Chapter 30 #2
But hadn’t she also said that her son was fond of Meg and that the longer Meg stayed, the harder it would be to return her—presumably because they were growing attached to her?
I knew how quickly Meg could get under your skin.
So maybe there was some hope after all. Though not enough hope to tell Charlie yet.
I stood back and studied the dance floor, shiny and wet with the first coat of black paint. This certainly put it into perspective, why I’d agreed to this calamitous, depraved idea. If Charlie got the chance to get Meg back, she better have enough money to take her far away from here.
The next day, I left a message with the Heidelbergs’ maid asking Mrs. Heidelberg to please telephone me back.
My plan was to tell her I’d requested Meg’s family history from the records department in Jackson and to please be patient before any decision was made about returning the child.
I prayed it would buy Meg and me some precious time.
By Thursday, the advertisement for the “cat call” had run in newspapers in three counties.
Though she’d said to keep expectations at “diddly squat,” Flossy’d also sent telegrams to girls up in Sweetwater and Memphis and down in Natchez.
Interviews were today, due to start on the front porch in two hours.
Charlie’d asked me to be there, and I’d told her I would, but that all I’d be asking these women was, Can you dance?
I certainly didn’t know what the qualifications were for a—the term I preferred was sporting girl, because it brought to mind a young woman with a sensible haircut in a starchy white dress who won athletic contests, though I knew hitting a tennis ball or swinging a club was not these girls’ sport.
I made eggs and biscuits for breakfast for myself and Charlie.
Flossy wasn’t awake yet. At the kitchen table, Charlie crossed herself Catholic and whispered a prayer up to Mother Mary.
I listened in gall. Asking the mother of Jesus to bless your prostitution operation and “bring us hardworking girls today,” I had to give it to Charlie, that was some faith.
Upstairs, I was moving my things I’d been keeping in the yellow room into the hall closet, since one of the new boarders would be moving in, when I heard a rumble out front.
I peered out the bedroom window down at the road.
A motorcar with a long black nose, a flat black top, and a fender curving high over the front wheel was pulling up.
This can’t be good. A woman with dark hair got out of the driver’s side and started up the walk.
I hammered down the stairs, calling, “Charlie, someone’s here,” as the woman tapped the knocker.
Was it an early interview or, dear God, one of Mrs. Tartt’s or Frances’s friends? I opened the door.
“Hello,” I said.
The woman looked to be in her mid-thirties, with short, dark hair set in perfect croquignole waves. She wore a lovely, silky green dress that wasn’t low-cut or tight like Flossy’s, though it was slim like the style. She put out a white-gloved hand. “Hello,” she said and I shook it.
“I saw in the paper you’re doing some hiring, so I thought I’d stop by and say hello.”
She had catlike brown eyes and high cheekbones.
Her olive skin gave her an exotic look, maybe she was Spanish or European.
She was beautiful. I’d expected them to look like Flossy, like a bargain buy at a yard sale at four o’clock.
But this woman—I felt like I should offer her coffee or to polish her car.
“You’re a little early.” I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to say.
Charlie came up the hall still buttoning her dress. When she saw the woman, she slowed down and actually took a deep breath. “Hello, I’m Charlie.”
“Esmeralda, so pleased to meet you.” Charlie shook her gloved hand.
“Are you currently with a house?” Charlie asked. She sounded a little stiff, maybe to sound like a madam. Or trying to make up for the fact that she was barefooted. And she’d buttoned her dress wrong.
“Not currently, no. I was actually on my way to look at some other establishments when I saw your ad in the paper.” Esmeralda smiled, showing a delicate gap between her front teeth.
“I must say, I’ve never seen anything like your advertisement before.
” She laughed and it was husky and rolled off easy.
“What other establishments?” Charlie asked.
“Oh, just a few places here and there.” Esmeralda looked up at the haint-blue porch ceiling, taking the house in.
She slipped her white gloves off, one finger at a time.
I saw her nails were painted beige, half-moon style like in the magazines, not the cuticles, not the tips.
Like Flossy’s but definitely not like Flossy’s.
Charlie tucked her own nail-bitten hand into her dress pocket.
“We’re offering a fair cut,” Charlie said. “Fifty percent, three dollars a week for board, five for the upfront, and you get to keep your own gratuities.”
“That does sound fair,” Esmeralda said. “Almost like the old Basin Street days in New Orleans. Times are a little different now.”
“That they are,” Charlie said, and they shared a nod.
“Would it be an imposition if I asked to use your powder room?” Esmeralda asked. “I beg your pardon, but I’ve been on the road awhile.”
Charlie stood silent a moment. But then she said, “Of course, but so you know, the house isn’t in tip-top shape yet. We’re still waiting on some things to come in.”
“Oh, I’m sure it’s fine.”
Charlie showed her into the grand hall, which I didn’t think looked so bad; at least there was a telephone on a little scratched-up table now.
I figured no matter what she was actually here to do, she sure would be good for my front.
She could pass as a beautiful dance teacher giving proper waltz instructions to the gentlemen at the college.
Walking down the hall, she glanced left at the sitting room with the settee covered by a bedspread, a brown rug with the hole in it, then right at the library full of piles of junk—I should’ve closed the door—past bare walls with squares of unfaded paint, into the little gold lavatory under the main stairs.
“We need her,” Charlie whispered.
“Nobody would suspect her,” I said.
Two minutes later, Esmeralda emerged. “Thank you for your time.” She added, “You’re out of paper and the lightbulb’s out.” And she walked straight out and down the front porch steps without another word and got back into her beautiful car.
Charlie shut the door after her and said, “We didn’t need her anyway. We need dependable girls who won’t walk off just because the damn house looks shabby.”
The three of us sat squeezed behind the card table I’d set up on the front porch.
I’d set it up to the left of the front door and Flossy was nearest the rail, Charlie was in the middle, and I was closest to the door.
In the yard, in the shade of the pecan tree, six women were waiting on folding chairs I’d set up.
I was definitely nervous. It was still hard for me to believe these women had actually shown up here for an advertisement that said cat call.
And yet, of course they showed up, people were desperate for jobs, they’d answer anything in the situations, which made me more nervous.
Who knew who’d show up here today to interview for our backyard brothel?
From the porch, I couldn’t really say if they looked like Esmeralda or Eleanor Roosevelt, but unless he had on a dress, at least none looked like the sheriff.
Flossy poured herself a glass of water from the pitcher. She was wearing her usual pink dress and had applied two bright spots of rouge on the apples of her cheeks. “Don’t say I didn’t warn ya,” she said. “Some pretty strange types prolly showed up here.”
“Stranger than we’ve got already?” I asked, but I couldn’t stop my smile. Flossy flashed her teeth at me with an ain’tchoo funny look.
“Now look, we gotta be selective,” Flossy said. “No half-raters, no dogs, no grannies. We need lookers or we’ll end up with a dollar-a-girl house and fifty-cent men.”
“We just need hard workers,” Charlie said. She wore a beige cotton dress with red piping, ironed to such a cracker-like crispness it reminded me of Frances. “They don’t have to be knockouts, but they have to be over eighteen.”
“Doll, we’ll be lucky if they’re below forty-five,” Flossy said. “And no darkies. I got no problem with it, but this ain’t Mahogany Hall and we ain’t after octomaroons. Cops don’t take to a mixed sporting house, shut you down faster than you can sneeze out your twat.”
“All I ask is that they can dance a little,” I said.
“Sure, Bird. You ask that,” Flossy said. “Alright, ladies, let’s get this whorehouse started.”
I’d only ever hired one person before, John Morton, the fifteen-year-old stock boy at the Foote, who got paid more than me because he was male and probably because he didn’t look content.
Why pay someone any more than you had to, when you knew they’d never leave?
Other than that, this was new. Charlie frowned at me for bouncing my nervous knee under the table, and I stopped. But then it started right up again.
Flossy leaned over the rail and yelled, “First girl’s up,” and three of the six women quickly rose from their chairs.
A woman, I’d say she was forty-five, in a dark skirt and white blouse with a bow, beat the other two to the stairs.
Her brown hair was set in a stiff circle around her face, which was powdered white, and she wore red lipstick on her very thin lips.
She’s perfect, I thought. No one would ever suspect she was a prostitute.
She tucked her skirt under her rear before she sat down. “Good morning, I’m Mrs. Withers, please call me Joan.” She kept her black pocketbook in her lap and set the newspaper ad, folded and creased into a neat packet, on the card table.