A Kiss From Mr Fitzgerald

by Natasha Lester

  Evie reached down into her diaphragm and pushed out the words harder and stronger than usual. Tonight her voice wasn’t supposed to blend with those around her – it was on show. And boy, did it respond. In spite of her earlier tiredness, her voice caught hold of the song and sent it right out into the far corners of the theatre, to the tops of the boxes, to the foyer, and up to the roof garden. The piano couldn’t hold the final note for as long as Evie could and so the song ended on the long and strong echo of one perfect C. The audience waited until it had absolutely faded away before they started to applaud, and then they stood and cheered.

  The moon lowered to the stage. Evie hopped off and did the Ziegfeld strut – arms outstretched, head tilted forward to balance the crown of stars – to the centre of the stage, where she bent her knees and performed an upright curtsey. She winked at a man in the front row, who actually blushed and turned to the lady beside him with a shrug, as if to say, That time, it wasn’t my fault. The lady frowned at him and Evie laughed, wondering why anyone would bother to marry someone who might leave them for a showgirl’s wink.

  It wasn’t until Evie flicked off her cape to reveal the star-spangled leotard beneath that she saw Thomas Whitman in the New Amsterdam Theatre, watching Ziegfeld’s Girls fluff their feathers like hens on heat. For the moneyed men and women of Manhattan, coming to Ziegfeld’s for a night of entertainment was the bee’s knees. Let the poor people have their moving pictures; those in the know got the live show in three dimensions, with a splash of titillation on the side.

  But what the hell was Thomas Whitman doing inside her theatre when he was supposed to be on the other side of the world, in London? He’d said he’d tell her when he was coming back, but here he was, studying her face, his expression inscrutable.

  The jolt she felt at the sight of him was even stronger than when he’d looked at her for the last time before he’d left for London. She wanted to run over to him, whisk him away for a dance and a drink, catch up on the long years that had passed, years when she’d dreamed of him almost every night. But then he stood up and strode towards the exit and she remembered where she was and what she was doing and that she hadn’t told him. The shame of her situation struck her full force; he’d never speak to her again.

  Evie took her curtain call quickly, stepping away from the front of the stage, anything to move the damn spotlight off her. The curtain came down, the show was over and Evie was pushed backstage by the combined hot air of a thousand questions and compliments: ‘Who told you to change the show?’ and ‘You were darb!’ and Louise Brooks, who didn’t like any competition, saying, ‘You’ll be lucky if Flo lets you out of here alive.’

  ‘Told you she was a star,’ said Bea, drowning out Louise. To Evie, Bea whispered, ‘Why waste that voice on a lifetime of dealing with the ladies and their ace of spades?’

  ‘Because this isn’t a lifetime,’ Evie whispered back. ‘You can only go to the moon a few times before it’s just like going to the corner store.’

  ‘Bob says there’s a queue at the stage door the likes of which he’s never seen and they all want to see you.’

  But would it be enough? Evie worried. Louise was right: no one messed with Ziegfeld and got away with it.

  She was about to find out. Florenz Ziegfeld was striding towards her. It was impossible to tell whether he was still as angry as he’d been when it looked as if she’d slept right through her cue.

  ‘That was your moon tonight, Evie,’ he said. ‘And it’ll be your moon for as long as this show runs.’ He kissed her hand, ever the gentleman, except when he was making whoopee with his leading ladies. But as he straightened, he said in her ear so no one else could hear, ‘Change anything in my show again and you’ll be working at the Creep Joint off-Broadway.’

  ‘Thanks, Flo. And you’re going to pay me like I own the moon too, aren’t you?’ Evie said in a loud voice, knowing that Ziegfeld didn’t like to be seen as anything other than the big man in town.

  ‘I’ve got the extra right here for you.’ Ziegfeld handed Evie a ring box with a folded five-dollar bill tucked into the velvet inside. It was all part of the show, and the girls in the dressing room oohed and aahed as he’d intended.

  ‘There’s one more thing.’ Evie knew she had to take advantage of her star turn here and now – she might not get another chance.

  ‘There always is with you.’

  ‘I need a week off soon. I’ve got some examinations to prepare for.’

  ‘Two nights. No more. The doctoring doesn’t get in the way.’

  ‘Except when I’m fixing up your girls so they don’t ruin the show by taking a night off. You could always create a little doctor number up there on the stage for me, Flo, and then I could get both jobs done at the same time.’

  Ziegfeld allowed himself a smile. ‘For the run of this show, if you sing like you did tonight, you get two nights off for your examinations and your extra five dollars a week and I won’t fire you for having another job.’ It was both permission and a warning and Evie understood.

  ‘That’s all I want, Flo.’

  ‘For this week,’ he muttered as he moved away.

  ‘You might be one of Flo’s favourites now, my love,’ Bea said. This was something to both long for and dread. While taking a starring role might bring in more cash, they both knew that what he really liked was the class bred into Evie’s bones and up there on stage, dressed with only the bare essentials covered, and with the suggestion that it could maybe be bought for a drink and a dollar later. It was how he groomed all his mistresses.

  But Evie had five whole dollars a week extra. She was practically rich! She kissed the clover ring. ‘You’ll be lucky if you get this back.’

  ‘It’s never brought me as much luck as it has you. You should keep it.’

  ‘If I find a rabbit’s foot, it’s yours,’ Evie promised.

  ‘I’d rather a gentleman’s foot. Or his body.’

  They laughed and hugged, and Evie found herself doing one of the most ridiculous things she’d ever done. She was standing in a room full of girls dressed as stars, so she made a wish – that this was the point at which life would suddenly get a whole lot easier.

  But then she remembered Thomas’s unreadable face. His swift exit. There was also her promise to the college that she wouldn’t do anything to bring it into disrepute. And while she didn’t think Thomas would tell anyone what he’d seen tonight, she couldn’t quite bring herself to believe that he’d want to have anything more to do with a girl who was paid to flirt every night with a theatreful of men. How stupid she’d been to think that he’d never find out she was a Ziegfeld Girl, that when he came back to New York they’d just pick up where they’d left off, dress up and dance to the jazz at Chumley’s, arms wrapped around one another.

  Evie didn’t bother to scrub her face or change. She had to get out of there, avoid any contact with Thomas and maybe he’d forget he’d seen her. If only she could forget she’d seen him, could pretend that nothing had changed, that he would still sign a letter to her with the words ‘love, Thomas’. She pulled off her headdress, threw on a coat over her leotard and charged out the door, desperate to make her way unnoticed through the crowds of men who waited by the stage door every night, holding flowers and gifts and hoping to escort a Ziegfeld Girl to whatever party was kicking up its heels. Tonight there were more men than usual, all salivating like thoroughbreds over a bucket of molasses. Luckily her coat and lowered head hid the fact that she was the woman who’d woken up on the moon, and she managed to escape with the imprint of only one hand on her ass.

  Rolls-Royces, Duesenbergs and Buicks were parked in the gutter outside, ready to whisk girls like Bea off to their happy-ever-afters – an after that rarely extended beyond the bedroom. Once past the cars, Evie boarded the El and sat with her feet propped on the opposite seat, resting them for the first time all day. At Eighth she hopped off and ran all the way to the boarding house on Minetta, praying that Lil would be home to
help her solve the Thomas Problem.

  Their street was one of the few curved roads in New York City, built over and following the course of a stream. Evie liked to imagine the water running beneath her feet, cleaning out all the bad things from the day and ushering in the new, fresh and full of optimism. It was hard to believe that the area had once been the heart of Little Africa, home to men with names like No-Toe Charley, black-and-tan saloons, and the easiest place to get yourself murdered just for minding your own business. Now it was inhabited by Italians and artistes, who filled the streets with garlic and jazz and the morals of Zelda Fitzgerald. Or the morals of Evie Lockhart, incompatibly a Ziegfeld Girl and a medical student, who’d been spotted strutting her stuff by a high-society Upper East Side banker who’d know she was breaking all the rules for standards of conduct.

  Evie pushed open the door of the attic room and slammed it shut behind her.

  ‘Is the big bad wolf after you?’ Lil asked, looking up from the dressing table, where she was rubbing cold cream into her face.

  ‘Maybe.’ Evie took off her coat, threw it on the bed and stood with her hands on her hips and a frown on her face.

  ‘Nice,’ Lil said, nodding at the patriotic leotard. ‘Think I could wear that to the Black Rabbit tomorrow?’

  ‘Zalia will bump me off if I don’t return it.’

  Lil shrugged. ‘Worth a try. Let’s get back to the wolf.’

  ‘Thomas Whitman was at Ziegfeld’s tonight. He recognised me. Of all the nights I get a solo, he’s there. Why isn’t he still in London?’

  ‘A solo? Do tell,’ said Lil, conveniently ignoring the real issue.

  ‘No, do tell me what to do about Thomas.’

  ‘This came for you today.’ Lil held out a letter. ‘It’s somehow taken three weeks to get here. You can finally replace the letter in your pocket that’s about to fall apart. I expect it has the news of his arrival.’

  Evie ripped open the letter to find that it was dated just three days after his previous one. Sure enough, in it he said that he thought the letter would arrive at much the same time as he did, and he would telephone her when he was in New York.

  Evie refolded the letter. She didn’t believe he would telephone her after what he’d seen tonight. Instead of telling Lil her fears, she said, ‘I came down from the sky as Queen of the Night and sang a little tune about the moon. Ziegfeld’s given me an extra fiver a week. This morning I got a scolding from Dr Brewer, and tonight I had praise lavished on me by Ziegfeld. I’m succeeding at what doesn’t matter and failing at what does.’

  ‘Don’t you ever want to quit college and use all that money to get a nice place and have fun?’

  Evie arched an eyebrow as she scanned their room, taking in the double bed pushed over to the side and left unmade all day, the dressing table for two with a handy crack down the centre so each of them never took up more room than was her right, the wardrobe whose doors were always splitting apart like a fat lady in a dress three sizes too small, the single armchair which meant that most of their conversations took place while sitting on the bed, and the table that Evie had found in the basement and claimed for those times when she had to bring her books home with her. That left a narrow gap for them to funnel their way through the room. ‘You mean this isn’t a nice place?’ she said.

  Lil laughed. ‘The only good thing about this place is you and me, and we know it. But enough about that. What about Tommy?’

  ‘He saw me on stage.’

  ‘So Tommy’s been back in town for a day and he’s already hitting the Follies. That man doesn’t mess around. It was bound to happen, you know. Especially if you’re going to take a solo number. Someone would eventually look beneath that blonde cap of hair and see what Concord Evie is doing to pay the rent.’

  ‘I thought I was safe. My parents never come to New York – or maybe they do now that Vi lives here, but they’d never go to Ziegfeld’s. Nor would Vi. She’d have apoplexy at the thought. And Thomas was supposed to be in London. But now he’s back and you don’t seem surprised.’

  ‘He telephoned earlier. He didn’t know you worked nights. I was going to organise for us all to have a little celebration. He wanted to talk to you.’

  Yesterday Evie’s heart would have belted out a tune of its own at the thought that Thomas was back and wanted to see her. But now she sat down on the bed, lit a cigarette, handed one to Lil and then asked the question she was most sure of the answer to. ‘Do you think he’ll tell the college?’

  Lil sank down on the bed beside her. ‘Tommy won’t tell a soul. But you already know that. Charles is the one you should watch.’

  Evie shivered. ‘I’ve been lucky so far.’

  ‘Damn right.’

  In some ways, Evie thought, the glacial shoulder her family had shown her had made things easier. There was so much less to have to explain. When she’d first moved in with Lil, she’d given them two months to abhor her, which she thought would be enough. Then she’d sent a letter home, enquiring after everyone’s health, telling them she was happily studying at medical college, promising to pay back the money she’d taken and giving them her address. No reply ever came. She’d tried every month but there was only silence from Concord. In the end, Evie read about Viola’s wedding in the newspaper. Then Charles and Viola had gone abroad for a year and Evie had waited until they’d returned to New York before writing again. Viola didn’t write back. So Evie had stopped trying. Lil, Leo, Bea and Mrs Whitman had become her family.

  To distract herself, Evie picked up a magazine. ‘You got The New Yorker. Did you read Lipstick yet?’

  ‘Nope. I went to the Black Rabbit with Leo and some others.’

  ‘How is Leo? I haven’t seen him for a while.’

  ‘That’s because you’re always at work. But he’s the same. Still a scoundrel. I left two ladies vying for his affections on the dance floor.’

  Evie laughed. ‘I wonder if he’s still got eyes only for that girl?’

  ‘What girl?’

  ‘I don’t know. Just something he said a while ago.’

  ‘There’s no girl. Leo’s like me. He likes variety.’

  ‘Variety is for ice-cream, Lil.’

  ‘You’re such a romantic!’ Lil teased, and Evie hit her with the magazine.

  ‘Let’s see what Lipstick has to say about life in the land of just-have-fun.’ Evie found the page she was looking for, entitled ‘Tables for Two’ and signed off by ‘Lipstick’, a woman whose identity was Manhattan’s best-kept secret. The latest column was about the opening of the Nineteenth Hole Club. Evie began to read aloud.

  ‘“The great feature of this was the informality achieved by the tricky putting greens on either side of the dance floor. What with the girls’ skirts being as short as they are nowadays, and the additional uplift contingent upon the position required for putting, the evening was not without humour. Really and truly, something ought to be done by Congress or somebody about the lingerie shortage in this country.”’

  Both girls laughed. ‘I thought I’d heard everything,’ Lil said. ‘A nightclub with putting greens? I bet it’s a real clip joint. Next there’ll be one with circus elephants.’

  ‘Ziegfeld’s just bought an ostrich for our next show.’

  ‘Do you have to ride on that?’

  ‘I hope not!’

  ‘Look at this.’ Lil pointed to a poem – ‘The New York Girl’ – at the bottom of the page. It read:

  She shines in high society,

  And dances at receptions.

  The picture of propriety –

  A mistress of deceptions.

  ‘Is she real, do you think, this New York Girl? Or is she a figment of advertising and journalistic imaginations?’ Lil asked as she rolled onto her back and examined the one thing of beauty in their room, a genuine crystal chandelier that Mrs Lomsky couldn’t be bothered dusting and so had consigned to the attic room.

  ‘If you can afford to be her, she’s real. Half of Ziegfeld’s G
irls charleston the night away at high-society parties in Great Neck with married men. But they work hard for their money – and I don’t mean at the theatre.’

  ‘Maybe there should be another line to that poem – and of hard-earned affections.’

  ‘Imagine living like Lipstick,’ said Evie. ‘With no cares for anyone but yourself.’

  ‘I expect one day you’d wake up and realise the consequence was that no one cared for you.’

  ‘That won’t happen to me. I spend every day caring for people.’

  ‘I don’t mean the kind of care it takes to clean out a lady’s basement. I mean the kind of care that comes with a man attached to it.’

  ‘And when would I fit that in? Besides, I thought you didn’t believe in romance?’

  ‘For me, I don’t. But for you –’

  Evie didn’t let Lil finish her sentence. ‘Perhaps I should have settled for being a poet.’

  ‘You’d be a terrible poet. You need to fall in love first.’

  ‘I don’t know anyone who wants to fall in love with me.’

  ‘Don’t you?’

  Evie got up and walked over to the phonograph, seeing only Thomas’s face. His very handsome face, which had once smiled at her in a way that made her blush and run up the stairs. What she wouldn’t give to transform his blank face of earlier into a smile.

  She selected ‘Oh, Lady Be Good’. ‘In honour of the fact that Thomas will most likely think I’ve been anything but.’

  ‘Don’t underestimate him.’

  Evie shook her head and slouched back onto the pillows. ‘Something strange happened today.’

  ‘Stranger than watching a woman push a baby out of a pinhole?’

  ‘Yes!’

  ‘Now I’m listening.’

  ‘The sisters at the Foundling told me I couldn’t see Mary again. I got the impression they were following someone’s instructions.’