'When we left the cinema I’d loiter to delay the moment of facing the grey light outside and to commune with the framed portraits of stars in the foyer. I would sneak glances at myself in the mirrors, seeking a reflection of their dreamy, pancaked finality in my own face, finding for a moment a touch of glamour in the heavy-lidded eyes of my sleeplessness. All the Odeons, Gaumonts and Majestics back then had whole sequences of curving, carpeted foyers and corridors, which acted like airlocks or green-rooms, antechambers to fantasy. When we walked out past the queue for the second house, I kept slightly apart from my family, imagining strangers’ eyes on my face. Perhaps they’d realise that I didn’t belong to these people at all, that I moved secretly in much grander company.'
Anthony Thwaite's copy with a signed card to him from Lorna Sage laid in, 'thanks so much for that perceptive and generous review – I'm very grateful, and very pleased, since I know you're hard to please'.
