Angels of Mercy

by Duncan, Alice

  That night after dinner, Caroline excused herself and went upstairs to read her latest acquisition from the public library, The House Without a Key, by Earl Derr Biggers. I’d read the book and loved it and, while I felt a little sad that Caroline didn’t seem inclined to spend time with Lulu and me, it was actually better that she not remain with us that evening. Lulu and I had plans to discuss. Although I plugged the new radio into a socket in the living room, we didn’t turn it on that evening.

  We huddled together on the living room sofa and, to the gentle clanging of Mrs. Buck cleaning up dinner dishes in the kitchen, we discussed how to find Peggy Wickstrom.

  “I guess the first thing we should do is go to the Palaise de Danse,” I said doubtfully. “They told me a week or so ago that she worked there. I guess they can tell us if she still does.” I gave her my reasoning as to why we should put in a personal appearance and not telephone the place.

  “Good idea. Do you have the address?”

  “Um . . . no. But I can look it up. So I went to the desk in my office, opened the Los Angeles telephone directory and found the address. I wrote it down just to make sure I wouldn’t forget, not that I anticipated doing so.

  “Good,” said Lulu when I gave her the address of the dance hall. Then she frowned. “How’re we going to get there?”

  “Why, I thought we could . . .” Shoot. I hadn’t thought about that. Then I brightened. “I’ll drive us!”

  “That’s right!” Lulu cried with pleasure. “You know how to drive your Roadster now, don’t you?”

  Hesitating slightly before telling a blatant lie, I ended up telling the truth. “Well, I’m no expert, but I know how to start it, back it up, turn on the head lamps and not bump into other cars parked at various curbs.”

  “Sounds good enough to me.” Lulu stood up, seemingly energized by our upcoming activity.

  I knew how she felt, because I felt the same way. We were actually going to do something and not sit around waiting for the police not to discover Peggy’s whereabouts. “Of course, if she’s not at the Palaise de Danse, I don’t know where to look next.”

  “She must have made an acquaintance or two while she worked there,” said Lulu. “We can talk to the other girls.”

  “Great idea.”

  “But we can’t go like this.”

  I looked down at my blue suit, the same suit I’d worn to work that day. Long gone (for me) were the days I dressed for dinner. Not Mercy Allcutt, the working girl. I put on my clothes in the morning, worked in them, and then went home in them. Sometimes I’d change into a comfortable house dress to wear in the evenings, but that night, both Lulu and I had been too excited about our upcoming mission to bother changing clothes.

  “I guess not. I look too respectable, don’t I?”

  “Yup.”

  I didn’t say so, but Lulu didn’t suffer from the same problem. She still wore the brilliant crimson frock she’d worn that day to work. Her lips and fingernails complemented her ensemble amazingly well. What with her blond hair and her red everything else, she looked to me as if she could pass for a lady of the night. Not that I’d ever, to my knowledge, seen a lady of the night, but I supposed they wore bright colors.

  “So . . . what should we wear?” I asked, not having a clue of my own.

  “I’ve got something I think will work. We have to look as though we belong in a joint like that, and a blue suit just won’t do.”

  “I know that,” I said, nettled.

  “Don’t get mad. Let’s just go up and look in our closets.”

  So we did and, oh, my goodness, if I didn’t know who I was, I wouldn’t have known who I was by the time Lulu got through with me. Not only was I wearing a perfectly scandalous black evening gown that wouldn’t have been at all scandalous if I’d worn the vest that was supposed to go over it, but Lulu had painted my lips and nails the same bright shade as her own. Then she worked on my hair until I looked like a tart out of an issue of the Police Gazette! After that she rummaged in her closet, found a long red boa, and threw it around my shoulders. If I hadn’t seen me for myself, I wouldn’t have known I had it in me to look so ghastly. I wished my mother could see me; she might ease up on her anti-working theme. In fact, she’d probably believe I’d sold my soul to the devil.

  Lulu looked as awful as I did, although on her the change wasn’t as astonishing as it was on me, since she was accustomed to dressing more boldly than was I. She had put on a vivid purple frock with a zigzag hemline, had rolled her stockings down, rouged her knees, and found a white boa for herself. Naturally, she still wore her crimson lipstick and fingernails. She made quite a sight. Well, so did I, but at least I was all in black and red and not purple and white with red highlights.

  At any rate, we looked like two women who weren’t ladies when we left the house at about eight o’clock that evening. I was carrying a black handbag with a shoulder strap—Lulu had advised me to take the strapped bag, since the neighborhood in which we aimed to do our snooping wasn’t the best and I could hold it to my side so it couldn’t be snatched—and I took out my key. My heart hammered like a pile driver as I unlocked Lulu’s door and then got behind the steering wheel.

  “This is going to be fun!” said Lulu, giving every evidence of believing her own words.

  “I hope so.” My own voice sounded a trifle less hearty.

  “Let’s go get ‘em!” cried Lulu.

  “Very well, but please don’t talk for a minute, Lulu. I have to remember all of Ernie’s instructions.”

  I’d only had five or six lessons. And I had driven in traffic. Rather heavy traffic, at that. But I’d done so on a bright, sunny day, not a dark, dark night. Also—and this was no little thing—before when I’d driven my Roadster, Ernie had been with me. That night I realized what a comfort his presence had been. Now I only had Lulu, and she didn’t know how to drive any more than I’d known two months previously.

  But nothing ventured, nothing gained, as they say. Whoever “they” are. I stuck the key into the ignition, turned it, pushed the starter button, pressed one foot on the clutch and the other on the brake—I didn’t want the machine to get away from me—and put the shift lever into reverse. Very, very slowly, I backed out of the drive. My backing-up skills hadn’t been practiced much at all, but at a snail’s pace and with Lulu and me both watching, I managed to get the Roadster out onto the road without scraping against anything. I felt better then.

  “Good job,” said Lulu, making me feel even better.

  “I hate to admit it, but I’m scared to be driving at night.”

  “You’ll do fine. You know how to drive this thing. You only need a little practice. Think of this as practice.”

  Not a bad idea. I tried to keep Lulu’s suggestion in mind as I slowly maneuvered the Roadster down the street and around the corner. Flower wasn’t too far away from where we lived, so it didn’t take long to get to it. The farther we traveled down Flower, the busier the traffic became and the less savory the neighborhood seemed to be.

  “Jeepers,” said Lulu as we neared Fifth. “I expected her to work in a dump, but I didn’t realize it would be like this.”

  Oh, happy day. Even Lulu was worried. I tried to remain calm. “Well, let me see if I can find a good place to park the Roadster, and we can walk to the Palaise de Danse.”

  “Better park it on a side street,” advised Lulu. “If you leave it around here, somebody’s likely to steal it.”

  Better and better. Nevertheless, bravely daring, I did as Lulu suggested and decided to park the Roadster near the Los Angeles Public Library. Heck, nothing of a criminal nature ever happened at a library, right?

  “It’s going to be a hike,” said Lulu.

  “But you said—”

  “I’m not complaining. I’m just saying we’re in for a walk.”

  So we exited the automobile, and I locked all of its doors. Even though we were near the library, there was no sense in taking chances.

  By the
time we got to Anthony’s Palaise de Dance, I’d come to the conclusion that Lulu had worked her magic a little too well on both of us that night. No fewer than three men who were not gentlemen had made unsavory suggestions to us.

  “I can’t believe these people think I’m what they think I am,” I whispered after the third man left us, grumpily telling us we were no better than we should be.

  “It’s all in how you dress,” said Lulu. Well, she should know.

  I was grateful when we finally saw Anthony’s Palaise de Danse on the other side of Flower from where we walked. At the corner, we crossed the street, wolf whistles following us. I knew I was blushing but doubted anyone could tell since Lulu had slathered rouge on me and the night was dark except under the electric street lamps, which were placed too far apart for my peace of mind.

  But we got there at last. I was shocked when a man at the door asked us who the hell we were and what the hell we were doing there. I’m not accustomed to being sworn at by strangers—or anyone else, for that matter. Ernie doesn’t count, because he doesn’t actually swear at me; he just swears.

  “We’re looking for a friend,” said Lulu, sounding harder than I’d ever heard her sound. “What’s it to you?”

  “It’s a dime a piece is what it’s worth to me,” said the man with a sneer. He was an ugly customer, indeed.

  “Oh, yeah? We don’t want to buy any dances, for the love of Pete. We only want to see if our friend is in there.”

  “Sez you. Who’s your friend?”

  “Peggy Wickstrom.”

  I have to admit to a cowardly gratitude to Lulu for taking over the speaking role in this little play of ours. I wouldn’t have known how to talk to a creature like the man confronting us.

  “Peggy? Hell, she ain’t been here for days. She and that guy she hangs out with stole money from the till and lammed it out of here a week or so ago. The cops are looking for ‘em. You got bum friends, missy.”

  “Don’t you missy me,” growled Lulu. “That guy friend of hers named Autumn, by any chance?”

  “What’s it to you?”

  Deciding it was past time to do my part in our drama, I held out a quarter to the man. “It’s worth this.” I tried to sound as hard and world-weary as Lulu, but don’t think I succeeded very well.

  He snatched the money out of my hand and sneered some more. “It’s worth more than that.”

  “The hell it is,” said Lulu, shocking me.

  I know. How foolish can one person be? Lulu was acting. She was, what’s more, good at it. I’m surprised a director or producer hadn’t snatched her up yet, although I still believed her staunch refusal to go anywhere but the Figueroa Building had a lot to do with her failure to hit it big in the pictures.

  “One more quarter, and you tell us the name of the guy Peggy’s with,” I said, doing a little growling of my own. Only this time, I held the quarter between my thumb and first finger. Never let it be said that Mercy Allcutt doesn’t learn from her mistakes.

  With another sneer—or maybe it was the same one. I wasn’t keeping track—the man said, “Yeah. The guy’s name is Autumn.” He snatched at the coin, which I deftly put behind my back before he made contact. “Hey, gimme that.”

  “What else can you tell us about Peggy and the Autumn guy?”

  “Not a damned thing. Now gimme that quarter.”

  “Did Peggy have any friends here? Any of the other dance girls?” Lulu asked.

  “She didn’t have no friends at all. She was standoffish, that one. Nobody liked her.”

  Hmm. Interesting.

  Lulu and I exchanged a questioning glance, and I saw Lulu shrug. So I gave the man his quarter.

  As we turned to walk away, he spoke again. “I’ll tell you one thing for free.”

  He had our attention. We turned around again. Lulu snarled, “Yeah?” as if she’d been speaking to people like that forever.

  “Autumn’s a bad character. If that Peggy is a friend of yours, you’d oughta try to get her away from him.”

  Lulu said, “Huh.”

  That was when a uniformed policeman confronted us.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “All right, ladies, what do you think you’re doing?”

  Shocked, I said, “Nothing, Officer. We were just walking the streets.”

  Lulu said, “Mercy!” and I realized that what I’d said might be taken the wrong way.

  “I mean, we were trying to find a friend who used to work at that place.” I pointed at the Palaise de Danse.”

  “Yeah. I think I heard that one before.”

  “But it’s the truth!” I said, appalled that he might not believe me.

  “I think you were right the first time,” growled the policeman. “Come along with me. We try to keep riffraff like you off the streets. It ain’t easy, especially around these blasted dance halls, but we do our best.”

  “But, Officer! We were truly only trying to find a friend!”

  By that time, the policeman had Lulu and me each by an arm and was dragging us along the street. Talk about a humiliating experience! Fortunately, if anyone I knew was watching, whoever it was wouldn’t recognize me. Small comfort when one is about to be clapped in the slammer.

  “She’s telling the truth,” said Lulu, sounding slightly panicky.

  Truth to tell, I was glad she was taking this matter seriously and hadn’t continued her role as gangster’s moll, which she’d been doing very well.

  “She isn’t even a friend, really,” I said, my anxiety clear to hear in my voice. “Her name is Peggy Wickstrom, and she stole money and personal effects from us. She lived in my home, you see, renting a room, and she drugged my friends and stole things from us!”

  “Tell me another one,” said the copper as we approached a parked car.

  Another uniformed man who’d been leaning against the police car and whom I presumed to be our captor’s partner, threw down the cigarette he’d been smoking and asked mildly, “Whatta ya got there, Pete?”

  “Coupla hookers. They was struttin’ their stuff at the Palaise de Danse.”

  The man who wasn’t Pete shook his head sadly. “Ain’t it a shame? Two broads who should ought to be married and home cooking for their families. And here they are, walking the street.”

  I wished I hadn’t used that same expression when Officer Pete first confronted us.

  “They’re young ones, too. Don’t know if it’s the booze or the drugs, but it makes me sick,” said Pete.

  “It’s not liquor or drugs!” I cried in growing desperation. “We were honestly trying to find Peggy Wickstrom! Or her boyfriend Johnny Autumn! He’s led Peggy astray!”

  “Cripes, you know Autumn?” The man who wasn’t Pete shook his head again. “You should ought to keep better company, lady.”

  “But I don’t even know Johnny Autumn!” I said. “All I know is he led Peggy astray, and she drugged my other tenants and stole from us. We were trying to find her!”

  “Yeah?” The other officer opened the back door of the police sedan and Pete shoved Lulu and me inside. It smelled putrid in there. “You were trying to find your friend at the Palaise de Danse? Funny friend you have there, girly.”

  “Oh, Lord,” I whispered, looking despairingly at Lulu, who looked despairingly back at me.

  “You can say that again,” said Lulu.

  So I did.

  The ride to the police station didn’t take long. In one sense, that was good, since the back seat of the police vehicle stank abominably. Later Lulu told me the police had probably picked up drunken people, stuffed them in the back seat, and they’d lost their excesses all over the upholstery. I almost wished she hadn’t explained the stench to me.

  In another sense, I wished that stupid ride would last forever, because I didn’t know what would happen to us once the policemen took us inside the station. Mind you, I’d been inside a police station before, but it was for legitimate business, and it wasn’t the one toward which we were headed. I knew
that because the other one was in the opposite direction. But I’d never been inside a police station as a—good Lord, I don’t even want to say the word—suspected criminal. A lady of the night. A scarlet woman. A prostitute. A streetwalker. And what a time to remember that euphemism. Stupid Mercy.

  Along the way, Lulu said, “I think we’ll each get to make a telephone call, but I don’t know who to call.”

  “Oh, my.” My brain awhirl, I tried and failed to think of whom I should call. Chloe? Good Lord, no. Not in her delicate condition and certainly not under these circumstances. No matter how much Chloe wouldn’t want to rat me out to our parents, she’d probably be unable to avoid doing so. Our mutual mother had a stare that would induce a stone to confess, even if it hadn’t done anything wrong.

  Then inspiration struck.

  It evidently struck Lulu at the same time it did me, because we looked at each other and said in unison, “Ernie!”

  Boy, was I ever grateful I’d put my little address book into my bag. I’d almost left it out because the bag was small but had decided to take it with me because I’d thought we might need paper and pencil. And, while I hadn’t been correct about the paper and pencil, I was definitely in need of the addresses and telephone numbers held therein.

  “What if he isn’t home?” Lulu asked, beginning to sound worried again.

  Darn, I wished she hadn’t asked that question. But it didn’t take too long for me to think of a good answer. “If Ernie isn’t at his apartment, I guess I can always call Phil Bigelow. He probably won’t be at work at this hour, but I can explain what happened and somebody at his police station will probably call him for us.”

  “Bigelow,” Lulu spat out. She hadn’t cared for Phil ever since he’d arrested her brother.

  Personally, although I agreed with Lulu that the police had been precipitate in arresting Rupert in that other case, I thought Phil was a pretty good man. At least he could help get us out of jail. I hoped.