Lucille Nailed It Ch. 01

Introduction

The Kirby-Jones Events Center was packed with a predominance of over-weight and under-exercised citizens eating and drinking excessively. There were exceptions of course - those skinny, thin-lipped people drinking mineral water whose smiles seemed not quite fulsome.

Clearly this was a gathering of fat cats, a cynic would say, glancing at the quality of personal presentation - the neck jewelry and spectacles frames and perhaps in almost contradiction noting an absence of spectacles among the 35-plus indicating contact lenses or corrective laser-vision surgery. Many females wore diamond-headed buttons on layered shirt fronts or in animated conversation waggled ear-rings costing more than what some poor families would list as their total assets.

The underweight principal guest, resplendently in ice blue to match personality, was herself an amazing contradiction for someone of largess of celebrity status. It would amaze guests to suspect bottom-enders of this world could ever attend such an illustrious event as this - and yet the very person being honored here tonight, publisher Lucille Lightfoot, came close five decades ago to being trapped in a lifetime of misery.

The thought of cold-hearted super rich Lucille Lightfoot almost slipping through the cracks of society would be dismissed with a chuckle as 'unbelievable' even by some associates close to her or influenced by her illustrious shadow. Success has a habit of dimming one's past.

Tonight Lucille was being acknowledged as 'Australian Publisher of the Decade' at the annual magazine awards. Some awards often raised eyebrows or are disputed in hot whispers, but not this one. At the age of 60, Lillian Grace Lightfoot reigned as the undisputed queen of women's media in her adopted country.

Surrounded by well-wishers who included a few long-time companions - the word 'friends' would be largely a misnomer - Lucille was dressed in glittering silver mesh overlaying a plain blue cotton dress that looked like an unadorned old-fashion slip. Which is was. That garment so typified her under-stated elegance - the matching ice blue elegant shoes and handbag of the same over-mesh glitter, a simple band of pearls and matching earrings and a black comb in the black of her natural pepper hair.

That comb was given to her almost forty years ago as a parting gift by Maria in New York. Maria, then a young woman had worn it in her hair on special occasions since girlhood. Tonight the aged Maria and husband Enzio were seated at Lucille's table; this was her way of saying thank you by giving them their journey of a lifetime.

The even more deserving person - Mrs Graham - unfortunately was deceased.

The room hushed as the presentation of media awards commenced to periodically erupt into applause and well-chosen words of acknowledgement flowed within groups.

The presentation ceremony allowed Lucille to muse on her past and a few brief revelations would come during her acceptance speech. There was much to think about but such thoughts traversed the brain with lightning speed. They came chronologically, Lucille being an orderly quite unemotional thinker. First came what she'd been told about her paternal grandparents and a mix of disclosure and shadowy memories of her parents.

Lucille's Journey from Despair

Aged great-aunt Zina related a death scene to young Lucille.

Aunt Zina described how the cancer-gripped body of Kismet, widow of posthumously decorated World War One hero John J. Lightfoot, lay in final rest as the lips of her seven-year-old son Talbot caressed her cold face.

Pastor Vickers, his white beard stained by tobacco, said to Talbot (who would become Lucille's father), "I'm sorry son, she's gone."

Lucille, then aged seven and listening to this part of family history, remembered Great-Aunt Zina scolding her, telling her not to cry or else she would stop describing to the young orphan about her family.

Talbot Weir was his mid-teens in an orphanage when, according to Zina, he swore he'd marry and have at least one child who would grow to know and respect his or her parents.

By God, Talbot told Zina - his father's sister who was crippled and could not care for him as she was alone and near destitute - he'd make that happen. No child deserved to be a misfit like he was and every child deserved to know his or her mother into maturity.

And so that promise began to take shape but was cruelly curtailed.

Truck driver Talbot Lightfoot married Lucille Tucker of no fixed abode and she had no family that she knew of. Both were thirty and they had a daughter they later called Tomboy.

Her real name was Lucille Lightfoot.

"You were such a dear child," Zina said. "Talbot waited to tell you of the pledge he'd made in the orphanage but he waited too long. He was killed on a county highway when you were five.

"His rig was inching across a bridge spanning a flooded river when the bridge collapsed. Your father was drowned as was your mother sitting beside him. It had been only a short journey to deliver bales of cotton locally and she'd insisted on riding with Talbot, not having seen her husband for ten days."

Aunt Zina died a pauper's death less than a year after telling Lucille the child's very brief family history.

Lucille could dimly remember the very old Pastor Vickers, his beard untidy and stained, coming to the tiny apartment where the family lived and telling her something like "I'm sorry, both of your parents have gone. Please don't cry Lucille as it won't do you any good."

Lucille's temporary fulltime babysitter fled screaming, never to return as after the funeral and being paid the money she was owed. But there was no money to pay her for caring for Lucille from that day.

Pastor Vickers had Lucille admitted to an orphanage. There she was bullied, screamed at by staff and had to learn to look after herself by fighting boys as well as girls.

She learned not to cry and discovered the real meaning of the word she'd later come to know as fortitude. They were grim days left in the past but stored in deep memory.

When turning fifteen, Lucille was hired as a maid by a couple with eight children living in a double apartment (two small apartments made into one) in Upper West Side.

The orphanage administrators gave Lucille a cardboard box containing two changes of clothes and $20, plus $100 added by Pastor Vickers now bed-ridden in a home for the aged and infirm.

Six months later Pastor Vickers died, leaving Lucille alone in the world and unhappy.

Working like a slave and saddened by the death of Pastor Vickers - she was denied time off to attend his funeral - she ran away that same night. She thought that was the best thing to do as she desperately wished to find happiness.

Only Lucille knew how she felt because it was easy - she felt nothing beyond despair. There she was a second generation orphan, nothing linking her to the past, no apparent future. Bleakness in her life seemed assured.

She remembered being a skinny kid with straggly black hair, a pinched face, deep-set eyes with probably hardness in them beyond her years - a kid that no-none kissed or cuddled or even had a kind word for.

Her isolation established a definition for the loneliness of a young teenager: she was 'adrift' in urban New York with her memories of an early life with her now dead parents and the loveless former life in an orphanage casting her existence as grey as a tombstone.

And this for a waif who'd only recently turned fifteen.

The runaway Lucille with $110 in her pocket walked for ten blocks before stopping, not knowing what to do next. She stood in the doorway of a boarded up building, due for demolition as we much of the homes on that street, rain falling and glistening on the wet pavement.

Alone and with her career choice in her hands Lucille faced a decision.

Should she try for a high life or remain gripped within low life?

She adopted the high life ladder, having no idea how she would attain it. She tramped about aimlessly hoping to find low-cost accommodation that was likely to come with fleas, cockroaches and rodents.

Just before 8 o'clock, unable to find anyone willing to give her advice other than saying something like 'Run-alone you little wretch' or 'If you have money where did you steal that money from?'

Lucille was in locked in a deep hole.

Then a woman wearing long skirts and a black shawl introduced herself as Maria; she asked the young disheveled teenager why she was walking the streets after dark. In her innocence Lucille explained why.

"My child, oh my poor child," Maria cried, and hurried home taking Lucille with her.

Maria was one of those people with a heart of gold, just married, aged twenty-five, and working with her husband to try to rejuvenate the business of a failed restaurant they'd purchased to allow the previous owner to pay off debtors.

* * *

Three years on Lucille was on the brink of a person being discovered as possessing worth.

The rags had gone and she dressed better because she now worked as head waitress in the Orlando restaurant.

Two years of singing lessons had changed her voice and other lessons had unleashed her musical talent to turn her into a guitarist worth hearing. She merged her two skills but she lacked marketing expertise and her talents went untapped until one night during a violent electrical storm the restaurant was plunged into darkness.

The kind Maria Lombardi, unloved herself, urged everyone in her husband's restaurant to stay seated.

"More candles are coming and we'll cook on gas grills, she assured everyone."

She told her husband Enzio to fetch Lucille's guitar and ask her to play because music was so peaceful and people drinking in the near-dark would become happier about the situation when hearing music."

Maria had from the outset insisted Lucille call herself her proper name of Lucille and not shorten it to Lucy.

Enzio handed Lucille her guitar and commanded, "Play."

"No I'm a waitress."

"Twenty dollars if you play."

"Very well, how could I refuse; what should I begin with?"

"The tune I always hear you playing."

The strumming started and picked up in depth and rhythm to become 'Ten Guitars'.

Ralph Chick was in the audience with his wife and her sister and husband.

"Know the words babe?" Ralph called. "If so, sing to us."

Lucille played it again, this time with singing lyrics sweetly and confidently that swept over the tables causing several of the patrons to mouth the words in silent accompaniment.

Ralph, a profession musician, sat spellbound as Lucille played on, singing 'Spanish Eyes', 'The Girl From Ipanema', 'Bette Davis Eyes' and, as the lights came back on, 'America Pie'.

The restaurant patrons cheered and Enzio clapped his in-house protégé.

"This girl if she went professional has the potential to make big money, Ralph Chick told his brother-in-law who was tone deaf and wondered why Ralph was out of his tree.

Unfortunately for Enzio, who was thinking about promoting Lucille to resident musician and placing her on salary, a wrinkled-faced thin woman wearing a shoulder to floor gown topped by a cherry-colored turban had Lucille backed against a wall.

"My dear," Winslet Graham said to Lucille, fingering Lucille's beautiful form-fitting dress, "where did you buy this garment?"

"I made it."

"Where did you steal the pattern from?"

"Steal? It comes from my head, like my music but not my casual selection you heard this evening."

"You play classical?"

Lucille remembered those beady dark eyes fixed on hers; this was a woman who demanded the truth.

"Of course."

"May I ask why you are a waitress?"

"I enjoy my food, cooking meals, serving meals so I work in a restaurant and I have not worked for anyone other than Maria and Enzio because nobody else has offered me work."

Mrs Graham replied instantly, with no time for reflection, "Please come and work for me."

Lucille looked at the woman; there was something about her. Was this the opportunity she knew would come to her one day. There was one way to find out.

"Yes, I think so, provided you pay Maria and Enzio some money for taking me away from them. What do you do?"

"I design and sell the clothes from my workrooms to shops here, across the country and Canada, to England and even Italy and France."

Lucille was nonplussed.

"Then you would have many, many people working for your, experts in their field. Why would you want the likes of me?"

The beady eyes lightened and a smile lurked.

"You appear to have uniqueness Lucille. I sense it without knowing what it is. If you can understand this, I have done everything from putting teams of people together and provided workrooms and arranging bulk buyers and distributors for the output of our factory."

"Now I have managers in charge of that, leaving me free to scout for people capable of making a difference. You are capable of making a difference."

"How Mrs Graham?"

"We'll find out when I have you under my wing; I promise you employment for two years."

"I'll work for you as soon as Enzio tells me he's satisfied with the money you offered him."

"I already like you Lucille. Personality, talent plus integrity are rare combinations in a person these days. I fancy I was like that at your age."

Lucille was unaware of how fortunate this chance meeting would be for her.

Even Winslet Graham was oblivious to the fact that, in approaching her twilight years and being dissatisfied with her own two children, deep inside she yearned to mold someone into a person at least equal to herself in drive and accomplishment. She was unaware what she sensed in Lucille that the teenager possessed some of the qualities for such a project.

Maria produced a watershed when Lucille said goodbye at the start of the New Year, Lucille staying until the celebration of her nineteenth birthday. Maria was conscious it was the end of an era.

She sobbed, "There's always a home for you here."

She left the room briefly and returned, still weeping, to place a black comb into the young girl's hair. Nothing was said about it but they both cried, knowing what Maria was passing on was something she treasured and so signaled she regarded Lucille as her daughter.

* * *

With her thoughts slipping back several decades, Lucille shifted a little uncomfortably in the chair at the Events center when remembering the next bit. But, oh well... it was not in her nature to try to brush embarrassment aside.

* * *

With Maria was called to the restaurant kitchen, they kissed once again and had their final hug before parting. Lucille went into Enzio's office where he hugged her emotionally and she felt his hands wandering but made no effort to resist. He bent her over his desk, lifted her skirt and entered her, puffing his garlic breath over her face as he finally groaned

Weeping, Lucille told Enzio she'd really miss him and thanked him for being so kind to her.

She enjoyed what that flamboyant man with a touch of arrogance did to her but was ashamed for her treachery against Maria, her benefactor.

Understanding and accepting concepts such as morality had never been part of Lucille's life; but her education was about to begin under Mrs Graham's all-embracing influence.

* * *

On Lucille's first day at her new employment, Mrs Graham took Lucille through the design department where they visited rooms where people worked sketching and other rooms where young girl re-rolled bolts of material that their temperamental superiors had unrolled, fingered, held up to the light to see through and against the light to test reflective subtleties and to even place against their cheek before either noting the code number or casting around for something else to catch their eye.

In a huge workroom the duo walked through the buzz of activity where cutters, seamstresses and their supervisors worked busily with much chatter, translating concepts into original garments - only the supervisors acknowledging Mrs Graham's presence and then mostly only with a nod and quick smile.

The two females ended the tour in a lounge where they had coffee, with little conversation between them because Mrs Graham took and made phone calls. Then she clapped her hands and a well-dressed woman at the far end of the room opened the door behind her and called out.

Three young women of similar unsmiling facial character and only average hair styling but all were long-legged and slim with noticeably square shoulders came in, each stepping up on to a low dais and the woman who'd called them turned on spot lights.

"Inspect those three garments and tell me what you think, my dear."

Lucille was not taken by any of the garments but realized she was being tested so made critical appraisals.

Four minutes later she returned to the table to sit with Mrs Graham who worked to conceal any excitement of engaging in this test of her judgment in recruiting the former restaurant worker.

Lucille began confidently.

"That business suit at the far end is very much like a uniform though well-constructed, very conservative and will last - solid and uninspiring through lack of flair. But additional coloring and the wearer's individuality will come by the right choice of shirt or high neck petticoat and her taste in jewelry."

"I'm impressed, an excellent description of our biggest selling product. It ships out by the hundreds. Nay, I'm talking truck loads. Next."

"It's aimed for the fall season has a dated look and is uninspiring. With apologies I have to say I don't like it."

"And neither do the women out there and not only in this country," Mrs Graham said dryly. "It's our failure of the year and will be moved by discounting it heavily. And the last?"

,

"It's for the spring, I guess, because I haven't seen it before. Does the lilac suggest the color range is pastel?"

"Yes."

"And those six bold dummy buttons on the jacket are the same with variety coming through batch changes to colors and the differently shaped lapels?"

"Yes, and some are belted."

Lucille pressed on. "And the skirts?"

"Unchanged - variation is restricted to the jacket."

"But production runs will be large, making changes economic?"

"Yes and you seem to know a great deal for a waitress."

They shared a knowing smile Lucille explained. "My work was in waiting at tables but my mind was in fashion - my guardian Maria was formerly a seamstress and now spends much of her income from the restaurant profits on clothes."

"We sometimes attended fashion shows and together regularly studied her fashion magazines."

"Ah and that's how it's happened," Mrs Graham said snapping her fingers for more coffee from her junior assistant. "What are your thoughts about this outfit for our spring collection? Production will commence soon."

Lucille apparently had expected that question.

"That six-button look is dated but is best for larger bust women. For the smaller sizes I would run the buttons in a crescent, crossing from the left to the right and believe the buttons should be only two or three shades darker than the fabric, not black as they are now."

"A problem lies with the skirt - it's a nothing. All the smaller sizes should have side slits - modest slits both sides on some, and an almost darling single slit on others."

"Slits are not a problem in limited production runs but in mass production..."

"If you are wealthy, take a risk. Have you not observed the stockings some young women are wearing - colored and even boldly patterned. Panty hose is sweeping the world but they are anything but romantic. Some women think garter belts are a curse to wear but ask an Italian man about garter belts and I bet his eyes will light up."