Cabaret (17 page)

“Freda, I need your help,” he croaked. He seemed to have lost his voice. “None of the acts have shown up tonight. Not a single one. Even Olga Mollica. His wife won’t allow him out of the house. It’s a conspiracy.They’re trying to put me out of business.” He ran the free flabby hand over his face, and I noticed it was shaking. “I know who’s behind it too, and I’m going to get even.” Now something of the old fire returned to his eyes and voice as he patted the bulging pocket of his greasy jacket.

“How can you be a cabaret club with no cabaret, Freda, I ask you? No acts, no punters,” he continued, “They’ll go to Fifi’s or the Pussy Cat Lounge. I’ll be ruined. So I need you to go on, Freda.”

“Go on?” I asked stupidly.

“Terrific,” he said. “I knew you’d do it. You’re a talented girl. Who knows, this could be the making of you. Get yourself kitted out in the star’s dressing room. Something sexy.

You’re on in five minutes. The band knows the numbers; you just got to sing along.”

“Oh, and, Freda,” he added, “it would help if you could dance a little, just wiggle your hips. You got great hips. And feel free to use any of the props.The snake always knocks their socks off.” With that he retreated into his office and the door slammed behind him.

I left the coat-check booth unattended—hopefully the items would be safe—and hurried to the star’s dressing room, which was adjacent to the kitchen. It was more like a cupboard than a room, dingily lit by a bare bulb, and smelled of stale sweat and greasepaint. The walls were lined with pegs from which hung an array of garish costumes, feather boas, hats, wigs, parasols, and gloves, and the floor was strewn with shoes and theatrical props: angels’ wings, whips, potted plants.

I didn’t know where to begin, but I had to be fast. I selected a long blue sequined dress that I thought might look all right, and stripped off my clothes. Something made me feel that I was being watched, and as I turned I saw the door was ajar and a number of eyes at different heights were peeping in.

I slammed it shut, unleashing cries of pain from the outside.

Then someone knocked loudly and shouted, “Freda Lippi.

You’re on in two minutes.”

Two minutes! I threw on the dress. It didn’t exactly fit, but it would have to do. It had a plunging neckline and a slit running up the thigh. I rummaged for some shoes in a pile and, in doing so, disturbed a snake that must have been sleeping in there. It was black, shiny, and angry. It reared up, hissed angrily, and spat at me. I felt a sharp and searing pain like a needle in my leg. The snake had bitten me! I just had to hope it wasn’t poisonous. If Mormile thought I was going to appear with that vicious creature, he could think again. I examined the wound. It was circular and smoking.

“One minute!” shouted the voice again.

I climbed into a pair of silver shoes that were several sizes too big, slung a feather boa around my neck, stuck a wax flower in my hair, and slathered some red greasepaint on the apples of my cheeks to give myself the color my fear had taken away. Looking in the cracked mirror, I felt I made a passable show of being a cabaret singer.

“You’re on,” shouted the voice, and this time the door opened. The hulking doorman, who had a plaster stretched across his bloodied nose, reached in and took me firmly by the arm as if he had orders not to let me get away. I felt wobbly and struggled to keep my balance in the shoes. Stage fright, I guess.

I was escorted to the beaded curtain, where we stood waiting. My heart was beating irregularly and I could feel my face burning. Inside, Mormile himself was at the microphone addressing the customers in his croaky voice that was amplified to an unbearable loudness.

“Ladies and gentlemen, girls and boys, fresh from the world’s luxury cruise liners where she—” Here he was interrupted by the microphone emitting a long and extremely painful whistle, but he carried on unheeding. “—and the flesh-pots of Damascus, I ask you to give a warm and appreciative welcome to the beautiful and talented Signora Veronique Kapoor.” There was a drum roll and then the band struck up the introduction to “L’Uomo Che Amo.” The spotlight picked out the door where I was waiting.

The doorman thrust a microphone into my hand and shoved me through the curtain. In the glare I was totally blinded. I knew I had to start singing. Fortunately I knew the number well. My voice came, amplified and distorted beyond all recognition. It was as though someone else entirely was singing.

The white circle of the spotlight began to move slowly across the saloon and I knew I had to follow it, concentrating hard to stay in both the dress, which was trying hard to fall off, and the shoes. Mounting the steps to the little stage was particularly tricky, and I tripped more than once but hoped nobody would notice.

Once I was on the stage, I began to relax, and strange as it seems, I actually began to enjoy myself. Before I even reached the end of the first number, the applause was overwhelming. Seamlessly the band led straight into “Notte e Giorno,” and I gave it my all.

“Freda, you’re a star,” shouted Mormile from beside the stage. And I felt like one too.

I sang my way through “Amante di Miei Sogni,” swaying in time to the music, and even ventured to slide one of my legs out of the split in the skirt. Everything was going so well until I felt suddenly and unbearably hot and my legs gave way beneath me.

I fell off the stage and landed on something hard. The band members didn’t know whether to play on or not; some did, some didn’t, and the microphone, which I was still clutching, continued to amplify and broadcast my own panting breath. It felt like ages before the lights went on, and when they did, I was dazed.

I found I had landed on a table, extinguishing the candle and breaking the glasses. My head was in the lap of the owner of a white suit. I thought I was delirious when I saw the man wearing the suit: yes, it was the Detective again. In disguise, but there was no mistaking him, despite the obvious wig in the style of Elvis Presley, the fake suntan, and heavy gold jewelry.

“Freda,” he gasped, “are you all right?”

“She’s fine,” said Mormile, who had appeared at my side.

“The show must go on.”

He clicked the fingers of his good hand in the direction of the band and then tried to haul me up. It was no good, my body just wouldn’t respond. My tongue expanded and was heavy and furry like a gerbil.

“Snakebite,” I managed to get out with what felt like my final breath.

The women in the audience started to scream, the men joined in, and there was a frantic scramble for the exit. In the ensuing panic evening dresses were ripped, silver shoes dis-carded, and hairpieces became dislodged.

“Poisonous snakes!” cried the patrons.

“Look out, there’s a purple man-eating cobra.”

“It’s a boa constrictor.”

“Rattlesnakes.”

Tables were knocked over, and fires were started as candles ignited the upholstery. Soon the saloon was thick with a choking black smoke.

The band joined the exodus, and Franco got his double bass stuck in the doors.The customers continued pushing and shoving behind him, and eighteen people were injured in the crush. It was chaos. Mormile was running about trying to calm things down, but he only succeeded in making them worse. Finally he was silenced when he got his head stuck in the bell of a bass tuba.

Meanwhile, before I lost consciousness, I was aware of the Detective ripping off his jacket and wig. Surely he couldn’t have romance on his mind at a time like this? No, instead he took hold of my injured leg and examined it closely. Then, taking out an enormous switchblade, he said:

“Freda, this might hurt a bit,” and applied the blade to the wound.

The pain was terrible. I considered fainting but decided I would do better to remain alert. Then, when he had finished probing with the knife, he applied his lips to my leg and started sucking. He sucked and sucked again, and then, periodically, spat the contents of his mouth vigorously onto the floor. I was worried I would be sucked dry.The smoke was so thick by this time our eyes were streaming and it was difficult to breathe.

Alerted by the chaos of the patrons fleeing the building and the smoke pouring out, the police took the opportunity of mounting a raid on the club they had been keeping under surveillance for several years. A squadron of uniformed officers rushed in waving batons. One started to beat the Detective violently on the head and body.

“Taking advantage of an injured woman,” said the sergeant with contempt, amid the raining blows, “you ought to be ashamed of yourself. Take that!” The Detective, beaten to a state of unconsciousness, fell on top of me.This was the point at which I definitely blacked out.

I
felt a splash of something cold over my face and opened my eyes to find the slow-melting eyes of the Detective looking into them anxiously.

“Madonna be praised,” he said. “Freda, you pulled through.” His voice was plump with emotion, betraying that his feelings for me were more than strictly professional.

My eyes stung a bit, and I located a slice of lemon on my upper lip and a few ice cubes in my cleavage.The gin and tonic had brought me round, where all else had failed. The Detective lifted me into a chair. His arms were strong and muscular, and I felt weightless as a doll in them.

The flames had been extinguished by the doorman, who was now using his jacket to beat out the final smolders from the upholstery. As the smoke cleared, the patrons began to file now and again back in ones and twos. The members of the band unblocked the doorway. Franco got his double bass unstuck, but it was badly splintered and two of the strings were broken. Selmo d’Angelo managed to prize his bass tuba from Dario Mormile’s head, but only by lying behind him on the floor, and jamming his feet on Mormile’s shoulders for leverage.

They regrouped themselves, and struck up a swinging rendition of “Per Favore Credimi.” One or two couples, including some of the police officers, who had resheathed their batons, took to the floor and began to dance. Beata Fresca, the waitress, was suddenly run off her feet as orders for drinks flooded in. Everybody needed to calm down and cool off. I was shocked to find my injured thigh had developed a mass of hair. How could that have happened? This was one effect of snakebite I had been unaware of. Yet closer inspection revealed the Detective had used his wig as a tourniquet. The wound was still gaping, however, and its lips were purple.

“Don’t worry,” he said, reading my thoughts. “It was only a harmless grass snake; it will heal in no time.” I became aware of Mormile hovering beside me.

“How about a little song, Freda, to raise the spirits a little. What do you say?”

I noticed he had a deep red rim running around his forehead.

I said, “No,” and felt empowered, although my physical condition was still poor.

Throughout, the Detective’s eyes were trained upon me.

As if he was waiting for me to say or do something. I didn’t want to disappoint him, but I didn’t know what it was he was expecting.

The tempo of the music changed then, and Mormile himself took to the stage to sing, “Amore Arrivo.” His voice wasn’t bad considering he was an amateur.

“Dance?” Asked the Detective.

I nodded, although I could barely stand. Again he lifted me in those strong arms of his, and we took to the floor. One by one, the other couples melted away, leaving us alone in that trembling world, perfumed by his masculine aroma, warmed by the heat of his body so close to mine, and accompanied by the lilting notes of Mormile’s song.

As the Detective’s lips sought mine, I allowed my eyes to close, and I drifted into a state of what I can only describe as rapture.

W
hen I next opened my eyes, I couldn’t fathom where I was and what had happened to me. In the muted light, I couldn’t see very much, but I knew I was in a bed.There were crisp sheets around me and the smell of antiseptic hung in the air. I could hear muffled crying and groans coming from close by. It dawned upon me that I was in hospital. In fact, as my eyes accustomed to the gloom, it began to feel very familiar. I couldn’t be certain, but I thought it was the same ward I was in after the accident.

There were rows of beds opposite, and to my left and right, and in them were the forms of sleeping figures. Next to my bed was a locker with a fruit bowl and a vase of carnations on it. I noticed there was a drip pumping some colorless fluid into my arm.

Then I began to remember things. Of course, I had been bitten by a snake at the cabaret club, fallen off the stage, and inhaled smoke from the fire. I tried to move, but my bad leg, the same one that had been bitten, felt dead and heavy and wouldn’t respond at all to my attempts to shift it. I pulled back the bedclothes and the hospital-issue surgical gown and was shocked to see that my leg and foot had gone green. Pea green. My thigh, where the bite was, was wrapped tightly in a bandage.

“Look at the color of that!” said a voice. It was the woman in the bed to the left, who lost no time in shuffling over to get a closer look. Both her arms were mummified in bandages and some of her hair had been singed off.

“Oooh,” she continued, “isn’t it horrible? Like something dredged up from a pond. Here, Nerissa, come and have a look at poor Signora Kapoor’s leg.”

Nerissa, who inhabited the bed opposite, struggled to rise. She was held rigid in a neck brace and in addition one of her feet was in plaster. Slowly, painfully, she crossed the ward, taking what seemed like ages to make the dozen or so steps.

She scrutinized my leg for some minutes in silence, before turning round and negotiating her way back again.

“Poor soul,” said my neighbor as we watched Nerissa’s retreat in slow motion, “bit off her own tongue in the crush.

Doctors tried to sew it back on, but it didn’t take. Got it on upside down. First one they’d done, you see. Anyway she’ll never speak again.”

I was beginning to feel depressed.

“I’m Valeria, by the way,” she continued. “You’ve been out cold for five days. I did enjoy your turn though, at the club.

There’s nothing left of it now, of course, razed to the ground.