6. LADYBIRD LEGS

THE FANCY DRESS BALL (6)

“Time to get up!” whispered Millie into my ear, though to me it was a loving breath of fragrant breezes from a far off and mystical land because it had found its way into a dream that I forgot the moment my eyes flickered open.

That was one of the reasons I loved Millie, not because of her insistence on a rigorous discipline that involved not lounging around in bed for half the day but because she did it with a gentility that became something I didn’t mind. You might not understand what I mean, but I do!

“It’s today!” I yawned.

“That could be said of every day,” she replied, squeezing me gently.

“I meant the Fancy dress!” I told her, “and it’s not my favourite scene at all.”

“And to think how macho and masculine you look in your mini-frock and shiny helmet!” she smiled at me, “those hairy legs, all muscle and power! It’s a wonder Roman soldiers weren’t constantly being ravaged by the women in their lives, and had any time for soldiering!”

“I believe” I said, pulling a clean pair of shorts on, “that it was a hard life. Say the road ahead was fifty miles long and going in a line as straight as an arrow, they had to build it first! That can’t have been much fun.”

“Then think of us poor women in our silky gowns all glistening and lonely, waiting for their men to come back from overseas.”

“You’d welcome anything in trousers if you were that lonely,” I grunted.

“You mean, anything in a mini-frock!”

“No: a macho tunic not a frock, and not that mini. I’ve researched them and they were down to the knees and coarse as sack cloth!” I told her, “and the men probably stank to high heaven, sweat and heaven-knows what, there not being a huge number of bathrooms in the wilderness, and no clothes-washing facilities.”

“All man and hunky,” she grinned, “come on, lazy-lump, I’ll cook some bacon and you can make the tea. Earl Grey for me, please.”

We made our way down the stairs and into the kitchen. I put the kettle on as per instructions and she filled the room with the aroma of bacon frying in its own fat.

“You really look quite cuddly when you put your outfit on,” she said as we sat to start the day with food, “it makes me go all jiggery inside just looking at your knees.”

“Then all I can say is you’re easily pleased,” I told her, “whereas I can hardly control myself every time I think of you in that sheer and silky outfit you reckon Roman women wore.”

“The men must have had plenty of self control back then or they’d never have conquered anywhere dressed in what you reckon they wore,” she said, “now eat up. I need to nip to the shops for a few odds and ends and then we’ll get ready for the ball. I promised Sir Jeffery that we’d get there early, in plenty of time to help sort things out.”

I snorted. “He won’t do much,” I said, knowingly, “he’s not at all keen on dancing at the best of times, and dressed up he prefers to run a mile, which he’s probably done already.”

“In weighted shoes,” she agreed.

By early afternoon, shopping done, we were ready to set out for the manor, already dressed in our costumes. I felt silly in mine. The tunic was too short and made my bottom half look like it belonged to a schoolgirl exposing too much leg for her own good, but Millie looked wonderful, the sheen on her silky robes dancing through the colours of the rainbow as the sun caught it when she walked.

We decided to walk to the Manor and then I wouldn’t have to stay sober. It was no great distance and the sun was shining from a sky that was devoid of cloud and the forecast said it should stay that way. But I did feel conspicuous as we made our way out of the house and Millie locked up. A handful of children ran after us as we set off, and one of them whistled as we past him by. Others tried to, but they lacked the ability to make more than a subdued hissing sound.

“You know,” I said to Millie, “when I was a kid we could all wolf-whistle! We did it all the time. It was a kind of right of passage and not being able to whistle meant you weren’t quite there.”

She looked at me sideways. “I never could whistle,” she said, “but then, we girls had better things to think about.”

We soon left the small gang of boys and girls behind us and walked self-consciously down the crescent towards the Manor. As we passed the station I paused.

Near the station entrance I spotted the same two men I had noticed days earlier when I had been waiting for the London train, and they were lounging against a fence and keeping their squinting eyes on everything, as if they had lost a treasured something and hoped to somehow see it.

“You see those blokes,” I whispered, “over there by the station gate?”

She looked and nodded. “Dodgy types if ever there were dodgy types,” she said,

“They were there the day I went to sort my flat out, I said, “just the same, doing nothing, just lurking.”

“They might be waiting for a train,” she said, “after all, it is a station!”

“True enough,” I replied, but kept my eyes on them. It struck me as odd, the way one or other of them always seemed to be looking our way, until the road curved away, leaving the men and the station out of sight.

“I’ll mention them to Oliver if I see him,” I told Millie.

“If your recognise him, that is?” smiled Millie, “what’s his outfit?”

“There won’t be many like him,” I laughed, “a female scarecrow, believe it or not! With, I believe, a hat that might once have been seen at Ascot.”

“Then he’ll be easy to spot,” she said, “but who’s that over there, on his way through the gate, beating us by fifty yards? It’s as if someone had put a mirror there! I do declare it’s another Roman soldier in a shiny helmet and I might almost be led to believe his legs are as delicious as yours!”

I looked at where she was pointing, and sighed.

“It’s Todd,” I said, “Todd Anderson. He’s a gardener when he can be bothered to turn up. Jeffrey lets him get away with murder because of his wife. Look, there she is, in the wheelchair. And that’s not part of a costume: she needs it, poor lass.”

“Rosalind,” nodded Millie, “I was at school with her. Her skill was gymnastics, and she won cups for it! It must have broken her heart when she lost the use of her legs in a car accident.”

I knew all about it. Rosalind had been one of the jewels of our schooldays, when I was growing into my teens and starting to notice girls, and everyone said that Todd had won the star prize when he married her. Then was the accident and the wheelchair, and to his credit everyone knew that he still genuinely believed that he’d won that star prize.

“You’ve got better legs, though,” smiled Millie as we crossed the road to join them. Todd was dressed in an outfit almost identical to my own and Rosalind, not to be left out was a ladybird, red with shiny black spots.

“Rosalind’s got better legs,” I said, teasingly, “because, look: she’s got six of them!”

© Peter Rogerson 22.07.20