Chapter 23A Pedestal Is for Standing On

The first arabesque had only just steadied. The raised back leg was still short of straight, and the half-open book on top of the sceptre had turned over one leaf.

The leaf of cold gold dropped with a thin sound. Her back leg stopped in the air. Her waist was still working, and the leaf had already been pressed flat. Something of hers had been ruled out.

“Your movement has no provenance. It is ruled invalid.”

His voice was not loud. Every consonant was bitten clean, not one missed. By the time the words landed, her back leg had already been pressed back to the ground.

She did not finish the movement. She switched to a big jump. Before she landed, the sceptre had turned over another leaf. She switched to a whip turn, and halfway through it, one more leaf turned over. Each time a page turned, it made the same sound, thin and short, and she could count them. She counted twice. One, two. With each page, one language her body could use was gone. She did not stop. She kept counting the beat, and on the third beat the beat broke off, and only the sound of the pages was left. In the practice room at the theatre, the teacher counted the same way. The teacher stopped on the third beat and left people to catch that beat on their own.

With every judgement, a narrow beam of light came down from the ceiling, fell on her movement, paused, and then went out. She had to wait for it to go out before she knew whether that last movement had counted. While she waited, her body stayed in the air, and her arm could no longer be drawn back.

She tried the smallest movement she could, lifting only the toe of her left foot an inch off the floor. The judgement light did not come on. She lifted it another inch, and the light still did not come on. It did not give her a continuous movement. It gave her only the one inch she was allowed.

On the third landing her knee struck the slab first. She pushed on the slab to get up, and her palm pressed down. The slab under her hand was cold, a dry cold, without a trace of damp. She sat back on the slab, her legs tucked under her, the old trainer on her right foot flat against the stone, and her left pointe shoe with its tip turned outwards.

The left foot in its pointe shoe stepped forward, over the shallow groove in the slab. The edges of the groove were clean. The tip of the sceptre had cut it, and white dust had settled in the bottom.

“Don’t rush. The rules are not a wall. They are only a line.”

This time he did not raise the sceptre. He said only one sentence. Her left foot stopped at the edge of the groove and did not go across. She looked at the white dust at the bottom of the groove. It was fine dust, and it would rise at the slightest breath. She did not blow.

Red tape came loose from the exhibits on all four sides and wound its way over to her. It caught the laces of her right foot’s old trainer first. It went round the instep and was fastened above the ankle, each turn pressed over the one before. It pressed the knot down as well. Then it gathered up over the ankle and up the calf. Last came her left foot. The satin ribbons of her pointe shoe were stuck fast to the floor along with it. The tape was even and cold, with no warmth in it. Where it pressed against her skin there was only stickiness, and nothing else.

There was no wind in the exhibition hall. The air was dry. It did not cling when she breathed it in, and it had no smell. The hall kept growing. The mosaic slabs ran on one after another, out towards the four walls, and the edge of every slab had been worn round. The four walls were filled with exhibits, statues and empty picture frames, row after row. Above her head a row of frames hung from the ceiling, each one bound with tape. There were six rows of audience seats, their backs wound with the same red, every wrap at shoulder height. There were six labels on the floor, and all of them were blank. There were thirty-two lamps, and twenty of them were on. Narrow beams fell from inside the lampshades. They lit only the exhibits, never the people.

He stood on the dark side. The crosses on the mosaic slabs spread out beneath his feet, square by square, and every step he took landed in the centre of a cross. She had counted. From her feet to the middle of the hall, fourteen slabs lay between. He did not come closer, and he did not step back.

Her right hand came up. Her fingertips were still half a metre from the nearest frame, and the judgement light had already come on.

The rules came down from the wall and were printed across the rings of red tape: No attack may damage any artefact.

Her hand was still hanging in the air. In this room, even a wave of the hand had become a crime.

“Everything in here is worth more than you. So you are not allowed to move.”

She did not move. She lowered her hand, and the judgement light went out.

※

She had her head bowed. A sheet of paper was caught in a joint between the slabs.

She lifted her hand and worked it free. The paper had been trodden on, and one edge was flattened. Across its face was the print of a sole, its edges clean and even, and she could not tell whose shoe it had been. In the middle were two old creases, from folding the paper in half twice. The paper was thin, and its fibres ran every which way, not one of them following a crease. The edges were soft, as soft as if the paper had been kept in a shoe for a long time. One side was curved, pressed into an arc by something, and the arc was the curve of an insole.

She turned the paper over. The back was blank, with no writing. There was only a row of very faint impressions, made by the typebars of a typewriter. She turned the paper back.

In the lower right corner of the paper was a square stamp. It was red and pressed hard. All four corners were fully printed, with no faint patch anywhere. There was no writing inside the stamp. She pressed it once with her thumb. The raised edge of the stamp dug into the pad of her thumb, and it took three presses before the paper lay flat.

She recognised it.

Her fingertip was still resting on the stamp. It was a rejection slip. It had only a number on it. The last digit had been scratched with a fingernail, and the scratch showed white. No reason was written on it. The reason had been given face to face, by someone holding a pen who had not looked up.

When she was twenty, she had been handed an identical one at the window by the back door of the theatre. The person behind the window was just the same, holding a pen and not looking up. She took it without reading it through, walked out onto the steps, and folded it in half twice. Her practice cardigan still had whole sleeves then. On the steps stood a cart selling water. The ice on it had melted, and the water ran down past its wheels. It had rained that day, and her shoes got wet. She did not change them. She walked home in them.

This one she had folded in half twice herself and pushed into the hole at the toe of her right shoe. The hole was not large, and its edges had frayed. The paper just pressed against the opening, and when she walked, its edge rubbed against her toes. She had never told anyone.

She looked down at her right shoe. The opening at the toe was empty, with only a little grey dust left inside. Her toes moved and touched the edge of the hole. The fuzz along the edge rose, then lay down again.

The opening was empty now. When the tip of the sceptre had drawn back, white dust from the edge of the groove had fallen onto her shoe and settled on the rim of the hole. The paper had slid out of the hole at that moment and dropped into the joint.

She smoothed the paper out, a little at a time. Her left hand was braced on the slab, and the cold of the stone went right through to her wrist. She had worn these shoes for six years. The mesh of the upper had been rubbed shiny by sweat, and the shiny places were white. The right shoe’s sole had been re-soled once. The cobbler had asked whether she wanted the upper replaced as well, and she had said no.

The bag was still on her shoulder. In its innermost compartment she kept several sheets of paper, all the same size and folded the same way, one lying on top of another. The bottom one was from the year she was twenty, and she had not taken it out to look at since. This one was a later one. She had never counted which number it was.

The same red stamp. It was on the papers in her bag, and on the tape too, one in every few. She had not seen a stamp on the corner of paper inside the dancer’s shoe. That corner had been folded in, and only a grey-white edge showed. She remembered the sentence said below the ninth step, about the right foot. The paper was the same paper, folded the same way. Under that corner, too, was this same stamp.

He stood five paces away. His stone heels pressed on the mosaic slabs, and he did not come any closer. His gaze rested on the row of empty picture frames on the wall, and it did not reach her face.

She held the paper up, its front towards him.

“This slip… I was given one exactly like it.”

※

It was not the theatre. It was a metro passage.

It was a transfer passage, and a long one. The tiles were white and the joints were grey. Along the ceiling a row of tube lights ran down the passage, and one of them flickered very slowly. Wherever it flickered, the gloss on the floor tiles lagged a beat behind. Fast walkers left their footsteps on the wall, and the sound trailed on for a moment before it faded. In the middle of the passage one tile had cracked. The crack had been filled with black sealant and smoothed very flat. When she was seventeen she had danced beside that patched tile. Back then she had put her hair up in a bun and pushed a pencil through it, point down. When she danced, the bun did not come loose and the pencil did not fall. At the far end of the passage was a wall with an old map on it. Each station had a small red dot, and the dots had been pressed by fingers until they had gone pale.

It was an afternoon with no rain. She came walking from the direction of the exit, her schoolbag on her back and the speaker slung across one shoulder on a strap. The strap cut into her collarbone and left a white mark. The wind coming up from the platform was cool. It carried the smell of the rails, a whiff of rust mixed with grit.

The speaker she carried was an old one. Its paint had come off in patches, and its handle was wound with tape. She set the speaker down by the foot of a bench. Inside it there was a layer of hum, a buzz that never stopped. The music came up through the noise, tilted to one side. She turned the volume up to the third notch and no further. Her shoes were a different pair then, and their laces were tied the ordinary way.

Three people waiting for a train sat on the bench.

Nearest the door sat an old woman, with a wicker basket on her lap. The handle of the basket was wooden. Her fingers pressed on it, one tap and then another, keeping time with the speaker. She kept the beat well. She was only half a beat behind the speaker. Inside the basket lay a pear, half peeled, and its peel hung over the edge without breaking.

In the middle sat a man with a folded newspaper in his hand. His leather shoes had been polished, and their toes pointed her way. The newspaper had not turned a single page.

By the wall sat a young man. He sat low, with his right foot resting on his left knee, and he was tying his shoe. The button at his jacket cuff was undone. The laces went round to the instep, round once more, then across the instep and tied above the ankle. He wound them slowly, pulling each turn tight before he wound the next. The laces were white. When they were tied, the toe of his shoe pointed at her. He wore dark trousers, and at the knee a patch had worn pale. When he had finished, he did not get up. He rested two fingers of his right hand on his knee and began to tap out a beat. It was her beat.

She danced a piece with no provenance. No one had asked her to dance it, and no one had stamped it. Before she began, she tapped the tip of her right shoe on the floor three times. Each time, she heard the shoe before she heard the tile. There was a film of dust on the tiles, and one swipe of her sole cleared it. Her back was to the wall, and the wall threw her footsteps back, half a beat late. On the first eight beats her hands opened out from her chest, fingertips going first. On the second eight beats her toe touched the floor, and then it came down again. On the third eight beats she turned, glanced at her own shadow on the floor, and turned back. On the fourth eight beats her right foot came down a fraction early. That fraction was her own. She did not count the trains. She counted only the beats.

Someone walked past her along the passage. Someone glanced at the speaker, then at her, and did not stop.

She had reached the fourth eight beats when the young man by the wall lifted his head.

He watched her for three beats. He was not looking at her face. He was looking at her feet, at whichever foot landed on the beat, and then at the other.

On the third beat there was a dull sound from deep in the tiles. The wind came first. A gust ran along the passage, lifted one corner of the newspaper and pressed it down again. The newspaper still did not turn. The train was coming. The sound ran along the white tiles, and all three of them lifted their heads at once. The carriage lights were white, in rows, coming along from the far end of the passage.

The young man stood up. He slung the strap of his bag over his shoulder, did not look back, and ran for the ticket barriers. The ticket barriers beeped, one after another, as people tapped through. His back flashed between them, and then he jumped onto the train. The doors closed behind him. Through the glass his back paused for a moment, and then the carriage behind blocked it from view. There were several handprints on the glass of the door, left by other people, one beside another, all of them small.

She did not stop. She finished the piece.

No one clapped. The old woman’s fingers paused, then started tapping again. The man still did not turn a page of his newspaper.

When she had finished, she sat down on the bench. She sat there until the next train came in and its doors opened and closed, and only then did she stand up. She switched off the speaker, wound the cable up, and slung it over her shoulder.

She looked down at her shoes. The laces of the right one had been wound round once, and then again, across the instep and tied above the ankle. She had tied them that way ever since.

※

“My best dance, and only three people watched it. They were waiting for a train.”

She said it to him. Her voice was not loud, but every word fell to the floor.

He did not answer. The sceptre did not rise, and the judgement light did not come on. His gaze was still on the row of empty picture frames, and it did not shift. His heels did not move. The stone toes of his shoes faced her, and they had not turned by one degree. The sceptre stood upright at his side, and the leaf at the edge of its pages, the one with no number, faced her.

The flat ring on her left wrist began to turn. Pearl-white scales came out one after another, touched the cuff, paused, and turned back over. Where the ring had turned, a thin thread was pulled out of the cuff, and it quickly slid back in.

She looked down at her taped feet. She did not try to undo them. The laces of her right foot were still inside the tape, the toe of the shoe showing outside it, and the opening was empty. She folded the paper twice and pushed it back into the hole of her right shoe. The edge of the paper held against the opening, just right.

Then she shifted her weight onto the old trainer.

Street dancing did not need her to stand up straight first. The first movement was hard, with hard stops in it. She ground her sole into the floor, once, twisted half a turn, and ground again. The sole came down on the slab with a dull thud, heavier than the sound her steps had made on the mosaic slabs. Each time she ground, her sole left a little white dust on the slab. The marks came one after another and joined into a slanted line, and the line broke off at the edge of the shallow groove. The tape was pulled taut by the speed of her turning, and then taut again.

The judgement light came on again. This time it came on at her ankle. She did not stop. She counted how many times the light came on, and on the third time it was half a beat behind her movement. The speed of her turning pulled the tape open into a gap. The light dropped through the gap and went out. The sceptre did not turn its page either. That time the pages only stayed where they were, and did not move.

“Look closely. This is not a performance.”

She said this with her body already turned into the second turn. The tape around her ankle was stretched to its limit and gave a very thin sound. Then it snapped in two places. The breaks were clean. Two turns came loose and hung from her shin, swinging. She hid none of the movements.

She breathed in over three beats and out over five. On the long breath out she kept her weight on the old trainer of her right foot, and did not let it leave the floor. Her ribs sank one by one, all the way down, and then rose again one by one. On the third turn she saw a speck of white dust on the seventh chair in the third row of the audience seats. The line of her shoulders was still there. The feather pieces were white, standing up in layers at the back of her neck. They turned as she turned, and did not press down. The satin ribbons of her left pointe shoe were still stuck to the floor.

※

Her left pointe shoe was stuck to the floor. She set her toe down and pulled hard. The ribbon came away from the floor and snapped a length off. She used that pull to lift her body.

A ballet jump starts from the toes. She pointed her foot to the very end, into one straight line. The old trainer on her right foot was still grinding on the floor. At the moment her left foot left the ground, her whole body was drawn straight. Her landing point was the edge of the pedestal.

It was a low platform. The statue stood at the far end of it, draped in cloth with seven folds. Its hands rested on its chest, the knuckles made of stone, palms facing down, pressing on something, and yet pressing on nothing. The statue’s face was turned towards the door. It was a pair of iron doors, and neither had a handle. The pedestal was made of stone. It stood a little higher than the floor, and its edges were worn round. On its top were rings of faint marks, worn by many years of feet, each ring fainter than the one before. An inscription was cut into one corner of the plinth. The tape covered the earlier part, and only the last two characters showed: provenance. In front of the pedestal, six blank labels stood in a row. There was no writing on them, and no one looked at them.

Her toe came down first and touched the edge of the pedestal. She rose onto her toes at the edge for a moment, as if testing how hard the stone was. Then the whole foot pressed down on the face of the stone. Her old trainer left a grey-white print on the stone, the lines of its sole clear, one after another. The satin ribbons of her left pointe shoe had lifted a length off the floor, and they had not been gathered in.

She stood on it.

In that instant the plinth stopped being a plinth. It was only a floor a little higher than the rest, no different from any other floor. Under her feet it was flat, and nothing needed to be held up. Her shadow fell from the side of the pedestal and reached all the way down to the floor. When she had steadied herself, she drew a long breath, and her ribs opened. The pedestal stood a little higher than her knee. Standing on it, the far side of the exhibition hall was right in front of her. The backs of the audience seats ran in rows. On the wall the names were in cold gold, eighteen to each panel. She counted one panel and stopped at the eighteenth name.

In the joints of the mosaic slabs, the row of grit was still there, each one the same distance from the next. Beside the grit was a small heap of white dust, which had fallen when the tip of the sceptre drew back. She followed the joint with her eyes. It ended at the tip of his shoe.

The narrow beam did not light her. It lit the statue at the far end of the pedestal. The folds the tape had pressed were now only white marks. The light fell on the white marks, and they brightened for a moment, then dimmed again.

“A pedestal is for standing on.”

This time she did not raise her voice. The sibilants were clean, and every word landed in the place where she stood.

Five paces away, at the centre of his wig, a small piece of tape had come loose and lifted, showing a white dot beneath. The dot was small, and it could only be made out as a dot.

※

She did not get down.

The exhibition hall was very quiet. The lamps were overhead, and the light inside their shades fell only on the exhibits. She stood on the pedestal and looked at him. He did not look at her. His heels did not move, and no grit fell from them.

He raised a hand to press down his wig. His stone knuckles pressed on the tape, and it would not stay down. The raised edge of the tape tightened, sprang back, and lifted again. The white dot stayed exposed. She looked at the white dot. It was white, and it was only a dot. It had no markings.

His voice paused at the start of the sentence. The pause did not fall on any beat.

“…Stop. You have no right to stand there.”