Theatre Shoes (25 page)

Madame's attention was caught by this bobbing and whispering. She came over to the junior table.

“You all seem very excited; do you know anything about the attaché case?” There was a pause. The children sat still, but their eyes swivelled round to Holly. Madame looked smilingly at Holly. “Everybody seems to think that you know something, Holly. Have you seen Miranda's attaché case?”

In the last days Holly had thought the attaché case was almost hers. She had persuaded herself that if Miranda knew how badly she wanted it she would give it to her. When Madame first mentioned the case, so convinced was she that it had been a real loan she did not even feel uncomfortable, but then the whispers had started and they began to penetrate the wall of imagination which she had built, and suddenly the wall fell down, and there was nothing left but the awful fact that she had taken something that did not belong to her, and told everybody it was a loan. The horror of the situation was beyond tears, it just made her feel as if she was full of hot coal. She shut her lips tightly together and stared with a very red face at Madame.

Madame, who had come to make a simple query, saw that something had happened which was not going to be so simple after all. She looked round at the children.

“Holly doesn't seem to be going to answer me. Who else knows about this case?”

Once more all the class began bobbing about like corks and whispering, and this time the name that came to the top was Miss Jones.

Madame hated whisperings and nudges; she felt convinced that a lot of fuss was being made about nothing. She looked round the room with some impatience and caught Miss Jones' eye.

“Would you come here a moment, Miss Jones?”

Poor Miss Jones was feeling miserable. She hated telling tales and had hoped most passionately she would be spared all trouble by Holly explaining what had happened herself. However, where Madame beckoned the staff went. She came over to the table. Madame still had a slightly impatient note in her voice.

“Do you know anything about Miranda's attaché case?”

Trained for mathematics, Miss Jones had an accurate mind. She said, of course, she did not know if the attaché case Holly had brought in was the one that was missing, but she reported how Holly had appeared with an attaché case and had held it up and said, “I was talking to my cousin Miranda. She's come to see me specially, and she said, Dear Holly, I don't like to see you carrying about a nasty paper parcel while the other children have attaché cases; do let me lend you one of mine.”

Miss Jones' words fell on a breathless hush. Every face looked shocked except Sorrel's and Mark's. Sorrel and Mark were looking at the floor, not knowing where else so shamed a family could look. Madame faced Holly.

“Was this attaché case the one that's missing, Holly?” Holly nodded. Madame held out her hand. “Come along, dear, I think this is a matter that you and I should talk over alone.”

In her study Madame sat down in an armchair by the fire. Holly, as the door shut, felt trapped and frightened and all her self-control gave way. She lay down on the floor and sobbed so that her whole body shook. Madame let her cry for a little while, and then she patted her shoulder.

“Be quiet, Holly, that's quite enough crying. Suppose, instead of lying on the floor there, you came and sat on my knee and told me all about it.”

Even after Holly was on Madame's knee it took her a long time to stop crying, but when she did the whole story came out.

“I never have as nice clothes as the others, and I wouldn't mind that, but I do mind a brown-paper parcel, and when I saw Miranda's attaché case wasn't doing anything I absolutely knew Miranda would lend it to me, and so I took it.”

“I see,” said Madame gravely. “That must have been a lovely moment when you came into the class and told the children you'd been lent it.”

Holly nodded.

“It was the most beautiful moment because, you see, everybody'd been sorry for me because Miriam had been given the scholarship instead of me, and for my cousin Miranda, who's awfully grand, to come all the way to the Academy specially for me, made everyone say ‘Isn't Holly lucky?'”

Madame was stroking Holly's curls and looking into the fire. She took a long time before she answered.

“I do see, Holly. I think it's very difficult to distinguish what's really happened and what one thinks has happened, even when one's grown-up, and it's certainly very difficult at your age. I can quite see how all this happened, and I can see how your mind was working, but all the same it mustn't go on working like that, must it? It's most important that you should know clearly what you make up and what you don't. Do Sorrel and Mark want attaché cases, too?”

“Dreadfully.”

Madame rang a bell.

It was the duty in wartime when staff was scarce for one of the children to answer Madame's bell. The senior class took turns and were known as the messengers. When the day's messenger appeared Madame sent her to fetch Sorrel and Mark.

Sorrel and Mark were appalled at that summons. To both of them came the idea that because they were the sister and brother of a child who was almost a thief, they were going to be expelled. Outside Madame's door they met and looked at each other with scared eyes. Sorrel gave Mark's tie a nervous twitch and pulled up her socks. Then she knocked.

Madame greeted Sorrel and Mark with a radiant smile.

“Come in, children. Mark, open that top left-hand drawer. I've got a new box of candy sent me by Pauline from America. I remember how you loved those American candies the first time you came to see me.” When the children had all chosen a sweet she told Sorrel and Mark to sit on the floor. “Well, Holly and I have come to the bottom of this attaché-case business. It seems that she and Mark suffer from the same complaint of letting their imaginations run away with them, but, even though it's not a very bad fault, it is a fault and it's got to be got rid of. Now, what I suggest is this. I'm going to buy three attaché cases. They'll cost a lot, as you know, and they'll take more money than you've probably got, but we can add to that because presently the Fossils will send you money for your birthdays. On each attaché case I shall have your names stamped so that there'll be no chance of your losing them. Sorrel and Mark will have their attaché cases right away, but Holly will only be shown hers once, and then it will be locked up in a cupboard until the beginning of the summer term.” She turned Holly's face towards her. “You can then see how vivid your imagination is, Holly. You can see then whether you can imagine you are carrying your new attaché case when you are not, and whether you can turn your brown-paper parcel into an attaché case. That'll be a very good way of learning where imagination ends and real things begin. Now, take one more sweet each and then, Sorrel, I want you to take the family home. I think an afternoon off will do you all good. You have had enough excitement for one day.”

When the door had shut on the children Madame got up and fetched her book of telephone numbers. She opened the book at “C” and laid her finger on the name Cohen.

In spite of Madame being so nice, the children felt pretty wormy inside when they arrived at the Academy next morning, and they felt no better when they got a message to say Winifred wanted to see Sorrel at once.

Holly clutched at Mark.

“Do you think it's something awful?”

Mark looked anxiously at Sorrel.

“It might be, mightn't it?”

Sorrel was feeling extremely doubtful herself, but she managed to smile.

“Well, the best thing is for me to go and find out.”

Winifred was working at the bar. She was in the middle of some frappés when Sorrel came in. She stopped with one foot against the calf of the other leg.

“Oh, Sorrel, your Aunt Lindsey has rung up to say that she wants to take you three and Miriam to lunch in a restaurant, and Madame says that's all right and it won't matter if you are half an hour late coming back.”

The school were just finishing lunch in the Academy dining-room when Madame came in. This time a kind of shudder ran round. Madame making a speech two days running! Something pretty awful must be going to happen. Probably the Forbes hadn't really gone out to lunch with their aunt, they'd probably been expelled. Madame waited until the children had greeted her, and then she beckoned to them all to come and stand round her.

“I'm going to take you into my confidence, and I trust, without asking for a promise, that you will not repeat to the three Forbes children a word I have said. The attaché case that was missing has, as you know, been found. Holly had it. I need hardly tell you that, of course, it was no great crime she committed. She's a child with a vivid imagination and she persuaded herself that it had been lent. However, that is a fault and it has been dealt with. How, concerns none of you. Why I wanted to talk to you is that I discovered from talking to Holly something in which I think you can all help. The Forbes children have, as you know, no mother and their father is missing; they live with their grandmother, but, of course, even the best grandmother isn't the same as a mother. The result is that Holly, certainly, and probably the other two as well feel that you children look down on them.” There was a gasp from the school. “I know you'll all say to me, ‘Of course we don't,' but are you sure? If your mothers make you new frocks out of old clothes and see that your hair-ribbons match and that you've always got clean socks and, incidentally, an attaché case to carry the socks in, have you never, even with a glance, suggested that a child with grubby socks or an unmatching hair-ribbon was rather an inferior being?” Madame smiled. “Now, I don't want anything silly. I don't want anyone racing out to buy Holly an attaché case or all of you children making a pet of her, but I think it would be nice if you kept it firmly in your minds that the Forbes children, in some ways, are less lucky than you are, and see that any special piece of luck, like being allowed to give a party, or having a few sweets to hand round, you share with them.”

While this talk was going on the children were having a superb and uproarious lunch with Aunt Lindsey. Aunt Lindsey took them to a grand restaurant where a band was playing, and they were very lucky because there was goose upon the menu and they all ate it, and not being used to goose, felt a mixture of pride in having eaten it and rather doubtful in the middle because it was not their usual form of food. It was with dismay they saw Aunt Lindsey look at her watch, and heard her say that the best of everything must come to an end and they were already half an hour late for the Academy.

Climbing the Academy steps each of the children, except, of course, Miriam, felt a sinking inside. People did not mean to look at them differently after yesterday, but they were looking different, there was no doubt of it.

Half the school were down in the changing room, when Sorrel and Miriam walked in. One of Sorrel's class ran up to her.

“Hullo, there you are! We thought you'd gone off for another afternoon. You wouldn't think it, but we miss your old mug when you're away.”

One of the juniors came up to Holly.

“My mother bought me a Mars bar out of my ration this month. I meant to save you half, but I didn't quite manage that.” She fumbled in her attaché case and brought out a dusty, bitten little end of chocolate. “There you are! I won't watch you while you eat it and then I won't miss it.”

CHAPTER XVI

AUDITION AT THE B.B.C.

Sorrel's twelfth birthday came at the beginning of the summer term. She woke up to find the sun streaming in and a parcel on the end of her bed. The parcel had been smuggled from the Academy in Mark's attaché case. It was from Pauline. Inside was a big box marked “Candies” and a card. The card said, “I hope this arrives in time for your birthday. I have sent some money for you to buy something, but I think birthdays ought to have parcels.” The candies were tied up in the loveliest way. Being used to seeing the sweet ration in a paper bag that was inclined to burst, or a flimsy cardboard container, there was pleasure in even unpacking Pauline's parcel. After the two layers of wrapping were off, the box was done up in fine white paper and tied up with yards and yards of green and scarlet baby ribbon. The candies had come in a tin and the tin itself was something that had not been seen for years, it was green and had a wreath of pretty little flowers painted on it. When the lid was off there was no utility packing, but wads of tissue paper and under that two paper doilies beautifully cut, the sort that if put away would make part of a present for Hannah on her birthday, for she was sure to think them lovely. The candies themselves were breathtaking, large and squashy, many of them covered with nuts. Sorrel put one in her mouth and then hurriedly put the lid on the box to keep away temptation. It would be so easy to eat the lot and then she would feel sick and that would be disastrous on this day of all days.

Lying back in bed chewing, Sorrel thought about Pauline. She had seen her now, for Alice had taken them to cinemas to get to know the faces of Pauline, Posy, and, especially, Uncle Henry. Pauline was so lovely on the films that seeing her had at first made her a stranger. She had written twice and Sorrel had written back twice. The first letter from Pauline, especially as she wrote so much about the Academy, had made her feel like a friend, and not much older than herself. Then, seeing her on the screen, she had stopped being an old friend, and had become somebody grand and remote. Then had come Pauline's second letter. Pauline had just received Sorrel's first letter and this time she really had written like a friend. There did not seem to be the smallest thing about the Academy that she was not interested in and nothing was the slightest bit grand about the way she wrote. What fun it must be to be Pauline! Fancy, when Pauline had been twelve she had played “Alice in Wonderland”! What a lovely part to play! She did wish that she could have a chance to play it, but, of course, she was not clever or pretty like Pauline had been. All the same she was going to an audition to-day. She wished she could tell Pauline about the audition. Winifred said Pauline had never been to an audition at the B.B.C., but Pauline had been to lots of other auditions and she would know just how it felt to wake up in the morning and know you were going to one, a mixture of wormy and excited inside.