‘She is good. It would be money well spent.’
Grandfather had stopped laughing and was turning purple. He was sorry he had said he would pay for Angus, but he had not supposed he would be taken seriously.
‘You’re wasting words, all of you. I’ll spend my brass the way I’ve a fancy. I won’t go back on my promise, if Angus can make that dancing school take him, and you say he can go, Alex, I’ll pay, but that’s my offer and there’s no more to it.’
Grandmother could not understand why usually reasonable people like Alex and Cathy were being so foolish.
‘Father’d never pay for dancing lessons for Jane, you know that, Alex. Letting little Angus have a lesson or two won’t hurt anyone, but Jane is a different matter. You don’t want to fill a girl’s head with silly ideas. If she takes extra classes they should be in a kitchen, where she’ll learn to make a good man happy some day.’
Uncle Alfred thought his mother so right he almost clapped.
‘You never spoke a truer word.’
Veronica was puzzled.
‘But you never let me go in the kitchen, Dada.’
Uncle Alfred was bursting with pride in Veronica. He thought it was a shame how plain, shabby and dull her poor cousins appeared beside her. That he was bursting with pride showed in his voice.
‘Things are different for you, Veronica, pet. When you marry there’ll be no need for you to do your own cooking, Dada will see to that.’
‘All the same, you must know how things should be done,’ Rose said. ‘When you leave school Dada will send you to a finishing school, and you’ll learn some cooking there.’
Since Grandmother had said Grandfather would not pay for Jane to learn dancing Ginnie had been seething with rage. This talk about Veronica and finishing schools was the end. She said, as if her words were a cork bursting out of a bottle:
‘That’ll be a waste of time, Veronica. Even if you learn to cook you’ll never make a good man happy, or a bad one either.’ There were horrified hushes and ‘Be quiet, Ginnie,’ and ‘Shut up’ from Cathy, Alex and Paul, and a faint ‘Don’t, Ginnie,’ from Jane, but nothing stopped Ginnie. ‘I don’t care. I’m going to say what I want to say. I’m glad Angus is going to learn dancing, if he wants to, though goodness knows why he wants to, but I don’t see why everybody’s siding against poor Jane….’
Only by the most terrific will-power was Jane holding back tears. There was to be no miracle. When, for a moment, you had believed one to be about to happen, that was bad enough, but for years to have longed and worked for a miracle and then to see it performed for another member of the family, that was too much. But Ginnie mustn’t be cross, it would do no good. She said in a strangled voice, which forced its way through the lump in her throat:
‘Don’t, Ginnie. Please don’t.’
‘It’s no good saying “Don’t, Ginnie,” and it’s no good frowning, Mummy, or saying “Hush,” Daddy. It was very kind of Uncle Alfred and Aunt Rose to take us to the ballet, but that doesn’t mean they can tell Veronica things are different for her than they are for Jane, just because they’re rich and we’re poor.’
Everybody, except Jane who dare not speak again, and Angus, who was dreaming he was dancing in a ballet, tried to stop Ginnie. Uncle Alfred with pompous ‘Well really!’ Grandmother with a shocked ‘Be quiet, Ginnie, love.’ Grandfather with a roared ‘Shut your trap, Ginnie.’ Alex with a sharp ‘Ginnie!’ Cathy with ‘Ginnie, be quiet.’ Paul with ‘Oh, I say, do shut up.’ Veronica with an excited ‘Ooh, isn’t Ginnie naughty!’ But none of them had any effect. Ginnie meant to go on until she had said everything she wanted to say.
‘Everybody in our family knows Jane’s wanted to go to a dancing school for years and years and years, and when the chance comes you all get grand and despising and say she must go and work in a kitchen….’
Glances exchanged between Alfred and Rose got Paul, Jane and Alex to their feet. Cathy said:
‘I’m sure the car must be here, Alfred.’
Uncle Alfred nodded, and opened the door.
‘It’ll be outside. Can’t you keep your child in order, Alex? Pity the evening should be spoilt for everyone by such unpleasantness.’
Alex had hold of a still muttering Ginnie, and was pushing her in front of him into the hall.
‘It’s not meant as unpleasantness. It’s just strong family feeling.’
Alfred was not having that.
‘Call it what you like, but it’s downright rudeness.’
‘Bad upbringing,’ said Rose.
Veronica skipped into the hall to enjoy the last of the fuss.
‘I’m never rude, am I, Mumsie?’
Grandmother was sorry for Cathy.
‘You should take a slipper to her, dear. I’d have taken a slipper to Alfred and Alex if they’d behaved this way when they were Ginnie’s age.’
Uncle Alfred thought everybody was passing off the affair too lightly.
‘It’s the ingratitude, Ginnie, that’s what I can’t get over.’
Cathy knew Ginnie; in her present state it was no good talking to her. She was thoroughly roused over what she considered a just cause. The great thing was to get her safely into the car, where she could calm down. It was urgent too, to get Jane into the car, she wouldn’t hold out much longer. She turned to Uncle Alfred.
‘Ginnie’s been very naughty, but you can trust Alex and me to deal with her.’
Ginnie thought all this apologising and scolding was humiliating, it was Uncle Alfred and Aunt Rose who were wrong.
‘Don’t bother with them, Mummy. Let them talk and sneer and sneer like they do, we don’t care, do we? As a matter of fact it’s done me so much good telling them what we think of them I shan’t care how you and Daddy deal with me.’ Then she pulled away from Alex’s restraining hands and dashed across the hall to Veronica, who was swinging on the end of the banister. ‘As for you, Veronica, I think you’re a spoilt stuck-up mimsy-pimsy minx. I’ve always thought so, and now I’m very glad I’ve told you.’
In a second Grandfather had picked Ginnie up in his arms and she was outside the front door and in the car.
‘You’re a bad girl, Ginnie, and I hope your father takes a slipper to you.’ Then he chuckled. ‘But you’re a chip of the old block and I like your spirit. Your father couldn’t say boo to a goose.’
Alex, Cathy and Paul tried to make their good-byes sound as if it was the end of any ordinary party, but they were not successful, and everybody except Angus, who had not known anything was wrong, and Ginnie, who was still bubbling with things she wanted to say, was thankful when the car started.
‘Ough,’ said Paul, ‘that was a sticky evening! Whatever got into you, Ginnie?’
Alex’s voice had never sounded sterner.
‘I’m very angry indeed….’
Cathy had her arms round Jane, she could feel her shaking with the sobs she could no longer hold back. Luckily Angus was in front with the chauffeur.
‘Shut the windows between us and the front of the car, Paul. Leave scolding Ginnie until we get home, Alex. Jane, Jane, darling …’
Jane gasped through strangling sobs.
‘I’m sorry, everybody, but I must cry. I did hold back crying while I was there, didn’t I, Mummy? They didn’t see I was going to cry, did they? Oh, I hope Veronica didn’t see. I don’t want to be mean or jealous. If Angus wants to learn to dance I’m glad he’s going to. But to be paid for! They’ll take him…. I feel it in my bones they’ll take him. Him to go to Sadler’s Wells and not me! I can’t bear it. I simply can’t bear it.’
6
Disaster
EVERY TIME CATHY remembered Angus’s birthday party she shuddered, and try as she would she could not help remembering it, for the effects of it went on and on.
First there was Ginnie. Alex and Cathy hated punishments, so there were as few as possible, and what there were had to be suitable for the crime committed; but what punishment was suitable for being rude to re
lations? In the end Alex decided Ginnie would not have been rude if she had not been overtired. Of course the cure for that was bed, so for a whole week Ginnie had to go to bed the moment she came home from school. Ginnie was grand about her punishment.
‘As a matter of fact Miss Virginia Bell is quite glad to go to bed, she gets bored hearing people talk, talk, talk, all the time.’
Of course it was not true, and everybody knew it was not true, and all the family felt miserable for Ginnie, and as well they missed her. Angus missed her for an odd reason.
‘It’s so dull having no one to quarrel with.’
But Ginnie’s punishment was a passing trouble. Angus learning dancing instead of Jane hung like a cloud over the vicarage, and Angus made Jane’s unhappiness worse. He never realised how terrible she was feeling, and rushed round to everybody showing his letter from Grandfather, saying he had meant what he had said, and if Sadler’s Wells would take him he would pay. His head was so full of the idea of learning to dance that he did not notice that his family and Mrs Gage were not at all keen to hear the letter read out loud. Alex and Cathy had a long discussion in the study with the door shut.
‘If only,’ said Cathy, ‘we could find a way to pay for Jane to go too. It’ll be heart-breaking if Angus learns and she doesn’t.’
But they could not think of a way to pay, though they considered everything, from selling their furniture to parting with a life insurance. What in the end they decided to do was to go and see Miss Newton, the head of St Winifred’s, and ask her advice.
Miss Newton was a very head-mistressy looking headmistress, with neat hair, severely cut coats and skirts, and rather perched spectacles. She had a cool, brusque, don’t-be-foolish-dear manner, but underneath she was a most understanding person. She was glad to see Alex and Cathy, because she had noticed something was wrong with Jane, and when she heard what it was she was really upset.
‘Poor child! No wonder she looks so wretched. It really is a cruel business. Everybody knows she has talent, and to see lessons wasted on her brother, who probably will have lost interest in dancing in six months!’ She sat silent for a bit, thinking. Then she said: ‘Let us write to Sadler’s Wells for you. Miss Bronson knows somebody there. I don’t suppose for a moment it’s the regular time for auditions, but perhaps, as a kindness, they would not only see Angus to put you all out of your misery, but see Jane too. I’ll explain you can’t afford the fees, but that we all want to know how much promise she shows.’
It was no wonder Miss Newton had noticed something was wrong with Jane, for she was feeling as low-spirited as if she was getting well after influenza. She could not remember a time when she had not longed for proper dancing lessons, but neither could she remember a time when she had not known her father was too poor to pay for them. It had been easy not to mind too much, because good dancing lessons were like a television set, or a car, terribly wanted but things they all knew they could not have. But now good dancing lessons had come off the list of things nobody could have, and at once not having them became an injury that never stopped aching. Supposing Sadler’s Wells School took Angus, how was she to endure seeing him go there while she went to dancing lessons at St Winifred’s? To make Jane’s life more difficult Angus spent every waking moment doing what he called dancing, and of course it was not remotely like dancing. Clumsy efforts to imitate the dancers he had seen, great leaps in the air, arms waving, feet anywhere, usually finishing in a crash with him on the floor, and chairs overturned. Cathy said it was nonsense Miss Bronson bothering Sadler’s Wells to audition him, they would only laugh, but Jane thought she was wrong.
‘If he was a girl it would be different, but I wouldn’t wonder if they let him have lessons for a bit, just to see if they can do anything with him. There is always a shortage of men dancers.’
As if Jane being sunk in gloom, and Ginnie being punished were not enough for one family to endure, Paul seemed to Cathy and Alex to be behaving peculiarly. Usually he came home from school full of talk about the day’s doings, but that week he came home looking, as Cathy complained to Alex, bowed with worries, which of course he was. It was all right as long as he was doing something, either work or games, but the moment he had nothing to do it was as if a door in his brain opened and in popped a question mark. Should he give up the idea of being a doctor? Should he write to Grandfather? Each day he went to bed deciding to write in the morning, and each morning he woke up deciding to think a little longer before he wrote.
Cathy was always glad to see her relations, but she had never looked forward to seeing them as much as she looked forward to seeing them that Saturday. Mrs Gage, who of course knew all about the Jane trouble, was almost as glad as Cathy when Saturday arrived. It was a lovely morning, and she came in beaming.
‘’ere’s Saturday at last. And very nice too. Do you good, dear, to ’ave a dekko at your Dad and Mum. ’eard from that dancin’ school yet?’
Cathy was cooking kippers for breakfast. She gave one of them a gloomy prod.
‘No. We might hear from Miss Bronson this morning.’
Mrs Gage tied on her scrubbing apron.
‘I was talkin’ to Mr Gage about it last night. Won’t ’alf be cruel, I said, if our Angus goes to that school, while our Jane keeps on at St Winifred’s, and do you know what ’e said?’
Cathy did not know, and did not really care, for what Mr Gage thought would not help.
‘What?’
‘’e said if ’e was the vicar ’e’d preach about it in church, and ’ave a collection took.’
Cathy nearly upset the pan of kippers.
‘Mrs Gage! What an idea!’
‘Well, why not? Ask for thin’s for anybody but ’is own family the vicar will. Foreign missions, churches eaten by beetles, and I don’t know what all. If I ’ad the gift what the vicar ’as, I’d lean right out of the pulpit and I’d say: “This mornin’ I’m goin’ to preach a sermon about me daughter and ’er dancin’.”’
Cathy laughed a real proper laugh for the first time since Angus’s birthday party.
‘Get along with you! Go and sound the gong, the kippers are ready.’
The gong was under the stairs. Mrs Gage picked it up and was just going to beat it when a hand came through the banisters, and Ginnie’s voice whispered:
‘Mrs Gage! Mrs Gage! Look!’
Mrs Gage looked. She almost dropped the gong. The face looking over the banisters was swelled out on one side like a football.
‘Oh, my goodness! No need to measure this mornin’.’
Ginnie was nearly crying.
‘I thought I’d had quarantine, I ought to have by now.’
Mrs Gage was making plans.
‘Anyone seen you?’
‘No. Not even Jane. She got up early to do extra dancing practice, in case they’ll see her at Sadler’s Wells.’
‘Well, back to bed quick, and lie on the side what’s swole.’
‘If I don’t come down to breakfast Mummy’ll come up and see me.’
Mrs Gage gestured to Ginnie to hurry.
‘I’ll tell ’er I’ve seen you. I’ll say you’ve one of your bilious turns, which is all it may be. I’ll say I’ve give you some salts to sleep it off. Soon as I can I’ll be up. ’op it now.’
Cathy accepted Mrs Gage’s statement about Ginnie quite calmly. She did sometimes have bilious turns, and usually was quite all right after a dose of salts. In any case there was something else to think of that morning. The post brought a letter from Miss Bronson. As it happened there was an audition on the following Wednesday. The school had written to say that Cathy could bring both Jane and Angus to it.
As soon as breakfast was safely started Mrs Gage crept up the stairs and into Ginnie’s room. Ginnie raised a very hot-looking swollen face, and tears rolled down her cheeks.
‘I never knew mumps would hurt so awfully. I suppose I’ve got them as a judgment like you said.’
Mrs Gage sat on the bed and made clicking, worried nois
es.
‘Funny it comin’ on now. This is a nice caper, this is. Whatever will your poor Mum say? No good worritting ’er before we need. Just as soon as she goes out shoppin’ you an’ me’ll slip round to the doctor’s.’
Ginnie choked back a sob.
‘I don’t feel like slipping anywhere. You wouldn’t believe how it hurts, it’s like a bear biting and biting.’
Mrs Gage got up.
‘I better go down before I’m missed. I’ll catch Jane, she’ll ’ave to see to the front door and that. Directly I tip you off you get your clothes on. We’ll ’ave to find a big scarf to cover that face. We don’t want the ’ole parish askin’ what’s wrong.’
Jane found the news she was to go to Sadler’s Wells School for an audition made her feel a tiny bit less low-spirited. It would not be any good, but she would have been inside and seen what the school was like, and that was something, and if by any glorious chance they said she showed promise, it would be a great deal. Feeling more like dancing than she had for days she went into the hall after breakfast to get in some extra practice before she helped Mrs Gage with the beds.
Mrs Gage, scrubbing the hall, kept track of all the family. She heard Alex shut himself in his study to finish his sermon, Paul take his books to his bedroom, and Cathy, Angus and Esau start out with a list and a shopping-bag. Then she came to Jane. She spoke in a whisper.
‘Keep on with your dancin’, dear, but you’ll ’ave to answer the bells an’ that. I got to slip out for a minute. It’s Ginnie.’ Her whisper became dramatic. ‘Her face is swelled up somethin’ chronic.’
Jane stopped dancing.
‘It can’t be! We’ll all be in quarantine! No audition on Wednesay! No Zoo!’
Mrs Gage looked anxiously at the study door.
‘No need to create, dear. It may not be the mumps, but I’m takin’ ’er to the doctor in case. Now, if your Mum comes ’ome before we’re back, whatever you do keep ’er downstairs. No good ’er gettin’ upset before she needs, poor dear.’
Jane sounded bitter.
‘Of course it’s mumps. Nothing else makes you swell. does it?’