Free Dreaming Out Loud by Benita Brown

she handed him a tip of a shilling. It was probably too much, she thought, and immediately began to worry about the size of tip she should give to the taxi driver.
    She had shown him the address on the letterhead and he had smiled. Kay thought this was because her destination in Wood Green was some distance from the station, so he would be receiving a good payment. When they arrived, she quickly worked out ten per cent of the fare and hoped that was correct. Perhaps it wasn’t, because the cab driver had been completely unsmiling when he pocketed it. He didn’t help her with her suitcase.
    Feeling tired and deflated, Kay stood on the pavement outside a grocer’s shop in a suburban high street staring up at the gold letters on the window of the first floor: Charles A. Butler, Solicitor. That was where she had to go. But how to get there?
    ‘Move along, will you?’ a large, unfriendly woman said. ‘Folks has to get by.’
    ‘Oh, I’m sorry . . .’ Kay began, but the woman had disappeared amongst the early-morning crowd.
    People were hurrying because it was cold. Despite her new woollen coat, Kay was shivering. The soles of her new fashionable court shoes did little to protect her toes from the cold pavement.
    ‘If you want the solicitor, the door’s right there,’ a young lad told her. He was wheeling a bicycle with a basket full of groceries on the front handlebars. He nodded towards a door at one side of the shop.
    ‘Oh, thank you.’
    The door pushed open easily and Kay lugged her suitcase up the worn lino-covered stairs. A familiar smell of smoked bacon, cheese and coffee seeped through the walls from the shop, and Kay, light-headed from lack of sleep, almost imagined herself back at Sampson’s. As she neared the top, she heard the clattering of a typewriter, and someone with an educated and melodious voice called out, ‘Is that you, Miss Lockwood? Do come in.’ A door with a frosted glass window was ajar. This was where the voice came from.
    Kay entered as she was instructed, and a tall woman rose from her desk. ‘It is Miss Lockwood, isn’t it?’ she asked.
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘I’m Moira. Moira Davies. Pleased to meet you. Do sit down.’ She waved an elegant arm in the direction of an armchair. ‘I’m just going to finish these letters,’ she said, ‘but if you’ve been carrying that bulging suitcase around it will give you time to get your breath back.’
    The chair was comfortable and Kay felt her eyes closing. If it hadn’t been for the clattering of the typewriter, she might have fallen asleep. Instead she forced herself to look around the room. Miss Davies’ office was like any other office, she imagined, with a desk, bookcases and filing cabinets. In the wall on the right there was another door. Kay decided that Mr Butler must be in there.
    She looked covertly at the woman behind the desk. The secretary’s greying hair was swept back into a French pleat, which made her look more austere than her welcoming manner had suggested. She was carefully made-up, and her black and white checked costume with its slim skirt and boxy jacket was extremely stylish.
    In the face of such up to the minute fashion, Kay was glad that she had allowed Miss Bennet to talk her into buying the cherry-red coat with its nipped-in waist and long, full skirt. And although she hardly ever wore a hat, she was thankful that she had remembered to pin on the little saucer-sized Juliet cap before she left the train.
    ‘Won’t be long,’ the secretary called out. ‘Then I’ll make us a cup of tea.’
    Kay began to wonder where Mr Butler was. This was all so strange. Had she come on the right day? Yes, it was obvious that she had been expected. The noise of the typewriter stopped and Moira Davies began to shuffle papers. The room was warm and Kay was tired. She wriggled her poor numbed toes to restore the circulation, then she closed her eyes.
    ‘Milk and sugar, Miss Lockwood?’
    Kay awoke with a start to find Miss