“Look around you. You think these crazies give two hoots in hell about your credentials? Poor old Sid Lewis got his brains beat out down in Rome for using the wrong adjectives about Mussolini.”
“That’s not what happened at all,” Rudman said. “Sid was queer. He got in a lover’s quarrel with some fascist he picked up in a bar and got his head bashed in.”
“Count on you to know all the dirt. You ought to start your own little monthly newsletter. All the news that’s unfit to print.”
“That’s very funny, Keegan. And what have you been up to?”
“I’m the embassy badminton champion. Me and Cissy Devane.”
“My God, that’s really impressive,’ Rudman said sarcastically.
Keegan waved his arm toward the crowded club.
“Take my word for it, pal, they’re the ones you have to worry about. Hitler’s all talk.”
“You sound like the isolationists back home. You should read
“I’ve read
Rudman looked surprised and said, “Well, I give him two years, three tops. He’ll have the Saar back, Austria, Poland, probably Czechoslovakia. He’s already using the Versailles treaty for toilet paper.”
“Rudman, I came here to be entertained, not to listen to lectures on the rise and fall of the German Empire.”
“Okay,” said Rudman, and abruptly changed the subject. “Okay. What’s this Gold Gate I’ve been hearing about?”
“Sex show upstairs.”
“Any good?”
“If you like naked men and women covered with oil rolling around under bad lights.”
“I do,” Rudman said with a leering grin. “Shall we?”
Keegan shook his head. “I came for the singer.”
“Does she sing covered with oil?”
Keegan rolled his eyes. “She’s coming on next. As soon as they round up that herd and get them off the stage.” He nodded toward the chorus line, all of whom were at least ten pounds overweight. As he spoke they lumbered into the wings.
“I’ll be where the action is,” Rudman said and headed upstairs. “Dinner tomorrow night?”
Keegan nodded and waved him away because now the stage lights were lowering. They went out. Keegan could barely discern the tiny woman who came out on the darkened stage carrying her own stool. She put it down in front of the microphone on the corner of the stage and sat down. The piano man started playing trills, warming up. Then the baby spot faded in on her.
He was immediately taken by her appearance. She was barely five feet tall, thin, rather frail. Her face was narrow to the point of being gaunt and her sharply honed cheekbones seemed etched into her face. The result was an almost haunted look, an impression strengthened by large, saucer-like eyes that gleamed in the tiny light and seemed almost tear-struck. A simple, long black dress accented the aura of vulnerability that surrounded her. He had to strain to hear her name when the emcee introduced her. Jenny Gould.
She stood without speaking for a few moments, just long enough for Keegan to worry that perhaps something was wrong, that she wasn’t going to perform. Then she began to sing.
The voice startled him at first. It was low, throaty, a torch- song voice that tortured every word of the Cole Porter song she chose to interpret, not as a cynical dirge, but as a metaphor about love gone sour.
The crowd was ill mannered and inattentive. Chattering, laughing, clinking glasses, creating a constant babel that underscored every word she sang, and Keegan finally moved down the bar closer to the stage to hear better. He was mesmerized by her. When the song was over there was a smattering of applause, except from Keegan who wore out his hands clapping.
He thought she glanced over at him as he applauded, but couldn’t be sure, felt foolish in fact at how pleased he was that she might have noticed him. Then she began her second song and he was, once again, caught in the magical, sensual spell she was weaving.
In the darkened room, Vanessa suddenly decided it was time to make a break for it. The boys were trapped on the other side of the room. The singer was into her second song and Vanessa snatched up her purse and stood to leave. From the bar there was a smattering of wolf whistles mostly lost in the clamor. She stalked across the room, her dress swaying in sparkling waves as she walked. Deenie struggled to her feet, trotting after the haughty beauty. Then Vanessa stopped so suddenly that Deenie bumped into her.
“Oh my God,” Vanessa said half-aloud.
“What is it?” Deenie asked.
