you could be just the person to help me get it sorted.’ He grinned at her.
Josh was aware that a new mood was rushing across the Atlantic from America and sweeping Britain’s youth up into its very own new culture. Rock and roll had arrived, a brand-new form of music that belonged only to the young, and one that demanded that the young changed the way they looked and acted to separate themselves from their parents’ generation. New hairstyles were a part of that culture, and Josh intended to ride the crest of the new wave by opening his own salon so that he could make his name and his fortune.
‘I can’t pay you anything,’ he continued, ‘but I’ll giveyou a free haircut and it will be the best you’ll ever have.’
He had so much confidence, and so much vitality and energy, Rose couldn’t help but smile.
He was looking at her hair and Rose automatically touched her chignon protectively.
‘I don’t want my hair cut.’
She was a one-off and no mistake, Josh decided, amused by her defensiveness. Normally he had girls pushing eagerly for his attention within minutes of meeting them, even if some of them masked their interest in him by acting all hoity-toity. This one was different, though, with her serious dark eyes and her cautious manner, as though she were afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing. Josh had a large and a very warm heart. He had grown up in the East End in a community where you looked out for your own and protected them. Rose, he recognised, aroused that protective instinct in him. She was looking as though she wanted to get away from him, but he didn’t want her to.
‘All right, I won’t cut it then, but I still want you to sort out the salon for me.’
‘But how can you say that? You don’t know anything about me.’
‘Well, that’s soon solved, isn’t it? Come on, I’ll go first and tell you my life story, then you can tell me yours.’
There was no stopping him, Rose decided with resignation.
‘My dad wanted me to be a tailor, like him, and even now he still doesn’t think that hairdressing is a man’s job, even though I’ve told him that it’s his fault that that’swhat I do. He was the one who got me a Saturday job sweeping up hair from the floor of the salon close to where he works, and he’s the one who taught me how to use a pair of scissors, even it was on cloth and not hair. He didn’t speak to me for a week when I told him that I wanted to be apprenticed and learn to become a proper hairdresser. He told me he’d rather disown me, but my mother talked him round in the end, and once he’d met Charlie, who owned the salon where I wanted to train, and realised that he wasn’t a pouf, he calmed down a bit.’
Josh wasn’t going to say so to Rose, but Charlie had been as rampant as a ram and ready to get his leg over anything female that moved, including most of his staff, as well as his younger and prettier clients. But it was the fact that he drove a fancy car and swaggered through the salon, come Saturday afternoon, wearing a sharp suit, eyeing up the birds for a date for Saturday night that had helped to make Josh decide that he wouldn’t mind a bit of that life.
Rose was a cut above the girls he knew, Josh could tell that, not because she talked posh–that would never have impressed Josh–but because she was…he hunted around for the right way to describe her and then gave a satisfied nod when he finally came up with the words…
delicate and refined
. That was it: Rose was refined, and needed to be treated right.
‘I’d seen Charlie coming into the salon all dressed up in a fancy suit, and I’d reckoned that hairdressing must be a good way to make a bit of money. And, of course, me being a Jew boy, I fancied making a bit meself.’ He grinned at his joke. ‘He worked his apprentices damnnear into the grave and paid us peanuts, but I learned a lot whilst I was working for Charlie.’
He certainly had. Josh had quickly learned about offering
Josh was aware that a new mood was rushing across the Atlantic from America and sweeping Britain’s youth up into its very own new culture. Rock and roll had arrived, a brand-new form of music that belonged only to the young, and one that demanded that the young changed the way they looked and acted to separate themselves from their parents’ generation. New hairstyles were a part of that culture, and Josh intended to ride the crest of the new wave by opening his own salon so that he could make his name and his fortune.
‘I can’t pay you anything,’ he continued, ‘but I’ll giveyou a free haircut and it will be the best you’ll ever have.’
He had so much confidence, and so much vitality and energy, Rose couldn’t help but smile.
He was looking at her hair and Rose automatically touched her chignon protectively.
‘I don’t want my hair cut.’
She was a one-off and no mistake, Josh decided, amused by her defensiveness. Normally he had girls pushing eagerly for his attention within minutes of meeting them, even if some of them masked their interest in him by acting all hoity-toity. This one was different, though, with her serious dark eyes and her cautious manner, as though she were afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing. Josh had a large and a very warm heart. He had grown up in the East End in a community where you looked out for your own and protected them. Rose, he recognised, aroused that protective instinct in him. She was looking as though she wanted to get away from him, but he didn’t want her to.
‘All right, I won’t cut it then, but I still want you to sort out the salon for me.’
‘But how can you say that? You don’t know anything about me.’
‘Well, that’s soon solved, isn’t it? Come on, I’ll go first and tell you my life story, then you can tell me yours.’
There was no stopping him, Rose decided with resignation.
‘My dad wanted me to be a tailor, like him, and even now he still doesn’t think that hairdressing is a man’s job, even though I’ve told him that it’s his fault that that’swhat I do. He was the one who got me a Saturday job sweeping up hair from the floor of the salon close to where he works, and he’s the one who taught me how to use a pair of scissors, even it was on cloth and not hair. He didn’t speak to me for a week when I told him that I wanted to be apprenticed and learn to become a proper hairdresser. He told me he’d rather disown me, but my mother talked him round in the end, and once he’d met Charlie, who owned the salon where I wanted to train, and realised that he wasn’t a pouf, he calmed down a bit.’
Josh wasn’t going to say so to Rose, but Charlie had been as rampant as a ram and ready to get his leg over anything female that moved, including most of his staff, as well as his younger and prettier clients. But it was the fact that he drove a fancy car and swaggered through the salon, come Saturday afternoon, wearing a sharp suit, eyeing up the birds for a date for Saturday night that had helped to make Josh decide that he wouldn’t mind a bit of that life.
Rose was a cut above the girls he knew, Josh could tell that, not because she talked posh–that would never have impressed Josh–but because she was…he hunted around for the right way to describe her and then gave a satisfied nod when he finally came up with the words…
delicate and refined
. That was it: Rose was refined, and needed to be treated right.
‘I’d seen Charlie coming into the salon all dressed up in a fancy suit, and I’d reckoned that hairdressing must be a good way to make a bit of money. And, of course, me being a Jew boy, I fancied making a bit meself.’ He grinned at his joke. ‘He worked his apprentices damnnear into the grave and paid us peanuts, but I learned a lot whilst I was working for Charlie.’
He certainly had. Josh had quickly learned about offering
Similar Books
