Mad Joy by Jane Bailey Page B

of course not.’
    I knew Gracie was doing a shepherd’s pie for tea: she had bought the meat from the delivery van that morning. But somehow we were both powerless before the easy confidence of Celia Buckleigh.
    ‘Jolly good. I’ll be borrowing her again on Saturday night – you won’t mind that, will you? Might be a bit late back.’
    Gracie looked dumbfounded. I couldn’t meet her eyes because I didn’t want to see the hurt there might be there. Gracie and I shared almost everything, our own giant secret like a pod we nestled in together.
    ‘I wasn’t expecting …’ I said, going to fetch my coat. Celia was already ahead of me. I folded it over my arm and peeped back in the workroom. ‘Cheerio, then, Gracie … you don’t mind, do you?’
    She looked up and smiled, and there wasn’t a trace of hurt in it – ‘Don’t be daft. Have a good time!’ – only fear.
    Celia took me to an intimate teashop with lace tablecloths and bought us a pot of tea and fancies as though she knew the menu by heart. I fiddled with the sugar lumps and she jokingly slapped my hand.
    ‘Oooh, Joy! Look at those nails! We’ll have to do something with those!’ Then she looked into my face, circling it with her eyes. ‘You know, you could be quite pretty with some make-up .’
    I rolled my eyes.
    ‘No – really – you could!’
    I was devastated, but all I managed was, ‘I’m sure anyone could look quite pretty with make-up.’
    ‘Oh, I don’t mean it like that. You would look stunning . You are pretty in a natural, country girl sort of way, but there’s a ravishing beauty in there somewhere just waiting to come out!’ At this she leant over and touched my hair, pushing a piece behind my ears. ‘Your hair! The things we could do with that ! Gosh, I can’t wait! You won’t know yourself!’
    The waitress plonked a pot of tea on our table, with matching jugs of water and milk. I felt embarrassed, because I recognized her suddenly as Olive Truss, who used to go to our Sunday School. I smiled, but she didn’t meet my eyes.
    ‘Celia … I’m not sure about all this. Can’t I just come as I am – I mean, with nicer clothes?’
    Celia breathed in deeply and sat back in her chair. She was quiet for a second or two, and then she said, ‘You know, James really likes you.’
    ‘James? How on earth can you say that? He’s never met me.’
    ‘Ah – but he’s seen you.’ The table seemed to float away. A lady on the next table was telling her companion that she wouldn’t employ Derek again if he came begging. A woman’s shout drifted in from the kitchen like an echo: ‘Table four!’ Hooves clopped loudly outside the shop window and a horse’s flank stopped inches from where we were sitting, steaming.
    ‘Where?’
    Celia sighed patiently. ‘Well, on Saturday for a start.’
    ‘Where, on Saturday?’
    ‘In town, you goof. Just after you left he came out of the cinema and asked who you were.’
    I stared at the tea she was pouring out. She had forgotten to put in the milk, but I was too intrigued to point it out. ‘What did he say, then?’
    ‘He asked who you were. He said, ‘Who was that lovely girl?’ – or something like that.’
    ‘So he just saw my back. He might think very differently if he saw my front.’
    ‘No, no, he’s seen you before.’
    ‘Where?’
    ‘Oh, Joy! I don’t know. He just has, I can’t remember. We were driving through the village once and he saw you come out of Griffens.’
    ‘So he knows I’m a seamstress?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘And he doesn’t mind?’
    ‘Why on earth would he? Milk?’
    ‘Yes, please.’
    The ‘fancies’ arrived: a little two-tiered affair with Peek Freans on the bottom and tiny iced yellow and pink cakes on the top. Normally I would have wanted to try them all, but I had no appetite. Celia ate one after another – very delicately chewing with her lips closed – and made arrangements for me to be picked up on Saturday. I said I would prefer to come to