The usherette sighed and shook her frizzy blond head. “I tried to be nice about this, but have it your way…” She twisted around. “You can come out now, Mr. Morgan.”
The curtain lifted again. Jack’s arm wrapped around my shoulders as we both backed up.
Bull Morgan seemed to have swelled since the railroad yard. He towered over us, his face puffed up and pale. His fleshy jaw worked back and forth on his toothpick, and the usherette kept time with him by cracking her gum.
“There you is,” Bull Morgan whispered hoarsely between chews on his toothpick. “The no-good pickaninny bummin’ brat and her little Jew-boy friend. Got you both this time.” He shifted the pick to the other side of his mouth with his big, tobacco-stained tongue. “Good job, Trixie.”
“Sure thing, Mr. Morgan,” said the usherette, Trixie. “Always glad to help an officer of the law.”
“He ain’t breathing,” croaked Jack. “Have mercy, he ain’t breathing.”
Jack was right. Bull Morgan walked toward us. Handcuffs dangled from his thick fingers. He chewed his toothpick and grinned, but he wasn’t breathing, not even a little bit. It’s such a tiny thing, you wouldn’t think you’d notice it looking at another person, but trust me, when it ain’t there, you notice right away.
Bull Morgan was dead.
Then I felt something else, something sharp and bright pressing against that extra sense I’d found. Headlights glared on the other side of the glass doors, and I heard a car’s engine. I swung around, taking Jack with me. A big silver Packard screeched up to the Bijoux, bumping right over the curb. Shimmy leapt out, ran to the theater doors, and rattled the handles.
Trixie looked at her and hissed. Bull Morgan lifted his heavy head.
Jack and I dove sideways, in opposite directions. I ran for the doors. Jack ran toward the theater. “Where you think you’re goin’, Jew boy?” laughed Morgan, stumping heavily after him.
He must have thought Jack was heading back into the movie, but Jack ducked sideways, grabbed up one of the poles with the velvet ribbon, and charged, aiming straight for Morgan’s big stomach. Morgan clamped his hands around the pole and tore it away like it was nothing.
Trixie, in the meantime, sauntered up to me. I rattled the door handle. I banged on the glass. On the other side, Shimmy did the same.
“You don’t have to worry none about her, Callie,” said Trixie. “She can’t get in here. Our gates don’t open for
I spun around fast. Trixie was bringing her flashlight up to shine on me. I decided not to wait for that.
I kicked her. I missed her knee, but I got her shin and she screeched. For good measure, I grabbed a fistful of that frizzy gold hair and yanked with all my might, spinning her around and slamming her into Bull Morgan, who had Jack by the arm.
I didn’t wait to see how they all untangled themselves. I whirled around again and laid both my hands on the handle of the outside door. Shimmy hammered on the other side of the glass so hard the door shook. I dug down deep into the place where my new sense waited, and I remembered the twisting key-in-the-lock feeling. I felt it in my heart and my stomach. I wished for it with all my might.
For a moment, I was certain I saw a spasm of fear on Shimmy’s face before she grabbed my wrist.
“Come on!” she shouted.
“No! Jack!” I twisted out of her grasp, yanking her halfway inside.
Shimmy gave a wordless shout of frustration and pulled herself up straight on the threshold, jamming her heel into the door to keep it open. Jack wriggled in Bull Morgan’s grip as the dead man lifted him off his feet, squeezing hard around his middle.
“We don’t ’low
The curtain behind the candy counter lifted again, and this time the chorus line appeared: a dozen Trixies, all dressed alike, all with the same hair and the same scarlet mouth and bright red nails, marched in time from behind the candy counter. Mr. Berkeley would have been on his knees to see those girls, all exactly the same, all swinging their perfect legs in perfect time.
All lifting up their flashlight beams to shine straight at me and Shimmy.
That light hit us, and it felt like hot honey pouring over my skin. It melted me down like I was made of wax, and I began to crumble.
Shimmy drew herself up in the light, spread her arms, and started to sing.
There were no words, just loud, clear, rich notes of pure sound, rippling up and down the scale. Shimmy’s voice cut through the light, cut through the fear, and I grabbed hold of it like a lifeline. I even knew the tune, “St. James Infirmary Blues.” She’d been singing it when I first saw her in the juke joint.
The Trixie chorus line staggered in perfect synchronization, first left, then right. Then they all fell back, their flashlight beams scattering every which way. I charged them, barreling through, not letting any of them stop me. Trailing Shimmy’s song and all its power behind me, I ran straight up to Bull Morgan, who was squeezing Jack so hard his eyes were bugged out and his mouth was open to gasp and gag. My stomach lurched up and down, but I grabbed hold of Bull Morgan’s ice-cold arm. I buckled my knees and let my weight drag on him, grabbed tight hold of Shimmy’s music, and
It was like trying to punch through a marshmallow wall; you went in deep and got stuck. For a minute, I couldn’t breathe. Jack choked hard, and I got hold of his fear with Shimmy’s music and we all started pulling back. Morgan’s grip loosened. Jack dropped to the floor. I grabbed Jack by the arm, and we ran straight for the Trixies. They swung round in a circle, ringing us in, bringing their lights up. Morgan growled. Jack snatched up one of the Trixies’ hands and shined her own light into her eyes. She gave a weird groan and slumped to the ground again, taking the rest with her.
We leapt over the sagging heap of usherettes. Shimmy backed up and shoved the door open, and we ran through. I felt the world twist again, and we were back in Kansas, with the dusty night wind blowing around us and a big, old silver Packard with its engine running right in front.
“Get in!” hollered Shimmy.
I dove into the backseat with Jack piling in behind and partly on top of me. We didn’t even have the door shut before Shimmy threw the car into reverse and stomped the accelerator so we tore backward with squealing tires. With another clash of gears, we shot forward. Vigilantes and civilians flashed in and out of the car’s headlights as Shimmy clutched the wheel with both hands and drove hell-for-leather down Constantinople’s main street.
“What was you thinking going to that rail yard?” she shouted. Jack had managed to get the door shut, which was good because we both spilled against it when the car tipped up onto two wheels as Shimmy cornered tight around the hardware store. We untangled ourselves in time to see the highway swinging into place under the headlights. With another hard bounce, we hit the pavement and raced forward into the dark.
Jack and I sat up, trying to catch our breath. It was not comfortable knowing that Shimmy had saved our lives. Worse, it was setting in that we were stuck with her in a speeding car.
“Where’re we going?” Jack asked.
“Away,” Shimmy snapped.
I tried to rally some nerve, but found precious little left to work with. “Look, thank you for getting us out of there, but…”
“You think you want me to stop?” Something small and dark flew toward me. I caught it automatically. It was a compact, the kind that usually held rouge or face powder. “You have a look in there, and then you tell me how much you want to get out of this car, missy.”
My fingers fumbled with the compact’s catch and finally got it open. There was a mirror under the lid, and I looked into my own hollow eyes, but only for a second. While I watched, the mirror turned solid silver, just like a movie screen. And just like a screen, it showed a moving picture. Except this picture was in color, and clearer than anything I’d ever seen in any theater.
