Chorus Lines, Caviar, and Corpses (A Happy Hoofers Mystery)

by Mary McHugh

  “Gut morning,” she said, clapping her hands together like the principal in a boarding school and arranging her face in what I’m sure she hoped was a smile.

  “Velcome, velcome,” she said in a loud voice to the startled passengers. “I am Heidi, your cruise director. Ve haf many fun things planned for you on this cruise and you vill enjoy them. Please ask me if you have questions. Our Russian crew will do their best to help you, but they sometimes have trouble with the English. Some of them are just learning their jobs. I’m sure you will be patient with them.” From the look in her eye, I was sure she was giving us orders, not asking for our cooperation.

  “I vant first to introduce our captain. Captain Kurt Von Schnappel.”

  A tall, grim-faced man with gray hair in a dark blue naval uniform stepped forward and surveyed the crowd in front of him. I couldn’t help feeling that he disapproved of us and that saying hello was a distasteful part of his job.

  “Guten morgen,” he said. “Enjoy your voyage.” He gave a slight bow and left the dining room. That was it. No friendly welcome. No “glad to see you.” I assumed we wouldn’t be getting an invitation to sit at the captain’s table anytime soon.

  Heidi watched him go, then motioned to the white-suited crew members. They stepped forward, their hands folded, looking down at the floor.

  “Oh dear,” Gini said under her breath. “What have we done?”

  “Now I vould like to introduce the crew to you. First is Sasha, who is in charge of the dining room.”

  Sasha stepped forward, his eyes darting wildly from side to side, desperately searching for a way to escape. His uniform jacket was buttoned crookedly, leaving one side longer than the other, and his shirt tail was untucked in the back. His hair stuck out all over his head as if it were trying to escape. Surely no older than twenty-five, he looked as if he couldn’t be in charge of a falafel stand on a street corner in New York City, let alone a dining room on a cruise ship.

  “Next ve haf our chef, Kenneth Allgood from England, who comes to us highly recommended. He vill prepare many delicious Russian meals for you—but with a British accent—and you vill enjoy them.”

  “A British chef on a Russian ship,” a man in back of us muttered. “What’s his specialty—Spotted Chicken Kiev?”

  I turned around and saw a handsome man about my age, with dark hair graying at the temples, at a table near us. He looked like a golfer in his seersucker slacks and short-brimmed cap. I smiled at him and he smiled back.

  The chef stepped forward unsteadily, a cigarette dangling from his mouth, wearing filthy whites with a toque perched on top of his greasy hair. He looked about twenty-eight years old. He glared at the passengers.

  “Geeez,” Gini said in a low voice. “His mother must have been Typhoid Mary.”

  I tried to give her a stern glance, but I was also trying to keep from laughing. If I looked at Mary Louise, we would both lose it. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see her stifling a giggle.

  Heidi introduced the waitresses, the desk clerks, and the kitchen crew, and then she said, “Ve haf a special treat for you on this trip. Ve are very lucky to have with us the Happy Hoofers from America, who vill tap dance for us tonight and every night of the cruise. Please stand up, Hoofers.”

  We stood up and smiled at the other passengers, who clapped rather halfheartedly. Who could blame them? This cruise was not turning out to be the polished, interesting, professionally run trip they had been hoping for. And, of course, they had never heard of us.

  “Happy Hookers?” an old man at the table next to us snarled. “What kind of a cruise is this? I don’t want to see a bunch of hookers.”

  His wife tried to shush him. “They’re hoofers, dear, not hookers. You know, dancers.” But he kept on grumping and snarling until she pulled him out on the deck. As she dragged him away, she said over her shoulder, “He’s been this way since Hillary ran for president.”

  We had another cup of good strong coffee and looked out the window at the clear, sunny day brightening the clean, white deck outside. I was glad we were making this trip in June when the temperature would be in the sixties and seventies.

  We walked out to the deck and leaned on the rail as the ship glided by little towns, with brilliantly colored red and blue and green church domes peeking over the treetops, people picnicking along the riverbanks, and fishermen who waved to us holding rods.

  “If that’s their idea of breakfast, I can’t wait to see lunch and dinner. What a crew of misfits. Why do I have the impression I’m on the Russian equivalent of the Titanic?” Gini said.

  “Let’s throw Debbie Downer overboard right now,” Janice said, grabbing Gini by the arm.

  “Look on the bright side, Gini,” Pat said. “How else could we get to see Moscow and St. Petersburg and the Hermitage Museum?”

  “We’ll be lucky if this crew can get us to the next town without running into another ship,” Gini said. “At least we can look forward to seeing the White Nights at this time of year. I’ll be able to take pictures twenty-four hours a day if I want.”

  “Think of this trip as a great setting for a documentary,” I said.

  “Riiiight. Look on the bright side,” Gini said. “You’re always such an optimist, Tina. You remind me of that Monty Python movie, Life of Brian. Brian is nailed to a cross, and he says, ‘Peter, I can see your house from up here!’ Then he sings, ‘Always Look on the Bright Side of Life.’ ”

  That’s all we needed to hear. We linked arms and sang the rest of the song, dancing and twirling on deck.

  Passengers gathered around us, clapping and laughing as we did some time steps and high kicks.

  Even Gini was in a good mood after our impromptu practice session.

  Two teenaged girls bounced up to us. “Are you the Happy Hoofers?” asked the one with dark hair with pink streaks on the side, who looked about seventeen years old.

  “We are,” I said. “Do you like tap dancing?”

  “Oh yes,” she said, “It’s cool. We saw a musical on Broadway with Savion Glover. I love that kind of dancing. He has so much energy.”

  “We want to be your groupies,” the younger one, around fourteen with curly blonde hair, said. “We saw you on YouTube, and half our class is taking tap dancing now. We could help you with scenery, or costumes, or anything you need. I’m Andrea and this is Stacy.”

  “We don’t really have scenery and we already have costumes, but you’re welcome to watch us rehearse,” I said. “We’ll teach you some steps. What are you doing on a cruise ship in Russia anyway?”

  “Our grandmother brought us. She’s celebrating her eightieth birthday and she thought it would be more fun if she took us with her.”

  “And I was right,” an older woman said, coming up to join us. She had a face she had earned after eighty years of a good life—beautiful, lined, serene, ready for anything that came along. “Hello there, Hoofers,” she said, and did a little time step and a ball change. “I’m Caroline. These are my two spoiled-rotten granddaughters, who are the joy of my life. Can’t wait to see you dance tonight. I do a little tap dancing myself.”

  “Nana was one of the dancing Kennard sisters in the fifties,” Stacy said. “She was really good, and she still is. She used to take us to Macy’s Tap-a-thon every year in New York—that’s why we love tap dancing.”

  “You’re kidding,” I said. “Mary Louise and I went every year for a while.”

  Her mention of the Tap-a-thons brought back all those hot August mornings when Mary Louise and I would drive into New York and put on some kind of cartoon T shirt—Mickey Mouse, Betty Boop, Garfield, whatever they thought up that year—and join people of all ages, colors, and states of mental health, to dance on Broadway in front of Macy’s.

  “Hi, Caroline,” Mary Louise said. “We had so much fun at those Tap-a-thons. The best part was, after we danced, Tina and I would go to the fanciest restaurant we could find, still in our sweaty T shirts and tap shoes, and eat up all the calorie
s we had just danced off. The last time we went, there were six thousand other people out there in Betty Boop T shirts and lace garters dancing on Thirty-fourth Street.”

  “We were part of the six thousand,” Caroline said. “We were probably right in back of you.”

  “You would have pretended you didn’t know us if you were anywhere nearby,” I said. “We kept forgetting the routine and asking the trainer to do it over again. Then we figured if we made a mistake, who would notice? We had a great time. I don’t know why they stopped doing them.”

  “They probably couldn’t find anyone crazy enough to organize them after the woman who did them for years retired,” Caroline said.

  “Nana was always the best,” Stacy said. “She helped the ones who were stumbling around. But the whole thing was really fun. I wish they still did it.”

  “Me too,” I said. “Come on, Caroline. Show us what you’ve got.”

  Caroline smiled. She sang a verse of “Always Look on the Bright Side of Life” in a still-young soprano, breaking into a time step and grapevine that brought applause from the crowd that had gathered around us.

  “How do you stay so young?” Mary Louise asked.

  “These two girls are the main reason. And tap dancing is great exercise. My sister and I taught dancing until a few years ago. Then I decided to travel and have a good time. But I miss the dancing.”

  “Come watch us whenever you want, Caroline,” I said. “I’m sure you could teach us a few steps—as well as a lot of other things. Here’s my cell–call me any time you want to find us.”

  “I’ll stay out of your way, but if you can put up with these two, they’d love it,” she said, reaching out to hug her granddaughters.

  “You got it,” Mary Louise said. “They’re welcome anytime they want to come watch us rehearse. We’ll put them to work.”

  A young man with shoulder-length blond hair tapped Janice on the shoulder. He was about twenty-eight, around 5′10″ tall, a little taller than Janice. His features were handsome, delicate. “Excuse me,” he said, “but aren’t you Janice Rogers?”

  “I am,” she said.

  “I saw you in a play in Princeton one time. I always wanted to meet you. I’m an actor too. ”

  “Always glad to meet another actor,” Janice said, her face lighting up the way it usually does when she gets to talk about the theater. “What play did you see?”

  “ ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?’ You were brilliant.”

  “That’s a great play,” Janice said. “I was lucky to get that part. What’s your name?”

  “Brad Sheldon.”

  “Are you working?”

  “Sort of. I’m going to be in an off-Broadway production in the fall. A new play.”

  “What’s your role?”

  “I’m a schizophrenic medical student.”

  “You are not!” Janice said, laughing.

  “I’m not kidding. Any help you can give me will be gratefully accepted.”

  “I’d like to try,” Janice said, moving closer to the young actor. “This is a real challenge. I always think the gestures you make are an important part of defining your character.”

  “What kind of gestures do you think my schizophrenic would make?” Brad asked.

  “I think he would use his hands a lot. He sort of talks with his hands. He’d get into the part physically—when he’s excited, he’d move his whole body a lot and use his hands to make a point. Like this,” said Janice, gesturing and reaching out to touch Brad while she talked. “See what I mean?”

  “You’re right,” Brad said. “I’ve been so busy concentrating on saying the lines that I didn’t think about my gestures. What else?”

  “It’s all about pretending you are schizophrenic. You should read up on that illness and figure out how it presents itself physically. Did you pretend to be different people when you were a kid?”

  “Oh sure,” Brad said. “Lots of times.”

  “That’s all acting is . . . What did you say your name is . . . Brad?” Janice said. “The best actors I know just pretend they’re someone else and have fun doing it.”

  “Is that what you do?” he asked.

  “Of course. It’s easy when you look at any part that way.”

  “This is really helpful,” Brad said. “What else should I—”

  The British chef, still in his stained whites, stepped in front of Janice. “Sorry to interrupt your acting lessons,” he said to Brad. “I noticed you before when Heidi was introducing us. I’m Ken Allgood. Are you an American?”

  “Yes, from New York,” Brad said.

  “Great city, that. I was there a couple of years ago and I’m going back as soon as I can. Maybe open my own restaurant. Best food ever there.”

  “Where did you go?” Brad asked, with an apologetic shrug to Janice.

  We moved to the rail to admire the scenery, but we couldn’t help overhearing the two men’s conversation.

  “All over. There was this one place—downtown somewhere. Right inside the door when you walked in there were all these apples—the smell was incredible. The dining room had dark red walls and an arched ceiling. And the food! Every mouthful was perfect.”

  “That sounds like Brigantine. I know someone who works there,” Brad said. “I’ll introduce you if you do get back to New York. Maybe he can get you a job.”

  “I say! You mean it? That would be great. We have to talk. What are you doing on this bonkers cruise ship anyway?”

  “Well, I—I was supposed to come with my friend Maxim,” Brad said, hesitating. He looked around the deck at the other passengers gathered in small groups, breathing in the clear, fresh air and talking to each other. “He’s from Russia. He was going to introduce me to his parents. And he wanted to show me St. Petersburg. He said it was the most beautiful city in the world. He wanted to take me to the Hermitage and to Catherine Palace, and everywhere. We bought our tickets six months ago and then–” Brad stopped and turned away. There were tears in his eyes.

  The chef touched his arm. “What happened?”

  “He met somebody else. We lived together for a year and then he just left. At first, I wasn’t going to go on this cruise, but I really wanted to see Russia because I had heard so much about it from him. But it’s not the same. This trip would have been so great with him along. Now it just reminds me of him.”

  He stared at the river stretching ahead of us. My heart went out to this fragile young man who was obviously in so much pain. I was about to invite him to join us for some coffee later, but before I could say anything, Allgood put his arm around Brad’s shoulder.

  “Maybe I can help,” he said. “Come on. I’ll buy you a coffee and help you forget. We’ll talk about New York. I still have some time before I have to get back to the kitchen.”

  Brad hesitated, then took a deep breath and smiled at the chef. “You’re on.”

  “There’s something about that Ken guy I don’t like,” Janice said to me. “I don’t know why exactly, but I don’t trust him.”

  “I know what you mean,” I said. “He’s got this sneaky way about him. Let’s hope he can cook.”

  “Good luck on that one,” the man who had been sitting in back of us at breakfast said. Up close, he was tall, and even better looking than I’d noticed in the dining room. He had one of those craggy faces—like Harrison Ford when he made the Indiana Jones movies about raiding lost arks. His hair was mostly brown with a little gray at the temples, and he was wearing the rimless glasses I love on a man. Bill used to wear them and so did my father. To me, they meant a man who is really smart, really in charge, really sexy. My kind of man.

  “Hi,” he said to me. “I’m Barry Martin. How did you get to tap dance in the middle of the Volga River?”

  “Hello,” I said. “I’m Tina Powell. My friends and I made a short video of our act and put it on YouTube. The agent for this cruise line saw it and hired us. We decided we were up for an adventure. What are you doing here?”
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  “It seemed like a good idea at the time,” he said, smiling. He was even better-looking when he smiled. “I’ve been everywhere else but I’ve never been to Russia. Now I’m not so sure it was a good idea.”

  “You can’t judge by the first couple of hours. Give it a chance. Maybe the food will be better than you think.”

  He looked at me and hesitated. I could see that he wanted to ask me something but wasn’t sure if he should. I waited. I was feeling really good about myself that morning. I had on a light blue top that made my eyes look bluer, and my hair curved around both sides of my face the way it’s supposed to when I use the dryer just right. I’d had it highlighted before we went on the cruise, so it was exactly the color I wish I had been born with. I could tell he liked the way I looked.

  “Did your husband come with you?” he asked.

  “My husband died last year,” I said.

  I swallowed hard. It’s still hard to talk about Bill. I can’t believe he’s really gone. We married young—I was twenty-three and he was twenty-five. We both read everything that wasn’t locked up, traveled whenever we had enough money, loved foreign films, saved every Friday night for a date, just the two of us, and never ran out of things to tell each other. I fell asleep in his arms every night for nearly 30 years.

  “I’m sorry,” Barry said. “You must miss him a lot.”

  “Every day,” I said, the words catching in my throat. “He was my best friend.”

  “Did you say your name was Powell?” he asked. I nodded, and he said, “You know, there was a guy named Bill Powell in my class at law school. I don’t suppose it’s the same guy.”

  “Bill graduated from Yale Law School in 1982.”

  “It is the same guy. I knew him—not well, but I knew him.”

  I did a double take. “You’re kidding. You really were in the same class with Bill? I don’t believe it. Oh, we have to talk.”

  “How about right now?” Barry said, taking my hand. “Let’s get some coffee.”