One result of Ruby’s introspection and self-analysis over this period was that her aim for the future became crystal clear. During the last two years when Ellie had been spending every penny she earned on enjoying herself, she had done the opposite. She had opened a savings account at the post office and the only money she had withdrawn from this apart from necessities like paying the rent and buying food and so on, had been to enrol in several night courses, one being elocution lessons, another advanced bookkeeping, yet another business management and a fourth in high-fashion dressmaking where she first heard the term ‘haute couture’. The teacher on this eighteen-month course, a small Frenchwoman called Madame Poiret, was a perfectionist with an acid tongue who suffered fools badly. She had begun the first evening by stating that the creation of exclusive custom-fitted clothing was in the same realm as painting a masterpiece; it could only be accomplished by an artist who was prepared to sacrifice themselves for their art. High-end fashion demands high-quality, expensive and often unusual fabric sewn with extreme attention to detail, she had informed them, her ebony eyes sweeping over the nervous faces in front of her, and only the most gifted and capable dressmakers had any chance of succeeding. It was time-consuming, difficult, frustrating and not for the faint-hearted. They were to forget everything they thought they knew about dressmaking, she had continued, because inevitably it would be wrong.

Ruby hadn’t been the only one who had finished that first evening regretting enrolling on the course, but unlike several others, she had returned the next week. And the next. She had practised what she had learned making her own clothes and those of Ellie at home, for a fraction of the price they’d have cost to buy, and all the time at the back of her mind thoughts of her own dress shop selling exclusive clothes copied from the London and Paris fashion houses were simmering.