If Abby noticed that I was mocking her and throwing her own words back at her verbatim, she kept it to herself. She just finished applying my makeup-pink rouge, red lipstick, icky blue eyshadow, etc.-vigorously and without comment. Then, after pinning my hair up in a taut little bun, she yanked a curly blonde wig down over my head and mashed it in place.
“Ugh! Do I have to wear this mop?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer to that question. “It’s so uncomfortable! It feels like my cranium’s been carpeted.”
“Would you rather have it shot full of holes?” Abby said, with a sniff. “If Tony the Tiger is the murderer, and if he recognizes you from any of your past newspaper photos tonight, your skull will be a bloody breezeway by tomorrow.”
“I get the picture,” I said, wishing that I didn’t. The image was a bit too graphic for my taste.
“Besides, you look really cute like this!” Abby bubbled, fluffing the short blonde curls and arranging them around my face. “You don’t look like yourself at all. You look just like Janet Leigh!”
“Harpo Marx is more like it,” I grumbled.
“Oh, hush. You’re such a kvetch.” Abby finished styling my fake hair and sprayed it with something smelly and sticky. Then she took a pair of sky-high black patent pumps out of her closet and insisted that I put them on.
“But I don’t want to!” I whined. “My feet hurt. I’m going to wear my new ballerina slippers.”
“Oh, no, you’re not,” she said. “You have to look really sexy tonight-like a hot, high-class call girl-not like a gawky, flat-footed preteen. Put those heels on, and come downstairs right now. We’ve gotta go, Flo!”
Abby was having fun. You could tell by the way she bounced down the steps, slipped into her fur-trimmed purple satin coat (it came with the dress), and then twirled over to the door like an Arthur Murray ballroom dance student.
I was in perfect misery. You could tell by the way I dragged myself down to the kitchen, shoved my cold, naked arms into the sleeves of Abby’s gray chinchilla jacket, trailed my former friend down the stairwell to the street, and then shivered, lurched, and wriggled-like a bare-breasted, fin-shackled mermaid out of water-toward the uptown IND.
THE COPA WAS AT 10 EAST 60TH STREET, JUST a few steps off Fifth Avenue. When Abby and I turned the corner and headed for the entrance, we saw that the entire block was crammed with long, shiny limousines, honking taxicabs, and town cars discharging prosperous-looking men in tuxedos and bow ties, and beautiful women in jewels and furs. Scads of shouting newspaper photographers were engaged in fierce combat for position and the chance to pop another batch of blinding flashbulbs.
Tony Corona was packing them in.
“Follow me!” Abby whooped, happily pushing her way into the fray. I tucked my chin to my chest and stayed as close behind her as I could, hoping nobody would poke their elbow in my eye or-worse-take my picture. (When you’re on a dangerous undercover hunt for a killer-and trying to keep your mission hidden from your overly protective, short-tempered detective boyfriend-photographic exposure in the press can be hazardous to your health. Wig or no wig.)
Jostling and shoving and yelling “Hot stuff!” at the top of her lungs, Abby thrust her way up to the entrance of the club with me wobbling right behind, huddled as close to her hindquarters as a kid riding piggyback.
“Hi, handsome!” she hollered at the doorman. “I’m Gina, and this is Cherry!” She leaned to one side, forcing me to show my face (which was surely beet red from embarrassment).
“You’re expecting us, right? We’re Mr. Corona’s guests for dinner and the show.”
The doorman didn’t say a word. He just arched one skinny black eyebrow, nodded his ham-sized head, pulled the door open a few inches, and shooed us inside.
I was shocked at how quickly we’d been allowed to enter. Abby and I were now sauntering-without male companions- across the luxurious, potted palm-lined lobby toward the glittering, welcoming gates of the most famous nightclub in the world, while scores of Manhattan’s most fashionable, celebrated, and properly escorted wives, girlfriends, actresses, models, and socialites were still being screened for admittance.
It’ s cool to be a cookie with connections, I mused to myself, but being a call girl with a well-connected madam takes the cake.
AFTER BEING SEATED AT A FRONT-ROW TABLE (as Sabrina had predicted), and immediately ordering our dinner and drinks (as Sabrina had advised), I turned and swept my gaze around the glitzy interior of the club. The decor was classy and Cuban, with white tablecloths, red velvet chairs, and glistening mirrored walls. There was an elevated bandstand, a small hardwood dance floor, a lofty, wraparound mezzanine, and several enormous floor-to-ceiling columns shaped as palm trees. Their trunks were pure white and their leaves were bright gold.
The band was playing a rumba, and the tables were filling up fast. Several couples ventured onto the floor to dance. “Hey, bobba ree bop!” Abby shouted to me above the music. Torn between watching the dancers and checking out the people who were quickly filling up the tables around us, she was twisting her head in all directions at once. “This is the living end!” she cried. “The air’s so thick with excitement you could slice it like a turkey.”
“Right,” I said, feeling far more nervous than excited. I had been to the Copacabana once before-when I was working on my very first Daring Detective story-and it had been a crazy, dangerous, hair-raising experience. I hoped tonight’s expedition wouldn’t turn out the same way.
“Hey, look upstairs!” Abby squealed, gaping toward the mezzanine in sheer delight. “It’s Gordon MacRae! Yummmm. He’s so handsome, it’s shameful. And what a sexy voice he’s got! Whenever he sings, my ovaries melt. He’s probably making the rounds tonight, showing up at the hottest nightspots to promote his new movie, Oklahoma!… Oooh! Wow! Guess who’s sitting over there!” she sputtered, eyes shifting toward a different spot in the balcony. “It’s Kirk Douglas! And he’s sitting next to Lana Turner! Holy smoke! Aren’t they both married to somebody else? I wonder if they’re having an affair!” She couldn’t have been more elated if James Dean had suddenly come back to life and sat down at our table.
“Cool it, Ab-er, Gina!” I hissed. “Get a grip on yourself. You’re acting like a starstruck bobby-soxer instead of a wicked woman of the world. And you’d better calm yourself down right now, kiddo, because a lot of famous people will be here tonight. And since they’ll all be sitting in the mezzanine-which, according to the gossip columnists, is reserved for VIPs-you need to keep your starry eyes fixed on the dance floor. Especially after the show begins,” I cautioned. “We can’t afford to offend our generous and demanding host.”
“I get your drift,” Abby said, wrenching her gaze away from the upper level and happily focusing it on one of the two champagne cocktails our waiter had just placed in front of us. “Here’s to life, liberty, and the pursuit of justice!” she warbled, holding her glass up for a toast.
“Cheers,” I said, clinking her cocktail for good luck, trying to suppress my nagging fear that we were headed for a nasty night.
ABOUT FORTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER-AFTER we’d devoured our Waldorf salads, broiled lobster tails, lyonnaise potatoes, and chocolate éclairs (well, we had to keep up our strength!)-the bandleader brought a torrid tango to a heart-throbbing climax and then signaled for a drumroll. The spotlights mounted in the golden leaves of the palm trees closest to the dance floor began to flash and spin, prompting the lingering hoofers to return to their seats.