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