Nobody’s Girl Read Online Free PDF Page A

help.’
    As Pearl walked away she kept her head low, but as she passed Frank’s stall he started to sing again. ‘“Pussycat, Pussycat, where have you been? I’ve been up to London to visit the Queen. Pussycat, Pussycat, what did you there? I frightened a little mouse under her chair.”’
    She picked up her pace, and with the raucous voices of the other traders calling their wares, she didn’t see or hear Derek Lewis approaching Frank Hanwell, his fists clenched threateningly.
    When Pearl walked into her bedsit she sighed with appreciation. The room was small, with just a built-in cupboard and chest of drawers, but to her it was heaven, a place of her own.
    In one corner there was a curtained-off area, behind which was a sink and a single gas ring. In a tiny cupboard there were a few pieces of crockery, a small saucepan and a frying pan.
    After kicking off her shoes, Pearl went to the tiny kitchen, placing the kettle on the gas ring. She wasn’t hungry after that wonderful meal in the café and was counting her blessings, especially as she was down to her last tin of soup.
    Who’d have thought she’d get a job with a meal thrown in? She turned on the gas tap, frowning when she realised she’d have to feed the meter. Her precious few tips were just enough to cover the shilling needed, so feeding the coin into the slot, she hoped there would be more tips forthcoming in the morning.
    There were used tea leaves in her small strainer and, carefully pouring boiling water over them, she frowned at the weak brew. Still, things were looking up and soon she’d be able to get a bit of shopping. Not only that, now that she was earning again her dream of taking art classes felt a little bit closer.
    After drinking the tea, Pearl had a strip wash, carefully hung up her one and only decent dress, then threw on an old pair of pyjamas. Sitting cross-legged on her bed, she picked up her sketch pad and pencil.
    Everything had looked dire that morning, and she had been in despair when she’d seen the advert for a waitress. Her elfin face lit up with a smile and she began to draw a face from memory. Dolly Dolby slowly emerged on the page, but when the sketch was finished Pearl flung it aside, wishing she could afford paint and brushes.
    Painting was all Pearl lived for, and never a day went by when she didn’t try to create something. With no money for paint she would sketch, burying herself in the task of perfecting whatever she was drawing. In the orphanage it had been her refuge, a way of blanking out all that went on around her.
    She was constantly picked on by the other children, all laughing at her because she was never chosen for fostering or adoption. From the day she had been found on the steps until the day she left, the only home Pearl had known was the grey and forbidding orphanage, her bed one among twenty that lined the dormitory. She had plucked up courage once to ask why she couldn’t be put forward for a foster home, only to be told by grim-faced Miss Unsworth that she wasn’t suitable. When she dared to ask why, she had received a slap, Miss Unsworth telling her that she should count herself lucky that she had a home in the orphanage.
    The face of Derek Lewis swam into her mind so, taking up her pad again, Pearl began to sketch. In the orphanage, picked on and helpless against the teasing, she had quickly realised that she needed someone to look out for her – someone to hide behind. She had chosen an older girl, one who, like her, was a loner, and it had worked.
    Of course, eventually the girl went into foster care, and Pearl was left alone again. It was the first time she’d faced such a traumatic parting, but Pearl had leaned another hard lesson. To survive she couldn’t get attached to anyone. If she hardened her heart, she couldn’t get hurt.
    From then on, through the years, she found other girls to hide behind, girls who would stand up for her, but though they didn’t know it, her feelings remained