Thornton,
Solicitor and Commissioner for Oaths.
December 9 1959
Dear Mr Thornton,
A good book is the precious life-blood of a masterspirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life, and as such it must surely be a necessary commodity.
Yours sincerely,
Florence Green.
December 10 1959
To: Mrs Florence Green
Dear Madam,
I can only repeat my former advice, and I may add that in my opinion, although this is a personal matter and therefore outside my terms of reference, you would do well to make a formal apology to Mrs Gamart.
Yours faithfully,
Thomas Thornton,
Solicitor and Commissioner for Oaths.
December 11 1959
Dear Mr Thornton,
Coward!
Yours sincerely,
Florence Green.
If Florence was courageous, it was in quite a different way from, for example, General Gamart, who hadbehaved exactly the same when he was under fire as when he wasn’t, or from Mr Brundish, who defied the world by refusing to admit it to his earth. Her courage, after all, was only a determination to survive. The police, however, did not prosecute, or even consider doing so, and after Drury had advised Mrs Gamart that there was nothing like enough evidence to proceed on, the complaint was dropped. The crowd grew manageable, the shop made £82 10s. 6d. profit in the first week of December on Lolita alone, and the new customers came back to buy the Christmas orders and the calendars. For the first time in her life, Florence had the alarming sensation of prosperity.
She might have felt less secure if she had reviewed the state of her alliances. Jessie Welford and the watercolour artist, who by now was a permanent lodger at Rhoda’s, were hostile. Christine’s comment, that she’d as soon go to bed with a toad as with that Mr Gill, and she was surprised he didn’t give Miss Welford warts, was quite irrelevant; the fact was that the two made front together. Not one of the throng in the High Street had come into the dressmaker’s, still less bought a watercolour. Nor had they looked at the wet fish offered by Mr Deben. All the tradespeople were now either slightly or emphatically hostile to the Old House Bookshop. It was decided not to ask her to join the Inner Wheel of the Hardborough and District Rotary Club.
As Christmas approached, she grew reckless. She took her affairs out of Mr Thornton’s wavering hands and entrusted them to a firm of solicitors in Flintmarket. Through the new firm she contracted with Wilkins, who undertook building as well as plumbing, to pull down the damp oyster warehouse – work, it must be admitted, which went ahead rather slowly. She could decide later what to do with the site. Then, to make room for the new stock, she turned out, on an impulse, the mouldering piles of display material left by the publishers’ salesmen. A life-size cardboard Stalin and Roosevelt and an even larger Winston Churchill, an advancing Nazi tank to be assembled in three pieces and glued lightly on the dotted line, Stan Matthews and his football to be suspended from the ceiling with the string provided, six-foot cards of footsteps stained with blood, a horse with moving eyeballs jumping a fence, easily worked with a torch battery, menacing photographs of Somerset Maugham and Wilfred Pickles. All out, all to be given to Christine, who wanted them for the Christmas Fancy Dress Parade.
This was an event organized by local charities. ‘I’m obliged to you for these, Mrs Green,’ Christine said. ‘Otherwise I’d have fared to go attired as an Omo packet.’ The detergent firms were prepared to send quantities of free material, as were the Daily Herald and the Daily Mirror . But everyone in Hardborough was sick of these disguises. Florence wondered why the young girl didn’t want to go dressed as something pretty, perhaps as a Pierrette. Out of the unpromising materials, however, Christine sewed and glued together an odd but striking costume – Good-bye, 1959. One of the Lolita jackets provided a last touch, and
Solicitor and Commissioner for Oaths.
December 9 1959
Dear Mr Thornton,
A good book is the precious life-blood of a masterspirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life, and as such it must surely be a necessary commodity.
Yours sincerely,
Florence Green.
December 10 1959
To: Mrs Florence Green
Dear Madam,
I can only repeat my former advice, and I may add that in my opinion, although this is a personal matter and therefore outside my terms of reference, you would do well to make a formal apology to Mrs Gamart.
Yours faithfully,
Thomas Thornton,
Solicitor and Commissioner for Oaths.
December 11 1959
Dear Mr Thornton,
Coward!
Yours sincerely,
Florence Green.
If Florence was courageous, it was in quite a different way from, for example, General Gamart, who hadbehaved exactly the same when he was under fire as when he wasn’t, or from Mr Brundish, who defied the world by refusing to admit it to his earth. Her courage, after all, was only a determination to survive. The police, however, did not prosecute, or even consider doing so, and after Drury had advised Mrs Gamart that there was nothing like enough evidence to proceed on, the complaint was dropped. The crowd grew manageable, the shop made £82 10s. 6d. profit in the first week of December on Lolita alone, and the new customers came back to buy the Christmas orders and the calendars. For the first time in her life, Florence had the alarming sensation of prosperity.
She might have felt less secure if she had reviewed the state of her alliances. Jessie Welford and the watercolour artist, who by now was a permanent lodger at Rhoda’s, were hostile. Christine’s comment, that she’d as soon go to bed with a toad as with that Mr Gill, and she was surprised he didn’t give Miss Welford warts, was quite irrelevant; the fact was that the two made front together. Not one of the throng in the High Street had come into the dressmaker’s, still less bought a watercolour. Nor had they looked at the wet fish offered by Mr Deben. All the tradespeople were now either slightly or emphatically hostile to the Old House Bookshop. It was decided not to ask her to join the Inner Wheel of the Hardborough and District Rotary Club.
As Christmas approached, she grew reckless. She took her affairs out of Mr Thornton’s wavering hands and entrusted them to a firm of solicitors in Flintmarket. Through the new firm she contracted with Wilkins, who undertook building as well as plumbing, to pull down the damp oyster warehouse – work, it must be admitted, which went ahead rather slowly. She could decide later what to do with the site. Then, to make room for the new stock, she turned out, on an impulse, the mouldering piles of display material left by the publishers’ salesmen. A life-size cardboard Stalin and Roosevelt and an even larger Winston Churchill, an advancing Nazi tank to be assembled in three pieces and glued lightly on the dotted line, Stan Matthews and his football to be suspended from the ceiling with the string provided, six-foot cards of footsteps stained with blood, a horse with moving eyeballs jumping a fence, easily worked with a torch battery, menacing photographs of Somerset Maugham and Wilfred Pickles. All out, all to be given to Christine, who wanted them for the Christmas Fancy Dress Parade.
This was an event organized by local charities. ‘I’m obliged to you for these, Mrs Green,’ Christine said. ‘Otherwise I’d have fared to go attired as an Omo packet.’ The detergent firms were prepared to send quantities of free material, as were the Daily Herald and the Daily Mirror . But everyone in Hardborough was sick of these disguises. Florence wondered why the young girl didn’t want to go dressed as something pretty, perhaps as a Pierrette. Out of the unpromising materials, however, Christine sewed and glued together an odd but striking costume – Good-bye, 1959. One of the Lolita jackets provided a last touch, and
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