Empire Girls Read online

  But what had he meant? The dress emporium, elegant as it was, had dark edges, like a cracked frame surrounding a beautiful painting. What was I getting mixed up with? Would a similar fate befall Rose? She’d let a tiger stretch out across her lap if it smiled up at her. If she was going to work for Cat, then I was, too. Jimmy said she’d provide opportunities. I wondered if we defined that word the same way.

  “Okay,” Cat finally said after I extolled my virtues. “You can do all those things, but can you keep a secret?”

  “Is the day long?”

  “Too long,” she said, and smiled wryly. She told Rose to gather up some dresses from the back room and brought me down a narrow hallway to a door hidden by a heavy red velvet curtain. I half expected to see Dante’s words emblazoned over the entryway—“Abandon all hope ye who enter here.”

  I didn’t change my mind once the door opened. A dim tunnel led to a crumbling cement staircase, the air turning musty and damp as we descended. “You breathe a word of this,” Cat said, “I’ll have Jimmy make hooch out of your melted bones.”

  Cat knocked on the door at the bottom of the staircase in five quick raps. When it opened, the round-faced girl from the party stood gawking at us. “What’s she doing here?” the girl said, thrusting her chin at me.

  “Ivy, do you know Bessie?”

  I met Bessie’s glare with a smile. When in doubt, father always said, kill ’em with kindness. “I do. We met at the party at Empire House.”

  “Ivy will take Lola’s place,” Cat said briskly.

  “But Lola isn’t gone,” Bessie protested.

  “Not yet,” Cat retorted, and stepped past the openmouthed girl, tugging me behind her.

  I’d been in a speakeasy once before. My father, flush with a check from some naturalist magazine, took Rose and me shopping in downtown Albany. After wandering around the city, we found ourselves in a bowling alley across the street from the capitol building. Not a single soul was in it; the pins stood clustered in groups like abandoned bouquets of flowers. My father walked past the lanes, through an empty kitchen and directly into the ladies’ room. Rose and I followed to warn him of his mistake, only to find ourselves in a room full of men. They didn’t appear startled to see girls our age, but I was sure shocked when my father walked up to a bearded old curmudgeon and asked for a glass of beer. He ordered the root variety for Rose and me, and we sat in the corner near a quartet playing cards. The men nodded in acknowledgment as we passed, mumbling my father’s name, and I realized he’d not only been there before, but was a known entity. Rose, eyes wide and face blanched of color, had obviously come to the same conclusion.

  “This is against the law,” she whispered.

  “Laws are made by man, and anything made by man is subject to fallacy,” Father said boldly, taking a sip of his beer. He leaned forward, warming to his topic. “What if a law causes more harm than good? Should it be obeyed?”

  I didn’t need to ponder the question. “No.”

  “You’re wrong,” Rose said quietly. “If those judgments are left to individuals, we no longer live in a community. Standards must be upheld or the world unravels like a spool of thread.”

  “You’re being too literal,” I said.

  “Have you ever tried to rethread a spool?” Rose asked, and her face flushed crimson, a sure sign her spirit was up. “It’s impossible to make it as neat and tidy as it was originally.”

  “Maybe I don’t like neat and tidy.”

  “Girls,” Father interrupted, his voice crisp. One of the cardplayers said something to his companions, and they shared a laugh. Rose and I kept our heads down, and focused on finishing our root beers. We said little but pleasantries for the rest of the afternoon, but every so often my father winked at me, and I knew he was silently telling me he agreed with my perspective. When he looked at Rose I saw a more complex array of emotions play over his features—frustration, pity, puzzlement. At the time I was angry with her for displeasing him, but as Cat brought me into the jewel-toned speakeasy that smelled of smoke and vice, I wondered if he’d approve of how easily I slipped into an underground life, just as Rose acclimated to her role behind the sewing machine without skipping a beat. Had he thought too much of me? Had he missed something vital about her? Had I? I wondered if my father could have found a way to be proud of both his daughters as we began to wrestle with this city, if he could see what was slowly becoming clear to me.

  Cat’s speakeasy was nothing like the sawdust floor room behind the bowling alley. Velvet tapestries hung from low ceilings, with rust-colored exposed brick peeking through, glimpses of the basement’s rough-and-tumble past. In the center of the space, black-and-white linoleum tiles created an octagonal dance floor, where people tangled limbs under a canopy of paper lanterns. A raised stage fanned out from a back corner, and I giggled to think of the house drummer trying to do his job wedged firmly between two walls.

  Bessie disappeared into a small room behind the bar and exited with a package wrapped in plain brown paper and tied with a hemp cord. “Your uniform,” she said, and handed to me.

  I opened the package to find a silk, two-piece pajama set with a mandarin collar, in line with the vaguely Asiatic theme of Cat’s joint. Though soft as water, the material was sturdy, and the bright jade color would stand out in a sea of bodies.

  “Maude and Viv are the other girls,” Bessie said, a note of bitterness in her voice. “Now that Lola’s gone.”

  It didn’t surprise me that Maude and Viv would work for Cat. This big city was getting smaller by the minute. I did wonder what transgression had sent Lola packing, but didn’t press the issue. I determined that with this crowd, questions had to be broached carefully, like searching for a pickle in a barrel full of sharks.

  “Should I put this on?” I asked instead, itching to try on the uniform.

  “Have you got a cleaning costume?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then put it on, but be careful. Cat doesn’t like us to look a mess.”

  Cat didn’t like any kind of mess, apparently. I spent most of the afternoon mopping the dance floor, washing the bar down with vinegar, and spot cleaning mystery stains from the hanging tapestries. I wore a cotton smock over my uniform, but that didn’t keep my silk hem from regularly dipping into the sudsy water.

  “Roll up your cuffs,” Bessie said, exasperated. “You’ll wreck the silk.” She knelt at my feet and showed me how. “Tuck ’em in twice and they won’t fall. Don’t you know nothin’?”

  That was a pretty fair assessment, but there was no way in hell I’d admit it. “Thanks,” I said, but she shook her head.

  “We don’t have to like each other, but we got to stick together down here.”

  Later, as the club got roaring, I still wasn’t sure what she meant. Other than a few pinches on the bottom, I hadn’t any trouble with the customers, and the girls didn’t have time for pettiness or squabbles. Cat’s place was hopping with cheerful, noisy Greenwich Village denizens thirsty for homemade gin and watery beer. The waitresses relied on each other to keep the drinks coming, and, according to Maude, we’d split our tips evenly at the end of the night.

  My feet were screaming at me when the joint finally started to clear out. A few lost souls clung to each other on the darkening dance floor, and I was tempted to join them, to find someone to lean against and close my eyes.

  “Cat wants this place spotless,” Viv said as she passed by, bumping my shoulder. “The night’s not over yet.”

  I started clearing tables, my movements sluggish, like I was underwater. As I slowly walked to the bar with an overflowing tray, Bessie came up next to me and lifted it from my hands.

  “Thank you,” I said, exhaling with relief. My arms had started shaking, and I wondered if I’d reach the bar without having to balance the whole thing on my head.

 
“I told you we stick together,” Bessie said. “You’ll do the same for me.”

  Something, possibly the late hour, possibly Bessie’s friendlier tone, made me brave. “Is that why Lola got the boot? Was she a lone wolf?”

  Bessie pointed to the glasses stacked against the mirror behind the bar. “See that glass there? How’s it different from the one next door?”

  One was a standard martini glass, the other a special crystal glass reserved for the customers who scored the front tables, the politicos, theatrical folk and Park Avenue men about town. I’d learned that fact after a few harsh words from a real swell with a chip on his shoulder. “There’s a world of difference between glass and crystal.”

  “You got it,” Bessie said. “Lola didn’t. She thought she was crystal, but we’re all glass. If you break, there’s another to replace you lickety-split. We’ve had a string of ’em who got the dustpan—Sophie, Rebecca, Daisy and now Lola—all gone.” She returned to her place behind the bar and handed me a crystal short glass and a clean cloth. “I stick around,” she said, pride evident in her voice, “because I keep my head down and get the job done.”

  From what I’d seen, Bessie’s opinion of herself was a tad inflated. She gabbed plenty, but I didn’t mind. I began to clean the already-spotless glass to keep her talking. “We’re in Daisy’s old room at Empire House,” I said, hoping she’d spill something juicy. “Boy, she got out of there in a hurry.”

  Bessie rubbed a hand across her freckled chin. “That one surprised me. I thought she was ladylike and classy, as fine as Hungarian crystal, but it turned out she was common as any of us.”

  “She got into trouble with a fella?”

  “That’s the skinny. He must have been a real beast ’cause in the three years she worked here, she never brought him round.” Bessie began to wipe down the cocktail shakers. “Cat knew what was going on—those two were thick, though you can never really tell if Cat trusts someone. Maybe the old lady at Empire House.”

  “Nell?”

  “That’s the one. She’s a piece of work, isn’t she?”

  They all were. New Yorkers were shaped by action, noise and the poke in the eye of competition. Asher’s eyes burned with the fire of the city, with the wit and wager of a challenge. I wanted to look like that. I wanted my brother to show me how it was done.

  “Daisy ever mention her boyfriend’s name?”

  “Not to me she didn’t,” Bessie said, then caught herself. “I don’t know what business it is of yours.”

  “I’m looking for a fella named Asher,” I said, keeping my tone light. “He’s a relative. When we last heard from him, he was in this neck of the woods. My sister and I think he might have gotten into some trouble. You said Daisy had gotten into a bind, and I just—”

  “You just nothing. Don’t go looking for things in here. In the city, yeah, take what you can grab, but this is Cat’s place. Private property. You gotta learn what that means.” Bessie picked up a common martini glass. “And if you don’t—smash! Into the dustbin you go.”

  * * *

  I returned to Empire House late that night. We each gave Sonny a dollar to keep the back door unlocked, and Viv and Maude, still jazzed up after our shift, stayed put in his kitchen to swipe some hot cocoa while I tramped upstairs. When I poked my head through the floor, the room was still lit, and I spotted Rose at the hidden window again, wearing our mother’s nightgown, her expression alternately dreamy and distressed. I was used to my changeable moods—they swept through me like small tornados. I rather enjoyed them, those dramatic reminders that I was alive, but in Rose, usually so placid, it was disturbing.

  “Hey-ya!” I said too loudly, and she jumped. “Can’t sleep?”

  Rose drew the collar of her nightgown tightly around her neck. “My thoughts are racing,” she said, but didn’t offer a reason. She smiled in an attempt to mask the disappointment in her eyes. It wasn’t me Rose was waiting to come up through the floor. Only later did I realize I should have asked. I should have settled in next to her and offered her a listen, drawing her out. Instead, the familiar spike of irritation ran roughshod over any tender feelings.

  “While you were off staring into space,” I said, “I was acting like a regular Mata Hari.”

  “What did you find out?”

  “Well...” What felt like real juice in the speakeasy felt like failure in the soft, quiet glow of the attic.

  Rose frowned. “Well, what?”

  I told her about Daisy’s mystery boyfriend, and of my suspicions regarding Cat and Nell. “And Daisy worked at Cat’s for three years. Even if Asher wasn’t her guy, she had to have run into him at some point.”

  “I suppose,” Rose said distractedly. “But there’s got to be a reason why Nell and Cat would lie. It makes me uneasy, Ivy. Why deter us?”

  I shrugged. “All I know is there are a lot of mysteries attached to Cat’s Place and Empire House. We know Father was connected to this house—we have his painting—and it stands to reason Asher’s story fits in somewhere. Since Daisy left under curious circumstances, it makes sense to start with her.”

  “I agree,” she said, and went to the dressing table, pulled out the top drawer and dumped out the contents onto her bed. It was a treasure trove of Daisy.

  Rose spread the menus, theater tickets and assorted odds and ends on the floor between us. “We don’t have much to go on,” Rose said, picking up a matchbook, “but we might as well start with what we’ve got.”

  I smiled and dug in, relieved Rose’s innate practicality had resurfaced. I brushed off any lingering concern about her and focused on the remnants of Daisy’s life in the city. The girl knew how to live it up. She’d been to the theater on Bleecker Street for a matinee of The Thief of Bagdad and spent a whole night’s tip money on a ticket to Desire Under the Elms at the Greenwich Village Theater. She’d dined at the Mandarin Palace in Chinatown and kept the fortune from her cookie: “Time is precious, but truth is more precious than time.”

  That was a kicker. I would have held on to it myself. These small pieces of Daisy’s life were a nice introduction—I was starting to wish she hadn’t left.

  “Here’s something,” Rose said. She’d flipped open the matchbook. On the inside was written: 3 p.m. A—Dr. Harold Spence, 67 Oleander Drive. –D.”

  “Do you know where that is or what it may mean?” asked Rose.

  “There are many reasons a woman sees a doctor,” I said, though my mind immediately went to one.

  “Yes,” Rose said, lowering her eyes briefly. “But what about that A? What if it’s for Asher? Maybe this is about him, not her.”

  “Let’s investigate this doc further,” I said. “And keep asking around about Asher as best we can.”

  Rose placed the matchbook to the side. “Ivy,” she said while placing it in the discard pile, “can you press Cat for more information?”

  “I can try, but she’s not exactly forthcoming.” I didn’t want to put the squeeze on Cat. I’d never felt intimidated by anyone before. When she was around I felt like I’d swallowed a stone.

  “Maybe not in front of others, but if you caught her alone...maybe,” Rose said. “She seems different speaking person to person.”

  “That might be true up in the dress shop, but I’m not sure that’s the case down in the dungeon.”

  “Maybe you haven’t given her a chance. She asked me a number of questions today, and seemed very interested in Mother and Father, and even Forest Grove. I almost wish we’d had more time to talk.”

  Rose touched my hand ever so briefly. “Caution usually isn’t your first choice in any situation, even when warranted. Care to tell me why?”

  I didn’t want to scare Rose, or reveal too much of my own fears, but I had no idea if she also felt as though we’d walked into a play in the middle of the story, enraging
the actors who’d already set their marks. I’d never felt unwanted before, and it was an unfamiliar feeling. Though Cat had employed us, and Nell had given us a room, I couldn’t shake the fact that they’d done so grudgingly, as though our mere presence was an insult. My confusion unsettled me, and my usual impulsiveness, something in which I took great pride, suddenly became a detriment. Tread carefully, Rose was fond of saying, and it was becoming increasingly apparent that she had a point. “I’m simply being careful.”

  Rose smiled. “Perhaps this city is having a good influence on you, sister.”

  “Possibly,” I said. “But I’d rather talk about how it’s influenced you.”

  “Oh, posh.”

  “I think a certain Italian war hero could tell me a thing or two.”

  “War hero? Where did you get that?”

  “Maude said he fought. I might have embellished a little bit.”

  “I’ll ask Nell again about Asher soon enough,” she said, eager to change the subject. “I’ve not much experience spotting a liar, but I am familiar with a break in pattern. If she acts strangely after my question, I’ll know something is amiss.”

  Something was already amiss, I wanted to say. But I was used to the erratic and had no experience with patterns. “Good plan,” I said, and placed my hand over her warm one, threading my fingers through hers, dreading the point where she’d pull away, where I’d have to let go.

  CHAPTER 9

  Rose

  IVY'S HAND WAS warm yet tentative. I thought I might pull my hand away, as we’d not been clingy sisters, even when we were little, except for the occasional “cuddle up” as we counted the seconds between lightning and thunder to estimate the distance of a storm. But something told me she needed me. And her eyes, they said a thousand words. She’d changed, somehow...that night working in God-Knows-Where.