the room.
I slipped away and stopped in the hall, where I leaned back against the wall, listening to the noise from the crowd and the gramophone as it restarted, a tinny upbeat of jazz bubbling through the apartment.
What was I doing here? Pops didn’t honestly expect me to be hunting for a husband among this crowd. No. And what thing of Teddy’s was everyone looking for?
I wish Teddy could tell me. I wish he’d come back and straighten out this whole mess.
Who was that miserable Rushton? He had been making fun of me. Making fun of Scott Fitzgerald and his stories. I touched my new-shorn hair. Rushton judged me, assuming I was just another flapper with nothing on my mind but dancing and drinking and finding my next beau. Yet something lay beneath his scorn, something dark and desperate. I saw the way he’d looked at Melody. Anger, I thought, barely veiled, and something else more elusive. What was it?
Uncle Bert emerged from the library bearing a tray with glasses and a decanter and saw me leaning against the wall. “Join us, Josephine?”
“No, thanks, Uncle.”
He’d taken a handkerchief to his face, but the flush remained.
“Suit yourself.” He disappeared into the living room, and the chime of the voices of Melody and her crowd lifted with the clink of ice on glass; I vanished into my room and closed the door.
Despite the pretty clothes and new hairstyle and brush with my idols at the Algonquin, once again I felt a rush of homesickness. I wished I had my ma to confide in. I missed my bedroom with the blue bedspread and yellow-flowered wallpaper. I missed slipping into Teddy’s room as I often did late at night, slipping onto his empty, made-up bed and staring at those boxes on his dresser, at his things arrayed like a shrine. Lying there in the dark and hoping he’d come home soon.
Teddy had promised me.
I pulled open the bottom dresser drawer and parted the few sweaters, then took out the scarf and its contents that lay buried beneath.
He’d made me swear. “On Ma’s gray head,” he’d said. “No one can know where I am.”
I’d nodded. But my eyes must have betrayed my confusion.
Teddy had leaned close. “Look, Jo. Some people might…some might be looking for me. So you can’t let anyone know what we did.” He’d looked away, chewing his lip. “I don’t want anything to happen to you. You’re my special girl. Okay? You swear?” He’d touched my forehead.
As fast as I could I’d lifted my hand, scout’s honor, and said it. “I swear. On Ma. On Pops, too.” As much as I knew it would pain them to think Teddy was dead, as long as I knew he wasn’t, I could protect them all.
He was still here, I was so sure, and maybe that was why I was in New York. It couldn’t be just chance. I was meant to come to the city. Meant to be here. Because here was where I’d find Teddy again, and once I did, everything would be all right.
And then I jumped: someone knocked hard on my bedroom door.
CHAPTER 11
Lou
I’ve got this belief: there are no pure coincidences.
Oh, for pity’s sake, Detective. Hear me out.
It’s not like we’re all being herded by Fate or anything, not like some Supreme Being is playing a gigantic game of chess and we’re all pawns—no, nothing like that. It’s that things happen for a reason, and chance isn’t a reason.
Maybe I have some special gift. I get these tingly feelings that tell me, Whooee, honey, look out.
Like when Danny took me to the show with the magician, that Howard Thurston, that’s what I’m talking about. The minute I looked at that poster of his, standing out on the sidewalk in front of the theater, brother, I got goose bumps all over. Thurston’s looking all mystical while little red devils and wispy white ghosts dance around his head, reaching for him, whispering in his ears, trying to make him see. See what, you ask?
THURSTON, THE GREAT MAGICIAN, the poster read, and then, DO THE SPIRITS COME BACK?
I turned to Danny. “Whatcha
I slipped away and stopped in the hall, where I leaned back against the wall, listening to the noise from the crowd and the gramophone as it restarted, a tinny upbeat of jazz bubbling through the apartment.
What was I doing here? Pops didn’t honestly expect me to be hunting for a husband among this crowd. No. And what thing of Teddy’s was everyone looking for?
I wish Teddy could tell me. I wish he’d come back and straighten out this whole mess.
Who was that miserable Rushton? He had been making fun of me. Making fun of Scott Fitzgerald and his stories. I touched my new-shorn hair. Rushton judged me, assuming I was just another flapper with nothing on my mind but dancing and drinking and finding my next beau. Yet something lay beneath his scorn, something dark and desperate. I saw the way he’d looked at Melody. Anger, I thought, barely veiled, and something else more elusive. What was it?
Uncle Bert emerged from the library bearing a tray with glasses and a decanter and saw me leaning against the wall. “Join us, Josephine?”
“No, thanks, Uncle.”
He’d taken a handkerchief to his face, but the flush remained.
“Suit yourself.” He disappeared into the living room, and the chime of the voices of Melody and her crowd lifted with the clink of ice on glass; I vanished into my room and closed the door.
Despite the pretty clothes and new hairstyle and brush with my idols at the Algonquin, once again I felt a rush of homesickness. I wished I had my ma to confide in. I missed my bedroom with the blue bedspread and yellow-flowered wallpaper. I missed slipping into Teddy’s room as I often did late at night, slipping onto his empty, made-up bed and staring at those boxes on his dresser, at his things arrayed like a shrine. Lying there in the dark and hoping he’d come home soon.
Teddy had promised me.
I pulled open the bottom dresser drawer and parted the few sweaters, then took out the scarf and its contents that lay buried beneath.
He’d made me swear. “On Ma’s gray head,” he’d said. “No one can know where I am.”
I’d nodded. But my eyes must have betrayed my confusion.
Teddy had leaned close. “Look, Jo. Some people might…some might be looking for me. So you can’t let anyone know what we did.” He’d looked away, chewing his lip. “I don’t want anything to happen to you. You’re my special girl. Okay? You swear?” He’d touched my forehead.
As fast as I could I’d lifted my hand, scout’s honor, and said it. “I swear. On Ma. On Pops, too.” As much as I knew it would pain them to think Teddy was dead, as long as I knew he wasn’t, I could protect them all.
He was still here, I was so sure, and maybe that was why I was in New York. It couldn’t be just chance. I was meant to come to the city. Meant to be here. Because here was where I’d find Teddy again, and once I did, everything would be all right.
And then I jumped: someone knocked hard on my bedroom door.
CHAPTER 11
Lou
I’ve got this belief: there are no pure coincidences.
Oh, for pity’s sake, Detective. Hear me out.
It’s not like we’re all being herded by Fate or anything, not like some Supreme Being is playing a gigantic game of chess and we’re all pawns—no, nothing like that. It’s that things happen for a reason, and chance isn’t a reason.
Maybe I have some special gift. I get these tingly feelings that tell me, Whooee, honey, look out.
Like when Danny took me to the show with the magician, that Howard Thurston, that’s what I’m talking about. The minute I looked at that poster of his, standing out on the sidewalk in front of the theater, brother, I got goose bumps all over. Thurston’s looking all mystical while little red devils and wispy white ghosts dance around his head, reaching for him, whispering in his ears, trying to make him see. See what, you ask?
THURSTON, THE GREAT MAGICIAN, the poster read, and then, DO THE SPIRITS COME BACK?
I turned to Danny. “Whatcha
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