“You did—and you dressed to win tonight, I see. Who are you wearing?”
“A hand-sewn Joyce Martin.” Joyce Martin was a highly sought-after dressmaker who also happened to be a member of Blair House. As she was already a solid fixture in fashion, Joyce’s gowns cost several thousands of dollars and were commissioned years in advance. She only made six customs a year but had never been worn to the Oscars. If Kitty won, wearing a Joyce Martin would be making history twice.
“Oh, my. And you, Mr. Tate—”
Nathan happily took the spotlight as Kitty’s gaze drifted into the camera lens. The reflection of her own eyes—an indigo blue that night—pulled her imagination through a dark hole to the other side of the camera, where her mother sat watching her live on television. She was at the Lakeses’ (Hazel had never had a television), dressed in her church clothes for the special night with Mrs. Nora and Mr. Lakes, whom she’d wheeled in to join her. A physical flutter started at her breastbone, a painful wishing that her mother was still alive, just so the possibility could exist.
Winning the Oscar for Best Actress that night was the sweetest vindication of her existence, a twisted parody. The industry’s acclaim was the glaze; its sweetness, bitter.
At the after-party, the women of Blair House gloated, silently passing their pride through their eyes. Some were guests, and others were staff. They hadn’t operated in units around Kitty in years, but her victory was the best reason to do so. Kitty Karr was in fact the first Colored actress to win an Oscar in a lead role, and nobody would ever know it.
CHAPTER 38
Kitty
Summer 1968
The Tate household was humming along. Kitty and Nathan were back in a creative groove, having started work on a film about a set of math-prodigy twins. Heavy into directing, Nathan was happy in his creative niche. He was spending the summer doing casting calls in middle America, and she was working with the writer to button up the script. This arrangement allowed for lots of time spent with Sarah.
Sarah was flourishing in school at the elite Center for Early Education and visited Kitty’s home at least once a week to swim, read books, and run around the yard. Nellie used the time to complain about Clifford, who didn’t approve of the way she was raising Sarah.
“He thinks I’m spoiling her, treating her like she’s White. Says she’s going to have quite a fall ahead.”
First he was going to leave, and then she was, and after four years they were still together because Nellie, like Kitty, so desperately wanted Sarah to be raised with two parents. Kitty was over those fantasies and felt Sarah had enough love without him.
“Why don’t you move into one of the duplexes on Orange Drive?”
“Can we?”
“Emma would allow it.”
“And what happens when the neighbors see it’s just me and my little Colored daughter living there?”
“We can turn it into one house. Build a private entrance for you to drive into. People won’t ever see you.”
“What a solution,” Nellie said.
Kitty didn’t understand her sarcasm.
“When she starts school, she’ll have to catch the bus from the other side of town so no one will know that she lives next door to them. She won’t be able to play with the other kids in the neighborhood.”
“She has her school friends.”
“I don’t want to be beholden to you,” Nellie said. “I have a career that can support us. I don’t want to rely on you for the rest of my life.”
“But that was our agreement.”
“So you can see her whenever you want. I can’t continue bringing her here multiple times a week. This”—Nellie flung her hand around Kitty’s large utility kitchen—“isn’t our real life.”
“You sound like Clifford.”
“He’s partially right.”
“You’re being stubborn. The house is paid for; it’s in a good school district. This is about her, not us.”
“I’m thinking of her. You’re thinking of you.”
Kitty sprung from her chair, desperate over her lack of control. “She deserves everything I didn’t have.” She started pacing the kitchen, putting away the peanut butter, jam, and knives they’d used to make lunch. “I worked too hard to have her growing up feeling like she’s less of a human than anybody else. She’s royalty, goddamn it.”
After over a decade in Los Angeles, Kitty was one of the biggest actresses in Hollywood; she couldn’t go anywhere without the accompaniment of a herd of photographers. She and Nathan had moved to a fortress of a home with high shrubbery, security guards, and a gate. It was in that sprawling, state-of-the-art kitchen where they now sat.
“No,” Nellie said softly. “You’re royalty. Sarah is not.”
Kitty returned to the table. Even as her mouth opened to speak, she hesitated. “My father is heir to the Lakes Tobacco Corporation. I have more money than I could ever spend, and I won’t have her thinking she’s less than anyone else. She will have the very best of life. I don’t care what I—we—have to do.”
“We’ll tell her when the time is right,” Nellie said.
“When she’s old enough.”
“When it’s necessary.”
“We’ll know.”
“We’ll decide.”
They went back and forth as they always did—as they always would—about Sarah.
“Together,” Nellie said.
Kitty warned her. “Things happen before you’re ready—most times, before you know they’re happening.”
That was the story of Kitty’s life, anyway.
CHAPTER 39
Kitty
December 1968
The morning before Christmas Eve was interrupted by a knock. Kitty opened the door to find two White men in cheap black suits. “Good day, Mrs. Tate,” the blond-haired one said.
“Can I help you? Who are you? How did you get up here?”
He opened his suit jacket to show an FBI badge. Feeling her heart flutter, Kitty stepped out onto the porch and closed the door behind her. “How can I help you?”
He pulled a file from his briefcase and handed it to the older man, who was smoothing his mustache with his thumb and pointer finger. He had a salesman’s grin.
Nathan opened the door behind them. “What’s this about?”
“We just have a few questions for you and your wife, Mr. Tate.”
“Do we need a lawyer?”
The two agents looked at each other. The older man spoke. “We believe you and your wife may have been victims of fraud. Do you know Cora Rivers?”
“Of course.”
“You know her to be the operator of a charity called the Blair House?”
“The Cora I know worked for me as a film actress,” Nathan said.
Kitty braced herself for questions about the house in Hancock Park and just how many members of Los Angeles’s society women were pretending to be White. Her whole life flashed before her eyes as she envisioned herself and her friends being arrested.
“We’d like to talk to you about some financial matters. May we come inside?”
Nathan ushered them into the living room. Kitty started to the kitchen, but the blond-haired agent stopped her. “We’d like to speak to both of you, ma’am.”
Kitty sat down, trying to hide her need to clutch the arm of the couch.
“Do you handle most of the charitable contributions your household makes, Mrs. Tate?”
“Yes.”
He placed a copy of a cancelled check on the glass coffee table. “Is this your signature?”
“Yes.”