Roundabout
MARGATE - boarding- houses and sticks of rock, sands and spades, deck chairs and 'Kiss- me-quick' hats—receded to a discreet distance; only the pier like a paddling governess loomed aus- terely out of the sea. Greta Anderson cut through the waves like a shark, her mouth a sideways 0 in every gasp for air. Her attempt at the Channel stilt several days away, Greta was just practising—and a photographer had hired a boat to make the most of it. He hung over the edge of the boat, his camera in the water, his rear end in the air, skilfully photographing the rise and plunge of Greta's piston-like arms.
Greta's husband looked approvingly down at her, goggles and all. 'She's a very competitive girl,' he said. 'She gets seasick, she gets tired, but she'd kill me if I took her out of the water.' He pulled on rubber flippers to join his wife in the water. 'I'm no swimmer,' he said, tut I can keep up with her for ten miles or so—with these.'
The boat lurched, the boatman steadied' it with his mahogany hands, and he was in the water. Like a pair of performing seals, he and the champion ducked and splashed for the camera; Panting and dripping, then scrambled on board again.
Greta talked in a flat husky naturalised American accent as she sat rubbing her naturalised blonde hair.
`Gee, that orange juice you gave me was terrible,' she said. 'I usually have just glycerine and water.'
`I watched a Mexican Channel swimmer once,' said the photographer. 'He insisted on having wine passed him. He was singing away and half sinking before he'd been in the water an hour.'
'Oh, well, you get plenty of goofballs in this business,' said Greta, 'but a good swimmer's got to have a really strong mind.'
Sitting bronzed and muscular in the rowing boat, this swimmer, it was clear, had a pretty strong body too—and any reporter might be tempted by the phrase 'not an ounce of spare flesh on her anywhere.' But apparently this is not Sc: the best way to lose 15 lbs. in a hurry is to Greta the Channel, preferably both ways; and `-treta likes to be at least 15 lbs. overweight to Make up for what she loses while swimming. In full action, she looks rather different; ear- Plugs, goggles, lamp-black (to absorb the sun's rays), grease (to keep her bathing-suit straps from rubbing) and her costume on inside out so that the seams won't rub. Whatever she wears, she wears the single word `Nutrilite'—the food firm that is her sponsoring organisation. Sponsors are very necessary : the hire of the two pilot boats costs $1,000 and a first-class pilot (who will not get lost and add miles to the distance) is essential. But if Greta succeeds in making the two-way crossing, she will be able to ask any fee she likes for teaching back in the States.
One might think a swimmer who puts the seals to scorn (well, the seal had to be towed across, the Channel) would have little patience with splashing toddlers; but in fact she loves teaching.
'In America so many families have a pool now that the kids have to learn to swim before. they can learn to walk into the pool,' she explained. 'I can teach any kid to swim in eight lessons, if parents don't interfere. Nowadays I just won't have parents around.' As the boat ground on the landing stage, the photographer was still trying to find out, delicately, what would happen if her attempt. failed. Would she just stay at Calais if she felt too exhausted for the return swim? Greta looked astounded.
`What, come all this way, spend all that money, and turn back half way? Of course I'll do it.'
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