“Holy smokes. A friend of yours?”
Mabel shook her head. “She terrifies me. I’ve never worked up the nerve to say more than hello and ‘Isn’t it a nice day?’ She lives here with her brother.” Mabel pursed her lips knowingly. “Well, she says he’s her brother. They don’t look a thing alike.”
“Her lover?” Evie whispered, excited.
Mabel shrugged. “How should I know?”
“These came for you, Miss Knight.” The doorman handed over a dozen long-stemmed red roses. Theta stifled a yawn as she ripped open the envelope on the card.
“ ‘A rose for a rose. With my dearest affections, Clarence M. Potts.’ Oh, brother!” Theta shoved the flowers back at him. “Give these to your girl, Eddie. Just toss the card first, or you’ll be in hot water.”
“Oh, you can’t throw those roses away. They’re the bee’s knees!” Evie blurted.
Theta squinted at her. “These stems? They’re from creepy Mr. Potts. He’s forty-eight, and he’s had four wives. I’m only seventeen, and I’m not looking to walk the middle aisle and be wife number five. I know plenty of chorus girls who’re regular gold diggers, but not me, sister. I got plans.” She nodded to Mabel. “Heya. Madge, right?”
“Mabel. Mabel Rose.”
“Nice to meet ya, Mabel.” Theta fixed her liquid gaze on Evie. “And you are?”
“Evangeline O’Neill. But everyone calls me Evie.”
“Theta Knight. You can call me anything—just not before noon.” She produced a cigarette from her pajama pocket and waited for the doorman to light it, which he did. “Thanks, Eddie.”
“Evie’s staying with her uncle, Mr. Fitzgerald,” Mabel explained. “She’s from Ohio.”
“Sorry,” Theta deadpanned.
“You said it—and how! Are you from New York?”
Theta arched a thread-thin eyebrow. “Everybody in New York’s from someplace else.”
Evie decided she liked Theta. It was hard not to be taken by her glamour. She’d never known anyone in Ohio who lived on her own terms, wore silk men’s pajamas into a public lobby, and could toss a dozen roses like they were a cup of Automat coffee. “Are you really a Ziegfeld girl?”
“Guilty.”
“That must be terribly exciting!”
“It’s a living,” Theta said on a stream of smoke. “You should come to the show some night.”
Evie thrilled at the thought. A Ziegfeld show! “I’d love to.”
“Swell. Name your night and I’ll leave a coupla tickets for you both. Well, I’d love to stay and beat my gums, but if I’m gonna hit on all sixes later, I gotta grab my beauty sleep. Swell to meet ya, Evil.”
“It’s Evie.”
“Not anymore,” Theta called over her shoulder as she disappeared into the elevator.
“I can’t believe you’re really here,” Mabel said. She and Evie were seated in the Bennington’s down-at-heel dining room having a couple of club sandwiches and Coca-Colas. “What did you do to get drummed out of Ohio so quickly?”
Evie toyed with the ice in her glass. “Remember that little trick I told you about a few months ago? Well…” Evie told Mabel the story of Harold Brodie’s ring. “And the terrible thing is that I’m right, and he comes off looking like the wronged party, the hypocrite!”
“Gee whiz,” Mabel said.
Evie studied Mabel’s face carefully. “Oh, Mabesie. You believe me, don’t you?”
“Of course I do.”
“And you don’t think I’m some sort of sideshow act?”
“Never.” Mabel swirled the ice in her glass, thinking. “But I wonder why you’re suddenly able to do it. You didn’t fall and hit your head or something, did you?”
Evie arched a brow. “Thank you.”
“I didn’t mean anything by it! I just thought there might be a medical reason. A scientific reason,” Mabel said hastily. “Did you tell your uncle about it?”
Evie shook her head emphatically. “I’m not rocking the boat. Everything’s copacetic with Unc right now, and I want it to stay that way.”
Mabel bit her lip. “And did you meet Jericho?”
“I did indeed,” Evie said, finishing her Coca-Cola.
“What did you think?” Mabel asked, leaning in.
“Very… solid.”
Mabel let out a small squeak. “Isn’t he beautiful?”