Chapter 2: Bus Home

They shook hands formerly, with Gertie looking downward shyly as she released his hand after Johnnie smiled to sweetly and handsomely at her.

Gertie turned and stepped onto the bus and Johnnie got on immediately behind her. She claimed the steep stairs to the top tier of the bus and, as the stairs turned around on itself, she noticed that he was following immediately behind her.

“Oh, you going this way? I thought you had your motor car with you?” Gertie had stopped and said almost without thinking, “How will your mother get home?”

“She has her own car and driver. I was at the theatre with her, but we didn’t come together as we live in different homes,” he smiled as he continued to climb, forcing her to climb higher, “I assume that you still live with your parents?”

“Yes, there’s just me at home now, my brothers wanted to rent their own places shortly after demob, they got used to their independence when they was away you see.”

By this time they had walked halfway down the bus and a number of passengers, mostly from the theatre, were coming up behind them, enough Gertie thought to at least half fill the bus. If this had been a normal Friday night, she would leave the theatre long after everyone else and catch a later, much sparsely filled than this one.

“Where do you prefer to sit, Gertie, up the front or in the middle?”

“Not too near the front,” she replied, “I’m always afraid I’ll miss my stop if I have too far to go to get back to the stairs. It’s not normally as busy as this.”

“Will here do?” Johnnie indicated a pair of seats on the pavement side of the bus.

“Yes, this’ll do but —”

“No buts, Gertie, I offered to take you home and I’m determined to see you all the way home. Look, we are in a crowded bus, even if I was a ‘complete bounder’ as predatory as that awful cad at the theatre, and I don’t believe you think I would be anywhere near as ungentlemanly as that, you are perfectly safe in this crowd and, wherever you are due to leave this bus, your road won’t be completely deserted at this hour of the evening, will it?”

“No, there is a lively pub on the corner and some shops will be open still even at this time.” Gertie spoke very softly, not wanting to be overheard by nosy passengers, and Johnnie leaned in close and she could smell his aftershave, or maybe his cologne; it smelt sharp, clean and fresh and she thought he smelt absolutely lovely. “Yes, there’s always people about. And I do believe that you are a gentleman, Johnnie, and well, I suppose I’m always so careful and, er, I am a good girl, you know, in all respects. I’m still a girl, actually, I’m only seventeen and not really ready in my mind to go out with any boy or man for that matter. I don’t have a boyfriend, in fact I’ve never had a boyfriend. And, well, you are a gentleman, a distinguished officer and educated gentleman, who has a motor car, and I am only a relatively poor hat check girl, from a respectable working family, who left school at fourteen and haven’t even got a bicycle...”

Gertie realised her nervous chatter was becoming complete nonsense so she stopped talking.

Johnnie laughed, and slapped his knee, “Gertie,” he leaned into her again to whisper his response.

To Gertie, even in the dim yellow light of the bus, his eyes seemed lit up in delight.

“I may have the advantage of having a little more money in my bank account than you have, but money and possessions are really not everything you know. People mean so much more than anything else where it counts. People who are family or friends be they cobblers, bus conductors, or hat check girls, it is the person themselves that counts, not their money or their position, both of those things depend on knowledge, understanding and opportunity. I’ve observed you at work for a while, Gertie, old thing, watching quietly as you politely deal with all these people who thrust their coats at you all at once and in a hurry to get their seats, then again when they want their coats back to catch their bus or get to their restaurant booking on time. You are an excellent hat check girl, Gertie, because you are alert, helpful, cheerful, efficient and caring. You take pride in what you do, which gives you value, you are valued by Whittaker, by the theatre, by your colleagues and I must say, by my mother too.”

“Your mother? Why? How? Who’s your mother?”

“Well,” his warm left hand sought out her cold right hand and held it, warmed it by his gentle enveloping touch, “I think I already told you that my mother regards the theatre as almost her own personal domain, although she is only a board member not the owner as such, but I have pointed you out to her before and, after her own observations, she agrees with me that you are an exceptional employee of the theatre. You, my dear old girl, are not poor at all, no, you are priceless. And you can take that to the bank any day of the week.”

“Oh.” After a moment she whispered that she didn’t even have a bank account but she did add that she has “a Post Office Savings Account and I try and put away two shillings a week, you know, for Christmas, holidays and rainy days.”

Johnnie nodded, smiled and gave her hand another warm squeeze.

She was silent then, as the bus jerked along, stopping and starting several times through the breadth of theatre land, collecting and sloughing passengers at a number of stops generally running eastwards before the Clippie could be heard coming down the gangway, collecting fares, dispensing tickets and punching or ‘clipping’ them as valid for that person’s requested stop.

Johnnie reached into his pocket and pulled out a smart leather wallet, from which, after flicking through a number of notes stored within, he pulled out a crisp, red-brown coloured ten shilling note.

“Johnnie,” Gertie whispered to him moving her head towards his as close as decorum allowed, “the fare is only fourpence, and I only have the bare four pence in my purse. I er, do rely on my tips from the cloakroom for my extra spending money, and I only bring the bare four pence for the return journey that I keep in a separate pocket of my purse as a reserve in case the tips are light.”

“Were they light tonight, Gertie?” he whispered back.

“No, but I gen’rally leave the tips in the saucer until I finish,” she chewed her lip, “er, leaving the tips in the saucer seems to add an incentive for patrons to note that appreciation has been offered by others and it does seem to attract more er donations than an empty saucer would. Matinees tend to go by with more empty saucers than the evenings though.”

“It’s called ‘seeding’,” he said, “when encouraging others to, shall we say, contribute to your earnings. Never mind, Gertie, you keep your fourpence in reserve for next time. I’ll pay both our fares, I did offer to drive you, and you turned me down if you remember? And it was Whittaker’s and my suggestion that you go home immediately, only in our ignorance we forgot about allowing you to collect your tips.”

“So did I to be honest,” she admitted.

“That is understandable in the circumstances,” he agreed.

“Fares, please,” came a commanding voice from above them.

Johnnie turned to face the Clippie who was at an even level eye to eye to him, even though he was seated, while Gertie looked up at them both from her seat.

“Limehouse, please,” Johnnie said. “For two.”

“That’ll be eightpence, Guv,” the Clippie said, reaching for the appropriate tickets and pulled out two green tickets from her rack and punched a hole through the pair of them for the Limehouse fare stage. She offered Johnnie the tickets and Johnnie in turn offered her the crisp ten-shilling note.

“Blimey, Guv,” the Clippie exclaimed as the note was pressed into her open hand, covered as it was by a rather grubby fingerless woollen glove, “ain’t yer got nuffink smaller?”

“No, I’m afraid not, I usually leave all my loose change in a jar in my dressing room, there’s always a rainy day around the corner you know, a fact I have recently been reminded of.”

“Yeah, don’t I know it! Well, it’s rainin’ ‘ard owt there now, mate, an’ we’re at the beginnin’ of me route. If’n I give yer all yer change of ten bob, ye’ll take all me bloomin’ float.”

“Well, do take a half-crown tip for your trouble, ma’am.”

“Well, that don’ ‘elp much, it’ll still take all me change!”

She rummaged in her coin bag for a moment and the bus rocked and jerked from side to side as it turned a corner. The Clippie rode the bus movements on the balls of her feet like a sailor on the choppy waves on the edge of a harbour.

“I’ve got two florins, a bob an’ free tanners, an’ all the rest is in coppers, oh an’ ‘ere’s a silver joey, they alwus gets caught in the corners.”

“Well, give me seven and ninepence in silver change for my ten shillings and you’ve got eightpence fare and two-and-sevenpence tip to sort out to split equitably between you and the driver when you’ve finally gathered in your fares and ready to deposit at the terminus.”

“Oh, right, Guv, er, fank you, most kind.” She handed over the tickets and the silver coins and tucked the folded ten shilling note into a rarely used compartment of the money bag.

“Thank you,” smiled Johnnie, and the Clippie moved onto the next two pairs of occupied seats.

“So,” Johnnie turned back to Gertie as he pocketed the tickets in his greatcoat pocket, “did you say your brothers served in the Army?”

“No, I didn’t, but Danny, that’s Daniel junior, he’s 25 now and he joined the Royal Navy as a aircraft mechanic on carriers in 1942, I think, I was already evacuated to Devon, you see. Danny served out in the Pacific until the end of the war. Then there’s Eric, he’s two years younger than Danny, and he joined the London Rifles in 1943 or early ‘44 and took part in the Italian campaign.”

“Excellent, I was in Italy myself for a while in ‘44. So what do they do nowadays?”

“Ah, Danny’s a motor mechanic, he works in a garage, Eric works with my father as they are both boiler makers, although neither of them actually make boilers, they work servicing railway engine boilers, you know, fixing leaks, cleaning and servicing valves, that kind of thing.”

“That sounds interesting.”

“Yes, I suppose so.” Gertie smiled, “at least they are in work, not everyone is, it is taking so long to get everything back to what it was before the war. And they do get free family passes to use the trains. What do you do, Johnnie?”

“Oh, I work in a bank, not at all as interesting as servicing steam valves or motor cars, I do enjoy tinkering with mine though, there’s something about the smell of grease and the heat of a hot engine that attracts a man, somehow. So, banking, well it’s a fine occupation but it’s not as interesting as engineering, actually taking something broken and getting it going again.”

“I suppose not,” Gertie laughed, “counting other people’s money all day does sound rather boring. Do they lock you away in the vault while you do it or are you out front taking the money in or handing it out?”

“Ah, well, I work in a merchant bank rather than a high street clearing bank, so we rarely see any actual folding money at all. We mostly help businesses raise capital for worthwhile projects by putting them in touch with investors, or refinance loans that they are having difficulty meeting or want to pay off early, or even help companies buy out other companies. Other clients have money that they want to put to good use and need a helping hand to find somewhere safe and secure to place it until they need it for something else. Like local corporations, getting in the council rates twice a year but don’t need to spend it all for up to six months, so they are looking for people to use that money for short term loans and they get paid a little interest which helps them provide more services for their city, town or borough. So it is a lot like being out in front of the bank counter meeting people and helping them. Not much different to what you do you really, Gertie, taking in people’s coats that would otherwise get in the way of enjoying the performance, hanging them safely so they can drip dry off after the rain, and returning them quickly and efficiently again so your clients can go home with their nice suits and dresses protected from the foul weather we are having.”