Mitzi of the Ritz

by Lee René

  The auditorium went black, the stage curtains opened as if by magic, and the famed Regal Pictures logo, a gloved hand shooting an arrow from a bow, the arrow propelled around the globe, appeared on the screen. Metro might have Leo the Lion, but everyone in the world recognized the Regal Pictures arrow circling the globe.

  The newsreel echoed what everyone in America knew—the times stank and America had plopped into the crapper. They finished and the screen went dark once again. The Regal logo flashed on the screen, followed by the words The Devil Dancer, the new offering from Regal Pictures, starring my favorite actor, Rex Dallas, as Detective Harry Paige, and the colored comedian Buster Sweet as his partner.

  I knew The Devil Dancer wouldn’t be a masterpiece. Regal Pictures didn’t make masterpieces, but in my humble opinion, no one in moving pictures had the charm of the dashing Rex Dallas. He hailed from Georgia and, despite the lousy sound, Miss Louella Parson’s description of his Southern drawl rang true. “Rex Dallas has a voice like molten honey.” Mr. Dallas uttered his signature phrase, “Time’s a’ wasting, Buster!” and the audience broke into applause. When the movie ended, I didn’t walk out of the Ritz, I floated.

  Chapter Two

  Mr. Nussbaum

  I arrived home barely able to catch my breath but called out, “Leah, I have a job!” Before she could answer, I heard a knock at the door. When I opened it, Mr. Nussbaum, the owner of our brownstone, stood in the doorway.

  I guess you’d call Mr. Nussbaum a sharp dresser. A wiry man in his thirties, he had an affinity for pinstriped suits, spats, and fedoras. Still, one look at his angry mug would give anyone the heebie-jeebies. Words like “thug” and “gangster” stuck to him like chewing gum on a shoe sole. Grown men made way when he walked down Fort Washington Avenue, and some even crossed to the other side of the street. He rarely spoke above a whisper, but the air of menace surrounding him escalated the moment he opened his mouth.

  “Hello, Leah. Hello, Mitzi.”

  My stomach knotted when he took my face in his hands and gave me a pained look like the movie star John Gilbert mooning over Greta Garbo. Leah twisted her handkerchief, and I knew her nerves were on end. She smiled weakly, then pointed to a parlor chair.

  “Mr. Nussbaum, please sit down. Mitzi, why don’t you put on a kettle for tea? You’re welcome to join us. Would you care for a slice of apple cake?”

  His face contorted into something resembling a smile. “Yes, that would be lovely.”

  Nussbaum turned to Leah with what some might call a soulful expression on his mug. Maybe he wanted to show he shared our grief, but to me he looked as if he needed to pass gas. He settled back in our best chair as if he owned the place, which of course he did. Leah pointed me toward the kitchen.

  “Mitzi, please, make the tea.”

  I hated leaving my sister alone with the likes of Joseph Nussbaum and planted my ear firmly to the door. Nussbaum spoke so softly I strained to hear.

  “Leah, please accept my condolences on the death of your father, such a fine gentleman. Everyone will miss him. I understand your pain since I lost my own dear wife.”

  What a load of hooey. Everyone swore he’d bumped off his “dear wife” then made it look like an accident. I kept my ear on the door, but conversation stopped and the flat went silent. I peeked into the living room praying he’d left, but no such luck. They faced each other, Leah twisting her napkin, Mr. Nussbaum’s lips stretched in an angry smile.

  “Leah, don’t think me insensitive, but there are practical matters to discuss. You see, I made allowances for your family. I prefer cultured tenants, and since Mr. Schector worked as a violinist for the New York Philharmonic—”

  Leah interrupted. “First violinist. My father was first violinist.”

  “Of course, first violinist, and because of that, I asked for half the rent I could have charged.”

  Leah jumped up from the wooden crate, and I hoped she’d give the bum the old heave-ho, only she didn’t. “Mr. Nussbaum, this isn’t the time to discuss money, especially with my younger sister in the next room. Yes, the Crash killed my father, and we’ll never get over his loss. It’s as bad as when Mama died in 1918, during the influenza epidemic, but don’t worry about the rent, Mr. Nussbaum. I have a job and Mitzi has just found employment. We don’t like to think of life without Pops, but at least we have each other.”

  When Leah walked into the dining room and hauled down my photos, I knew what would happen next—the kvelling. Leah took pride in my smallest accomplishment and praised me to the hilt.

  “I wasn’t much of a scholar, but let me show you how accomplished my little sister is. Here she is playing the Wurlitzer organ at the Capitol Theater, only ten years old. Look, Mr. Nussbaum, our little genius at her high school graduation, not quite fourteen yet president of her class. Did you know about the quota on Jews at Barnard? They wanted my little sister anyway. Imagine, our Mitzi, fourteen years old and already a college girl.”

  Oh, the humiliation, but thankfully she didn’t pull out my baby pictures. Nussbaum took the photographs and caressed them for what seemed an eternity.

  “Yes indeed, Mitzi is a beautiful, cultured girl.”

  After he left, I’d scrub the picture frames down with bleach. The kettle whistled and I arranged the tea, pastry, lemon slices and lumps of sugar on a tray. How easily I could have spooned strychnine into his cup, but it would have been inhospitable, even for him. I slapped a phony smile on my face, waltzed into the living room, and placed the refreshments on the ottoman.

  “Mitzi, why don’t you go to your room? Mr. Nussbaum and I have things to discuss.”

  I managed another approximation of a smile and stepped out of the room. Suddenly, I thought better and snuck back into the hallway. If Leah needed help throwing the bum out on his ear, I’d be near.

  “Mr. Nussbaum, did you come to share in our grief? If not, may I be so bold as to ask why you’re here?”

  Nussbaum didn’t answer right away since he was busy stuffing his face with pastry. He slurped his tea, rattled the plate onto our coffee table, and resettled his rump in the chair.

  “Very tasty, thank you.” Nussbaum smacked his lips, then dropped the bombshell. “Leah, I’m here to make an offer of marriage.”

  Pops had died six short days ago and the skunk proposed to my sister? Yes, he was a rotten egg all right, but this took the cake. “What you ask is impossible, Mr. Nussbaum. Pops isn’t even cold in his grave, and we barely know each other.”

  Nussbaum picked up the teapot and poured, seemingly transfixed as the amber liquid trickled into his cup. He threw in four lumps of sugar and sucked down his tea like the toad he was. I hoped he’d get diabetes or at least choke to death.

  “Leah, you’re a woman of great charm and beauty, but I couldn’t propose marriage to a dancehall gal.”

  The room went silent. Nussbaum slurped more tea, then began chortling. “You didn’t think I knew about you working at Roseland, did you? Girlie, I have eyes and ears around the city. No, it’s Mitzi that I want to talk to you about. I want to marry her.”

  Me? Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. Leah sat speechless, and Mr. Nussbaum appeared to enjoy her confusion. He wore a triumphant grin on his ugly puss, one I would have loved to wipe away with a punch in the nose.

  It took a moment for Leah to find her tongue. “Mr. Nussbaum, Mitzi is a young lady of eighteen and has no plans to be a wife. As I said before, she has a new job and hopefully will be able to return to her studies shortly. I’m afraid we must decline your offer.”

  My stomach rumbled, and I regretted breakfasting on lentil soup and bagels. I leaned against the wall to keep from slipping to the floor. Scum that he was, Nussbaum appeared to relish Leah’s discomfort.

  “Look, sister, I’m putting my cards on the table. Everyone knows your father speculated in the stock market and left you penniless. Let’s be honest—you have no money, or else you wouldn’t be prancing around for dimes in a dance hall. I have lots of long g
reen and can afford to be generous. Mitzi is a cultivated young lady, a real looker, and I have the means to take care of her.”

  Wasn’t the year 1930? Did this dolt think I’d wander around Manhattan dressed in rags, with a pushcart? Weren’t the days of arranged marriages over?

  My sister stared at Nussbaum, her look one of complete shock, but it didn’t stop him from flapping his jaws. “As for you, Leah, your pain can be avoided. I’ll pay any debts plus give you enough money for you to be free of Roseland and dancing until your feet drop. Mitzi will want for nothing, and you can stay in this beautiful apartment, free of any obligation. All I ask is for your sister.”

  Leah rose, grabbed his hat, and walked to the door. “You’ve given me a great deal to think about, Mr. Nussbaum.”

  Nussbaum chugged down the rest of his tea and jumped up from the chair, a victorious grin on his face. “I’m a very patient man, Leah. By the way, since we’ll be relations, please call me Joe. Shalom.”

  Leah shut the door behind him. “I know you were listening, Mitzi. Come here.”

  I entered the room, took one look at her face, and bawled like a baby. “Leah, I’ll work my fingers to the bone, but don’t make me marry that horrible man. Please.”

  My tears were infectious, and she sobbed as she pulled me close. “Silly baby, do you think I’d let that animal touch you? I’ll speak to Zisel before I kill him.”

  ****

  Zisel showed up the next morning, dressed to the nines as usual. She wore a woolen frock with a capelet rimmed in mink, a matching cloche, and elbow-length gloves. Although she was only a few years older than Leah and me, she’d already been widowed twice, and always wore black.

  People celebrated the beauty of the Schector girls, yet our styles were quite different. People referred to me as cute and pert, while they labeled Leah the seductress. Zisel had mastered the European hauteur look. Her style was as au courant as a page of Vogue Magazine. She’d bobbed her dark hair and become a devotee of Elizabeth Arden’s face powder, rouge, scarlet lipstick, and nail polish.

  Zisel, the very picture of elegance, removed her gloves and began drumming her Chinese-red nails on the tabletop. “The nerve of that schmuck. Let me at that lecher. What are we? Polish trash who pimp their daughters for a few shekels?”

  Leah looked at me and turned crimson. “Please, you can’t use that kind of language in front of Mitzi.”

  Zisel scowled at her and kept ranting. “Mitzi better learn that kind of language if she’s going to live in this world. If that crumb thinks he can stick his schlong in our baby sister, he’s got another think coming. I’ll cut it off first.”

  She collapsed onto the chaise, but I knew her second wind was imminent. “Nussbaum is a crook and a chiseler. In the old days, they would have strung the bastard up. He shot his wife when he got tired of her, and his police cronies helped him get away with it. Suicide, my ass! I heard when he left New York a few years ago, all of Washington Heights danced in the streets. Unfortunately, the louse came back. If he wants Mitzi, he’ll never give up.”

  Those weren’t the words I wanted to hear. Leah began sobbing with the same bitter intensity as she had when Pops died. Zisel blabbed away, undaunted. “He’ll make your lives a living hell if you refuse him. Even if we found another place in the city, he’d have his hoodlums search you out, and the police won’t help. Leah, you have to take Mitzi away.”

  Zisel’s words spurred Leah to find her voice. “Zisel, do you want us to surrender to that monster? Isn’t this 1930 New York City, not 1830 Russia? We should fight, shouldn’t we? What about Mitzi and her new job?”

  “Forget about the stupid job, Leah. We’ve got to save our baby.”

  When Papa became ill, I had to drop out of Barnard. Now, I’d have to give up the Broadway Ritz, Zisel, and New York. I might as well jump off the Brooklyn Bridge. Zisel raised my chin and looked me square in the eyes. “Mitzi, we’ll have to get you far away.”

  Leah chimed in. “What about New Jersey?”

  Zisel nixed her suggestion. “No, Jersey is too close, and so is Chicago. What about Los Angeles?” Leah stared at our older sister as if not comprehending. She repeated the words. “Los Angeles? Where poor Baron burned to death?”

  The two siblings looked at each other in silence for a painful moment, then Zisel nodded. “Yes, Leah, Los Angeles. I know Uncle Baron died there, how could I not remember? It cut our family in two. Our grandmother died a broken woman because of that spoiled boy.”

  Leah glared at Zisel. “You shouldn’t speak ill of the dead.”

  Zisel returned her nasty look with one of her own. “You can’t stop me from telling the truth, Leah. Baron caused our family nothing but pain. Do you remember when Papa rushed across the country to search for Baron? He left Bubbe alone to fend for three girls. She had to turn to friends for the money to feed us and keep a roof over our heads.”

  When Zisel jumped from her chair, I knew only an Act of Congress would shut her up. “Nineteen years old, the path as a scholar already mapped out for him, but Baron abandoned everything. He finagled a job at Regal Pictures and burned to death before Pops found him. No one should have died like that.”

  Zisel slumped into a chair, winded and sobbing. The room became hushed. Then the grandfather clock struck nine, puncturing the silence.

  After a few minutes, Leah spoke. “Yes, Zisel, it’s a sad story, and you’re right, Los Angeles is where we should go. It’s far away from Nussbaum.” She steeled her shoulders. “We never learned where they buried poor Uncle Baron. That sweet boy is lying somewhere with no family to tend to his grave. Perhaps we can finish Pops’ search.”

  I looked around our living room with its saffron walls covered with paintings, and the New York sky shining through the bay window. This had been my home since I could remember, but we’d have to leave it. May God forgive me, but at that moment, I hated Joseph Nussbaum more than anyone in the world.

  Chapter Three

  The Fuller Brush Man

  The next morning I arrived at the Broadway Ritz with a throbbing headache. A confrontation with a furious David Stein didn’t lessen my pain. He’d dressed in a natty pinstriped suit with spectator shoes, smelled like paradise, and looked even more handsome than the day before. I hadn’t prepared myself for his anger, and his irate response to me quitting took me aback.

  “What the hell do you mean you’ve got to quit? You haven’t even started yet.”

  I told him as much as I dared. “Please, Mr. Stein, I’m so sorry. You have every right to be sore. I don’t want to leave, but there’s this fellow, and well, Leah and I have to get away from New York.”

  His beautiful eyes blazed with so much fury, I stepped back from him. “Fellow? Did you get yourself in trouble or something?”

  How dare he ask such a question! “I’m not having a baby, if that’s what you’re thinking. The guy’s a thug, and I hate his guts, but he’s twisting my sister’s arm because he wants to marry me.”

  His eyes softened. “A thug? I have friends on the police force.”

  “Yes, and so does he. The police looked the other way when he shot his wife.”

  When he took my hand, I didn’t pull away. “Mitzi, I’m a man of means. I can help you.”

  I had a vision of the Broadway Ritz in flames. “I can’t talk about it, Mr. Stein. Believe me, you don’t want to get involved. Let’s just say it’s a family matter, and Leah and I have to leave New York, pronto.”

  “Where are you going, Mitzi?”

  “To Los Angeles. You see, this fellow is after us, and we have to vamoose. My sisters decided we should go there. My uncle died in Los Angeles years ago, and we’re going to find his grave. I haven’t told anyone but you because the louse might find out. He’s a real stinker and could make plenty of trouble.”

  Mr. Stein gazed into my eyes for an uncomfortable moment, his handsome face unreadable. He picked up an embossed card from the holder on his desk and handed it to me. “Sounds like you
’ve been through the wringer, doll, but maybe your luck is changing. I own a theater in Los Angeles. It’s not grand like the Broadway Ritz, but I always can use an extra usherette. I’m leaving for Los Angeles tomorrow. Call me as soon as you arrive.”

  He looked at me with such intensity I felt a blush coming to my face. “Yes, Mr. Stein.”

  His mouth spread into a wide, Cheshire-cat grin. “I know you’re a woman of your word, Dollface, but how about we shake on it?”

  He held my hand in his for a moment, then turned it over and kissed my palm.

  “Goodbye, Mitzi. We’ll meet soon.”

  I looked down at his card as soon as I left his office.

  David Lincoln Stein, Stein International Theatre Company.

  Perhaps I should have been turning cartwheels at the prospect of steady work in a new town with a young, handsome boss. Still, something dark and troubling gnawed at my psyche, and stopped me from jumping for joy.

  ****

  We left New York on the twelfth of November. That morning I ignored Nussbaum’s threat and strolled through our neighborhood. I said farewell to everyone and everything I knew. Although Pops adored the highbrow stuff, Chopin and Debussy, he loved popular music too. We’d while away the hours listening to Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington on our Victrola. Al Jolson’s jazzy baritone became my father’s favorite, and he often swore, “Nobody sings like Jolson.”

  Pops had delighted our friends and neighbors by belting out “I’m Sitting on Top of the World,” “April Showers,” “Swanee,” and his number-one favorite, “Blue Skies.”

  No matter how lousy life became, while the world sank deeper in the crapper, Pops had a perpetual smile on his face, even after the Crash took everything and finally killed him.