“Irene, are you there?” Sarah called again, feigning confidence. If Irene wasn’t there, she’d have to bluff her way past others the way she’d bluffed past the doorman.
But a voice said, “Who is it?” and Sarah knew she need look no further. She pushed the door open all the way and stepped in to find a narrow room lined on both sides with crudely built shelves that apparently served as dressing tables with mirrors above them. The shelves were littered with the same kinds of grease paints Sarah had found in Anna Blake’s room, along with wigs and brushes, combs and hand mirrors, and scraps of ribbon and hairpins and feathers and all sorts of grooming items. At the far end of the room stood racks of what appeared to be costumes, judging by their garish colors and fabrics.
Three young women in various stages of undress stood in the center of the room. The one who wore a wrapper carelessly draped over her underclothes was staring at her most intently, while the other two seemed merely curious. “Hello, Irene,” Sarah said to the one who was staring. “I’m Sarah Brandt.”
“Do I know you?” she asked warily. She wasn’t old, not in years. Her body still retained its youthful curves and her face showed no signs of dissipation. Her eyes, however, revealed a wealth of experience, and they’d taken Sarah’s measure in one glance. She didn’t seem impressed by what she’d seen.
“I’m a friend of Anna Blake’s,” Sarah tried.
Instantly, the two curious women moved away and busied themselves with the costumes at the far end of the room. Irene looked even warier now, as if she might bolt. Murder had a way of making people cautious, Sarah had learned.
“A newspaper reporter, Webster Prescott, said you knew Anna,” Sarah tried quickly, in an attempt to break through Irene’s understandable reluctance to speak of Anna Blake to a stranger. “I’m trying to find out who killed her, and if you could-”
“You?” she scoffed. “How could you find a killer? And why would somebody like you care who killed Anna anyway?”
Sarah doubted Irene would understand her concern for Nelson Ellsworth even if she’d felt like explaining it, which she didn’t, so she said, “I want to see justice done. The police…” Sarah made a helpless motion with her hand. “I don’t think they care very much about finding the killer.”
“I thought that fellow did it, the one in the newspaper who was her lover,” Irene said. “That’s what the reporter said, anyway.”
Sarah only needed a second to come up with a new lie. “That’s what the police are trying to make everyone believe so they don’t have to exert themselves to find the real killer. But he didn’t do it, and Mr. Prescott is helping me find out who did.”
Irene didn’t care about any of this. “I gotta get ready for the performance,” she said impatiently.
“I don’t want to bother you,” Sarah said. “But I only have a few questions, and I’d be willing to pay you for your time. It’ll only take a few minutes.”
The two women who had been so interested in the costumes suddenly turned their attention back to Sarah. “I knew Anna,” one of them offered.
“You did not,” Irene snapped. “Shut your lying mouth.” Then to Sarah, “Come out here where we can talk.”
She led Sarah back into the corridor. Some more women had arrived and were making their way toward the dressing room. Irene took Sarah’s arm and drew her down to the far end of the corridor, into the shadows where the gaslights on the walls didn’t quite reach.
“I can’t talk long,” she warned. “What do you wanna know?”
“How long did you know Anna?”
“A couple years. Ever since I joined the troupe.”
“She was here when you came?”
“That’s right. Been with them a long time, she said.”
“Why did she stop acting?”
Irene smiled strangely. “You mean why did she stop working here?”
“Yes.”
“She was getting old, you know? Too old for any of the good parts. She could still sing, but they put her in the back row. She didn’t like it, but there wasn’t nothing she could do about it. Then she met this fellow.”
“What fellow?”
“I don’t know his name. He’d wait at the stage door for her. Hadn’t nobody waited for her for a long time. We was all pretty surprised.”
“What did he look like?”
She shrugged. “Skinny. Short beard. Nice clothes. Good manners. A real dandy. He owned the house where she went to live.”
“Mr. Walcott?” Sarah asked in surprise.
“That’s him,” Irene said. “You know him?”
“Yes. Are you saying he was a Stage Door Jimmy?”
Irene smiled condescendingly. “That’s Stage Door Johnny, and yeah, he was one. He’d wait out there after the show and give her flowers or something. Some of the swells, they give you jewelry or really nice things. Flowers ain’t good for nothing, but they’re nice. And Anna, she liked the attention, ’cause she hadn’t had any in a while, her being so old.”
“How old was she?” Sarah asked in amazement.
“Twenty-five, I think. At least, that’s what she’d admit to.”
Sarah didn’t think that was very old, but since the doorman had deemed her too “long in the tooth” to begin an acting career, she had to assume different standards prevailed in the theater. “I’m sorry I interrupted you. Go on. Mr. Walcott was giving her presents.”
Irene shrugged again. “Then next thing you know, she says she’s going to live with this Walcott. Says he’s got a rooming house where she can live for free, and she won’t have to work no more.”
That sounded suspicious. The Walcotts definitely gave the impression the girls were paying customers. Unless Anna was a special case. “How would she support herself if she didn’t work? Even with a free room?” Sarah asked.
Irene made a face. “We had our ideas. Only one kind of place gives you a free room, but we figured she’d be too old to attract much in that trade either. She said it wasn’t that kind of a house, though. Just laughed when I warned her to be careful.”
“Why were you worried about her?”
Irene gave her a pitying look. “A girl has to be careful. Nobody takes care of you for nothing. I figured this fellow wanted something from her, even if I couldn’t figure out what it was. But she wasn’t worried. She told me she was just gonna do what Francine did and end up rich and living in the country.”
“Who’s Francine?”
“She worked here, too. She found a rich fellow to take care of her, or that’s what she said when she left here. Anna said Mr. Walcott introduced Francine to her gentleman friend and he was gonna do the same for her.”
“What does Francine look like?” Sarah asked, thinking of Catherine Porter.
“Short with red hair. Lots of freckles.”
Not the same person. “Do you know a Catherine Porter?” she asked.
Irene shook her head. “Never heard of her… Oh, wait, could that be Katie Porter?”
“I’m sure it could. She’s an actress, too. She has dark hair, very Irish looking.”
“That’s probably her. I haven’t seen her for a while. I thought she’d gone on tour or something. She hasn’t been around.”
“She lives at Mr. Walcott’s house, too,” Sarah offered.
Irene registered surprise. “Does she now? Ain’t that interesting? I guess it really is a brothel, then. Wasn’t Anna surprised?”
“What makes you think it was a brothel?”
“Because of Katie. She never liked being poor. If she couldn’t get work on the stage, she’d find some on her back, if you know what I mean. She never would admit to being a whore, because she only did it now and then, but if you say she was working in that house…” She shrugged again, her meaning clear.
Sarah was certain the Walcotts didn’t operate a brothel, but a woman who’d had experience in both acting and prostitution would certainly be an asset if all the women there were doing what Anna Blake was doing. “Has Mr. Walcott taken an interest in any of the other actresses in the theater?”