‘Tadadadada da DA!’
Lili suspected she’d hear this mindless song repeated in her nightmares till the day she died. Firmly sandwiched between two of her extremely good-humoured kidnappers (she guessed there must be at least twenty in total), she was forced to inhale their alcohol fumes, not to mention the odours from their clothes, which could have benefited from a dry cleaner. The overly-excited revellers seemed benign but they were also very, very drunk and it had become a point of honour to hang on to Lili for the duration of their stupid dance, however long that turned out to be.
She made smiling attempts to extricate herself. ‘I need to go and find my boyfriend. I’m not used to these silly shoes! I’ll break something!’ But her protests only made them more determined.
‘Pretty little thing like you,’ slurred the soldier, who was gripping her firmly by the waist. ‘If Ginger Rogers can dance backwards in heels, I’m sure you can manage it forwards!’
The last thing Lili wanted was to give anyone a reason to remember the girl in the red dress, the girl who didn’t even have a ticket for the ball. So, she pasted on her best party girl smile, sang ‘Tadadadada da DA!’ from a dry mouth and wondered what the hell she was supposed to do now. Why hadn’t he come to meet her as they’d arranged? Had he set her up after all? Terror made all the tiny hairs prickle on the back of her neck; maybe she was being watched at this moment …
‘We have to dance in and out of every door on the ground floor!’ the young woman in front yelled to Lili over her shoulder. ‘Except the bathroom obviously!’ She let out a shriek of laughter.
Still out of breath from running, Lili felt herself perspiring through her dress. She’d have to get it professionally cleaned before she took it back. She hoped no-one had noticed that she’d already ruined her expensive silk stockings, not to mention badly scratching up her hands. It couldn’t be helped, she told herself. She’d simply made the best of a bad job. But her prayer that she’d be able to re-enter and leave the house undetected had not been granted. Everyone was supposed to be in the ballroom by this time, jitterbugging, throwing streamers, celebrating the end of the war to end all wars. Lili hadn’t anticipated a drunken conga emerging from the billiards room, which she was almost certain hadn’t been on her floor plan and triumphantly intercepting her just as she reached the bottom of the staircase. She certainly hadn’t bargained on a sandy-haired man in a British army uniform seizing her by the elbows and whirling her away in the opposite direction.
She had been helplessly pushed and pulled along what felt like miles of shadowy corridors, turning left and right apparently at random, like being trapped on some lurching runaway train. She stumbled along, her stockinged feet sliding about inside her too-large high heels, the unpleasant sensation adding to her fear that everything was spiralling out of her control.
People can’t tell, she tried to comfort herself. They can’t tell from looking at me. Rationally Lili knew that the chilling sensation of being watched was due to high levels of adrenaline racing around her body, but this didn’t help when every nerve-ending was shrieking at her to kick off her borrowed shoes and run. To top it all, she could feel that vile elasticated garter belt stretching and tightening under her dress with every tiny movement. She could kick off her high-heels if she had to, but she doubted she could run far in this hateful corset-like garment.
A moment later, Lili caught a glimpse of herself as they passed a tarnished old wall mirror. She was surprised and gratified to see how convincing she looked. Her glossy dark hair had been swept up in its Victory roll, her mouth was slick with red lipstick and the shimmering scarlet silk clung to every one of her curves. Yes, her eyes were too bright and her cheeks had flushed to a hectic pink. But in the mirror, her wide-eyed expression just looked like the result of too many gins combined with the general post-war euphoria. The worst of Lili’s panic ebbed away. She had thought on her feet and she had come up with a temporary solution. It should be safe for the next forty-eight hours or so. Then, somehow, she’d find a way to retrieve it.
Without warning, she collided with the girl in front, causing the soldier behind her to barge into Lili. Everyone had straggled to an ungraceful halt. Lili heard helpless giggles coming from the front of the line. The dancers had been confronted with a flight of shallow steps. After a brief consultation, people half stumbled, half fell down the three or four stairs, generating more giggles and a lot of swearing.
‘What a shower of incompetents! This is a complete and utter shambles!’ the soldier yelled in her ear.
Then a commanding male voice shouted, ‘on three. One, two THREE!’ and the dancing and moronic ‘Tada-ing,’ started up again.
They were in an older part of the house now. The ceilings were higher and the floors tiled. Lili found herself being jostled through a heavy, oak-panelled door into what she saw, with relief, was the library. Disorientated by all the switches of direction she’d lost her bearings. Now she realized that the line of dancers was laboriously looping back to the ballroom it had presumably started out from. Her floor plan had showed the ballroom as having doors opening on to the terrace. If all the other guests were as drunk and jolly as this lot, she should have no problem slipping out unnoticed.
‘Tadadadada da DA,’ she sang happily with the others and pretended not to notice the soldier giving her an appreciative squeeze.
Once around the library and then out again. A smart right turn led into the sadly faded dining room; it was probably grand, once. Then an immediate left took them into the Victorian conservatory, where potted palms cast ghostly shadows over arrangements of dilapidated wicker chairs. Out in the corridor again and,after a few more raucous ‘Tadadadas,’ they were within sight of the ballroom. The warm brassy sound of a big band had been gradually growing louder and now Lili could hear a tenor voice caressingly singing, ‘As Time Goes By’. As the big band music swelled, the dancers decided to drop their mindless chant in favour of singing along.
‘You must remember this; a kiss is just a kiss.’
Inside the ballroom, Lili pretended to stumble and stooped down as if to examine her shoe, but this ruse wasn’t necessary. Now they’d achieved their goal of dragging Lili the length and breadth of the old manor house, her kidnappers appeared to lose interest and simply melted away.
She began unobtrusively making her way towards the far side of the room. After the gloomy maze of corridors, the ballroom was painfully bright, lit with the crystal glitter of dozens of chandeliers. All around, she could hear the muted scuffling of couples slow-dancing over the polished wooden floor. She edged past a sailor and his girl, gazing into each other’s eyes, their expressions rapt.
‘The world will always welcome lovers,’ sang the tenor.
Lili now saw the band, up on their raised platform. The musicians’ brass instruments glittered under the lights as they played well-loved favourites, which had helped to keep everyone sane during the war. Home-made banners hung over their heads proclaiming VICTORY and WELCOME HOME TO OUR BRAVE TROOPS and PEACE IN OUR TIME in patriotic red, white and blue. All around the ballroom, little Union Jacks had been strung up for bunting.
Putting all her trust in her floor plan and its theoretical but crucial French doors, Lili continued to make her way through the crush. It was then that the band swung exuberantly into ‘In the Mood’ and the energy levels in the ballroom went through the roof. Couples started wild jitterbugging and swing dancing. Trying to avoid the jabbing elbows and knees, Lili failed to see the man in the Scots Guards uniform closing in until it was too late.
‘Don’t give me the brush-off, darling,’ he coaxed in his Glaswegian accent, ‘this is a historic day and I’m in urgent need of a beautiful girl to dance with!’
‘I can’t help you, I’m afraid,’ she said politely. ‘I’m, I’m looking for somebody.’
‘I’m somebody, won’t I do?’ He caught at her hands, smiling into her eyes, very sure of his charms. ‘I only want to dance, darling! Just a dance. Nothing sinister.’
‘I told you, I can’t!’ Frantic now, she shook him off.
She felt a soft breath of air against her neck and cheek. Thank God! The floor plan had been right after all. There were French doors leading out on to a terrace, which were, mercifully, standing open. Lili fled, forgetting the unsuitable shoes and the corset-like garter belt, just letting the night-scented breeze tell her where to go.
Outside, the May evening was blissfully cool and fresh after the heat and noise of the ballroom. Couples had drifted outside to dance, smoke a crafty cigarette or just kiss in the shadows. One man sat slumped on a low wall, obviously the worse for alcohol. Around the terrace, flaming torches gave out a ruddy light.
Heart beating, Lili glanced around, but didn’t see anyone obviously watching and carefully descended the stone steps leading down into the garden. The music, laughter and talk began to fade behind her. Just a short way along a gravel path and she was plunged into pitch darkness. One of her stockings caught on something. A bramble. But by this time Lili’s silk stockings were a lost cause and she recklessly tore herself free.
Earlier, in the afterglow of sunset, it had been easier to find her way. She’d forgotten how dark the countryside became when the sun went down. Country darkness was a different and more menacing animal to the city kind. Anything or anyone could be hiding out here, waiting to make their move. There’s no one out here but you, Lili. You’re being an idiot. She made herself take calm, deliberate breaths and felt that infernal garter belt breathing with her. The first thing she was going to do when she got home was rip the damn thing off and throw it out with the rubbish.
In the ballroom, the band started to play ‘Land of Hope and Glory’. Its patriotic sentiments seemed to belong to a different world to the one Lili had been born into; a world where wars were just, victories won only by the great and good and happy endings lasted forever.
‘But you did it,’ she whispered to herself. Because of her, it was almost over. Soon she’d put the final full stop to the decades of damage, but, for the time being, she’d concentrate on finding her way back to her car. In an hour or less, she’d be back in her London flat.
‘God, who made thee mighty, make thee mightier yet!’ voices bellowed from the ballroom.
Lili’s heart was beating too fast for comfort, yet she forced herself to keep still a few moments longer, letting her eyes gradually adjust to the night, breathing in the delicate scents of spring.
There was an explosion directly over her head. She jumped as lurid green stars rained down, hissing, from the sky. Simultaneously, the sound of cheers and popping champagne corks came from the terrace. Despite herself she felt compelled to turn and watch.
Another, much louder detonation lit up the garden, turning night briefly into day. Fountains of silver light floated down then dissolved as if they had never been. Subsequent fireworks came so thick and fast that the garden seemed to be pulsing on and off, vanishing then magically reappearing, one moment black, another bleached out gold.
In one of these golden pulses of light, Lili saw someone standing between her and the house and felt herself turn cold. Everyone else on the terrace was looking up at the sky watching the fireworks, but this unknown person was looking deliberately and directly at Lili. The outpouring of light from the ballroom made it impossible to identify features or tell if they were male or female. Not that it mattered, she thought numbly. They’d found her.
Then her fight or flight instincts kicked in. She could run right at them, take them by surprise, kick out at their kneecaps and scream for help. Somehow she’d get past them, back to the light and warmth and hide herself in the crowd. She’d dance that ridiculous conga all night long, if it would keep her alive. But even as her mind wildly calculated and made bargains, the figure was suddenly in front of her, cutting off her escape, not speaking or threatening, just breathing softly and steadily. Waiting.
The garden dimmed and brightened then dimmed again. Lili didn’t have a choice. She had to go further into the dark. She ran, willing the fireworks to stop so she could simply melt into the ink-black night like the terrified animal she’d become.
She felt a heel give way, stumbled and fell. She had time to register hundreds of tiny sharp stones cutting into her knees and palms, then strong hands seized her by the shoulders, dragging her backwards across the gravel. If anyone on the terrace was to turn and look out into the garden, they’d see. But no one did.
Lili screamed then, although she knew no one could hear her through the music, the fireworks and the cheers and laughter. Then she screamed again, because the first scream had unleashed so much raw terror that she was physically incapable of stopping.
Before she could open her mouth in a third visceral scream, her skull was being smashed against a cold hard surface. Lili’s head filled with unbearably bright white points of light and after that something must have happened to her hearing, because the bangs of the fireworks,the distant strains of ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ and even the sound of the breeze stirring the leaves overhead, were simultaneously silenced.
Next minute she was forcibly plunged under water. Cold, rank, weed-smelling water filled her nostrils, her mouth and throat, her lungs. She struggled, not because she was strong or brave, but because she couldn’t not struggle. Lili’s body wanted to live and so she fought and fought against this terrible thing that was being done to her, but the hands were too strong.
Towards the end, Lili’s eyes opened for the last time and she thought she could see the reflection of the soundless fireworks in the water. They looked like impossibly beautiful flowers, the kind you might see in a dream. She had one clear thought. Please God, let it be safe now.
And then. Nothing.