hard, and while Mother considered my dancing ‘a pleasant little hobby’, my heart was soon set on it becoming far more than that.
Shortly after my debut season, I developed a talent for escaping my chaperones. While other debutantes diligently danced gavottes in the austere rooms of elegant homes across London, I discovered the heady delights of the city’s nightclubs. I met theatre producers and actors, writers, artists, and dancers. I was captivated by them as much as the gossip columnists were captivated by me. My exceptional beauty and extraordinary behaviour became a regular feature of the society pages. As the years passed, my parents increasingly despaired of my unladylike behaviour and my failure to secure a suitable husband. I, however, revelled in the exciting new circles I mingled in.
But it was the arrival of war that gave me my first real taste of freedom. We were told the fighting would be over by Christmas, but it soon became clear it was going to last much longer than that. Losses were heavy. Help was needed. I couldn’t bear to stand idly by as Aubrey and Perry and dear friends of mine fought for their lives at the front. Going against my mother’s express wishes not to, I enrolled as a Voluntary Aid Detachment nurse at the Royal Herbert Hospital. The work was difficult and exhausting, but I took comfort in knowing that I was helping. Photographed in my uniform, I became something of a poster girl for the VAD. Other society girls soon followed my example.
The sleeping quarters of the shared hospital dorm were cramped and inelegant, but the freedom of dorm life was thrilling to a girl who had been educated at home. On my evenings off I relished the opportunity to dance and drink and forget the awfulness of war for a while. It was during those evenings away from the hospital that I first met Charles Cochran. It was Cockie who saw my charm and my talent and encouraged me to dance in his little revue at the Ambassador’s. It started as a bit of fun, a distraction from the shocking realities of nursing. I took to the stage with audacious poise and a new name, Loretta May. While Lady Virginia Clements put in long shifts at the hospital, Loretta May became a shining star of the stage. Night after night, Virginia was dismantled as easily as a piece of scenery, replaced with the dazzling smile and beautiful costumes of my new persona. That I danced in secret whilst under the glare of the brightest spotlight was nothing short of thrilling.
Small speaking parts soon saw my reputation soar. Sassy, beautiful, beguiling – the hacks lavished praise in their emphatic press notices and it didn’t take them long to discover the truth behind this intriguing new star. The papers couldn’t print their headlines quickly enough.
By day, I attended to the sick and wounded. At night, I entertained those whose lives were falling apart. While the revelation about my true identity saw Mother take to her bed for a week, it only made the gallery girls and society pages love me even more.
And then the first letter arrived, and everything changed.
My dear Miss May,
You must forgive me, but I have fallen hopelessly in love with you and I’m afraid I must tell you that you are now inextricably linked to my survival in this dreadful war.
‘One minute to curtain. One minute to curtain.’
The cry of the stagehand cuts through my thoughts. I check myself again in the mirror, touch up my rouge, and apply more kohl to my eyes. The mask of theatre. Who cares that my head is pounding and my bones ache dreadfully. The show must go interminably on.
I open the dressing room door and call out into the dimly lit corridor: ‘Does anyone have an aspirin?’ but my words evaporate in a cloud of powder and perfume and glitter as the chorus girls scurry past, their heels clicking and clacking along the floor as last-minute adjustments are made to zips and straps, buckles and laces.
Only Hettie hears me. ‘Should I go and find one?’
‘One what?’
‘An aspirin.’
‘Yes. Please.’ I wave her away with a distracted hand. I have no idea why the poor thing puts up with me. I treat her dreadfully at times. I don’t mean to. I just don’t seem to know how to treat her any differently.
I listen at the door until I’m certain the last of the girls have gone. Only then do I reach beneath the dressing table and open the bag I keep hidden there. I pull out the bottle of gin. A quick slug. Purely medicinal. What I wouldn’t give for a shot of sweet morphine, to slip into that delightful abyss of nothingness where nobody can hurt me and nothing dreadful has ever happened and Roger is coming home and I am perfectly well. There was a time when I took morphine for fun, to numb the emotional pain of war. Now the doctors tell me I must take it for the physical pain that will eventually bring about my demise. I take two long gulps of gin, coughing as the liquid burns the back of my throat, before returning the bottle to the bag and rushing from the dressing room, the sharp tang of liquor flooding through me, suppressing my pain and my fear and my doubts.
‘Miss May! Your aspirin!’
I ignore Hettie and carry on along the passageway, climbing the steps into the wings. I hear the chatter and rustle of the audience as they settle back into their seats. As the houselights go down I take a deep breath, close my eyes, and allow everything to dissolve into a muzzy warmth as I step onto the stage.
The curtain goes up. The spotlight illuminates me. There is an audible gasp from the ladies in the stalls as they admire the beauty of my red velvet cape. I know the reporters for The Lady and The Sketch and the other society pages will be scribbling down every detail. The gallery girls burst into rapturous applause, screaming my name and standing on their chairs. ‘Miss May! Miss May! You’re marvellous!’ I open my eyes, the audience a blur of black against the dazzle of the footlights. My leading man, Jack Buchanan, gives me the cue.
I step forward and deliver the line. ‘Honestly, darling, must we invite the Huxleys for dinner. I think I would rather curl up in a ball and die.’
The audience roar with laughter, unaware of the cruel truth contained in my words.
‘It isn’t my place to tell you when you’re dreadful, especially not on opening night.’
A heavy fog smothers London by the time the show is over. Outside the door to Murray’s, the soot-tainted air catches in my chest, making me cough. It is sharp and painful. Far worse than anything I have experienced before.
Perry looks worried. ‘You really should go to the doctor about that cough, Etta. It’s definitely getting worse.’
When I’ve recovered and caught my breath I take a long drag of my cigarette and tell him to stop fussing. ‘Was I all right tonight, darling? Really?’
He shivers, pulls his scarf around his neck, and claps his hands together for warmth. ‘You were fabulous, sister dear. Everybody said you were splendid.’
I wrap my arms across my chest and sink the fingertips of my gloves into the deep pile of my squirrel-fur coat. ‘Of course they did. They always do. Anyway, you wouldn’t tell me even if I was beastly. Would you?’
He says nothing. I pinch his arm.
‘Ow! That hurt.’
‘Good.’
‘Etta, I’m your favourite brother, and