what was going on up there on the stage, it was dizzying. This, indeed, had to be the end of the show, because there was a lot happening at once. At the back of the stage there was a kick line of about a dozen dancers—girls and boys—grinning madly as they flung their limbs up toward the dusty heavens. At center stage, a good-looking young man and a spirited young woman were tap-dancing as though to save their lives, while singing at full bellow about how everything was going to be just fine from now on, my baby, because you and me are in love! On the left side of the stage was to be found a phalanx of showgirls, whose costumes and movements kept them just on the correct side of moral permissibility, but whose contribution to the story—whatever that story may have been—was unclear. Their task seemed to be to stand with their arms outstretched, slowly turning, so that you could take in the full Amazonian qualities of their figures from every angle, at your leisure. On the other side of the stage, a man dressed as a hobo was juggling bowling pins.
Even for a finale, it went on for an awfully long time. The orchestra banged forth, the kick line pounded away, the happy and breathless couple couldn’t believe how terrific their lives were about to get, the showgirls slowly displayed their figures, the juggler sweated and hurled—until suddenly, with a crash of every instrument at once, and a swirl of spotlights, and wild flinging up of everyone’s arms in the air at the same time, it ended!
Applause.
Not thunderous applause. More like a light drizzle of applause.
Olive didn’t clap. I clapped politely, though my clapping sounded lonely there at the back of the hall. The applause didn’t last long. The performers had to exit the stage in semisilence, which is never good. The audience filed past us dutifully, like workers heading home for the day—which is exactly what they were.
“Do you think they liked it?” I asked Olive.
“Who?”
“The audience.”
“The audience?” Olive blinked, as though it had never occurred to her to wonder what an audience thought of a show. After a bit of consideration, she said, “You must understand, Vivian, that our audiences are neither full of excitement when they arrive at the Lily, nor overwhelmed with elation when they leave.”
From the way she said this, it sounded as though she approved of the arrangement, or at least had accepted it.
“Come,” she said. “Your aunt will be backstage.”
So backstage we went—straight into the busy, wanton clamor that always erupts in the wings at the end of a show. Everyone moving, everyone yelling, everyone smoking, everyone undressing. The dancers were lighting cigarettes for each other, and the showgirls were removing their headdresses. A few men in overalls were shuffling props around, but not in any way that would cause them to break a sweat. There was a lot of loud, overripe laughter, but that’s not because anything was particularly funny; it’s just because these were show-business people, and that’s how they always are.
And there was my Aunt Peg, so tall and sturdy, clipboard in hand. Her chestnut-and-gray hair was cut in an ill-considered short style that made her look somewhat like Eleanor Roosevelt, but with a better chin. Peg was wearing a long, salmon-colored twill skirt and what could have been a man’s oxford shirt. She also wore tall blue knee socks and beige moccasins. If that sounds like an unfashionable combination, it was. It was unfashionable then, it would be unfashionable today, and it will remain unfashionable until the sun explodes. Nobody has ever looked good in a salmon-colored twill skirt, a blue oxford shirt, knee socks, and moccasins.
Her frumpy look was only thrown into starker relief by the fact that she was talking to two of the ravishingly beautiful showgirls from the play. Their stage makeup gave them a look of otherworldly glamour, and their hair was piled in glossy coils on the tops of their heads. They were wearing pink silk dressing gowns over their costumes, and they were the most overtly sexual visions of womanhood I had ever seen. One of the showgirls was a blonde—a platinum, actually—with a figure that would’ve made Jean Harlow gnash her teeth in jealous despair. The other was a sultry brunette whose exceptional beauty I’d noticed earlier, from the back of the theater. (Though I should not get any special credit for noticing how stunning this particular woman