‘No, I won’t. I’ll learn it with my feet, and then I’ll know it always.’ Posy got up, and walked out a routine of steps, then she walked them again, then did them faster.
‘Fancy,’ Petrova said, ‘me. You’d think I’d be the one to do nothing at all.’
Pauline shook her head.
‘I wouldn’t. I’ve always thought you were the one that might. Film stars and dancers are nice things to be, but they aren’t important.’
Posy had learnt the vow with her feet, and she spun round the hall. At that moment the door opened.
The man who came in was old; he had a grey beard, a wooden leg, and a shabby hold-all in one hand. Posy stopped dancing. Pauline and Petrova stood up, and then, as if the old man was a magnet, they were drawn down the hall towards him.
The old man plunked his suitcase on the floor, and looked round at the girls in an irritated way.
‘It’s always the same,’ he said. ‘I keep a pack of women in this house, and they’re never about when they’re wanted.’
‘Is it possible,’ Pauline asked politely, ‘that you are Gum?’
‘Gum! Of course I’m Gum. Who else should I be? Who’re you?’
‘Pauline.’
‘Petrova.’
‘Posy.’
He stared at them.
‘But you were babies. I collected babies.’
Posy patted his arm comfortingly.
‘You’ve been away some time, you know.’
‘Some time? I suppose I have. One forgets. Well, let’s sit down and hear all about you.’
They sat round him on the stairs, because there was nowhere else where they could all sit. They told him everything: about how poor they had been, and the house being sold, and finally the day’s news.
‘I’m going with Garnie to Hollywood to be a film star,’ Pauline explained.
Posy thumped his good knee.
‘And I’m going with Nana to Czechoslovakia to train under Manoff.’
Gum swung round and looked at Petrova.
‘That seems to leave you and me. What would you like to do?’
‘Flying and motor cars,’ Posy put in, before Petrova could answer.
‘That suits me.’ Gum looked pleased. ‘I’d like to fly — get about quickly. There are lots of things you can pick up if you get about quickly. Cook and Clara still here?’ They told him they were. ‘Good! Then they shall look after us, as you’re taking Sylvia and Nana. Might hire a car tomorrow, Petrova, and find a house near an aerodrome where you could study.’ He got up. ‘Where’s Sylvia?’
‘In there.’ Pauline pointed to the drawing-room. ‘But you’d better not go in, she’s signing my contract. Mr Reubens is there.’
‘Think I care for contracts or Mr Reubens?’ Gum opened the drawing-room door and hobbled in.
The three girls stared after him. Pauline smiled.
‘He’s nice.’
‘I’d like to live with him if I wasn’t going to Czechoslovakia,’ said Posy.
‘I shall like it.’ Petrova looked radiant. A house near an aerodrome. Gum, Cook, Clara. It did sound fun.
‘What different things we are going to do!’ said Pauline.
‘In such different places,’ added Posy.
‘I wonder’ — Petrova looked up — ‘if other girls had to be one of us, which of us they’d choose to be?’
Table of Contents
Cover
About the Author
Title Page
Copyright Page
Contents
Dedication
Ballet Shoes
CHAPTER I Great-Uncle Matthew and His Fossils
CHAPTER II The Boarders
CHAPTER III The Fossil Family Makes A Vow
CHAPTER IV Madame Fidolia and the Dancing Class
CHAPTER V The Children’s Academy of Dancing
CHAPTER VI Petrova has Influenza and Makes a Friend
CHAPTER VII Maeterlinck’s ‘Blue Bird’
CHAPTER VIII The Matinée
CHAPTER IX Pauline Wants a New Frock
CHAPTER X The Audition
CHAPTER XI Pauline Learns a Lesson
CHAPTER XII August
CHAPTER XIII The Clothes Problem Again
CHAPTER XIV ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’
CHAPTER XV Independence at Fourteen
CHAPTER XVI ‘Richard the Third’
CHAPTER XVII Making a Picture
CHAPTER XVIII Posy
CHAPTER XIX Gum Comes Back
Noel Streatfeild, Ballet Shoes
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