The Dollhouse

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

New York City, 1952

Darby entered the grand lobby doors of Carnegie Hall and looked about her, confused, until a man in an usher’s uniform redirected her to the back entrance. She took the elevator up to the floor where the American Academy of Dramatic Arts was located, and stepped into a hallway filled with young people her age. Some were talking loudly or laughing, others singing scales. The noise level was astounding.

She stepped over two khaki-clad men sprawled on the linoleum floor, smoking cigarettes and reciting their lines out loud. Hopefully, Darby would get a chance to pull Esme aside before the next class began. She scanned the crowd for her friend’s dark mane, with no luck, eager to surprise her with the news that her mother had come and gone, that the deed had been done.

Darby opened a door marked OFFICE at the end of the hallway, where a secretary talked with a distinguished-looking gentleman who perched on the side of her desk. The secretary looked annoyed at the interruption.

“I’m looking for Esme Castillo.” Darby was nervous, but all the phone lessons at Katharine Gibbs had paid off, for her voice remained perfectly modulated.

“Who?” The receptionist looked down at a list on her desk. “Is she a student?”

“Yes, she began studying here this fall.”

“How do you spell that?”

Darby spelled it out and waited.

“No, I’m not familiar with that name. Hank, you heard of her?”

The man was handsome in a Hollywood way, with thick, wavy hair. He seemed to enjoy being looked at and took his time answering. “No, can’t say that I have. Are you sure you have the right school?”

“AADA. I know I do. She tried out last month. She’s been taking classes each week.”

The receptionist giggled and the man named Hank smiled. “We call them auditions, not tryouts.”

“Right. Auditions.”

“Wait a minute.” The man froze, one hand lifted, mouth parted, as if he was teasing her or playing some kind of acting game, but then his concentration broke. “Esme Castillo?”

She breathed a sigh of relief. Of course, with so many students, it would be hard to keep track. Particularly if you were as self-aggrandizing as this guy. “Yes. That’s her.”

“Does she have an accent?”

“Yes. She’s from Puerto Rico.”

The secretary bit her lip and looked confused. “Huh.”

Hank cut in. “I do remember her. I can’t believe I ever forgot this.” He held his hand in front of him, palm facing outward, setting the scene. “I wasn’t scheduled to be on the panel that day, but Mr. Peterson was ill. This woman came in, lipstick the color of blood, shiny brown hair.”

“That’s Esme, yes.”

“She was arresting, I’ll give you that. She stood in the center of the room, wearing a dress that was quite revealing, and launched into a monologue from Romeo and Juliet. I tell you, I could barely understand a word the girl said. We sat there with our mouths agape.”

“We don’t take people with accents,” said the secretary, by way of explanation.

Romeo and Juliet. Esme had left a copy of the book in her room soon after they’d met, saying she didn’t need it anymore now that she’d been accepted. “She’s not enrolled, then?”

Hank laughed. “No, of course not. But she certainly perked us all up after a long day. I remember her well.”

Anger surged at his offhand dismissal. Esme had spent weeks preparing her speech. Only to be cut down by these buffoons. “Would she have studied with someone from the school, or anything like that?”

“No, there’s no room in the industry for girls who don’t know how to speak properly. Sorry, but you won’t find your friend here.”

Back in her room, with Mother’s condemnation still echoing in her head, Darby was surprised to learn she had another visitor. Had Mother returned to drag her back to Ohio? Or maybe she regretted their harsh exchange?

Instead, Sam stood in the lobby of the hotel. Darby checked herself from running into his arms, as Mrs. Eustis was greeting some new arrivals near the front door.

“I’m so glad to see you. I was just about to head downtown to find you.”

He looked around, pulled her close, his voice low. “We need to talk.”

Darby requested a visitor’s pass from the registration desk clerk, and led Sam up the stairs to the public lounge on the mezzanine level. A couple of the models giggled when they walked by, but Darby shot them a look that, to her surprise, sent them scampering away. To her relief, Sam didn’t gawk at their long limbs and silky hair as she expected him to. He pulled her down onto the tufted leather sofa.

“My God, it’s good to see you.”

“What’s going on?”

Sam ran his hand through his hair. “We’re in trouble.”

“We are?”

“Well, I am. The club, me, Esme. Big trouble.”

“I went looking for Esme at her acting school earlier, but they said she never enrolled.”

He straightened up. “Look, Darby. I think she’s run off.”

“What do you mean, run off? We have plans.”

“I know this will be hard to hear, but your plans mean nothing now. I don’t think she’ll ever show up here again.”

What was he talking about? Darby didn’t like his grave tone. “What’s going on?”

He reached out to touch her, but his hand fell back to his lap, as if it didn’t have the energy to finish the movement.

“Sam, tell me.”

“An article came out in the Herald Tribune today.” He pulled out the paper from his jacket pocket and handed it to her. “Esme did something really stupid.”

Darby glanced down. Sam pointed to the lead column and she began reading. The words swam on the page: Puerto Rican hatcheck girl, Detective Quigley, heroin, and the names of musicians she knew well. The Flatted Fifth.

She swallowed hard.

Sam ran his hands through his hair. “Esme had another side to her, one she didn’t want you to see.”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s worked for Kalai for the past year.”

Darby tried to understand why this would be a problem, but it didn’t add up. “Esme sold spices?”

“Mr. Kalai has another kind of import business. He brings in heroin, other drugs on the side. He’s mentioned later in the article.”

“My God, Sam! Did you know all along?”

“Yes, but I stayed out of that part entirely. Kalai’s a brilliant man, and he was willing to pass down his knowledge of spices to me. His sons think spices are a waste of time—they only care about the money from the drugs. So they leave me alone and manage the heroin sales under their father’s watch.”

If she had been on shaky footing when she woke up this morning, now the ground was crumbling under her feet. “How did you get mixed up with a man like Mr. Kalai?”

“I met him through Esme. Part of her job as hatcheck girl was to act as a go-between for Kalai and his clients.”

“Why would she agree to do such a thing?”

“Money.”

Darby remembered the heaps of makeup that Esme had, the dresses that materialized out of nowhere. The strange encounter at Hector’s Cafeteria. “I think I saw her once, actually. Uptown at lunch. She passed off something to a man in a suit. She said he was in her acting class.” She looked up at Sam. “Obviously not.”

“She double-crossed Kalai, gave info to the undercover cop at the club.”

“She couldn’t have. She hated that guy.”

“This article includes a full transcript of an informant, an ‘Esme C.,’ spilling secrets. Which means Kalai knows everything. He’ll be after her; that’s certain.”

Why hadn’t Esme ever confided in her? All the lies and cover-ups. Still, she deserved a chance to defend herself. Darby owed her that much at least.

“I’m sure she can explain everything, Sam. Or I hope she can, anyway—there has to be a good reason why she’d do this.”

Sam blinked a couple of times. “Don’t you understand, Darby? She’s gone, and if she’s smart, she’ll stay that way. She’s in serious danger now. And, by extension, so am I.”

“But why are you in danger?”

“My father told me Kalai is out of control, in a complete rage. He has his sons out looking for anyone else involved.”

“But you weren’t involved. You just said so.”

“Except that it was me who convinced Kalai we couldn’t toss the cops out of the club night after night. I thought it made us look too suspicious and would end badly for my dad. But now Kalai thinks I was secretly working with the undercovers all along, that I convinced Esme to rat him out. He thinks the sting was my doing.”

“I don’t understand. Can’t you just explain to him that it wasn’t you?”

“Kalai is paranoid. He’s decided I’m to blame and so I am. My father wants me to leave right now, go out to California where my brother is.”

Darby’s world was collapsing. Esme was a police informant and involved in the drug trade. Sam was fleeing New York City. Mother’s harsh words echoed in her brain. She’d been blinded by her hopes and didn’t see the danger they were all in.

Sam reached out and took her hands. A slight tremor shook his fingers.

“You’re shaking,” she said.

“I’m angry. I’m angry at Esme for screwing everything up for me. For us.”

Darby’s heart pounded in her chest, heavy with dread. “I think Esme did this for me.”

“What?”

“I think it’s probably a scheme she came up with to take care of me, until we’re on our feet. If she got money for snitching, it was to support me. She couldn’t have known that it would be leaked in the papers.”

“She should have talked to me first. I could have helped. Now I have to leave and go where no one knows me. I’ll have to start as a line cook somewhere, begin all over again.”

She couldn’t bear to see him go. “Maybe it’s only for a month or two. Mr. Kalai will end up in jail, and you’ll be able to come back.”

“His sons won’t give up the business. The money involved is too enormous. The police may get Kalai, but the organization will carry on. That’s why I want you to go with me.”

Her heart stopped for a moment as she processed his words. “To California?”

“Why not? We’ll take the train out tonight. I have some money saved, and we’ll find my brother and start a new life together.”

“The two of us?”

“Yes. I hear California’s great, no freezing winters and you can eat figs right off the tree.”

“But what about New York City?”

“It’ll always be here. We’ll come back in ten years, when the coast is clear and I’m a successful chef and you’re a famous writer. We’ll be married with a couple of kids and we’ll show them where we first met and fell in love.” He took a deep breath. “I love you, Darby.”

The room closed in around her. If she chose to go with Sam, she’d be a single girl, traveling with a bachelor. No chaperone.

And no more gloves. No clunky typewriter with the x key that always stuck. No giraffes.

But no Esme.

“I love you, too. I’ll go with you. But I have to say good-bye to Esme first.”

“You won’t find her.” He spoke firmly, calmly. “I’m telling you, Darby, I promise you, she’s gone.”

She thought of Daddy, what he might have revealed to her if she’d known to give him the chance. Esme deserved that as well. “I have to try. Can you give me some time? Not much. Just enough to nose around here a little bit. Her shift starts in twenty minutes. If she doesn’t turn up, I’ll leave a note for her at the front desk.”

“Fine, but be careful. I’ll head downtown to get my things and meet you under the clock at Grand Central in two hours. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Good.” He brought his hand to Darby’s cheek and smiled. “I’ll be waiting.”