Ballerina silhouette on upper back

You will laugh, but Mrs Hollis has finally let me stay after the Saturday class to help with the lamps. The church hall only has the one bulb over the piano, so when the sun goes down she sets the big paraffin lantern on the windowsill and the whole room goes dark at the edges. That's when the dancing looks best, she says, because nobody can see the wobbles.

Last week she pinned a sheet of black card to the back wall and cut out a girl for us, nothing but a shape, one arm up over her head as if reaching for a light fitting, the other stretched out as though asking for a lift home. The tutu flared like a bell. Her legs were up on their toes. She cut the whole thing with the kitchen scissors in twenty minutes and wouldn't let anyone touch it. Every girl in the class stood underneath and tried to match her, and not one of us managed the feet.

Thursday the lantern guttered and the hall went pitch black, and in the light from the street lamp through the frosted glass I saw the cardboard girl go up on the wall, bigger than life, and I swear she was dancing. Only it was Mrs Hollis, who had come back for her cardigan, standing in the doorway with her arm lifted towards the switch.

She has never once mentioned Mr Hollis since the telegram came. I think she just wanted someone to see the shape of her still moving. I did not tell her I saw it. I put the cardboard in my satchel instead, and I'll post it to you with this letter if you promise to hang it somewhere with a lamp behind.

Love, Joan