Tell Me Pretty Maiden

by Rhys Bowen

“One of them’s not from that English duke, is it, Lily?” one of the girls asked.

  “Not that I can see,” Lily said.

  “Do you think he’ll show up again?” someone else asked wistfully.

  “If he does, then he’s mine, so hands off,” Lily said. “I always did fancy myself as a duchess.”

  “You? A duchess, that will be the day!”

  “You don’t know how to drink tea with your pinky up!”

  Lily looked haughty. “Those Florodora sextet girls all married well, didn’t they?”

  “Yes, well, they were the stars. We’re only chorus,” someone reminded her.

  “But take a look at our leading ladies and gentlemen,” Lily said triumphantly. “All over the hill, long in the tooth, and nothing special to look at. We’re the ones they’ll be waiting for tonight. You’ll see. They’ve already seen our ankles in the tennis scene. You wait until they see us in our bathing suits!”

  There was a great burst of laughter at this.

  “I wish the censor hadn’t cut that cancan number,” Lily went on. “Then we could show them our bottoms, too.”

  “Lily, you are the living end,” someone exclaimed.

  “Oh, don’t you go acting the prude with me, Connie Sharp. I know what you do in your spare time, and it ain’t embroidering pillows, neither.”

  Elise caught my eye and shook her head. “Don’t let them upset you, Molly. Most of us are good girls, just wanting to earn a living, same as anyone else. And if we happen to strike pay dirt and catch the eye of a rich young man after the show, then who is to blame us if we do what we can to make sure we hang on to him?”

  “I’m not blaming anyone,” I said. “But it seems to me as if Lily is courting trouble.”

  “She is, Molly. She knows she’s a looker and has got what they call sex appeal, pardon my language. One day she’ll go too far.”

  “So you all hope to meet a duke standing at the stage door, do you?” I asked as I reapplied makeup to my lips.

  “Doesn’t everyone? Of course not all the stage-door Johnnies can be trusted, you know. Some of them want too much in payment for a nice dinner, and some of them—well, they’re just twisted, if you know what I mean. They don’t just want normal things. I worked with a girl last year who went off with a young man she met at the stage door. He looked harmless enough but her body was found floating in the Hudson with signs of horrible torture all over it. They never did find the guy responsible, or if they did, his family was powerful enough that they paid off the investigation. So stick with me after the show and I’ll let you know if I see a wrong’un.”

  “Thank you,” I said.

  I had no time to hear more as we were summoned down to the stage for the second act. The girls ran down ahead of me eagerly, already thinking ahead to exciting post-theater parties and glamorous dinners. The orchestra started playing and the curtain went up. We were on. As predicted the bathing scene was a great success. There was a gasp of horror (or was it delight?) from the audience when the girls appeared in their bathing suits with their legs exposed from the knee downward. If only they’d seen me swimming in the ocean at home, I thought. Then they’d really have had something to be shocked about!

  I sensed the audience too had settled down in the second act. The laughter no longer had that tense, nervous quality to it. They applauded often and loudly, clearly enjoying the show. We reached the ballroom scene and I heaved a sigh of relief. The wind machine had been removed from the stage area. The wings were empty. In ten minutes it would be over. The band struck up the waltz number and the partners whirled around. “The waltz, the waltz, most romantic of dances, the mood that entrances, just as if we were in Vienna,” they sang.

  Then Arthur, the male star, led Miss Lovejoy out onto the floor. The couples moved to the side as they began to waltz—first, fast to the tempo and then slower and slower, until they were rooted to the spot, staring into each other’s eyes. I was watching them so intently that I only caught the movement out of the corner of my eye. Then someone shouted, “Look out!” Someone else screamed as a pillar toppled across the stage. Miss Lovejoy leaped aside at the last second and the pillar crashed onto the stage, exactly where she had been standing.

  The audience was in an uproar. Flashbulbs went off from reporters’ cameras. Some people were still screaming, already fighting their way to the exits. I slipped off stage and rushed around the backstage area, keeping one eye on the pass door, through to the front of house, and the other on the stairs that led up from the stage. All I saw were stagehands and prop boys, standing wide-eyed.

  “Did you see anyone back here?” I demanded. “Was there anyone here who shouldn’t have been? Anyone out of position?”

  “No, miss,” they answered. “There was nobody here at all but us.”

  “And you could see each other? You’d have noticed if one of you slipped away to give that pillar a good push?”

  “Oh yes, miss. We’re not allowed to loiter in the wings unless we’ve got a job to do and then we have to stand in a particular spot, so that we’re not in the way of the actors’ entrances and exits.”

  Over the tumult I heard Blanche’s powerful voice. “Ladies and gentlemen, please take your seats again. I’m sorry for the interruption, but we won’t let it spoil our evening. We are professional performers. We won’t let a little accident prevent our grand finale, will we? The show must go on.”

  There was huge applause at this.

  “Maestro?” Blanche indicated the conductor who lifted his baton, glancing around shakily. “From the last reprise if you don’t mind.”

  The band struck up again and Blanche began to waltz with Arthur as if nothing had happened, leaving everyone onstage staring at her in open-mouthed admiration. I was staring at her, too, because something was wrong. I had watched her through the rehearsals and something struck me as different. Then I realized what it was. When I watched her before, I could see her absolutely in profile. Now I could also see the back of her head. Someone had moved her mark.

  As soon as the curtain came down and we lined up for our curtain calls, I went over to examine. I could see where the first chalk mark had been erased and the new one put in. For the first time I knew what I had suspected all along: this was no ghost. Somebody had a personal vendetta against Blanche Lovejoy!

  Up in the dressing room there was chaos. Some of the girls were in tears, almost hysterical.

  “She was almost killed,” Connie was wailing. “And it almost hit me, too. It slammed down right beside me. If I’d been off my mark, I’d have been a goner as well.”

  “Don’t be so dramatic, Connie,” Lily said. “It missed you by a mile. And it probably wouldn’t have given you any more than a nasty concussion either. It’s only a stage prop, not real marble, you know.” She took the pins out of her hair and let it fall over her shoulders. “I don’t know about you, but I’m in serious need of champagne. Some guy outside better have a jeroboam with him, and it better be chilled and waiting in an ice bucket.”

  I took off my makeup and changed out of my costume while beside me Elise was doctoring her feet. “Have you worked with Miss Lovejoy before, Elise?” I asked her.

  “Yes, once, three or four years ago. Miss Lovejoy hasn’t had a show for the last few years. The public seems to want sweet young things these days, ever since Florodora.”

  “But you’ve been working in the theater here?”

  “Oh yes, I’ve been in quite a few shows now.”

  “So can you think of anyone who hates Miss Lovejoy?”

  “Hates her?”

  “Yes, hates her enough to kill her or at least to frighten her?”

  Elise looked shocked. “Molly, you don’t think . . .”

  “That the pillar wasn’t either an accident or a ghost? Yes, I do.”

  “Oh my goodness. But it couldn’t be one of us. The whole cast was onstage for the ballroom scene. And the stage manager would have spotted anyone who wasn’t supposed to be ba
ckstage. And besides, Henry would never have let them in. He’s really strict, especially now with all the young men at the stage door trying to sneak up to the dressing rooms.”

  I sighed. “I know. It does seem impossible, but I’ve witnessed three of these incidents myself now, and nobody has seen anything suspicious, or anybody where they shouldn’t have been.”

  “Then maybe it is the phantom after all,” Elise said. “I did feel cold again tonight, didn’t you?”

  “That’s because you were in a ball gown that was very décolleté,” I said. “And I don’t believe in ghosts.”

  The dressing room was beginning to thin out, girls hurrying down to latch onto the best catches among guys waiting outside the stage door.

  “Come on, Molly,” Elise called. “You don’t want to be the last.”

  I gathered my own belongings and followed the throng down into the street. To tell the truth, I was anxious to witness the scene for myself. I also thought it might be rather nice to be enticed away with the promise of champagne drunk from a slipper, although I couldn’t think that any young man would have noticed me with my severe spectacles and thick braids.

  I could hear the uproar going on beyond the stage door and Henry’s raised voice. “Just wait patiently, gentlemen. They’ll be out any second now. And no, you’re not going up to meet them. I don’t care who you are. If you were President Roosevelt himself I’d still keep you waiting down here.”

  We came out to popping flashbulbs, eager reporters, and a whole army of young men dressed in white tie and tails, watching for us expectantly. Suddenly it was as if I was having a vision. I pictured John Jacob Halsted going off to the theater and then calling his friend to tell him that he’d arranged supper and a pleasant surprise. JJ Halsted was a stage-door Johnnie!

  I had barely had this thought when Elise tugged at my arm. “Watch out for that one over there,” she whispered. “He likes to play rough.”

  I followed where she was pointing and almost couldn’t believe my eyes. The young man in immaculate evening dress was none other that my Mr. Roth!

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  I barely had time to register this when I was set upon by my friends.

  “Molly, you scoundrel. How could you keep it from us that you were in the play?” Sid shouted over the tumult. She pretended to shake me.

  “We nearly died of shock,” Gus added. “It was all I could do to stop Sid from shouting out your name. You were awfully good.”

  “I didn’t have to do anything,” I said. “Just stand there.”

  “But you stood there so well.”

  “And guess who we found in the audience?” Sid said excitedly, then stepped aside to reveal Ryan O’Hare.

  “Molly, my dearest, what can I say?” He stepped forward to kiss my cheek. “If only I’d known that a great thespian lurked beneath that delicate little bosom, I’d have hired you for one of my plays long before now.”

  “You and your blarney, Ryan.” I laughed as we moved out of the crush of the crowd.

  Flashbulbs were still going off and the smell of sulphur hung heavy in the air while smoke curled around us. I heard one of the girls—Connie, I believe—saying loudly, “And it almost struck me. I was lucky to get away with my life.”

  “So I take it you haven’t managed to unmask the ghost yet,” Ryan said. “I must admit that ghostly toppling of the pillar was rather spectacular.”

  “Is that why you were there?” Sid asked. “You were hired to find the ghost?”

  “Exactly.”

  “And do you believe there really is one?” Gus asked. “Have you seen it? Sid and I were dearly hoping to. We’ve always wanted to see a ghost for ourselves, haven’t we, Sid?”

  “Absolutely. I must admit it was rather exciting—the pillar crashing down in full view of everyone, just missing Miss Lovejoy! We were agog, weren’t we, Gus?”

  “My dears, I was positively terrified,” Ryan said. “Unlike the rest of you I can’t abide ghosts. I grew up in a haunted castle and I hardly slept a wink until I was sent to boarding school. I’d stare at the wall all night to make sure it wasn’t coming through into my room.”

  “Well, you don’t have to worry, because I don’t think this is a ghost,” I said. “I believe that someone is out to get Blanche Lovejoy.”

  “Who do you think it is?” Sid whispered as she drew me out into the crowded street beyond the alley.

  “I have no idea.” I glanced around to see if anyone could overhear us. “Each time it has happened, nobody has been spotted nearby. We’ve been able to account for the movements of practically everyone, except for the producer and the choreographer, but they wouldn’t be backstage during production. And if they were, they’d have been noticed. I’ve now witnessed three of these strange tricks and it’s still a complete mystery to me.”

  Out of the corner of my eye I noticed Lily getting into a hansom cab with a young man. Then I noticed that the young man was Mr. Roth. I hoped she knew what she was doing. I’d have to ask her all about it tomorrow.

  “Come on, Molly, we’re taking you for a late supper at the Fifth Avenue Hotel.” Sid took my arm. “We’re meeting our friend Elizabeth, who is really you-know-who. She was in the audience tonight. I know she’s dying to speak to you again, and to hear what’s happening with the girl in the snowdrift.”

  We climbed into a cab and off we went.

  It was a merry evening and I came home after midnight to find Mrs. Tucker sound asleep in my armchair. My girl was sleeping equally peacefully upstairs. I didn’t have the heart to send my nursemaid home in the middle of the night so I brought down blankets to cover her, then went to bed. I woke in the morning to the smell of fresh coffee. Mrs. Tucker was up and bustling around my kitchen.

  “Comfortable chair you’ve got there,” she said, not looking up from making toast. “I slept like a baby. How’s she doing today?”

  “I haven’t looked in on her yet. I came down to see who was making coffee.”

  “I’ve got the tray ready to take up to her,” Mrs. Tucker said.

  I opened the bedroom door for her then hung back as she went inside. The girl sat up as Mrs. Tucker came in, and then, to my astonishment, she smiled. As Mrs. Tucker had predicted, good old-fashioned loving care was breaking through before science could.

  “We’ll have you up and around and talking away nineteen to the dozen, won’t we, my pet?” Mrs. Tucker asked as she sat on the bed beside her.

  She had just finished eating and Mrs. Tucker was carrying down the tray where there was a knock at the front door. It was Daniel. He came in, waving a newspaper. Giant headlines proclaimed GHOST STRIKES THEATER STAR WHILE HUNDREDS WATCH IN HORROR.

  “I’ve been reading about the near disaster at the theater last night so I came round to see that you are all right.”

  “I’m fine, thank you. Come on in and have some coffee,” I said.

  “Wonderful. Thank you.” He removed his hat and placed it on the hall table. “I must say I’m relieved to find you unscathed. What a strange business. Presumably you didn’t catch the perpetrator?”

  “I rushed backstage as soon as it happened. The stage hands were standing there and they saw nobody.”

  “Could it have been one of them?” he asked.

  “I don’t see how. They were all standing together. Anyone who pushed a pillar would have been noticed.”

  “Unless they were all in it together,” he suggested.

  “Why would they want to do it? What motive could they have?”

  “Someone was paying them well enough to risk it? Someone wanted your leading lady out of the way—someone who was not connected to the theater, maybe, and wanted to make it seem as if it was a theater vendetta.”

  “That’s not a bad thought,” I agreed.

  “I was a detective once, you know,” Daniel said.

  “I’ll go to see Blanche today and find out if anyone outside of the theater might carry a grudge against her.”

  “I
thought I might go back to New Haven and talk to the theater people there,” Daniel said. “I believe I’ve covered all bases with your Jewish bachelor.”

  “We’ve both covered all bases,” I said, “and another thing I have to do today is to inform the family that hired me that they do not want Mr. Roth marrying their daughter.”

  “Why would you say that? What possible reason can you have? The man is a paragon. Do you think she would die of boredom?”

  “He’s a paragon who hangs around theater stage doors with a reputation of ‘playing rough,’ as one girl put it. I saw him outside the Casino last night.”

  “Good God,” Daniel said. “I’d never have thought it of him. Are you sure it was he?”

  “Oh yes, and he went off in a cab with the chorus girl who is most generous with her favors.”

  “Well, I never.” Daniel shook his head. “So you’ve concluded one case, at least. Now you just need to find a theater ghost and the whereabouts of JJ Halsted.”

  “How are we ever going to do that, Daniel? Presumably the police across the country have been alerted to be on the lookout for him.”

  Daniel thought for a minute. “Well, if I were running the case, I’d work outwards from the car. We’ve tried local farmhouses and we’re pretty sure he didn’t hide out there. So where is the nearest station? Did anyone see him getting on a train in the morning? And if he had the loot with him, how did he carry it? Silver isn’t particularly light.”

  “Right.” I nodded appreciatively.

  “And probably carriers have a regular route up and down that stretch of road. I’d ask if Halsted could have hitched a ride with any stage going into the city. And then it might be worth checking the steamship companies and finding out if anyone matching Halsted’s description booked passage to somewhere like South America.”

  “This is all presupposing that he’s guilty,” I said.

  “Then give me another explanation.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Then we have to assume that something drove him to act in a way that was completely uncharacteristic for him—debts or drugs. And assuming he’s guilty, the next step is to see if he has fled the country.”