He clapped his pudgy hands together. And gave us a little twirl.
“Mes enfants, mes enfants … l’aventure commence. The ADVENTURE commences. Tout de suite. Immédiatement. Once again, we at Dother Hall embark on the noblest of voyages, we are voyaging to the land of entertainment. Of magic!!! Of transformation.”
And he did a spontaneous pas de deux.
Jo said, “If he does that again he won’t be in that leotard for long.”
I said, “No, he’ll be in an ambulance.”
Flossie punched my arm. And said in her Texan drawl, “Why, Miss Lullah, that was very nearly a goddam joke y’all told there.”
Monty was still talking.
“And guiding us as always on our journey is our captain. Or should I say, our captain-ess! The brightest star in our firmament. The wick of our candles. The bow to our arrows. The beaver in our midst. Ms. Sidone Beaver!!!”
Monty skipped back and stood in third position as Sidone slowly came onto the stage.
She was wearing a riding outfit and a black, feathered hat. With an eye patch. And a riding whip.
Vaisey whispered to me, “That’s what I wear when I am Black Beauty.”
I whispered back, “What, you wear an imaginary eye patch when you are your imaginary horse?”
She said, “Yes.”
I smiled to myself. This is the life. Proper friends who share everything together.
Sidone was looking at us. Her eye roving over the rows of expectant faces before her.
At last she spoke.
“My girls, my girls, once again we enter the theater of dreams. Our hearts filled with hope, our feet ready to bleed if necessary. Once more we strive, strive to reach the stars. Because, as the old saying, goes …”
Sidone was using her projecting voice. Rolling her “r”s and pausing a lot. Flicking her whip.
“All of us are lying in the gutter … but … some of us … are looking up at the stars!”
There was a round of applause and Monty pirouetted.
Sidone hadn’t finished though. Her voice got very deep and emotional.
“And some of us are being spat upon by the taxman. But let me tell you, my girls, we shall not be spat upon and take it lying down. We shall rise up and wipe off the spit and turn it into clouds of stardust.”
She swept off the stage and we all looked at each other. What did that mean?
Flossie said, “It doesn’t say anything in my timetable about spitting.”
Vaisey said, “I think she means it sort of metaphorically. You know, like pretend … spitting …”
Jo said, “So does that mean we’re doing mime spitting?”
This is what performing arts is like. People, or “artists” as I suppose we are technically called, talking about mime spitting. It’s the thea-tah, dahlings!!!!
After assembly, we drifted off to first lesson and I said to the others, “My cousin told me how to make boys like you. You go like this, flicky hair, flicky hair.”
And I did flicky hair, flicky hair.
Then we all tried flicky hair, flicky hair as we walked along the corridor.
A voice behind me said, “Tallulah Casey, walk properly.”
I looked after Dr. Lightowler as she swept down the corridor, her cloak billowing behind her.
I said, “Why me? Why does she hate me? Maybe she holds my knees against me.”
We had Monty first thing. He had managed to get out of his leotard and had his tweedy suit on and a waistcoat.
He clapped his pudgy hands together and said, “Oh, girls, joy of joys, once more we go back to the Bard. William, William, William Shakespeare. As you know, our group project this term is A Midsummer Night’s Dream, his hilarious romantic comedy. Ah, the puzzle that is romance!! Le grand amour. The dreams, the fantasies. I remember in Copenhagen a dark night, the stars peeping from the firmament, probably looking down in amusement at the antics of us humans wandering around the Reeperbahn. Giggling, dancing, high on the emotions of la romance. I said to Biffo … well, well, never mind. What larks, girls! What larks!”
Vaisey and a few of the girls have been in productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream before. But I had never even read it. After hearing about Monty and Biffo in the Reeperbahn I am not sure I want to.
Monty said, “But I will show you what I am going to do with the sacred text. I’m going to do this.”
And he kissed his copy of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and then flung it to the floor dramatically.
He looked at us.
“You are thinking I have gone mad. How can I throw the Bard to the floor? And indeed I can’t.”
He picked up the book. “But what I am saying, girls, is that William would want us to make our own connection with the feelings of love and dreams and with his poetry. You have a young person’s idea of love, you must explore this for yourselves … not be led by someone like me who ‘hath the gray bearde.’”
Jo said, “Erm, who hath the gray bearde?”
I whispered behind my book. “Monty certainly hasn’t. He hasn’t even got the gray mustachey.”
Monty the Beardless was still talking and musing. “Of course, read, read, read the original, girls, his text, drink in the words of his genius. Immerse yourself in the poetry of confused love and imaginary asses.”
Flossie snorted. Monty didn’t notice.
“But in true Dother Hall style, we are going to give the play a modern spin. Go a little bit … avant garde!!! Just to give you an idea and a flavor, I have taken one of the fairy verses and turned it into a song.”
He got out a tambourine and started singing, “I am that merry wanderer of the night …”
And started tap-dancing.
At break I saw Dav and Lav looking over at us.
Lav waved at me. She called over, “We’ll show them what we Oirish can do, bejesus.”
Vaisey said, “She’s really taken to you, hasn’t she? Is it because she’s Irish as well?”
I said, “No, but her dad has got an Irish gardener.”
Please don’t let her be my new best friend.
I said to Vaisey, “I hope she doesn’t try to be my mental.”
She said, “Mentor.”
I said, “I know what I mean.”
Flossie said, “I’m going to ask Honey how she manages having a few boyfwends on the go. Because if I got the knack I could have Seth and maybe even that nice Charlie as a sort of side dish and that still leaves room for meeting someone at The Jones’s gig on Saturday.”
What?? Why was she talking about Charlie? Not that I care as I am forgetting about him. Whoever he is.
Flossie said, “Actually, speaking about Charlie, I thought he quite liked you, Lullah. It’s funny that he didn’t ask you to the cinema last term. I thought he was going to, didn’t you?”
Vaisey said, “Yeah, so did I!”
I said, “Mmmmmmmffff.”
Which just about sums it up, actually.
We didn’t get the chance to say anything else because the bell rang and we had Monty. Again. For French.
Not that it makes much difference what we have Monty for. It always ends up being about him and Biffo and Sprogsy at drama college.
French was mostly listening to Monty tell us about his youth in le gay Paree. And guess who was there?
“Mais oui, we had such a gay camaraderie, Biffo and Sprogsy and I.” He started chuckling fatly. “Let me illustrate, with the aid of my training in clowning, a très amusant incident that happened.” He put on a big red nose and started acting out the surprise he got when Biffo and Sprogsy pushed him into the Seine.
As he splashed about on the floor shouting, “Au secours … vous êtes méchant!!” we started passing notes to each other.
Flossie wrote:
Bonjour Mon Arbre Sisters,
I ’ave ze plan. Zis is mon three or four boyfriend plan. Je commence on Saturday at le gig. I am going to make Seth Hinchcliff my plaything.
Au revoir
/> How can she even think about having anything to do with that family?
At lunch we got togged up in our hats and coats and slouched out through the gates. It was freezing. We linked arms for warmlies as we crunched over the dead leaves and fallen-down branches. The woods have changed since we were last here. Not many leaves on any of the trees.
Suddenly I felt all wistful and autumny and said sadly, “The woods have gone all baldy.”
Jo was scampering ahead. “Baldy-smaldy, it’s just trees. I wonder if the lads will be out and about. Do you think so, do you? I know they are back today because Phil told me it was the same day as us.”
Vaisey said, “It would be really nice to see Jack but maybe it’s a bit too soon. I mean, it’s only the first day … and anyway, does my hair look a bit, a bit …”
I said, “Mad?”
As Vaisey started smoothing down her curls she looked at my head. “Lullah, you’ve got a bit of twig in your hair. Shall I pick it out?”
I let her pick the twig out of my hair not because I wanted to impress the boys. It was just too twiggy.
I said to Jo, “Did Phil say he would meet you today at the tree? At lunchtime?”
Flossie said, “Did you tell him to bring some mates for me? Like a mate should.”
Jo started spontaneously smashing up a big mound of toadstools with a stick. She said, “If someone has been talking to you every day and then didn’t get in touch for two whole days is there a secret boy meaning in that?”
I don’t know.
I said, “My cousin Georgia says that boys are like gazelles. She says they get alarmed when they get close to girls. And have to leap off to the woods like gazelles in trousers. Or have I just made that up?”
Vaisey said, “Gazelles in trousers? But gazelles have got four legs, haven’t they? So that’s two pairs of trousers really …”
Jo put her hand over Vaisey’s mouth.
Flossie said, “Well, what did Phil say when he last spoke to you?”
Jo said, “He said, ‘See you later.’”
Uh-oh. What did that mean? When was later? Was later today? Or was that too early for later?
I found myself rambling out loud.
“I didn’t know that being a girl was such hard work. Did you? I sort of thought you went along looking like a boy for a bit then your corkers started growing, and that was it. I tried to ask Mum once about girl stuff. And she said, ‘Just be yourself’ and went off to the Netherlands to paint bikes.”
Vaisey said, “I know. I didn’t know whether to bring my plectrum or not. And anyway what does giving someone a plectrum mean? It might not mean what a girl thinks it means. It might not be nice. A boy might mean, here’s a plectrum, now go and get your own guitar and play it. It would be good if Honey was here because she knows a lot.”
Jo said, “But we didn’t have a row or anything, I didn’t do any more shouting than normal. Why would he just not phone me?”
I said bitterly, “I don’t know. Why do boys be nice to you and then, er, not be?”
Vaisey said cheerfully, “Maybe Phil, well, he’s quite physical, isn’t he? Maybe he broke his hand when he was helping the police … and couldn’t write or phone with it.”
Flossie looked at her. “He would have to have broken both hands, wouldn’t he?”
Vaisey shook her curls. “Yes, that will be it, he kept on helping the police after he’d broken one hand and then the other one … broke.”
Flossie said, “That’s a bit unrealistic, Vaisey. Maybe, maybe he got sudden eczema of the head and was …”
I said, “Too shy to say?”
Flossie nodded.
I said, “Or, it may have been … boils. Adolescent boils.”
I have just realized I’ve still got my dance tights on. They don’t exactly hide my knees. And what would I do if Charlie was there? Should I ignore him? Perhaps he would ignore me? I must ignore him first. Just in case.
I’m a nervous wreck now.
When we got to our special tree it was all quiet. And a bit eerie. The forest was very still and there was no scuttling or snuffling going on. It was too damp to sit down so we had to eat our lunch standing up.
In between munching, I said, “Apparently if you want to get a boy to like you, you go sort of mysterious and icy and cool. That’s what my cousin said and she has loads of boyfriends and snogging-type experiences.”
Vaisey said, “So how do you do that? Be mysterious and icy and cool? Like a human icicle? Because I could try it out on Jack. If I ever see him again. Maybe Cain has told him not to see me after the last time, you know, with a gig coming up and everything.”
I said, “Well, I don’t want to be the fly in the dancing tights, but nothing would surprise me about Cain Hinchcliff after what he did.”
Vaisey was still keen on the icicle idea. “How do you do the icicle thing, Lullah?”
I said without really thinking it through, “Well, I did sort of try the icicle thing on Cain Hinchcliff, but he’s not really a boy, he’s an animal in trousers.”
Flossie said, “Yum yum, an animal in trousers. They’re handsome, though, the Hinchcliffs—mean, moody, and magnificent. Yum yum, animals in trousers.”
We all looked at her.
“Well, you said Cain was like an animal in trousers. Seth’s his brother so he must be an animal in trousers as well. Goodie.”
I said, “Er, I didn’t mean that being an animal in trousers was a good thing … and also they have destroyed a lavatory.”
Flossie was floating about in the deep dark South in her mind. She did her drawl.
“Now, I know that Seth he dun no good. He’s no good, y’all, and I kinda know he done wrong, but I can’t help myself, he’s got animal magnetism.”
I said, “Well, it’s probably the ferrets he keeps down his trousers.”
Jo wasn’t interested in ferrets. She said, “So what happened when you tried this icicle thing on Cain?”
Damn.
They were all looking at me, so I finished my tuna surprise and I improvised. I had to share the hailstone thing with the Tree Sisters.
“Well, I will tell you how it happened. It was like this. The day you all arrived on the bus from Skipley, I was on my way to meet you. An icy, cruel wind was blowing in from Grimbottom. Savage and cold, the kind that freezes socks and underpants on lines. Wild creatures scuttled to their dark lairs; sheep stood cross-eyed in hedges, looking at their noses. And that was when I saw him. Him. As it began to hail, he was standing by the fence like a heathen rusty crow.”
Hmmm, I must remember to put this in my performance notebook. A heathen rusty crow.
Vaisey spoiled it of course. I think she must have been an egghead, or an elephant, in a previous life.
She said, “A rusty crow? Do you mean, that he was like a metal crow that had been out in the rain and …”
Jo said, “Yeah, what’s a ‘heathen’ crow? Is that a crow that doesn’t go to church?”
I went on, before they all got into the crow business.
“When he saw me, he said in his cruel broad accent, ‘So, it’s the soft Southern lass back again.’ He was taunting me like he always did. But this time was different. I had changed. I had grown.”
Flossie said, “Are you talking corker-wise?”
I ignored her and trod on her foot as I continued.
“I looked into his black, tainted eyes and felt courage stir in my breast.”
Flossie said, “Good, good. I’m a bit worried about the one breast though. Shouldn’t you say, ‘stirred in my breasts’?”
“No.”
Flossie was still thinking about the breasts. “Or what about ‘stirred in my corker area’? Or ‘even my corkers stirred’?”
I went on. “I said to him, ‘Cain Hinchcliff. I hate you. I hate you from the depths of my soul.’”
Jo punched my arm. “Well done, girl.”
Flossie looked at me. Through her glasses from underneath her fringe. r />
I said, “What?”
She just kept looking.
I said, “What are you doing looking? Is that all you can do? Look and look?”
She was still looking.
I said, “All right, I didn’t quite say that.”
She said, “What did you say?”
I looked down at the ground and mumbled.
“I didn’t get a chance to say anything. He licked a hailstone off my face and went off.”
Now all of them looked at me.
Flossie said, “Cain licked your face? He LICKED your face … he licked your FACE?”
I’ve got my new timetable. There’s all sorts on it that I have no idea about. What is “Theater of the Absurd”? My love life probably. Not that I’ve got one yet.
I can’t even read my letter from Dream Boy because I left it under my pillow in my Darkly Demanding Damson Diary.
We finished at four o’clock after jazz dance and went into the café to have a drink. It’s nearly dark already. I’m going to need a torch soon to get home.
Flossie said, “Anyone fancy going down to the studios? We could make Bob let us play around doing some singing. If we pretend we really like Zep Lepplin or whoever it is he …”
At that point Bob walked into the café with a sign, which he hung on the wall by the door.
The sign read: Don’t bathe until further notice. Rat in tank.
As he waddled off he hung the hammer in the back of his belt and we could definitely see his bottom crack. Flossie said, “I’ve sort of gone off going down to the studio.”
Jo got up and said, “I think I’m going to go and … you know … read.”
And she went off.
Vaisey said, “She’s upset about Phil not being at the tree.”
When I got back to Dandelion Cottage, I was so tired that I had my supper and went to bed even before the lunatic twins. They were making a dog out of washing-up liquid bottles and said, “For oo.”
So in my bed it’s me, Mr. Fevver man, and Sudsy the dog.
How many days is it until Alex the Good will be here?
I don’t know what day he wrote his letter, but he said in a couple of weeks. And you would come home on a Friday, wouldn’t you? So I think it will be the weekend after next.
I’m going to start my “normal topics” list. For things that are normal to talk to boys about.