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‘Are you sure this is a good idea?’ she whispered in her ear.
‘Please don’t,’ Delphi said with her usual soft defiance, powdering her nose to blot away the perspiration. ‘I’m tired of my health holding me back.’ She had slipped off her dress and was smoothing down the white V-necked blouse beneath. ‘What about your hankie?’
‘Blast.’
Natalie had forgotten the handkerchief. The League had been very clear that it must be pressed and placed in the left leg of her elasticated satin shorts. Not that there was much room for anything inside those shorts.
‘You’ll have to borrow mine if you get upset. They’re going to pay tribute to Prunella’s mother.’
Prunella Stack, the founder’s recently bereaved daughter, was now in charge of the League.
They followed the chattering girls through to the Grand Hall. The hairs on her arms stood tall again. The sweeping latticed glass ceiling, way above them in the heavens, was both a hothouse that at once amplified the chatter of two and a half thousand excited women, while also bringing them closer to the serenity of the clouds above on this grey April day.
She threaded an arm through Delphi’s and they smiled at one another, sharing the thrill of the moment, the tingle in the air.
A troop of women brushed past them as they marched up and down behind banners from their home towns or counties; first Portsmouth went by, then Yorkshire was followed by a rowdy group from Yeovil. On either side of the central concourse – the same dimensions as a swimming pool, though broader and longer than anything she’d ever seen – were steep-sided seats for the spectators: the children, sisters, brothers and husbands of the women demonstrating today.
‘I want to be near the front,’ Delphi said, ‘as close to Prunella as possible.’
Natalie held back, noticing the flashbulbs coming from the front. Prunella had been the main topic of many of Delphi’s letters, but they had to be practical and not get too close. They’d both told lies so they could be there today. It would do neither of them any good to find themselves pictured in the press, nor would it help Delphi’s career prospects if she had a sleeping fit right at the foot of the stage.
Delphi gave up on pushing through when an instruction came for them to sit down. They noisily lowered to the cool concrete floor and sat cross-legged. Delphi and Natalie squeezed into a row in the midst of a group of Scots wearing tartan ribbons on their shoulders, about half a dozen lines from the very front. They had an excellent view of the stage and the three-piece jazz band, but were safe from the photographers, and hidden from view should Delphi take a turn.
Natalie lifted her head and looked all the way behind her at the rows and rows of ladies, all in matching white shirts and black shorts. All with their hair set in waves.
For all their uniformity, the women inside the outfits were much more of a mixture than she’d expected. At her college there was a definite sort of girl who thrived there – she’d been one herself – usually wealthy, or as in her case, with a father in a respectable profession.
These ladies weren’t of one sort at all. Some were their age – surplus women as the press liked to label them, women like she and Delphi, in their thirties, still single and not much hope of that ever changing. The loss of so many men in the war had seen to that. Not that she’d ever give up the hope of finding a husband. Others around them wore more lines about the eyes, and had rounder hips. War widows, no doubt.
All of them, whatever their age or circumstance, had come more out of the need for company than exercise and so for that reason she should fit right in, but still she couldn’t shake the feeling that she was wrong to have come.
Prunella, with glowing skin, nape-length bouncy curls and a radiant smile, welcomed them all to this special memorial rally. The rumour in the Phys Ed corridors was that first the Women’s League founder, Mary Bagot Stack, and now her daughter, Prunella, the so-called Perfect Woman, had made themselves rich on a system of exercise with no grounding in science and no discipline whatsoever. They were simply profiting from lonely women like her and Delphi.
Prunella cocked a hip and bent a long leg as if she were chatting to a friend, not addressing a packed hall. As she spoke she maintained a smile at all times. Even as she wrapped her lips around an ‘o’, the rest of her face pulled the other way.
It was the newspapers that had given her the moniker the Perfect Woman. Natalie and Delphi had discussed in their letters what constituted perfect. The journalists who’d come up with the name were undoubtedly male but even so, Natalie had expected Prunella to be much more athletic. She showed good leadership though and she had charisma too. Perfect or not, she had captivated the Grand Hall.
Wherever she moved at least one photographer crouched in front of her, the flashbulb illuminating her every few moments. Delphi swooned, her red lips stretched to their limits by her smile. She was so happy and that had to be a good thing. Her illness had a habit of ruling her life.
Prunella’s voice echoed about the hall as she told them of her mother’s dying wish. How she’d hoped her work with the Women’s League of Health and Beauty, and her aims for spreading peace and cooperation, would continue.
A bugle blew behind Prunella. The resounding cheers faded as the lights dimmed, and their collective heads bowed. Delphi had warned her this display would be sad and yet still a tingle travelled along her spine. The tribute to Prunella’s mother was to be the Representation of War that she’d helped choreograph for the previous year’s rally.
First came the deathly rattle of the drum. Next the women erupted into the shrill whistle of Tipperary. Then the drums retaliated with a rat-a-tat-tat, before the assault of the bugles and then the women won the battle with the unity of their voices. The hairs on her arms betrayed her for the third time that day as a slow procession of women criss-crossed the stage; some bandaged, one a white strip bound around her eyes, feeling the air in front of her.
The sight of one woman as she propped up another, drunk with pain, clogged her throat with a fist-sized lump. She’d imagined her two brothers had been there for each other at the end in that same way. The idea that they hadn’t died alone had been a story she’d had to believe. One small island of consolation in an ocean of grief.
She wished she’d remembered to bring that damned handkerchief to tuck in her left short leg now. Delphi stroked the back of Natalie’s arm and then opened her palm to proffer her own crumpled hankie. The two of them held hands while Natalie blotted her eyes.
‘Isn’t it wonderful?’ Delphi whispered.
*
The dance demonstration came to an end and they all began to march in formation. Each large group of them making up the spokes of a wheel. It put her in mind of the photograph she’d seen in the Times of last year’s Nazi rally in Nuremberg where they’d formed a human swastika.
‘What do you think?’ Delphi asked as they marched, knees high.
‘It’s more ordered than I expected, but it does feel rather that they’ve plucked their ideas out of the air.’
‘Just look how happy everyone is.’ They both checked along the line as they rotated.
They often came to blows on this matter. Delphi’s ideas were a little more abstract when it came to the benefits of physical exercise.
Delphi had stopped a few times to catch her breath during the dance and now as they marched she didn’t look too well. She smiled and opened her eyes wide each time Natalie caught her gaze, as if to say, there’s nothing to see here. But her nose was beading in sweat; her forget-me-not blue eyes had clouded over. All was clearly not well.
As the hall full of women sat to watch the choreographed cabaret on the stage, Natalie saw Delphi’s knees buckle. She made up her mind in that instant to take advantage of the pause.
‘What on earth are you doing?’ Delphi asked as Natalie took her hand and led her down a covered walkway that stretched from the stage area and through to a dark corridor lined with doors. ‘Peggy St Lo choreographed that routine,’ she slurred. ‘I want to see it.’
‘You don’t look well.’ Natalie swung open the first door that she came to. She had just enough time to flick the electric light switch and illuminate the drab clothes hanging from a hat stand and the horizontal mirror edged with light bulbs, before Delphi’s legs buckled again. Like a puppet with its strings cut, sleep triumphed and she piled to the floor. Natalie slowed her fall as much as she could and then crouched beside her. There was a tatty knitted polo neck on the back of the dressing table chair, which she smoothed over her.
Natalie watched and waited. She was still the same beautiful Delphi in every way except her jaw was clenched, and she was asleep on the floor. Natalie didn’t touch her. Sometimes in these fits she was actually still awake, but trapped by the paralysis of her own body. Natalie’s touch would be leaden to her.
She looked at her watch. So much for the quick escape after the rally. She’d promised Miss Lott that she’d check in the girls at the college’s ten o’clock curfew, but Delphi would be in no fit state to get the tram home by herself. The changing room had its own telephone on a stand, next to a vase of carnations. That was their first bit of luck because she was going to have to call up Delphi’s younger brother, Jack.
*
‘Oh, I’m terribly sorry.’ Prunella Stack twitched her head and backed out of the room, checking the name plaque on the door. ‘I thought I was in my changing room.’
‘No, no, it is. That’s to say…’ Natalie found herself unusually tongue-tied.
‘I was feeling a bit light-headed…’ Delphi explained. Her voice still groggy with sleep.
‘…So I brought her inside for a rest.’
Delphi had come around twenty minutes ago and she’d grown cold and was now wearing the polo-neck jumper while they waited for her brother, Jack, to arrive and drive them home.
‘Oh, you poor dear,’ Prunella cooed as Delphi and Natalie introduced themselves and shook hands. There was a kerfuffle at the door. A photographer tried to push his way in; the flashbulb went, and a woman with dark hair sent him packing.
‘These newspaper photographers become a nuisance after a while,’ Prunella explained. ‘You were taken ill during the demonstration, I recall? I saw you leave; you looked terribly pale.’
‘Oh it was nothing.’ Delphi flushed red. ‘I was giddy with excitement. I want to train with you, you see.’
Natalie made for the door. They would wait for Jack in the corridor. She regretted sneaking out of the college to come here as it was; to now be meeting Prunella Stack was one dance with the devil too many. But Delphi hadn’t even let go of the woman’s hand. She was under her spell, and at close quarters Natalie could see why.
‘Well I hope we didn’t make you overexert yourself with the demonstration.’ Prunella wore a look of concern as she asked her Aunt Norah to fetch both of the visitors a glass of water and told Natalie to sit down. ‘Our teachers are a lot fitter than they might look. It’s all too easy to expect too much of our members.’
Natalie laughed at Prunella’s suggestion; she couldn’t help herself. Delphi nudged her in the ribs and she stopped, but it was too late. She had piqued Prunella’s interest. The other woman leant against the dressing table, her long slender legs and bare feet stretching out in front of her, her face upturned and serious, inviting Natalie to explain her mirth.
‘I’m a physical training teacher, that’s all,’ Natalie explained, but the sharp gaze coming from Delphi told her that her tone was a little too heavy with pomposity. ‘Actually I’m the Vice Principal at Linshatch College of Physical Education. I suppose, I just wouldn’t say…’ She stopped herself before she said too much and offended Prunella.
‘What wouldn’t you say?’ Prunella enquired after a moment’s silence.
‘Well…no…it’s nothing.’
‘I’m interested,’ Prunella said. ‘You don’t have to worry about offending us.’
She thought of her promise to Delphi to give it a go, and keep an open mind, and she had done that. Besides, Prunella’s smile was warm and friendly and made her feel there was nothing to fear in being honest.
‘Very well then.’ She cleared her throat. ‘I was surprised at what you said about your instructors, that’s all. Your activities – I just didn’t find them terribly invigorating.’
‘I see,’ Prunella said with a sniff. The smile had evaporated. Delphi delivered another nudge in her side.
Aunt Norah, whose jet-black hair rose up from her forehead like the fat end of a cream horn, had returned with two glasses of water and had overheard Natalie’s credentials. ‘You probably know that we’re trying to gain national recognition for the League,’ she said, addressing Natalie, ‘but we’re finding the Board of Education is rather a closed shop and wedded to the methods employed by the colleges.’
‘I’m sure Natty could help…’
‘I’m sorry, but I really couldn’t.’ Natalie clasped her hands in front of her. Their pact to support one another’s ambitions didn’t extend to sabotaging one career for the advancement of the other.
‘Could you offer any advice?’ Norah pressed her.
Natalie looked to Delphi. She was just smiling and encouraging her to say something charming, but if these women deserved anything, then it was the truth.
‘The problem is that the establishment puts a lot of faith in science and it’s because of that scientific grounding that we know that our methods work, you see.’ She paused. Aunt Norah had folded her arms at that last remark. ‘I was curious to come along today. I must admit I have heard some suspicious rumours about you, but Delphi is quite taken with her classes and wants to train as an instructor. And I did have a lovely day out…’ She paused again, hoping the conversation might take a different turn, but they both still looked at her with expectation. ‘At the end of it all, I am left wondering whether without rigour and discipline, is this really educational?’
Prunella’s smile had grown over-ripe and was beginning to sour.
‘The ladies have had fun today.’ Prunella almost punched out the words. ‘You said it yourself. Our classes lift spirits and let women express themselves through movement…’
‘Absolutely,’ Delphi murmured.
‘Mmm.’ Natalie scratched her neck. ‘But none of that is…’ Stalled by the fear of making things worse she came back to the same word ‘…educational. I mean what has anybody actually learned today?’
‘Oh, Natty!’ Delphi shook her head. ‘You were moved to tears today.’
‘Yes but that’s not exercise as I know it… Miss Stack, in my view it’s bordering on artistic poppycock.’
She saw Prunella’s eyes widen.
‘What she means to say is…’
‘It’s all right.’ Prunella held up a hand. ‘We come from different worlds. And we’ve heard worse, much worse. Our methods are based on exercises used in India for many hundreds of years. What’s more, the number of women here today means more to us than the support of the Board of Education. Now, if you think you’re feeling quite well,’ she said to Delphi, ‘perhaps you and your friend wouldn’t mind…’
Keen to comply with Prunella’s request, and mindful that she’d spoiled what should have been Delphi’s moment to create a good impression, Natalie rushed to the door and opened it while looking behind for Delphi to follow, and in doing so she collided with the chest of a man in the corridor.
‘Steady on, Natty!’ The man held her in his arms. It took her a moment to realise it was Delphi’s brother, Jack, come to take them home. ‘Knight in shining armour at your service.’ He winked.
She pulled herself free, stepping back to take him in. This was the first time she’d seen him since he’d returned from living in America, and what a difference those seven years had made. His hair – more of a white blond than she’d remembered – flopped forwards over the side of his forehead and lightly fringed his lively eyes. She appeared to be frozen to the spot by the blue of them.
‘Hello, Jack,’ Delphi said with a sigh. ‘Are you here to take Cinderella back to her scullery?’
‘Keep the jumper.’ Prunella addressed Delphi, and then as Natalie reached the door, she said, ‘Discipline or not, we run the League on good intentions and a rather frayed shoestring. In regards to the things you’ve heard, I’d be grateful if you could quash any rumours you hear about us profiteering. We actually barely turn a profit at all.’
They walked down the corridor shrouded in an uncomfortable silence, Jack looking from one of them to the other as if trying to guess who would speak first.
‘Mother’s snake venom didn’t work then?’ he tried a joke, a reference to Mrs Mulberry’s attempt at finding a cure for Delphi’s illness with a tonic she had purchased from the reptile curator at London Zoo. Neither of them found it funny.
‘That was just the foot up my career needed,’ Delphi said eventually, once they were far enough away to be out of earshot. ‘I can’t possibly apply for a place on their instructor training course now.’
‘I’ll put it right,’ Natalie called after her as Delphi stomped on ahead and then slowed again as her tiredness caught a hold of her.
‘And how will you do that, exactly?’ Delphi shook her head in exasperation and took Jack’s arm to steady her.
Natalie had no idea, but she was going to have to think of something.
Chapter Two (#ulink_eb2527d9-9c2e-57ef-8342-af9199c62f4d)
The swallow dive
The diver arches her back and holds her arms out from her sides until she is close to the water.
‘It took me a moment to recognise you back there,’ Jack told her as they continued in darkness down another tree-tunnelled Kentish lane. They’d dropped Delphi – still angry – safely back home, taking her straight up to her room to avoid her parents and their guests in the drawing room. Now for this final leg it was just the two of them.
She thought about it for a moment.
‘What do you mean?’ She caught a glimpse of Woodham’s motor repair yard. They weren’t far from the college now.
‘You didn’t look how I remembered, I suppose. You looked like one of those women you were with, actually. You both did.’
‘I’m really not a part of that set.’
And nor is that likely to ever happen. Artistic poppycock! What a thing to say.
‘Your hair looks different, you’re wearing make-up, but actually…’ he nodded his head ‘…yes, that’s it. I think it was the shorts that threw me.’
She supposed she did take more care over her appearance these days.
‘What I’m really saying is that I had no idea you had such great legs.’
He laughed as he said it and lifted an arm from the steering wheel to defend himself from the blow she launched at his head. America had done nothing to quell his confidence, or his flirting.
‘And what about me?’
‘What about you?’ She turned her head away from him to feel the heat on her cheeks with the back of her hand.
‘Did you recognise me?’ he asked.
‘Of course. You haven’t changed a bit.’
