Ballet Shoes

by Noel Streatfeild

  ‘I want to learn,’ Pauline said sulkily. ‘It’s because I wasn’t learning that I didn’t like it; and anyway I never said so.’

  ‘Your face said it, and Miss Jay could see. You were angry. Why should you watch these girls? What had they to teach you? You, who had played Tyltyl so well. You were in the mood I was in when I watched “L’Aiglon”. Why should I watch? What could an old woman teach me?’

  ‘But you were watching a great actress.’

  ‘It never matters whom you watch, you can always learn. Always, always, always. Now bring your book here. Together we will translate the story. At the end of next term we will give a performance of it, in costume.’

  Posy came to her class and was told that Madame could not take her as she had to coach a girl for a pantomime; she was to go to a general class. This happened three days running; then Posy took the law into her own hands. She paid no attention to the message, and went on upstairs just as though she had not received it. She knocked on Madame’s door and went in and curtsied. Madame was giving a lesson, she looked round with a frown.

  ‘What is it, Posy dear?’

  ‘I’ve come to say goodbye,’ said Posy cheerfully. ‘I’m not coming any more this term except for fencing.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘The class I’m going to isn’t any good to me.’

  Madame’s eyes grew very small and looked angry; she hated disobedience.

  ‘I have arranged for you to attend it.’

  ‘Yes.’ Posy smiled at her happily. ‘But you don’t know what they do.’ She came over to the bar. ‘Those frappés are over too quick: no time to get them right. Then there are two exercises you and me don’t do, and I won’t do them until you’ve shown me. Not any of it does me good, so I’ll work at home just like you’ve showed me, and I’ll come again next term.’

  Madame looked for a moment as though she would hit her. Then suddenly she laughed.

  ‘How old are you?’

  ‘Eight.’

  Madame kissed her.

  ‘Goodbye. If you don’t come to classes I rely on your honour to work at home, and all through the holidays. I shall take you for extra classes next term.’

  The pantomime rehearsals suited Petrova. Some of the children in her class were dancing in troupes, and nobody had time for those that were not. They were supposed to work at the bar by themselves; but of course they never did, but had a glorious time doing anything they liked.

  The next year was an important year. Pauline would be twelve at the beginning of December, and so old enough to have a licence, and they all had whooping-cough.

  Whooping-cough is a miserable disease, but if you must have it, the worst place is the Cromwell Road; it is so far from the Parks and any place where you can whoop nicely in private. They spent the first part of having it in bed, but after a bit they got well enough to get up, and then it was most depressing. The weather was ghastly — very cold, with those sort of winds which cut your legs and face, and often it rained and sometimes half snowed, and they whooped too much to go on an underground, or a bus, and they were all cross, and they got tireder and tireder of walking to the Victoria and Albert and back. Then one day Mrs Simpson remembered that an old housemaid they had when she was a girl lived in the country and was poor, and would be glad to have them. Sylvia was worried, because what money she had was getting steadily less, and there was not a word from Gum. But Mrs Simpson said it would not cost much, and that it would be a present to the children from her because the garage was doing well, and she thought it was because, as a family, they had brought them luck.

  The cottage was in the middle of a common in Kent. It was a perfect place for whooping-cough, because there never was anybody about, and if there chanced to be a passer-by and a whoop came on, there were plenty of gorse-bushes. As a matter of fact, directly they got there they began to whoop less. The weather got better, and they found early primroses, and the catkins and pussy palm showed there would not be much more winter, and at once they felt better. Nana, who was fussy about gloves and looking like ladies even when you were going to look anything but a lady and stand whooping in the road, seemed to change in the country. She was country born herself, and she so liked helping Gladys (the housemaid Mrs Simpson had when she was a girl) with the chickens, and putting up Gladys’s husband’s dinner, which meant popping a bit of bacon into a pastry turnover, and looking over the potatoes in the barn, that she never bothered the children at all. As long as they were out all day, and ate plenty, she did hot even get angry when they came in late for meals. They went back to London without a whoop in them in time for the Summer term. That Summer term and the beginning of the Autumn were very hard working for Pauline. She would be twelve in December. A child can get a licence to act from her twelfth birthday. Pauline was to try and get her first engagement that Christmas.

  ‘Pauline,’ said Miss Jay one day in November. ‘I want you here at eleven tomorrow morning. I want you to bring a length of hair ribbon with you and to wear a nice frock. I am taking you to see a manager.’

  The news that Pauline was to see a manager the next day caused more confusion than pleasure. Gum’s money was getting lower and lower; and since eating is the most important thing, everybody had to do without new clothes. Nana did miracles in the way of patching and darning, but of course patches and darns, though neat, are not smart. The only dresses the children had that could be described as ‘nice’ in the way in which Miss Jay meant, were their white organdies, and Pauline could not wear white organdie with a blue sash at eleven o’clock on a November morning. For lessons, and to go to the Academy, they had kilted skirts, and jerseys, and on Sundays and better occasions they still had velvet frocks which Sylvia had bought them when times were not so bad; but Pauline’s was much too short for her now, and one of the elbows was darned. Nana took it out of the cupboard and held it up to the light.

  ‘Terrible!’ She shook her head. ‘Nobody’d engage you for anything, Pauline, looking like a rag-bag in that. I’ll just wash your jersey through tonight, and you’ll have to wear what you’ve got on.’

  Pauline got very red.

  ‘I can’t. Miss Jay will think we haven’t any clothes if I wear a jersey and skirt after her saying a frock.’

  ‘Well you haven’t any, so there’s no harm in her thinking it.’ Nana spoke crossly, because she hated the children not to be well dressed.

  The three children looked at each other. They knew all about going to auditions for parts, for they had seen it happen. You came to school in best clothes, and stood in the hall where everybody could see you, and people called out ‘Good luck! I hope you get it.’

  ‘She can’t go in a jersey and skirt, Nana,’ Petrova said.

  ‘No.’ Posy looked very determined. ‘Jerseys and skirts are never worn at auditions.’

  ‘Well’ — Nana sounded crosser than ever, but they all knew she was not — ‘what do you think I am? A conjurer? Do you think I can make a frock like they bring rabbits out of a hat?’

  In the ordinary way they would have laughed at that, but they did not now. Going to an audition in old clothes was far too serious a matter. They could hear the whispers, and see the nudges, ‘Those Fossils haven’t any clothes.’

  Petrova clenched her hands.

  ‘They’re not going to be sorry for us — they shan’t. Pauline has got to have a frock.’

  ‘If only we had some money.’ Pauline went over to the velvet dress. ‘Do you suppose I’ll have to take my coat off? The front isn’t so awful.’

  They all examined the frock. It had got that going-different-ways look that velvet gets when it is old. It had been a nice blue once, but it was greyish in parts now; the darn on the elbow showed terribly, and so did the place where the hem had been let down. After a moment they left the frock. There was no need to say anything: it was obvious she could not wear it.

  ‘Do you think Garnie has a little money?’ Posy suggested.

  Pauline and Petrova answere
d together.

  ‘We can’t tell her, she mustn’t know.’

  ‘No,’ Nana agreed, thinking of all the extra grey hairs in Sylvia’s head, and the hours she spent working out accounts, and knowing how badly, even with the boarders’ money, they worked out. ‘We mustn’t bother Miss Brown.’

  ‘I know!’ Petrova exclaimed. ‘Our necklaces! They’d sell.’

  ‘Oh!’ Posy let out the gasp before she had time to hold it back, because she was very fond of her corals. Then she took a deep breath and said in as pleased a voice as she could, ‘Our necklaces! What a good idea!’

  ‘There’s our watches,’ Pauline said. ‘Wouldn’t they do instead? I’d rather sell my watch.’

  ‘No.’ Petrova looked at her watch. ‘We always wear those. Garnie would be sure to ask where they were.’

  Pauline looked worried.

  ‘Well, couldn’t we just sell my necklace?’

  Nana shook her head.

  ‘Turquoises don’t fetch much, dear.’

  ‘But pearls do,’ Petrova said. ‘Perhaps just mine would do.’

  ‘But it’s for a frock for me,’ Pauline protested.

  Petrova sat on the floor to think better.

  ‘It’s for us all really. It would be all our shame if you had to go in a jersey and skirt.’

  ‘Tell you what,’ Nana suggested. ‘Let’s take all three necklaces along, and see what is offered. We couldn’t get a dress in a hurry for Pauline under four or five guineas. It’s no good buying cheap stuff, it’s got to last.’

  ‘I tell you what.’ Pauline sat down by Petrova. ‘Suppose we buy a dress with our necklaces between us, and keep it for nothing but auditions. Let’s get one that’ll suit all of us.’

  ‘Doesn’t matter awfully about it suiting me,’ Posy pointed out. ‘I can’t go to an audition for nearly four years.’

  ‘Unless the Professor’s back,’ Nana said in a voice which showed what she thought of the Professor, ‘it’s what you’ll wear for more than four years.’

  ‘Very awkward it’s going to be,’ Petrova observed, ‘when all of us are old enough for licences and want to wear it on the same day.’

  Pauline looked proud.

  ‘You seem to forget that I’m going to an audition about a part. If I get it I shall earn money. Probably by the time Posy is twelve I shall be keeping you all.’

  Posy put on an American twang.

  ‘And how!’

  The plan was that Pauline and Nana should go out as soon as the shops were open, taking the three necklaces with them. All their plans were upset, however, by Mr Simpson coming up after breakfast just as they were starting, and saying that since it was a most important occasion he intended to drive Pauline to the Academy. Pauline looked at the others, and none of them knew what to say. Then Posy blurted out:

  ‘But you can’t. She’s got to…’

  Petrova put her hand over her mouth and stopped her saying any more; but of course Mr Simpson could not help seeing something was odd.

  He looked at them, then he sat down and asked Nana if he might light his pipe. Nana said he could, and while he was seeing to it they made signs to each other to say he must not be told anything. When his pipe was going nicely he looked round and smiled.

  ‘What’s the trouble, Nana?’

  ‘Nothing, sir,’ Nana said firmly.

  He sighed.

  ‘Oh, dear, I hoped I was a really trusted friend, but I suppose I’m not.’ He got up. ‘Very well, then, I’ll go to the garage if I can’t help with a lift, Pauline.’

  Pauline and Petrova looked at each other in a worried way. They felt awful, and Petrova made a face at Pauline to say ‘Couldn’t we tell him?’ Then suddenly Nana said:

  ‘If you wouldn’t mind stepping outside a minute, sir.’

  He went at once, and then she told them that she thought they had better tell him, for gentlemen knew about jewellery, and perhaps he would not only drive them to a shop where they could sell the necklaces, but see the man in the shop did not cheat them. Nana thought everybody cheated women, and had great faith in a man being about. So they called Mr Simpson in and told him the whole story. He listened, then he said he had a better scheme. He got out a piece of paper and a fountain pen. He wrote a lot. Then he spoke like a man at a board meeting.

  The children said nothing for a moment because it seemed such an easy plan, but sounded so business-like. Then Petrova asked:

  ‘If we don’t earn money quickly to buy them back, will you sell them to get your five pounds?’

  Mr Simpson nodded.

  ‘Naturally, but since we are friends I will keep them as long as I can.’ He laid the piece of paper on the table and held out his pen. ‘You first, Pauline. Sign here.’

  CHAPTER X

  The Audition

  THERE is no doubt a new dress is a help under all circumstances. This new one was very becoming to Pauline, whose hair had got no darker as she grew older, but had remained a natural platinum. All the children considered velvet the right material for an audition frock, and in Harrods, Nana and Pauline found a black chiffon velvet dress. It was plainly made, with a white collar and white cuffs, and a tight bodice with rows of buttons down the back. Pauline wished it was not black, which she thought dull, and like their elocution overalls; but it was the right sort of thing to wear, and had the advantage that there was an enormous hem to let down, and that the black knickers that belonged to her overall would do to wear under it. Mr Simpson waited outside Harrods in the car, and though it was too cold to take her coat off, Pauline unbuttoned it so that he could see what the money he had lent had bought. He said she looked magnificent, and all the way to the Academy he pretended he was driving a débutante to a Court at Buckingham Palace.

  Pauline left her hat in the cloakroom, and she and Nana went and stood in the hall. Nana carried her coat, for the students were always inspected before they went to an audition. There was one other child waiting, who had her mother with her. Her name was Winifred and she was very clever. She was the child who would have played Mytyl if she had not had measles. She had acted really well, she was a brilliant dancer, she had an unusually good singing voice, but she was not pretty. She had a clever, interesting face, and long, but rather colourless, brown hair. She was wearing an ugly brown velvet frock; not a good choice of colour, as it made her look the same all over. When Winifred’s mother saw Nana, she gave her Winifred’s coat and shoe bag and hair-ribbon, and asked her to be so kind as to look after her, as she could not well spare a morning, as she had her husband ill, and there were five children younger than Winifred at home.

  Winifred looked enviously at Pauline.

  ‘What a lovely frock! I can hardly breathe in mine, it’s so tight. I bought it last year out of the money I made in Pantomime. I’ve grown since.’

  Pauline flushed. It was not her secret how she had got the money for the dress, so she could not explain; but she did not want Winifred to think she often had things like that.

  ‘I borrowed the money for mine,’ she whispered. ‘But don’t tell the others.’

  Winifred nodded to show she would not.

  We’re going for “Alice”,’ she said.

  ‘“In Wonderland”?’ asked Pauline. ‘How do you know?’

  Winifred held out the hair-ribbon which she was holding.

  ‘Whenever they put on “Alice in Wonderland” and they are taking people down about “Alice”, they tell them to bring hair-ribbons. I should think you might get it. I wish I would, though.’

  ‘It would be lovely!’ Pauline’s eyes shone at the thought. ‘Fancy meeting all the people, the Frog Footman, and the Mad Hatter, and…’

  ‘And think of the money!’ Winifred added.

  Pauline thought of the necklaces.

  ‘Would one earn much?’

  Winifred looked wise.

  ‘It’s the Princess Theatre; it’s a mean management. Ought to get six, but it’ll be more likely four…they might squeeze five.�
�

  ‘Five what?’ asked Pauline. ‘Shillings?’

  Winifred stared at her.

  ‘Shillings! Pounds. Don’t you need money at home?’

  Pauline thought of Gum, and Sylvia’s grey hairs, and the boarders.

  ‘Of course.’

  Winifred pulled up her socks.

  ‘There’s needing money, and needing money,’ she said wisely. ‘If I could get this job, Mother’d put half away for me, but even what’s left would mean the extra stuff Dad needs to get well. He’s had an operation, and doesn’t seem to get right after it. Then there’s clothes wanted for all of us, especially shoes. Oh, it would be wonderful if I could get it!’

  She looked so anxious that Pauline almost hoped she would. Of course she needed the money too, but somehow, although there was not any for new clothes, and the food was getting plainer and plainer, nobody had ever said what a help it would be when she could earn some, and certainly she had never worried about it as poor Winifred seemed to do. All the time Winifred was talking people who walked by called out, ‘Good luck, Winifred, good luck, Pauline.’ Pauline could see from the way they looked at her that they thought she looked nice, and from the way they looked at Winifred, that they thought she did not. She wished she had some money and could buy Winifred a new frock; she was so nice and she looked so all-wrong.

  When Miss Jay came, she turned both Winifred and Pauline round and said, ‘Very nice,’ and though it was impossible that she thought Winifred looked nice in her mustardy-brown frock, which was too small for her, there was nothing in her voice to show it. She told them both that they were going to the Princess Theatre to be tried for the part of ‘Alice’, in ‘Alice in Wonderland’, and she asked for their hair-ribbons, explaining to Nana that it helped if they looked like Alice. She tied Winifred’s brown ribbon first, and then Nana gave her Pauline’s black velvet that they had bought in Harrods to match her frock. Miss Jay took a comb and swept Pauline’s hair off her face, and tied it back, then she laughed and said she looked ridiculously Tenniel. Pauline was just going to ask her what Tenniel was, when she remembered he was the artist who had done the first ‘Alice in Wonderland’ pictures. Doctor Jakes had told her so.