Beautiful Little Fools(91)
Our first day in this new city, Duke and I left our temporary rooming house and took a pink taxicab to the South Side, the grayest, dirtiest street I’d seen since I’d been to visit Myrtle in Queens. As I got out of the cab, I held Duke tightly under my arm for some sort of illusion of protection. But the truth was, he’d never hurt a fly—Duke was just like Myrtle, all bark and no bite.
I stood out on the sidewalk for a moment, staring up at the tattered gray awning above the storefront. I’d picked this place out of the directory on its name alone: Wilson’s Pawnshop: Goods Bought and Sold. That had seemed a compelling enough reason to justify the taxi fare here, though now that I was actually on the gray, run-down street I did wonder if it might’ve been smarter to find a broker in a better neighborhood. But I was here nonetheless. I took a deep breath and walked inside.
A bell clanged against the glass, and the man behind the counter looked up. He was older, skinny, with graying hair and a wrinkled face. He eyed Duke, then me, then cast me a smile, revealing one severely unattractive front gold tooth. I wasn’t sure what I’d been expecting when I’d caught on the name Wilson’s in the book. That maybe going here would be some sort of final penance? But now I was relieved to see he reminded me nothing at all of George.
“Don’t see too many pretty ladies like you around here,” this Wilson said, his eyes roaming uncomfortably down my face, to my chest.
I wanted to get in and out of here as fast as possible. I pulled the diamond hairpin out of my coat pocket and placed it on the counter. “How much can you give me for this? Diamonds are real,” I said resolutely. “Don’t lowball me or I’ll walk out that door.” There’d been plenty of other pawnshops in the book, and if Wilson didn’t want to give me what I deserved, I truly would walk out.
He picked the hairpin up in his wrinkled, graying fingers, pulled out a magnifying glass from underneath the counter, and stared at the diamonds.
Ever since Detective Charles had come to see me with Myrtle’s matching hairpin last fall, I knew I needed to get rid of this pin. I shivered now, thinking about what Detective Charles might do, what pieces of George’s and Jay’s deaths he might question if he ever found out about Myrtle’s affair with Tom and my connection to Jay, or even that I still had and lied about this hairpin. After that, I knew I had to get this out of my possession as soon as I could.
Still, I’d sobbed a little this morning staring at the pin in my room, questioning my decision to come here. I’d cried, thinking, for a moment, that this hairpin was the last piece I had left of my sister. But then I’d wiped my tears and realized, the hairpin wasn’t a piece of Myrtle at all. It was a gift to her from Tom, and I remembered that drunken afternoon at their apartment when he’d broken her nose. This hairpin was a symbol of everything that had ruined her. I despised it.
“Two thousand dollars,” Wilson said now, putting his magnifying glass down.
“Don’t insult me,” I said, trying not to reveal the excitement I actually felt in my voice. Though the pin was likely worth more, two thousand dollars was a lot of money. It would pay the rent on a decent apartment and my living expenses for at least the year, probably two.
“Twenty-five hundred,” he said. “That’s my final offer.”
“Three thousand,” I demanded, resolute.
He examined the diamonds one more time with the magnifying glass, and then with a little nod of his head, we had a deal.
* * *
NOW, A NEW year dawned. Nineteen twenty-three shimmered before me and filled me with an unexpected sort of hope.
I had a new life in Chicago, a new apartment with a nice view of the frozen lake in the distance. A new job working for the Women’s Trade Union League. It barely paid any money, but I had enough put away now to cover my expenses for a while. And we were working to open up a shelter for women who were unsafe in their homes. It would help women like Myrtle. And be the first of its kind in Chicago!
Sometimes I thought if I helped just one other woman the way I never was able to help my sister, then everything I’d done, every lie I’d told, it would all be worth it in the end. It would all mean something. My life would mean something. And maybe that was the last and biggest lie of all. That what I would do next with my life would be good enough to make up for what I had done.
Even in this new life of mine in Chicago, I dreamed of last summer sometimes still—the smell of the smoking gun and burning flesh, Daisy Buchanan’s scream and Jordan Baker’s ultimate cool head and practicality.
I’d seen both women in passing last summer when we’d all gone into the precinct, but since then I’d kept up with Daisy Buchanan in the society pages and Jordan Baker on the sports pages.
A promise was a promise was a promise. But I hoped that I would never speak to either one of these women again. Or that Detective Charles would never make his way to Chicago to visit me.
* * *
ONE AFTERNOON LATE in January, I saw Tom Buchanan.
I’d left work to go home, and he was suddenly just right there, walking ahead of me on Michigan Avenue. I recognized his unmistakable, arrogant swagger, even dressed in his overcoat, with the collar turned up against the cold. I slowed down, so I wouldn’t catch up, but he seemed to sense me there, and he turned around.
His eyes caught mine, and that brutish hulking face was exactly and awfully the same as it was six months ago. I remembered the way he’d looked when he’d punched Myrtle in the nose, the way her blood had felt on my hands then and later in the morgue.