Where Memories Are Made (23 page)

‘You must have missed the quarter to six bus by that time so you had a long wait for the next at nine?'

‘Oh, I er … I didn't wait for the next bus, I walked to Mablethorpe to catch the bus to Skegness.'

‘What, nearly six miles? I wouldn't have fancied that trek after a day's work.' Jackie looked at him thoughtfully. She hadn't seen him on her journey back from visiting her brother in Mablethorpe, and she would have done surely if he'd done as he said. ‘I rode back from Mablethorpe at just after six and I never saw you or I'd have given you a lift.'

‘Oh, er … that's because I cut across the fields. It's much quicker that way. Do you want me to ring through the orders for supplies the cleaning supervisor brought up yesterday afternoon?'

‘Oh, yes, please.' His abrupt change of subject did not go unnoticed by Jackie and for an instant she had the overwhelming feeling he was lying to her. People who lied had something to hide. She wondered what it was that Al didn't want her to know about. But she had a mountain of work that was waiting to be dealt with so hadn't time to be wasting on speculating further.

Later that morning Terry Jones, the Head Stripey, flicked the stub end of his cigarette into the bushes and said to Jackie, ‘If I agree to help you, what's in it for me?'

She inwardly groaned. She might have known Terry would want something in return. She was not stupid. She knew what he was angling after, and he could angle as much as he liked but he would never get what he was after from her. She'd sooner die first. Still, he obviously wasn't going to agree to help her unless she did tempt him with an inducement. ‘I'll buy you a drink the next time I see you in Groovy's,' she offered.

‘One drink! That's hardly fair exchange for what you want me to do. Go on a date with me and we might have a deal.'

Jackie inwardly shuddered at the thought of spending any longer than necessary with this ferret of a man who really believed he was God's gift to women. How he always seemed to have a string of girls clamouring after him she had no idea. She could only assume that it was his position as Head Stripey that attracted them. It seemed if she wanted Terry's help she would have to agree to his terms, but she didn't have to go ahead with it when it came to it, did she? She responded sweetly, ‘We've a deal. But trouble is, Terry, as much as I'd love to go on a date with you, I can't make any firm arrangements at the moment as I'm working all the hours God sends covering for Rhonnie and Mrs Jolly. But when they come back we'll sort something out.'

He eyed her knowingly. ‘Think I'm stupid, eh, Jackie? You found time for a date with the drummer from the Upbeats last night, so you can't be working all hours.'

Jackie inwardly groaned. Nothing any of the staff did was secret at Jolly's, thanks to the camp grapevine. She told him, ‘For your information that wasn't a date I had with Vic last night, he just happened …' She then inwardly scolded herself, realising what she was doing, and snapped at him, ‘I don't need to explain myself to you. Are you going to do what I ask?'

‘Only if you agree to have a date with me and we make the arrangements now.' Terry leered at her. ‘You know you're desperate to. It's only 'cos you were courting that you didn't before. Well, now you're free and single. For God's sake, just admit you've got the hots for me, Jackie! And if flashing your knickers at me the other day wasn't a come on, then I don't know what is.'

She scoffed, ‘Do you seriously believe that I purposely ripped a good skirt to give you a flash of my underwear? You really are something else, Terry Jones.'

He completely misconstrued her comment and said proudly, ‘About time you admitted that. So do you want my help or not?'

He wasn't going to budge so she either agreed to his demand or she'd have to forget this particular way of helping Harold Rose to overcome his shyness and think of something else, getting people to help her who wouldn't demand such a high price from her in return. But it was such a good idea, and if it worked as well as she hoped then it would go a long way towards achieving Jackie's goal. With great reluctance she told Terry, ‘Okay, one date.'

He grinned smugly. ‘It's my night off on Monday. I'll meet you in Groovy's at eight.'

Before she could make any protest he had shot off inside the Paradise where his small office was located in the foyer, to resume his task of sorting out the Stripeys' staff roster.

Jackie was already beginning to regret agreeing to his demands. There could be any number of staff members in Groovy's on Monday night, and if she was seen with Terry … well, the gossips would have a field day with it. Knowing Terry as she did, he was not going to allow anyone to think he had blackmailed Jackie into a date with him, but would lead them to believe she was mad for him and it was she who had asked him out.

When she whispered to Ginger at dinnertime in the restaurant the situation she had got herself into, her friend's immediate reaction was to convulse with laughter. Jackie had hoped Ginger would come up with a get out, but she gleefully said there wasn't one she could think of. So, having made her deal with Terry all Jackie could do was grin and bear it and live with the consequences.

At three o'clock that afternoon, Harold Rose lifted his head from his work when there was a tap on the door. Calling out for whoever it was to enter, he expected it to be Al or Jackie with his afternoon cup of tea and biscuits. It was Al but he wasn't carrying anything.

‘Sorry to bother you, Mr Rose,' he began. ‘But there's an urgent situation over in the Paradise ballroom and Jackie is out on her daily tour of the camp. I can't leave the office unattended to deal with it.'

Harold felt himself go hot under the collar. Dealing one to one with Chef Brown the previous day had been purgatory enough for him, a situation he was still not quite recovered from, but the Paradise ballroom at this time in the afternoon would be full of people attending the afternoon tea dance. To enter a vast room full of people was to him as fearsome as entering a ravenous lion's cage. His legs began quaking under his desk, his palms running with sweat as his thoughts raced to find a plausible excuse.

Before anything came to him, though, Al, as Jackie had instructed, said, ‘I'll tell the Stripey on the telephone that you're on your way.'

With that he did an about turn, leaving a highly anxious Harold Rose staring blindly after him, knowing he had no choice but to take himself over to the Paradise to find out what the problem was and hope he didn't make a complete idiot of himself in front of all the people there.

Nervously approaching the large wooden double doors leading into the ballroom, Harold Rose almost jumped out of his skin when he heard his name being called and spun around to see a skinny young Stripey with a mop of long fair hair come out of one of the double doors leading into the Paradise, letting out a blast of ‘The Tennessee Waltz' which the band were playing as he did so. It faded to a distant strain as the door shut behind him and he hurried over to Harold.

Terry Jones said with a confident air, ‘Hi, I'm Terry Jones, Head Stripey.' He then looked thoughtfully at Harold's stout brogues. ‘Not really dancing shoes, but they'll have to do.'

Harold took off his horn-rimmed glasses which had steamed up in the heat coming off his face, took a handkerchief from out of his pocket and gave them a swipe, then another quick pass over his sweating brow before he put his spectacles back on. ‘Er … my shoes will have to do for what, Mr … er … Jones?'

‘Dancing.'

‘I'm sorry! Oh, I … er … think you're confusing me with someone else. I'm Mr Rose, Temporary Manager. I was told you have an urgent situation, and as no one else is available I've come to see how I can help.'

‘That is our urgent situation, Mr Rose. Les Hunter, he's one of my senior Stripeys … cracking dancer, the old dears love him … we'll, he's gone and sprained his ankle. One of the old chaps got carried away doing a tango and tripped him up. Anyway, Sister Stephens has strapped Les up and told him he's to rest it for a couple of days. Well, I can sort something by tomorrow to cover for him if he's still off, but it's too short notice for today. So that means I'm short a dancer.'

Harold's face turned ashen. ‘Am I to understand that you wish me to take his place?' His heart began to thump painfully, his legs threatening to collapse beneath him.

Harold stuttered, ‘Oh, but you will have to get someone else, I'm afraid. I'm far too busy with work. Anyway I … I … I don't dance so I'd be no good to you at all.' That wasn't quite true as Harold was in fact a good dancer, having been taught by his mother to her collection of dance-band records. She'd loved to dance and there'd been no one else to partner her. But dancing with her in privacy was one thing; in a ballroom full of people it was very much another. It seemed Terry didn't hear him, though, as he was already holding open one of the double doors for Harold to follow him through.

Inside the ballroom the band were now loudly playing a military two step. Harold was still protesting, ‘Look, Mr Jones, you don't seem to have understood me …'

He was cut short by the arrival of two old ladies. One was small and fat with a head of tightly permed white hair tinted pink. She was very fussily dressed in a bright pink frilly dress with matching dance shoes. The other lady was tall and thin, her grey hair scraped back in a tight bun at the nape of her scrawny neck. She was wearing a calf-length black dress, its high neck and full sleeves edged with white lace, A cameo brooch was pinned to one shoulder. They had their arms hooked together.

The short, fat lady spoke first, in a high-pitched squeaky voice. ‘Oh, Terry, is this the young man you've brought in to replace Leslie?' She smiled at Harold coyly, showing a set of badly fitting false teeth, then said to her thin friend, ‘I saw him first, Agnes, so it's only fair I get first dance with him.' Before Harold could stop her she had slid her arm through his and was propelling him to the middle of the dance floor.

Next thing he knew they were surrounded by dozens of other dancing couples, their ages ranging from the mid-forties to the advanced years of the old lady who had commandeered him. She had by now clamped herself tightly to him, obviously expecting him to take the lead. All he could think of was that the sooner he got this dance over with, the sooner he could make his escape from this nightmare situation. But that wasn't to be. When the music stopped his partner was elbowed aside to be replaced by her thin friend, who was demanding he partner her for the next dance.

This situation carried on. It was over an hour and a half before a chance to escape came, and that was only because the afternoon tea-dance session had come to an end with the band's final chords of ‘The Anniversary Waltz'.

Excusing himself from his last partner, Harold hurried over to the exit but was waylaid by Terry Jones. ‘Well, you certainly proved a hit with the ladies, Mr Rose. They're all saying what a wonderful partner you made.'

Harold eyed the other man, astonished. Terry was making that up, surely? Harold had been a nervous wreck, had several times tripped over his own feet and many times lost the beat; several times he forgot steps to a dance his mother had painstakingly taught him. Those comments must just have been made to be kind. ‘You will excuse me? I have to get back to work,' he murmured, and with that he shot off.

Back in the general office he scurried through without even acknowledging Jackie or Al. In his own office he shut the door firmly behind him, desperate for the sanctuary it afforded him. He had barely sunk gratefully into his chair when there was a tap at the door and he almost leaped to his feet again. Terrified this could be another summons to appear somewhere in the camp when he'd had no time as yet to recover from his last ordeal, he anxiously called out, ‘Enter.'

Harold stared wildly over Jackie's shoulder, as she came in and walked over to his desk. He was mortally relieved when she said to him, ‘I understand there was a problem in the Paradise while I was out, Mr Rose. I'm sorry I wasn't here to deal with it myself, now I know how hard it is for you to deal with strangers.'

He appreciated her thoughtfulness. ‘Well, er … it couldn't be helped, I suppose.'

As though Jackie didn't know, she asked him, ‘Did you manage to sort out the problem or do I need to go over there?'

‘Er … well, yes, I did resolve it. Mr Jones was short of someone to partner the campers at this afternoon's tea dance as one of the Stripeys had sprained an ankle and been ordered to rest. I … er … obliged.'

She looked at him admiringly. ‘Then after what you told me, Mr Rose, I think you should congratulate yourself. That situation couldn't have been easy for you. It's funny how scared we can feel when we're faced with doing something that we don't want to, and then afterwards realise it wasn't half as frightening as we thought it would be. Maybe, in fact, quite enjoyable?' The look on Harold's face told her that for him the situation had proved to be just as frightening as he had thought it would, and he had definitely
not
enjoyed it. This made Jackie realise that if she had ever thought her task was going to be an easy one then she'd been badly mistaken. She was going to have to come up with a few more situations such as the one she had just engineered before he even started to build up his confidence. She felt a bit sorry for what she was purposely putting Harold through, but wasn't going to let that stop her from finishing what she had started, however long it took.

She said to him, ‘You look like you could do with a cup of tea. I'll see to it for you. Oh, and to keep you informed, we've had several replies for the replacement nurse and Sister Stephens is going to whittle them down to the ones she feels are worth interviewing.' She omitted to tell Harold then that she intended him to be sitting in on those interviews, too, whether he liked it or not.