Cavendish Mews is a smart set of flats in Mayfair where flapper and modern woman, the Honourable Lettice Chetwynd has set up home after coming of age and gaining her allowance. To supplement her already generous allowance, and to break away from dependence upon her family, Lettice has established herself as a society interior designer, so her flat is decorated with a mixture of elegant antique Georgian pieces and modern Art Deco furnishings, using it as a showroom for what she can offer to her well heeled clients.
Today however we are northwest of Lettice’s flat, in the working-class London suburb of Harlesden where Edith, Lettice’s maid’s, parents live in a small, two storey brick terrace house which opens out directly onto the street. Edith’s father, George, works at the McVitie and Price biscuit factory in Harlesden as a Line Manager, and her mother, Ada, takes in laundry at home. Whilst far removed from the grandeur of Lettice’s Mayfair flat, the Harlesden terrace has always been a cosy and welcoming home for Edith and her seafaring brother, Bert. As she often does, Edith is visiting her parents on her midweek half-day off.
After taking tea at her family home, Edith has followed her mother to the nearby Harlesden High Street with its Jubilee Clock Tower* with its four gas lamps and drinking fountain, where they are visiting Mr. Pyecroft’s ironmongery** establishment. It is Edith’s Aunt Maude’s birthday, and Ada knows she will find the perfect gift for her practical elder sister amongst all the shelves lined with copper and brass pots and pans, decorative pottery jars and cannisters, stacks of bowls and brass jelly moulds.
“Yes, I think this citrus juicer will make a lovely gift for your Aunt Maude,” Ada asks as she holds aloft a pretty Delftware style porcelain juicer painted with pretty blue flowers. “Don’t you think so, Edith love?”
“Yes, Mum.” Edith replies laconically in a voice tinged with a far away lilt.
“Well that doesn’t sound very enthusiastic, Edith.” Ada replies with sagging shoulders, lowering it again, disappointed at her daughter’s lack of enthusiasm of her choice of gift.
“What?”
“Well, it sounds like you don’t think it’s very nice, Edith.”
“What?” Edith asks distractedly again.
“The citrus juicer, Edith love!” Ada gasps, holding it up again.
Edith looks at the juicer in her mother’s brown leather glove clad hands. “Oh no, its lovely Mum.” she affirms. “I’m sure Aunt Evelyn will love it.”
Ada’s face crumples with concern as she looks across at her own daughter’s face. Her eyes have a dull, vacant look about them as her gaze flits about the ironmonger’s shelves of goods in a desultory way, gazing first at a set of pots, then at some cannisters, and then at a brass mould in the shape of a fish, yet not really seeing any of them.
Lowering the juicer in her hands again Ada goes on, “And I was thinking that I might buy some new cannisters for myself. What do you think, Edith love?”
“Yes, Mum.” Edith replies again.
“After all, you’re always telling me I should buy new cannisters, aren’t you, Edith love?”
“Yes, Mum.”
“Oh Edith!” Ada scoffs.
Dragged from the world of her own thoughts, which she has been deeply buried in, Edith suddenly becomes aware that her mother is addressing her. “What Mum?”
“Edith!” Ada tuts. “You haven’t been listening to a word I’ve been saying, have you?”
“Yes I have, Mum!”
“No you haven’t.” Ada retorts, pulling a doubtful face as she does. “This juicer is for your Aunt Maude,” She holds the juicer aloft again. “Not your Aunt Evelyn. And you didn’t hear a word I said about buying new cannisters for the kitchen.”
“Are you finally going to buy some new cannisters, Mum?” Edith gasps, clapping her hands. “I’ve been telling you to buy new ones for years.”
“No!” Ada replies, giving her daughter another dubious look. “I just said that to gauge your response.” She hands the juicer over to her daughter before folding her arms akimbo, her beaten old brown leather handbag dangling from the crook of her arm. With a clouded face she goes on, “And judging by that, I know full well you’re not paying attention. You’ve been away with the faeries ever since you arrived today. What’s wrong, love? Has something happened with Frank? You haven’t had a falling out, have you?”
“No Mum!” Edith quickly reassures her mother. “Frank and I are fine. Don’t worry on that account. We’re going to go and see ‘The Diamond Man’*** at the Premier in East Ham**** on Sunday, and then we’ll stop in to see old Mrs. McTavish.”
“Then what’s wrong, Edith love?” Ada asks with concern. “It must be something bad if you’re as distracted as you are today.”
“Oh I didn’t mean to worry you, Mum. I’m sorry.” Edith sighs heavily as she cradles the juicer in her hands.
“So what is it then?”
“It’s Miss Lettice, Mum.”
“Miss Chetwynd? What’s happened to her?” Ada’s aging face crumples and darkens as she goes on, “She’s not unhappy with you, is she? She’s not going to dismiss you, is she?”
“Oh Mum!” Edith laughs. “Miss Lettice just gave me an increase to my wages. Why would she dismiss me?”
“Now Edith love, I like your Miss Chetwynd. She sounds like a good egg, but even good eggs can turn bad.”
“What do you mean, Mum?”
“Well, Miss Chetwynd is a flapper.”
“I don’t see what being a flapper has to do with it, Mum.” Edith says doubtfully.
“Well, you’ve said yourself that Miss Chetwynd is changeable, Edith love.” Ada remarks.
“Yes, but we can all be changeable, Mum.”
“True, but some people are more changeable than others, and they often don’t consider how that changeability can impact the lives of others. Your Miss Chetwynd comes from a good upper-class family, with lots of money. Them who’s never had to work before, find people like us, working class people, dispensable.” Ada tuts. “You may be in favour today, my girl, but there is nothing stopping you from falling from grace on the idle flip of a coin tomorrow.”
“Oh Miss Lettice isn’t like that, Mum.” Edith assures her mother.
“You say that now, Edith love, but you just never know with that class of people. Mark my words. Everything can change at the drop of a hat, and before you can say knife*****, you can find yourself out on your ear with no reference.”
“Oh, I know that, Mum. You remember me telling you about Hilda’s and my friend Queenie from Mrs. Plaistow’s and her problems up in Alderley Edge.”
“I do, Edith love. So just be careful, is all I’m saying.” Ada cautions with a wagging finger. “Anyway, if that isn’t the issue with your Miss Chetwynd, what is the matter with her?”
“Well, you see Mum, she’s been acting rather strangely this last week.” Edith begins.
“How so?”
“Like I told you when I arrived at home this afternoon, Miss Lettice has finished with Mr. Spencely, or rather he has finished with her after becoming engaged to a Kenyan diamond mine heiress and breaking off their engagement.”
“Well naturally that would upset any girl, Edith love. No wonder she is out of sorts.”
“Yes, but it’s not so much that she is out of sorts, but how she is out of sorts, Mum.”
Ada looks quizzically at her daughter. “I don’t understand. What do you mean ‘how she is out of sorts’, Edith love?”
“After Mr. Spensley’s mother the Duchess packed him off to South Africa, poor Miss Lettice fell to pieces.”
“Yes,” Ada remarks with a quick acknowledging nod. “I remember you telling me.”
“She cried and cried and cried, and the fled back to her parents home in Wiltshire. Yet this time,” Edith goes on. “There have been no tears. I mean, she came back red rimmed from her afternoon tea with the Duchess, so she obviously had been crying. But since she’s been back at Cavendish Mews, she’s been unnervingly calm. No, hysterics, no tears, no nothing like last time, Mum. She has breakfast in bed before she gets up each day and goes about her business. I mean she hasn’t gone out, and she did cancel dinner with her friends Mr. Brunton, and a luncheon with Mrs. Channon and Mrs. Palmerston, but she’s ever so quiet and calm. It’s unnerving.”
“Well, that doesn’t sound like anything to lose sleep over, Edith love. In fact, it seems to me that your Miss Chetwynd has reconciled herself to the fact that her engagement with Mr. Spencely is at an end.”
“But it’s not like Miss Lettice to behave like this, Mum. She’s too calm. She just sits and reads, or paces the flat, gazing out the window. Miss Lettice is usually so… so dramatic, especially when it comes to matters of the heart!”
“Matters of the heart!” Ada scoffs. “You’re starting to sound like one of those films you and Frank like to go and see at the Premier, Edith! Do you know what I think?” She looks with kindly eyes upon her daughter.
“No, what Mum?”
“I think you’re looking for, and hoping to find, the drama in your Miss Chetwynd’s life, when it just isn’t there. She’s a little older than you, so maybe she has finally grown out of that phase of grand passions, sweeping romantic gestures and broken hearts. I mean, she’s been managing herself very well for the best part of the last year with her young man gone, hasn’t she?”
“To a degree, Mum. But she’s had her moments. I’ve heard her sobbing when she thinks no-one is listening.”
“Well maybe you’ve not been as discreet as you’d like to think you are, Edith love, and Miss Chetwynd has been crying when she knows she is truly alone.” Ada pinches her daughter’s left cheek with her right thumb and index finger, causing Edith to pull away irritably, blushing as she retreats. “Or maybe she is has just been preparing herself for this eventuality over the last year. After all, there was no guarantee that he would return to her, was there?”
“If you’d seen them together, Mum, you wouldn’t say that.”
“Well, even though this calmness in Miss Chetwynd is worrying you, Edith love – not that I think you need to worry, mind you - there is nothing you can do about it, and worrying about her won’t make a difference either,” She chuckles pityingly. “At least not to her, it won’t.”
“I just want to help her, Mum.”
“Ahh,” Ada raises her hand to her daughter’s temple lovingly and pulls back a stray strand of blonde hairs that have come loose from her chignon, and winds them carefully behind Edith’s ear. “You’re a good girl, Edith love. Your dad and I have raised you well, and we’re so proud to have such a kind and caring daughter. Do you mean what you say, about helping your Miss Chetwynd I mean?”
“Of course I do, Mum!” Edith’s looks earnestly at her mother.
“Then just keep doing what you are doing now. Keep being the indispensable maid that you are. Cook her meals and keep the flat tidy, arrange her wardrobe and do any other little task she sets to you do,” Ada smiles. “And stop worrying.”
“Do you really think that’s the best thing to do, Mum?”
“I do, Edith love.”
“I just can’t help but worry that this is the calm before a storm, Mum.”
“Oh Edith love, don’t go stirring up drama. There’s no sense in worrying about things before they happen, or things that aren’t really there.” Ada sighs. “Now, come on, let’s pay for this citrus juicer before someone else decides to buy it and get Mrs. Pyecroft to wrap it up nicely for us.” She points to the juicer in Edith’s hands. “That will help take your mind off things.”
The pair walk over to the wide shop counter which is cluttered with different pieces of blue and white pottery which jostle for space with a gleaming brass register and a set of enamelled scales. Behind it sits a middle-aged woman with horn rimmed spectacles wearing a milky coffee coloured frock and a darker brown cardigan with a string of burnt orange beads cascading down her front. She wears her hair, mousy brown with streaks of silver grey, in the same way Edith does, in a chignon at the back of her neck.
“Hullo Lilian!” Ada says brightly.
“Hullo Ada!” she replies warmly. “And hullo Edith!” she adds cheerfully, spying Edith in her black coat and her cloche of black straw decorated with black feathers and lilac satin roses, the juicer held carefully in her purple glove clad hands.
“Hullo Mrs. Pyecroft.” Edith replies, smiling shyly.
“I’m sorry if George kept you occupied the other night, Lilian” Ada apologises to Mrs. Pyecroft. “He stayed out with your Ernie so late on Sunday that he nearly missed his tea!”
“Oh don’t apologise, Ada,” Mrs. Pyecroft answers, flapping Ada’s concerns away with a sweeping gesture that causes her plain gold wedding band to glisten in the diffused light of the shop. “Once Ernie and he get talking about whatever it is that they think is in Brian Johnston’s fertiliser, they are like two gossiping old women, and there is no stopping them.”
Edith, Ada and Mrs. Pyecroft all chuckle light heartedly at Mrs. Pyecroft’s wry observation.
“Oh don’t we know it, Lilian.” Ada agrees as she places her handbag on the top of the shop counter.
“Ernie nearly missed out on his tea, too. Why on earth they can’t just admit defeat graciously and agree that they aren’t as good at growing marrows as Brian,” Mrs. Pyecroft winks cheekily at Edith. “Is beyond me. I thought all this one upmanship stopped when the boys left school and became men. We grew up when we left school, didn’t we Ada?”
“Men will always be boys of a larger size, Lilian.” Ada chuckles.
“So long as there are wives to tidy up their messes like their mothers did, Ada,” Mrs. Pyecroft adds jovially.
“Especially wives who grew up with them and went to Sunday School with them or were in the same class as them, Lilian, like you and your Ernie.”
“And that’s a fact! Now,” She spies the juicer in Edith’s arms. “What have we today?”
“It’s Maude’s birthday,” Ada explains. “And since she accidentally broke her glass citrus squeezer a few weeks ago, I thought I’d get her a new one as a gift.”
“Good lord! Is it really Maude’s birthday?” Mrs. Pyecroft gasps. “You know, Ada, I don’t think I’ve seen your sister since we were all at school together. And you know how long ago that was!” She laughs heartily as a wistful look crosses her face and softens her already soft and friendly features. “Remember, we used to make each other cards for our birthdays back in the day?”
“I do!” Ada agrees. “Pressed flowers or découpage affixed with wheapaste******, or watercolour paints if we had them. I still have some of yours, you know.”
“Well, I think I have all of yours in a box upstairs, up on top of the wardrobe.” Mrs. Pyecroft remarks, casting her eyes upwards to the white painted plaster ceiling above. “Tied up with twine and kept safely with all my other girlhood memories.”
“Fancy that!” Ada laughs.
“Well, give me that then, Edith, and I’ll wrap it up in a bit of butchers paper and a nice bit of twine, shall I?” Mrs. Pyecroft says, gesticulating for Edith to pass her the citrus juicer. “Make it all pretty and festive for her. Eh?”
“That would be lovely Lilian.” Ada agrees.
As Mrs. Pyecroft pulls out a sheet of creamy white butcher’s paper and begins wrapping the juicer’s base, she asks, “So Edith, are you still in service then?”
“Yes, Mrs. Pyecroft.”
“In Mayfair your mum tells me.” She nods towards Ada.
“Yes, Mrs. Pyecroft, for the daughter of a Viscount – the Honourable Miss Lettice Chetwynd.”
“Very nice!” Mrs. Pyecroft opines as she folds the paper which crumples dully beneath her deft and swift moving fingers as the blue and white china is quickly hidden beneath layers of protective sheets.
“Oh she is, Mrs. Pyecroft, very nice. Much nicer than Mrs. Plaistow or mean and spiteful old Widow Hounslow!”
“Oh gracious!” Mrs. Pyecroft begins to chuckle again.
“Edith!” Ada chides her daughter. “Don’t speak ill of poor old Mrs. Hounslow. You know I don’t like it.”
“Oh Ada!” Mrs. Pyecroft exclaims as her face twists in concentration as she continues to wrap. “She may be our landlady, but that doesn’t mean she deserves a soft spot from you: ghastly old trout!” She winks cheekily again at Edith, who chuckles and smiles in return.
“Don’t encourage her, Lilian.” Ada wags her finger at her friend.
“You’re a spoilsport, Ada Watsford, and there’s another fact!” Mrs, Pyecroft retorts. “That old woman is so mean and nasty, lording it over us all, pretending to be our Christian saviour Lady Bountful******* whilst charging more than is fair for the rents on our homes and livelihoods. She’s fair game and is deserving of every last disparaging remark as far as I’m concerned.”
“Spoken like a true, Christian woman.” Ada remarks sarcastically.
“Alright! Alright!” Mrs. Pyecroft holds up her hands in defence. “I’ll change the subject.” Turning back to Edith she cheekily adds. “Although there is little sport I enjoy more than a bit of old Widow Hounslow bashing.”
“Me either!” Edith laughs.
“Lilian!”
“Alright, Ada.” Mrs. Pyecroft demurs. Addressing Edith again she says, “And your mum also tells me that you have a young man you’re stepping out with now, Edith.”
“I do, Mrs. Pyecroft.” Edith replies proudly. “Frank Leadbetter.”
“Is it serious?” Mrs. Pyecroft asks.
“Oh yes! Frank’s a very serious young man.”
“Very studious.” Ada adds.
“He’s the grocer’s boy for Mr. Willison, who is Miss Lettice’s local grocer in Mayfair.” Edith goes on.
“Oh, a lad with prospects then?” Mrs. Pyecroft asks.
“He’s got big ideas, Mrs. Pyecroft.” Edith explains. “Mr. Willison is showing him different facets to the grocery business, and even lets him dress the window on occasion. One day he hopes to have his own grocers.”
“He’s got big dreams, Lilian.” Ada adds coolly.
“Well, we all have to dream, don’t we Ada?” Mrs. Pyecroft replies matter-of-factly. “There’s a human need to dream.”
“I agree Mrs. Pyecroft.” Edith continues. “He’s full of wonderful ideas, and he’s ever so clever.”
“Must come from all his book reading, Edith.”
“Yes Mrs. Pyecroft.” Edith laughs shyly, blushing as she does.
“He’s a good lad,” Ada agrees. “Mannerly, and he knows how to treat our Edith with respect.”
“Not handsy then?” Mrs. Pyecroft asks.
“Oh, not at all, Mrs. Pyecroft!” Edith assures her. “Frank’s a real gentleman.”
“Good! Nothing worse than a young man who can’t keep his hands to himself.” The shopkeeper takes a length of red and white twine and cuts it adeptly with a sharp pair of glistening scissors. “Has he proposed yet?”
“Not yet, Mrs. Pyecroft, but he’s committed himself to me. He says he will when the time is right, and I think that will be soon.”
“George and I were hoping in one way that he would propose this side of Christmas, but it doesn’t seem likely.” Ada remarks with a sigh. “But I cannot fault him. Both Frank and Edith are going about things properly. They are trying to get a few shillings behind them before they get married.”
“That’s very wise, Edith.” Mrs. Pyecroft remarks, whisking the twine around the neatly affixed parcel containing the citrus juicer. “Especially considering the fact that you’ll have to leave service once you’re married********.”
“That’s what we thought, Mrs. Pyecroft.”
“And I can’t be worrying over when Frank proposes to Edith.” Ada adds. “I know it will happen one day, when the time is right.”
“And we’ll be so happy for them when it does.” smiles Mrs. Pyecroft as she finishes her wrapping by tying the twine into a neat bow on top.
“Thank you, Mrs. Pyecroft.”
“As I was just saying to Edith before, things don’t happen before they happen, and there’s no use worrying about them before they do.”
Edith looks at her mother doubtfully. “And I still think that if you knew Miss Lettice like I do, you’d agree with me that something is up, and that this is just the calm before the storm.”
*The cast iron Jubilee Clock has remained a Harlesden landmark since its erection at Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee in 1887. It is ornate, decorated with dolphins, armorial bearings, a fluted circular column with spirals, shields of arms and swags. When it was built, it featured four ornate gas lit lamps sprouting from its column and two drinking fountains with taps and bowls at its base. It also featured a weathervane on its top. During the late Twentieth Century elements were removed, including the lanterns and the fountain bowls. In 1997 the clock was restored without these elements, but plans are underway to restore of the weathervane and recreation of the original four circular lanterns to the clock and the two fountains.
**An ironmonger is the old fashioned term for someone who sells items, tools and equipment for use in homes and gardens: what today we would call a hardware shop. Ironmongery stems from the forges of blacksmiths and the workshops of woodworkers. Ironmongery can refer to a wide variety of metal items, including door handles, cabinet knobs, window fittings, hinges, locks, and latches. It can also refer to larger items, such as metal gates and railings. By the 1920s when this story is set, the ironmonger may also have sold cast iron cookware and crockery for the kitchen and even packets of seeds for the nation of British gardeners, as quoted by the Scot, Adam Smith.
***‘The Diamond Man’ is a 1924 British crime film directed by Arthur Rooke and starring Arthur Wontner, Mary Odette and Reginald Fox. It is based on a novel by Edgar Wallace. ‘The Diamond Man’s’ plot focuses on an orphan who takes the blame for her sister's crime, and later reveals her boss as her evil husband.
****The Premier Super Cinema in East Ham was opened on the 12th of March, 1921, replacing the 800 seat capacity 1912 Premier Electric Theatre. The new cinema could seat 2,408 patrons. The Premier Super Cinema was taken over by Provincial Cinematograph Theatres who were taken over by Gaumont British in February 1929. It was renamed the Gaumont from 21st April 1952. The Gaumont was closed by the Rank Organisation on 6th April 1963. After that it became a bingo hall and remained so until 2005. Despite attempts to have it listed as a historic building due to its relatively intact 1921 interior, the Gaumont was demolished in 2009.
*****A term used to represent quickness, phrase, “Before you can say 'Knife!'”, dates from at least 1850, when it appeared in Charles Dickens' ‘Household Words’.
******Lady Bountiful is a term used to describe a rich and generous woman, often associated with Christian piety. Used derogatively it often describes self-righteous women who patronisingly show off their wealth by acts of unwanted and unwelcome generosity.
*******Wheatpaste (also known as flour and water paste, flour paste, or simply paste) is a gel or liquid adhesive made from wheat flour or starch and water. It has been used since antiquity for various arts and crafts such as bookbinding, découpage, collage, papier-mâché, and adhering paper posters and notices to walls.
********Prior to and even after the Second World War, there was a ‘marriage bar’ in place. Introduced into legislation, the bar banned the employment of married women as permanent employees, which in essence meant that once a woman was married, no matter how employable she was, became unemployable, leaving husbands to be the main breadwinner for the family. This meant that working women needed to save as much money as they could before marriage, and often took in casual work, such as mending, sewing or laundry for a pittance at home to help bring in additional income and help to make ends meet. The marriage bar wasn’t lifted until the very late 1960s.
This busy looking shop with its shelves of goods may look real to you, but it is in fact made up entirely with pieces from my miniatures collection.
Fun things to look for in this tableau include:
The shelves are filled with a panoply of household goods from brass measuring cups and saucepans, to porcelain cannisters and pottery jugs. The copperware pieces, including the kettle on the front counter, all come from different miniature specialist stockists online. The blue and white china you see throughout the room, sitting on shelves and tables, are sourced from a number of miniature stockists through E-Bay, but mostly from Kathleen Knight’s Doll’s House Shop in the United Kingdom and Mick and Marie’s Miniatures in the united Kingdom.
The blue and white pottery jug and bowl next to the copper kettle on the counter have been hand fashioned and painted by an unknown miniature artisan ceramicist in America.
The scales you can see at the left of the photograph on the counter comes from Warwick Miniatures in Ireland, who are well known for the quality and detail applied to their pieces.
The bright brass cash register comes from Beautifully Handmade Miniatures in Kettering.
Edith’s handbag handmade from soft leather, and Ada’s made from soft brown leather, are part of a larger collection of hats and bags that I bought from an American miniature collector Marilyn Bickel.
The shears with black handles in the basket open and close. Made of metal, they came from Doreen Jeffries’ Small Wonders Miniature Shop in the United Kingdom.
The pencils on the counter are 1:12 miniatures, and are only one millimetre wide and two centimetres long.
The bill in the foreground on top of the butchers paper is a 1:12 miniature replica of a real invoice and was made by Little Things Dollhouse Miniatures in Lancashire.
