Speak Easy, Speak Love

by McKelle George

  “I don’t know what will happen without the speakeasy,” Hero whispered. “Papa just drinks all the time; how’s he going to pay for everything without a job? I’ll be the one handing out keys to a run-down boardinghouse, taking care of him until I’m an old maid.”

  Beatrice turned her head. “I thought Aunt Anna’s family had money?”

  “Oh, they do. But Mama was disowned on account of going to feminist rallies, running picket lines for factory workers, marrying Papa, selling illegal liquor in her home.” Hero ticked off the reasons on her fingers.

  “The speakeasy will do great tomorrow, you’ll see. One weekend at a time.”

  “I wish you weren’t going away.”

  Beatrice frowned. “Where am I going?”

  “Why, to medical college, of course. You said it yourself.”

  Hero’s bald confidence both warmed and terrified Beatrice. “So I did.”

  “If I marry Claude,” Hero murmured, snuggling into Beatrice’s shoulder, “I’ll get him to pay for your schooling. Don’t you worry.”

  CHAPTER 16

  SHALL I NEVER SEE A BACHELOR OF THREE-SCORE AGAIN?

  Benedick turned over on his cot, feeling more or less like the last tulip in spring. Last night they’d opened the joint up again, but unlike at the Masquerade, he’d stayed dry as a corn husk. He usually did. There were only so many mornings one could wake up having been chewed up and spit out by that great noble experiment of Prohibition.

  All in all, it had been a success: enough people to fill the room and enough booze to fill the people. Of course Benedick thought they owed a sizable chunk of their attendance to a flock of gossipers who had come to see for themselves where Claude Blaine had ventured off when he didn’t show up at the Vanderbilts as he was supposed to, and the rest didn’t properly count because Leo and Father Francis let vets drink free because of Decoration Day. But there had been a party for the second weekend in a row, and that was a victory.

  Besides, his lousy mood had nothing to do with the speakeasy. Fair or not, he was placing 100 percent of the blame on an opinionated little twerp named Beatrice Clark.

  Ye gods, his room was boiling, and it was only morning.

  And stuffy.

  Just like my writing, he thought miserably, turning over, not bothered enough to get up to open the window.

  Someone pounded on his door. So raucous and demanding it had to be Beatrice, but of course she wouldn’t knock at all, would she?

  “Ben!” The door opened and filled all the way a moment later with Leonard Stahr. “Good morning!” he bellowed.

  Benedick sat up, stared at him, speechless. “Is it?” he asked eventually.

  “You bet your ass. Get up; we’re going into the city. It’s ten already, and you’re not even dressed.”

  Benedick did as he was told—not that there was much choice. Had he hesitated too long, Leo might have tugged his pants on for him. He hadn’t seen Leo like this for months. This was the man he’d first met, eyes clear and hungry, the entrepreneur husband of Hey Nonny Nonny’s hostess.

  “What are we doing in the city?” Benedick asked, once he’d exited the washroom. (Leo had serenaded the proceedings, which had not made Benedick go any faster but had given Leo a good laugh.)

  “First, we’ve got to collect Prince,” said Leo. “At this hour he’s probably grinding away somewhere, but both the cars are here, so he can’t have gotten too far.”

  Of course. Prince, the beast of burden; Benedick, the parasite. Benedick had once stupidly envisioned pitching in with the money he’d make selling his short stories, one by one, editors lapping them up as fast as he could type them. He muttered, “But what do you need me for?”

  “Ben—” Leo set his hand on Benedick’s shoulder; his palm, heavy and sure, nearly covered it. When he was fully upright, Leo was near to the same size as Benedick’s lionlike father, only Leo was more a bumbling bear than a cat of prey. “You know I love you,” Leo continued. “And it is with love that I say that sometimes what you need most in the world is a swift kick in the pants.” With a hearty squeeze, Leo released him.

  They discovered Prince (where else?) in the empty speakeasy, chewing the end of a pencil as he pored over several pages of shipment transactions: what had been used last night, where they were running low. By the look on Prince’s quiet face, they were running low approximately everywhere.

  He glanced up, a cup of coffee halfway to his lips, as Leo steam-engined up to the bar. “What’s this?” Prince glanced at Benedick, who shrugged.

  “Looks like coffee!” Leo said. “But you know best, you’re drinking it. Put it all away; we’ve got an errand to run.”

  “An errand?”

  “Yes, yes. In the city.” Leo waited until Prince had put away the papers and come out from behind the bar. “God’s teeth, I forget how you shot up like a skyscraper this past year until you’re right next to me. We’re going downtown to get my baby a proper birthday present. I need you there because no one knows Hero better, and Benedick will make sure whatever we pick has taste and class. We can’t let that new dandy of hers show us up, can we?”

  “Well, all right.” Prince surrendered softly. “But can we afford—”

  “We can, we absolutely can.” Leo crooked his finger at both of them and did not move until they had shuffled close enough for him to draw his arms around their shoulders in a conspiratorial huddle. “Several of that Blaine boy’s sloshed friends stayed the night yesterday and I believe are planning some sort of beach picnic this afternoon. Don’t ask me what I charged for the absolute most special rooms in the joint, but I will say each of the blighters could have sneezed out double what I asked and not batted an eye.” Leo winked at Benedick. “Anna always gave me a talking-to for that little trick, but we did get Ben out of it, so she could never be too mad.”

  The argument could be made that a better birthday present to Hero would be to use that money to buy more supplies for the speakeasy, but Leo was hard to resist when he was like this.

  With a helpless shrug Prince asked, “When are we going?”

  The day was sweltering; Leo kept the top down on the Lambda as they roared over the Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan. His speed seemed especially brazen as they passed the multitude of cars going on to Long Island for the holiday weekend.

  Certainly a good day for the beach.

  Would Beatrice go with Hero and Claude and the pack of highbred vacationers? Hero would probably invite her, but picturing Beatrice lounging in the sand, getting a tan, smoking a cigarette between red lips, playing a round of lazy badminton—the way Benedick tended to think of Long Island beach trips—was nearly unfathomable. He stopped himself from going down the twisty brain trail of wondering if she even owned a bathing suit and what it looked like.

  Ah, well.

  His brain went there after all, without his permission.

  Because the only logical answer was one of those old ridiculous Victorian jumpers, with blue-and-white stripes and puffy breeches and a sailor’s collar. No lipstick, no sunglasses. A sunburned nose. She would not play badminton. First, she would swim a mile in the choppy water, and then, not winded at all, she would proceed to study jellyfish and lecture anyone who would listen about some sciency mumbo jumbo—

  He stopped himself.

  If he could think of scenes for his novel half so well as he could ruminate on how the unconventional Beatrice Clark might fit herself into the conventional world, he’d have an actual book in his hands.

  Shadows fell across Benedick’s face, jolting him out of his reverie as they crawled along the city streets. The building that had blocked the sun was the skyscraper on Wall Street where his father worked.

  They parked near the shopping district, and Benedick shook off any feelings of his father. Leo’s soberness brought back a lightness to Prince’s step that Benedick hadn’t seen in a while, as if Leo had reshouldered some of Hey Nonny Nonny’s burden.

  They didn’t bother with clothes
; they had little chance of surpassing Hero’s finessed eye. But when they went by a tailor’s shop, Prince paused. “There,” he said, pointing at the display window, where a Damascus Vibrating Shuttle sewing machine sat on a velvet stand, with a price tag of $27.95—monthly installments optional with a $4 deposit!

  “That’s perfect,” said Benedick, and it was, never mind that he wouldn’t have thought of it until Prince pointed it out. Hero always looked top-shelf and far classier than the rest of them, but it was all by her own doing. She took gifted frocks and old pieces of her mother’s and had no trouble looking as if she had the same salary as any other girl a boy like Claude Blaine would normally date.

  “There it is,” Leo agreed quietly. “Go haggle with the storekeep, Prince. Ben and I will pick out some fabric and thread to buy with it.”

  Inside the cool and dim store, Benedick perused the shelves with Leo while Prince talked with the owner in the back. He let a swath of blue silk slide over his fingers.

  “So, Ben, any special girl for you? In my day a nice ribbon was an okay gift.”

  Ben snorted at the thought of Beatrice’s wild nest bedecked with colorful bows. Then he colored because his mind had gone to Beatrice in the first place, and she was not his special girl. Or even special.

  She was just a girl.

  “Not me,” said Benedick. “I’m a bachelor for life; you know that.”

  “You’ve told me so, but I’ve never believed it. I said the exact same thing at your age.”

  “Until you met Anna.”

  “Girl like Anna is hard to forget, but there’s more of them than you’d think. You know who reminds me of her?”

  “Hero?”

  “Certainly! Hero’s got the same sparkle, always has.” Leo stroked his mustache. He glanced toward Prince. “Of course you’ve always been more brotherly toward her.”

  “I couldn’t hope to keep up with her anyway.”

  “But I rather thought Beatrice had the same spunk as well.”

  Benedick worked very hard to remain fascinated with the fabric in his hands. He didn’t glance up. “She doesn’t seem like Anna or Hero at all to me.”

  “Not in personality, no. But that’s not what I mean. They’ve got the same ferocity on the inside. The kind of girl where you can only hang on for the ride and hope your hat stays on. Break your heart three times in one week, and you’re glad for the chance.”

  Benedick turned away. “I hadn’t noticed.”

  Prince returned, looking cheeky. “He’ll do three dollars and fifty cents a month over six months, but if we buy some yards of fabric today, he’ll sell for twenty upfront.”

  “Good lad!” Leo slapped the back of Prince’s shoulder and went with him to sign the agreement.

  Benedick stayed back, his eyes drifting traitorously toward the ribbons, but even if he had felt inclined to give Beatrice a gift, a ribbon seemed all wrong. So did all the other usuals, as his mind went through them: flowers, chocolates, a pretty piece of jewelry, a poem about the luminescence of her eyes.

  What on earth, he imagined her saying, holding up a gold-chain necklace, am I supposed to do with this?

  Too bad he couldn’t gift wrap something like, say, an education.

  Even if he was in a position to pay the last of her tuition, as he no longer was, he had a feeling she wouldn’t accept a donation of that kind. If only he knew a doctor . . .

  An idea wormed its way in, right through his she’s-not-my-girl-and-I-don’t-give-a-damn mantra. He recalled his conversation with poor Payne Chutney, practically dying where he stood. When Benedick told him he was forging his own path, away from his father’s financial assistance, Mr. Chutney had been impressed, lamenting his vulturelike relatives swarming over his fortune. Why not, Benedick had suggested, give some of it to no relatives? Give it to charities and libraries and hospitals. Mr. Chutney had rather liked the idea, though he admitted he was already giving to such organizations.

  Words came fully formed to Benedick’s mind. A patron after death. Mr. Chutney could be a benefactor to anonymous individuals who would truly need such a gift. And Benedick had the perfect girl, the perfect character, whose story would make the idea seem worthwhile.

  She only needed the proper framing for other people to see what he saw. And then it was as if she’d bought her own way in because it was her own life he was using as a bartering tool.

  They were a satisfied, jovial lot pulling into Hey Nonny Nonny that afternoon—a mood that dimmed slightly at the sight of a parked Oldsmobile the color of a stained undershirt. Two men emerged from it as Leo pulled to the side. The first man was shorter than Beatrice but well over two hundred pounds, most of it in his stomach, which he carried in front of him like the breast of an overfed pigeon. His black beard didn’t match the ashy hair visible beneath his fedora hat. At his shoulder, the second man was thin and several inches taller, his neck crooked and bobbing like a crane’s. He looked like a sullen tourist, with a floppy fisherman’s hat hanging low on his head and a tiny gap of hairy skin between where his pants ended and his wool socks began.

  “Hullo!” Leo called as he stepped out of the car. “Can I help you gentlemen?”

  “Happy afternoon to you,” the first man said. “We’re a coupla out-a-towners seeking accommodation.” The smile he presented was charming, if devoid of actual warmth. “I’m Mr. Joe Hansen, and this here’s my partner, Mr. Henry Smith. You’re not the master of the house?”

  “Indeed I am.” Leo shook Mr. Joe Hansen’s hand, then Mr. Henry Smith’s. “I’m Leonard Stahr. And my boys, Pedro Morello and Benedick Scott.”

  Mr. Hansen’s brow lifted a fraction at Benedick’s name, as if he found it mighty interesting. “Your sons?”

  “Not as such. This one I claim as my own.” Leo put a hand on Prince’s shoulder, who went a bit warm around the cheeks. “Ben’s father is some sort of money what’s-it on Wall Street. Ben spends his summers with us.”

  “Wonderful!” Mr. Hansen didn’t probe further. In fact he seemed deliberate in his effort not to give Benedick a second glance.

  “You look familiar,” Leo said. “I wouldn’t know you from somewhere, would I?”

  “Don’t think so!” Mr. Hansen said. “We’re from Connecticut. Just have one of those faces, I s’pose.”

  “Ah.”

  “So! Any rooms for a few weary travelers?”

  “Washroom’s shared, but I can give you two rooms on the second floor. How long are you staying?”

  “Oh, we’d hoped a week or two, if it’s all the same to you.”

  Leo considered a moment. He hadn’t had a drink yet that day. “I’m afraid,” he said slowly, still friendly, “that we’re booked for the weekend. You’ll have to check out Friday morning. But I can give you accommodation for the week, if you’d still like it.”

  They were not booked, of course, but neither Prince nor Benedick would question his decision, especially not when his old instincts were in fighting form.

  Mr. Hansen glanced at Mr. Smith. The pause between them seemed unnecessarily weighty; then all at once Mr. Hansen’s countenance became bright and blank as paper. “Of course!” he boomed. “Something is better than nothing, what?”

  Leo said, “Very good. Come with me, and I’ll see that you’re registered.”

  “I can take your bags,” Prince offered, stepping forward.

  “Certainly not.” Mr. Smith swung his bag up by his chest. “Precious equipment in here. Very fragile.”

  “We’re pheasant hunters,” Mr. Hansen said conversationally.

  Mr. Smith scoffed. “Pheasant scientists, pheasant observers,” he corrected.

  Mr. Hansen said, “Who kill our studied quarries.”

  “Preserve!” Mr. Smith shrieked.

  “Beg pardon?” Leo asked.

  Mr. Hansen shook his head. “Most sincere apologies, Mr. Stahr. Smith is an old man, and his wits are not as blunt as I wish they were. But he’s as honest as the skin between his brows, God bl
ess him.”

  “Yes.” Mr. Smith’s lips puckered. “I thank God that I am as honest as all the other old men who are not honester than me.”

  “I don’t know what the blasted hell you’re talking about,” Leo said, “but so long as you’ve got money to pay for your stay, you’re welcome. Come with me.”

  Benedick arched a dubious brow at Prince. Prince lifted a shoulder, but he looked squirrelly, as if he, too, were trying to place where he might know the two men.

  Once they’d gone inside with Leo, Prince got the sewing machine out from the back of the car. Benedick followed behind him but paused at a tinny sound coming from the drawing room.

  He followed it in, and there was Beatrice, on her knees, fiddling with the dials on the radio box. She hadn’t noticed him come in. He had not yet sunk so far in his silly obsession that he could read her mind, but he knew when it was chewing on a bone. Obviously there was the minor barrier of his eloquent declaration of their forever separation, but he was feeling a bit more confident with his letter idea still buzzing in his head.

  “Whatever it is that’s eating you,” he said, sitting down, “it must be suffering horribly.”

  She glanced over, startled. Her eyes went immediately cold.

  Oh, right.

  He might also have called her a heartless automaton and declared her incapable of human interaction.

  Well!

  She’d only got back what she gave. Fair was fair, and what did he care if she was looking at him as if he were a hair discovered in her soup? She was a fingernail in his, and that was the way the world was.

  “Yes, well,” she finally replied. “Some of us are indeed burdened with thoughts of weight and substance.”

  The radio hummed in the background at low volume. He knelt beside it, careful to keep a hefty distance between them, and tapped the wired covering. Static. “Is your weighty brain blocking the radio’s electric waves?”

  “Electromagnetic waves,” she corrected him. “And I suppose it’s possible.”

  He gave her an incredulous glance. Her face was entirely serious. Pressing her temples with her fingers, she closed her eyes.