
Earlier this year I had the immense pleasure of reading a couple of Doris Langley Moore's delightful novels, All Done with Kindness and My Carravaggio Style, both of course published by the wonderful Dean Street Press. I'm happy to say I've just read another one, and have a fourth waiting in the wings.
The two I'd read so far were both originally published in the 1950s, but this one was an early effort which came out in 1938, though it seems to have been reprinted in 1955. This new edition includes an extract from a letter Moore wrote to her publisher explaining the theme of the novel:
Fanny Burney would not approve of some of my chapters, but it was my affection for the novels of her school, in which the heroine goes through all kinds of distresses but emerges in a sweeping triumph at the end, that made me long to try my hand at the same theme—treating it, however, in our down-to-earth twentieth-century way.
When I was a child I often used to play Snakes and Ladders. Said to be based on the Hindu belief in the workings of karma, in this game you move around the board following the throw of a dice. Sometimes you land at the bottom of a ladder and whizz up it, but too often you land on the head of a snake and have to shoot right down to the bottom of the board again. Such indeed is the plot of this novel, in which two young women, more or less in the same position at the start of the book, see their lives going in totally opposite directions as a result of what may seem more or less arbitrary instances of luck.
Lucy and Daisy have ended up in Egypt. They are actresses, appearing in a successful musical comedy which has been touring the world. Lucy, a witty, intelligent vicar's daughter from middle England, has been responsible for rescuing the rather flighty Daisy from a difficult situation in Australia, and as a result the two are friends, though they really have little in common. Unfortunately the success of the show elsewhere is not replicated in Egypt and after a while it is forced to close. By this time, Daisy has become involved with a wealthy businessman and is happy to stay in Egypt. Lucy, however, plans to return to England, and has just enough savings to pay for the journey.
Everything changes, however, when Lucy falls seriously ill, and Daisy needs to arrange for her to go to hospital. Unfortunately she opts for an expensive private clinic rather than the free public hospital, and when Lucy emerges, having lost her looks and her singing voice, she finds herself deeply in debt. Daisy persuades her wealthy lover to pay Lucy's debts, and suggests he gives her a job in the theatre he runs. The one thing Daisy doesn't want is for Lucy to leave the country - her life as a kept mistress is one of long, empty days, and Lucy provides her with company for the otherwise dreary hours. Lucy accepts the job, but only so that she can start saving again for her journey. Her job is really rather demeaning - a sort of dogsbody for anything that needs doing around the theatre - but she persists and in time, with lots of scrimping and saving, she's got enough for the fare. But, in a series of really terrible circumstances, she ends up being conned out of the whole lot. And to make matters worse, she loses her job.
Slowly, the years go by. Daisy's position improves greatly when her lover finally decides to marry her, and she ends up in a grand house with plenty of servants. Lucy meanwhile is now working as a cashier in a cinema, where one day, to her horror, she see her one-time lover, an English aristocrat, approach the box office with his wife. She darts away, afraid to be seen by him.
However, the scales slowly begin to tip the other way. Daisy, who has gained everything she thought she wanted, finds she is not accepted in the high echelons of society despite her valiant efforts. Lucy meanwhile is becoming relatively contented and after a long time (many years have now passed) has finally put by enough to make the long voyage home. At this point, a young woman who she befriended years earlier and did a great favour for decides to help her, so Lucy goes back to a congenial job and a place to live. And yes, there's a happy ending for Lucy, though Daisy is not so lucky.
I don't know if Doris Langley Moore knew anything about karma, but she certainly - here and in the other books I've read - was interested in how the results of our actions, even if not immediately obvious, come home to us in the end. Daisy has persistently behaved badly towards Lucy, who has always been good-hearted and wanted to help others. So it's a great joy to see Daisy's profound discomfiture at the end, when she sees Lucy having reaped a reward far beyond her wildest dreams, while she herself realises she will never get what she wants above all else. Excellent stuff.