The Show (Northwest Passage Book 3)

by John A. Heldt

  "But?"

  "But I'm not sure I want to get a job or go to school. Not now."

  "That's OK, Grace. There's no pressure. You can do what you want."

  Joel put his hands on Grace's face and looked at her with newfound concern.

  "What do you want?"

  Grace slowly lifted her eyes to his.

  "I want to be a mother, Joel, and sooner rather than later."

  Joel smiled. He wanted her to be a mother too. He wanted to help her become a mother. But he saw no reason to rush the matter.

  "We'll work on that. As soon as I get a little more settled in my job, we'll do the family thing. I want children, too, Grace. I want as many as you want."

  Grace touched his lips with a finger.

  "Thank you," she said. "We haven't really talked about children. It's very important to me."

  Joel turned away for a moment. Of course it was important to her. She was an orphan, an orphan without siblings. She did not have the very things he had taken for granted his whole life. He returned to his bride and kissed her again, this time more forcefully.

  "We'll do it, Grace. We'll have a family, a big family."

  "I needed to hear you say that," Grace said, "and I'm glad you said it now."

  Joel smiled and looked at her curiously.

  "Why now?"

  Grace stepped back and untied the top of her bikini.

  "It's very simple," Grace said.

  Joel tilted his head.

  "When I say I want to start a family sooner rather than later, I really mean sooner."

  Grace removed her top, placed it on the bed, and once again gazed at her husband with inviting eyes. She threw her arms over his shoulders and gave him a tender kiss.

  "And when I say sooner, I really mean tonight."

  CHAPTER 28: GRACE

  Seattle, Washington – Saturday, October 5, 2002

  Ginny walked tentatively from the coffee table to the sofa, grabbed her mother's knee, and flashed two of the newest teeth in town. They had come in only days earlier but had already made their mark on a young woman who was more than ready to give up breastfeeding.

  "Are you going to be a good girl for Grandma?" Grace asked.

  "Of course she'll be a good girl. They'll both be good girls."

  Cindy Smith entered her living room with Good Girl Number Two, the one-year-old twin of Good Girl Number One, and sat down next to her daughter-in-law. She held Katie high with both arms and then lowered her to her lap.

  "What time should we put them to bed?"

  "I'll leave that up to you. I usually give them a bath at seven, read a story, and wait for Joel to stir them up. They are usually asleep by eight."

  Grace looked at her mother-in-law and smiled. She appreciated the deference from a woman who knew very well what time toddlers went to bed. She appreciated the help too. Motherhood was rewarding, but it was also hard work. Grandparents were worth their weight in gold.

  Grace got off the couch, straightened her attire, and brushed off Animal Cracker crumbs left by the Good Girl with choppers. She walked toward an open picture window, which allowed just enough evening light to illuminate her three-tiered lavender tea dress.

  "How is the dress fitting?"

  "It's a little tight, but I can't complain. Most of the women I saw in the costume shop had to buy dresses that were much too large or much too small. This is only one size down."

  "Well, you still look lovely."

  Cindy moved her head from side to side, as if to get a better look at Grace and her World War I-era outfit. She flinched when Katie pulled on one of her earrings.

  "Where is your wedding ring?"

  "I took it to the jeweler to get the setting tightened. I wanted to wear it tonight, but I don't want to lose the diamond. So I'm wearing this instead."

  Grace smiled sheepishly as she displayed a ring on her right hand. A yellow butterfly protruded from a blue plastic band. Its wings alone spanned two fingers.

  "It was in one of the boxes from the girls' birthday party. I didn't want them to swallow it, so I put it away for a rainy day. Well, it's raining today."

  Cindy laughed.

  "It's perfect! It matches your brooch too. Where on earth did you find that?" Cindy asked. She stared at a colorful enamel-on-sterling monarch butterfly pinned to Grace's dress. "It looks like an antique."

  "It is an antique. It's an Atkins original, made in England. My aunt gave it to me as a high school graduation present. She had purchased it in 1919, which makes it older than I am – and that's saying a lot."

  Cindy laughed again.

  "We'll, it's beautiful. You both are."

  Grace started to say something but stopped when she felt a tug on the hem of her dress. She picked up the source of the disturbance and gave her a kiss.

  "What will I do with you?" Grace asked Ginny.

  She didn't know the specific answer to that question. She knew only that whatever she did with Ginny – and Katie – it would involve an abundance of love and attention. She could not imagine life without the little ladies who had come into the world on a bittersweet day.

  Grace sighed as she thought of that day. It was easy now to dismiss the fear she had felt. Time had a way of putting things into perspective. But she knew she'd never forget the particulars of September 11, 2001, when she had raced to the hospital at thirty-six weeks and the Smith family of 2321 Wenatchee Avenue and the United States had changed forever.

  "Are you ready to go?" Joel asked.

  The question snapped Grace out of her daydream. She turned toward the voice and saw her husband and father-in-law wander in from the kitchen.

  "I'm as ready as I'll ever be."

  "Let me take her," Frank Smith said.

  "She might be ready for a change."

  "I'll take my chances."

  Grace smiled at Ginny.

  "In that case, say hello to Grandpa."

  Grace handed her firstborn to Frank and then joined Joel in front of an unlit fireplace as he inspected a top hat and cane. The accessories perfectly complemented a double-breasted, three-piece wool suit that he had borrowed from the grandfather of a colleague at work.

  Frank laughed and shook his head.

  "You two are a sight. Stay put while I get my new toy," he said.

  Frank put Ginny on the floor and returned a moment later with something called a digital camera – a camera that he had demonstrated earlier that week, a camera that did not use film. It was just another of many modern gadgets that Grace had come to understand and appreciate.

  Frank took his pictures and then retrieved Ginny, who had discovered the possibilities of ceramic coasters in his absence. When he had the situation in hand, he turned to Joel.

  "Are you sure you've got the look down? I remember seeing suits like that in the fifties."

  "I'm pretty sure," Joel said. "I did extensive research on the clothing of the time."

  "Is that so?"

  "It is. I went through a 1918 Sears Roebuck catalog I found at the library."

  Cindy laughed.

  "Well, you both look authentic to me," she said. "Will they offer prizes for the best-dressed couple or a discount on your tickets?"

  "We get a discount," Joel said. "We get our tickets at half off if we look the part, and I think we look the part. Grace definitely looks the part. The only thing we're missing is a Model T."

  "We're not missing a thing," Grace said smugly as she grabbed Joel's arm. "Once we step in the theater, it won't matter how we got there. I read today that the place looks just as it did when it opened. If we go in with the right attitude, we will all but step back in time."

  CHAPTER 29: JOEL

  Joel noticed the similarities even before he crossed the street. The Palladium on Pike Street, like the Phoenician on University Way Northeast, was big. It had big doors, a big marquee, and big lines that wrapped around the block. But with each step toward the ticket office, it became apparent that the Palladium was more t
han just another movie house.

  The theater featured a neoclassical, white terracotta facade that towered over the street; imposing windows; faux arches; and exterior ornamentation that seemed lost to another time. Architects had used the original blueprints as their guide when designing the new Palladium. The modern version replaced a building that had burned to the ground on March 3, 1919, less than five months after it had opened to great fanfare in downtown Seattle.

  "I love the searchlights," Joel said, referring to the crisscrossing beams that probed the skies for enemy aircraft. "It definitely gives this place a retro feel."

  "So do the clothes on the moviegoers," Grace added. "If it weren't for the cars and the restaurants, you'd never know we were in the twenty-first century."

  Joel looked over his shoulder and laughed. The fast-food restaurants on the other side of Pike most definitely altered the remodeled block's Progressive Era theme. He wondered how patrons of the arts in 1918 would have handled Bob's Burgers and Taco Tuesday.

  Joel purchased two tickets from a man in a bow tie and escorted Grace into a spacious, carpeted lobby. More than two hundred others, most in period attire, filled the open space and worked their way through a dozen vendors serving beer, wine, and hors d'oeuvres. All had come to see a grand opening that was billed as the biggest cultural event to hit the city since a traveling King Tut exhibit made a stop in 1978.

  As more people pushed their way in, Joel searched the lobby for breathing space and saw some on the far side of the room. He led Grace by the hand to a quiet, unoccupied nook near the restrooms. When he reached the spot, he leaned back on the wall, put his arms around his wife of two years, and pulled her close.

  "Happy anniversary," Joel said.

  Grace leaned forward and gave him a kiss.

  "I take it you like your present."

  "Yeah, I like my present. This was a wonderful idea, Grace."

  She had approached him with the idea of attending the event in July, after reading an article in the Sun. Joel had resisted at first. He had wanted to spend their second anniversary sailing in British Columbia's Gulf Islands. But Grace had convinced him that attending the opening of the Palladium was an ideal way for two people who had fallen in love in the balcony of an old-time movie house to renew their commitment to each other.

  "I like your hair too," Joel said with a laugh. "I've never been a fan of the bob cut, but you're turning me into one. You look splendid, Mrs. Smith."

  "Thank you."

  Turning his eyes from the splendid Mrs. Smith, Joel assessed the back of the lobby, where a curved refreshment stand projected outward from the wall. Offering everything from traditional fare to espresso and sushi, the stand was one of the few architectural concessions to 2002.

  Few theater owners in 1918 had wanted to needlessly subject their plush facilities to the ravages of soda, candy, and popcorn, so few offered food on the premises. Many who did tried to restrict the consumption of snacks to their lobbies.

  The Palladium's owners were no different. According to an article Joel had read earlier in the day, they had allowed vendors to sell refreshments outside the theater but officially discouraged people from bringing them inside. Customers brought them in anyway.

  Joel scanned the rest of the lobby and saw more interesting sights. He saw busts of goddesses, inlayed in Italian marble walls, and brass chandeliers that looked like they had been liberated from the Titanic. He did not, however, see the answer to a pressing question.

  "What's playing tonight, anyway? The Three Stooges? Laurel and Hardy? Charlie Chaplin?"

  "You got one out of three, Mr. History," Grace said in a patronizing but affectionate voice. "This is 1918 Night, remember? The Three Stooges and Laurel and Hardy did not begin performing together until the 1920s."

  Joel smiled at his suddenly animated bride. Few people in his life had ever schooled him on anything related to history or the arts, but Grace Vandenberg Smith was doing a dandy job now. It was clear that she had done her homework before putting on her tea dress.

  "We will see Charlie Chaplin. He is appearing as a doughboy in Shoulder Arms. That plays at eight and will be followed by Tarzan of the Apes, starring Elmo Lincoln, and Stella Maris, starring Mary Pickford."

  "Tarzan, huh? How's he going to do his jungle yell in a silent film?"

  Grace stared at him but said nothing.

  "OK. OK. I'll behave myself. I promise."

  Joel was about to give his informative movie guide another hug when he saw a thin man who looked like an escapee from a barbershop quartet lead a group of about a dozen toward the suddenly not-so-quiet, not-so-unoccupied nook.

  "As you can see," the man told the group, "we've made a few accommodations to the modern age. The large Braille signs posted outside the open, 48-inch restroom doors bring the facility into ADA compliance. Each of the restrooms also has a changing table, sensor faucets, and a hand dryer to minimize waste and clutter. Now, let me show you the auditorium itself . . ."

  Joel glanced at the talkative man and then his less talkative wife.

  "Do you want to join the tour? It might be interesting?"

  "I would," Grace said. "Let's go."

  Joel grabbed her hand and led her to the back of the group as it entered one of the most elaborate and impressive public spaces he had ever seen. Nearly everything about the chamber, from its 88-foot screen to the recessed lighting to the massive balcony, which supported six hundred of the auditorium's twenty-two hundred seats, overwhelmed the senses.

  "When the Palladium opened on October 5, 1918, it was the fifth largest movie theater in the world and arguably the most advanced," the barbershop man said. "No expense was spared in creating what city leaders had hoped would be a tourist attraction and a source of civic pride for decades to come."

  The guide led his charges down one of the auditorium's two aisles to a large carpeted space that separated the front row from the screen. When the last members of the group, which now numbered more than twenty, reached the open area and began to fan out, the guide asked them to turn around and face the back of the theater.

  "Please direct your attention to the mezzanine section, just below the balcony," he said. "If you look to the right of the projection room, you can see the top of a Wurlitzer organ that is identical to the one that greeted patrons on opening night in 1918. It boasts nearly twenty-one hundred pipes, arranged in thirty-three ranks. The cost of the organ was a half million dollars."

  "This is so exciting," Grace said. She squeezed Joel's hand. "I can only imagine what it must have been like to see a movie in this theater when it opened."

  Joel smiled at Grace and put his arm around her shoulder. His history professor was suddenly a schoolgirl again. He soaked up her newfound excitement.

  Joel listened to the tour guide describe the interior ornamentation and the modern capabilities of the projection system but paid more attention to the scores of people who entered the theater and began to take choice seats. He looked at his watch and then at Grace.

  "It looks like the first show isn't far off. Where do you want to sit?"

  Grace put a program in her purse and then scanned the auditorium from left to right. When she finished, she grinned and looked at Joel with sparkling eyes that would never go out of style.

  "The balcony."

  CHAPTER 30: GRACE

  Grace picked at her eye as Mary Pickford played with the lapel of her love interest in Stella Maris. Something had slid below her eyelid about halfway through the third movie and was quickly becoming a major irritant.

  "Is something wrong?" Joel asked.

  "I'm OK. I just have something in my eye."

  "Do you need to take care of it?"

  Grace nodded. She got up from her seat and stepped past her husband, who occupied an end seat of an end section. They had arrived too late to find something better. Everyone, it seemed, had wanted the middle of the balcony – not just couples celebrating their second anniversary two days late. When she
reached the aisle, Grace placed her hand on Joel's and gave it a squeeze.

  "I shouldn't be long. It's probably just an eyelash," she said. "But if the movie ends before I get back, don't wait for me. Meet me in the space between the restrooms."

  "Take your time," Joel said.

  Grace smiled softly at the dapper man letting go of her hand and proceeded down the steps. What a husband he had turned out to be, she thought. What a father too! When she had expressed interest in starting a family at the beginning of their marriage, he hadn't tried to talk her out of it with Joel Smith-style reason but had instead embraced her wish with enthusiasm and cheer. He'd told her that a house could wait and that other things could wait as well. He'd made it his mission to please his new wife and do everything in his power to ensure her happiness.

  When she reached the main level of the auditorium, Grace stopped to look at the screen and saw that the black-and-white movie had again turned to color. For some reason, the film's producers had decided to apply a soft purple tint to certain scenes. Grace wasn't sure if she liked the rudimentary special effect, but she conceded that it was novel.

  She rubbed her eye a few more times but succeeded only in making matters worse. So she walked briskly out of the auditorium and proceeded to the lobby. More than fifty people still wandered the public area. Some patrons seemed more interested in sampling beer, wine, and cheese than movies that had not been shown to wide audiences in more than eighty years.

  Grace moved quickly toward the restroom, noticed the Braille sign by the door, and went into the well-lit chamber. Two women eyed her as she entered. The first, an elderly lady in a green dress, dried her hands with the machine on the wall, grabbed her purse, and exited. The second, a pretty college-age girl in a purple dress, lingered a few seconds. She applied a colorful balm to her lips, primped her red shoulder-length hair, and bolted out of the room.

  Grace walked to the first available sink and went to work on her eye. She looked in the mirror and saw that the sclera had become red from irritation. As she had suspected, the culprit was an eyelash that had found its way to a hard-to-reach place beneath her eyelid.