fire officers made more mess than the fire did, what with chopping bits out of my door and the water damage,’ I point out ruefully. I don’t believe in bearing a grudge – I don’t want to be like my mother.
But it is a big problem, all the same, and it’s adding to my worries.
So far, the loss adjusters are reluctant to pay out for the hole between our flats, because they see the fire as an act of negligence on Lucy’s part, and the estate management isn’t happy with the fact she’s got a sauna at all.
I haven’t told my parents about the fire yet, because one way or another, going by past experience, they’re going to blame me for it. Ideally, if I have my own way, they’ll never find out.
But if the worst comes to the worst and we have to pay for it ourselves, I can’t afford to go halves with Lucy to mend the hole. My priority is to get more stock to sell. The whole ‘rising from the ashes’ bit is all very well, but without stock I’m not going to have a business left.
‘I’ve arranged for the flats to be thermo-fogged,’ she says after a moment.
Apparently, thermal fogging is a kind of deodorising method of blasting out the smoke smell, replacing it with something citrusy and nasally acceptable, despite being toxic to aquatic life.
‘Great! No more smoke smell!’ I’m very happy about that. Obviously not the toxic bit, but I love the idea of the flat smelling citrusy for a change.
Back at mine, determined to do as much as I can to put things right, I make a coffee, get my paintbrush and go outside to paint the front door. I’m kneeling on the doormat, when my phone rings in my back pocket. I balance my paintbrush on the pot. It’s a number that I don’t recognise. Spam, at a guess, but I answer it just to be sure.
It’s a woman. ‘Fern Banks Vintage?’
‘Yes, that’s me,’ I say warily. ‘Who’s this?’
‘Chalk Farm Library. Just a moment, I have a call for you. Here you are.’
I’m perplexed. I have no idea why Chalk Farm Library is calling me. I’m not even a member. ‘Hello?’
‘Hello?’ The voice is high-pitched and accented, vaguely familiar. ‘Is this Fern Banks who’s in the paper today?’
‘Yes,’ I say again, getting to my feet because I’ve been kneeling for ages on the bristles of the doormat and they’re prickling my knees.
‘Good! You’re the woman who stopped the bus to give me my money back. You see, I recognised you from your picture. You have a very distinctive style. My name’s Dinah Moss. M-O-S-S,’ she repeats with emphasis. ‘And you’re Fern Banks. B-A-N-K-S. You see how it is? Moss, Fern, Banks.’
I laugh – I can’t believe it. Something good is happening at last!
‘Now, I see from the paper that you have a business as a curator of fashion, I understand?’
‘Yes, that’s right!’ I reply brightly.
‘I’m ringing to invite you to tea to thank you and I’d also very much like to show you my collection of haute couture. It’s evident to me that you’re a woman who’ll singularly appreciate it.’
The words thrill me. Haute couture is dressmaking perfection, with garments made from the most extravagant fabrics, in the most intricate designs, with meticulous detailing and the finest needlework. And she thinks I’ll appreciate it! (That’s understating it slightly.) Haute couture is stratospherically out of my price range so it’s my equivalent of treasure. ‘I’d love to come to tea.’
‘Ah! We’re agreed! And also, I have a business proposition for you that I believe will interest you. But I won’t talk now; I’m in the library. So, now I have your number. And you take my number, too,’ she says imperiously.
‘I’ll get a pen.’ I go into the shadowed, smoke-scented flat to find one and she gives me her home number. I read it back to her and write it down on my wall calendar with her name next to it, smiling to myself: Dinah Moss. Moss, Fern, Banks. We agree to meet on Monday afternoon, my day off.
‘Excellent! Goodbye. I’ll look forward to it.’ Her voice fades as she says to the woman on the desk, ‘Here you are, I’ve finished now.’
The call ends and I put the phone back in my pocket. I have to say, I’m excited about the phone call, because Dinah Moss who wears Chanel says I have a very distinctive style and a compliment always means more coming from an expert.
I try not to speculate about the business proposition.
I have a good feeling about it, all the same.
From time to time over the past few days I’ve been mulling over David Westwood’s comment that no good deed ever goes unpunished. Not that I’m superstitious or anything, but the fire did come shortly after my good deed.
More than anything, I’d like to prove him wrong.
LOT 6
A blue cotton day dress with five bowling-pin-shaped wooden buttons, fitted waist, patch pockets, size 12, labelled with Controlled Commodity symbol (CC41) to comply with government rationing controls, 1941
Sunday is a sunny day and the market is busy. However, sadly for me, I’m not busy at all. I was hoping to sell the last of my stock on my practically bare stall so that I’d have the funds to resupply, but the lack of choice is putting people off.
Gratifyingly, a few people recognise me from the article in the Camden New Journal and sympathise about the fire, but not enough to buy anything. I get them to write their contact details in my client book before they go.
I lean on the counter and watch the constant shifting tide of people flow past as I listen enviously to David Westwood’s sales patter above the noise, lifting my face to the warm sun, whiling away the time thinking up a patter of my own.
And then, suddenly, the mysterious lull occurs and the market is quiet again.
Mick has a theory that any lulls in conversation in a pub or restaurant occur at ten to or ten past the hour, so I check the time. Sure enough, it’s ten minutes past five and I feel a sudden fond urge to ring him and tell him. I’m just getting out my phone, when David casts his shadow over me.
‘That was crazy,’ he says, pushing up the sleeves of his black T-shirt, his mood buoyant. He’s grinning, high on success, and looks up at my rails. ‘How did you get on?’
‘Fine,’ I tell him, grinning back. I don’t want to ruin his mood.
Most people would take this statement at face value and I assume he has, too, because he strolls back around to his side. Then he returns with a single blue acrylic panel and holds it up to the light for me to look through.
‘This is what the constellation of Leo looks like,’ he says.
As I lean over the counter to look, chin in hand, I can feel his warmth radiating through his black T-shirt.
‘Yeah?’ I squint at it, trying hard to make something of the random holes. How the ancients got a lion out of that, I’ll never know. David’s tanned thumb is holding the Perspex, and I look at the pale crescent of his nail. ‘Nice!’
‘This is the tail, see?’ he says, slowly tracing the shape of a lion to the rump, down a leg, along the back and up the neck to the mane and the muzzle and the chest.
Our faces are so close that I can smell him, clean and fresh, even on this hot day in the dusty city. I swallow so hard my throat squeaks. ‘So that’s Leo,’ I say hoarsely, the holes leaking sunbeams along my finger.
‘This particular lion has golden fur. It makes it fearless and indestructible.’ He shifts his face a little to look at me and he’s still holding up the Perspex, its blue colour deepening his eyes and shading his face. ‘You’ll be okay,’ he says seriously.
Without warning, I feel as if I’m going to cry. I’m nodding agreement, pressing my lips together to stop the trembling. ‘Yeah, I know.’
He straightens before I do. ‘Anyway,’ he says. ‘That’s Leo.’
When he goes back to his stall I feel as if the earth has shifted underneath me. To ground myself, I do what I was intending to do a few minutes before. I call Mick.
‘Hey, Doll,’ he says in his rich, soft voice.
I can hear music in the background and I know he’s home.
‘When did you get back?’
‘This morning. I got a lift with Roscoe.’
Roscoe’s a member of the band. ‘That’s good,’ I say wistfully, staring at the glow of the sun through the canvas roof.
‘I was going to call you. What are you doing tomorrow?’ he asks.
I smile. ‘Nothing.’
He chuckles softly. ‘That’s where you’re wrong. Let’s make a day of it and go—’
‘Oh!’ I interrupt him quickly, suddenly remembering about Dinah. ‘Actually, I am doing something! I’m meeting a woman about a business proposition. But that’s not until the afternoon, anyway.’
‘Ah, hell, Fern. Can’t you do it another time?’
Through the corner of my eye I can see David’s legs outstretched on the cobbles, his polished shoes gleaming, and I lower my voice. ‘Well – not really, no, Mick. It’s business. How about we make it Tuesday?’
The volume of the music increases. What time is this to be partying?
‘I’ll get back to you, Doll,’ he said and hangs up.
I laugh merrily once he’s gone, in case David’s listening and thinks my love life is as much of a failure as my business. ‘Bye!’ Damn. I’m a Leo. I’m fearless and indestructible, I tell myself firmly, putting my phone away.
Utilitarian glamour – that’s the look I’m going for as I head to Dinah’s for tea. Dinah’s house is in Netherhall Gardens, a quiet, residential part of Hampstead with large, impressive red-brick houses, architectural plants and electronic gates. I’m thinking of reminding her about the first time we met. The way I look at it, the first time was chance, the second time was a coincidence, but I feel in my optimistic heart that this third meeting is meant to be.
Dinah’s house has a brown wooden gate and a crazy-paving path leading to the front door. I ring the bell and she opens the door immediately as if she’s been standing behind it waiting for me to arrive. She greets me graciously, posing with one arm on the doorframe and looking very Coco Chanel in a little cream silk shift dress accessorised with a cascade of faux pearls. Her dyed black hair is curling slightly around her sharp jawline; her lipstick is bright scarlet.
She, of course, is scrutinising me in turn. I’ve dressed very carefully for this business meeting in a navy shirtwaister with square shoulders and a narrow belt. I’m posing, too. I’ve rolled back my fringe from my face, very Forties, and with my peach blusher and red lipstick I look as healthy as a land girl. Dinah beckons me in and we bond immediately over a familiar subject.
‘I like your look,’ she says approvingly. ‘Although you gave me a start when I first saw you with that suitcase. There was all that dreadful rattling noise and it unsettled me. I’m a person who’s very susceptible to noise.’
‘Sorry. It’s a cheap case and one of the wheels is coming off.’
‘Oh,’ she says, spreading her hands, ‘and there’s a hole in my handbag; it’s come unstitched!’
There’s something in the way that we’ve just swapped stories of our shoddy goods that makes us both laugh.
‘It’s being repaired now,’ she adds gravely, ‘at the Handbag Clinic.’
‘Good. I’m afraid there’s no hope for my suitcase. I’m going to have it put down.’
She nods seriously. ‘Put out of its misery; yes. I think that’s best – it looked a sorry thing.’ Her mood brightens. ‘First of all, before we have tea I want to show you something that you’ll appreciate as a curator of fashion. Come. Always one must put pleasure before business.’
We climb an oak spiral staircase, which leads up to the first floor.
Dinah takes me into a windowless dressing room with mirrored wardrobes on all three walls. She invites me to sit on a large ivory velvet ottoman. The chandelier throws pools of rainbow light on the polished floor. With a flourish, she touch-opens each of the wardrobe doors in turn. Our reflections disappear and the interiors of the wardrobes glow with lights.
Dinah’s smiling, more to herself than to me. ‘This is my collection,’ she says shyly.
‘Wow.’
It’s like falling into my favourite dream. Her clothes are hanging in muslin garment bags that shroud the dresses inside them. Each garment bag has a vinyl pocket with a Polaroid of the garment tucked into it. I’m seriously excited by these wrapped-up delights, impressed by the care she’s taken to look after them, and I’m filled with a rush of anticipation.
She laughs gleefully at my expression. ‘It’s taken you by surprise, hasn’t it?’
‘Yes!’ I’m looking at the Polaroids and through the muslin bags I can see the vague but enticing outline of her clothes.
She sweeps her hand along them carelessly but possessively, like a lover, and looks at me coquettishly over her shoulder. ‘I have a question for you. How would you catalogue a lifetime’s collection of couture like this?’ she asks.
Is this something she wants me to do? My heart is beating fast with anticipation. Oh please, yes, I’d do it in a heartbeat. ‘I guess I’d do it by designer and by era,’ I say, wondering if this is the actual interview.
‘That’s exactly what I do,’ she says approvingly. ‘I keep them all in chronological order, in the order I was given them by my dahlink husband.’
I’d like a husband like that. ‘Really? Going back to when?’
Again, she turns her head to look at me, her hands on her hips, raising her eyebrows briefly, enjoying my surprise.
‘Let’s see how clever you are, shall we? Tell me, what was the style in post-war nineteen forties?’
I laugh. ‘Come on, that’s too easy. I’m wearing it. Utilitarian, flannel, no more than five buttons due to clothes rationing, two pockets—’
She wags her finger at me. ‘Shame on you, Fern Banks! I’m talking about couture! Here! Look!’ She pulls out a bag, unzips it and takes out the garment to show me.
I can’t believe what I’m seeing. It’s a wasp-waisted jacket over a corseted black silk dress with a midi-length full pleated skirt, so boned and perfectly structured that even on the hanger it holds the shape of the wearer – it could probably stand up by itself.
Christian Dior. I’m stunned, lost for words. My skin prickles with adrenaline. I’ve only ever seen this ensemble in books and, unexpectedly, here it is, a museum piece hanging in a wardrobe.
Dinah thrusts it into my arms and chuckles. ‘Go on! Take it! Feel!’ she says. ‘Don’t we always have to feel?’
Seeing my hesitation, her smile fades and suddenly her mood changes. She says sharply, ‘The cat got your tongue? Tell me about this!’
She’s testing me. I might, after all, be a fake. ‘Well, it’s obviously …’ I hardly dare to say it. ‘It looks like – it’s in the style of Christian Dior’s New Look collection. Spring nineteen-forty-seven, right? La Ligne Corolle. After the war he wanted to move on from the relaxed, practical frocks that women were used to and he chose the corseted, exaggerated cinch-waist styles.’ I’m looking under the skirt at the seams, at the finish of it. I glance uncertainly at her, trying to read her expression, wondering what this is all about, what exactly my role is.
She relaxes again. ‘Of course, you’re quite correct,’ she says languidly, swatting away my words with her hand as if they’re not important anyway. ‘It also has a hat with it. I have it in a box.’
Fascinated, I hold the Dior at arm’s-length. It’s like looking at something incredible, like a sunset, and trying to put a price on it. I’ve got an idea how much this outfit is worth. Probably six figures. Does she?
My speechless admiration amuses her. She laughs and takes it from me – she has other things to show me and she shares in my delight. I get a glimpse of the most beautiful fabrics: chiffon, crêpe romaine, crêpe marocaine, crêpe de chine, gossamer, moiré, organzine, shantung, brocade, velvets in jewel colours – emerald, amethyst, turquoise, lapis lazuli, ruby, sapphire, ivory; dresses so beautiful that I groan in pleasure.
‘They’re all here,’ she says with great pride, spreading her arms wide. ‘The best of the best. Dior, Givenchy, Balenciaga, Laroche, Schiaparelli.’
The names are poetry to me.
Dinah pauses and glances at me conspiratorially. ‘And Chanel.’ She raises her hand. ‘No, don’t say it! I know you’re wondering, Chanel? How could she? Well, I forgave her in the Fifties.’
‘You did? For what?’
Dinah frowns and her expression hardens. ‘What do you think? For cosying up to the Germans during the occupation, of course. Everyone knows she had an affair with that diplomat, the Baron.’ She shrugs. ‘But she was cleared of being a collaborator, so what can you do? Maybe, after all, it was just sex. I chose to forgive,’ she says haughtily, sliding the hangers along the rails. ‘Look! Here’s a Grès that might interest you.’
‘Madame Alix Grès,’ I say, showing off my knowledge, and Dinah pats my cheek sharply but approvingly.
‘Of course, dahlink. Madame Alix,’ she says fondly. ‘Who else but us remembers her anymore?’
She pulls out the gown, in Grecian draped and pleated ivory. It’s breathtaking, a miracle of construction, the pinnacle of elegance. As she holds up the hanger, her arm trembles with the weight; it’s heavy, lavish with fabric. I want to hold it. Hell, I’d kill to wear it.