Hester's Story (18 page)

*

The celebration at Gino’s restaurant went on until the early hours of the morning. Madame Olga and Piers left before the others, and after they’d gone, Hester glanced around the table and suddenly felt as though she were outside her own body, looking down at everything. The voices, the laughter, the lights of candles stuck into Chianti bottles on every table were far away and she almost fainted.

‘Are you okay, Hester?’ said Nell. ‘You look most odd. Very pale. Has it all been too much?’

‘I don’t know. I did feel funny for a bit, as though – I don’t know how to describe it – as though there was a huge cliff by my feet and nothing but empty space and I was about to fall. All of you, the tables, everything were all far away and I was, I don’t know. Afraid, I suppose. I expect I’ve had too much wine.’

‘You’ve only had half a glass. And you added water to that,’ said Dinah.

‘I’m just tired,’ Hester said. ‘And a bit sad because Madame Olga’s going off early in the morning and I’ll miss her. Don’t worry, I’ll be fine tomorrow.’

*

In the Attic de Luxe, Hester undressed and got into bed in a daze of exhaustion. She felt like weeping, and didn’t really know why. All evening people had been saying nice things to her, and each time she’d felt like bursting into tears.

‘Good night, both,’ said Dinah, already sounding as though she were half asleep.

‘’Night,’ said Nell.

‘’Night,’ Hester said. ‘Thanks for helping me this evening.’ And then there they were at last, under cover of darkness, all the tears she’d been holding back for the last few hours. They rolled out of her eyes and into her hair. She turned over and hid her face in the pillow, hoping the others wouldn’t hear anything, if they were still awake which she doubted. Why, she asked herself. Why are you crying? This should be one of the happiest nights of your life. How can you? What would you say if someone asked you what on earth you had to weep into your pillow about? I’d tell them I was missing
Grand-mère
. She would have been so happy tonight if she could have been there, sitting in the front row next to Olga and Piers. I was a success,
Grand-mère
, and you weren’t there with me. That’s why I’m crying.

The gold chain,
Grand-mère
’s gold chain, fell forward against Hester’s chin and felt cool against her skin. She turned over on to her back and fingered it gently, leaf by leaf.

28 December 1986

Alison was walking across the hall when she met Hugo on his way to the kitchen for breakfast. A woman was on her way out of the house, too. She was tall and slim and the coat she was wearing was white and fluffy. She must be one of the dancers in
Sarabande
, Alison thought. I’d look like a polar bear in a coat like that.

‘Hello, Alison,’ said Hugo. ‘How’s everything? Hello, Silver. Have you had breakfast yet? This is Silver, by the way, Alison. Silver McConnell, this is Alison Drake. Claudia’s daughter.’

‘Hi!’ said Silver, and surprised Alison by grinning and putting out her hand to be shaken. She smiled at Hugo and said, ‘I’m going for a walk before class. I want to have a look at the garden.’

‘Nice to meet you,’ Alison muttered and then, realising that she’d muttered, began to smile to make up for it. She wanted to say something about how Silver looked exactly like her name, but Hugo spoke to her before she’d thought of how to put it.

‘Off exploring?’

‘Yeah,’ Alison answered. ‘Bye, Silver. Bye, Hugo,’ and before she could say anything else, Hugo had gone into the kitchen and Silver had closed the front door behind her. Alison was left alone in the hall.

The wooden floor here was polished and shiny, and a staircase led up to the corridors where all the bedrooms were. Hester – Alison still felt strange
thinking of her like that, even in her own head – had her own private rooms. The carpet on the wooden floor was gorgeous: maroon and peacock and pink and chocolate brown in complicated patterns of trees and flowers. The rest of the woodwork was almost black. The curtains were burgundy and gold, with tiny little glittery bits woven into them. The whole thing looked like a stage set or something. Alison could easily imagine a sword fight taking place on that staircase.

What was it that Hugo had said about ‘exploring’? Alison thought he was being stupid. Now, though, it seemed like something a bit more interesting to do than lie about indoors. She’d noticed the theatre as they drove up last night. That’ll do, she thought. I’ll go and explore that.

She opened the front door and made her way along the gravel path. Yes, there it was. It looked like some kind of doll’s house. Fancy having a theatre in your garden! Fab or what? When she got there, she was a little surprised to find the front door unlocked. She stepped into the foyer, which was quite deserted. It had pinky-red carpets, wall to wall, and a ceiling decorated with gold-tipped twirly bits. A chandelier hung above her – quite a small one, but very pretty, with crystal drops. To her left, a staircase curved upwards, to the circle she supposed. Soon, they’d all be here, ready for the first rehearsal. And the pep-talk from Hugo before that.

Hugo wasn’t bad. Not compared with some of Mum’s men, who’d been ghastly. A few of them had done a good job of pretending Alison didn’t exist, and in some ways, she thought, they were right. I’ve been at boarding school for three years so it’s quite easy for everyone to forget all about me for weeks and weeks. I bet Mum’s longing for the twelfth of January when I’ll be off her hands. Tears came into Alison’s eyes and she
blinked them away. Stop it, she told herself. Don’t be pathetic. It was pathetic to want someone’s love and approval so much. She’d been ultra-brilliant at hiding this and she was pretty sure Claudia thought she didn’t have much time for her. So I’m good at
something
, Alison thought. My mum doesn’t know how I really feel about her. Great. Fantastic. Also, she doesn’t know the first thing about me. Everything that’s important in my life she scoffs at. She makes fun of the fact that I want to be a midwife, and keeps going on and on about squalling babies and blood and how could I think of living my life with no one looking at me and applauding. That’s not what she says, but it’s what she means.

Alison turned and made her way up the stairs. This brought her to the theatre bar, a long room complete with bar stools and a mirror behind the bottles. There were windows all along the opposite wall and, at the far end, two glass display cabinets. She went over to the first one and gazed at a white dress with a long, gauzy skirt and a bodice covered in tiny, white satin roses. It was draped against some dark blue velvet and next to it was a garland, also of white roses, but these were bigger and there were leaves made of dark green velvet sewn in among the flowers. Alison read the words on the card lying next to the garland:
This is one of the costumes worn by Hester Fielding in the famous 1957 production of Giselle
.

It wasn’t all that hard to imagine the lady she’d met last night wearing such a wispy, skimpy dress. The waist was ridiculously tiny and wouldn’t have fitted a normally shaped child. Alison had seen
Giselle a
couple of times when her mother had been one of the ghosts, the Wilis, who dance to their death the men who betrayed them in life.

The other cabinet was full of ballet shoes, laid out in
rows on some more blue velvet. They were all satin, but of different colours – pink, white, black, lilac and red. You could see that they were worn, but the ribbons had been arranged to lie artistically in twists and curls. The card read
Shoes worn by Hester Fielding between 1950 and 63
.

Ballet dancers were funny, Alison reflected. There were stories about them taking off their shoes at the end of a ballet only to find them bloodstained inside from all the wear and tear on their toes. Thinking of this now made Alison wince. It was revolting! Claudia’s old shoes had never had any blood in them, thank goodness.

Between the cabinets she noticed a door. It would have been easy to miss it because it was so well disguised to look like part of the wallpaper, but there it was; a small, gold handle gave away the secret. Alison opened the door and began to go up the narrow, rather steep stairs she found behind it. Perhaps I’m not allowed to be here, she thought, and then realised that if anyone had wanted her to keep out, it would have been locked. The keyhole under the doorknob had a gold key in it, just like in a fairytale.

At the top of the staircase, she found a corridor, with doors to several rooms leading off it. She opened the first one she came to and stepped back, horrified. Someone was in there already, sitting on a chair at the far end of the room.

‘Oh, gosh, I’m so sorry,’ she said. ‘I didn’t realise that there was anyone up here. I’ll go …’

‘No, no, dear, don’t worry.’ The person on the chair stood up, and Alison could see that she’d been crying. She was busily wiping her eyes with a hankie and then she put on the glasses she was holding in her other hand. ‘I was just about to go back to the house. I know
who you must be. Miss Drake’s daughter, Alison. Am I right?’

Alison nodded, wondering how this woman knew this.

‘I expect you’re wondering how I know who you are. I’m Hester’s companion. Ruby Stott, but everyone calls me Ruby. I was Hester’s dresser for years and years, and there’s no standing on ceremony in the theatre, is there?’

‘I’m sorry if I’m not supposed to be here,’ Alison said. ‘I was just looking round. It’s … it’s lovely.’

Ruby seemed more like a teacher at school than someone connected to a theatre or a ballet company. She had a kind face and grey hair and she was wearing a grey tweedy skirt and a pale blue cardigan over a white blouse.

‘This is Wardrobe,’ Ruby told her. ‘We’re very lucky to have all this space. We’re over the auditorium now. The rehearsal room is next door. Much bigger than Wardrobe, of course. Both this room and the rehearsal room have very thick soundproof floors, but still, Hester insists that no one must be here during performances.’

‘It’s great,’ Alison said. The costumes – hundreds of them, or that’s what it looked like – were hanging in a cupboard with no doors, so that you could get at them more easily. She could see long, filmy skirts, and the stiff short skirts of tutus sticking out; there was lots of velvety stuff in bright colours; tights rolled into small bundles and piled up on a shelf on the other side of the room, and dozens of pairs of pink, blue, beige and black ballet shoes. These were stacked together next to the tights.

It was amazing how many shoes ballet dancers needed, Alison thought. There ought to be a way of making them stronger. These must be spares. Every
ballerina Alison had ever met took her own shoes with her wherever she went, in a special suitcase. Alison used to play with Claudia’s when she was a little girl, pretending that they were animals. She gave them names and arranged them in exactly the way they were arranged here with their ribbons nicely wound round and neatly tucked in.

‘What’s in that box?’ she asked, pointing to a small trunk standing next to the shoe cupboard.

‘Ribbons,’ said Ruby. ‘You can never have too many of them, I’ve found. They’ve all sorts of unexpected uses.’

‘May I look?’

Ruby nodded and Alison lifted the lid. She gasped when she saw what was in the box. There must have been thousands of them, all rolled up and in every colour she could imagine, as well as a few she hadn’t ever thought of – like a grey one which had strands of sparkling black woven through it and a white one sprinkled with red stars. ‘They’re fantastic, Ruby! Where did you find them all?’

‘I’ve been collecting them over years. Whenever I’m in a shop that sells them, I buy whatever catches my eye.’

‘They’re beautiful,’ said Alison. ‘Really lovely. Are you going to be using some on the
Sarabande
costumes?’

‘No, I think most of those are coming by road, later this week. Though your mother did tell me last night that she’s brought hers with her.’

‘Has she?’ Alison said, doing her best to remember. ‘I don’t really know.’ Then it came back to her: Claudia prancing round the lounge in what looked like peacock-blue chiffon tracksuit bottoms. Could that have been part of a costume? She’d had a kind of bra on top, with sequins all over it … yes, it had to be a
costume, because even her mother, who wore really silly clothes sometimes, wouldn’t have dared to go out in something like that. ‘I think she did try on some blue outfit.’

Alison went to stand in front of a full-length mirror that took up most of one wall. She noticed Ruby looking at her and turned round.

‘I’m sorry, I’ll go in a minute. I don’t know why I was looking at myself. I never do normally. I hate mirrors.’

‘Why would that be?’ Ruby asked.

‘Because I’m not good-looking. My mum thinks I’m ugly. She’s never said, of course, but she must think that. She’s very beautiful, you see. She thinks I don’t come up to scratch. I’m a disappointment.’

‘I’m sure she doesn’t think anything of the kind. And you know full well you’re not a bit ugly.’

‘Yes, I suppose I do really. It’s just that my mum is so beautiful. It’s intimidating. She says I don’t make the best of myself. That’s practically as bad as being ugly according to her. I don’t want to wear contact lenses. And I’ll never be a ballet dancer. I’m the wrong shape, sort of square and short.’

‘Well, I think you look fine. Unless, of course, you’ve ambitions to be a ballerina. Perhaps you’re not quite small enough for that. But I don’t think you’re that interested in dancing. Am I right?’

Alison laughed. ‘Can you honestly see me in a tutu? Such a stupid sort of dress, isn’t it? No, I hate ballet. Well, not hate it really, only I’m bored by it and I can never see the point of anything that goes on. It’s well, like a kind of silly game with its own rules and if you don’t understand them and obey them, you’re made to feel thick and insensitive.’

Ruby nodded. ‘I’ve never been very interested in the dancing side of it myself,’ she said. ‘Though I’ve spent
more than half my life in the theatre. I did like working with a lot of people, though. It’s hard to be lonely if you’re part of a ballet company.’