Sparrows Part 26

"You'll be saying you don't know the Old Bailey next."

"I don't. But I know a lot of people who should."

"Don't send 'em to 'Poulter's,'" said Miss Nippett. "There's enough already who're be'ind with their accounts."

A few minutes later, Mr Poulter entered the room, wearing evening dress, dancing pumps, and a tawdry-looking insignia in his coat.

"That's the 'B.A.T.D.,' Grand Council Badge," Miss Nippett informed Mavis.

"Wonderful!" exclaimed Mavis, who felt that her hypocrisy was justified by the pleasure it gave kindly Mr Poulter.

"Say we enjoy a whiff of fresh air before commencing our labours,"

suggested Mr Poulter.

Upon Mavis and Miss Nippett rising as if to fall in with his suggestion, Mr Poulter went before them, up the stairs, past the "Ladies' Cloak Room," along the pa.s.sage to the front door.

As Miss Nippett and Mavis followed the dancing-master, the former said, referring to Mr Poulter:

"'E once took the 'Olborn Town 'all for an 'All Night,' didn't you, Mr Poulter?"

"The night the 'Clacton Schottische' was danced for the first time,"

replied Poulter.

"And what do you think the refreshments was contracted at a 'ead?"

asked Miss Nippett.

"Give it up," replied Mavis.

"Why, no less than three s.h.i.+llin's, wasn't it, Mr Poulter?"

"True enough," replied Mr Poulter. "But I must admit the attendants did look 'old-fas.h.i.+oned' at you, if you 'ad two gla.s.ses of claret-cup running."

By this time, they were outside of the front door, where Mr Poulter paused, as if designing not to go any further into the night air, which, for the time of year, was close and warm.

"I don't want to give the 'Bush' the chance of saying Poulter never shows himself outside the walls of the academy," remarked the dancing-master complacently.

"There's so much jealousy of fame in the 'Bush,'" added Miss Nippett.

As they stood on the steps, Mavis could not help noticing that whereas Miss Nippett had only eyes for Mr Poulter, the latter's attention was fixed on the plaster figure of "Turpsichor" to the exclusion of everything else.

"A cla.s.sic figure"--(he p.r.o.nounced it "clarsic")--"gives a distinction to an academy, which is denied to mongrel and mushroom imitations," he presently remarked.

"Quite so," a.s.sented Mavis.

"She has been with 'Poulter's' fifteen years."

"Almost as long as I have," put in Miss Nippett.

"The figure?" asked Mavis.

"The statue 'Turpsichor,'" corrected Mr Poulter.

"Turpsichor," in common with other down-at-heel people, had something of a history. She was originally the plaster cast model of a marble statue ordered by a sorrowing widow to grace the last resting-place of the dear departed, a widow, whose first transports of grief were as extravagant as the order she gave to the monumental mason. But when the time came for the statue to be carved, and a further deposit to be paid, the widow had been fascinated by a man whom she had met in a 'bus, when on her way to visit the cemetery where her husband was interred. She was now loth to bear the cost of the statue and, as she had changed her address, she took no notice of the mason's repeated applications. "Turpsichor" had then been sold cheap to a man who had started a tea-garden, in the vain hope of reviving the glories of those forgotten inst.i.tutions; when he had drifted into bankruptcy, she had been knocked down for a song to a second-hand shop, where she had been bought for next to nothing by Mr Poulter as "the very thing." Now she stood in the entrance hall of the academy, where, it can truthfully be said, that no heathen G.o.ddess received so much adoration and admiration as was bestowed on "Turpsichor" by Mr Poulter and Miss Nippett. To these simple souls, it was the finest work of art to be found anywhere in the world, while the younger amongst the pupils regarded the forlorn statue with considerable awe.

When a move was made to the ballroom, Miss Nippett whispered to Mavis:

"If Mr Poulter wins the great cotillion prize compet.i.tion 'e's goin' in for, I 'ope to stand 'Turpsichor' a clean, and a new coat of paint."

When all three had waited in the ballroom some minutes, the pupils for the night cla.s.ses straggled in, the "gentlemen" bringing their dancing shoes in their overcoat pockets, the "ladies" theirs, either in net-bags or wrapped in odd pieces of brown paper. These "ladies" were much of a type, being either shop-girls or lady clerks, with a sprinkling of maid-servants and board school teachers. They were pale-faced, hard-working, over-dressed young women who read Marie Corelli, and considered her "deep"; who had one adjective with which to express appreciation of things, this "artistic"; anything they condemned was spoken of as "awful"; one and all liked to be considered what they called "up-to-date." Marriage they desired more than anything else in the world, not so much that they wished to live in an atmosphere of affection, but because they believed that state promised something of a respite from their never-ending, poorly recompensed toil. The "gentlemen" were mostly shopmen or weekly paid clerks with social aspirations; they carried silver cigarette cases, which they exhibited on the least provocation.

Mavis played, whilst Mr Poulter put the pupils through their steps. She had no eyes for the dancers, these not interesting her; her attention, of which she had plenty to spare, was fixed upon the kindly, beaming face and the agile limbs of Mr Poulter. It was a pleasure to watch him, he so thoroughly enjoyed his work; he could not take enough pains to instruct his pupils in the steps that they should take. Miss Nippett sat beside Mavis. Presently, in a few minutes' interval between the dances, the former said:

"Don't you ever be a fool an' teach dancing."

"Why 'a fool'?" asked Mavis.

"Look at me an' the way I 'obble; it's all the fault of teaching the 'gentlemen.'"

"Indeed!"

"The 'gentlemen' is such clumsy fellers; they always tread on my right foot. I tried wearing flannel, but they come down on it jess the same, 'arder if anything."

Soon after nine, Miss Meakin came in, having travelled from "Dawes'"

with all dispatch by the "Tube." She warmly greeted Mavis, congratulated her on getting employment at "Poulter's," and told her that, after she (Mavis) had left "Dawes'," the partners had made every inquiry into her habit of life. Miss Meakin had been summoned to one of the partner's rooms to say what she knew of the subject, and had sat near a table on which was lying Mavis's letter; she had made a note of the address, to write to her directly she was able to do so.

"We must have a long talk, dear; but not to-night."

"Why not to-night?"

"Mr Napper, my 'boy,' will be waiting for me outside."

"Bring him in and introduce me."

"He'd never forgive me if I did. He's all brains, dear, and would never overlook it, if I insisted on his entering a dancing academy."

"What is he?"

"He's a lawyer. But his cleverness is altogether outside of that."

"A barrister?"

"Scarcely."

"A solicitor?"

"Not yet. He works for one."

After the pupils had gone, Mavis, pressed by Mr Poulter, stayed to a supper that consisted of bread, cheese, and cocoa.