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above her sister’s screams of protest as Dulcie tried to unfasten her blouse. ‘You’re always thieving my things, helping yourself to them, and then ruining them.’
    ‘No I’m not.’
    ‘Yes you are. Now get my blouse off.’
    ‘Dulcie, I’ve got to borrow it. I’m going for my audition this evening and I haven’t got anything decent to wear. I’m not like you, working at Selfridges. Oww!’ Edith screamed as Dulcie grabbed her hair and gave it a furious tug.
    ‘What’s going on?’
    Both of them turned to look at their mother, who was standing in the open doorway.
    ‘It’s her, she’s pinched my best blouse.’
    ‘It’s Dulcie, Mum, she’s being mean to me.’
    ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, Dulcie, why shouldn’t she borrow your blouse? She won’t harm it. She is your sister, after all.’
    ‘Sister? She’s a thieving nuisance, and she’s not wearing my blouse,’ Dulcie insisted, her temper well and truly up now. ‘I’m sick and tired of her treating my things like they’re hers, borrowing my stuff without so much as a by-your-leave.’
    ‘That’s enough, Dulcie,’ her mother told her sharply. ‘Look how you’ve upset Edith.’ She gestured to the younger girl’s tear-stained face. ‘I thought better of you than this, I really did.’
    ‘That’s it,’ Dulcie exploded. ‘I’ve had enough of this and her treating my clothes like she owns them. Do you know what I’m going to do? I’m going to find myself somewhere to live. Somewhere I’ve got a room of my own, with no thieving sister sharing it.’
    ‘Dulcie!’ Both her sister and her mother looked shocked.
    Rick came in to join the fray, shaking his head and warning her, ‘It’s all very well saying that, Miss Hoity-Toity, but who’s going to rent you a room? Mind you, I’m not saying that this place won’t be a lot more peaceful without you around.’
    As always when she was challenged, Dulcie immediately dug her toes in and refused to back down. As the elder girl in her family it was her opinion that her younger sister should look up to her, and their mother should put her first and not fuss over Edith like she did. Dulcie’s pride was smarting, and even though right now she had no idea how she would get herself a room of her own, she was determined that she would do so.
    The sound of their father’s voice downstairs, demanding to know where his tea was, had them dispersing, her mother hurrying back down, whilst Rick retreated whistling to his own room and Edith went back to brushing her hair, an expression on her face that to Dulcie was unbearably smug and triumphant.
    Sibling quarrels were part and parcel of their shared home life, and normally blew over, but during the evening, the more Dulcie thought about renting a room of her own, the more appeal the idea had. She resented the cramped space she shared with her sister almost as much as she resented the way Edith thought she could help herself to her clothes, and, what was more, her pride was still stinging from the fact that their mother had taken Edith’s side in the quarrel. Didn’t she give her mother a whole two shillings a week for her keep more than Edith did? The trouble with her mother was that she didn’t appreciate her like she should, and the trouble with her sister was that she didn’t respect her like she should.
    Dulcie might not have thought anything of the two of them sharing a bed before she had started to work for Selfridges, but now, from listening to the other girls, she recognised that most of them lived in rather better circumstances than her own, middle-class girls in the main, whose parents had neat houses on the outskirts of the city, instead of growing up at its heart as she had, in what was unpleasantly close to being a slum area. Dulcie could well imagine how Lydia, whose father was a director, would look down on her if she knew how Dulcie’s family lived. She couldn’t imagine David James-Thompson walking her home here after that