Dresses of Red and Gold by Robin Klein & Fiona Wood

Author:Robin Klein & Fiona Wood [Klein, Robin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: The Text Publishing Company
Published: 2017-07-27T16:00:00+00:00

An Act of Luminous Goodness

‘Meet you back here at five-thirty on the dot,’ Heather said when they were through the turnstile. ‘And if you spend all your money in the first ten minutes, just don’t come tagging after me trying to cadge, because you won’t get a single penny! Don’t either of you dare tag after me, anyway—I’ve arranged to meet a…someone I know from school.’

Vivienne had no intention of wasting her carefully hoarded money in the first ten minutes. Eight shillings and sixpence in small change jingled delightfully in her purse, each coin representing thrift and labour. Cathy had charged off, as she did every year, towards the amusement rides, but Vivienne wasn’t planning to have even one turn on the merry-go-round. Ever since the age of five, she’d secretly yearned to buy a doll-on-a-stick at the Show. Cathy always jeered about them and said they looked like torsos drowning in plates of chopped-up jelly, but she didn’t care what Cathy thought. This year she was going to spend all her money on one of those dolls! It was really just a matter of self-discipline, of walking firmly past fairy-floss stalls, hoopla booths and merry-go-rounds.

She passed the Octopus, thinking how aptly named it was with those long tentacles that whisked people, screaming, up into the sky above the tent tops. It was hard to understand why anyone would want to pay to be terrified, but Cathy, who understood very well, had already joyously exchanged sixpence for a ticket. Vivienne left her to it and began a methodical search for dolls-on-sticks, heroically averting her eyes from such goodies as crisp waffles filled with cream, or the marvellous rainbow ice-creams that were obtainable only at the Show once a year. Heather, who’d found her way to the miniature rifle-range, was eating one of those ice-creams. She was also screeching idiotically at each rifle shot, and Vivienne glanced at her in surprise. Heather wasn’t in the least frightened of guns, having gone rabbiting quite often with Uncle Trip, but now for some reason she was pretending to be startled by the noise. That big gawky boy firing at the target of painted ducks must think she was a pest, and it was a wonder he didn’t turn around and tell her to shut up!

Vivienne walked on, stopping to inspect booths that sold dolls-on-sticks, but also making a detour into the exhibits hall to see Aunt Ivy’s prize-winning decorated cake. Aunt Ivy would be deeply offended if none of them could describe it on her next visit. Because of the crowd inside the hall, a glimpse of that cake also meant a slow forced circuit of the other exhibits all the way around to the other door. She passed the trestle tables of bottled fruits, admiring their luscious symmetry, but made faintly uneasy by the sheer number of jars. It was as though people secretly believed that the annual bounty should be cached in case another summer never came.

Once outside, she resumed her important search.

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