The Other Typist (11 page)

Our meal that day was reaching its conclusion. With a silver tray in one hand and a white towelette folded tidily over the opposite arm, the headwaiter brought the coffee service to the table, along with a discreet slip of paper for Odalie to sign.

“Thank you, Gene,” she said, and smiled again in her innocently bright, sunny manner. I had already observed that Odalie had at minimum one hundred smiles in her arsenal, but this one—the particular variety she was smiling now—was the one she called upon most often. Gene nodded and moved on. She dropped her voice: “I’ll tell you a little secret: I can’t recall if his name is actually Gene. But he’s never said anything, and I’ve been calling him that for so long now, it may as well be!” She gave an amused giggle and, wanting to feel complicit, I couldn’t help but join in with a laugh of my own.

I squinted at the slip of paper, but there were no numbers on it, just a place for her to sign her name. With a jaunty hand, she lifted the fountain pen that had been laid out next to it, scratched out something utterly illegible, and then looked up at me. She was still smiling and it was still a very bright smile, but now there was something also vacant about it, and I could tell she was already looking into the future and devising some sort of plan. I suspected she was doing sums in her head. Her lips held their pleasant pose, but something flickered behind her eyes.

“How much do you pay now?”

“Beg pardon?”

“For the room. At the boarding-house. How much do you pay? Say, nine or ten dollars a week?”

“Oh. About that, I suppose.” It came out sounding guarded. The nuns had always taught me it was not polite to talk about money, and downright crass to name exact sums.

“Well, whatever it is, move in with me and just pay me the same.”

“Are you in earnest?”

“Course,” she said with a shrug of her small, narrow, boyish shoulders. “I’d be getting a leg up, and you’d be setting yourself up with a much better situation.” I flinched, as any good American does when someone makes direct reference to a disparity of wealth. She shot me a frank, unapologetic glance. “Well,
you’ve
seen it.” It was true; I recalled the night of my bubble bath. The grandeur of the memory had left a deep impression on me. “You’ll have much more space, and it’s not as if you have a private room right now,” she continued. “And besides, I can promise you, I’m a whole lot more fun than that bitter little failed ingenue Helen and her ridiculous theatrical hysterics.”

I hesitated, and then immediately worried Odalie had glimpsed my hesitation. Truth be told, I was desperate to jump at the idea. It wasn’t just curiosity anymore; Odalie represented something new to me now. I’d already come to feel . . . well, not quite myself around her. The sensation of it was refreshing, as though unexplored possibilities were opening themselves up to me. I was not simply Rose—I was
Odalie’s friend,
and every time this thought crossed my mind I felt a tickle of pride. Moreover, Odalie had also become something of a confidante to me. I’d told her so much about my childhood, about the horrible treatment I’d received at the gossiping hands of Dotty and Helen (although I tactfully left both the slap and the story of Adele out of the account). When she mentioned sharing her hotel room, I admit my imagination immediately conjured up an endless stream of late nights spent tucked under the covers and whispering secrets to each other as rosy dawn slowly crept in through the windowpanes. As these images entered my head, I felt a stirring of near-blind glee come over me. The idea was an exciting one, but at the same time a frightening one. I’d never lived anywhere other than the orphanage or the boarding-house, and in both cases the living arrangements had been contracted and secured for me. I glanced up at Odalie. If she saw my brief moment of hesitation, she chose to ignore it.

“What will I tell Dotty?” I asked, absently biting a fingernail.

“Tell her anything you like,” Odalie said, lighting a new cigarette. I could see now we were going to be late returning to the precinct. I frowned. We had already been late coming back from lunch twice this week.

“What if she’s very upset with me?” I pictured Dotty charging into the police precinct in pursuit of me with a hungry-looking, rangy-necked lawyer by her side. “Maybe she has rights,” I murmured.

“Like fun she does,” Odalie replied, and in that moment a sort of truth revealed itself—she already knew I was going to move to the hotel with her. When I glanced at her again, I realized I already knew it, too.

A
fter Odalie extended her invitation, I moved in the very next week. As I had predicted, moving out of the boarding-house proved to be the trickiest part. Dotty stood at the bedroom door holding her three-year-old, Franny, on her hip and squinted possessively at every object that went into my suitcase, as though it were possible I might manage to defy physics and pack a lamp shade or an entire nightstand into my small suitcase the very second her back was turned. Franny, for her part, screamed and cried the entire time. Franny’s cries were not for my departure, but rather for the penny candy Helen was eating downstairs in the parlor and not sharing. Dotty was well aware of this fact and could’ve quelled the tempest by simply feeding Franny a single spoonful of raspberry jam from the larder, but I think she liked the further sense of righteous indignation afforded her by holding a crying child in her arms. I had noticed in previous times—say, whenever bill collectors came to the house or neighbors knocked on the door to complain about the dog’s howling in the backyard—Dotty had a tendency to lift whichever child was unhappiest onto her hip.

Despite the fact that the little girl was three, Franny still cried with the utter abandon of a much smaller infant, and her screams often ranged from inhuman, guttural, animal depths to shrill, ear-piercing heights, all in one breath. The scene was, to put it modestly, hardly a pleasant parting. But being that I did not own very many material objects to speak of in the first place, it did not take me very long to get everything into the suitcase, and before I knew it I had the crumbling leather straps cinched into place and was on my way down the stairs.

“Dotty always suspected you might do something like this” were Helen’s only words to me as I passed through the front parlor, where she sat reading a magazine. I took one last look at her doughy face. She popped into her mouth a piece of the selfsame penny candy that had only minutes earlier driven Franny into a tantrum and smacked on it with her eyes slanted at me, and I knew by this gesture what she was really trying to say:
Tsk-tsk, leaving a war widow high and dry. . . .

Oh, but it did little to move me. I very simply and sincerely couldn’t be there anymore. Not with Dotty and not with Helen and not with the two of them whispering together in the kitchen about me and Adele, the latter whom they’d never even met but were happy to sit in judgment upon. By then Dotty had followed me down the stairs and into the parlor, and upon glimpsing Helen eating the penny candy Franny broke out into a fresh set of wails, exploring a whole new half-scale of notes that threatened to break the fragile membranes deep inside the human ear. The sound of it was all I needed to push me along those last steps out the door and down the front stoop. I walked quickly down the street and did not once turn back to look at the dilapidated brownstone that had served as my home for the last few years.

A couple of subway trains later, I reached Odalie’s hotel. Under the awning on the sidewalk, I looked up at my new home, its golden doors lit up by bright floodlights. I felt myself grow intimidated. Everything about the move felt more frightening now that I was actually doing it. I ascended the carpeted stone stairs and heaved my weight against the revolving door with hesitation and the tiniest inkling of misgiving. Most residential hotels were quite . . . functional. Nothing drastically different from a boarding-house, really. Especially the residential hotels for women. But Odalie’s hotel was a real, bona fide, tourist-class establishment. It had given me a thrill on that fateful rainy day of my first visit, but on that official moving day, the luxury of it only gave me a jumpy, nervous sensation. Dressed in a heavy coat and with my bulky suitcase in one hand, the revolving door presented a struggle. My grand entrance into the lobby turned out to be an awkward trip and stumble as the revolving door spat me out like a reaction to something bitter it had eaten.

The staff on duty did not recognize me. I could hardly blame them; my previous visit had been my only visit, and as I’ve mentioned I’d long ago perfected the art of plainness. They gave me some trouble when I made for the elevator in an attempt to go upstairs, and eventually they had to telephone up to Odalie’s room to request she come down to collect me. Everyone seemed to know Odalie—or at least know of her—and it was understood that the proposition of her coming downstairs would take some time. The concierge showed me to a sofa and pointed out a booth that contained a courtesy telephone, saying, “If there’s anyone you’d like to ’phone . . .” But he needn’t have bothered. I wasn’t acquainted with anyone who had a private telephone—just imagine!

Twenty-five minutes ticked by, and then at last the little golden birdcage of an elevator descended. Odalie stepped into the lobby. I couldn’t help but notice the effect she had on her audience. As soon as the elevator’s cheerful
ding!
sounded, all heads snapped toward the elevator and remained fastened there to Odalie’s shape. She paused ever so slightly—a pause almost indistinguishable to the naked eye—then with a smirk took a snappy step forward, walking in her girlish sashay across the lobby. All heads pivoted with the kind of entranced synchronized unison usually reserved for tennis matches. As I rose to greet her, she slipped her arm through mine. I blushed, but couldn’t keep the proud smile from forming on my lips.

“Memorize this lovely face, boys,” Odalie said, meaning me. “Rose here has come to stay.” She took me around to all the hotel employees and introduced me to each in turn, much the way the Lieutenant Detective had promenaded her around the precinct on her first day. She seemed to know all their names—or at least, as it had been with poor “Gene” at the restaurant, they did not protest her rechristenings—and I shook hands with each of them, allowing my bare hand to be held by white glove after white glove. It was difficult not to feel self-conscious. I was aware that adrift in the hotel’s lavish setting my clothes and overall appearance suggested it was more likely I had come to wash the floors than to take up residence. Finally Odalie asked a baby-faced bell-hop, who was either called Bobby or else renamed by Odalie as Bobby, to carry my suitcase upstairs. I thought of protesting, but my arm was sore from hauling the bag up and down the subway stairs, and the thought of someone else doing the lifting came to me as a relief. When we got to the apartment, Bobby brought the suitcase inside and Odalie gave him a dime for his trouble. To be fair, I think he would’ve much preferred a kiss from the way he watched her mouth as she smiled. He lingered for the slenderest of moments, then departed good-naturedly, as if he understood how much of a long shot his ambitions were, and why.

As soon as we were alone in what was to be my new bedroom, Odalie lifted the suitcase and plunked it down on a bed that had been nicely made up with a chenille bedspread and peacock-green satin pillows.

“Here’s you,” she said. “I hope it’s all right.”

It was more than all right. I surveyed the room. Upon my last visit, I had peeked into the doorway and glimpsed a study, replete with green-shaded bankers’ lamps and a rather heavy-looking mahogany desk. But since then somehow the room had been transformed into a cozy sleeping space. A gold-leafed Oriental screen painted with the black silhouettes of long-legged cranes stood against one wall next to the bed. On the nightstand a large cut crystal vase sat overflowing with white lilies, the points of their petals curling with a sensual fullness. An old cylinder phonograph was positioned on the opposite nightstand, its amplifying horn shaped like a giant morning glory, equally shapely and eager to compete with the lilies. Odalie caught me looking at it.

“Oh! I hope you pardon that ancient thing. I move it around here and there, and I’m never really sure where it ought to go. Practically obsolete, you know, these days! I’ve got the latest model Victrola, and I keep that in my bedroom, but of course you’re welcome to come in and listen to it any old time.”

I was at a loss for what to say. Odalie’s assumption of disdain had missed its mark entirely. I had never owned a phonograph—new
or
old—but had always wanted to. “I . . . I don’t have any records,” I stammered rather stupidly.

Odalie laughed—a musical trill in and of itself, no phonograph or records required.

“I’ve got stacks and stacks. I’ve practically got records coming out my ears,” she said, gesturing to a tall pile of paper sleeves heaped on a nearby bookshelf. “You can play whatever you like, if you can stand that ancient thing!”

Suddenly her mood shifted, and she grew silent and cocked her head at me, deep in concentration. And then . . . a classic Odalie smile broke out over her face, like the sun breaking through dark clouds. She suddenly clapped her hands together, looking a little like a child who’d just been given a surprise birthday present. “You know what? This is an occasion! We really ought to celebrate properly!” She took my hand and pulled me toward her bedroom. My mind flashed to Odalie’s bohemian friends and the lifestyle I assumed they espoused, and I suddenly felt my muscles grow tense at the prospect of what was about to happen.

“We’re going out! Let’s find you something to wear,” she exclaimed, throwing open an armoire. My heart slowed back down to its regular rate. I was hardly in the mood to go out, but I didn’t say so. She selected a very modern lilac shift with a black ribbon that was slung low around the hips and tied in a floppy bow. Odalie held it up to me, tucking the hanger up under my neck. I tried not to look critical. It was shorter than anything I’d ever worn. “Hmm. Yes. Yes. This might just do the trick,” she said with a frown, more to herself than to me.

“I can’t wear that,” I said. When Odalie asked me why, I found myself unable to say what I really thought:
Because it’s indecent.
But I don’t like to feel indebted to people, and when I looked around at the lavish apartment that was my new home, I naturally felt a little guilty and a little awed. Before long, I had been overruled and the dress was on my person.

I was not at all sure where Odalie was taking me. Downstairs in the hotel lobby, she had ordered one of the bell-hops to hail a cab for the two of us in her imperial yet bewitching way, and once we were fussily ensconced inside with our scandalously knee-skimming skirts tucked neatly under our derrieres in defense against the sticky leather seats and our arms giving off the rich scent of powder, she gave an address not far from the police precinct. This struck me as rather odd; I didn’t know of many entertainment venues on the Lower East Side. But then I must be frank here and admit I didn’t know of many entertainment venues, full stop.

After the cab had been paid and we had successfully alighted curbside, I looked around but saw nothing. Or, at least, nothing that resembled the sort of merriment and revelry I had been anticipating. No mingled sound of music and laughter came drifting out from an open door, no glow of electric lights cascaded down from the windows above us. We appeared to be on a block filled with shops, all of which had long since been shut up for the day. Each abandoned shop front was dark and full of a bizarrely heavy yet inert sort of gravity, as though we were standing amid a row of sleeping giants. Our eventual destination seemed even more curious and shrouded in mystery than ever.

“Where in heavens—”

“Shhhh!!”

Odalie leaned into the empty street and cast a furtive glance in both directions, and suddenly I got the peculiar sensation there might be someone watching us. “All right. All clear,” she reported in a charming, husky whisper. “But we might as well keep it down.” She took my hand in hers, and we began wandering down what I was sure was an alley that dead-ended. My ankles wobbled a bit in the T-strap pumps Odalie had insisted I wear despite the fact they were half a size too big. I felt the coolness of the night close in around my bare skin, and as an idle breeze caught my skirt it fluttered against the backs of my thighs, reminding me that was precisely where it ended. Farther down the lane the shops dropped off, which came as no surprise. Alleys, of course, are not dreadfully good for business. But I spotted one shop, all the way at the very end of the alley. As we drew closer, I was astounded to see it was still open for business. It was a wig shop, dirty and poorly lit, with a sole clerk drowsing at the register. Odalie giggled, an excited giggle, and pushed her way in through the front door while a little bell tinkled over the tops of our heads. The second we walked in, the young man who had been slouching over the cash register perked up.

“Can I help you find sompin’, ma’ams?” He was a strange-looking creature, with long greasy hair that fell down to his eye and oddly colored suspenders. I noticed he had a queer way of pronouncing
ma’ams
. He said it
mums,
as though he were British. Still young enough to be a
miss,
I wasn’t accustomed to being addressed as a
ma
’
am,
and I’m certain Odalie wasn’t, either. But I had never been one to insist on my youth and felt, for a fleeting second, a very slight inkling of authority.

“Why ye-es,” Odalie answered with an air of distraction, her gaze surveying the contents of the store. She spun in a slow circle, evidently looking for something specific. Lined up on shelves along the walls were the bodiless heads of mannequins, each wearing a different fashion of wig and smiling the same pink painted smile. I was flabbergasted. Odalie possessed the lushest, loveliest, darkest hair of any girl I’d ever known. I couldn’t imagine what she could possibly want with a wig. Finally she reached out with her tanned hand and slender wrist. With a deft motion, she slid one wig off to reveal the bald head of its vacant-eyed, still-smiling owner. The wig itself was a particularly wretched thing: an elaborately Victorian bun that might have attracted the likes of Helen, if only it hadn’t been the most horribly drab shade of iron gray. Odalie brought the atrocious wig to the clerk and tossed it on the counter by the cash register.

“I hear this is lovely in chestnut,” she said in a somewhat theatrical voice to the clerk. I looked on, incredulous, as her mouth twisted into a flirtatious smirk. “But mahogany’s twice as nice,” she finished with a wink. I blinked. It was gibberish. The clerk, evidently, did not think so. As though Odalie had just said something perfectly intelligible, he snapped to attention and, with a very businesslike air, punched down a few keys on the cash register. As he struck the last key, a very loud metallic
CLUNK
sounded and a panel in the wall behind him swung open to reveal a dark hallway lined with red velvet curtains. Gay voices floated out, the rising, falling murmurs of conversation punctuated every so often with feminine laughter and the brittle clink of glasses. The sound of Al Jolson singing valiantly along to the wry
wah-wah
of trumpets and jaunty
plinkety-plunk
of guitars was collectively droning away on an unseen phonograph.