Blackberry Winter: A Novel (17 page)

I nodded. “Where to?”

“Vera,” he said, as if suddenly struck with a thought, “why don’t we go to that dance-a-thon?”

I shook my head. “You can’t be serious.”

“We’re an incredible dance team,” he said, grinning. “I bet we could win. Besides, I’m tired of this stuffy old place.”

“You do know what a dance-a-thon is, right?”

He looked at me with naive eyes. Here was a man who could waltz—but swing? “I think I do.”

“Couples dance for hours—sometimes all night,” I explained. “The winners are the last ones standing.”

“I’d like to be the last man standing by
you
,” he said, reaching for my hand.

I could hear band music billowing out from the gymnasium onto Sixth Avenue. Charles and I stood on the sidewalk staring at the double doors, where a crowd of young men puffed cigarettes, wearing shabby suits sized too small or too large.

Charles rubbed his forehead nervously.
What was I thinking bringing him here?
Surely none of his polo-playing friends frequented the makeshift Friday night dance hall. The men eyed Charles suspiciously as we made our way to the entrance.

“Hey, dollface,” one of them said to me. “Looking for a dance partner?”

Charles held out his hand. “She has one, thank you,” he said, putting an end to the proposition.

“Some broad you got there,” I heard the man remark as we walked inside. His voice was swallowed up by the music. But it was the sight before us that captured our attention. Couples everywhere danced with such energy, such passion. I watched as a man lifted his partner into the air and then brought her down again, whipping her from left to right like a ball on a tether.

Charles’s mouth fell open. “Wow,” he murmured. “I’ve never seen anything like
this
.”

“We can go if you want,” I said, looking toward the door.

“No, no,” he replied, watching a man dip his partner so low her
hair skimmed the floor. “I’ve just never seen people dance like this. It’s…amazing. I want to try it. Can you do it?”

“Swing? Yeah,” I said. “Well, a little.” I took his hand, but before we could make it to the dance floor, an older woman tapped Charles on the shoulder.

“Did you register?” she asked.

“Register?” I replied.

“A nickel apiece,” she said. “Covers your admission, the cost of the photo, and a bowl of chili.”

Charles looked amused. “And a bowl of chili.”

She pointed to a desk just ahead. “You can pay over there.”

He pulled a dollar bill from his wallet and handed it to a man behind the desk.

“And your change is—”

“Keep it,” Charles said.

“Thank you, sir,” the man said, looking at Charles in astonishment. “Did Alice tell you the rules?”

He shook his head.

“We cut off admission in five minutes, so you just made it. Rules are as follows: No sitting. No eating. No drinking. Dancers must not stop dancing or stand in one place longer than three seconds or face elimination. The last couple to remain dancing wins the kitty here.” He pointed to a glass canning jar filled with nickels. “Photos are just to your left.”

Charles and I walked a few paces and stood side by side against a white curtain.

“Smile now,” the photographer called out from behind his camera with an elaborate flash. It was easy to smile with Charles by my side.

“There,” the photographer said. “If you come back next Friday, the photo will be waiting for you.”

We approached the dance floor timidly. Charles clasped his hands around my waist and began moving his feet clumsily. I smiled, taking his hands in mine and showing him the basic swing step.

“Like this,” I said, moving my feet in time with the music. I waved at Lola, a former schoolmate, in the distance. She looked shocked seeing me in Charles’s arms. Shocked and jealous, maybe.

“This is harder than it looks,” he said, attempting the move again and landing on my right foot. “Sorry.”

“You’re doing well,” I said. It felt good being the one teaching
him
something.

After a while, Charles got the hang of swing, and he twirled me around the floor with the confidence of an old pro.

“I can see why you like this better than the waltz,” he said, grinning. “It’s a heck of a lot more fun.”

I felt a bead of sweat on my brow. “So what do people like you do for fun?”

He flashed a half grin. “You act like I’m from a different planet.”

“Well,” I said, wiping my brow, “you are, in a sense.” I gazed out at the regular folks on the dance floor—sons of factory workers, daughters of dressmakers. And then there was Charles, the son of one of the wealthiest families in the city, and perhaps in the country, by Caroline’s estimation.

“Oh, come now,” he said. “Don’t you think that’s being a bit dramatic?”

A diminutive figure entered the gymnasium, and I recognized her instantly: Ginger Clayton, an old friend. Her younger sister had died six months before because her family couldn’t afford the medicine to save her. Suddenly I didn’t feel like dancing anymore. How
could I dine on oysters and caviar while people like little Emma Clayton had lost their lives?

I let go of his hand. “Don’t you see?”

He tucked my hand in his again. “Careful,” he said. “We’ll be disqualified if we stop. What was it again? The three-second rule?”

I looked away.

“Did I say something wrong?”

“No,” I said. “Well, yes. I just wish the poor didn’t have to suffer so.”

The band slowed its tempo, and I was glad for it. It felt strange to be having such a serious conversation when dancing at such a frenetic pace.

“Listen,” I continued, seeing concern register in his eyes, “I do believe you care, and I know you’re different than most people in your position. I just wish more people with your privileged background cared about the plight of the poor. Times are tough. The widow who lives on the floor below me has to leave her children alone all day while she works because there’s no one to care for them. Perfectly respectable people are out on the street, begging for handouts. All this while the rich…”

“While the rich do nothing about it?” he said.

“Yes,” I replied, nodding.

“Well, you’re right,” he said with a look of conviction. “We’re a despicable lot. I’m the first to admit that. My own parents won’t even pay the household help a living wage. Most have to take second jobs just to feed their families. It’s not right. I’ve tried to speak to my father. He won’t hear of it. He himself came from poverty. Worked his way up from a farming town in Eastern Washington. He’s a self-made man. He believes that hard work and discipline is the ticket out of poverty. In his mind, anyone can make their fortune.”

I shook my head. “But that’s not always true.”

“I know.”

“What he doesn’t realize is that decent, hardworking people are down on their luck,” I continued. “There aren’t enough jobs to go around. People who want to work can’t.”

Charles looked away. “I don’t know what to tell you, Vera. I don’t like it any more than you do.”

“I don’t mean to sound like I’m blaming you, or your father,” I said, worrying I’d overstepped my bounds. It’s just that I was taught that if you have two of something, you share it with someone else. Why can’t the privileged do more to help the needy?”

Charles nodded. “That widow you spoke of, what’s her name?”

“Laura,” I said. “Her name’s Laura.”

“Where does she work?”

“In a garment factory in the industrial district.”

“How many children does she have?”

The band began playing a faster song, so we picked up the pace. “At least five,” I said. “The eldest is barely nine years old. It’s a terrible situation. I brought a loaf of bread down to her last week. The place was an awful mess. Squalor, really.”

Charles looked at me tenderly. “I want to help her.”

“How?”

“For one, let’s get her out of that wretched factory job so she can care for her family,” he said.

“To do that she’ll need—”

“Funds, yes. I’ll take care of it.”

I smiled from a place deep inside. “You will?”

“Yes,” he said. “But she must not know of my involvement.”

“I can help,” I offered.

“Good.”

I nestled my head on his lapel. “That’s an honorable thing to do.”

“No,” he said, stroking my hair, “it’s the
right
thing to do, and I’m ashamed I haven’t done more things like it.”

Charles twirled me across the floor before I rebounded like a fire hose back into his arms. The music stopped for a moment as I looked into his eyes. His gaze made me feel tingly everywhere, and when he leaned toward me, I let my lips meet his.

“There you are!” a shrill female voice echoed across the dance floor. I took a step back from Charles and watched as a woman approached. Her tan silk dress and hat trimmed with white feathers looked like a page torn from one of the discarded
Vogue
magazines Georgia sometimes brought home from her housekeeping job. In the ragtag gymnasium, this woman stood out like a swan in a coal mine.

“I’ve been looking for you everywhere, Charles,” she continued with a chastising tone.

He divided his attention between the approaching woman and a man who appeared before us wagging his finger. “I’m afraid you’ve paused too long,” he said. “Please step off the dance floor. You’ve been disqualified.”

“Sorry, Vera,” Charles said to me. “It was my fault.”

The woman pushed through a crowd of people, and Charles and I followed. “Why is my
sister
here?” he said under his breath.

Away from the dancers, he folded his arms. “Josie?” His tone wasn’t exactly welcoming.

“Wow, I didn’t think I’d actually find you
here
,” she said, annoyed. She tucked a lock of her perfectly coiffed brown hair under her hat before smoothing an imaginary wrinkle from her
dress. “I went looking for you over at the Blue Palms and Delores said”—she looked at me with disapproving eyes and took a deep, frustrated breath—“anyway, there isn’t much time. It’s Mother. She’s taken ill.”

Charles dropped my hand. “Oh no,” he said. “What happened?”

“The doctor’s with her now,” she replied. “But you need to come quick.”

Charles turned to me. “I’m sorry, Vera, I have to go. I’ll…I’ll call on you soon.”

“Don’t worry about me,” I said, trying to hide my disappointment. “Go.”

I watched Charles and Josie walk briskly out of the gymnasium. They disappeared in the shadows of the night before I turned back to the other dancers on the floor. Only a few dozen remained. Beads of sweat dripped from their brows. We would have won, Charles and I. We would have danced until dawn.

“My, aren’t you a vision, Vera!” Lon exclaimed when he saw me in the lobby. I hardly recognized my own name on his breath. And when I caught a glimpse of myself in the gilded mirror on the wall to my left, a society girl stared back. My waist looked inches thinner, suctioned in by the fancy undergarments beneath the blue silk dress. My breasts brimmed out of the bodice in a way that made me feel like a roast turkey on a platter, buttered and browned and ready to be devoured. I held my hand to my chest self-consciously.

“Your beauty is dizzying,” Lon said, slipping a possessive arm around my waist.

I didn’t like his hand there, or anywhere. I swallowed hard.
I can do this. For Daniel.
If I played my cards right, Lon might use his resources to help me find my son. I would be his dinner guest. I would smile and look pretty. I would do anything, really, if it brought Daniel home.