by Michelle Cox
Polly looked at her, the slightest shard of hope lighting up her eyes before it disappeared again just as quickly. “I think it’s too late for Libby,” she said soberly, looking away.
“You never know . . . but even if it is . . . if it is too late, don’t you want to find out what happened? Find out who’s responsible?” Inspector Howard’s words were finally finding their way back to her in fits and starts.
Polly sighed deeply. “All right. Suit yourself. But don’t say I didn’t warn you. You’ve no idea what you’re getting yourself into.”
“Will you help me, then?”
“Help you? How do you mean?”
“Will you lend me a dress for the audition? Maybe the green one?”
Polly was silent for a few moments before she spoke. “All right,” she sighed. “Let me go get it, and you can try it on.”
“What will you do, Polly?” Henrietta asked, stopping her before she left the room. “For work, I mean.”
“I’ve got a little saved up. I’ve got to find Mickey. He’s got a cabin up north in Wisconsin somewhere. Always said he’d take me there someday,” she said with a small smile. “He might be there.”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to be found,” Henrietta said quietly. “By anyone just now.”
“Maybe. But if that’s the case, I won’t stay long. I’ve just got to know if he’s alive somewhere.”
“But what about what Inspector Howard said, about not leaving?”
“He can go take a leap. Listen, Hen, if you’re so chummy with him, you explain it. You tell him Mickey didn’t have nothing to do with it, either.”
“I’ll try,” she said, suspecting that the inspector would be terribly upset, and wondering if he might even put out a warrant for Polly’s arrest. “You could get in loads of trouble, Polly. If you run, they might suspect you, too.”
“I don’t care, Hen,” she said in a suddenly sad voice. “I don’t care much about anything anymore. Not after Libby. Mickey’s the first real thing I’ve had, don’t you see?”
Henrietta didn’t want to tell her about the other women she had seen Mickey frequently dallying with, so she merely nodded and took another sip of her whiskey. “Say, Polly,” she said, an idea suddenly dawning on her. “Can I ask another favor? Can I leave my stuff here?” she called out, Polly already having gone back to the bedroom now. Not waiting for her to answer, Henrietta continued, “While you’re gone, I mean? I . . . I still have to worry about fooling Ma,” she said, gesturing at her shabby outfit as Polly came back into the room. “Can you imagine if she saw me in an usherette’s getup?” she said, smiling at the thought.
“For God’s sake, Henrietta!” Polly snapped. “Why don’t you just tell her? You’re a grown woman! It’s ridiculous that she thinks you work in a factory. She’ll soon get over it; you’ll see. She doesn’t have a choice; she needs you, and she needs the money.”
Henrietta was stunned by Polly’s brutal honesty, and the smile quickly left her face. Polly could sometimes be so cruel.
When she saw Henrietta’s hurt expression, Polly instantly regretted her words and put her arm around her shoulders. “Hey, don’t mind me,” she said in a softer tone. “Course you can leave your things here. It’ll be good. You can look after the place for me. I’m sorry, doll. I’m—I’m not myself, I suppose.”
“You’re sure? It won’t be for long . . . just until I get the lay of the land at the Marlowe. Find a place to stash my things there.”
Polly slid her arm from around Henrietta’s shoulder and stood facing her, taking both of her hands into her own. “Just be careful, Hen. Please.”
“I will. Honestly. Don’t worry.”
“And I’d watch out for that inspector if I were you. I don’t trust him.”
“I’ll try,” Henrietta said with a weak smile, wondering, however, if it was already too late.
CHAPTER 6
It was bitterly cold the morning of the audition. Henrietta stood shivering in the blustery March air, waiting in a line of women that stretched from the infamous Marlowe Theater all the way down Monroe and around the block onto Market Street. Henrietta had had no idea that so many women would turn up, though she supposed they were all in the same boat—hungry for work like the men she had passed on the corners holding out tin mugs as she hurried past. There seemed to be more and more vagrants the closer she got to the Loop. The saddest ones were the soldiers who had somehow maneuvered through the Great War but who now couldn’t seem to find their way once returned. In some strange way, being in such a large company of women who saw nothing wrong with wanting a job at the Marlowe made her feel better about her decision, but nervous as well that the competition would be fierce.
She had been waiting over an hour already and was nearly frozen. She hadn’t wanted to wear her bulky overcoat, so she had borrowed a light mackintosh from Polly. The two had parted company that night and had not seen each other since. Henrietta had not needed to stop by the apartment until this morning to get ready, but when she did, Polly was nowhere to be seen. Henrietta had rummaged through the closet and observed that most of her things were gone, so she assumed she had left on her quest up north to find Mickey. Likewise, she had not heard from Inspector Howard since he had first propositioned her. He had simply given her the time and address of the audition but nothing more, which had surprised her, though what she was expecting she couldn’t rightly say.
She felt strangely detached as she stood in line, as if she were in the wrong place and the wrong time, not sure of why she was even there. She wondered if she were indeed making a big mistake, a feeling that was getting stronger the longer she stood in the cold. Her teeth were beginning to chatter. She tried to force her growing reservations from her mind as she stamped her feet against the dropping temperature and blew on her numb hands cupped in front of her mouth, wishing desperately that she were holding a hot mug of coffee instead. She tried thinking of home as a way to distract herself from both her nervousness and the actual pain she was beginning to feel in her extremities, especially her toes.
The day prior, she had pretended to be ill as a way of explaining why she was not going in to work at the electrics. She could have gone to Poor Pete’s, but she didn’t feel like explaining the whole thing to Mr. Hennessey, as she knew he would not approve of her new source of employment, and she didn’t want to lie to him. She supposed she could have gone and stayed at Polly’s, but somehow that didn’t seem right, either.
At first Henrietta saw her “illness” as a chance to spend some extra time with Jimmy and Doris and Donny, but her mother, fearing she was contagious, had made her stay in bed. Initially, Ma had tried to force her to go in to work, despite not feeling well, sure that Henrietta would be fired for staying home, but Henrietta had stubbornly insisted, mustering up a nasty cough or two as she lay in bed. Ma had eventually given up, but as soon as she left to run down to the corner shop and the butcher’s, the three little ones had made their way into the room and sat with her while she told them stories and tickled them. Any other time, she would have relished a chance to lie in bed all day, but the guilt she felt made it difficult to enjoy. In the end, she had gotten up and dressed, claiming to feel remarkably better, and had cleaned the house for Ma and done the ironing, though Ma, still disgruntled from before, had not expressed any gratitude.
At any rate, Henrietta was glad she had been there when Father Finnegan had unexpectedly shown up, Eugene angrily in tow, just as they were finishing up making supper.
“What’s he done now, Father?” Ma had asked, alarmed, nervously wiping her hands on a dish towel.
“I’m afraid I found him down by the pool hall, Mrs. Von Harmon.”
“I was looking for work!” Eugene said sulkily to the floor.
Ma swiftly clipped him on the ear. “You watch your mouth, boy! You apologize to Father.”
Eugene paused for several dreadful moments before finally mumbling, “Sorry, Father.”
Satisfied, Ma told
him to get out and get washed up. “You’ll stay for supper, Father?” she asked, glancing at the lone pot on top of the stove.
Henrietta saw his eyes travel to it as well before he made his excuse that he had a Knights of Columbus meeting to attend. Henrietta had never really liked Father Finnegan. He was a big man, with graying hair and a deeply wrinkled face that always made it look as though he were frowning. He had been a chaplain in the war, and he had an odd, militaristic demeanor about him still, even on the altar, expecting the poor altar boys to be exact in their movements and to wear their lace cassocks perfectly.
“I’m sorry about Eugene, Father,” Ma had said as he moved to the door to leave. “He’s—he’s not been the same since . . . ”
“No need to explain, Mrs. Von Harmon,” Father Finnegan condescended, holding up his hand to stop her. “I’ve seen this sort of thing many a time. No father. Difficult. He should be in school, that one should. He should contemplate a vocation in the church. Very promising he is.”
“He doesn’t have any more of a calling to the church than I do!” Henrietta said, unable to keep still any longer.
Father Finnegan turned his gaze to her now and kept it there. “We are all of us aware of your lack of vocation, Henrietta, but your brother might not yet be lost.” Before anyone could respond, he had raised his hat in farewell and slipped out the door, saying a rote “God be with you” as he went, almost colliding with Elsie as she hurried up the stairs.
“Oh, Hen! Why on earth do you have to open your mouth all the time?” her mother moaned.
“What’s happened?” asked Elsie quietly as she hung up her coat. “Feeling better, Hen?” she asked with her sweet smile.
The rest of the night had gone on uneventfully, dinner mostly consisting of Ma scolding both Henrietta and Eugene, who sat silently eating, refusing to respond to anything Ma said to him, except to say, “I’m not goin’ into the church, Ma, and I ain’t goin’ back to school.”
Later, Henrietta had tried to have a word with him as she had promised Ma, perhaps get him to confide in her like he did when they were little, but Eugene remained mostly silent as she implored him to either go back to school or to be the man of the house and find work. Eventually she had given up and left him to sulk while she went back to the kitchen to help with the dishes. If nothing else, the evening’s events had only made Henrietta more determined than ever to secure this job at the Marlowe, though she had to admit that Father Finnegan’s barbed comment had indeed stung her.
Henrietta strained her neck again to see if there was any movement at the front of the line. The last group had gone in what seemed like a long time ago, and she tried counting the women in front of her in an attempt to guess whether or not she would be in the next group admitted. She had been watching, and it seemed, as far as she could tell, that they were letting in groups of about twenty each time.
“Like I said, honey,” said a woman now in front of her, smoking and leaning confidentially toward the woman standing beside her.
“Nothin’ to it. Just get up there, lift your skirt, give ‘em a bit of a smile. All there is to it,” she said, taking a puff of her cigarette.
“Then what?” said her friend, stamping her feet in the cold.
“My cousin says they tell you ‘right’ or ‘left’. The door to the right leads right out into the alley. You’re done. Try again next time. The door to the left means ya got a chance. So I’m told, anyway. That’s where we’re headed, doll, I just know it.”
“Oh, Ida, I don’t know . . . Maybe we shouldn’ be doin’ this, anyway.”
“That’s no way to talk! Don’t be nervous! Nothin’ to it!”
“Next!” called out a thin man in a tweed cap who had just emerged from the Marlowe. “Next group,” he said emotionlessly, his voice thick and raspy, presumably from cigarettes, as he stood hunched over against the cold. The women began hurrying in, the thin man eyeing them steadily and counting them as they passed him. Henrietta prayed she would make it in. She just wanted this to be over. She was almost there . . . she could hear him mumbling, “You, you, you, you . . . ” She shuffled along behind the other women and thankfully made it in just before he abruptly announced, “That’s it,” and shut the door again, roughly turning the lock.
Henrietta stood huddled in the darkened lobby with the other women, the foyer not being much warmer than it had been outside except that they were at least sheltered from the wind now. The women’s excitement was palpable, though, as the thin man made his way to the front of the group. She could hear what sounded like low, seductive jazz with a slow, steady beat coming from somewhere deeper inside the theater.
“This way,” said the man lazily as he began to lead the girls along a darkened hallway.
“Excuse me? Mister?” shouted out one girl near the front. “Where should we put our coats and things?”
“Coats? Coats go here or there or maybe nowhere,” he muttered, cryptically. “Prob’ly gonna need ‘em again in a few ticks,” he said, grinning at them with gray, crooked teeth as if amused by himself. “Out you go to the alley in two shakes.” He turned then and continued down a hallway and up a few steps, apparently unconcerned as to whether they were following him or not because he never looked around again.
Sobered by his less than encouraging words, no one else said anything, though there was a slight hum of whispered conversation as they made their way through the maze of hallways behind the thin man. Henrietta was oddly reminded of the ancient Promenade with all of its little twists and turns and alcoves, but this was on a much grander scale. Despite her efforts to the contrary, she eventually lost all sense of direction, though the sound of the band had gotten steadily louder, so she presumed they were headed somewhere toward the heart of the theater.
Finally they arrived at what appeared to be the backstage area, and the thin man turned to them, gesturing them to stop. “Line up right ‘ere,” he said, waving absently with his hand at the general area behind him as he peered out through a crack in the heavy, velvet curtain.
Henrietta found herself toward the end of the line. She slipped out of her mackintosh and brushed out the skirt of the emerald-green dress she had borrowed from Polly. It fit her perfectly, hugging her curves tightly, and exposing more than she had ever dared to do while at the Promenade. Polly’s matching shoes had been a bit too big, but Henrietta had remedied that by stuffing cotton wool in the toes, hoping it would do. She had had to admit as she had stood in front of the mirror this morning alone at Polly’s that she looked rather ravishing. The deep green of the dress accented her auburn hair, which she now fluffed with her small hands, letting some of it slip over her right eye, a look she knew to be alluring. She placed a hand on her hip, hoping to appear confident, though her heart was beating wildly in her chest. She observed the women in front of her with a sinking feeling, as it was quickly becoming apparent to her that most of them seemed to have done this sort of thing before. They were all extremely attractive in their own way, but in addition to that, they also seemed to possess a self-assuredness that she seemed to lack. She felt horribly out of place as she awkwardly tried to listen to what was happening on the stage.
The music had just stopped, and Henrietta was surprised to hear what was a woman’s voice calling out, “Left, right, right, left, right, right, left, right . . . ” doling out the sentences for the girls currently on stage. The fact that it was a woman conducting the auditions rather than a man made her even more nervous, as she instinctively felt it might be easier to perform for a man. No matter, she told herself, and took a deep breath, trying madly to calm her nerves. She tried to think about how nervous she had been at the interview with Mama Leone and how absurd it had turned out to be, and almost laughed out loud at the memory, despite, or maybe because of, her current state of anxiety. Her attention was redirected, however, when she heard the women on stage shuffling off and then a shout, “Next group!”
Henrietta felt a sudden sense of panic and momentaril
y contemplated not going on at all and running away instead. She closed her eyes, trying to steady herself, and forced herself to remember why she was doing this. She tried to tell herself that she was overreacting, that this was no different than taxi dancing, for God’s sake, probably even better, actually. This way she wouldn’t have to be held by different men night after night. Unfortunately, she kept hearing Polly’s warning in her head, but she tried to block it out, remembering that she was here to prove Polly and Artie’s innocence and maybe even find out what had happened to Libby. Plus, there was the money. And the inspector. Oddly, she didn’t want to let him down, a feeling that simultaneously puzzled and irritated her.
The thin man, still at the head of the line, turned to them now and grinned. “This is it, leddies. Do or die, as they say,” he mumbled, holding open the curtain for them to file past. Henrietta could feel his eyes on her, a cigarette now dangling from his thin, almost nonexistent lips, as she made her way through and quickly found a chair upon which to toss her coat. No going back now, she said, forcing herself to smile and walking toward the front of the stage.
“That’s right, ladies. Line up. Right in front, now,” a woman’s voice very sternly called out.
Henrietta peered into the darkness of the seats beyond the stage, but the footlights temporarily blinded her. She put her hand up to her eyes, shading them, and was able to make out a tall, severe-looking woman sitting a few rows from the front. Beside her sat a stocky man with a receding hairline and thick, bushy eyebrows. He pressed the tips of his thick fingers together, holding his hands just under his nose as if in prayer, but it seemed to Henrietta that his mood was not one of peaceful repose, but rather of mild irritation or perhaps boredom. His eyes never seemed to blink, and Henrietta couldn’t help but think he looked cruel. She wondered if this could possibly be the infamous Neptune that the inspector had mentioned. She tried to look away, but she could feel him staring at her as she brushed down her skirt again.