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Arthur Marlow hadn’t been willing to take on the case, not at first, but Walter hadn’t given up. He and Theodore had been as close as brothers, and he’d had to help him. Had to. With no money to pay the attorney, Walter begged Marlow to let him work off the fees to represent Theodore. Arthur eventually agreed and Walter had thought everything would work out perfectly.
It hadn’t.
The jangle of the phone pulled Walter out of the past. He entered his office and crossed the room.
Hope. That’s what that girl from Nebraska said she had. He’d had that once, too. So had Theodore.
Picking up the phone, Walter held the receiver to his ear and the mouthpiece to his mouth. “Hello.”
“Walter? Walter, that you?”
Instantly recognizing Sam Wharton’s voice, Walter answered, “Yes, Sam, it’s me. How are you this evening?”
“Good. Real good. I’m down at CB’s, and Tony Ebbert and I need some legal advice. Can you drive over here?”
Sam had been a client for years; the money he’d paid for assistance on business deals had nearly paid for Walter’s house.
Walter considered the request for a moment. Normally, he’d suggest a meeting in his office tomorrow, but an evening out could be exactly what he needed to get his mind off other things, including that girl from Nebraska, and on to things that mattered. “Sure, Sam. I’ll be there shortly.”
“Hee-haw!” Sam replied with his signature statement. “See you soon!”
Cartwright’s Basement would never be his first choice to visit. Known as CB’s, it was downtown, in the basement of the ten-story Cartwright building. The main level was a grocery store, the upper levels apartments, including a floor where the girls who worked at CB’s lived and used for alternate activities.
There were too many speakeasies like CB’s within the city to count and Walter had figured out long ago that some things a person just had to accept. Like them or not.
He grabbed his suitcoat, told Mrs. McCaffrey he was going out and walked out the back door and to the garage.
After opening the wide double doors, he climbed in the car and hit the ignition. The engine roared to life with so much power the seat shook. The car was a luxury. There hadn’t been anything wrong with his old one, except that he’d wanted a new one, and getting it had been easy, unlike some of the other things he’d wanted. Still wanted but continued to tell himself that he didn’t.
He backed the car out and onto the road, then grinned as he shifted into First and laid his foot on the gas pedal. The roadster was a dream to drive.
Morning, noon or night, traffic always rolled up and down the streets downtown, and Walter had to circle the block before he found a place to park. He climbed out, then took the sidewalk to the alley, where the entrance to CB’s was located.
The joint might be in the basement, but their secret had long been released. Everyone, including the police, knew where it was located and what went on in there, as well as hundreds of other places. In fact, there were just as many laws on the city books to protect the speakeasy owners as there were against prohibition. Federal agents didn’t have a hope in hell of upholding the laws Congress had passed.
Cigarette and cigar smoke swirled up the steps as he walked down them, and music echoed off the walls, as did joyous laughter and the murmur of conversations.
He entered the long and wide room full of tables and an elaborately carved wooden bar that ran the entire length of the back wall. A band played music at the far end, where people danced, and cigarette girls sashayed around the tables, wearing tight, short red dresses and carrying more than packs of cigarettes in the white wooden trays hooked around their necks with thick white straps.
Walter scanned the chairs, looking for Sam and Tony. He and Sam noticed each other at the same time. Sam stood, waved one of his long and gangly arms. Where he found shirts with sleeves that long had been the topic of more than one conversation.
Weaving his way toward Sam, Walter nodded and said hello to numerous people at various other tables. Some he knew well, others were mere acquaintances, and a few, he wouldn’t mind never seeing again.
“Hey, Walter. I ordered you a drink,” Sam said, his straw-colored hair sticking out from beneath the rim of his flat tweed hat. “The good stuff. Have a seat. You know Tony.”
“Thanks.” Walter took a seat and nodded at Tony. A redheaded heavyweight champion boxer who had a good chance at the world title this year. “Good seeing you, Tony. Congrats. Hear this could be your year.”
“It sure could,” Tony replied with a voice so low it had to come from the depths of his stomach.
The conversation bounced from boxing to cars, to the latest rumors, including who had financed the building of the new theater, and back to boxing. Walter had finished his drink during that time, and enjoying the camaraderie, he reached out to snag a cigarette girl so he could order another drink.
Catching one by the arm, he twisted to tell her, “I’d like another—”
The startled blue eyes looking down at him stopped his ability to speak. To think. Except for remembering her eyes looked exactly like they had when he’d rounded his car and saw her sitting on her butt on the pavement.
She tugged her arm out of his hold just like she had that day. “Another what?” she asked.
“Whatever you got on that tray, darling,” Sam said.
She kept her eyes averted as she set three drinks on the table and then spun around.
Walter jumped to his feet and followed. She stopped at the bar to refill her tray, and he stepped up beside her.
“What are you doing here?” He kept his voice low to not draw attention.
“Getting more drinks.” She set drinks of rotgut on her tray.
He firmly but gently turned her to face him. “I mean, what are you doing here? Working at CB’s?”
Her eyes snapped as she stepped back. “We can’t all start at the top, but we still gotta start or we won’t get anywhere.”
“What? This isn’t a start. It’s a dead end.” He meant that literally and pulled out his pocketbook. “If you need money for the train ride, I’ll give it to you. Right now.” He held out several bills. “Take it. Go back to Nebraska.”
She glanced around as if making sure no one was looking. He hoped that meant she’d finally come to her senses.
Settling her gaze on him, she asked, “What’s in that noggin’ of yours? Nothing? I don’t want your money, and I ain’t—am not going back to Nebraska.” She pulled several bills out from beneath an ashtray on her tray and handed them to the bartender.
Walter knew how these joints worked. The girls had to pay for the drinks on their trays, and then collect the money from the customers. Any spilled drinks or unpaid ones came out of their pockets, not the owners’. “You aren’t going to make enough money here—”
“Beat it,” she whispered fiercely. “And mind your own beeswax while you’re at it!” She spun in the other direction and marched off.
With a cigarette hanging out of the corner of his mouth, the bartender leaned across the bar. “That dame’s a closed bank, forget her. We got ones that are more...friendly. For a couple of clams, I’ll send one to your table.”
“No, thanks.” Walter walked back to his table and positioned his chair so he could keep an eye on the room. On her.
“You know that doll?” Sam asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Do you?” Walter asked instead of answering.
“Never saw her before.” Sam looked at Tony. “You?”
Tony shook his head. “No, but Mel has a longer assembly line of girls than Ford does cars.”
Which was exactly why she shouldn’t be here. She couldn’t possibly know the dangers of working here. Walter’s back teeth clamped tight. If she was working here, she was living here. Upstairs. His blood ran cold at that thought.
Sam started explaining the reason he’d called. He and Tony wanted to put on a boxing exhibition show and needed advice on the legal side of things. Walter listened, and answered their questions, and kept one eye on the woman the entire time. He didn’t even know her name, so in his mind, started calling her Blondie.
She was still working the room, serving drinks, when Sam and Tony must have had all the information they needed from him, and called it a night. He bade them goodbye and stayed at the table, still keeping an eye on Blondie. Other girls had brought their table the drinks Sam and Tony had consumed. He was still nursing the only one she’d brought him. The ice had long ago melted. He didn’t care. He wasn’t drinking it. Just using the glass as something to twirl between his fingers.
There were no laws governing speakeasies; most were open twenty-four hours, and it was up to the owners what sort of hours the workers put in. Walter glanced at his wristwatch. Almost two-thirty in the morning. He hadn’t stayed up this late in years, but would sit right here until her shift ended.
A large portion of the patrons had long ago left. Some with cigarette girls on their arms as they walked out the doors; a few left in stumbling, ossified stupors, and others, like Sam and Tony, left alone, had simply been there to enjoy the nightlife but had jobs to go to in the morning.
So did he. Had to be at the courthouse by eight.
The room was almost empty by the time she made her way toward the bar with a full tray of drinks still strapped around her neck. He knew how that would play out. That the drinks would be dumped, and she’d be out the money for them. He stood and sidestepped, cutting her off before she made it to the bar.
“I’ll buy those.” He laid a bill on her tray, one that would pay for twice that many drinks.
Exhaustion showed on her face. He could understand why. She’d not only delivered drinks all night, she’d spent a fair share of time declining offers of more. More than once he’d wanted to grab her and haul her out of the door. The only thing that had stopped him was her. She’d handled herself well. That left him in a quandary. If he did haul her out of here and she came back, she’d get the wrath of Mel, the owner. If he didn’t, there would soon be a man she couldn’t fend off. Or worse.
“No.” She nodded toward his table. “You still have a drink, and I don’t need you or anyone else doing me any favors.”
“It’s not a favor.” He picked up a drink and downed it, nearly choking at the rotgut whiskey. If it hadn’t been so watered down, he wouldn’t have been able to swallow it. “I’m thirsty,” he said despite his burning throat.
“You’re...” She shook her head.
She thought he was crazy. He might be. “I’m Walter Russell,” he said. “Who are you?”
She huffed out a tired-sounding sigh. “It doesn’t matter. Take your money and leave.”
He took another drink off her tray. “Not until you tell me your name.”
She glanced around and then sidestepped to the table he’d sat at all night. There, she lifted the final four drinks off her tray and set them on the table. Tucking his bill beneath her ashtray, she nodded. “Enjoy your drinks, Mr. Russell.”
Walter grasped her arm, but the bartender, with yet another cigarette hanging out of his mouth, cleared his throat. The glare the man gave Walter said he’d be in charge of anything that happened from here on out.
That could include her leaving with him, for a price, Walter understood that. He also understood it wouldn’t be her choice. But she’d be expected to do whatever he wanted or she’d lose her job.
She, however, probably did not understand that.
Walter let that settle for a moment before he set the drink in his hand on the table and then pulled a calling card out of his suit pocket and laid it on her tray. He gave her and the bartender a nod before he turned about and left.
Every step got harder and harder to take, and by the time he was at the door, he was ripped right down the middle. She wasn’t his problem, but she had no idea what she’d gotten herself into.
He did, and would do something about it.
Chapter Three (#u77e00006-780c-5943-9e89-f85b9a1dd476)
Shirley lay on the lumpy cot in the room she shared with six other cigarette girls and stared at the calling card. It was shiny, like the pages of a magazine, but harder, stiff and small, just a few inches long and a couple inches wide. And the writing on it was gold.
Gold.
She’d never seen a calling card before, but had heard about them. The other girls had said she better not let Mel learn about it. He was the owner of CB’s and would be mad because when a man gives you a calling card, he wants to see you outside of the basement.
That wasn’t going to happen. She didn’t want to see Walter Russell again. Not inside or outside of the basement.
Under his name it said The Russell Firm. She wasn’t sure what that meant, but there was also an address and a phone number on the card. A phone was very expensive. Not even the Swaggerts could afford one. They sure as heck didn’t have calling cards, either.
One of the other girls, Alice, rolled over, and Shirley quickly tucked the card beneath the one and only cover on the bed, a scratchy wool blanket.
Alice didn’t open her eyes, but she did pull her blanket over her head to block the light shining in through the window.
It was the middle of the night, but the city, so full of lights, was never dark. The building next door had a big cigarette billboard on top of it, and the lights on the billboard lit up the room all night as brightly as the sun did all day.
Alice had been tricked into working at Cartwright’s, too; so had Rita and all the other girls sleeping on the cots.
Shirley pulled her arm out from under the blanket and stared at the calling card again. It was him. The same man who’d almost run her over. She’d felt as if he had run her over tonight when she’d recognized him sitting at the table with a man that was as skinny as a match. The second man at the table not only had hair the color of a carrot, but he looked like one, too. A big one. Wide at the top and skinny on the bottom.
Walter wasn’t skinny or fat. Just somewhere right smack in the middle. He was nicer to look at than the other two, too. Actually, he was nicer to look at than any other man in the room. Any other man she’d met since arriving in California. Mayhap in her whole life.
His eyes. There was something about them that made it hard to look away from him. It was as if they were sad or lonely. No—lost. That’s what they looked like. Like he was lost.
She felt that way herself. Lost. With nowhere to go. All the fancy talking Roy Harrison had done turned out to be nothing but baloney. He’d hoodwinked her, that’s what he’d done. It hadn’t taken long to figure that out, but it had been too late.
Oh, he’d gotten her an audition where she’d sung her heart out, and had jumped with joy when she’d been given the job. Roy had even given her a fancy dress to wear and had shown her an apartment. Not this one. That one had been a real apartment. With nice furniture and a bathroom complete with tub, right next to the kitchen with a stove and refrigerator. This one, the one she was staying in, only had two rooms, and both of those rooms had nothing but cots in them. This apartment dang near packed in as many people as the Swaggerts’ bunkhouse had during harvest time.
After all that, him showing her that apartment, giving her that dress and then the audition where she’d sung her heart out, Roy had left. She’d spent that first night in that fancy apartment, dreaming about the days to come. Believing her dream had finally come true, until morning.
That’s when she’d met Stella.
Stella took away the dress, gave her the skimpy red dress and hideous white tray, showed her this apartment and then led her downstairs to work.
Shirley wasn’t about to schlep drinks, and had said so. Also said she was here to sing, and had headed for the door.
Stella said she could leave right after paying the breach of contract amount.
Shirley’s stomach had sunk all over again. She had signed a contract, and evidently hadn’t read it closely enough because she hadn’t known about a breach of contract, nor had she known the amount of money that had been listed. That any amount had been listed. She’d had nowhere near that amount in her purse. Not then or now. Weeks later.
Her options had been to work it off or go to jail.
Jail.
So here she was, working off a debt that grew rather than shrank each day.
Some of the other girls said she had a good chance of being discovered here. Rita claimed lots of famous people came to the basement. Stars and producers, radio jockeys and singers. She took that to heart the first night, but soon thereafter figured out no one visiting the basement was looking for a singer.
The only person who had discovered her was Walter Russell.
The one person she wished hadn’t seen her. He’d been right about too many things, and she didn’t want him to be right about one more. He’d told her to go home, but she didn’t have a home to go to. Hadn’t for years.
The wage she made schlepping drinks was less than the Swaggerts had paid her. It had taken her four years to save enough to leave there, and at the rate she was going right now, it was going to take that long to pay off CB’s.
Not only did she owe for the dress and the night staying in that fancy apartment, with a real bed and sheets, she had to pay for her lodging in this room. And the meals they fed her. At first, she’d decided she just wouldn’t eat, until she was told she had to pay for the food whether she ate it or not.
The air in her lungs grew so heavy she had to push it out, but she refused to let the sting in her eyes get to her. She would not cry. Would not. She’d told Walter that not everyone could start at the top, but that they had to start. That’s what she’d told herself, too. She had managed to make it to California, and somehow, she would become a singer. Make a life for herself, one where she didn’t have to answer to anyone.
It would just take a little longer than she’d first thought.
