After an awkward introduction, Ernest ordered a series of Gracie’s favorite dishes to be shared. The first to arrive was a tureen of steaming melon soup with chicken and water chestnuts. A waiter filled their rice bowls amid the small talk. In the background Ernest heard a jingle on the nearby radio that had been played over and over again to promote the new fair: If you’re going to kiss me…kiss me there.
“Ma.” Hanny spoke as though her mother were hard of hearing. “Rich is my fiancé. We’re getting married. Ma, I’m finally going to tie the knot.”
Gracie looked at both of them, nodding solemnly, blowing on her soup.
Ernest saw the worry in Juju’s eyes as everyone waited for a response.
Gracie smiled and continued eating.
“So, Ernest,” Rich said, to break the awkward silence. “Juju told me that you used to work as a driver for all the famous types who came to Seattle.”
“Oh, my daughter exaggerates a bit. It wasn’t that glamorous, really; they were just nice people who needed a ride,” Ernest demurred. “I was your basic, garden-variety driver most of my life, but I did get special calls once in a blue moon.”
“Dad, don’t be so humble,” Juju said. “Sugar Ray Robinson came to town and got sick. He wouldn’t trust a white doctor, so he found Dr. Luke in Chinatown, of all places. Dr. Luke gave him my dad’s name, and Dad drove the champ all over the place while he was in Seattle. From there, word of mouth did the rest. He ended up driving Floyd Patterson when he was in town, then Louise Beavers, Dinah Washington—the list goes on and on. He’d come home late at night with autographs for us kids, souvenirs. He even drove Billie Holiday.”
“Now you’re just making stuff up,” Ernest said. “That’s how simple stories become tall tales. You might be pushing the limits of your journalistic integrity.”
“That’s incredible. Sounds like you’d love it out in Vegas—you’re used to rubbing elbows with the stars,” Rich said. “Speaking of stars, Juju said that you’re part of a big story for the Century 21 Expo—something about a mysterious boy who was raffled off at an earlier world’s fair. I’d love to look into the legalities of that. And she also told us how you grew up in and around Seattle’s old red-light district…”
Ernest looked at Juju, who shrugged innocently. He glanced at Gracie, who listened intently as she slurped her soup. Meanwhile, Hanny stared back incredulously as if to say, And you thought my career was bad?
Rich kept talking. “I guess before Las Vegas there was always Chinatown. Bootleg booze and gambling going all the way back to Prohibition, speakeasies, all kinds of glamorous nighttime entertainment.”
“It wasn’t Chinatown,” Gracie interrupted, speaking slowly. “It wasn’t Chinatown or even Japantown, it was a parlor joint called…the Tenderloin.” Then she went back to her soup as though she’d said something obvious.
Rich looked at Ernest, who spoke softly, hoping to leave Gracie out of the conversation. “Yes, the Tenderloin was a…club for gentlemen.”
Juju continued, “My father is being coy. The Tenderloin was a famous sporting house run by Dame Florence Nettleton, over by Pioneer Square. No one knows much about her, and any records of her earlier life were probably destroyed in the Great Seattle Fire. Plus, she’s been lost in the shadow of her more famous predecessor, Madam Lou Graham, the Queen of the Lava Beds, who I believe ran the Tenderloin before her. And then later by Naughty Nellie Curtis, who ran a crib joint out of the old LaSalle Hotel overlooking Pike Place Market. There’s another story there I’m sure…”
Ernest sat back, listening, nodding. His daughter had done her research—he was impressed, again.
“So is that where the two of you met?” Rich asked, smiling. “At this Tenderloin place? I mean, forgive me for being a bit forward with my assumptions, but I do work in a colorful town and I’ve seen a salacious thing or two in my time. Hollywood’s finest come to Vegas to get married or divorced, sometimes in the same trip.” He laughed. “I’m immune to scandal.”
“What can I say? We were just kids, barely in our teens…” Ernest said.
“You were part of Seattle history,” Juju said. “And you, Dad, you’re practically a living, breathing Ripley’s Believe It or Not! I know people of your generation don’t like to talk about themselves very much—if at all—but come on…”
Gracie slowly tapped her spoon on the side of her bowl.
Then she looked about the restaurant—at the lamp, the statue, the diners at other tables and in booths—as though she were remembering where she was. Smiling.
“Ernest is being…modest,” Gracie said. “He was a coachman, and a good one. You had…driving gloves and a leather coat. You looked so handsome. How could I ever forget that?”
Everyone waited, holding their breath.
Then Juju added, “And you worked there too.”
Rich snickered and teased. “Don’t tell me you were a party girl, Mrs. Young.”
Juju frowned at the man. Ernest tried to change the subject, waving to the bow-tied waiter, who was already on his way with a platter of preserved beef, braised chicken, and seaweed salad. All of it served cold.
“Oh no, nothing so romantic,” Gracie said pleasantly. “I was a prostitute.” She spoke as though she might have said, Please pass the salt or How’s the weather?
Rich fell silent for once, addressing his soup without looking up. Hanny laughed, thinking she’d just caught the tail end of a joke; then as reality set in she stared at Juju, mouth agape, her face equal parts shock, confusion, and disbelief. Juju cocked her head toward Ernest, as if to ask for confirmation.
ANGELS IN THE SNOW
(1909)
Ernest pulled his red wool scarf up higher to shield his nose against the wind, which was blowing fat snowflakes in every possible direction. His breath was warm, even as his toes felt like ice cubes in his rubber three-button boots. He leaned into the shovel again and again as he worked to clear the dense, wet drifts of mashed-potato snow that piled up on the sidewalks and the front steps of the Tenderloin. Ernest had always loved the idea of a white, picture-postcard Christmas, even if that meant he had to shovel snow all day long on Christmas Eve.
As he caught his breath and stretched his aching back, Ernest heard the jingling of bells on a harness. He waved a mittened hand at a black-bearded man in a long overcoat, who tipped his snow-brimmed top hat as he talked to his team of draft horses as though they were stubborn children. The man shouted words encouraging them, chiding them, and scolding them as they pulled a metal plow down the street, carving a path through the snow-covered city. Shopkeepers swept and shoveled, businessmen in fine suits took turns clearing the trolley platforms, and dozens of stevedores, hired for the day, worked furiously to clear the rail lines again and again so the streetcars might have a chance amid the falling, drifting snow. It was an effort that, to Ernest, seemed as endless and futile as trying to bail out the Pacific Ocean.