Susan Albert: The Darling Dahlias and the Naked Ladies

But just at that moment, the front door of the house opened and a woman came out onto the porch. She was dressed fit to kill in a stylish fire-engine red dress with a dropped waist and a pleated skirt that came just to the knee. A filmy red scarf was wrapped several times around her neck, the ends flowing loose. A chic red felt hat with a floppy red bow on one side perched on her platinum blond hair. She was wearing black gloves and red suede high-heeled shoes with four-inch French heels and narrow ankle straps, and carried a red-and-black pouch handbag big enough to stuff a live chicken into.

“That’s her,” Lizzy said. “Miss Jamison.”

“Jeepers,” Verna muttered, staring.

The woman came down the steps, looked up and saw them, and gave a little wave before she turned away. Even from a distance, it could be seen that Miss Jamison’s face and eyes were heavily made up, that her mouth was painted bright red, and that she was generously endowed in the bosom department. Very generously.

But as Lizzy waved and smiled in return, she couldn’t help thinking that, unless Darling’s newest resident changed her style, she was going to find it difficult to fit into the local scene. For one thing, while one or two of the smartest ladies might wear a red dress and makeup to an evening party, particularly around the winter holidays, red was not considered an appropriate choice for afternoon shopping. And nobody-not even the younger women-wore that much makeup, ever. If Lizzy knew anything about the residents of Darling, she’d bet dollars to doughnuts that Miss Jamison would cause a titanic stir in Hancock’s Groceries or Mann’s Mercantile or Lima’s Drugs, wherever she was going. In that red dress, she would be as noticeable as a big brown June bug in a plate of grits. Tongues would be wagging around Darling’s supper tables tonight.

Verna’s eyes were wide. “Jamison?” She turned to Lizzy. “Is that the name she’s using?”

“Well, yes. Nona Jean Jamison. As I said, she’s Miss Hamer’s niece. She-”

“I heard what you said. But Nona Jean Jamison has another name, Liz. She is Lorelei LaMotte. Lorelei LaMotte! She’s a Broadway star! A vaudeville dancer!”

Lizzy frowned doubtfully. “Are you sure? She didn’t say a word about a dancing career or being in vaudeville or anything like that. What Miss Jamison told Mr. Moseley was that her mother was Miss Hamer’s younger sister and that she grew up over in Monroeville and visited here in Darling. But that was years and years ago. She said she’d never been back since she was a little girl. She came here from Chicago-one of the suburbs, actually.”

“She didn’t mention being Lorelei LaMotte?”

“Nope.” Lizzy shook her head. “If you ask me, she’s had a rough life, Verna. She’s definitely well preserved and still very pretty, but up close, you can tell that she is definitely looking over her shoulder at forty. I’m not doubting your word, but if she’s a dancer, she-”

“Doubt my word?” Verna was sputtering. “I am right , Liz, and I have a souvenir playbill to prove it. A photograph of Lorelei LaMotte, nearly naked, with her actual signature on it! I’d know that face and figure anywhere. She’s the naughty half of the Naughty and Nice Sisters. They’re dancers.”

“Nearly naked dancers?” Lizzy’s eyes got big, and she turned to look as the woman in red, hips swaying, walked down Camellia Street toward Rosemont. “Where was this, Verna? And when? And wouldn’t you think she’d mention it to Mr. Moseley?”

“It was the Ziegfeld Frolic, back in 1920. Ten years ago, but it seems like yesterday. I remember every minute of it.”

“The Ziegfeld Follies?” Now Lizzy’s mouth fell open. “Seriously?”

“No, not the Follies, the Frolic. The Midnight Frolic. The Follies were designed for a more refined audience.” Verna gave her a wicked grin. “The Frolic was naughtier. The girls were more… um, naked.”

“More naked than the Follies?” Lizzy stared at her, remembering the scanty costumes she had seen in photographs. “But how in the world do you know about this, Verna?”

“Because I was there , you goose! Walter’s cousin Gerald was living in Brooklyn at the time. He took Walter and me to see her do the shimmy.” Walter was Verna’s husband. He’d been killed when he walked out in front of a Greyhound bus on Route 12. “We rode the train to New York and Gerald showed us the sights. The Statue of Liberty, Coney Island, the Brooklyn Bridge, Times Square. And the New Amsterdam Theater, where Mr. Ziegfeld had his shows.”

“I didn’t know you’d been to New York.” Lizzy was impressed. She had never been any farther than Atlanta. “And you’re saying that Miss Jamison starred in the Frolic? She’s the one you went to see?”

“And how!” Verna nodded vigorously. “Only her name was LaMotte, not Jamison. The show was in the rooftop theater at the New Amsterdam, on West Forty-second Street. Fanny Brice and W. C. Fields headlined, and the Naughty and Nice Sisters did this swell song-and-dance act.” She rolled her eyes expressively. “Boy-o-boy, that woman could kick up her heels. And shimmy? You wouldn’t believe it, Liz. She did this song called ‘Shimmyshawobble.’ ” Verna held her arms out straight and shook the rest of herself. “‘I can’t play no piano,’” she warbled, “‘I can’t sing no blues, but I can shimmyshawobble from my head down to my shoes.’”

“Oh, my stars,” Lizzy said, wide-eyed at the sight of Verna doing… what Verna was doing. “Is that what the shimmy looks like?”

She had heard “Shimmyshawobble” on the radio, of course, but she’d had to use her imagination when it came to the shimmy itself, as well as the Turkey Trot, the Bunny Hug, the Texas Tommy, none of which she had ever seen. She had seen the Charleston, though. Vaudeville acts featuring singers, dancers, and comedians sometimes came to the Dance Barn, out on Briarwood Road. Last year, a pair of girls had danced the Charleston. It had caused quite a sensation. The Baptist preacher (who had dropped in to make sure that there were no “licentious acts” that might sully the souls of his flock) even called the sheriff. When Sheriff Burns got there, he asked the girls to give him a private performance, just so he could see what the preacher was complaining about. He declined to press charges.

Verna dropped her arms and stood still. “That’s what the shimmy looks like-except that I’m not any good at it, compared to her . She shook everything, Liz. And I do mean everything , top to bottom and all parts in-between. Walter was bug-eyed. Gerald said he went to the Frolic whenever he could afford it, just to watch a hometown girl do the shimmy.”

“But how did Gerald know that she was a hometown girl?” Lizzy asked reasonably.

“He said he went to school with her. He and Walter both grew up over in Monroeville, you know. Of course, I had no idea that Lorelei LaMotte had an aunt here in Darling, and I’m sure Gerald didn’t, either. He just thought it was a really swell joke. He got a big kick out of seeing her up on stage, all made up and beautiful, shaking her chassis and belting out those songs. He said he’d never in the world have recognized her.”

“Shaking her chassis ?”

Verna laughed at Lizzy’s shocked look. “Well, that’s what she was doing. And you should have seen her costume-what there was of it! For all practical purposes, she was naked. After the show, we went backstage and she signed the playbill for me. ‘For Verna,’ she wrote, ‘with all my love. Lorelei LaMotte.’ This is the same person, Liz. Believe me.”

“What about her sister?” Lizzy asked, by now completely convinced. “The ‘nice’ part of the act. Did she shimmy, too?”