I’d eaten about two hours ago but it didn’t matter if it had been two days or two minutes. I can’t refuse those scones and she knows it so the manipulative little witch keeps baking them.
We returned the boat to its rightful slip in a spot on the pier then walked to a vehicle that was parked by a curb about three blocks from the pier. Two people sat in the vehicle.
“Izzy! And Saree? How did you get involved? Whose van is this?”
Saree leapt out to hug me. “Izzy called me and told me everything that had happened in Memphis and then he said you’d been grabbed outside the train station. So I telephoned one of Flo’s stagehands backstage who said he had a van that belonged to the Follies but he figured since you’re a chorine, that Mr. Ziegfeld himself would drive it if he were here! And since he wasn’t, Joe offered to let me and Izzy take it to search for you. And then Briley called Izzy and told him that your landlady had figured out where you were and to wait for us at the Pier. So we did.”
It was a mixed-up explanation but it didn’t matter. I hugged her again and glanced at Izzy who was watching the pair of us with paternal pride - and a little something extra where Saree was concerned. I winked at him over Saree’s shoulder. He winked back. Wicked.
Izzy drove us back to Mrs. Donovan’s rooming house, let the enigmatic landlady and me out, escorted us to the door then took Briley and Saree to their respective residences before bringing the van back to the New Amsterdam Theatre. Briley argued that he wanted to accompany me to my room, but I told him I needed a shower and a long sleep even more than a bodyguard.
It was now close to one in the afternoon. I had a show to do tonight.
Chapter 30
“Melody? It’s for you again. Another hotsy-totsy beau.”
Edith Beyers, self-appointed phone monitor for the day, stood over me.
“What time is it?”
“Time to answer the fifth stinking call you’ve gotten in less than two hours.”
Obviously I was not going to get a nap. Edith’s math was correct. I’d had five phone calls since I’d gotten back to Room 413 after my kidnapping adventure.
“Melody? Hey, l’il lady! Ah heard you were back in town. It’s Grady. You up fer some supper after the show tonight? Lloyd may join us.”
“Melody? This is Lawrence Vassily. I was told you’d returned to New York yesterday. Would you care for some dinner after the show?”
“Mel-o-dee? Zis ees Prince Peter. You iss back? Vood dine after show dis evening?”
And a surprise call. “Melody. This is the Count. Would you like to have dinner with me after the show? I’ll send the car around with Mr. Bongo.”
I’d told them all no. One of them might well be the Ptah Wannabe and I didn’t need to make abduction easier. My life and virtue were in already in jeopardy. Aside from that, I declined each invitation for a much better reason. Briley. We hadn’t had a second to ourselves since the spectacular rescue at sea. Uh- bay.
The Count’s call had been the one that had forced Edith to roust me from my short nap. After I’d politely told him I appreciated the invite but “no, thanks, not tonight” I wandered down the hall back to my room musing that in this era people didn’t need cell phones or the internet. There was a grapevine in play speedier than cable modem on a state-of-the-art computer.
I opened the door to my room and screamed. Lotus blossoms filled vases in every corner. I marched back downstairs and informed the latest desk clerk that I was certain whatever hospital was closest would be more than happy to take them off our hands, if she’d be so kind as to call. She did. I waited in the lobby of the building until several young men arrived from St. Luke’s, then escorted them to the room so I could watch watch them remove every bloomin' bloom from my sight and smell.
I threw on one of Bettina’s casual skirt and blouse combos, then grabbed my bag and carefully folded one of Bettina’s fancier dresses inside. Briley had last seen me as a dripping piece of animal-skin covered flotsam this morning. Once I got to the theatre I’d be wearing a ton of make-up and attired in costumes. I wanted to be gorgeous for our after-show date.
Bettina’s dress was a mix of silk, satin and lace in a lime sherbet color that set off my hair color. Like the party dress I’d worn to the Ellingfords less than two weeks ago, this early flapper, handkerchief-hemmed baby had a dropped waist that set off my legs. For once Briley McShan was about to get an eyeful of Mel not covered in dirt from a makeshift pyramid tent, water from the East River, or ashes from a burnt-down whorehouse.
I splurged and took a cab so I’d get to the New Amsterdam with plenty of time to iron and hang up the dress. I rehearsed steps with another chorine since I hadn’t danced in a week. I stretched out, wincing over sore muscles and Geb-inflicted bruises.
Saree burst into the dressing room. She was even more effusive and bubbly than normal – which was saying quite a bit. “Mel! You’ll never guess! Guess what? Wanna guess? Huh?”
“You’re engaged.”
Her face dropped a mile. “How did you know? No one knows. Who told you?”
“Saree! I was joking! My gosh! You really are engaged? Holy Madonna!”
She squealed, giggled and threw her arms around me. “I am! Really! For the first time in my life, if you can believe it given the number of guys I’ve gone out with!”
“Saree! I’m thrilled. Details, girl, details!”
“Well, it’s partly your fault.”
“What?”
“Yep. Izzy said you told him I thought he was cute and he’d been liking me for ages and ages and he didn’t have the nerve to do anything about it ‘cause of guys like the Count always hanging around, but when he heard that the Count and I had been bust for the last week, well, he just screwed up his courage and finally asked me out. He called me long distance all the way from Memphis when he was down there - can you believe?”
“I can, but I don’t. Go on.”
“Okey-dokey. He came right over to my place yesterday after all of you guys got off the train. Of course, that was before he heard that you got nabbed by those gangsters or he would’ve stayed to help Briley, but anyway, he came over and we went out to dinner and he brought me a rose and we talked and we smooched and we smooched some more and the next thing he’s on one knee and he’s asking me to marry him. He even had a ring! Of course I said yes. I’ve adored Izzy forever but he never did anything about it.”
We hugged again. I grinned at her.
“I’m so glad for you. Honest. Izzy is, let’s see, what would you call him? A pip? And you’re perfect for one another.”
She sighed. “We are, aren’t we? Mel, do you want to hear something really nutty?”
Getting engaged after one date was nutty enough but I nodded. “Sure. Hit me with it.”
“Izzy got offered a job at some newspaper down in Memphis. The Curried Apple?”
I smiled. “Courier-Appeal. It’s like the Memphis version of the New York Times.”
“Terrif! Well he’s going to take the job. We’ll be moving south at end of the summer.”
“Wow. Pretty fast. Saree, I have to ask. Are you going to miss the Follies?”
She smiled at me. “Melody, I’ve been dancing in shows since I was eight. Did a vaudeville act with some cousins when we were kids. I like performing, and I’ve loved being a Follies girl, but - don’t laugh. Guess what I’ve always wanted to do?”
I shook my head. “No clue.”
“Teach. I want to open a dance school. It’s too hard to do that in Manhattan where it’s just way too expensive to find a place. But in Memphis? How many are down there?”
Time to tread with care. “Uh, not many. Really. I took dance from a great place when I was a kid. It was very friendly and not competitive like a lot of studios can be. My best friend, Savanna, and I both took there. Her family owned it.”
“That’s exactly the type of school I want. Like a neighborhood academy for kids - and even older people too. I’ve saved all my Follies earning
s forever. Even got a name for it.”
“Saree’s School of Swing, Sashay and Sway?”
She tapped me on my cheek in a fake punch, but giggled. “Naw. I’m serious now. This is sort of a sentimental thing. I want to name it after my mama. She’s the one who taught me to dance.”
“Yes?” I asked.
“Rachel Academy of Dancing Arts.”
I jumped up. “My God! That’s where Savanna – uh – that’s a great name. Uh.”
I’d been an idiot. “Saree? What’s your full name? I mean, I suppose Saree is a nickname, right?”
Saree hadn’t noticed my slip. She was too excited envisioning her nice future with Izzy Rubens at her side and small children in pink tights and tutus on makeshift stages in Memphis, Tennessee.
She answered my question with, “It’s Sarah Rachel Leah. From the Bible.”
I sat back down, stunned, as a new voice filled the air in the small dressing room.
“Saree! You seen my lipstick? Honestly, every time I put it down someone swipes it.”
Saree sighed and whirled around to take care of a Follies make-up crisis. I stared at her retreating back. Sarah Rachel Leah Goldman about to be Rubens. Izzy Rubens. And on down to Sarah Leah Rubens Epstein. Savanna. My best friend was the great-granddaughter of my closest buddy at the 1919 Ziegfeld Follies. No wonder it felt as if Saree and I had been friends for years. In a way, we had.
It wasn’t just the matter of of Saree’s strong personality resemblance to Savanna. When I’d taken dance at Rachel’s Academy I’d seen pictures of Sarah Leah Rubens all over the place dressed in Follies costumes. I was a kid and kids don’t always notice faded photographs, but I remembered being entranced by all the photos that showed the former chorus girl. One in particular stood out of Saree in her Spanish Toreador costume with a singer named Johnny Dooley. I’d loved the black and white photos of this lady with legendary Eddie Cantor where the pair had been mugging for a shot that had obviously not been intended for the official Follies scrapbook. Cantor and Saree had been mooning the photographer – in bloomers. Not the classiest picture on the wall but it had been one of my favorites.
I was still reeling over my late discovery that Saree was related to Savanna, when the stage manager called “Places.” I ran to the wings and prepared to go onstage after a week away.
Perhaps that week had given me a different perspective. I wasn’t frantically trying to remember songs and dances and when to go on. I gave it my all when I was onstage, but found I kept snapping pictures of the heart to keep for the time when I was no longer a Follies girl.
Capturing Saree was the easiest inner snapshot. She glowed more than the lights illuminating the stage. The standout photo in my mind came at the end of a shimmy dance when she kicked just a tad higher than the rest of the girls, then flung back her head, laughing in sheer happiness.
Bert Williams was a more poignant picture in his blackface makeup and white gloves and shabby tuxedo and stovepipe hat. Just before he went onstage to join the cast for the Mandy minstrel number I saw him close his eyes. He took a deep breath, opened them again then smiled his onstage character smile. I knew it hid a pain none of us would ever understand.
The last heartfelt inner photograph of the night came when John Steele stepped out to sing "A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody." He winked at me and grinned broadly before gesturing directly at me while I descended the staircase to the lyric that included my name.
The night passed almost like a dream. The show was over in a few hearbeats. I was bowing in the curtain call then staring into the mirror in the shared dressing room.
Saree raced in just as I was preparing to slather on cold cream for the painstaking removal the make-up from my sweaty face. She screamed, “Don’t!” I jumped three feet into the air, terrified that Ptah Junior was hiding under the table waiting to pounce.
“What?”
“Don’t take off your make-up! Picture time!”
“What?”
“Yeah. Tonight.” She upped her volume so the other five chorines sitting at tables preparing to divest themselves of mascara, shadow, rouge and lipstick would stop before they got too involved in the process. “We have to get into the staircase parade costumes, and do what we can to fluff out our hair to get rid of the Prohibition bonnet squishes.”
Groans and gripes echoed around the room. The Prohibition bonnets were nothing short of hair destroyers. Mary De Luca began stroking her bobbed hair until it stood up in spikes. She sighed. “Why didn’t they do this earlier? Before the show? Before we looked like, like . . . ”
“Demented ‘B-boys’ krumping on the sidewalk in hundred-degree heat?”
Faces whipped around to stare at me. Saree giggled. “What in creation are you talking about?”
“Oh. Uh. ‘B-boys.’ Uh. Those are - uh - barbers who wave hair. Instead of crimping it’s called krumping.” I waited for lightning to strike me dead.
The dressing room became silent. Then Saree whooped and hugged me. “You are so funny, Melody! You make up the kookiest things and then come up with such terrif explanations! I’m going to miss you!”
I froze. Had Saree somehow figured out my time-traveling secret? Did instinct tell her I was going to disappear soon back to my own time? Had Fiona Belle been gabbing? Worse, did she somehow know I might becoming a ghost soon? I stayed silent and watched five girls smother Saree in a huge embrace.
“We’ll miss you too, Saree! Congrats on getting hitched and moving down South!”
I took a deep breath. She was talking about her own traveling plans – plans that sounded nice and normal. Getting on a train where the honeymoon cabin has been reserved was a far cry from winding a musical doll and landing in another era.
Or being murdered and haunting one’s future self.
I joined in the good-will wishes and hugs and kisses. Then all of us got down to the business of making ourselves look like Follies girls again instead of skunks with red cheeks.
Saree and I strolled on stage together - arm in arm. The photographer was setting up for the staircase shot as we entered. He placed Saree on the next to last step at the bottom, with me standing beside her on the right side of the stairs. For the next thirty minutes bulbs flashed in my face. My mouth hurt from smiling so much.
The photographer took one final shot, telling us all to picture beautiful things as befitted beautiful girls. I glanced into the wings. Briley was standing near the curtain pull; Duffy the dog obediently at his side. Briley smiled at me and waved and I flashed the warmest smile of the night. That picture was meant for him and him alone.
Chapter 31
“Irving Berlin was right.”
“About what?”
“His new song John Steele sings each night. A pretty girl is indeed like a melody. At least my Melody.”
I blushed. “Thanks. Both for the compliment and the ‘my’. I like the sound of that.”
Briley smiled. “I like the idea of that as well.”
He rose from his seat at the table at Fontainebleu’s, the very latest Follies hang-out.
“Care to dance? I’ve wanted to have my arms around you for the last four hours, but never got the chance. That photographer took forever.”
“Love to.”
The band was playing a slow waltz. Perfect for holding one another close without attracting the attention of a crowd. The music was even soft enough to let the two of us talk without resorting to screaming at each other.
Briley murmured, “I never really apologized for acting like a spoiled child.”
“When? You’re always wonderful to me. What are you talking about?”
“In Memphis. Well, more specifically, on the train coming back when I wouldn’t talk to you about the future. I was still sore about Frank staying down there but I didn’t mean to take my anger out on you. I’m really sorry.”
I continued to sway to the rhythm of the music, but reached over and lightly kissed him. It was all I could do not to let that kiss
go further.
“Briley. You were hurt. I could see that. And it was – it is – perfectly understandable. You just found your brother. You didn’t expect him to, well, kind of disappear from your side again. It wasn’t meant like that but I imagine you felt somewhat betrayed. And your apology is not needed, but it’s accepted anyway.”
“Thanks.” He paused. “You’re a good listener, Melody Flynn.”
I preened. “All due. . . ”
“To your friend Savanna’s brothers,” he interrupted with a smile.
“Yeah, well, they really did teach me more genteel things than techniques of fighting and breaking and entering. They were fairly solid citizens when they weren’t stirring up trouble.”
“I wonder if I’ll get to meet them one day?”
I didn’t respond for a few seconds and Briley gently took his hand off my waist and lifted my chin so I could look at him. “I understand. According to your theory, by the time they’re born I’ll be an extremely old man. Unless Mrs. Donovan decides to take us both traveling by means other than the Central Railroad.”
I sighed. “It is nutty. isn’t it? I wish I could pin her down as to how and why but everytime I try to ask she throws sheet music or a scone at me and that ends all hope of reasonable discussion.”
The music shifted to a tango. Both of us love tangos. We quit talking so we could shift dance positions. I loved the feel of his body pressed against mine but this music put a swift end to our conversation.
When we finished, we sat back down and Briley poured champagne into our glasses. Then he raised his glass. “A toast. To Mel and Briley. To the miracle of finding each other however it came about. Staying together - always” He took a breath. “I do intend marrying you one day -in this century or the next. Would you say yes?”
My breath caught. I closed my eyes. “Oh yeah.”
He kissed me.
Haunting Melody Page 21