down to keep her from taking in washing.
I never mentioned Laura to Shorty. I just knew she never would have understood him, or that
crowd. And they wouldn't have understood her. She had never been touched, I'm certain she
hadn't, or even had a drink, and she wouldn't even have known what a reefer was.
It was a great surprise to me when one afternoon Laura happened to let drop that she "just loved"
lindy-hopping. I asked her how had she been able to go out dancing. She said she'd been
introduced to lindy-hopping at a party given by the parents of some Negro friend just accepted by
Harvard.
It was just about time to start closing down the soda fountain, and I said that Count Basie was
playing the Roseland that weekend, and would she like to go?
Laura's eyes got wide. I thought I'd have to catch her, she was so excited. She said she'd never
been there, she'd heard so much about it, she'd imagined what it was like, she'd just give
anything-but her grandma would have a fit.
So I said maybe some other time.
But the afternoon before the dance, Laura came in full of excitement. She whispered that she'd
never lied to her grandma before, but she had told her she had to attend some school function
that evening. If I'd get her home early, she'd meet me-if I'd still take her.
I told her we'd have to go by for me to change clothes at the house. She hesitated, but said okay.
Before we left, I telephoned Ella to say I'd be bringing a girl by on the way to the dance. Though
I'd never before done anything like it, Ella covered up her surprise.
I laughed to myself a long time afterward about how Ella's mouth flew open when we showed up
at the front door-me and a well-bred Hill girl. Laura, when I introduced her, was warm and sincere.
And Ella, you would have thought she was closing in on her third husband.
While they sat and talked downstairs, I dressed upstairs in my room. I remember changing my
mind about the wild sharkskin gray zoot I had planned to wear, and deciding instead to put on the
first one I'd gotten, the blue zoot. I knew I should wear the most conservative thing I had.
They were like old friends when I came back down. Ella had even made tea. Ella's hawk-eye just
about raked my zoot right off my back. But I'm sure she was grateful that I'd at least put on the
blue one. Knowing Ella, I knew that she had already extracted Laura's entire life story-and all but
had the wedding bells around my neck. I grinned all the way to the Roseland in the taxi, because
I had showed Ella I could hang out with Hill girls if I wanted to.
Laura's eyes were so big. She said almost none of her acquaintances knew her grandmother,
who never went anywhere but to church, so there wasn't much danger of it getting back to her.
The only person she had told was her girl friend, who had shared her excitement.
Then, suddenly, we were in the Roseland's jostling lobby. And I was getting waves and smiles
and greetings. They shouted "My man!" and "Hey, Red!" and I answered "Daddy-o."
She and I never before had danced together, but that certainly was no problem. Any two people
who can lindy at all can lindy together. We just started out there on the floor among a lot of other
couples.
It was maybe halfway in the number before I became aware of how she danced.
If you've ever lindy-hopped, you'll know what I'm talking about. With most girls, you kind of work
opposite them, circling, side-stepping, leading. Whichever arm you lead with is half-bent out
there, your hands are giving that little pull, that little push, touching her waist, her shoulders, her
arms. She's in, out, turning, whirling, wherever you guide her. With poor partners, you feel their
weight. They're slow and heavy. But with really good partners, all you need is just the push-pull
suggestion. They guide nearly effortlessly, even off the floor and into the air, and your little solo
maneuver is done on the floor before they land, when they join you, whirling, right in step.
I'd danced with plenty of good partners. But what I became suddenly aware of with Laura was
that I'd never before felt so little weight! I'd nearly just think a maneuver, and she'd respond.
Anyway, as she danced up, down, under my arm, flinging out, while I felt her out and examined
her style, I glimpsed her footwork. I can close my eyes right now and see it, like some blurring
ballet-beautiful! And her lightness, like a shadow! My perfect partner, if somebody had asked me,