Canning Town Folk The work of Elsie J. Oxenham

NB: All of the excerpts about folk dancing below are © the estate of Elsie J. Oxenham

The New Abbey Girls (1923)

Here for the first time we see Daisy Caroline Daking - 'the Pixie' - at her home in Holborn and teaching at the Plaistow Y.M.C.A. The Abbey girls also attend the London classes and parties run by the English Folk Dance Society, and we meet Oxenham as a character in her own books as 'the Writing Person'.

Chapter 7 - Consulting the Pixie

“WE’LL go in Eirene,” said Joy, at lunch time. “It seems rude to dear Belinda not to let her have a run to town, but considering the amount of pussy willow and daffodils Jen’s taking along with her, Eirene seems necessary.

And when the girls set out, in the little car which for longer journeys had taken the motor cycle’s place in Joy’s affections, the back seat was heaped with flowers and catkins and blossom.

Jen was warm and picturesque in a round fur cap and big coat, for after the few days of sunshine which had been so convenient for Joan’s wedding, and had turned spring into summer, the March winds had come back, and there was a threatening touch of north in the air which hinted at showers of sleet. These met them half way to town, and the girls stopped to cover their flowers, and then crouched behind the windscreen as they sped eastwards. Joy, in her leather chauffeur’s suit, cared nothing for any kind of weather; she would have gone through the storm gaily on Belinda’s exposed saddle, and was sheltered and comfortable behind the screen. She, too, had a big coat over the leather jacket and breeches she always wore on her cycle, and with a cap fastened under her chin could face any gale. The streets were glistening with rain as they raced through Uxbridge and Ealing and the West End, the wind whistling with a scream down side streets and across commons and open spaces.

“Nice, warm, cosy, sheltered spot, London!” Joy murmured. “Why did we leave our abbey under the hill? Did we really sit out on the garth yesterday? Are you all right, Jenny Wren?”

“Ker-wite all yight, sank’oo, mummy!” and Jen snuggled down under her rugs. “Where are we going first, Wild Cat? To get rid of some of the cargo, and see if my husband’s all right?”

Joy glanced at her watch. “No, Jacky-boy must wait. The Little One’s expecting us early. She said “three o’clockish,” and it’s three now. We’re not to be late, for she has to go out. So we’re all out for the Pixie’s flat.”

“Right-o! I’m dying to see her again. Have you seen her since that evening in the barn at Christmas, when you were her man in the Running Set, and you wouldn’t let me dance?”

“She came to the President’s wedding, the following week. I haven’t seen her since. Now, don’t chatter, my infant! I’ve got to keep an eye on the traffic. I don’t want to kill you a second time.”

Jen subsided, and watched in admiring silence as the strong hands gripped the wheel, the keen eyes watched carefully.

“You’re an awfully good driver, Joy,” she said seriously, when they were held up for a moment by a policeman at Oxford Circus.

“I’ve had the fright of my life,” Joy said grimly. “I don’t want another. It’s a marvel to myself I can drive at all. Old Newcastle did that. She made me take her out that very same evening, before I had time to get nervy. If she hadn’t, I don’t suppose I’d ever have gone on Belinda again.”

Jen glanced at her quickly. “Made you take her out? Wasn’t it rather horrid?”

“Beastly. I was all shaky; not afraid of anything more happening; I knew perfectly well how it had happened! But frightened, simply scared to death about you. But it was good for me; I might have funked it if I’d had time to think. She made me go out to do things for you, you see—send telegrams, and fetch Jack from the cottage where she’d fainted, and tell them at the school, and so on. And, of course, I’d have done anything if I’d thought it was for you. Now we’re off! We’re almost there.”

“You did have a rotten time!” Jen said sympathetically. “And I didn’t know anything at all about it, for days and days! Oh, does the Pixie live here?” as Eirene pulled up before a block of high straight-fronted houses in a wide, quiet street just off a busy thoroughfare, filled with trams and buses, motors and wagons.

“Shares a flat with two more, but she said they’d be out. Come and disentangle your pussy palm! It’s fingers are all tied up in knots.”

“It looks awfully dull, and—and gray, and uninteresting!” Jen said doubtfully. “And she loves pretty things. I always think of lovely colours when I think of the Pixie—greens and blues and yellows and grays! This is so—so flat!”

“You wouldn’t ask her to have her house green and blue and yellow outside, would you?” Joy mocked. “Perhaps inside it’s more like her. Let’s go up! I’ll tootle to give her warning,” and she woke the echoes with Eirene’s horn.

The bare stone staircase, of wide, shallow steps, up which they climbed flight after flight to the top, depressed Jen still more. “It’s cold and dreary and lifeless! It’s not good enough for her! She’s so much alive. I’m shivery!”

“I say!” a voice hailed them from the upper regions. “Isn’t it nice to see you here! I am glad you’ve come! I say! you’ve got new coats! Oh, what a nice one, Jenny Wren!” and the Pixie, four foot ten and a half, but looking very tiny, hung over the top railing to welcome them.

“Well, don’t you think we need new coats?” Jen laughed. “Of all the dismal, chilly, wet, clammy places to live in, London’s the worst! Why, we’ve been sitting out, in the abbey!”

“It isn’t really. Only in March. You mustn’t say rude things about London; I love it! I’m never quite happy away from town. Theobald’s Row is just heavenly;” there was defiance in the Pixie’s tone.

“That crowded street we’ve just crossed, with the trams and things? It’s not exactly my idea of heaven!” Joy laughed.

“Oh, but I love a London crowd! It’s different from any other crowd! Are those flowers for me? Oo-er!” with exaggerated emphasis. “All for me? Aren’t they lovely? What’s this?—almond? How my men at Plaistow will love it! Come and put it in water; this way!” and she hustled them through rooms and into the kitchen, without time to glance about them.

“Oh, but I want to see!” Jen remonstrated. “I believe you’ve got a lovely room there. I want to see it. I didn’t think there could be a pretty room in such a cold looking house! It looks so businesslike from the outside. Like offices, you know! Can’t we see everything?”

“Of course you shall! Go and put your coats off; I want to see your frocks! That’s my bedroom we came through; all our rooms open out of one another! My bed’s the little one in the corner.”

“Please, I haven’t a frock on,” Joy said meekly. “I’m Thomas, the chauffeur, today. Do you mind?” and she threw down her coat and stood in the doorway in breeches and gaiters.

“No, I like it,” the Pixie looked up from her willow buds and cast a quick glance over the neat figure. Then her eyes twinkled. “Going to classes tonight? Just like that?”

“Oh, no! We’re going to change at Jack Wilmot’s. Wouldn’t Madam be surprised if I went to do morris like this?”

“I’d be sorry for your morris in those boots. And for the boots, too. Oh, aren’t these lovely?” as she arranged the daffodils in a bowl. “I shall take some, and the almond, down to Plaistow tonight; do you mind? they don’t get flowers like these. I’ll say they’ve come straight from the country.”

“There are a thousand million daffies in our orchard, under the apple trees, so you can say it safely. You’re not to give them all away, though,” Joy remonstrated. “We brought them for you.”

“Oh, but I’ll get the good of them there. And my men will love them so!”

“If there are men in the case, of course we needn’t say any more! She’ll give them all away to her men!” Jen mocked, coming from the bedroom. “What’s on at Plaistow? And where is it, anyway?”

“I’ve got the loveliest classes. You must come and see them one day, but not yet; we’ve only just got started. We’re only finding ourselves. At the big Y.M.C.A. Club, you know; men and girls—such dears, all of them! And we have big parties, and enjoy ourselves no end.”

“It sounds all right! I’d love to come to a party!”

“You shall. I’ll ask you some day. Now come and have some tea. Oh, I like your frock, Jenny Wren! Have that for the wedding? You’re to tell me all about it. I made that wedding! I was so sorry I couldn’t come, but I had a big party in Nottingham that night. What did you want to see me about?” to Joy. “You said it was something important. Is it something Moral?” in anxious capitals. “Or only folk dancing?”

“I’m afraid it’s Moral. Do you mind?” Joy looked down at her hopefully. Everybody looked down on the Pixie hopefully, sure of help and sympathy.

“No, I’m glad. But what made you think of asking me? And what is it all about?”

“I’ll tell you after tea. The wedding will be better for tea time. There didn’t seem to be anybody else,” Joy said simply. “I couldn’t think of any one else to go to; aunty always tells me to do what I think right, and to decide for myself! And I do want to talk to somebody in earnest, somebody who’ll tell me what to do! I know you will. You see things so clearly.”

“It’s awfully nice of you,” the Pixie said soberly, as she lifted the bowl of daffodils and led the way through the bedroom again. “Aren’t they lovely?” she murmured, her eyes on the blaze of yellow. “How they’ll love them down in Plaistow!”

“Oh! What a gorgeous room!” Jen stood on the threshold to gaze. “I’d never have believed you could find a room like that inside a house like this!”

“It’s so big and square.” Joy, the lover of the open air, looked round the lofty room with approval. “Nice big windows! It isn’t stuffy, if it is in town!”

“And the colours!” Jen’s tone was full of deepest satisfaction. “Oh, I am glad we came!”

The room was deep blue, and black, and dull blue gray, in walls and carpet, big couch and easy chairs; here and there was a touch of vivid flame colour, in cushions, curtains, or china. The walls had tiny water colours in gilt frames; the corners were full of shadows, and the Pixie, in her loose hanging jumper of green and blue silk, stood in the doorway with the glow of the firelight upon her, holding the bowl of daffodils, and looking up in delight at their approval. Jen treasured the picture of her next letter to Joan.

“It’s an artist’s room; I love it! Oh, we only rent it, but isn’t it beautiful? I do think we’re lucky! The others are out all day, you know. Brown’s a typist, and she gets home about six. Parr’s in the Women’s Police, and she gets in at all hours, and just rolls into bed without waking anybody. I’m only odds and ends, of course, just here at odd times; for weeks I’m rushing round the country;. But I may be a bit more settled at Plaistow. There’s a lot of work to do there; it’s a big chance, if we can only seize it. Yes, I love this room! Your daffodils shall stand here. Look at that beautiful blue bowl! My Nottingham class gave me that, the dears! Wasn’t it lovely of them? Now came and have tea! Choose your chairs; Jenny Wren, pass up the hotters! The kettle’s boiling.”

Jen lifted a plate of hot scones from the hearth. “These? I never heard them called hotters before.”

“Oh, that’s Oxford! We always called them hotters. Now tell me all about the wedding! What did you all wear? I love to hear what people wore. Was Joan’s frock pretty? She’d look lovely, of course; she couldn’t help it. And he didn’t get married to you by mistake?” with a twinkle of amusement at Joy. “Gracious! You did give me a shock that day, when I found I’d got two of you in my class! I’ve never got over it. D’you remember?”

“Remember! You wanted me to go straight out and dye my tunic green, so that you’d know us apart.”

“You aren’t so much alike as I thought at first;” the Pixie studied her face thoughtfully. Joy had discarded her motoring cap, but perforce remained boy like in her breeches, which she wore with great enjoyment. “But you’re getting more like Joan, I do believe. What have been doing to yourself lately?”

“I’ve thought that too,” Jen said swiftly. “She is more like Joan than she used to be! It doesn’t matter now that Joan’s gone, but it’s as well she didn’t start getting like her before, or Jack might have got tied up in them.”

“He never showed any signs of it coming on, that I could see! Have another hotter, aunty!” and Joy flourished the dish before the Pixie. “Oh, I’ve heard them call you aunty! It’s because you mother everybody, I suppose. The cheek of you; that size, and mothering great hefty men!”

They come to me about their shirts and socks, the dears! The Plaistow men are just beginning; I do feel so pleased about it! It feels just like being in France again. It’s your expression that makes you more like Joan,” the Pixie decided, still eyeing Joy carefully.

“It was only their expressions ever made them any different. Except for that, they always were as like as two pins,” Jen remarked. “You’re quite right, of course, aunty! I’ve noticed it myself.”

“But tell me all about the wedding!” the Pixie demanded hungrily, and Joy plunged into the story, and ended with a laughing account of the morning adventure in the abbey, of Madam’s visit, and her amused horror at being “buried alive.”

“She’ll never forget it against me, of course. I know that!” she ended ruefully.

“But she just loved it!” Jen added.

“Of course she did. She’ll never let you forget it, though. I wish I’d been with you when you were buried! Has everybody had enough tea? Now, Joy, what’s the trouble? It is nice of you to come to me about it!” and the Pixie pushed away the table with a businesslike air. “Pull in your chairs to the fire! Shall I switch on the light?”

“No, firelight’s cosiest,” Jen took the corner of the big sofa, and retired into the background, but watched Joy’s face, and then the Pixie’s continually; as the one talked, the other listened thoughtfully.

Joy sat on the fender, nursing her knee, and soberly repeated what she had said the night before. The Pixie, on a low stool before the fire, listened curiously, finding in the new thoughtfulness of Joy’s face the explanation of the unexpected likeness she had just discovered.

“It’s the whole question of one’s attitude to money,” Joy said at last, when she had described the new feeling of responsibility which had come at the time of Jen’s accident, her efforts to do what she could and give help where she saw it needed, and the new demands suddenly made on her. “I can give it away; that’s easy enough. I’ve plenty; I can give away a lot, and never feel it. I do try to give sensibly, but I don’t give to every old person who asks! They do ask, you know. I get shoals of begging letters.”

“Of course you will. But you have to sift them. In some cases, you’d do more harm than good by giving money. Your part is in taking trouble to make sure you are using the money well. You can’t give money to the point of feeling it, as most of us have to do. You’ve too much. But you must give somehow; you’ve got to work for it. Every one must do that,” the Pixie said, very definitely. “Your giving of money is too easy. You have to give yourself; in time, and thought, and trouble. You can do a lot for people, if you only will. You’ve made a very good beginning. I like your idea of finding girls who really need a holiday and seeing that they get it. I could find you heaps; East End girls, who’d almost die with joy at such a chance. Why don’t you run a little hostel in the village? Not in your own house, for your aunt is there, and Joan will want to come back; and anyway, your work is cut out for you there with these two children. But a little house in the village, where you could have parties down all summer; and a nice woman to mother them?”

“That’s a topping idea!” Joy said swiftly. “I like it! Go on, Pixie! And you do think I’ve got to take in these two infants? I was afraid you would. I knew it all the time inside of me.”

“Of course you will. Your work is waiting for you there. The schoolgirl may not bother you very much, but the heiress is another matter. You can just be the making of that child, if you will.”

“Madam said I was the last person in the world she’d choose as a fit and proper guardian for a girl!” Joy said pensively. “Isn’t she brutal, sometimes?”

“But she took it back afterwards!” Jen’s voice came out of the darkness over the Pixie’s shoulder. “She said she wasn’t so sure, after all.”

The Pixie dismissed Madam and her sweeping judgments with a gesture. “She doesn’t understand. You hadn’t told her all this?”

“Help, no! It never came into my head! Besides, I didn’t know about Maidlin then.”

“Then she couldn’t possibly judge. Of course, you can do it beautifully. You’ve been through it. You know just how she feels; about the fortune, I mean. And you’ve got big ideas; you’ll put them into her. It’s a chance, and you can do it better than any one else. And it’s a chance to give service where it’s needed; to give real personal help and trouble, the kind of thing no money can buy. That’s what you rich people have got to do, besides using your money properly. If you just give away a little, and enjoy yourself on the rest, you’ll feel a slacker. Isn’t that what you’ve been feeling?”

“Yes,” Joy said slowly. “Yes, I think it is. I knew you’d be definite, and go straight to the point!”

“Oh, but you had seen it for yourself! Let me know how you get on, won’t you? I shall want to hear. And if ever you want girls in need of a holiday, just ring me up; I know plenty of them, poor things! Now I’ve got to run, you know, or my classes will be waiting for me. I am so glad you came! It was nice of you!”

“Couldn’t Thomas the chauffeur, who’s fearfully grateful to you, run you along to Plaistow?” Joy asked, standing on the rug in the firelight and looking down at her. “I haven’t an idea where it is, but I’d find it all right. I don’t like you racing round in tubes and buses; and isn’t it the crowded time? You’re too tiny to have to fight! Couldn’t I take you along? I feel like a man when I’m with you; I want to take care of you!”

The Pixie bubbled with laughter, at thought of her years of roughing it in France during the war. “I had such a nice thing said to me the other day! It was one of those dear men at Plaistow. He came up to me, and said, “I say, miss! If your young man ain’t good to you, you send ‘im along to me!” Now wasn’t that beautiful?”

“I know just how he felt!” Joy declared. “He wanted to be sure somebody was taking care of you. I know you don’t need it; you spend all your time taking care of other people. But I feel just as he did. Can’t we take you along?”

“No, of course not. I’ve just time to do it, and you couldn’t find it in the dark.” She switched on the lights, and Jen clapped her hands softly as a bright orange glow filled the blue room.

“What pretty shades! And I suppose it’s wet and cold outside! I’d forgotten the wind and sleet. Aunty Pixie, it is so nice to have seen you at home! We only knew you in classrooms before. Some day we’re going to have tea with Madam, and get a pretty background for her too! I shall always think of you now as a tiny spot in this big, warm, blue room, with firelight on you, and yellow flowers!”

“Quite poetical, Jenny Wren!” Joy mocked. I shall think of her as even more businesslike than I did before!”

The Pixie chuckled. “Come into the kitchen for three minutes! I want to put on the potatoes for Brown’s dinner, and make her a fruit salad, so that it will be all ready when she comes in tired. She’s due in twenty minutes. No, you can’t help. Just sit on the table and talk to me,” and she peeled potatoes at the sink in the diminutive kitchen at express speed. “Shall I tell you a perfectly awful thing that happened once? It was one morning. I was making some soup for their supper; I was going to sleep at Plaistow, as I shall tonight. I put it on to boil, and never thought of it again till I was on a bus and half way to Canning Town! And it was about eleven o’clock then, and no one would be till six!”

“Oh, I am so glad you can do that sort of thing!” Joy sighed. “It’s such a relief to hear it! It’s just exactly the kind of thing I’ve been doing all my life! But I never supposed other people were like that too. Not you, anyway!”

Jen chuckled. “What did you do?”

“Got out and took the first bus back. The flat was full of blue smoke, and the saucepan was done for. Now make up some of those flowers in a bundle for me, will you? My men will just love them. And get into your coats. We’ll all have to run.”

“Yes, or Jacky-boy will have gone to classes without us! We’re hoping to give Madam a surprise.”

“Oh, give her my love! I never see her, but I love her just the same, you know! And let me know how you get on with your heiress! I really want to hear. It was nice of you to come to me!” was the Pixie’s last word, as she hung over the top railing and called goodbye after them while they clattered down the big stone steps.

Chapter 9 - Old Friends and New

A BUSY thoroughfare, with mud, and traffic, and many small children playing in the doorways of small shops; a quieter side street, down which the cutting north wind blew drifting showers of sleet; then an iron gate, giving entrance to a dark tunnel; and here the girls stopped to pant after their run through rain and wind, while Jack led the way to a big doorway. “Come on! I don’t like being late!”

“Is it in here? I thought you’d only dropped in to breathe!” and they followed her through the swing door.

In a dressing room were girls in all stages of undress; girls changing shoes, girls changing stockings, girls changing blouses, girls one and all getting into tunics and saying their worst about the weather.

Jack, throwing greetings right and left, went to look through the inner door, unbuttoning her coat as she did so.

“She’s here!” briefly, to Joy. “You two had better go and explain yourselves. We are late!”

“Why, it’s Miss Shirley!” “Why, Joy!” “And Miss Robins, from Cheltenham!” one after another recognised the new comers.

“I say, Shirley, this is an unexpected pleasure. Where have you dropped from?” A round faced jolly looking dark girl came up, tying her girdle. “Where’s Joan? Isn’t she with you? And what’s become of Hobart?”

Jen, in the background, rocked with laughter. “I didn’t know you’d been adopted as thoroughly as that!” she told Joy afterwards. “I nearly died! I’ve never thought of the President as “Hobart”!”

“Married, both of ‘em,” Joy assured the plump person solemnly. “Isn’t it sad?”

“Oh, I say, Shirley! And you never asked me?”

Joy laughed, and left her still remonstrating. “Come and explain yourself to Madam, Jenny Wren!”

“Why, it’s little Robins! Where have you all come from? I say, are you all right again, Robins?”

Jen laughed and nodded, and followed Joy. “Isn’t it jolly nice to be remembered?” she murmured.

The inner door opened on a big hall, with cleared floor, a piano on the platform, a dark girl tuning a violin, and Madam, in a bright green sports coat over a blue tunic, sitting on the hot water pipes to thaw herself.

“Where is everybody? They’re all very late tonight. Or I’m very early—for once.”

“Quite a mistake on your part,” the violinist jeered.

Two girls were playing leapfrog to warm themselves; two more were strenuously practising morris steps, coached by a third; others were handling the swords waiting on the platform, or selecting the particular morris sticks they fancied.

“I think we’ll start. It’s time. Are there any more out there?” and then Madam saw the visitors, and her eyes opened in surprise. “Hal-lo? Why, Joy? Jen? Where on earth have you come from? What do you mean by it?” in mock indignation. “You never said anything about this yesterday!”

“Oh, we didn’t know! We just decided to spend a night with Jack, and so we came along. Do you mind?”

“Have you buried anybody lately?” Madam asked accusingly, and a laugh from the fiddler showed that she had heard the story.

“Not since you. One a day is about as much as I can manage.” Joy retorted. Do you mind if we watch? Jacky-boy wants us to see how clever she is. She’s swanking fearfully about having learnt rappers before either of us.”

“Won’t you dance? There’s sure to be some one away, on a night like this. Aren’t you perished?” and Madam shivered and hugged the pipes again.

“Oh, but we’ve never touched the things! No, thanks! We’ll look on,” and they subsided into a corner, and watched the evolutions of the “Earsdon” dance with keen interest.

“Now I’m going with her to have some morris!” Joy sprang up eagerly, when the sword dance was over. “In another hall, Jacky- boy says, but only ten minutes walk. Aren’t you coming? Jack says they’re doing “Bampton”—“Glorishears” and “Bobbing Joe.” You know your “Bampton” needs rubbing up, Jenny Wren! Don’t be a slacker!”

“It does, but you needn’t call me names! Go and rub up your own “Bampton”! I’m going to stop here. I love Madam too, but I like watching new people. Tell Jack to come back for me; I couldn’t possibly find my way home alone. I’ll be lost in London for ever, if she doesn’t come and rescue me,” and Jen stuck to her corner beside the hot water pipes.

She thought better of it, however, and while the morris class was assembling she approached the girl who had taken command, and who, conforming to the fashion of the evening, was also sitting on the radiator, rubbing her hands and making scathing comments on the temperature to the violinist.

“Do you mind if I watch for a little while, please? We’re only in town for one night, but we’re awfully keen, so we came along with a friend.”

“Oh, I mind frightfully! I think I’ll turn you out,” and she smiled. “Aren’t you going to dance? Are you quite all right again?”

“Oh!” gasped Jen, utterly taken aback. “But you don’t know me? I mean, I’ve never been in your class? And you haven’t seen me since last August, anyway; nine months! And I must look quite different with my hair bobbed! I didn’t think anybody would know me! How can you remember?”

“If you will distinguish yourself, as you did, and upset the whole school on the last morning, of course you must expect to be remembered,” was the retort.

Jen retired to her corner, stunned, and watched the first dance still in a state of incredulous amazement, which increased when the teacher turned to her to say, “Don’t you want to dance, Miss Robins? There’s room in that back set.”

“She even knows my name!” marvelled Jen’s mind, while she explained limply that she had never learned “Bledington Trunkles.” “I’ve done no morris since Cheltenham; I wasn’t quite up to it at Christmas,” she added. “I’m quite all right now, but I don’t want to put the rest of the set out.”

Curled up in her corner, her big coat on over her tunic, one hand on the radiator, she watched in absorbed interest, for the teaching was very different from Madam’s. There were about thirty girls in the class, all in tunics, mostly of blue, though a few were green or brown; and a few men in flannels. They were all enjoying themselves; that was obvious; but they were very much in earnest, thinking only of their work and trying hard to satisfy their teacher—not an easy task, for her standard was high. She had many original ways of helping them to reach it, however, and Jen’s eyes widened in surprise, and then danced in amusement, when, at the end of the “Bledington” dance, after a few pointed remarks on kick-jumps, the girl on the platform bade everybody take two chairs and practise jumps between them. At the sight the hall presented for the next five minutes, Jen collapsed in politely suppressed laughter, hugging herself in silent glee, and longed for Cicely. Some jumped steadily, with stern determination and grimly set faces, their eyes on the positions of their feet; others were too helpless with laughter to do much; some, after a few attempts, placed their chairs together and sat perched on the backs of both, or lay at full length on the seats and flatly refused to do another jump. The teacher walked up and down, and round the room, with comments and suggestions and criticisms, and the prostrate forms came to attention at her approach and had one more try.

“I loathe “Bledington”!” a tall girl collapsed on a chair near Jen. “I shall never do kick-jumps, I’m sure of that!”

“Did any one say it was a cold night?” another laughed. “Aren’t there any more windows we could open? Oh, look at that silly kid!”

“She’ll have pneumonia,” and the tall girl went to remonstrate with a little friend, who had climbed on to the sill of an open window and was sitting in an icy draught, a picturesque silhouette against the lights outside, with bobbed wavy hair, and slim neat neck and shoulders.

“Well, I always sit there in the summer!” said she, in an injured tone; but yielded to the forcible arguments of her friend, and descended to a less dangerous position.

A girl in the lighter blue of a well known training college, with white belt and shoes, was sniffing her hands disgustedly. “Ugh! I loathe massage! I smell of disinfectant still!”

“Been at hospital again?” asked somebody.

“Yes, all afternoon. They always save up the worst cases for me. I wouldn’t go if I could help it.”

“It’s part of your course, isn’t it? You have to do it?”

“Rather! Can’t get out of it. I say! Give me a dance at the party next week, will you?”

“I’d love to. Are you doing “Newcastle” with anybody?”

“Haven’t booked anything yet. Right-o! We’ll have that. Thanks awfully! What are you going to do with me at the party, Morgan?”

“Morgan” turned and laughed. “Anything you like, old sport. You choose!”

“Let’s “Whim” together—swim together—I mean! Shall we?”

“Wish we could! I’m dying of heat. All right! I’ll put you down for that.”

“Are you going to the Easter School, Russell?” asked another, fanning herself vigorously with her big handkerchiefs and lying back exhausted in a chair.

“No, I’m saving up for Cheltenham. Can’t manage both!”

“Oh, I can’t stand Cheltenham?! Too hot! I’m going at Easter instead!”

Then they were called to make four lines for a “Bledington” jig, to show what progress the difficult step had made, and all sprang eagerly to their places, heat, exhaustion, everything forgotten.

Jen in her corner had been unnoticed. They were all absorbed in the enjoyment of the moment. She watched the teaching of “Lumps of Plum Pudding” with deep interest, her eyes going continually from the class to the teacher, as she gave little demonstrations of the various movements, and particularly of the side step.

“She’s interesting, isn’t she?” and at the end of the dance some one sat down rather breathlessly beside Jen; she had been watching her absorbed face, and now spoke sympathetically.

“Awfully!” Jen turned quickly. “Oh, weren’t you at Cheltenham?”

“Yes. I know you by sight. I’m afraid I’m bad at names. I was in Room C with you the first week, and moved on with you and all your crowd to Naunton Park. After that we were in different classes.”

“Oh, then you know Madam and the Pixie!” Jen said joyfully . “Aren’t you the one Cicely calls the Writing Person? Don’t you write girls’ books?”

“Well, I do. And I do know Madam and the Pixie. Are you quite well again?”

“Everybody knows all about me!” Jen said, in a tone of mournful satisfaction . “Quite, thanks. Isn’t it thrilling?—writing books, I mean?”

“It’s very interesting!” the Writing Person said sedately. “So are people! I was frightfully interested in all your crowd at Cheltenham! Then your accident happened, and I didn’t like to go round bothering your friends, to know how you were getting on; but I wanted to know very badly. Of course, I asked as soon as the autumn classes began, and was told you’d gone home and they thought you’d be all right in time. You look quite all right again!”

“Oh, I am! I could do morris jigs, if I happened to know them! But the less said about my kick-jumps the better, and I’m quite aware of it. I have tried them, but that’s all.”

“Oh, they’re brutes! But you can’t have “Bledington” without them, and “Bledington” as a whole is too good to live without, so the kick-jumps have to be thrown in somehow.”

“You’re frightfully keen on the dances, aren’t you?” Jen asked with interest.

“I’m frightfully interested! When I get introduced to a new tradition, and find out all its weird points, and just where it’s peculiar, I feel as if I’d unearthed a hidden treasure, or come into a fortune. I want to go and thank the person who gave it to me; but, of course, you can’t.”

“Why not? I don’t see why. I should think she’d be pleased.”

“I can’t! I should think she’d think I was a lunatic! But it’s how I feel, all the same; as if I’d been given an unexpected present. Last term we did the “Longborough” dances; they were all new to me, and I was a bit scared of them at first, but it’s gorgeous to feel I understand them at last! I could hardly restrain myself when I found we were really going to do “Princess Royal” to that wonderful tune. I wanted to get up and cheer.”

Jen laughed. “Well, why didn’t you? Oh, is that the tune that sounds like “Princess Royal” gone drunk?”

“The first time you hear it, yes. But it grows on you tremendously. Are you thinking of the lecture at Cheltenham last summer, when the Director played it to us?”

“Yes! And the whole room laughed; it was so weird, after the one we know so well. It’s one of the funny modal things, isn’t it?”

“It’s Dorian. I love it! When we were beginning to learn it, and were standing listening to “Once to Yourself,” somebody in the class gasped “Oh!” when the first E natural came out; and you can believe the rest of us laughed! But I felt like a millionaire when I went home that night and played it, knowing the steps that fitted the music. I’d never dreamt of such luck!”

“And you didn’t go and tell her how glad you were?”

“How could I? Of course I didn’t. But I really was awfully grateful. Now she’s going to make us have another go at “Lumps.” Won’t you come and try it?”

Jen shook her head and laughed. “No, thanks! I know all about how bad my RTBs are! I’ll watch you instead.”

“I’d very strongly advise you to watch some one else! I only play at it, I’m afraid,” and the Writing Person went to take her place.

“I’m glad I stayed to watch,” Jen said at the end. “It’s better fun than dancing.”

“It’s as good, anyway. And not half so hot!” her new friend conceded, sitting down again rather breathlessly. “No, I will not practise kick-jumps, or anything else! I know mine are very funny, but I’m half dead!”—this only for Jen’s benefit, however, as the class were advised to work at their weak points, and the more energetic proceeded to do so.

“She’ll be at you in a minute,” Jen laughed.

“No, she won’t plague me; she’s been awfully nice to me. She doesn’t worry me to do things I can’t. Oh, time’s up! No more morris! What a blow! I’m always sorry when it’s over for another whole week.”

“Do you come every Friday?” Jen asked with interest.

“I wouldn’t miss a Friday for any money!” the Writing Person said fervently. “My work would simply stop. I couldn’t carry on without Fridays to buck me up to it.”

“Oh, do you find it helps?”

“It’s the only thing that keeps me going, sometimes. I always get a fresh start after Fridays.”

“How funny! Oh, here she comes! She must be after you. What have you been doing?”

““Headington” circles in a “Bledington” dance, probably. Or something equally childish and infantile. If there is an awkward way to do a movement, I’m sure to find it; and if there is an elementary mistake to be made, I make it.”

“How did you get through the exam?” Jen laughed.

“I never took it. I knew better. I just moved myself up. Madam said I might,” and the Writing Person awaited the comments with expectant eyes.

It was Jen who was wanted, however. “Come along, Miss Robins! You’ve embraced that radiator long enough. Haven’t you the courage to join in “Chelsea Reach”?”

“May I? I’d simply love it!” and Jen laughed and sprang up, throwing off her coat.

“I was beginning to wonder what you had your tunic on for!” and stepping on to the platform she announced the dance. “it would be very nice if we could have the second figure right the first time of trying!” she added pensively, and several laughed in anticipation of the muddle to come.

“I danced the whole hour of Country!” Jen informed the rest, as they sat down starving to supper. “They do have topping teachers! And they’re doing wonderful new dances in that grade. We had a gorgeous thing called “Spring Garden”; I’d never even heard of it, but wasn’t it appropriate for March? I danced a lot with that Writing Person; she asked me to be her “man”, as her regular partner wasn’t there. The partner’s father has been very ill, and she’s afraid he may be worse, or they may have gone to see him at the hospital. So I danced with her several times.”

“We had the usual kind of jolly old time you always do have when Madam’s in charge, and all enjoyed ourselves no end,” said Joy. “I don’t know how she does it, but she does make you love it! I think it’s because you can see she’s having such a good time herself. She’s frightfully infectious, of course.”

“Sounds nasty,” Jack remarked. “She’s tremendously alive, anyway.”

“I had a perfectly gorgeous evening!” Jen said loftily.

From Chapter 11: 'Jen's "Think"'

Every detail of the visit to town was rehearsed for Mrs. Shirley’s benefit. Jen told, with a reminiscent shout, of the greeting to “Shirley” and the reference to “Hobart,” and of the way most of the girl students addressed one another by their surnames only. “I suppose it’s always done at college, but I never went to college. It sounded so funny!”

“Oh, that happened at the Christmas School!” Joy explained. “We found they all did it, so we did it too.”

They told of the Pixie and her artist’s flat—“She’s about so high, Maidlin. You shall see her some day soon. She says she’s nearly five feet, but she looks about three and a half!”—of Madam and her sword class—she’s the one who came here and got buried in the crypt. She won’t let me forget it either!” Of Jacky-boy’s struggles with “rappers,” and her delight in them now that she was used to them.

Then the tea tray was carried away, the tables disappeared, Mrs. Shirley went upstairs again, and the three girls drew the curtains, made up the fire, and sat in its light to talk.”

“I’ve a gorgeous plan for next week!” said Joy. “Maidlin ought to go and see her lawyer—it’s all right, infant! Don’t look so scared! I’ll do the talking. But he ought to see you do really exist.—And she’d like to do some shopping. If she’s game for all the things I think she ought to do, she’ll need more clothes than she’s needed so far.” Joy had said she was not tactful, but she did not hint that better clothes might also be advisable. “You’ll have to choose them yourself, Madalena! But Jen and I won’t mind giving you a little elder-sisterly advice. We’ll go up in Eirene on Thursday, do business all day, and run along to Jack’s after tea. You know how she begged and prayed this morning that we’d come for the party, so that we could take her home! Jacky-boy is Jen’s chum and other half; her adopted husband, Maidlin; and she lives in town, and we spent last night with her, and she loved having us. But her dad and mother have to go away for a few days next week, and she’s just dying to have us to keep her company. She wanted to borrow Jen, and I might have had to let her go, if I hadn’t had this plan for all the lot of us in my mind. We’ll all go to the party, Jenny Wren! Maidlin will love to see it. How’s that?”

“Oh!” Jen gave a little shriek of joy. “I’ve been dying to go to one for years! Months, anyway! Ever since I heard about them! But it was too far to come. Oh, Joy, that’s tophole! I’ll get some good out of being a member at last. Tell me who’ll be there? You went once with Cicely and Joan!”

“Everybody, my dear! Everybody who counts for anything at all will be there; Madam and her man, and all that lot, and, of course, the Prophet and his Little Page. And we’ll dance country dances for two hours; and the Director will play for us himself. And you know that’s worth living for!”

“I can’t wait till Thursday!” Jen sighed happily. “It will be just like Cheltenham!”

“And on Friday we’ll see. Perhaps we could take the Pixie out for lunch, or go to call on Madam. I’ll do some ringing up, and see what everybody’s plans are. We’ll show Maidlin a little of London, and see how she likes Eirene.”

“But I can’t go seeing all your friends!” Maidlin faltered, aghast.

“Why not? You’re lucky to have the chance. They’re topping sort of friends to have! They really are a very jolly crowd, and quite harmless,” Joy said solemnly. “You’ll like Jacky-boy; she’s just a kid, anyway. As for the party, nobody will take any notice of you! They’ll all be far too busy enjoying themselves. You’ll just sit in a corner and watch. It’s really rather pretty, with all the colours and all the evening frocks, even if you aren’t keen on the dances themselves.”

“I’d like that,” Maidlin admitted.

“Of course you will! You’ll love it. There’s nothing to be scared of in any one I’ll take you to see, kid. They’re all folk dancers; and that means they’re ordinary jolly natural people, who love to have a good time and who don’t swank or put on side, and who aren’t any of them a scrap affected, or they couldn’t do those dances! Jenny Wren, isn’t it so?”

Jen had been staring into the fire in absorbed silence, but woke with a start. “Rather! That’s part of the big think I had in the car this morning.”

“And now you’re going to tell us all about it!” Joy commanded. “I want to know what kept you so quiet for such ages! Most unnatural, it was!”

“I was thinking about last night—the whole of it. The sleet, and the wind, and the wet, cold streets, and that dark tunnel entry; then all the jolly crowd of girls inside, forgetting all about the weather and their work and worries, and just giving themselves up to the old music and those wonderful dances. And it seemed to me that people like Madam, and the Pixie with her men and girls down at Plaistow, and others, I suppose, in other places, aren’t doing such a very little thing at all. They aren’t merely holding dancing classes, and helping teachers to get extra certificates. To heaps of those girls, who work really hard all day, in one way or another, those evening classes once a week must be something to live for, something they’ll count up the days for, a kind of oasis in a desert. Think of being in an office, and adding up figures all day—”

“I can’t! Can’t think it, I mean. I should die!” Joy murmured. “But I see what you mean. Go on, Jenny Wren!”

“Well, suppose you had to! Wouldn’t you live for your morris and country classes at night, and nearly die when they were over for another week? Wouldn’t you think about swords all the time you were adding up? Wouldn’t you do dances in your head, as you walked along the streets to the office or went out to lunch?”

“And get run over at every crossing! I should do more than think them. I should hum and whistle till I was arrested as a lunatic, or till my boss had to get rid of me.”

Some of them are in offices. The Writing Person told me; she knows a lot of them. She says she’s been in that class for a year now, and having got there, she means to stay for the rest of her life, as she can’t get any higher without passing exams, and she seems quite sure she could never do that! So she’s had time to get to know a lot of the girls. One lives near Oxford Circus—a tomboy looking girl with bobbed curly hair, and a dinky little frock instead of a tunic; made it herself, too! Goes camping in a real proper tent in August, and comes to the Summer Schools for dancing; prefers it to any other kind of holiday, though she doesn’t get very long. She lives near Oxford Circus, and works in an office all day, and simply has to fly to get to Friday classes; I do think some girls are plucky! Has to do all the work of looking after her room, and dressmaking, and so on, after she gets home at night. Well, don’t you think the dancing means a good lot to a girl like that? I suppose girls who don’t know of folk dancing go to the pictures, or to theatres, or walk about the streets, or belong to clubs; think how much better it is for her to come and do morris and sword and country, and enjoy the music, and meet a jolly lot of friends, week after week!”

Jen paused for breath. Maidlin was listening in rapt interest, her wide eyes showing how new such talk was to her.

Joy said urgently, “Go on! No wonder you were wrapped in silence all morning! And don’t forget to tell me your tomboy’s name. She’s the kind who could easily come out here for a weekend. But how did you find out so much about the girls, all in one evening? Oh, was it that Writing Person?”

“I asked her about them, in between dances. She calls the tomboy Topsy; I’m sure she’d love to come, and you’d like her, too. Most of the girls are teachers, and want their certificates because they could get better posts if they had them. Well, fancy if you’d taught a class of sixty small infants every day for a week! Think how you’d feel by Friday night!”

“I can’t!” Joy said again. “I’d be dead!”

“Some of them love it, of course, and feel it’s the only work in the world worth doing. I don’t see how anybody can be a teacher unless she does feel like that. It must be fearful if you don’t. But even if you love it, you must get very tired. When they’re just about done in, at the end of the week, they come along and do “William and Nancy”, and “London Pride”, and “Queen’s Delight”, and “Haste to the Wedding”, and “Beaux of London City”; and they’re bullied themselves, instead of having to worry about bullying their infants; and don’t you think it’s a rest? Even if it nearly kills them with hard work, it’s a rest! The Writing Person says they once did nine country dances in an hour, and she could hardly lie still in bed after it, because she was so sore! But her work went beautifully next day. She’s another argument; she doesn’t teach or do office work; she says either would kill her in a week. But she’s writing all the time, and she says it’s fearfully hard not to get stale, and I can quite believe it. And nothing she’s ever found yet helps her to keep fresh so well as folk dancing does. She says time after time she’s worked all day, till she felt just empty, like a balloon without any air in it—writing, or typing, or correcting proofs; and then, when she’s felt only ready for bed, but really too fagged to sleep, she’s made herself go to dancing instead, and done an hour or two; and she’s gone home far less tired than when she went out. Then she’s slept well, and done stacks of work next day. She always works best the day after classes. Isn’t it funny?”

“I expect it stirs her all up, and so she gets new ideas,” Joy said shrewdly. “Cicely always said anything to do with folk dancing stirred her all up. And the music would help, I should think, and meeting people, if she’s so much interested in them.”

“She says it all helps, every bit of it. She loves every tune in any of the books, and if she wasn’t allowed to dance, she says she’d go just the same, to look on, and to watch the teaching; for teaching like that is worth watching any day; I’ve always thought so, and she said so too! Well, Madam and all those people are helping her, just as they help the teachers and the office people! I think they’re doing a big thing for girls who have to work, by giving them folk dancing in the evenings, to keep them fresh and help them to carry on. And there are classes almost every night. If I were a business girl living in town, I’d go to them all, and have dancing every night of the week! I shall, too, if we have to live in town for a while. That’s what my “think” was, Joy; what a big thing those London classes are for London girls! Is there one before the party on Thursday? For if so, I’m going to watch, or to join in, if they’ll let me!”

“Sword, morris and country! We’ll take Maidlin; she’ll love it. I wonder who’ll be teaching, though?”

“You can’t have Madam all the time!” Jen laughed. “I don’t mind who’s teaching! Play us something, Joy! Maidlin ought to hear your piano.”

From Chapter 15: 'The Pixie and the Club'

The decision to go to town on Wednesday had been made after Joy had spent Tuesday morning ringing up people and making arrangements.

“Come and have tea with me on Wednesday!” the Pixie had said. “I’ll show you my room and the club, and if you can wait you shall see my men. They come to me for morris, and they’re frightfully keen.” So Eirene sped hooting through the West End, on past St. Paul’s and the Bank and the Monument and London Bridge and the Tower, and dived into the unknown crowded whirl of Aldgate.

Even Joy, though born a Londoner, knew nothing of this end of the City. She asked her way of policemen occasionally, but for the most part found it by means of a certain sense of direction which rarely failed her. She knew she had to go east, and east she went, and had no difficulties till Whitechapel lay behind her and she was heading for the river and the docks.

“I’ve a bump, you know; a bump of locality. I always had,” she said briefly, as Jen commented admiringly on her unhesitating decision when they came to a choice of roads. “I could always find my way in the woods, as a kiddy, even in the dark. I used to spend days exploring, when I ought to have been doing useful things at home. I always know which is east and west; and I don’t often lose my bearings.”

She pointed out the well known places they passed, for Jen’s benefit as well as Maidlin’s, but explained frankly that she only knew the outside of places like St. Paul’s, and that only from picture postcards.

“You can’t mistake it, of course. But I’ve never been inside, so far as I know; nor in the Tower. Yes, it is awful, isn’t it? When you come and live in town, Jen, I’ll bring Maidlin up and we’ll do the sights of London. There! That’s the Tower, of course. I haven’t an idea what it’s like inside; all bloodstains, I believe. I don’t think London people do go to the Tower! Country cousins and Americans do that. Londoners go to the Boat Race, or to see the opening of Parliament. Of course, they all go whenever there’s a procession! Now we must be getting near the club. Is this the kind of place the Pixie’s teaching folk dancing in?”

And they looked at the crowded streets, and the unemployed men standing at the corners, the squalid houses, the mud and dirt and bustle, with startled eyes.

“Is this the place we sent the daffodils to?” Jen murmured. “I wish I’d sent more! How little we know, away there in the abbey, of the places some people live in, “Traveller’s Joy”!”

Joy was frowning, though not over the difficulties of the road. “We ought to know more,” she said shortly. “I feel a pig. Did you see those children? Think of our orchard; and those daffodils! Think of our lawns and fields! I don’t suppose those kids have ever picked a primrose. I’m going to run that hostel. But that’s such a little thing. I’d like to take them all away out of this; all the girls and children, and those tired mothers in that doorway; did you see? It doesn’t seem right! But there must be thousands of them. I shall ask the Pixie. We ought to help; she’ll tell me how.”

Maidlin glanced at her in wonder. This was the other Joy, the one who had come to her in the refectory, who had won her over, who had held her in her arms that first night; not the lighthearted, laughter loving, mocking Joy she did not understand. This was the Joy she loved best; though the other, happy and full of jokes and fun, was a bright and beautiful person to be worshipped from afar, in awe tinged with bewilderment. She began to be curious about this other person, this “Pixie,” who was so full of wisdom. It was difficult to think of Joy looking up to anybody, but her tone said that she looked up to this Pixie and waited for her advice.

“Will I be afraid of her?” she asked doubtfully.

Joy’s lips twitched. “I don’t think so!” she said gravely. “Will she, Jen?”

“If she is, she ought to have first prize for being a nervous, silly little object,” Jen said severely. “Maidlin, you really mustn’t go about expecting to be afraid of people! Afraid of the Pixie! Silly kid!”

“Well, I don’t know her!” Maidlin was roused to defend herself. “And if she’s so clever—”

“She knows everything!” Joy said solemnly. “Every mortal thing you can think of! I’d take her advice about anything. And if you knew all the things she did in the war!”

“Joy, don’t tease the kid. You’ll love the Pixie, Maidlin. I say! Doesn’t it strike you two that a country dance club for men and girls down here, in the middle of all this, is rather a fine idea?”

“Been having another “think”?” Joy queried. “But I agree; an awfully fine idea. For a moment it seems out of place—country dancing in these slums, among all the factories and offices and works. But it’s just what’s needed.”

“Yes, to give the people something different; new ideas, and something to freshen them up. It must be as big a thing for the Pixie’s girls as it is for those teachers and people at headquarters every week; something in the background, behind their everyday lives, to think about and look forward to. How they must love it! I’d like to see a party down here. But think of “Gathering Peascods,” and “Sellenger’s Round,” and “Jenny Pluck Pears,” and—and “Spring Garden”! The very names don’t fit in with the streets and the smoke, and the public houses at every corner!”

“It’s just like the Pixie,” Joy said soberly. “Country dancing didn’t fit in with the war! What could be more unsuitable for camps and convalescent depots? But you know what she made of it out there. Ordinary teaching, of comfortable, nicely dressed classes, wouldn’t be enough for her, I believe. She must be where she’s really needed, where there’s more to be done than just teach dancing. She wants”—Joy laughed—“to mend their shirts and darn their socks, the dears! Didn’t she say so?”

“Well it’s like her. I love the thought of dancing clubs down here. Oh, what’s that big white place?”

“I shouldn’t wonder if it’s the club we’re going to, considering the picture she showed us last week.”

“Why, it’s a palace! How—how gorgeous for the people living round about! Can any one go? Or have you got to be something to do with the Y.M.C.A.?” and Jen stepped out of Eirene and stood gazing up at the great white building in delight.

Maidlin followed her in an amazed dream. She had never imagined a “club” of this size, even in fashionable London, let alone in the slums; her only experience had been of a village club room and small parish hall. In a whirl of incredulity she followed Joy and Jen up the big steps, and stood with them at the top of the first staircase to read the marble tablet proclaiming the beautiful building a memorial to the men of the district who had fallen in the war.

“Now that’s a war memorial worth putting up! Far more sensible than some of them!” Jen said with approval. “Jolly decent of the people who thought of it! Doing something for those who are left!”

“It’s tophole,” Joy said gravely, and they all looked wonderingly about them, at the wide double staircase, the entrance to the cinema close beside them, the glimpses of big lounge and billiard rooms through open doors.

“It’s a gorgeous place! I wonder if she’ll take us over it? She said, turn to the left, and we’d find her in the restaurant at four thirty. Oh, here it is!” and Joy pushed open a swing door and led them in.

Maidlin gazed eagerly round the big hall, with its high windows, little tables, brown woodwork, and waiting girls in brown with hanging veils to their caps. Then she looked anxiously, and still a trifle nervously, for the great person in whose wisdom Joy had so much faith, the Pixie.

“Here she is!” “Here you are!” the greetings rang out together, and the Pixie ran to meet them.

“So you’ve found me all right! Did you have any difficulty? Good! It is nice to see you here! Isn’t it a beautiful place? You must see all of it presently. But first we’ll have tea. What will you have? You can have anything here, you know. Toast and cakes? Sandwiches? Eggs? Oh, you’ve had lunch! All right; tea, toast, and bread and butter and cakes for four, please, Beatrice. And is this your new abbey girl? Just tell me her name again, Jenny Wren! Don’t tell her I’ve forgotten it, or she’ll never forgive me! But I know all about you, you know,” to staring Maidlin.

Maidlin was staring, indeed. She had vaguely expected some one imposing and awe inspiring, though she could not have said why. This little person was no taller than herself, though she had enough to say for two. Maidlin’s first relieved impression was that there was no need to be frightened; others came later.

“And how are you getting on at the abbey? Oh, I say, thank you so much for the flowers! My classes simply loved them yesterday. Did you help to pick them for me? I know you did!” to Maidlin, who suddenly felt glad that she had helped. “It was beautiful of you all to think of it. Everybody had some; every single person I saw yesterday.”

“And you never kept any for yourself. I know you! But it was Jen’s idea. She and Maidlin did it all.”

“Didn’t you keep any for your own room, Pixie?” Jen asked severely.

“I still have those you gave me last week; they’re lovely! My men did love them so when they saw them! And has your other girl arrived? What’s she like—the schoolgirl? Don’t you get on well with her?” the lightning question took Maidlin’s breath away.

“How did you know?” she gasped. “I never said—”

“But you don’t know her yet. She hasn’t been there long enough. You mustn’t judge too soon, you know. She’ll be all right; girls are all dears! You should see some of mine. You’ll be great friends in no time!”

At sight of Maidlin’s confusion, Jen chuckled, and Joy gave a shout of laughter.

“Oh, Aunty Pixie! You can’t dispose of our problems as easily as all that! It’s jolly nice of you to try, but Maidlin just thinks you don’t anything about it. And you don’t!”

“Only what you told me over the phone,” the Pixie, not at all abashed, looked up at her with a twinkle. “You said it wasn’t all plain sailing yet, and Maidlin didn’t quite understand the new girl, but you thought things would soon be all right. Didn’t you, now? Didn’t you say that?”

And Joy, who knew very well she had never added the last hopeful sentence, and had put Maidlin’s attitude very much more strongly, accepted this tactful amendment with a grin.

“I’ve come to ask advice, as usual, Pixie,” she changed the subject hastily, however, to give Maidlin time to recover.

“What’s the trouble now?—Good afternoon, Jack! All right again?”

“Yes, thanks, aunty!” and a big man paused on his way to the door, and looked down at his tiny friend.

“Now you take care and don’t get another chill. Have something hot next time you get home soaked; and it needn’t be whisky! Tea’s just as good; and much cheaper in the end. Much better for you, too.”

“Yes, aunty!” and he grinned and passed on.

“How’s the foot, Bob?” to another, who had just come in. “Think you’ll be able to dance tonight? These friends have come a long way just to see you dance!”

Bob grinned sheepishly. “Aw, miss! I’m going to dance, though.”

“Of course you are. See you aren’t late, and bring the rest up with you.”

“I’ll fetch ‘em all up, miss,” and he too passed on.

“I’m sure you darn their socks, aunty!” Jen sighed. “Are you mothering the whole establishment?”

“I don’t know what they’d do without you!” Joy had been helpless with suppressed amusement.

“They’re dears, all of them. I love them. And I think they like me too. What’s the worry, Joy?”—the keen eyes had seen that Joy was in earnest.

“What ought people like us do for people who live in those streets we just came through?” Joy asked bluntly. “I feel a perfect pig to go back to the Hall and have that huge place to myself. I feel as if I ought to chuck everything and come here and work with you. You’re doing a big thing for the people who live here; any one can see that. But I couldn’t teach! But it seems so hateful and—and callous to do nothing!”

The Pixie looked at her thoughtfully. “The last thing in the world you have to do is to “chuck everything.” That’s not what the money was given to you for. You can do far more by using it properly. By living at home, and asking some of our people there to share it with you, you’ll do far more than by living here. Don’t you feel that?”

“I suppose so. I shouldn’t be any use here, of course. But it feels so mean!”

“You could be of use here. Your music alone could give pleasure to hundreds. You could play to them, and you could teach them to sing! But—”

“Didn’t we say she always saw the best of everybody?” Joy interrupted. “Here she is, remembering the one little thing I can do!”

It’s not such a little thing. But I think there are others. You’re going to use your house and money for other people. I don’t say you can’t do something here, too. You can do a lot; and if you’ll come and see us often, and join in what we’re doing and be friendly and one of us, it will be a big thing. You’ve no idea the kind of things that are wanted down here! I heard of one lady who had been speaking to our girls, and some of them said to her, “Oh, miss! If you’d only come and teach us to talk like you do!”—and they’ve had a class for English conversation all the winter; yes, really! You must come along sometime to the university settlement round the corner, where I sleep when I don’t go back to the flat, and see what all the friends there are doing; wonderful work! And a very real bit of help you could give would be to bring Eirene down now and then, and take some of our cripple children out for a ride. Think how they’ll love it!”

“Yes, I’d like to do that! Shall I come once a week?”

“Aunty Pixie, how wise you are!” Jen said softly. “You don’t ask Joy to do difficult or impossible things, but just little ordinary ones that she can do quite well. And yet they’re such real things!”

“But they’re the things that are wanted. Besides,” and the Pixie gave her a quick, straight look, “Joy’s difficulty won’t be in doing them once or twice, but in keeping on with them regularly and not getting tired. Some people have to do big things; others do little ones, but keep on doing them. And that’s harder!”

“I guess you understand me pretty well!” Joy said grimly. “But I won’t slack off, Pixie. Those streets were a shock to me, and I’d like to do something to help. We’ll plan it out. I could come up to town regularly, one morning a week, and give your kiddies rides all day.”

“And stay the night with me, when we’re settled in our flat, and go to classes at night!” Jen said joyfully. “Oh, Joy! What a topping plan! You must come on Fridays, for those are the jolliest classes! Except when there’s a party; then you’ll come on Thursday!”

“I wasn’t thinking about classes, or any fun for myself!” Joy said indignantly.

“No, of course you weren’t,” the Pixie said soothingly. “But there’s no reason why you shouldn’t have it,” she added practically. “May as well get the good of your fare to town!”

“My petrol, you mean!” Joy laughed. “You are an unromantic little person, you know, Pixie!”

The Pixie’s eyes twinkled. “Oh, I believe in getting the most you can out of everything. Now will anybody have more tea? Then come and see the club!”

Chapter 16 - A Morris Pipe and a Pixie

“I’VE no words left!” Jen said weakly. “I’ve used them all, three times over! It’s the most gorgeous club I ever saw!”

“And for people here! Living in those houses we saw!” Joy added. “Pixie, it’s very wonderful!” she said gravely. “Isn’t it rather ripping to feel you’re part of such a big thing?”

“Oh, rather! I love it. I’m fearfully bucked at being here. And such nice people to work with!”

“Oh, but you’d say that about anybody!”

“Oh, no, I shouldn’t. There are people I can’t work with. But they’re all dears here.”

She had led the girls to the beautiful gymnasium—“We dance here, on party nights. I play for them, up there!” pointing to the piano on its platform under the roof. “I go up the ladder. I’m always lifted down very tenderly off the last three steps by some of my men. It does amuse me so!”—to the billiard rooms, with their big green tables and low, shaded lights—“Any one can have a game here by paying a little. It’s not only for club members. Much better than going to the public house for your game, you know!”—to the big lounge and reading room, the boys’ club room and the girls’ club room, with their huge red brick open hearths, restful brown wooden furniture, big red leather easy chairs and settees, tables with papers and magazines, and cosy corners arranged for discussions;—to the cinema-theatre; and last of all to the big swimming pool, used during the day by the schools of the neighbourhood, and at night open to members of the clubs. It was this last, and the well fitted gym, that reduced Jen to a limp state of joyful wonder. Maidlin was dumb with surprise, though her bright, eager eyes showed how much she was taking in of new ideas and impressions. Joy, though not too stunned to speak, was graver than usual in her appreciation of it all, with the constant picture of the streets outside before her eyes.

“Cheers for the Y.M.C.A., I say!” said Jen, as they came to rest at last in the Pixie’s upstairs office.

“Or for the great men who gave it to the Y.M.C.A. It was a splendid gift, you know. Yes, isn’t it a wonderful thing for the people down here? And they love it so. All our clubs are full. We could do with another place as big, and still take in more. Now I’ve got to change; it looks more businesslike. You can fold up my things when I fling them off!” and she hurled her garments at them, and in five minutes had changed from her silk jumper to a smooth little black tunic and cream blouse, and was once more the Pixie of the Cheltenham School.

“It takes me right back to Naunton Park!” Jen laughed. “I think we ought to walk the “Ilmington Hey,” Joy; “walk it just once, for luck!” Oh, Pixie, dear, you were a treat to us that day!”

The Pixie’s eyes were dancing. “Joy was a horrible shock to me! Two of them in my class! And that man turned up, and threw you all off your balance. I couldn’t think what was the matter with you, for I could see you knew “Shepherd’s Hey”! And have you buried anybody lately?” wickedly, to Joy.

“Only myself and Maidlin. What do you do for music up here, aunty? You said your men came here for morris. But you’ve no piano!”

“That’s my old bus under the table,” and the Pixie pointed to her little gramophone. “We do “Blue-Eyed Stranger” and “Rigs” to her. For “Rodney” and “Lads a Bunchun”—I play for them myself. I have my pipe, you know,” and she took up a tin whistle.

“Oh, play to us! Do play to us! We didn’t know you could!” Jen cried delightedly, and Maidlin’s eyes kindled.

The Pixie, in her tunic, perched on the edge of the office table, and began to pipe; and Jen, in the midst of her enjoyment, treasured this new picture for her letter to Joan. Tune followed tune, in clear sweet notes and such perfect rhythm that the girls’ feet were tapping in sympathy, while they strove wildly to identify the airs—“Chelsea Reach,” the “Helston Furry,” “Nonesuch,” Oranges and Lemons,” “Ladies’ Pleasure,” the “Tideswell Processional.”

“I always remember an old lady where I once lodged,” and the Pixie paused. “I was playing “Chelsea,” and she came in and said to me, “Miss, I do like the way you turn the tune!” My men would rather have the whistle than the piano, you know. They say they can dance to it better; they can hear it better.”

That’s because you dance as you play it; I mean, you play it as a dancer. An ordinary pianist can never do that,” Jen remarked.

“I suppose it’s that. Here they come! You’ll have to tuck yourselves into corners, if they all turn up. Maidlin, you can sit on Jen’s knee in the big chair,” her eyes had danced with amusement at Maidlin’s amazed look when she donned her tiny tunic, but she had made no comment.

“We ought to go. We’ll be late for Jacky-boy’s dinner. And Maidlin was to go to bed early tonight, to make up for tomorrow,” said Joy maternally. “We’re going to the party, you know. Will you be there?”

“No, I have classes all evening. Just wait and see us do “Rodney” and “Blue Eyed”! We really are getting some rhythm into it.”

“If you’re going to sit on the table and pipe for “Rodney”, like a cupid or cherub, I simply won’t go!” Jen laughed. “Joy can take Maidlin out to the West End and come back for me. Or I’ll go by bus or train. I must see your men dance to your piping! It’s a simply priceless idea!”

Deeply interested, she and Maidlin sat in the big leather chair and Joy perched on the arm, while half a dozen lads came in, overcome with shyness and amusement at sight of three girl visitors at first, till the Pixie’s welcoming chatter made them forget themselves and the strangers. Conscious that they had faded into the background, the girls watched in absorbed silence as the six crowded round the table on which their tiny mentor sat enthroned, explaining the absence of others, making rough jokes, exclaiming at sight of the flowers, curious as to the budding almond, which was evidently a mystery.

“Those were given to me last week. Aren’t they lasting well? They came right from the country. That’s almond blossom, just coming out. Isn’t it pretty?”

“Coo! Will there be almonds on that?” jeered one unbeliever, who evidently had only met almonds in shops.

“Now, get your bells on. Fetch them out, Bob. Get the sticks, Peters. Take your places, and listen to the tune. Be careful of your cross-back-step, Andrews. D’you remember the tapping, Tom? Right! Let’s see it, then!”

The lads were only beginners. They forgot their Foot-up, and with shouts of embarrassed laughter had to begin again. They got lost completely in their hey, went too far in Cross-over, muddled the tapping and forgot to repeat it, bumped into one another in Back-to-back, and roared with laughter at each new mistake. The jingle of the bells and the clatter of the sticks could not drown the thunder of their boots, for several had forgotten their shoes. But their enjoyment was overwhelming; they fairly radiated delight and good humour. Every keen criticism from the little autocrat on the table was received with laughter; every boy who failed or forgot was admonished by the other five as smartly as by her. They wanted no rests; as soon as “Rodney” had been practised, as a whole and in bits, with the familiar command, “Do it once more, for luck!” which drew Jen’s eyes to Joy’s in reminiscent laughter, they crowded round the table begging for “Blue Eyed Stranger,” picked up and fixed the gramophone, found the record, and produced huge, wonderful handkerchiefs of varied hues. Their circles were wild in the extreme, but here again was unbounding enjoyment, and the shout at the end was a real triumphant “All-in.”

“How they love it!” Jen whispered. “Isn’t it topping to see them? This is the real thing, Maidlin; real men’s morris, even if they are just beginners! It’s got life in it; it’s tremendously real. And one or two of them are jolly good!”

“Yes, that leader’s rhythm is wonderful,” Joy too had been watching enthralled. “And others are getting hold of the idea. I wonder how long they’ve been at it?”

“Only a few weeks,” said the Pixie, swamped in a crowd of boys, but overhearing the question. “Some of them have only had two lessons; haven’t you, Andrews?”

“Then they really are wonderful. You’ll have to give a demonstration!”

“I’d rather give a party! But we shall give a show some day. They danced “Rigs” to the girls at our party last week,” and the boys grinned awkwardly, and then shouted with laughter at the remembrance.

“I’m sure the party loved it. But we really must go,” and Joy rose resolutely. “I could sit here and watch all night, of course, but we simply mustn’t. Be strong minded, Jenny Wren! Maidlin, haul her out of that big chair! You’ll have to show us the way down,” to the Pixie. “I’m hopelessly lost in this mansion!”

“I’ll take you to the girls’ lounge, and any one will show you the way down. I must hurry back to my men, though.”

The boys were eyeing Joy’s leather suit. One, a true Londoner, quite untroubled by shyness, asked in a tone of respect, “Drive a car, miss?”

Joy gave him a swift, radiant smile. “Yes, just a little one. But she goes very well. But I’m not much good at cleaning her or crawling about underneath, so I don’t really do the thing properly, do I?” and did not explain that the car was her own.

There was a laugh from the crowd, as one awkwardly but readily offered to help her into her big coat. “‘Tain’t no job for a girl, messing about with engines,” said one.

“Now, men, I’ll be back in two minutes. You practise the tapping of “Rigs.” Come along, girls!”

“But why, oh, why, did you call them “men”?” Jen burst out, before the door was fairly closed. “They are dears, as you said; I’d love to see them again! But when you said men, I supposed you meant men! They’re only boys of sixteen!”

“The wily flattery of the very tiny but very wise!” Joy began.

The Pixie interrupted her sharply. “Every one of them is over eighteen. They belong to the men’s section. We have a boys’ section as well; that’s why. You have to be careful.”

“Pixie! Eighteen! Why, they aren’t—aren’t tall enough, for one thing! Only one of them was a decent size! They only looked like boys!”

“That’s Plaistow!” the Pixie said grimly. “They’re old enough for eighteen! Of course, eighteen is only a boy, until you compare him with fifteen, though he likes to be counted a man! But that’s the size and build you are at eighteen, if you’ve lived always in overcrowded homes, perhaps one room or two, and been underfed all your life. Those are eighteen-year-old boys of these parts; not the big fellows you meet in West End classes, I’ll admit! There’s only one in my little lot who’s really well grown. And the girls are just the same; active and full of life, but small and stunted; cheated of something.”

“And pasty!” Jen said, in a low voice. “I noticed the queer pale colour, no matter how much they laughed or how jolly they looked. Oh, Pixie, it—it isn’t right!” she said helplessly.

“And yet they can take as much and as deep delight in a purely artistic thing like folk dancing as any of your West Enders. You saw how they loved it’ and the girls are the same in their country dancing. You should see the joy, and life, and energy in our Saturday night parties! I never saw heartier dancing. They’d tire you out in one evening. And yet they’re City people; shows “country” dancing isn’t really the best name. It’s because it’s folk, of course; folk dancing. It appeals to everybody; that’s folk. It’s sincere and natural, and they all respond to it, just as the Tommies did in France. My lot here simply love it. They have modern dancing too, but they like our parties best; they’ve told me so. And they love it in the best way; their dancing is as artistic, and as musical, and as full of rhythm and beautiful movement, and of delight in it all, as any you’d find anywhere, even at your Vacation Schools or big town classes. But you’ve seen the streets they come from; only the big streets, of course! You don’t know anything about their homes, really; but you’ve seen enough for a beginning; and you’ve seen the results in them. Those are our “men”; those little slips of lads, with no height or growth to speak of; that’s Plaistow! I love them, and I love being here. And they like me, you know! Now I must run back to them, or something will be getting smashed. They are dears; but talk about high spirits!—Molly!” they had entered the big lighted girls’ lounge. “Show these friends of mine the way down, will you? They’re afraid they’ll get lost. Thank you awfully! Good bye! I’ll ask you to a party some day!”

Maidlin sprang to hold open the swing door for her. The Pixie, catching the look in her eyes, as of one who had seen and heard so many new and bewildering things that her brain was in a whirl and quite beyond speech, paused to say a word of thanks. “You’ll come again, won’t you? If you learn a few dances, you shall come to a party too. And see you’re nice to that other girl. Remember you were one of the family before she came. You have to do your share in making her feel at home. She can’t be quite happy unless all three of you welcome her. You have to work together, and all help Joy. Now, good bye, everybody!” and she ran down the steps to her own room, a tiny, eager figure in fawn knitted coat over smooth black tunic, black band round smooth fair hair.

“Darling!” murmured Jen, as Molly led them across the lounge, where girls were sitting at tables or in corners, standing round the piano, or practising a one step in preparation for the next “modern dance.”

“That’s all very well!” said Joy sombrely, when—after curious glances into the many lighted rooms, all busy now with club members; games, music, cinema, restaurant, all in full swing—they were racing in Eirene through the crowded brilliant streets back to the City and so to the West. “But I want to say more than “Darling”! Think of what she’s doing, just by being there, just by existing, just by meeting those people every day! It would be worth their while to pay her to stay there, even if she never taught a class. Just to have somebody about, thinking and talking as she does, is a big thing. And then think what she’s taking those East End people, in our music and dancing. Talk about your “something in the background”! It must change all their lives!”

“Yes!” Jen said thoughtfully. “If we, with all we’ve got, can imagine looking forward all week to our dance evening, what must it be to girls living at home and working in factories and shops, or living at home in those dreadfully crowded places! Think of coming even once a week and dancing country dances in that beautiful gym!”

“With the Pixie in command, bullying them all in her own jolly, happy way, and making fun out of everything! I should simply live for it, I know. It sounds silly and sentimental, but that dancing once a week must be like a trip into gorgeous sunny country, it seems to me. They’ll be fresher, and have new ideas, and—and be bigger in every way, because they’ve danced with the Pixie for an evening. She’s doing a big thing,” Joy said fervently. “I’m just sorry there’s only one of her. She ought to multiplied by umpteen thousands. There ought to be one of her in every street!”

“Oh, Joy!” Jen laughed. “But I do agree! I beg most heartily to endorse every statement the last speaker has made, Mr. Chairman! Them’s my sentiments entirely! But all the same, I say again, Darling! Oh, that morris pipe, and her perched on the table! I’m dying to tell Joan!”

From Chapter 18: 'Cuckoo's Nest'

“Get into the pink frock while we change!” Joy commanded after tea. “We’re going to a morris class, which implies tunics, as I think you know by this time; but you’re only going to sit in a corner, so you may as well be ready. We’ll have a fearful rush to get changed.”

So Maidlin arrayed herself—no lesser word would do justice to her feelings at the moment—in the new dress, and went in shyly to show herself, bright spots of excitement on her cheeks.

The three girls, in businesslike blue tunics with green girdles, which they still wore for their old school’s sake, were getting into big coats and picking up their dancing shoes; hats could be dispensed with on a fine night, when the hall was just round the corner.

“Some swank!” Jack stared at Maidlin frankly. “Swish! I love pink frocks!”

“It suits you, Madalena,” Joy’s tone was carefully offhand. “Don’t say too much!” she had warned the others. “It isn’t good for the young to be admired! She’ll look a dream! But don’t dream of telling her so!”

“Jolly nice!” Jen looked her over with approval. “You’ve put it on nicely too, Maidlin. Have you got the foreigner’s knack? Be thankful if you have. I don’t suppose you’ve had a chance to find out yet, but we’ll soon know.”

Much of this Maidlin did not understand. But she knew they were satisfied, and her happiness and excitement grew.

Joy’s anxiety as to who would be teaching that night had been increasing all day, and Maidlin had heard so much about her hopes that she almost understood. It might be some one referred to as “Madam,” or “The Duchess,” and in that case Joy was going to be blissfully happy; or it might be one of several others, and any one else would be a severe disappointment, it appeared. She followed the three across Great Portland Street to the big hall, pausing only to satisfy Jack’s craving for a long look at the lights of Portland Place and to show Maidlin that side of London life for the first time; and fell behind diffidently as they ran up the steps.

By Jen’s laugh and Joy’s groan, she knew the teacher on the platform was not the beloved “Madam,” of whom she had heard so much. Jen went forward to ask permission to join in the class.

“Do you mind? We couldn’t resist the thought of some morris. If your sets aren’t all made up, may we go in a corner somewhere? We’ve done a little “Field Town,” so we’ll try not to be too much of a bother to you;;” she had heard the music as they crossed the hall.

“Have you come up for the party? We didn’t quite kill you the other night, then?” the teacher smiled.

“No, but I was stiff! I suppose it was “Argeers”.”

“You’ll be stiffer tomorrow, if you’ve done no morris since the summer! All right! Go into that back set. But we shall make you work, you know.”

Jen laughed and nodded, and ran to fetch sticks. “It’s “Bobby and Joan”, isn’t it?”

“You squeeze into a corner and watch,” said Joy to Maidlin, and her eyes followed the teacher, whom she had often seen at Cheltenham, as she led a girl out into the middle of the floor and gave her a demonstration of the hop-back step, showed how she had been doing it and just where she had been wrong, and how she could correct the fault. The girl, laughing a little because she knew all eyes were on her, pluckily tried to understand and copy the movement, and with a smile of approval and a word of encouragement, their mentor left her at last to practise, but only when she was satisfied the explanation had been understood.

“Doesn’t she take a lot of trouble, just over one person?” Joy marvelled, in an undertone. I don’t know if I’d like to be hauled out and put through it before the crowd like that!”

“You would, if you were keen enough,” Jen said wisely. “She knows who are the keen ones, I bet! Doesn’t she?” and she looked with a smile at the Writing Person, who had just come in, in big coat and hat and carrying shoes. “Aren’t you dancing tonight?”

“I’ve come for the party. Two hours of party, after an hour of morris, would do me in. I just crawl home as it is. But I love to watch the classes first. Some people do two hours and a half of classes, then a quick change, and dance for two hours at the party. I’m keen, but I couldn’t do that. I should be dead. Besides, there’s tomorrow night! I can’t afford to kill myself outright on a Thursday. May I ask you something?” to Joy.

“If I may ask you something too!” Joy said promptly. “We’ve brought a kiddy with us; over there, in the corner, with the big eyes! She’s been reading one of your books. May I bring her to speak to you? She’ll be too shy to say a word, but she’ll love to see you. Jen bought the book for her last week, after meeting you on Friday night.”

“How awfully nice of you!” the Writing Person laughed to Jen. “I hope she wasn’t disappointed in it! I’ll go and talk to her while you’re dancing. Where’s the rest of your crowd? There were a lot of you at Cheltenham. Do tell me if there have been any weddings? I was sure there was one coming, and perhaps two.”

Joy laughed. “We’ve been bridesmaids twice since Christmas. Joan and Cicely are both abroad now.”

“I am glad! Thank you so much! It’s tremendously satisfying to know the end of the story. I couldn’t help wondering, of course. You had no men when you first turned up, but before the end of the month there seemed no doubt of their intentions.”

“Are you going to put them in a book?” Jen asked. “You’d better come and see Joan’s abbey; it’s full of stories. Things simply will happen there!”

“Make up sets for “Cuckoo’s Nest”,” said the teacher on the platform, and the other four with whom Joy and Jen had danced made frantic signs to them to come and take their places.

“Good luck to you!” said the Writing Person. “I’ve been hauled out into the middle of the hall for this! The capers, you know; she came and worked my arms to show me what she wanted, and criticised my capers at the same time. As I’m still only able to control one part of me at a time, I didn’t manage to satisfy her. I nearly died when she stood over me.”

“Of rage?” Joy asked sympathetically.

“No, of amusement. Oh, you don’t have to mind that kind of thing! I’m keen enough on morris to want to get it right. I dare say it was awfully funny for the rest, but I hadn’t time to think about that. It was jolly decent of her to think I was worth taking trouble over. I hardly think I am myself,” and she walked down the room to Maidlin’s corner.

The girls saw her say something—apparently, “I hear you’ve been reading something of mine. Which book was it?”—for Maidlin’s face lit up in incredulous interest, and they were soon deep in talk.

The class, failing to give satisfaction in its shuffles, found its sets broken ignominiously up and everybody set to practise up and down the room in long lines. Forward for two bars, then shuffling backwards for two, they went time after time, till they thought they must know every mark on the floor, for all had their eyes on their feet. Their teacher walked up and down between the lines, watching critically, making comments and suggestions, and very occasionally giving a sparing word of praise. Jen’s eyes met Joy’s, bright with suppressed amusement, but they kept their feelings to themselves, till after ten minutes of steady shuffling they were allowed to rest a moment.

“Don’t you feel an infant in arms?” Jen laughed, as she dropped into a chair near Maidlin. “But it’s just what I needed! I knew the less said about my shuffles the better. And of course, she saw!”

“I never knew what was wrong with mine before. I knew they were bad! But she spotted it as soon as she looked at my feet; did you see her stand over me till I got them the right width apart? It’s a different thing all together when you’re made to see it.”

“She’s been telling me about people!” Maidlin whispered to Joy, when the morris class was over, and in the interval the Writing Person had gone to speak to others. “There! That one she’s talking to now! She’s a Wise Brown Owl; doesn’t it sound funny? It means she’s the leader of a lot of little children called Brownies, who aren’t old enough to be Guides yet; and she teaches them singing games, and plays with them, and does Nature study with them, all in the middle of London somewhere. The Writing Lady says the Brown Owl once gave up a whole evening’s dancing to go out with her into the country, to a wood where there were all kinds of birds’ nests and baby birds, because she wanted to tell her Brownies about them afterwards.”

“She’s the tomboy from Oxford Circus, Joy,” said Jen, glancing at the round faced girl with wavy bobbed dark hair, who was chatting eagerly with their new friend.

“And that one she’s going to now!” as the Writing Person turned to another friend. “She told me about her too,” Maidlin said eagerly. “She’s the drill and games mistress in a big school, with four hundred girls, and she teaches them all country dancing, and they dance beautifully. She doesn’t look nearly old enough, does she? But then none of them do. I suppose it’s the drill dresses, isn’t it?”

“And the bobbed hair; you see how many of them have it! I suppose you know everybody?” Joy challenged the writer of books, when she returned from her chat with the jolly, happy looking gym mistress.

“I wish I did! But I’ve been coming to classes for some time now, and the same people keep turning up.”

“Tell us about some of them!” Jen urged. “We aren’t going to dance in this. We’re going to race home to change for the party in a moment.”

“I’m going out for coffee. I can’t go round asking questions of all of them, though I’d love to. Everybody has some story behind, but it’s only by chance you hear about them. If I asked questions, they’d think I was after copy! As if I had time to think about my work, once I get here! I’m far too busy enjoying myself. I believe some of them suspect me of coming to find things I can make use of afterwards; if they only knew, it takes me all my time to keep up with people like Madam, who expect you to be frightfully quick at picking up things. I never think about work from the moment I get here till I’m safely away again; haven’t a second to spare for it. That’s why the classes are such a rest, such a thorough change. As for thinking, “I could use that in a story,” and at the same time paying decent attention to all those thousands of tiny points you have to remember in morris, or the figures in country, it simply can’t be done. I’m far too rattled to think about anything but the business of the moment.”

“But you have used dancing in books, haven’t you?”

“Oh, yes! But I’ve never consciously come to classes or schools to look for material. What does happen, of course, is that when I’ve enjoyed a thing enough, it has to come out later; generally after some months. Things lie for a while, and then they work up into stories. But not at the time! And I never go about asking questions from that point of view. But I am always interested in the stories lying behind people, of course, and sometimes things come out in talk. One thing that always surprises me is the girls, just bits of girls, who answer to “Mrs.” when the register’s called. I suppose it’s the result of the war. That one, first woman in this set, the very pretty dancer; do you see?”

“Yes? She’s not married, surely?”

“Got two children, a boy of three, and a girl of five. Well, she says so!” in answer to their incredulous protest. “I’ve only seen a photo of them. We asked if she’d been married at eleven, but she was nineteen, and it was in 1914. She’s a war widow; oh, yes! The husband’s dead. There are other stories I could tell you; just now and then I hear about some one. I had a little partner once, with straight, bobbed hair; looked about seventeen. But if you’d heard that kid talk about geology and botany! She was taking her B.Sc. at Chelsea Polytechnic, and giving up all her holidays to specimen hunting. She got it, too; and also got engaged to a boy who was the same way inclined. You’d never have thought she was brainy to look at her!”

“Tell us some more!” Jen begged eagerly. Joy was listening in deep interest.

“Oh, I can’t go on telling life histories! But there is one very interesting thing about nearly all these people! If you talk to them long, you find they have “girls” in the background. You hear about “my girls” or “my children.” Sometimes it’s the children in their day school classes; most of them are teachers, of course. But very often it’s big girls, Guides, or a club, or Guildry, girls to whom they’re teaching folk dancing in the evenings, mostly just for the love of it. They nearly all do it.”

“And have you girls in the background, too?” Joy asked curiously. “Real ones, I mean? Or are the book ones enough? You don’t teach, do you?”

“Not regularly; I wouldn’t have the patience! But I have girls too. I doubt if I could go on having the book ones otherwise. I mean, you want to be with real girls sometimes; don’t you think so? Mine are a Camp Fire; I’ve been their Guardian for six years.”

“A Camp Fire? What’s that?”

“Oh, there really isn’t time to tell you that!” she laughed. “But see my Guardian’s pin; isn’t it neat? You’ll never see me without that! And there’s the ring; our sign of membership,” and she took a silver ring from the little finger of her left hand, and told the meaning of its symbols. “We’re very keen on sword and country dancing. The girls would like morris too, but they can’t give the time to practice that I think it needs. My respect for morris is too high, and my opinion of my own is too low. I’d hate to have it badly done. So we stick to swords and country. I remember the excitement the first time I suggested country dancing!”

“Did you begin it so that you could teach the girls? Jolly decent of you!”

“No, I’m afraid I didn’t. That idea came later. I began because I loved the music, and wanted to know what dances fitted the tunes. But the girls were keen from the first. I remember our first night with “Earsdon”, too,” she laughed. “We couldn’t untie our Nut. And I’d thought I’d understood it! When I told Madam, next week, she stared at me for a moment, and then just shouted.”

“Earsdon”! Help! Fancy teaching rappers!”

“The girls love them; but then they’re a fairly brainy lot; I only taught one team, you know, not the whole crowd. We tried it in our dining room first, and nearly smashed the electric light.”

“I should think so!” Jack, leaning on Jen’s shoulder, was listening round eyed. “Couldn’t untie your Nut? Don’t you mean you couldn’t tie it?”

“We tied it beautifully,” the Writing Person assured her gravely. “But we couldn’t undo the wretched thing again; short of flinging it on the floor and kicking it to pieces, of course. There was always that as a last resort. We didn’t know which handles to take when it was lowered; that was the trouble. I’d learned it as Four, and, without realising it, I’d been content to take the last hilt and point, the one everybody else had left for me; and it had always come right. I’d had the feeling all along that it had just happened by chance, but that I didn’t know why. When the girls tried to untie, their hands came all crossed, and we were tied up in the most awful knot.”

Jack giggled. “Did you phone for Madam to come and undo you?”

“I thought we’d have to. The girls all looked at me most accusingly, and I felt desperate. We pulled the thing to pieces on the floor, and tied it again, very carefully, and then we all stood and looked at it for a long, long time, and talked about it, till we knew just which hands had to be on top, and how many hilts and points there must be between each. I even suggested tying coloured threads on our own handles, to be sure we’d get the right ones again, but the girls wouldn’t hear of it; they wanted to understand, and, of course, they were right. We’ve never had any trouble with our Nut since. We had a frightful experience a few weeks ago!” she said pensively. “We’d worked up “Sleights” and “Earsdon”, and were going to show them for the first time, and all the parents and heaps of friends were invited; and the night before the show, Number One in “Sleights” and Three in “Earsdon” began with measles!”

“Help! The night before? What did you do?”

“Put in a reserve who knew her Single Guard and Nut, but not her figures, and did double work myself taking care of her and telling her how to turn, and at the same time keeping up my own end as Five. And went into “Sleights” as One myself. I was in “Earsdon” already, because the girls wouldn’t face it without me to whisper the names of the figures. Unfortunately, they have fancy names for them, and I don’t always remember. “Prince of Wales” is known as “Kitty’s arm exercises”, or “Where you swish round”; “Fixy” is “Putting on Kitty’s braces”! It needs presence of mind to think where you’re doing it.”

“Yes,” Jack laughed. “If you come out with those names in class, Madam will stare! How did you go, after all those troubles?”

“Fairly correct, but very slow and careful. No life in it, but nobody in the audience knew that. They’d never seen rappers before, and they were properly thrilled. But we all knew that our stop-gap had a doubtful elbow, that might give way at any moment; and that she’d just put her knee out. And there she was doing “Prince of Wales” and step-and-jump over the swords! We were all in terror of what might happen any second.”

“Frightfully plucky of her to see you through!” Jen remarked.

“Yes, it was jolly decent. But she didn’t give way anywhere, and the situation was saved. But I thought my hair would be white before the end of that evening.”

The girls laughed. “But if you’ve taught “Earsdon”, why do you keep coming to the class every Friday?” Jack asked curiously.

“For the fun of doing it. I love it, now that I’ve stopped being terrified”—Jack laughed sympathetically—“Besides, I don’t say I could do any place! I’ve got it all written down, and I’ve taught my own team, and I could teach it again; but I never know how they’re all going to turn in “Fixy”! I leave that to them; they all know their own places. If I had to be anything but Five at a moment’s notice, you’d see me feverishly reading it up. I always think you need to learn “Earsdon” at least five times. I say!” she hinted, “hadn’t you better—did you say you were going to change?”

Jack gave one glance at the clock, and fled. Joy paused to say to Maidlin, “We shan’t have time for any dinner. You wait here for us, kiddy, and I’ll bring you a bun. You can hold out, can’t you? It isn’t worth while coming with us. We shall simply fling off our tunics and jump into frocks and come tearing back.”

“She’ll come with me, and have buns in the shop at the corner,” said the Writing Person. “I always go there for coffee before the party begins; there’s such a crowd in here, and it’s such a waste of time to have it when you might be dancing! You’ll come, won’t you, Maidlin?”

Maidlin looked up at her with shy interest. “Will you tell me more funny things about your Camp Fire?”

“Funny! That concert wasn’t funny! It was a fearful occasion—at the time! But I’ll talk Camp Fire, if you like—Indian names, and gowns, and symbols. You know all about it, of course!”

“It was in the book. I’ve never heard of it before. I’d like to go camping! Did you ever have a cat just like that one?”

“Grey Edward? We’ve got him still. He’s supposed to be very proud because he’s been put in a book and everybody’s heard about him. He says it doesn’t happen to many pussies!”

Maidlin laughed. “Does he talk as much as he did in the book?”

“Well, my sister says he does. She translates; he’s her cat. We have to take her word for it. Slip out quietly; don’t let the door bang. It’s a fearful crime. The noise when it bangs nearly reduces Madam to tears,” she laughed, to Joy and Jen, who had changed their shoes and were hurrying out. “It gets on her nerves till she nearly weeps, and wants to swear, and her husband does it for her. I saw her sit down and cover her ears and shudder once; so he expressed her feelings for her, quite forcibly, and then said soothingly, “It’s all right, dear! I’ve said it for you! You can go on now!” See you later, then! Come along, Maidlin!”

Chapter 19 - One Jolly Evening

IT had been another day of new experiences for Maidlin, but not the least of them came in the last two hours. Hoisted up on to a wide window sill by Joy, she sat enthralled as the big square hall filled with girls and men, till all the wide floor space was a mass of moving colour. The dances had no meaning for her yet; she had never seen a country dance except in that evening’s class. She saw that sometimes the dancers were in rings, flying round with linked hands, sometimes in long double lines stretching the whole length of the hall, sometimes in square sets of eight people, sometimes in short lines of six or eight, and sometimes in little squares of four. Sometimes suddenly they were all in lines hand in hand across the hall, running up towards the platform; she did not know how it had happened, but it had come about quite easily and naturally, with no bustle or confusion; one moment they were facing one another in the double lines, the next, all were facing up hand in hand, without any sign or word of command. Maidlin wondered greatly how they all knew what to do at the right moment, as she saw it happen so easily, time after time.

She saw, too, that they were never in couples, going round and round the hall, as in all the dances she had hitherto seen, but were much more “mixed up all together,” as she vaguely phrased the more sociable character of the country dances. She saw that the dancers sometimes clapped their own hands, or their partners’, and that they skipped and ran, in steps children might have used in their games, but that there was never a difficult step, or one which she could not understand, used during the whole party; nothing in any way like the morris she had watched with wondering eyes. She noted a great many who were not “dressed up” at all, but wore light summer frocks or coloured silk jumpers, though there were more, like Joy and Jen, in pretty evening dresses and “ultra-swish” frocks of vivid colours; the blending and interweaving of the colours was wonderful. And she saw, without a shadow of doubt, that the dancers were all enjoying themselves immensely; the talk and laughter, and the eagerness for places in sets, testified to that.

She saw the teacher of the previous morris class dancing all through the evening, as if she had not taught for two hours and a half, with only an apple to keep her alive. She saw Joy and Jen dash to welcome another, a brown haired, happy looking fair girl in a black evening frock with touches of vivid blue, and bare neck and arms, and heard their greeting, and the jolly infectious laugh with which she gave them answer.

“Duchess! You’ve got a new frock! And you do look regal in it! Is that because you’ve got married?”

“No wonder you weren’t here to take us in morris, if you were getting into that! We came early on purpose to have a class with you!”

“Have you buried anybody lately?” Madam retorted. “Or do you only do that on Thursdays?”

“Only on Thursdays. So Jen brought me up to town yesterday, for safety’s sake. Are you going to dance “Butterfly” with him? For if it’s going to be as wild as that “Haste to the Wedding” on our lawn, I’m going into another set. You two will do some damage indoors.”

“We’ll be very careful when we come near you and Jen,” Madam promised kindly, and went with her husband to a place in the line, and presently danced down the room and up again like a schoolgirl.

“You’ll kill somebody, you two!” Joy warned her, when they met, and steered Jen out of the way. “You want the whole hall to yourselves!”

“We’re only enjoying ourselves,” and the husband quite obviously tried to take his partner off her feet, and failed ignominiously, in spite of the challenge of her dancing eyes.

Maidlin saw other greetings also; heard a plump, jolly girl greet Joy with a shout of, “Hallo, Shirley! You’ve turned up again! Good news from Hobart? Where’s Joan got to now?”—and recognised her as the heroine of one of Jen’s stories; saw Jen rush up to a black haired girl of her own age, and, after demanding a dance, begin to talk eagerly about Cicely and Dick, and end with a question, “Have you burgled anybody lately?” That was evidently another story, by the laugh it raised; and the two went off arm in arm to find places in a longways set, Jen declaring, “I’ve never done it! I don’t know a step of it. Can you shove me through? Is it fair, or shall I put everybody out?”

“Oh, I’ll haul you through. It’s as easy as easy,” said Avvy Everett, Cicely’s new sister-in-law. “It’s only “corners back-to- back, skipping ring of four once and a half round, and change with your partner back to places”,” and this, cryptic as it sounded to Maidlin, seemed to reassure Jen.

“Sure that’s all? Oh, I won’t funk that!” she laughed, as the piano and violin struck up “The 29th of May”.

“What a topping little dance! I love those skipping rings!” and Jen came to rest, breathless and exhausted, on the chairs below Maidlin’s perch, where Joy had already collapsed, to pant and fan herself. “Joy, how the Hamlets would love that! We must give it to them soon! How have we missed it so long?”

“Didn’t know it ourselves. Yes, they’d love it. We’ll have a party and teach it to them, Jenny Wren. The Club must have a good thing like that.”

“I’ll fetch lemonade,” said Jen. “This is where it would be useful to have a man. Avvy, can’t you find a man to scrounge lemonade for us? We’re dying! Haven’t you any more brothers?”

“Madam dances every dance with a different man, and sends ‘em all in turn to fetch lemonade,” Joy said enviously. “I’m sure that’s the fifth or sixth. She’ll be ill!”

“Useful, sometimes, to have all the men buzzing round!” Jen commented, and went to take her turn in the crowd round the table.

“The jolliest party I ever was at, except perhaps an out-of- doors one at Cheltenham, was down at Plaistow, with the Pixie’s girls and men,” the Writing Person had danced with Jack, and now sat by Joy to rest.

“Oh, have you been? We’re to go to one sometime. What is it like?” Joy asked eagerly.

“Priceless. They all dance fearfully hard, and the Pixie, in a white frock, stands up on the high platform under the roof and acts as M.C., and shouts orders in a voice that every one can hear; and if there’s too much noise she uses a whistle. When she wants to come down, she clings to the rope and runs down the ladder, and some big man, or two or three men, lift her off and deposit her tenderly on the floor. Then she runs round and arranges the sets, and hustles everybody into the places she thinks would be best for them, and breaks up the little cliques, if they’re beginning to form, and nobody minds; they’ll all do anything for her. She simply won’t stand cliques. If you go to her parties, you’ve got to be ready to dance with anybody and go just where she thinks you’ll be most help to those who don’t know the dances well. You really haven’t any choice in the matter. But then you don’t want it. You feel, as they do, that you’ll do any mortal thing she wants, if only it will help her. And you’ve only got to look at any of those men and girls to see how much they think of her.”

“Do you often go to see her?” Joy asked soberly. “I’m going. I haven’t been often yet, but I’m going oftener.”

“I like to go when I can. I feel better for going. When I went last,” and the Writing Person laughed, “I was very busy on a new story, and I hadn’t had a minute to get to it all day. I had an hour in the train, to reach Plaistow, with no changes; so I took the story with me, settled down in a corner seat, and took no more notice of anybody. Fortunately, I woke up at West Ham, or I might have gone on to Barking. I told the Pixie I’d had a very happy journey, as I’d written a thousand words since I’d left home. She looked at me in astonishment, though I don’t know why she should! It’s no funnier to write in the train than to do lovely crochet, as she does! Then she said warmly, “Well, you’ve made your fare, anyway!” How I laughed! I’d never thought of it like that. I just knew I’d cleared a worrying chapter out of the way, and now I could go ahead. And I did a big bit more on the way home.”

“I wonder you could write in the train?”

“Oh, I forgot all the rest of the world! The other people in the carriage simply didn’t exist. I was a long way away.”

“Where were you?” Joy asked curiously; but the Writing Person only laughed.

“When are you coming to see me?” Madam flung the question at Joy and Jen, as they met her coming down the line in “The Whim”.

“When may we? We’d love to. But you’re always out. We must go home tomorrow;” they were passing her in the changes of the hey.

“Early afternoon? I’ll give you tea! I have that sword class at six, remember.”

“We’ll love it!” and then they went up the line and she went down.

“If you wait till I write and ask you, you’ll wait for ever,” Madam called, when presently they met again going in the other direction; for the dancers had refused to stop when the music did, and had clapped till the Prophet at the piano, with a kindly laugh of pleasure at their enjoyment, struck up the air again and gave them a little more. “I never touch a pen until I’m absolutely obliged,” she said, as she did back-to-back with Joy. “Is that the child who fell out of the pulpit on to us? The Italian heiress? Bring her, too. What have you done to her? I said she was pretty!” as they changed places in the hey.”

“Put her into a pink frock. Joy’s adopted her, and we’re bringing her up and broadening her mind,” Jen explained. “Oh, last time!” regretfully, as she bowed and Joy curtseyed. “What a dear little dance! The Club must have that one too. We didn’t know it; that’s two new ones tonight!” exultantly to Madam. “It is topping to feel there are still new dances to learn!”

“Oh, you don’t know a hundred and twenty five yet!” Madam retorted.

“Can I get you some lemonade?” Joy asked politely.

Madam missed the mischief in her eyes, and answered innocently, “I think my partner’s getting me some. Thanks all the same.”

“Every single partner does! And you were ill last autumn! Do you think it’s safe?” Jen teased.

“Oh, I’m quite all right now. And it’s not as bad as all that!” indignantly. “Have you rotters been keeping count?”

“I think we’ll retire,” Jen laughed, as the partner and the lemonade arrived. “See you tomorrow! Thanks awfully!”

“Do they often have parties like that?” Maidlin whispered, as she crept into Joy’s arms that night.

The final closing dance, in a huge ring that filled the whole big hall; and other smaller rings inside, till five circles were swinging round at once; the hearty, laughing farewells; the run through the quiet streets; and the hasty but much-needed supper, had all seemed dream-like to her, for after the exciting day she was very tired. But it had been a very happy dream, and the music and laughter were ringing in her ears, and the vivid moving mass of colour still danced before her eyes—that wonderful “wave” moment of arms-up to the centre—the five widening rings swinging round and back again—as she crept into bed, less tired in her limbs than Joy and Jen and Jack, who had crawled home “in the last stages of exhaustion and starvation,” they declared, but more weary in mind because to her it had all been so new and surprising.

“About nine in the year, in London; three in each term; but they have them at holiday schools as well. They have lectures and singing-evenings and dance shows as well. Now don’t ask me to talk tonight, kiddy! I’m simply dead; and tomorrow we’ll all be stiffer than stiff! Wait till you hear our groans when we try to go downstairs! Are you wondering why we do it? Because we can’t help it; that’s all I know. Madam says it’s mania; but she’s got it quite badly herself. You saw her?—the big, jolly, pretty one, with heaps of friends, who danced all the time, and in a way nobody else does, quite. Cicely and Joan say so, anyway. She’s asked us to tea tomorrow. Cheers! I want to see where she lives. Now go to sleep, infant. I’m too dead to talk!”

From Chapter 23: 'Spring Idol'

Chapter 23 - “Spring Garden”

MRS. Shirley came down the wide staircase to the entrance hall, and smiled at the picture of the four girls in their dancing frocks, as they waited for the members of the Hamlet Club to arrive. Joy had been faithful to her first choice, and wore bright apple green, with a white muslin collar and little white cap laid on her bronze hair. Jen’s frock was of rich blue, with rosettes of bright cherry ribbon high under her arms and a full swinging skirt, the round neck and short sleeves edged with ribbon to match the rosettes. Rosamund’s very short dress was of bright golden brown, “the colour of a well baked scone,” Joy had said teasingly, with white frills at the elbows and neck. Maidlin’s golden frock had been made with a smooth, simple little bodice and a short full skirt coming high under her arms, and the simplest of white collars and wide cuffs, and with her hair braided in long black plaits she was a picturesque contrast to fair haired Rosamund. Both wore white stockings and flat dancing shoes, and both, at present, had the plain white caps which they wore as “women,” but which they would discard if they decided to dance as “men,” to show their sex. Without any conscious thought of the pretty effect of their contrasting colours, but with the true folk dancer’s disregard for anything but enjoyment, they had arranged to be partners for a good deal of the dancing.

“Because you don’t know the girls, yet Maidie, and you mustn’t get left out,” the invitation to make a couple had come from Rosamund. “Of course, you’ll want to dance with Joy and Jen too, and Babs will ask you, because the Queen always does. But if you haven’t a partner for anything, you can count on me. I’ll shove you through!”

In Joy’s memory, that afternoon lived as “the party when things happened.” It was the most eventful meeting of the Hamlet Club she had known, except only for the one at which she was chosen Queen, and that other night in the barn, when Cicely had made her engagement and Joan’s known, and Madam and the Pixie had come to dance the Running Set to the Club for the first time.

All began happily, however, and even Maidie forgot to be shy as the crowds of eager, bright faced girls arrived, cycling, walking, or driving, changed their shoes and left their coats and hats indoors, and gathered on the lawn, where a morning’s hot sun had dried the smooth turf, and a week of showers and sunshine had brought the spring flowers into full glory. The daffodils, the almond trees, the deep blue scillas, the white and crimson prunis, were no more vivid than the dancing frocks of the girls, however, and their chatter drowned even that of the blackbirds and thrushes, whose astonishment at this invasion of their domain was loud and insistent at first. When Margia Lane tuned her fiddle and struck up “Haste to the Wedding,” and then “Butterfly,” it would have been difficult to find a gayer scene, even at a London evening party.

Mrs. Shirley smiled, and sighed for Joan, as she stood watching from the long hall window. Babs Honor—Queen Barbara—had insisted, for reasons of her own, on opening the dance with Rosamund, and was leading her down the middle. Joy had Maidlin as a partner, and was bidding her, “Lean well back and let yourself go, as you saw Madam do at the party; but keep facing me; don’t twist your shoulder round!” when they came to the swing and change; and if Maidlin’s skipping was a trifle uncontrolled, it was very hearty and full of enjoyment. At last she was really part of a dancing party! No longer need she look on, as on that Thursday night! Now she knew what it was all about; now she understood how to give herself up to the music and obey its command. She exulted in the thought, and in the joy of the movement, and danced well.

Jen was dancing with Nesta, one of her first partners, four years ago. But when “Rufty” was called, she came to claim Maidlin for her partner, and the long lines changed as if by magic into squares for four.

After several set dances, for eight and six, Joy called for “longways for as many as will” again, and, standing on a chair, taught the two new dances she and Jen had learned at the party, “The 29th of May” and “The Whim.” These were new to the Club, and were received with delight and given a high place among favourites at once; the skipping rings of the first, and the more subdued, but more finished, balance and change, back-to-back and hey, of the second, taking the fancy of the girls by storm.

Then came tea, in groups sitting under the trees, on all the rugs and cushions the house could furnish, since no one would agree to go indoors; and after tea a time for rest and chat. Joy and Jen, making up for the interval since their last meeting with the Club and greeting friends on every hand, met near the house, and stood on the slope below the windows, looking over the pretty scene.

“Rosamunda’s taking care of Maidlin and introducing her to “dear old Meg” and everybody else. She’s a jolly good sort!” Joy said warmly. “And Maidlin’s thawing visibly in the atmosphere of the Hamlet Club!”

Jen nodded, but her eyes were on the almond trees around the lawn, each a miracle of soft pink cloud, almost too faint and fairy like to be blossom—on the sheets of daffodils spread below the green tipped branches of lilacs and laburnums—on the snowy prunis trees, with their crimson leaf buds just opening—on the green dancing floor, and the hyacinths round its border.

““Spring Garden”!” she said softly. “Joy, they ought to dance it! But oh—think of Plaistow! Wouldn’t you bring the whole of London here, if you could?”

“I’ve thought of it often,” Joy said soberly. “But it’s no use, Jen; we can’t do that! We must do the little we can to help the Pixie, who’s doing a lot, that’s all. As for “Spring Garden,” the girls would love a new big dance, but you’d have to give it them. I haven’t even seen it.”

“I? I couldn’t teach the Club!”

“Why not? You teach your classes at home!”

“Oh, but they’re only infants! I could never teach the Club! Why, Edna and Georgie are here, and they’ve been dancing since the very first start of the Club, when I must have been about ten!”

“But, my dear kid, they haven’t been to Cheltenham! Or to London!” that was a conclusive argument to Joy. “You’ve had the real thing, from the real people. Everybody knows that. A week of Madam is worth years of our kind of pottering! And you had two weeks of her, and one of the Pixie! Get up on the chair and have a shot at it. I’m going to learn “Spring Garden” too.”

“But it’s difficult, Joy! They’ll never remember. I’m not sure that I’ve got it right myself.”

“I saw you writing it down,” Joy said ruthlessly. “And you know you looked it up in the book, and said it was all right. Don’t funk, Jenny Wren! You’ll teach us beautifully!” and before Jen could finish her protest, she was mounted on the chair, and the girls, eager and interested, were in longways sets of eight before her.

Half shy for once, and very doubtful of her own powers, she eyed them deprecatingly, more than half inclined to apologise for her impertinence. For a moment she hesitated, then laughed, and spoke out bravely.

“Girls, I know it’s fearful cheek! But Joy wants me to try to give you a new dance. I’m the only one of us who’s learnt it, you see. It’s difficult, but if you’ll let me try, I’ll explain it as well as I can, and I believe you’ll love it. I had it from a topping teacher a fortnight ago; no, not one of the ones who came here! Quite a different kind of person! But a very special kind of teacher. I thought it was lovely of her to teach us “Spring Garden” in March; and Joy and I feel you ought to have it too. So if you’ll try, I’ll try too, if you’ll let me, and we’ll see how we get on. Longways for eight; that’s right! Now listen to the tune once; then start with forwards and backwards twice.”

The dance was complicated and long, for a country dance, but Jen’s orders were very clear and very definite, which was not to be wondered at, considering from whom she had learnt the dance. There were some girls present, however, who would not, or could not, take the trouble to think and remember; and for their sakes movement after movement had to repeated again and again. Gradually Jen’s calmness forsook her; her commands became more emphatic, her comments more scathing; and Joy’s grin of delight deepened till she could hardly keep in her laughter. At last Jen, exasperated beyond bearing, sprang from her chair and fairly hurled herself into the midst of the offending set, scolding right and left.

“I said turn right everybody! Everybody means all of you; don’t you understand English? Edna, which is your right hand? Don’t you know? Nesta, you were wrong, too, every time. When I say turn right, I mean turn right, and not left! I know it feels the wrong way, but it isn’t. How could I have said it so often, if I didn’t mean it? Go back to the beginning of the figure—the back-to-back square. Not the rest of you; you were all right. It’s only this set; they’re hopeless, I think. Now cast, as you did before; now set right and left, and cross, and turn right into places! No, no, Nesta! That way; right round, the longest turn!” and she took her friend by the shoulders and swung her round.

“Oh!” Nesta said blankly. “Oh, is that what you mean?”

“Now do you all see? Very well then! Do it once more, with the music, everybody, and do be careful, or I really shall begin to say things!—What’s the matter with you, Joy Shirley?” indignantly, for Joy had collapsed on the grass, hugging herself in silent glee.

“Madam! You’ve got her style to a T! It was priceless! You’re just her over again! Didn’t you know? I could just see her! I nearly died! They say we all catch our teachers’ little tricks! You got the wind up just as she does; that’s exactly her hectic way of flying into a set and shoving them right! It was as good as old Room C, at dear old Cheltenham! Oh, Jenny Wren, you have cheered me up this day!”

“Get up, you big silly!” Jen laughed indignantly. “We’ll go on without you, if you roll about there any longer! Maidlin’s waiting for you. I didn’t learn this from Madam, you goat!”

“You were Madam to the life. Now be the Pixie!”—and Joy rose dramatically. “SILENCE! Now”—very winningly—“we haven’t all quite got that, have we? Let’s have it just once more for luck, shall we?”

“Joy, you are an idiot! We’re ready, all but Joy, thank you, Margia! Be careful now, girls! Do think this time!”

“Madam’s mantle has fallen on you, Jenny Wren!” Joy murmured, as she took her place by Maidlin again.

“Now do the whole dance right through! And do think what you’re doing this time!” Jen commanded, when she had taught them the easier last figure; and Joy’s eyes danced again at the familiar words in a very familiar tone.

Jen ignored her, though she saw well enough. But at the end she said, with deliberate intention, “Yes, that’s quite good! It really wasn’t at all bad! Try to remember that for next time!” and her eyes met Joy’s mischievously. Then, from her chair, she called, I want this set, and that set, to stand out and watch the rest dance. Then they’ll dance and you shall watch,” to the dismayed victims. “Get on chairs and seats, or up on the bank and window sills, you audience people! I want you to see the pattern you’ve been making. It’s rather extra special.”

“Jenny Wren, what a perfectly brilliant idea!” Joy stepped up beside her and steadied herself precariously on half the chair. “Of course, we couldn’t see it while we were doing it! I’d no idea it looked like that. Oh, isn’t it pretty! What a topping idea, Jen!”

“It’s not original!” Jen laughed. “But it is brilliant. I saw it done in town that Friday night. We were told to watch the pattern, and there was a wild rush at once for the high seats at the back of the platform. We looked right down on the class; it felt perfectly awful when our turn came and the rest looked down on us, though! Like giving a demonstration in the bottom of the Albert Hall! I was sure I should lose my head from sheer fright, as I did that first day with Madam! I didn’t, though. Now you go and dance, and let us see how beautifully you can do it. That second figure is rather fascinating, isn’t it?”

“It’s all rather wonderful, the weaving in and out. I had no idea it was so brainy. I intend in future to watch every country dance from above, if I have to climb trees to do it! I love the way it disentangles itself. Cheers! It’s a great idea!”

“But they ought to show if they’re men or women! Women, do remember your caps! The first lot spoiled their effect by not showing what they were. That’s better; now we can see what it looks like. Yes, it is pretty!”

“Visitors, Joy! Alice is looking for you,” Maidlin came up as the girls gathered round Margia, clamouring for something simpler, something “we can do without thinking, and just let ourselves go, like “Goddesses” or “Mage” or a longways!”

“Bother! On a Saturday afternoon? I do call that the limit!” Joy said indignantly.

“Must you go? Won’t Mrs. Shirley see them?”

“She will, but I mustn’t leave it all to her. Joan doesn’t like her to be worried, and visitors worry her. They don’t need me here. You can carry on all right!” and Joy ran across the lawn to the house, with no very cordial feelings towards the intruders.

Chapter 24 - Another Queen From the Abbey

“BOTHER! Oh, bother!” Joy exclaimed, as she glanced at the card the maid handed her. “Those people again! Are they always going to catch us at awkward times? What do they mean by coming on a Saturday afternoon, anyway?”—for the card bore the names of the old lady and her son, who had come to see the abbey on the morning after Joan’s wedding.

“Their car had a breakdown, Miss Joy, and it was near our gate, so they come in to ask if Atkins could lend a hand at getting it right again, and Mrs. Shirley said the lady must come in to rest and wait.”

“Oh, I see! It’s not really a call. Of course, we ought to have called on them first. We were going to, in time!” Joy murmured apologetically. “But I do hate calling! I’m afraid I made aunty put it off. I’d better explain to the old lady! And I’d better explain why I’m dressed up!” she laughed, with a glance at her loose green frock. “It’s not exactly a March costume! She’ll think I’m always dodging about in weird garments, considering she saw me first in my tunic, and then the other day on Belinda, in my helmet and goggles and gaiters! But perhaps she didn’t recognise me that time; the man did, though! I saw his look. I expect they’ll be extremely frigid and disapproving towards me, and very gracious, but rather sympathetic, to poor dear aunty!”

Mrs. Shirley had sent for tea for Lady Marchwood, and was apologising for her delay in calling. As Joy went forward to add her explanation, the grave eyes of the man standing by his mother were on her curiously; she was so very dainty in the green and white frock and the little white hood, such a spring picture against the panelled walls, so graceful and yet so dignified in the easy movement her dancing had given her. Through the open window came the lilting music of “Lady Spellor,” and Joy’s foot was tapping unconsciously as she asked politely if the breakdown of the car had been serious, if her man had done everything to help, if they thought they were going to like the neighbourhood.

“I fear we have intruded at an awkward time,” Lady Marchwood glanced at the window, where the bobbing heads of the girls could just be seen.

“Oh, that doesn’t matter at all, if you’ll excuse my dancing frock! We’re only having a schoolgirls’ party, a meeting of our folk dance club,” Joy said lightly. “Won’t you come and watch? It’s really rather pretty, especially on the lawn,” and she led them to the window.

“I have been out of England for some years,” there was a curiously wistful note in the man’s voice, as he gazed intently at the moving coloured lawn, the happy girls, the flowers and trees behind. “This seems to crystallise all I’ve dreamed of, when I have been very far away. But we are keeping you from your dancing and your friends. Won’t you go back to them?”

“Oh, I’ve danced enough! That’s quite all right. Shall we see what they do next? It looks a wild muddle when the sets break up, doesn’t it?” as the Club crowded round Margia again.

“It is quite a pretty scene,” Lady Marchwood said graciously, as the tea arrived, and she and Mrs. Shirley turned back to the table.

“It’s more than pretty. May I watch? I would rather have this than tea. But I must not keep you—”

“I’ve had mine with the girls. Yes, do watch! I must wait on your mother first, though. I’ll come back,” and Joy went to hand tea and cakes.

“Thought he wanted to watch country dancing!” she said indignantly, but very much to herself, as she realised that, while she waited on one guest, the eyes of the other were following her every movement instead of looking out of the window. “He shall watch dancing! I’m not here on show!” and as soon as she could she went back to the window. “I’ll keep the silly creature busy! Staring like that, just because I’ve got on a baby frock and a white cap!”

“What are they doing now? Have they had a dance since I went away?” she asked severely, knowing very well that she, having heard the music of “Goddesses” all the time, knew more about it than he, who had only been watching her.

“It’s—it’s something very lively!” he gave a guilty start, and looked hastily out at the lawn, where the last figure was ending in a very wild cast off.

“It’s very untidy! They’re all over the place! Just look at Jen! That’s romping!” Joy said severely. “She ought to know better! Jen’s the tall one with the bobbed yellow curls, that you met in the crypt a fortnight ago; the one in the pretty blue frock. I nearly killed her in a motor bike accident, seven months ago,” she added defiantly. “You wouldn’t think so to look at her now, would you? We thought she’d be crippled for the rest of her life.”

“She seems to have made a very complete recovery,” the great traveller said gravely.

“You should see her dance a morris jig! It’s great; she puts so much into it. Oh, sets of eight! “Paper!” Then they’ll sing! How jolly nice of them!”

The voices of the girls, as they sang for the introductions—“If all the World were Paper, if all the Sea were Ink”—put the finishing touch to the picture on the lawn, and the great man’s face softened to a smile which changed it surprisingly, as he said,—

“Inexhaustible energy! One would think they would have no breath left!”

“The singing’s feeble!” Joy retorted. “But after “Goddesses,” it’s no wonder. They’ll go through this two or three times; yes, “arms up to the maypole”—that’s beginning again, you know. The maypole’s in the middle, though you can’t see it! It’s a May-day dance, of course.”

“Won’t you go and dance with them? I feel we have spoiled your afternoon.”

“Oh, I’ve danced heaps, thank you! I’ve been taught one new dance—by Jen; and I’ve taught the rest two others.”

“It all sounds very enjoyable!”

“Oh, it is! You’d better learn!” Joy said mischievously, her lips twitching. “Excuse me one moment!”

She went to the garden door and called to Maidlin, who was, of necessity, watching the dance. “Maidie, as soon as they stop, get hold of Jenny Wren, and say this to her! Say—“Jen, Joy says, if you love her, dance “Molly Oxford,” as you did in the orchard one morning!” Just that. And say it’s very important!”

Maidlin sped, a spot of brilliant gold, into the crowd to give the message. Jen laughed, and questioned, but could get no explanation.

“Margia! Joy says I’m to dance “Molly Oxford”! Do you think there’s anything the matter with her?”

“I should do it,” Margia laughed down at her from her perch on a chair. “I expect she has a good reason. I can think of one, anyway. She wants the Club to see you’re able for morris again. At Christmas you weren’t fit for jigs, you know. They’d all be pleased, Jenny Wren.”

“Oh, if you think it’s that, of course I will! I’m absolutely fit. I’d do more than a morris jig to please Joy. She still feels bad about that old smash-up. All right, Margia! Have a rest, girls! I’m ordered to show you how jolly fit and well I am! Hankies, please, somebody! Any one got any big morrisy ones? Good for you, Edna! And bells? Oh, cheers!” and she slipped the rings of bells up below her knees.

“She’s going to do it,” Joy at the window spoke softly but eagerly. “Now you’ll see! Watch this; it’s worth watching!” as Jen, a lone blue figure on the lawn, began to dance.

“Yes, that was very good! Very well done!” Joy spoke with deep satisfaction, as the girls on the banks below the windows broke into applause, and Jen, laughing and breathless, bobbed a curtsey and retired to rest by Margia.

It was very fascinating; and beautiful. I’ve seen nothing like it.”

“I’d forgotten you!” Joy said frankly. “I asked her to do it for you to see, but I’d forgotten everything but the joy of watching her. Won’t she say things when she hears there were strangers looking on? She thought she was only doing it for the Club. Oh, Jen’s a real folk dancer, and jolly good, and as keen as mustard!”

“I would like to see more,” regretfully, as Lady Marchwood rose to go. “Don’t you invite friends to look on?”

“Well, of all the cheek! Friends!” said Joy to herself, in indignant surprise. “Not outsiders, as a rule,” she said definitely. “We generally dance at school, or in our barn, near Wycombe. This is a special invitation.”

“We are neighbours. I hope we must not always remain outsiders,” he said tentatively. “Oh, but they are wanting you! We have trespassed on your time too long already!” as a shout went up from the lawn for “Joy! Joy!”

“I ought to go. I expect they want me to vote for the new May Queen. It’s a very important occasion!” and Joy excused herself and fled, glad to cut short the discussion of the extent of their possible friendship.

She ran lightly down the dark walled hall, unconscious that both her guests were gazing after her, one hungrily, the other with approval; and at the doorway met Queen Barbara giving out voting papers, scribbled Rosamund’s name on a slip, and screwed it up and handed it back to Babs.

“A pretty chatelaine for this old house!” said Lady Marchwood to Mrs. Shirley, as she thanked her for her hospitality and begged her to call if she felt strong enough, for since her illness in the spring a year before, Mrs. Shirley had been very frail.

According to custom, Queen Babs, and two of the earlier Queens retired to count the votes, in a corner of the big hall, and Jen, Edna, and other seniors set the excited Club to dancing again, by begging Margia to play “Pop goes the Weasel.” The call of the music was too strong; the girls turned from useless guessing on the result of the voting, formed their long lines again, and began running gaily round in rings of three, “popping” one under the raised arms of the other two, and repeating the movement with the waiting “second man”.

“The first dance I saw the Club do!” Joy murmured. “In the old barn, when Joan and I had been to tea with Cicely for the first time. I’d just heard that Joan meant me to go to school instead of her; but none of us dreamed that I should ever be Queen, let alone Joan! It has all been queer! I wonder if kid Rosamund is the new one?” and she turned to ask Mrs. Shirley if the visitors had tired her.


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Text © Ju Gosling aka ju90 2010

Supported by Arts Council England, Well London, East London Dance, English Folk Dance and Song Society, London Borough of Newham, Newham NDP. Lottery funded.