Dresses of Red and Gold Read online

Vivienne went out into the hall and listened to the preoccupied activity taking place in the kitchen. There seemed to be some crisis going on there about gold paint not drying fast enough and the wishbones having to be transferred to an oven tray…She returned to the lounge-room and wriggled out of her jersey and skirt. The beautiful dress settled luxuriously about her ankles as smoothly as water, the little gold cap sat on the back of her head like an opened flower. She climbed a chair to look, entranced, into the sideboard mirror. The dress fitted perfectly, apart from being slightly too long because Cathy was taller, and she curtsied to her reflection. She was the Princess Madeleine, getting ready for a banquet prepared in her honour. Soon her ladies-in-waiting would arrive to dress her red—no, chestnut hair, plaiting it into thick braids entwined with pearls. Her hands (petal-soft because she always rubbed exotic lotions into them at night and slept in gloves) would be adorned with magnificent jewelled rings. Those hands would carry a basket of beaten gold, filled with nosegays to toss to the humble peasants. How beautiful she would look as she entered the great hall which would be ablaze with a thousand tapering candles, her feet shod in delicate red slippers…

  ‘Oh, you wicked little hussy!’ Mum cried and whisked Princess Madeleine off the chair, giving her several hefty whacks at the same time. ‘Cathy told me she thought she’d heard you sneak in here! The very idea, touching the bridesmaid things when I said no one was allowed to, and so help me, if anything’s damaged, I won’t be held responsible for my actions…’

  The dress wasn’t harmed in the slightest, though Cathy, hovering in the door to watch someone else get into trouble for a change, acted as though it was now creased with wrinkles, stained under the armpits with sweat and all the stitches along the hem jerked undone. Vivienne, tingling from the slaps, retrieved her jersey and skirt, but Mum said tartly that she needn’t bother getting back into them, she could just take herself off to bed in disgrace for being so disobedient.

  Vivienne went, sticking her tongue out at Cathy, and telling herself that she didn’t care, she’d prefer to go to bed seeing they were all so mean about not letting her help with any of the interesting jobs. And anyway, at least she’d had the chance to try on that glorious dress, probably her only chance, for Mum had plans to remake it into a skirt and waistcoat for Heather immediately after the wedding. No one could take away the exhilaration of having been Princess Madeleine for a few brief moments, but Cathy needn’t think she’d ever speak to her again after tattling to Mum like that!

  She pretended to be asleep when Cathy finally came to bed, though Cathy knew she was shamming and acted provokingly on purpose. She let the wardrobe door bang, pushed the window up noisily, then jumped into bed so that it squeaked on its castors. Vivienne lay still and kept her eyes closed. Cathy kept the light on for a long time to read, clearing her throat boomingly at intervals. Vivienne gritted her teeth and said nothing. Mum came to turn the light off, saying bridesmaids should get plenty of sleep, but Cathy claimed that no one with their head pinched up in a vice could possibly be expected to sleep—unless they had some Ovaltine. Which she couldn’t get up and make herself because of her hands being tortured in slathered cream and gloves. Mum, too busy for arguments, fetched her some hot Ovaltine, and Cathy took her time about drinking it, making loud appreciative slurping noises for Vivienne’s benefit.

  Vivienne deepened her breathing into convincing snores. She hoped, when Cathy finally turned off the light, that the tight rag curlers would keep her awake all night, but Cathy fell asleep at once. Vivienne was the one who tossed and turned in jealous insomnia, praying for a miracle to stop Cathy being a bridesmaid tomorrow. That horrible Cathy didn’t deserve such an honour! She’d done nothing but moan about all the dress-fittings, and when Hilary Melling had taken her into town to buy those matching shoes she’d disgraced herself by asking if she could have a pair of riding boots instead and just wear her sandals to the wedding. It would serve her right if she woke in the morning with her face spotted with chicken-pox! Or—she might develop a sudden attack of stage fright, working herself into such a state of jitters they couldn’t possibly risk letting her spoil the wedding. Then they’d have to find someone else—someone nearly the same size as Cathy—to take her place! Dozens of things could happen, Vivienne told herself, knowing forlornly that none of them would. In the morning Cathy would put on the beautiful red and gold dress and go off to be a bridesmaid at Hilary Melling’s wedding, and that would be that.

  Vivienne fell asleep only when all the Sawmill Road roosters began to greet the dawn, waking blearily to hear Mum having a prodigious dithering panic all over the house as though she were the bride herself. Vivienne was hauled out of bed and scarcely given time to eat her porridge, then sent off to gather the extra fern so the buttonhole sprays could be finished.

  ‘I’ll need a lot, not just a handful of mingy sprigs,’ Mum said. ‘If you can’t find any by the river, try the quarry.’

  ‘It isn’t fair—why can’t Cathy go and pick it? It’s her godmother being married, not mine!’ And that was another injustice, Vivienne thought angrily—Cathy having a glamorous young godmother like Hilary Melling! She and Heather were stuck with boring Aunt Ivy, who sent them only a card every birthday accompanied by hectoring advice about how they could improve their characters.

  ‘Cathy’s under strict orders not to set foot outside at all this morning,’ Mum said, impulsively changing her mind and ripping off the new veiling she’d just tacked to her felt hat. ‘She’s been told to sit quietly in the front room and not disturb all those lovely curls I just brushed out. Go on, child, I’ve got a million things still to do, the sprays, and this hat looking like a chamber pot, with or without veiling. Now I’ll have to resurrect my navy straw instead—that’s if I can even find the wretched thing after Aunt Ivy tidying away everything not nailed down.’

  Vivienne, feeling distinctly martyred, went outside to search for more fern, having no inclination to traipse across to the river or all the way over to the quarry. She walked up the paddock to the damp little hollow instead, and even though the maidenhair fern growing there was pallid and sickly looking, she picked it all the same, hoping Mum would be too busy to notice. She didn’t intend to trudge around the countryside while that spoiled Cathy was loafing inside doing nothing at all! As it was, she was probably risking her life. The O’Keefes from up the road all said there’d once been an old well in the hollow, which had collapsed and been filled up with rubble. Nothing the O’Keefes said was ever trustworthy, but in this case they could be telling the truth. The hollow always felt damp even in midsummer, and might suddenly cave in while she was standing there collecting fern—which by rights certain other people should be doing! She could be sucked right down into an underground spring and drowned, and then there most likely wouldn’t be any wedding at all. It certainly wouldn’t look very nice being held on the same morning as a tragic family accident, although Cathy wouldn’t think it was tragic. She’d most likely just be full of glee at having an excuse to get out of being a bridesmaid…

  Cathy—who wasn’t in the lounge-room at all, but had sneaked outside and was now up in her lookout! Instead of going back to the house with the fern, Vivienne charged across the paddock to point out that other people could be malicious enough to tell tales, too, unless they received a grovelling apology. Cathy, however, wasn’t alone, but was engaged in one of her fierce, long-running battles with Danny O’Keefe, who was scowling up at her from the ground. Both of them looked dangerous, and Vivienne hesitated, not wanting to be involved. This particular fight, she surmised, was because part of Cathy’s lookout stuck over the fence into the O’Keefes’ paddock, and Danny had decided to make an issue of it.

  ‘I don’t give a brass razoo what you think!’ Cathy was saying belligerently. ‘That land under the branch might be yours, but you certainly don’t own anything in the sky above it! You just try taking potshots at aeroplanes and see what happens—by law this tree-house isn’t any different!’ />
  ‘I know the law better than you, Melling!’ Danny said. ‘If trees poke over into someone else’s yard, then they’re allowed to cut off the branch. That’s what I’m gonna do, saw off the branch and maybe your skinny legs, too, if they happen to get in the way—unless you let me up in that lookout!’

  ‘You just try coming up here and I’ll rip off your ears and use them as potholders!’

  Vivienne suddenly recalled a book she’d read where the heroine had united two warring families by speaking gentle words of wisdom. If she could achieve that where the O’Keefes were concerned, life would become much simpler. The walk to the bus-stop in the mornings, for instance, would be less traumatic without all those fierce tribal faces leering from behind telegraph poles. And she’d be able to get modelling clay from the quarry safely, for at the moment the O’Keefes considered it to be their own personal property. Anyone rash enough to climb down the quarry without permission ran a menacing gauntlet on the way out.

  ‘I don’t think you should talk to one another like that,’ she said earnestly, stepping forward. ‘It’s not friendly. I’ve got a better idea—why don’t you both sit down peacefully on the grass and take turns putting your side of the argument? Do unto others as thou wouldst have others do unto thee…’

  They stopped glaring at one another and eyed her with astonishment.

  ‘In fact there’s no reason why you couldn’t end up being the very best of friends,’ Vivienne simpered, greatly encouraged, beaming from face to face. ‘Neighbours should always be kind to each other. For example, you could take each other peaches if there’s any illness in the house…’

  ‘O’Keefes just nip in any old time and raid people’s fruit trees without even asking,’ Cathy said rudely. ‘And if I was sick, Danny O’Keefe’s the last person in the world I’d want to see! Except the sight of him would be a big help if I wanted to throw up and was having difficulties.’

  ‘Who let her out without a straitjacket?’ Danny O’Keefe said with scorn.

  ‘If any of us have any problems, we should be able to go to a neighbour and know we’ll receive help and comfort,’ Vivienne persevered. ‘Imagine what a beautiful civilised place the whole world would be if everyone did that!’

  Taking advantage of Cathy’s stunned reaction, Danny O’Keefe swarmed up the ladder slats. Cathy immediately recovered and began to stamp on his knuckles, but he managed to reach past and hook an arm and a leg over the platform.

  ‘Get off!’ Cathy roared, and wrapped herself grimly around his other leg like a boa constrictor, dangling in space.

  ‘Please don’t resort to violence!’ Vivienne begged, wondering why her speech, which was almost exactly the same one as the heroine in the book had used with such excellent results, appeared to be failing. ‘Oh please, Cathy, if you’d just sit down quietly and listen to what he has to say—and Danny, I’m sure she’d let you use the lookout sometimes if you’d only…’

  Danny twisted his free hand into Cathy’s mass of overnight curls and tugged sharply. Cathy bit him on the calf and they both tumbled, yelling, to the ground, where Danny conceded defeat. But before retiring across the paddock to his own place, he scooped up Cathy’s tar tin from the ground and dumped the contents over her head.

  ‘Don’t come back, either!’ she bellowed after him, dabbing at the trickles that oozed down her neck. ‘Next time you want a punch-up, you gutless wonder, you’d better bring along reinforcements!’

  ‘Oh, Cathy, just look at you!’ Vivienne whispered, awe-struck.

  ‘Doesn’t matter, it wasn’t hot tar, only lukewarm heated up over a candle, and I can always get some more from the hospital driveway to finish plugging the roof…That Danny O’Keefe—I’m going to fill a bucket with chook poo and keep it up the tree for ammunition. If he dares show his ugly mug anywhere around here ever again…’

  ‘Never mind that!’ Vivienne cried. ‘The wedding, your hair…’

  Cathy went suddenly quiet. She put up an anxious hand and felt amongst the curls which spiralled all over her head. ‘Is it all that bad?’ she asked soberly, examining her hand and knowing it was. ‘Couldn’t I…sort of scrape it off or something before Mum finds out?’

  ‘Melted tar doesn’t just scrape off,’ Vivienne said. ‘Remember that time you got it all over Heather’s sandshoes and even turps didn’t work? Oh Cathy, what a mess! It’s all matted together like…like squashed blackberries!’

  ‘Maybe that little cap will cover it so no one would notice.’

  ‘But it’s not just on top, it’s trickled down all over the place! You never saw such a sight, Mum’s going to…’

  ‘…murder me. All right then, there’s nothing else for it,’ Cathy said philosophically and began to climb the ladder into her lookout, prising each slat loose after her with the hammer so that when she reached the platform she was stranded up there. ‘I’m safe for the time being,’ she said. ‘And I won’t get bored, either—I’ve got plenty of work to be getting on with. It’s not the end of the world, anyhow—you’ll just have to wear that cacky dress and be a bridesmaid instead of me. You’d better go and tell Mum.’

  Vivienne, after a moment’s reflection, altered her face so that her mouth turned down instead of radiantly upwards.

  ‘You’ve got a nerve expecting someone else to wear your repulsive dress in public!’ she said. ‘I was just thinking only last night when I tried it on how ghastly…’

  ‘I know it’s ghastly, and I’m really sorry, Viv, honest I am. But listen—there’ll be all those nice eats afterwards to make up…’

  ‘That won’t make up for anything! As well as that awful dress, there’s the gold stingray basket and handing out all those posies! Not to mention having to wear that terrible little cap and Isobel giggling outside the church—you know her, she’ll probably bring along the boarders from the Convent, too, so they can all split their sides! You can’t expect me to go through all that for nothing.’

  ‘Well, when the wedding’s over and Mum’ll be too tired to murder me so it’ll be safe to come down, I’ll…I’ll give you my pen with the glass handle.’

  Vivienne chewed her lip, considering.

  ‘Plus I’ll sweep the hall every time Mum asks you to,’ Cathy promised contritely, and Vivienne went dancing all the way down the paddock to break the news to Mum that she had a hemline to take up.

  Glamour Girl

  The best thing about being chic in a little town like Wilgawa, Isobel thought, was that there was never any serious competition. However, because of her own high standards of glamour, she had to allow plenty of time to get ready properly for school each morning. The Convent uniform in itself was a formidable daily challenge. There was no remedy for starched blouses with floppy round collars and a tunic that looked like a sentry box, but something could certainly be done about thick black stockings. Isobel simply bought a smaller size and yanked them up as high as they would go, rolling the tops several times around her garters to achieve a semi-transparent effect. No one, she thought righteously, could possibly expect legs like hers to be hidden away from public view.

  The pudding-steamer hat, which was supposed to be worn square on the head with the brim turned down, presented no difficulties. Isobel devised her own fashions—hat tilted jauntily to one side, crown dented like a stetson or pushed in to form a little trough, brim pushed up all around like a sombrero. Girls waited at the Convent gate every morning to admire her latest hat style, although none of them was brave enough to copy. Just as they were too much in awe of Sister Benedicta to ornament their plain gloves as she’d done, with green braid sewn around the cuff and a striped scarf to match.

  Her hair alone, which according to school regulations was supposed to be kept neatly above the collar, required a good twenty minutes’ work each morning. Isobel would have died rather than wear plaits or a bob, unlike her cousin Cathy Melling who’d actually rejoiced when most of her hair had to be cut off because of an incident with tar. Cathy claimed it simplified lif
e, and didn’t seem to mind at all looking like an eggcup cosy. Isobel, however, set her own hair in dozens of pincurls overnight, then brushed it out into a pageboy style after breakfast. It usually stayed clear of her collar long enough to pass roll-call inspection, but by noon she could feel its luxurious weight descending to her shoulders. The other girls, pigtailed and bobbed, would say enviously, ‘Oooh, it looks just gorgeous, Isobel! How on earth do you get away with it?’ The ability to get away with things was vital for glamour, Isobel knew, and not only in personal appearance. For example, some particularly fascinating item had to be found to take to school every few days. Last week she’d written herself a letter and read it under the desk lid until Josephine Guilfoyle noticed, then she’d torn it up and swallowed the fragments. Josephine had been frog-eyed with curiosity, and Isobel finally said, ‘Okay, I’ll tell you—only cross your heart and spit your death you won’t go blabbing to anyone else…’

  Josephine learned that the letter was from a Third Year boy at the high school, but as Isobel wasn’t officially allowed to go out on dates yet, they were forced to conduct the romance by mail. She’d instantly told everyone else in 1C, as Isobel had intended, but there’d been an expensive aftermath necessary to quell doubts. Isobel had been obliged to buy a box of Winning Post chocolates and send it to herself by mail, opening the parcel in the centre of a dazzled group at recess. A note accompanied the chocolates, saying ‘To my raven-haired beauty—with undying love from Roland’, but it had almost ruined everything. Josephine had sneaked up the hill to the high school, checked over the fence with someone, and found there was no one at all called Roland in Third Year or in any other class.

  ‘That’s just my pet name for him,’ Isobel explained. ‘You can’t honestly expect me to tell you his real one, we’ve sworn a pact of secrecy.’

  Then there’d been the photograph affair, made necessary when class interest in Roland seemed to be fading. She announced casually during sewing, ‘Did I ever happen to mention I’m related to Ginger Rogers?’