The Dollhouse - Fiona Davis Page 0,79
didn’t mean the work was dull, not at all. It’s my dream to be a secretary, and you see, my mother has spent all of her savings on my tuition. I can’t fail.” She imagined Mother reading the letter of expulsion, knowing that none of the fees were refundable, and a cold sweat enveloped her. She reached out a hand and gripped the edge of the desk. “You can’t tell Mother. I’ll make it up to you, I promise. Please. Tell her that I’m still enrolled, that it was a mistake.”
“I’m sorry, Miss McLaughlin. Please take your belongings with you. You are expelled.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
New York City, 2016
Ms. Doris Spinner of apartment 4G gave Rose a charming smile. “We would sneak boys up all the time. The girls who worked the back elevator would keep quiet if you gave them a lipstick, or you could climb up the back stairs. There was a woman in charge, Mrs. Eustis or Ewing, I can’t remember, who was intent on running a tight ship, but there were leaks here and there, no doubt about it. I lost my virginity in this building, to a boy who worked in a bank. He had a wicked way about him.”
Rose waited two beats and then signaled for Jason to stop recording. The sound bite, and Ms. Spinner’s interview, couldn’t have gone better.
“That the kind of thing you’re looking for?”
“Yes, exactly. Thank you so much for your time. And your level of detail. We really appreciate it.” They’d taped several interviews that morning, and Rose was relieved to find that her relationship with Jason wasn’t strained from their strange parting in the cab. If anything, they were more in sync than ever while interviewing the women of the fourth floor. Rose had spaced out the schedule so they could take their time with each one, shooting either in their apartments or in the second-floor lounge. She deliberately avoided coming up with a list of questions beforehand, preferring to allow the interview to ebb and flow like a real conversation, and the result was better than she’d expected. Tales of back-room abortions and rampant sexual harassment were tempered with stories of young love and the joys of living in an intoxicating city.
But that wasn’t the least of the good news. Rose had shown up uncharacteristically late to the first interview, after visiting the New York Public Library at Forty-Second Street earlier that morning. As soon as the library’s doors opened, she’d followed the grand marble hallway into a shabby room with dropped ceilings and fluorescent lights. It was a place she knew well, having done hours and hours of research there as a newly promoted assistant producer, and it felt like coming home. She always enjoyed digging up the past, whether it was for a tribute for some star who’d passed away or deep background for an investigative piece.
Even though the clunky microfilm machines probably dated back to the 1970s and scratches marred the glass viewfinder, she patiently scrolled through back issues of every newspaper in New York City from the week of October 31, 1952, including the ones that had gone out of business. She was constantly surprised at what she found: a listing in the real estate section for a two-bedroom, terraced apartment on the West Side for one hundred dollars a month; help-wanted sections divided up by gender, where women could find work as typists and receptionists while men were sought in engineering and sales positions. This was the world Darby had encountered when she’d come to New York.
A few hours in, she hit the jackpot.
After showing Ms. Spinner to the elevator, Rose returned to the lounge, bursting with excitement. Jason was packing up, wrapping a cord around his elbow and wrist with quick, sure movements.
“You did a really good job today,” he said.
“Thanks. I always find the best quotes come from the least likely questions, the ones tossed off at the end, as an afterthought.”
“Do we dare take a cab back? I have to say I enjoyed our ride the other night.”
Remembering the few seconds they’d kissed sent a ripple of pleasure through her. Weird how a man so completely different from Griff could have that effect on her.
Griff. Over the past week, as she’d dived into the story, she’d stopped thinking about him quite as often. Instead, she’d been consumed with the narrative structure of writing about Darby and her neighbors. And she wasn’t about to jump into another relationship so soon.
She needed to