Lipstick and Lies (4 page)

“No,” I answered primly. “A personal secretary. The woman who accused me, my employer—er, former employer—Mrs. Snodgrass, is elderly. Gets easily confused.
Thinks
I took a couple of necklaces and bracelets…” I knew next to nothing about robbery or fine jewelry and had been warned to avoid discussing the topics at any length. “Why would I take anything?” I countered hastily. “I’m a skilled secretary. I know the Gregg method of stenography. Studied it at—”

Billie let loose an earthy laugh; Irina gave a knowing giggle.

“Un-huh,” Billie said, nearly choking on another guffaw. “We
all
in here by mistake.”

Their levity rattled my already shaky confidence. I focused on my spoon, watching it stir figure-eights in the watery remains in my bowl. Moments passed like this, until it dawned on me: the Countess had not joined the other women in mocking me. Why not?

I looked up. A private cellblock housed with select inmates was not the only privilege she’d been granted. Jewelry of any sort was taboo in jail—the Hole’s property clerk had collected Liberty’s bracelet from me—yet she was twisting a divine diamond and ruby ring. In a flight of fancy, I imagined she was uneasy because she’d fallen for my cover and thought the fiery band vulnerable.

The ring-turning stopped. “The name of your boss, Mrs. Snodgrass, seems familiar. By chance, might she be a member of a women’s club? The Cosmos Club, perhaps?”

The porridge I had managed to get down sat like a brick. I didn’t know a Mrs. Snodgrass; the name was a random pick. “Hmm…no, Countess. Far as I know, my Mrs. Snodgrass is not a club member anywhere. May I call you Countess, by the way?”

Her eyes brightened and her lips curled in pleasure. “Yes, certainly please. The news reporters have made a mockery out of my using the title. But it is mine to use. It goes back to my great-grandfather, you see…” As quickly as it had appeared the spark left. “Ahh, but that is another story. One not for now, I think.”

A melancholy silence followed. I moved to fill it. “I’ve never met a charm consultant before. What exactly do you cover in your lectures?”

The topic turned out to be far broader than I expected and the morning’s urn of coffee had been drained before she at last concluded her musings.

“How do you get invited to speak at clubs?”
And why would anyone want to sit through one of your lectures?
I nearly added, instead observing, “For example, to the place you mentioned earlier. The Cosmos Club, wasn’t it?”

“The club’s Enrichment Program committee chair, Kiki, ehm, Miss Barclay-Bly, is a dear friend. It was she, Miss Barclay-Bly, who invited me in to speak. The audiences were
fah-
bulously appreciative. I was asked to return several times.” She sent me a significant glance meant to remind me of her illustrious past, adding, “It was Kiki’s sister, Miss Deirdre Barclay-Bly, who introduced me to my fiancé.” She began twisting her bejeweled ring again and her mind seemed to drift away.

Leaving the Countess to her thoughts, I coaxed a few additional facts about their professions from Irina and Billie.

Irina was a maid, employed by a custodial agency. The placements varied but she preferred steady work, like the position she had once held in a grand home with lovely people. She had lost the job, she explained, after too many no-shows, the absences due to injuries inflicted by her former boyfriend. Acne was not responsible for the scars on her face; they were cigarette burns. The bump on her nose was the result of one of the ex-beau’s beatings. Ex because he was dead. Irina had killed him. Shot him straight through the heart in the midst of his drunken rage. “It was either him or me,” was how she put it.

For Billie’s part, life in jail was better than facing her pimp, who by now would have heard about her plan to change careers. Billie wanted to be a performer. Fed up with hooking, she wanted to sing or dance or act. It didn’t matter which, she liked to do it all. And thanks to a loyal customer, a jazz club owner who offered her a start as an attendant in his joint’s powder room, she had nearly snagged a break. Bad luck rarely comes at a good time. In need of funds to buy the uniform required for the job, Billie had solicited a john who turned out to be a cop, the turn of events chucking her off the path to performing and, once again, landing her in jail.

The Countess, having belabored the topic of life as a lecturer, skirted discussion of her secondary career as a spy after confirming that I, like everyone else, had already read the newspaper accounts of “the misunderstanding.” Instead, she launched into her complaints about how the FBI had thwarted her and her “girls,” attempts to obtain legal representation. “The situation is unjust,” she declared.

My view wasn’t solicited, and I didn’t give it, but I thought she might as well quit her whining. Her treatment was governed by wartime rules and, according to what Dante had said, the government’s position was not likely to change anytime soon.

Our breakfast hour over, we shoved our trays back through the food slot. Irina and Billie strolled to the opposite end of the cellblock, where Billie had left her cigarettes; I accepted the Countess’ invitation to resume our places at the table.

Immediately, she leaned toward me. “Like you, I am wrongly accused,” she whispered. “I am an FBI pawn, in jail due to a breach of trust. People are working to obtain my release, but the process is slow. We are stymied at every turn. My fiancé, Mr. Butler, he was there when I was promised immunity. He will act as a witness, corroborate what they said.
Immunity!”

I bent closer. “Oh?”

The Countess flicked her cellmates a stern look. “Those girls don’t understand the nuances of my case. They think everyone thrown in jail, even those who are guilty, claim they are innocent.”

“Yeah, I noticed.”

“I am not guilty,” she said staunchly, “and the government’s treatment of me goes beyond unreasonable. They have cut me off from the outside world. They censor what I read, delivering only news reports meant to let me know how badly the war goes for the Axis, how I am despised by the press, and also by the public. They allow no visitors, not a lawyer, not my fiancé, it is only their agents who come.”

Her gaze flitted to Billie and Irina again. “While I have been grateful for their company, I have been without an equal with whom I might discuss more sophisticated and urgent matters.” Tears welled in her eyes before she could turn away.

While I had no sympathy for a fascist spy, particularly one who also came across as a bigoted snob, I saw my break. Reaching across the table, I patted her hand lightly. “It’s none of my business, but if it would make you feel better to discuss things…”

She pulled her hand from under mine and dabbed her eyes. “You are the only one who thinks it is none of your business. The press, the public, everyone would like to crucify me. Even the other prisoners would like to see me strung up. They call me names, Judas, skunk,
verrater
,
hure
, traitor of traitors, names you have not heard before.” Ah, but I had. Last night. “But what do they know?”

The Countess foraged in her jumpsuit pockets, extracting a pack of Camels and a mother-of-pearl holder, promptly stuffing it with one of the cigarettes. She took a drag and, scrunching her mouth sideways, let a long stream of smoke escape. “What I would like them to know is that it is the proud and pure all-American FBI who are the traitors. It is they who have deceived me.”

“What do you mean?”

“I have done the citizens of America a wonderful service. I helped the FBI to entrap a bona fide ring of spies. I should be honored, not punished!”

She should be committed to a loony bin
was what I was beginning to think.

“But what did they do?” she went on. “After promising that I would receive special consideration they lock me behind bars like a common criminal.”

I glanced at the ruby and diamond ring, then nodded in the general direction of her cell. “But your special needs and comforts
are
being met.”

“The privacy? The little luxuries?” she whispered in a shaky voice. “Not enough. Not nearly enough.”

The four cells in our cellblock spilled into the common area, a caged open space shared by the inmates. It was where we took our meals and where, before I retired for my nap, the Countess and I had huddled in private. Unfortunately, before I was able to bring up the industrial spy, Otto Renner, Irina and Billie returned to our table, bringing the intimate exchange to an end. Afterwards, I had moseyed back to my bunk under the guise of wanting to read. What I really wanted was some quiet time to digest what I had learned in our initial session, and to plan my next move.

The doors to our cells had been opened in the morning and, barring any trouble, would remain that way until lock-down this evening.
Personality Unlimited
in hand, I stepped out of my cell and lingered at the threshold. Across the common area, outside the bars, a matron in a white shirt and dark skirt was on routine inspection. She scrutinized our activities from the catwalk, a narrow walkway encircling the common area’s perimeter. Our monitor had beady eyes and a sour, pursed mouth.

“All okay in there?” The matron threw me a severe look. I answered with a cooperative nod.

Irina was lying on her back on the floor. She did not reply. The matron asked more directly, “Irina, you all right?”

Irina’s eyes were closed. They flew open. “Uh-huh, yes, Matron. How nice you ask. I work on my posture. Must to lie here ten minutes. I do this and Countess she says I will soon stand straight and tall, like…” She hesitated, an image forming, and smiled broadly. “Like man who wear tall hat and lead band, marching in parade.”

To my surprise, the matron returned Irina’s smile, exposing an unfortunate top gum line with more open spaces than teeth. The smile vanished. “Hmm, improvin’ yourself is a good thing, but watch out. Don’t go letting Hitler’s handmaiden in there boss you ’round too much or else you’ll be marchin’ straight-backed, imitating those goose-steppers in jackboots we been seein’ parading through the newsreels lately.”

Irina rolled her eyes, and the guard swept her gaze next door to where the Countess and Billie were talking. I stepped into the common area, eager to take a look myself.

The top bunk of the Countess’ iron-framed bed had been removed, giving her quarters an added sense of spaciousness. She sat, primly perched, near one end of the mattress. Behind her, Billie was brushing her hair into a scraggly ponytail, holding it this way and that as if trying to find just the right style for doing time. While Billie fussed, the Countess chattered incessantly, her voice muffled by the bowed position of her head.

No wonder they had isolated her from the others, I thought, taking stock of her booty of special privileges, noting that besides providing docile cellmates and allowing her to wear jewelry, the Bureau had supplied her with a small stack of books. And while we all wore our own footwear, in my case, cotton socks and saddle shoes, the Countess wore leather pumps in a snappy red. The portion of her leg visible beneath the hem of her navy jumpsuit shimmered. My jaw dropped. Was she also wearing silk stockings?

At a question from Billie, she raised her head. Her pretentious voice suddenly carried and we were treated to an ersatz hair-care tip, currently all the vogue in Europe. “Chamomile tea and lemon juice for color. Beer or raw eggs for body,” she recommended.

With a snort, the matron lumbered off. Irina remained on the floor. She had closed her eyes again.

“Heard you talking with the matron, Irina,” I said. “I hadn’t noticed a problem. Something wrong with your posture?”

Her lids fluttered. She smiled broadly. “Miss Pucci. How nice you up. No, it is not problem. Countess she say, way we walk and pose it tell much about us. I got habit always to stand one-legged, like stork, one foot wrapped round other. Look insecure, Countess say, like I going to topple over. I try instead stand proud, hands at sides, feet flat on ground. Make better impression.”

I’d been favoring slumped shoulders, myself. I straightened up.

Billie tucked a final tendril of hair into the curve of the upsweep she had created. “There you go, Countess honey.”

The former spy patted her hair. “How verr-y clever of you, Billie.” She crossed the seven-by-twelve-foot cell and paused before a metal plate bolted to the wall above the sink. She tilted her head, straining to see her reflection. “Exquisite! Billie, this time you have ahb-solutely outdone yourself.”

She stooped and casually dragged out a fur coat from beneath her bed. I stifled a gasp. Mink, I guessed, observing its glossy sheen, watching as the Countess, with the aplomb of a bullfighter, swept the coat like a cape around her.

“A little cah-old in here, don’t you know.” She sashayed into the common area, the fur’s hem swinging heavily at her sides. Her practiced eye swooped over me. “Now, whatever shall we do for you, Miss Lewis?”

I wanted to say, “Lend me the fur. Anyone would look like a million bucks in it!” But before I could react she zeroed in on my hair.

“Ahh, so interesting,” she said, lifting a small section. “The orange coloring shows flair and is lovely contrasted with the porcelain complexion and green eyes. The jagged cut…” Her hand cupped her chin while, squinting, she eyed me top to bottom. “Well, it is unusual and the short length is good atop your trim figure. The Untamed Look I would call it. Perhaps, when you are out of here you will consider a henna rinse to deepen this flamboyant shade into a rich auburn. More sophisticated, don’t you know?” She reached for my hands. “Your nails, hmm…” She scrutinized my self-manicure, then flipped my hands palms-up. Her eyebrows arched. “These are not the hands of a thief.”

If she was fishing for a reaction, she got one. Blood rushed to my face; I felt suddenly hot. “I tried telling you this morning. I didn’t do it. I was set up.”

Her eyes narrowed and something in her look said, I don’t believe you.

Billie hooted with delight. “Like I said before, honey, we all been set up.”

The clanking of keys and the slamming of metal signaled the return of the vinegar-faced guard. “Preacher’s here to see you, Irina. C’mon out of there.” She jimmied a key into the lock of the cellblock door. “You, too, Billie, c’mon. Your lawyer says he’s got news.”