China Dolls

RUBY: Sunny-Side Up

We’d been in Miami for eight months. I dumped the rubber king after he proposed. (No one would tie me down.) So we were back in our beach hotel-happy with our suite of rooms and attentive doormen. Grace and I were playing the Beachcomber. We had a group of harmless stage-door Johnnies, and we basked in the glow of our mutual success. Grace’s body-skinny legs and big tits-had finally caught up to the time and place. Every magazine and newspaper wanted to photograph her, even more than they did me. I didn’t let it bother me too much. Tommy had recently turned four and would be going to kindergarten the following year. Helen started to plan. “Soon Eddie and I will be a broken mirror rejoined-a husband and wife together again. I don’t want to return to San Francisco, and none of us wants to be on the road again. I’m going to look for a house.” It sounded good to Grace and me, and we asked her to look for something for us too.

Club business was bigger than ever as men returned stateside. We survived. Bring on the drinks! Bring on the girls! I took up with a Cuban sugar king, and he introduced Grace to a pineapple prince-also Cuban-named Mario, who was sweet enough. (He and Grace sure could mambo.) The sugar king proposed to me, so I immediately gave him the boot. “I’m not the marrying kind,” I said, and I meant it. A week later, Mario proposed to Grace. “Nothing wrong in marrying for money,” Helen advised. “You’ll be set for life.” Helen had once said something similar to Grace about marrying Monroe. Grace was never going to marry this guy either. Mario wasn’t a bad sort; she just didn’t love him.

On Christmas Eve, Helen packed away her photo of Lai Kai, and then off we went to the airport. When she spotted Eddie, she swooped up Tommy and pointed. “There’s your daddy!” Eddie looked as cool as ever. He’d been mustered out of the Army with a standard suit, a pair of shoes, an overcoat, and an old-fashioned trilby. He moved just like he always had-with inimitable grace-but somehow he seemed a little lost. He hugged us one by one. He shook Tommy’s hand, careful not to scare him. We climbed into the rubber king’s convertible-I wasn’t about to return it!-and drove to our hotel. In the rearview mirror, I saw Eddie’s eyes shifting from side to side. A horn blared next to us, and he jumped so high he nearly flew out of the car.

A small tree with white flocking and red balls sat on the table in our shared living area. Helen was obviously thrilled Eddie was home, and he acted happy to be with all of us, but the poor guy just wasn’t the same. He tried mightily to put up a good front, though. When Tommy worried that Santa wouldn’t find him because we didn’t have snow or a chimney like he saw in his picture books, Eddie hammered five nails into the windowsill, hung our stockings, put some cookies on a saucer, and promised, “Santa will come right through this window.” That night, Tommy slept with Grace and me so the married couple could have some time alone-to talk. The next morning, Helen opened our door and called, “Merry Christmas!”

Eddie gave us French perfume, Hermès silk scarves, and the softest kid gloves you can imagine. Grace, Helen, and I had shopped together, so we didn’t have a lot of surprises: straw purses embellished with appliquéd tropical fruits and flowers, earrings, bangles, and-now that shortages and rationing were over-brightly colored skirts with fluffy petticoats. Grace and I gave Eddie bathing trunks, shorts, a Panama hat, and sandals-to welcome him to Miami. Helen’s present: a stylish tuxedo. “So you can dance again,” she said. Eddie stared at it for the longest time before trying it on.

Tommy had to be about the luckiest little cuss that year. His mom and his aunties gave him clothes, coloring books, and toy trucks. In France, Eddie had bought a set of antique tin soldiers for his son to play with backstage. Tommy, overcoming his initial shyness, climbed on Eddie’s lap and pronounced this “the best Christmas ever.” Maybe for him, but I thought his dad might burst into tears.

AT THE CLUB, while Helen was backstage with Tommy, Eddie danced the bolero, tango, and rumba with customers to try to get back in the swing of things. Soon he and Helen (and the kid too, of course) started staying after the last show so they could practice their old routines and come up with some new ones. (They didn’t have a traditional marriage, but they did love each other, and they’d always been fabulous dance partners.) Eddie was sober and physically strong, but Grace and I could hear him prowling around the suite’s living room all night. In the morning, Helen, Eddie, and Tommy would emerge from their room looking exhausted. Helen said Eddie often woke up shivering and drenched in sweat. He was nervous and jittery, cringing any time he heard a loud noise and during the fireworks on New Year’s Eve. By now my friends and I had all suffered. Time, love, and companionship had helped each of us. I hoped the same would happen for Eddie, and his anxious state would pass.

In February 1946, Grace and I headlined the Miami branch of the Latin Quarter. A week into our run, the manager came backstage after the second show and told us two men at table ten-the best in the house-wanted to see us. Grace and I dressed in gowns, fluffed our hair, reapplied lipstick, and then went out to see just who they were. My body was as slippery as an eel under my sequined gown as I slithered through the tables. My skin was translucent. A sparkling rhinestone clip held my gardenias in place.

“It’s Lee Mortimer!” I squealed in surprise and delight, grabbing Grace’s arm. “He’s the one who sponsored me to get out of Topaz!”

Lee looked just the same: tall forehead, bright white teeth, a cigarette held between his forefinger and middle finger with an air of casual sophistication. Next to him sat a big Irish ape of a guy with a half-chewed cigar clamped in his mouth. His name was Tom Ball.

“I wanted Tom to see you, Ruby,” Lee said. Once a sponsor, always a sponsor? “And of course everyone’s heard of the Oriental Danseuse-”

“Show business,” I interrupted before he could get too carried away with Grace. “One minute you’re up…” I slowly lifted one of my legs up, up, up until my sequined skirt slipped into my crotch and my leg extended above my head. (“All the way to high heaven” is what Lee would later write about that move.) “The next minute you’re down,” I purred as I brought my gold-satin high heel back to the floor. “I ought to know, darling. My career has truly been a roller-coaster ride.”

Yes, even after all we’d been through, I still wanted to outshine Grace.

Lee gulped. “You gals have been in Miami long enough,” he managed to get out. “You’re ready for New York, and New York is ready for you. Tom here is opening a club called the China Doll. We’re down here to lure you up there.”

I sat up in my chair. Return to New York? Finally!

“We want to build the whole show around the two of you,” Tom added in a voice that grated like a cement mixer. “We’re calling it Slant-Eyed Scandals. It’s going to be the biggest, costliest, most elaborate Oriental floor show seen anywhere, and it will stand up to any all-white show on Broadway. We open in eight weeks.”

Grace signaled to a waiter, whispered in his ear, and then slid her chair closer to Tom. “Who else do you have?”

“We’ve got Keye Luke, Charlie Chan’s Number One Son, to emcee.”

Grace and I arched our eyebrows. Charlie Chan’s Number One Son? So trite. So stereotypical.

“He’s a terrific singer, for your information,” Tom said. “I’m getting the best of the best.” He was also negotiating with the Lim Sisters, the Merry Mahjongs, Bernice Chow, George Louie, and Ming and Ling.

“We’ve played with all those folks,” Grace said with a shrug. “You make it sound like just another Oriental follies.”

She could be quite the smart aleck, and she peppered him with questions, but I could see she wanted this as much as I did. Her delay tactics were explained when she announced, “Ah, here’s Helen, our road manager. Let’s see what she has to say.”

Helen assessed the situation and explained that she would handle logistical details that couldn’t be left to Sam Bernstein. Her first question was where would Grace and I reside.

“Wait a minute! You’re coming too,” I blurted.

“I can’t go,” Helen said. “Eddie and I are putting our act back together.”

I turned to the men. “You can’t have an Oriental theme without the Chinese Dancing Sweethearts.”

“Haven’t heard of them,” Tom growled.

“Then call Charlie Low at the Forbidden City,” Grace said.

But Tom, bullheaded, took a hard line. “We’ve already got a father-son comedy duo,” he said. “I don’t want another family team. It’s a nightclub. People go to nightclubs for fantasy, not to see husbands and wives.”

“They don’t dance like a husband and wife,” I assured them.

“He’s been off the stage for too long,” Lee objected.

“He was in the war!” Grace exclaimed. “Where’s your patriotism?”

“Lee, Tom, sweet ones, let me give this to you straight,” I declared. “Grace and I won’t go to New York unless you hire Helen and Eddie too.”

The two men exchanged glances. Could we really be such prima donnas? YES!

“All right,” Tom sighed. “We’ll check them out with Charlie. If everything’s on the up-and-up, then we’ll call Sam to work out the financial details.”

Sam negotiated $1,000 a week each for Princess Tai and the Oriental Danseuse. The Chinese Dancing Sweethearts would earn $750 a week. We’d be rolling in dough. Oh, and no George Louie. Grace still held a blood grudge against him and didn’t want him around. That was fine by me. I’d purposely locked away from my mind what had happened to me-the internment camp and who might have turned me in-and I’d continue to do it. No questions, no bitter accusations, no arguments; a thousand bucks a week, New York, stardom. Brighter stars ahead.

WE ARRIVED IN New York City on February 11, seven weeks before the China Doll’s grand opening. We settled into a three-bedroom suite with a small living room at the Hotel Victoria at Fifty-First and Seventh. Lee Mortimer swept Grace and me on a champagne-bubble tour of the Stork Club, Copacabana, Leon and Eddie’s, and the Rainbow Room. We met Clark Gable, Noël Coward, Hedy Lamarr, Lena Horne, Betty Grable, and Gene Kelly. We listened to bands play “Brazil,” “You’d Be So Nice to Come Home To,” “That Old Black Magic,” and “Avalon.” We saw Milton Berle (who we heard made ten thousand dollars a night), Danny Thomas (the nicest guy), and Jimmy Durante (a hoot and a half). We danced purely for fun and showed those big-city folks what was what.

And, man, were we dressed. We shopped like maniacs, throwing out our tropical prints and exchanging them for sophisticated city dresses. When Lee asked us, “How much do you need to buy new shoes?” and we answered, “Three dollars,” he laughed. “You can’t buy a pair of shoes in New York for three dollars.” He opened his wallet and gave us each fifty bucks. We bought black satin ankle-strap sandals and black suede platform pumps. He gave us even more money to buy frocks with hemlines that covered our calves.

“You’ve got the look, baby,” Lee told Grace. “You’re a perfect piece of cheesecake in the city that invented cheesecake.” He encouraged Grace to drop her neckline to showcase the cleavage that had once embarrassed her. He gave us the skinny on what to do with our handbags. “Dames who carry their purses while dancing demonstrate that they’re more at home in a dance hall than a nightclub.” He taught us the ropes: don’t go to a dressy place wearing day clothes; don’t go to a dump in evening togs; don’t complain about the bill, because you were a sucker to go there in the first place. He showed us how to spot and then steer clear of out-of-towners.

When he took us to Sardi’s, he suggested we speak loudly, so other patrons could eavesdrop on us. Dorothy Kilgallen, the gossip columnist, wrote: “What two lovely denizens of the night are building reputations for their biting repartee and devastating treatment of 52nd Street wolves? Lee Mortimer calls the enchanting Princess Tai his ‘little minx.’ ” Then, on to Grace: “Never one to pick a single bloom when she can have a bouquet, the Oriental Danseuse is known to attend many First Nights on the arms of different lucky gents. Those swells better watch out for her nails, though. Meow!” As a result of that squib, Grace’s nails became so famous that Sam got her a contract with a cosmetics company as the first Chinese nail model in the country. I said I was happy for her, but it was a bitter pill to gag down.

Of course, I cut my usual wide swath. I spent time with Xaviar Cugat, who was between wives, before moving on to Louis Prima, who was married. Under the headline ROMANCE, Walter Winchell scribed: “What unfortunate bandleaders have had their hearts broken by a girl who should change her name to Jezebel?” When I read that, I laughed and laughed.

Where were Helen, Eddie, and Tommy while we were tearing up the town? Either in our hotel, where Eddie could avoid the grinding gears and honking horns of prewar taxis, or at the studio space they’d rented to work on their act. Grace and I stopped in one evening to see the new routine Eddie had choreographed to “It’s Been a Long, Long Time.” It was typical Eddie-beautiful, intricate, and graceful. He still suffered from sweats and nightmares, but I was convinced he’d knock the socks off those New Yorkers once they saw him onstage.

IN MID-MARCH, AND completely out of the blue, I received a phone call from my mother. I hadn’t spoken to her in ten years. She skipped the “I missed yous” and “how have you beens,” and got right to it. My parents had been released from Leupp and had decided to go back to Japan immediately. “You can’t do that,” I told her in Japanese when I saw Grace listening. “We haven’t even seen each other yet.”

“We will have a long voyage together-”

“I’m not going to Japan.”

My mother balked at that. “Have you forgotten who you are?” she asked. “Have you forgotten that the Americans killed Hideo, and Yori is dead because he fought for them?”

“Yori was in the most highly decorated regiment in the history of the armed forces,” I told her. “He earned the Medal of Honor. You should be proud of him.”

She said, “Your father and I and the others in the camp celebrated the emperor’s birthday. We ate our eggs sunny-side up, because they looked like the flag of Japan. When we were told the war was over, your father asked why the Japanese flag wasn’t flying over the camp.”

By the time I hung up, I was sobbing. Grace put her arms around me.

“Do you want to go to San Francisco and see them off?” she asked.

“No,” I replied with a sharp shake of my head. “I can’t get it out of my mind that they might actually have been spies.”

“But you can’t be sure about that-”

“They never got a trial, but I’m no closer to the truth about them.”

“Other people were sent to camps, including you,” she pointed out, trying to comfort me, “and it was terrible. Maybe they’re going home because they’re fed up. Maybe they’re going home because they always wanted to go home. You told me that the first day we met.”

“True, but I can’t honestly say if my parents are innocent, can I? I want to believe they are.” I dabbed my eyes with a handkerchief. “You and Helen are all the family I have left.”

I went to bed and wept for hours. But the next morning… New York!

What else could I do? I needed to survive.

GRACE: Woo Woo of the Week

Two weeks before the China Doll opened, all the headliners met for blocking and dress rehearsals. The club was just a half block from our hotel. Where the Forbidden City played up an imperial China décor with plenty of red, gold, and clutter, the China Doll, a few steps below street level, was sleek, modern, and first-class all the way. The walls were pale blue with simple Chinese scenes painted in white. Dark blue lanterns hung from the ceilings.

The ponies and showgirls shared one dressing room; as headliners, Ruby, Helen, and I each had our own dressing room. Settling in, I heard a familiar voice at my door: “Hi, Grace. What’s cooking?” It was Bessie, the eldest of the Lim Sisters. Ella and Dolores stood on either side of her, and one foot back, just as they did when they performed. Soon, others arrived: the Merry Mahjongs with their whirling acrobatics, Bernice Chow with her big voice, Ming and Ling with their hillbilly act. It was great to see them all.

We met the director, Donn Arden-gayer than a sweet potato and famous for mounting extravaganzas with snazzy costumes. Ruby was given a new bubble and fans made from ostrich feathers. The fabric for Helen’s gown was dyed in tea until the color matched her skin, then seamstresses covered the dress in rhinestones. My costumes were the most glamorous and expensive of my career, including one made from fifteen yards of monkey fur imported from Hong Kong. Real diamonds were sewn onto the tips of my shoes, so my feet would sparkle when I danced.

The China Doll was to be a regular United Nations. Mr. Ball, an Irishman through and through, hired Jewish choreographers, composers, and writers to come up with good-fresh-material. We had two bands: one to play the show and a Latin band to pack the joint for dancing on weekends. A young guy named Lenny Bruce would do a comedy routine after the last show. Mr. Ball found Chinese cooks, a Jewish maître d’, and Puerto Rican waiters, dishwashers, cigarette girls, and hatcheck girls, who would all pretend to be Chinese. The ponies? It was just as hard as, if not harder than, it had been in San Francisco to find local Chinese girls willing to work in a club. More Chinese lived in the area, but that also meant the community was more conservative, so Mr. Arden and Mr. Ball poached a bunch of gals from Charlie and other club owners out west. Although Charlie had once labeled his glamour girls “Chinese” to protect them, all the entertainers at the China Doll were labeled “Chinese” so no one would be reminded about the dropping of the atomic bombs.

On opening night, the place was packed with Broadway and Hollywood celebrities, critics and press agents, and Manhattanites and suburbanites. Our first show was clicking. Ming and Ling clowned and crooned. “Lee Mortimer’s China Dolls”-as the ponies came to be called-were sharp. Backstage, Eddie-slick as a cat’s whiskers in his evening dress-listened warily as Helen reassured him. He truly was one of the most handsome men ever to walk the earth, but I could see he was nervous.

I recited the usual good wishes. “Break a leg!”

As their music started, my heart was full. Kiss me once, and kiss me twice, and kiss me once again… Was there anyone in the audience who didn’t respond to that postwar ballad-so romantic it made you want to cry every time you heard it? Helen floated onstage, her gown flowing, her arms extended. Eddie was supposed to be right behind her. Instead, he stared out at her, slack-jawed, his body shaking. Helen completed the circle that would bring her and Eddie face-to-face with the audience. When she realized she was alone, her smile wavered.

“Eddie,” I urged in a whisper, “you’ve got to get out there.”

He shook his head.

“Come on, Eddie,” I prodded. “Helen’s alone.”

But he was paralyzed. He’d survived the war, but he wasn’t the same. Shell-shocked. He’d done well during rehearsals, but now he was crippled by stage fright. Onstage, Helen kept dancing-Ginger minus her Fred. I remembered back to my final audition at the Forbidden City, when I froze and Eddie helped me.

“We’ll do our old routine,” I whispered. “Two girls and one man. Hear it? The tempo is a little slower, but we can do it.”

“No.”

“It’s easy, Eddie. We practiced this ten thousand times, and we’ve got that neat trick at the end. All you have to do is count in your head. Say it with me. One, two, three, four.”

“Five, six, seven, eight,” he mumbled.

I took his hand. “One, two, three, four. Ready? Here we go.”

Together we glided out. The audience applauded. The Oriental Danseuse was making an early appearance! I heard Eddie counting under his breath. I whispered through my stage smile, “You’re doing great.” I prayed that Helen would decipher what we were doing. Eddie and I did a couple of turns from the old routine, slowly moving closer to Helen. When she changed her steps-awkwardly to be sure-to fall in with us, I relaxed a little. Eddie released me and took Helen in his arms. Back and forth we went, weaving together and apart, but Eddie was terribly stiff, his face expressionless. Our grand finale, when Eddie lifted us off the ground and spun Helen and me, was a huge success. We took our bows, with Helen and me each putting a hand on Eddie’s back to push him down.

When we came offstage, almost the entire cast was there. They parted to let us through. Everyone loved Eddie, and they offered congratulations. “That was great!” “You still have your magic!” “You slayed it, buddy!” Eddie kept his head down, refusing to acknowledge the sympathetic lies. Helen tried not to cry.

Then: “A Chinese Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers act won’t work if Fred is a clod.” It was Mr. Ball, and he proceeded to berate Eddie in front of us. But there was no time to defend Eddie, because it was opening night. The show must go on! The Lim Sisters were a smash with their new fruity Carmen Miranda headdresses and full ruffled skirts and sleeves, and the audience went ape for Bernice’s rendition of “Let’s Do It.” Our reviews were over the top. The Merry Mahjongs earned “Wow of the Week,” Ruby grabbed “Best Undressed Doll of the Week” (with a special note about her “gorgeous chassis”), and I snagged “Woo Woo of the Week.” That skunk columnist Ed Sullivan, who, it turned out, worked at the same paper as Lee Mortimer, wrote in his “Little Old New York” column: “It’s a slant-sational show. The wolves brayed wolf whistles at all the China dolls.” Mercifully, no mention was made of the Chinese Dancing Sweethearts.

THE MORE WE tried to help Eddie, the worse he got. He forgot how to lead. He forgot his lines. He forgot how to count in his head. It was heartbreaking to see, and, after six weeks, Mr. Ball notified Eddie and Helen that he wouldn’t be renewing their contract. “It’s just as well,” she said in resignation. “These new people can’t get Ruby’s makeup right.” Then one of those darned Merry Mahjongs volunteered to help, saying, “I’ll dance with you.” Chan-chan and Helen, with assistance from Mr. Arden, put together an endearing routine, in which Chan-chan’s only role was to partner Helen, lifting and whirling her so she looked like an angel. Helen, never one to trust good fortune, decided to work as Ruby’s dresser as well. Eddie reacted to all this by going back to dipping his bill, staying out all night, and coming home in the morning still boiled to the eyes. Helen was worried sick, and Ruby and I worried about both of them.

The club was rocking, though, jammed wall-to-wall with customers. The line to get in went around the corner. We hummed with one-shot business as servicemen, many of whom had first been enchanted by the charms of Oriental girls in Japan, the Philippines, and China, returned to the States and sought out those same beauties before going back to Florida, Kentucky, or Maine. Even the Smart Set got a kick out of seeing Oriental girls swinging, shaking, and jiggling to Latin rhythms-so much so that some wags began calling the club “El Chino Doll.” And Ed Sullivan? Like most Americans, he put his suspicions about Japanese Americans behind him and became a reliable chronicler of Ruby’s every move.

And I was living the life I’d dreamed of in Plain City. When I stepped onstage, everyone in the club stopped to watch me. I demanded attention, and I got it. I had lots of admirers. They sent so many flowers that sometimes my dressing room smelled like a florist shop. I shunned the special house drinks for champagne and developed a love of caviar. I went to parties until the sun came up. I slept most of the day. The next two years were a helluva ride, but it can be lonely at the top without someone special to love you.

HELEN: A Camellia Drops

It was 1948, and the China Doll had been open twenty-six months. On the surface, things still seemed to be clicking, but champagne living had lost its fizz. The China Doll-“New York’s Favorite Rumba-vous”-and other nightclubs were drying up, because people stopped spending money like there was no tomorrow. Our boys had come home, married their sweethearts, gotten jobs, and moved to the suburbs, where they drank martinis, bounced children on their laps, and watched television. Those people were mortgage poor-and they had to save for washers, dryers, lawn mowers, and power tools-so some nights we performed our hearts out, giving everything we had, to a half-filled house.

Reporters began to ask our ages. We always gave the same rehearsed reply: “Age is a number, and I have an unlisted one.” In truth, Grace was twenty-seven, Ruby was twenty-nine, and I was thirty. A female performer is a lot like a camellia, which doesn’t fade, wilt, drop petal by petal, or brown on the stem. At the height of its beauty, a camellia drops whole from the bush. You can’t escape aging no matter how talented you are. We still looked beautiful-perfectly ripe-but after ten years as entertainers, we weren’t young or naïve anymore. We were like carps stuck in a dry rut-or, as lo fan might say, world-weary showbiz broads.

You cannot wait to sink a well until you’re thirsty nor can you wait to make a cloak until it starts to rain. When Mr. Arden announced he was leaving New York for Las Vegas, where he promised to stage the splashiest productions in that town’s history, he asked us to join him. Mr. Ball, not to be one-upped and possibly taking advantage of his rumored “connections,” proposed taking the China Doll floor show to Las Vegas too. That gave Ruby the idea of putting together her own small Oriental revue and trying the gambling city as well. “I’ll call it Ruby and the Dancing Chopstix,” she said. I’d always seen her as birdlike, but by now I understood she was more like a hawk than a skylark. I couldn’t imagine her ever slowing down or retiring. As for Grace… Mario, the pineapple prince, had recently come up from Miami, bearing a thirty-thousand-dollar platina fox fur and an engagement ring. She’d never been all that faithful to him-and, let’s be honest, she didn’t love him-but after all this time, she considered his offer.

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” she said, which made me sad for her. The burdens of her mother and father had been lifted from her and she’d achieved great success, but she was still missing the one thing she’d longed for since the day I met her: romantic love. It seemed all her hopes for a true happily-ever-after had faded after Joe broke up with her. “I sure don’t want to be alone down there with just Mario,” she said. “Why don’t you and Tommy come too? You could go into real estate,” and it seemed like a great idea, because I had long handled our living arrangements and could spot a defect a mile away. “I bet in six months you’ll be riding around in your own Rolls-Royce.”

Ruby enticed me with a different plan. “The Mahjongs have agreed to be in my revue. Wouldn’t you rather keep dancing with Chan-chan than go to Miami?”

“I love you both,” I said, “and I want to be with both of you, but I need to think about what will be best for Eddie and Tommy.”

At the beginning of June, my parents came to New York to meet up with Monroe, who’d finally been released from Walter Reed, and to see Tommy, Eddie, and me. Through the miracle of penicillin, my brother had survived his lobar pneumonia. However, he’d been sick a long time-so long that he’d fallen in love with and married his nurse, a girl from Indiana, who happened to be an Occidental. Aiya!

Mama, Baba, and the newlyweds reserved a table for the show. They ordered dinner and clapped at all the right places. Grace, Ruby, Tommy, and I peeked out of the curtain to stare at the bride, who was as white as white on rice, or however that American saying goes. My parents did their Chinese best to pretend she wasn’t at their table. My marrying Eddie-who also sat with my relations-was nothing compared to marrying a lo fan.

When the first show ended, Ruby and Grace changed into gowns and came to my dressing room. They’d promised to stand by me when I met the family. Baba entered, followed by the others until the room was jammed. Eddie pulled the bench out from under my makeup table, took Mama’s elbow, and helped her to the bench, where she sat down and tucked her bound feet out of view. Baba congratulated us on the show, but mainly he gushed over me, telling me what a great performer I was. Maybe I truly had risen above my brother!

Then Baba spotted my son. He stiffened as he took in Tommy’s hair and complexion. He went on to handle the introductions anyway, ending with “And this is Maryanne Lively-”

“Baba, her name is Maryanne Fong now,” Monroe cut in good-naturedly. He put a protective arm around his pretty wife’s waist and pulled her close. He was corpse-thin but so happy. “She’s your daughter-in-law now.”

Into the subsequent silence, Mama finally spoke. “We want you to come home, Helen. We want to reunite with Eddie and our grandson too.”

“Yes, it’s time for you to quit this life,” Baba agreed. “A man does not travel to distant places if his parents are still alive.”

He may have been trying to display generosity and forgiveness, but his words were like nails in my eyes. “I’m not a man. I’m only a daughter-and worse, a widow-as you’ve forever made very clear.”

“Considering you’re a daughter, you should be grateful we want you to come home.” Baba bristled. “This is an opportunity for us to be a family again. To live in the compound-”

“I agree with your father,” Mama picked up. “You can’t spend your life powdering some woman’s rear end and dancing around. When you have a child, you can’t live like a vagabond.”

Mama had a point, but then Baba went on. “You need to be a proper mother to Tommy. It’s true, he might be more comfortable in another family. He’s a mongrel, but at least he’s a son.”

Baba had made a tactical error. He could treat me as a worthless daughter for all eternity, but I’d never allow him to hurt my son. Always place righteousness above family loyalty.

I turned to Eddie. “Let’s go to Miami and buy a house through the G.I. Bill.”

Grace smirked (she’d won), Ruby looked peeved, but Eddie shook his head no.

“I want to go to San Francisco,” he said. “Charlie will take me back. Maybe I’ll be fine at the Forbidden City.” He paused to let me digest the idea. Then, “I saw too many people die to be anything other than who I am. I can be myself in San Francisco.”

My lungs emptied of air. “I don’t want to lose you, Eddie.” In an abrupt reversal, I added, “I’ll even go back to the compound, if we can stay together. I’ll do anything for you, Eddie, because you did everything for me.”

For a second, I stepped out of my body and sensed how strange it had to be for the others to witness such an intimate moment-my husband practically announcing his preference for men and my trying to hold our marriage together, even if it was in the oblique manner of a proper Chinese couple, in so tiny a room. And I’ll say this: nothing that was said came as a surprise to my relatives, but that Maryanne sure didn’t know what had hit her.

“A family without a woman is like a man without a soul,” Eddie recited. My parents nodded, happy that they had him on their side, and recognizing, at last, that he had come from lineage as good as, if not better than, ours. “I love you and Tommy, but you don’t need to stay with me out of duty or obligation. I’ll buy a house for the two of you. What city you choose is your business, but you might want to consider Los Angeles, where you’ll be closer to-”

Tommy’s real father…

“-me,” Eddie finished. He may have been humbled and shell-shocked, but he would forever be a gentleman in my eyes. He’d never let me down when I needed him the most.

“I don’t want you to be alone.” My voice cracked.

“He won’t be alone,” Baba declared, breaking into the conversation. “Your husband will live with us. We have enough disgrace with you being a widow and a big-thigh girl, but at least you aren’t divorced.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It was better to have Eddie as a son-in-law than me as a daughter? The realization was excruciating yet oddly freeing. I felt like a balloon that had been released from a child’s fingers-up and away…

“I wanted to give your father eight sons,” Mama murmured. “Eddie can be our eighth son. He needs loved ones to take care of him. Maryanne is a nurse, which is even better than having a doctor in the family. I promise you, Helen, that I’ll cherish him as my own.”

All eyes turned to Eddie. He was a man of elegant grace, but his defeated shoulders and bowed head illustrated more than any words how broken and fragile he was. Still, he was better than a daughter, a widowed daughter, or a divorced daughter.

Eddie lifted his chin and spoke directly to Baba. “I’m not going to change who and what I am.”

“So? I won’t be changing who I am, and it’s clear Monroe hasn’t changed who he is,” Baba replied. “The gossips will do what they do, but you are part of my family and that will never change.”

Mama reached up and took Eddie’s hand, which wordlessly seemed to seal the deal. Perhaps the most overused Chinese curse is May you live in interesting times. With the addition of Eddie and Maryanne, the people who lived in the compound were about to experience some “interesting times.” I was glad to keep my little Tommy out of it.

A FEW DAYS later, Eddie departed for California with Mama, Baba, and the newlyweds. Even though he was leaving, I didn’t feel he was abandoning me. He was doing what was best for me, for Tommy, and for himself. In that regard, we would be forever partners in the true sense of the word. When Tommy and I returned from Grand Central Terminal, our suite felt empty. Tommy missed Eddie already, but I’d always be number one in my son’s eyes. But the separations were hardly over. Miami awaited Grace, and Ruby would be heading to Las Vegas, but what about me? Never have I heard so much crying up the virtues of wine to sell vinegar.

Ruby pressed me to go with her: “That way you’ll be close to San Francisco and Los Angeles. Don’t you want Tommy to see Eddie and meet his real father too?”

“What? Do you expect me to show up on Tim’s doorstep? Here we are. Forget it,” I pronounced with finality.

Eddie called and repeated his suggestion that I move to Los Angeles-close, but far enough for us to lead our own lives: “We’ll always be like a pair of mandarin ducks-forever an affectionate couple. And I don’t want to lose Tommy.” I promised that, no matter where I decided to live, I’d make sure Eddie saw Tommy at least twice a year.

Grace put the screws to me too: “Come with me and you’ll be the first millionaire among us.”

They all wanted me. I was being given a chance for a new beginning. I could release the bad things that I’d done and that had been done to me, which meant goodbye at last to my natal family, goodbye to the compound, goodbye to Eddie, goodbye to Ruby, and goodbye to so many sad memories, resentments, and jealousies. I would no longer let my history determine my destiny. I would go to Miami with Grace.

I had made it this far without revealing my deepest secrets, and, for a moment, I forgot that to believe in dreams is to spend half your life asleep.

GRACE: Movie Talk

A week later, as we were finishing our contractual obligations to the China Doll, scouts from a new television show called Toast of the Town visited the club. Ed Sullivan, who’d written so much about us in his column since we’d come to New York, was to be the host. “He’s looking for an Oriental act,” Sam Bernstein said when he called to discuss an offer.

“I’ll do it!” I practically shouted into the receiver.

“I bet you would, but it’s for a trio. Would you be willing to work with Ruby and Helen?”

Helen rejoiced when I told her about the opportunity. “This could be the beginning of Heaven and Earth! Epoch-making! Finally, after all these years, we’re going to perform together… and on national television. Think of where that could lead…”

We didn’t have a lot of time to prepare, Helen had never been much of a hoofer, and Ruby’s specialty was walking around with a bubble in front of her. Ruby spoke to Mr. Arden on his last day at the China Doll, and he came up with all sorts of cockamamie concepts for what we could perform. Helen called Eddie to get his ideas.

“Be the girls you’ve always been,” he told her. “Be yourselves.”

When Helen relayed that message to us, I pictured something in my mind.

“We’ll do ‘Let Me Play with It,’ ” I said. “We can update the original arrangement by dropping the country sound and going with all strings. We’ll do the routine we taught Helen back on the Waverly Playground but all in soft shoe. If we keep it simple, then we’ll still have enough breath to sing. Of course, everything will need to be squeaky clean for Mr. Sullivan, but it could be fun… and unexpected.”

Helen and Ruby loved the idea.

“What should we call ourselves?” Ruby asked.

“That’s easy,” Helen said shyly. “The Swing Sisters, like I suggested all those years ago in Sam Wo.”

Ruby and I loved that idea.

We worked on the routine in the afternoons, and then we went to the China Doll for our three shows. I’d rarely been so exhausted, but excitement and anticipation buoyed all of us.

Several nights later, I left the China Doll early, hoping to spend a few quiet minutes alone going over the details of our Toast of the Town performance before Ruby, Helen, and Tommy returned to the hotel. I waded through the usual stage-door Johnnies, waving them off as the endearing nuisance I’d grown to accept. A tenderly thin man, wearing a fedora pulled low and leaning his weight on a cane, stood a little removed from the other Johnnies. He was tall and his shoulders were broad, but the message he sent with his body was one of frailty. His eyes pulled mine to his.

Joe.

Next to him, an older woman-wearing practical walking shoes, a decidedly non-New Look dress, and a mink stole wrapped around her shoulders-pulled on her fingers nervously. A worried expression creased her forehead.

Struggling with my emotions, I glanced at the cane and then back into Joe’s eyes. At last, I lifted my chin and strode forward purposely. “Joe,” I said, professional yet friendly. “This is a surprise. How good to see you.”

“Grace.” He drew out the syllable like it was wine being poured into a goblet.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, all good cheer.

“My mom and I have come to look at NYU and Columbia. I need to finish law school. My parents would like me to be closer to Chicago-”

“We’re in New York to see you,” the woman, who had to be his mother, interrupted.

I absorbed that, and then asked Joe in my most chipper tone, “How did you know where to find me?”

“It’s a cinch Winchell knows!” he answered, reciting the popular tagline.

That told me he’d read about Mario and all the others, and yet here Joe was on the sidewalk in front of the China Doll. The stage-door Johnnies edged closer.

“I’d like you to meet my mother.” Joe gestured to the woman beside him. “Mom, this is Grace. Grace, this is my mom.”

“Mrs. Mitchell.” I extended my hand.

“Call me Betty.” Instead of shaking my hand, she held it in both of hers. “I came with my boy, because I wanted to make sure he didn’t turn chicken. He’s got all sorts of medals now-the Bronze Star, the Air Medal, and a Purple Heart,” she recited proudly. “But he’s always been a bit of a scaredy-cat when it comes to girls.”

“Mom.” Joe stared at his shoes. I felt for him, because no one can embarrass you more than your own mother. Despite my best efforts to protect myself, I could feel my defenses crumbling and my heart opening.

“Are you set now, Son?” Mrs. Mitchell asked. When he nodded, she returned her gaze to me and squeezed my hand. The message couldn’t have been clearer. Don’t hurt my boy. Then she embraced Joe. “I’ll see you back at the hotel.”

After she left, we stood silently, searching each other’s faces. His was wan-from lingering pain? From months as an invalid? His eyes looked as though they’d seen too much. I wondered what changes he saw in me. Finally, I said, “Let’s go somewhere we can talk without all the ears.” I cocked my head to the stage-door Johnnies, but I was actually fretting that Ruby would emerge from the club any second.

Joe and I walked, slowly, slowly, because of his limp. He had always seemed invincible, but to me he felt almost ghostlike. It hurt me to see him so frail. We found an all-night diner and slid into a booth. The waitress served us coffee. He pushed his cup back and forth in front of him nervously. I fought to regain my resolve: I can’t help him. He dumped me.

“No reason to make this long,” he began, his voice slower and more deliberate than I remembered.

“Take as much time as you’d like,” I said.

He didn’t seem to want to do that either.

“I had a rough go, Grace.” Joe struggled to get out the words. “My plane and I got shot up pretty bad. My right lung was pierced, and my leg took a lot of shrapnel. I barely made it back to the airfield. By the time they pulled me out of the wreckage, I’d lost consciousness. I didn’t wake up for a long time. When I did, I had gangrene.”

I sucked in a breath through clenched teeth. The side of his mouth ticked up at my reaction.

“I fought them hard, but they took my leg,” he went on. “I can’t tell you how angry I was… at myself, at the world. That’s when I first told you to stop writing back to me.”

Whatever backbone I’d hoped to have went to mush. “Oh, Joe. That’s just awful. I wish you’d told me. I would have helped you.”

“At first, I didn’t want you to worry about me,” he admitted. “And, of course, you’re Grace. You kept writing anyway. But later, when it looked like I was going to die, I didn’t want to hurt you. I wanted you to be free of memories of me-”

“That’s the most preposterous thing I’ve ever-”

“After they amputated my leg,” he continued, speaking right over me, “I didn’t want to come back to you as less than a man.”

What was he telling me exactly? I blurted out my first crass notion: “It’s just your leg, right?”

A long moment passed. Then he threw back his head and laughed.

“Then all is perfect.” I tilted my face and gave him my best China doll smile. “After all, your manhood isn’t measured by your leg.”

He laughed even harder at the audacity of my comment.

“A lot of guys got it worse than you.” I thought of Yori and all the waiters, busboys, and servicemen, who didn’t make it back.

“But I was an ace.” Joe hesitated before trying to explain himself. “I thought, when this thing is over, I’ll forget about law school and become a commercial air pilot. Remember how we used to talk about that? I won’t be able to fly commercially now,” he stated with grim finality. “You need all your parts-”

“So you’ll fly for fun.”

He gave me a wry smile. He didn’t need to explain. What if I’d never been able to dance professionally?

“Anyway,” he went on, “it took a long time before I was stable enough to be sent back to the States. Even when I got home, I didn’t want to see you. I felt sorry for myself, but my anger was what kept me from getting in touch. I’d promised I wouldn’t be around you when I was like that.”

Disappointment still radiated from him, but I didn’t sense fury or bitterness. His fighting days were over.

“What changed?”

“Time. Home. My mom and dad. I told them about you. And they-my mom especially-have been working on me. But I’ll be honest with you, Grace. I’m not who I was.”

“Neither am I.”

That hung heavier in the air than I expected. Outside, night was melting into dawn. The clock on the wall read 6:34. I needed to get a little sleep before meeting the gals at 2:00 for our last rehearsal before Toast of the Town, and then I had three shows tonight. I still had no idea what Joe wanted, but I needed to be firm for the sake of my friends.

“I’m really sorry, but I need to go to my hotel and get some sleep. The next two days are big for me, Joe.”

He didn’t ask why. Maybe this hurt him. But if he wanted to say something or ask me something, then he needed to act. I wasn’t going to help him, not after everything we’d been through. Yet the look on his face pushed me to ask, “Will you come and see me tonight at the China Doll?” As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I regretted them. “Ruby will be there.”

“I know,” he responded. “I had a lot of time in the hospital and even more time in Winnetka to read the gossip columns. But why would I care where she is? I came to see you.” He shook his head. “What I mean is, I’ve come for you. My life is no good without you.”

Romantic words, and I so wanted to believe him, but a part of me was in turmoil. He was the love of my life, but could I trust him after he’d left me high and dry and broken my heart? And what would he do when he saw Ruby? She was so beautiful, and he’d always been entranced by her. My insecurities went even deeper than that. Even if he no longer cared for her, was he just falling back on someone he thought would take him now that he was crippled?

While all this was batting around in my head, Joe was watching me, bemused, taking in, I felt sure, every questioning emotion that must have been playing across my face. Even after our long separation, he knew me so well.

“I’ll come to the last show,” he said finally. “That’s always been your best.”

A FEW HOURS later, Ruby woke me out of a sound sleep. “You look like hell,” she quipped after I sat up and put my feet on the floor. “Hurry up. We need to rehearse.”

Over the years, I’d learned that people deceive each other in many ways. By hiding: secreting clothes and money under the bed so you can escape, as I had done. By destroying: tearing up receipts so your husband doesn’t see what you spent on that new pair of shoes, as Irene had done. By changing the topic: “Good show tonight, dear?” as Eddie had asked Helen after he’d spent a night carousing. By outright lying: “I’m Chinese,” when actually you were Japanese, as Ruby and Ida had done. But the best-and easiest-is simply to keep your mouth shut. You tell yourself, “This isn’t a good moment” or “We’ll talk about it later.” People recite those inanities, but that doesn’t make them any less liars, cheats, or deceivers, which is how I managed to get dressed, ramble five blocks with Ruby and Helen to the studio to practice our routine for the last time, then walk to the China Doll and get ready for the night’s shows without mentioning that I’d seen Joe, what he’d said just a few hours earlier, or that he’d be in the club for the third show when we performed.

My omissions left me jumpy and on edge. After the first show, I went to Helen’s dressing room. Eddie had sent Tommy a new set of tin soldiers, and he was lining them up in neat rows on the floor. I sat on a stool to watch, but I nervously clicked my Oriental Danseuse nails against each other to the point that Helen said, “Stop worrying. We’re going to be great tomorrow.”

The second show was swell. When Ruby’s cue came for the third show, I followed her to the curtain. I watched as she slipped off her kimono, picked up her fans for her last performance of the night, and sidled onstage into her blue light. I peeked out at the house and spotted Joe. He appeared mesmerized by Ruby and her feathers. The smell of her gardenias seemed to waft through the club like a dark vapor. Could that same old triangle of Ruby, Joe, and me ever be broken? Would I ever be able to forget that they’d been together? I was a grown woman-a famous woman-but an impulse to flee gnawed at my insides. This time I was determined to stay and fight.

Ruby’s act ended, and she swept offstage right past me-her ostrich feathers caressing my face, arms, and breasts. I needed to tell her about Joe-he was mine-but there wasn’t time. I heard the music for my routine. I lifted my hands, extending my absurdly long nails, and let my feet carry me onstage. My mind churned with visions of Ruby and her feathers and Joe’s expression as he’d watched her dance. Now it seemed as though all the things that made him the man I loved had drained from his face. Through the laughter, the clink of champagne glasses, and the happy sighs of the club; above the band, cutting through the sound of my feet padding across the stage, my breathing and the beat of my heart-but surely it was my imagination-I heard Joe’s chair scrape across the floor as he pushed himself away from the table. He lurched from the room. Was he running from me again? Or was he running to Ruby?

Onstage, all I could do was keep counting in my head-one, two, three, four-and finish my number. I didn’t stay for my second or third bows. Instead, I ran to Ruby’s dressing room. I opened the door to find Helen wiping off Ruby’s makeup and Tommy on the floor with his toy soldiers. I shrugged as if I’d made a mistake.

“Don’t bother with me. I’ll see you in a couple of minutes.” I retraced my route, feeling confused and worried. Where had Joe gone? Had seeing Ruby dance changed his mind about me? I entered my dressing room, and there he was, sitting on the bench before my mirror, holding a rose he’d plucked from one of my bouquets. I felt like I was able to breathe again-from relief… and gratitude.

“All the husbands are returning to their Rosies,” he began. “Those women don’t realize that the men who went away are not the same as they once were.” He glanced past my shoulder into the hallway, struggling with his emotions. “Grace, the things I saw. The things I did.”

The years without him completely fell away, as did my doubts. Whatever he’d done-or not done-to hurt me in the past no longer mattered. He was my future. He’d always been my future.

“Whatever you have in you, I can take,” I said.

“This thing”-he tapped his artificial leg-“isn’t good enough for what I’m about to ask, so I hope you’ll accept me where I am.” He inhaled. Held it. Then, “I’ve made a lot of mistakes, and I’ve wasted a lot of time. I love you. I don’t want another minute to go by without you. Grace, will you marry me?”

I didn’t hesitate. I’d been waiting for the question for so long. “Yes.”

“Are you sure?” he asked, unwilling to accept my answer so readily. “Are you willing to give up everything for me when you’ve already seen my weaknesses and stupidity?”

“Yes,” I said as I kneeled before him.

“I’ll never be able to dance with you, Grace. Not like we danced before.”

“We’ll do the box step.”

“If we get married, neither of us can ever run away again-emotionally… or otherwise.” He rapped a knuckle on his leg. I saw him then as so vulnerable. He was telling me he was committed, but he needed me to be as well.

“I love you, Joe. I always have.”

He took that in. Then, “We won’t have the moon, Grace, but we can be happy-”

Such movie talk!

“Let’s get out of here. Let’s never look back.” He whistled the opening bars to Kay Kyser’s newest hit. I’d love to get you on a slow boat to China, all to myself alone. “Come with me now. Don’t pack. Don’t say goodbye. We’ll get out of here and go to San Francisco. I’ll go to Stanford or back to Cal to finish up at Boalt.”

In that moment, I knew I’d won the prize I’d always wanted: love. I loved him so much I would suffer anything for him. I loved him more than my own life, I realized. Yet this was the moment when the two things I’d dreamed about for so long-love and stardom-collided. And I wasn’t willing to give up either.

“I didn’t have a chance to tell you this morning, but Ruby, Helen, and I are going to be on a television show tomorrow. I can’t back out now. I need to be there for them.”

He had just proposed and asked me to run away with him this instant, but now his eyes burned with disappointment.

I tried to explain. “They’re my friends…”

“And you want this.”

I bowed my head and nodded. But how could I be ashamed when this opportunity might be the greatest of my life?

I got up, opened my purse, and handed Joe a ticket for tomorrow’s show. “I hope you’ll come.”

He held the ticket in his hands and stared at it wordlessly. Finally, he reached up to me with his eyes. What I saw in them was sure and true. He was happy for me. “I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“I love you,” I said.

“I’m nuts about you too, Grace.”

With that, he used his cane to stand, and he limped out of my dressing room.

I took a deep breath, sucking in happiness, releasing worry. I loved Joe more than dancing, but what about Ruby? I didn’t want to hurt her in case she still had feelings for him. Play it light, and it might go easier.

I didn’t bother to change. I walked down the hall to Ruby’s dressing room, hesitated before the closed door to brace myself, and then entered. Helen wore a pale pink cotton sweater set with a light gray skirt that came midcalf. She was on her knees, having just finished removing Ruby’s body makeup. Ruby leaned in to the mirror, smoothing cream under her eyes. She was dressed in her kimono and gardenias. Tommy sat in the corner, making his first battle moves with his soldiers. I swallowed and clicked each of my nails from the pinkies to my index fingers once against my thumbs as the three of them turned to look at me.

RUBY: The Dark Shadow Side

“Joe is here,” Grace announced as she entered the room.

My neck stiffened. Below me, on the floor, Helen sighed.

“He’s asked me to marry him,” Grace went on, “and I’ve said yes. We’re moving to San Francisco-”

“What about the Swing Sisters?” I asked with seemingly dead calm, calling on all the rules my mother had taught me about not showing my emotions.

“I’m staying for the show,” she answered breezily.

“Great, but what about the Swing Sisters?” I repeated.

“The Swing Sisters?” Grace looked confused. “I was worried you’d be upset about Joe.”

Joe, Joe, Joe. She’d always been stuck on that guy-like I cared. Joe was one thing; my career was quite another. “What about our plans?” I persisted. “What about our new lives?”

“What about your revue?” Grace asked unperturbed. “What about Helen taking Tommy to Miami?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” I put my hands on my hips. “Toast of the Town changed all that. This is our gold ring.”

When Helen cut in to say, “Besides, we said we’d never let a man come between us,” I knew this was going to be a two-against-one disagreement that Helen and I would win.

“I’m sorry,” Grace said. “I love him.”

We’d gotten along pretty well since Yori died, but this news and her attitude about it caused something to rise up inside me. I’d thought I’d done a pretty good job burying my anger and suspicions about her these past years. Turned out they were right below the surface of my skin, ready to pop, all along. As that stupid dam people are always going on about burst, I was shaken by the rush of my emotions. Didn’t stop me, though.

“How can you do this to me?”

“To you?” Grace asked, taken aback.

“You owe me.”

At which Helen sat down fully on the floor and muttered one of her idiotic Chinese sayings. “Predestined enemies are fated to meet in a narrow alleyway.”

“This isn’t about fate,” I said to Helen. “It’s about loyalty and friendship.” I turned back to Grace. “You’ve never honored either.”

Grace feigned lightness. “What is this? Target practice?”

“You didn’t comfort me when Hideo was killed or when my parents were detained,” I began, as all the injustices she’d inflicted on me began to flash through my mind.

“Of course I did-”

“You let me cry alone in my room-”

“That was seven years ago!”

“I needed a friend, but you liked hearing me suffer.”

“I didn’t want you to lose face,” Grace explained, still trying to remain unruffled. “And you didn’t want to talk about it. You wanted to make believe nothing had happened. You wanted to pretend you weren’t Japanese-”

“You showed who you were even then.” Anger was not my deal-e-o. I knew I had to try to pull myself together, but I just couldn’t. “Later, you stabbed me in the back by stealing my part in Aloha, Boys! But that still wasn’t enough for you. You had to steal my fiancé too.”

“How can you possibly say that?” Grace now visibly struggled to stay cool. “You invited me to go to Hollywood with you. How was I to know that people would come and take you away or that the director would ask me to fill in for you? If you knew how painful all that was for me, you never would accuse me. And do you really believe I stole Joe? I understand you’re upset, but you aren’t remembering things correctly.”

“Oh, I remember. You pinched my part, then you became the Oriental Danseuse.”

“Is this about fame?” Grace asked. “Why me and not you?”

“Stop acting so coy,” I shot back.

Helen put a hand on her forehead and closed her eyes.

“I don’t see why you’re so mad,” Grace said.

“You don’t? Well, try this on for size. Why did you turn me in?”

“I didn’t turn you in,” Grace said placidly. “I’ve told you that before.”

“Admit it.” I prickled.

“I won’t. Because I didn’t.”

“Helen told me all about it.” It felt surprisingly good to be confronting Grace, but why had I waited so long? “She said everyone at the Forbidden City looked at the clues and figured out it was you. You were the one who sent Western Union telegrams all the time. You were my friend and you reported me, so you’d get my part in the film.”

Grace’s brow furrowed. “Why did you tell Ruby that?” she asked Helen. “Why would you say those things about me… ever?”

From the floor, Helen regarded Grace. “You’ve never accepted responsibility for what you did.”

“If you really thought that… In all these years, you never told me…”

“Has your conscience been eaten by a dog?” Helen asked.

Grace returned her gaze to me. “Is this what you truly think?”

I held my ground. “I said it, didn’t I?”

“But all this time we’ve been together-traveling, sharing clothes, sometimes sleeping in the same bed… If you thought I’d betrayed you, how could you have stood to be near me at all?”

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, I’d said something similar to Helen, but Grace had cut me off. Now I did the same.

“Helen said it was best to keep an eye on you. Keep your enemies close-”

“The direct translation is Know the other, know the self, hundred battles without danger,” Helen murmured.

I liked Helen all right, but she was bugging my teeth right out of my gums. Why didn’t she stand up and fight at my side? Maybe it wouldn’t matter anyway, because Helen was so easy to ignore. Sure enough, Grace spoke directly to me.

“I didn’t report you. You’re my friend-”

“You would have done anything to take my part.” My eyes bored into her. “Can you deny it?”

“That doesn’t mean I reported you.”

“Then who did?” I demanded.

“It could have been anyone,” she answered. “Maybe it was Ida.”

“Yeah, blame it on a dead Japanese girl.” I jutted my chin. “I’m not a fool.”

“Charlie,” she tried again, her voice cracking. “Maybe it was Charlie-”

“Right. Charlie would report his number one moneymaker.”

“What do you want me to do? Make a list of everyone we knew back then? It could have been anyone-”

“It was you!”

An intense silence fell over us. I wasn’t going to budge, and neither was she. Then, a small but authoritatively businesslike voice spoke.

“You’re not a loyal person, Grace,” Helen said from her spot on the floor. “I went to look for you in Los Angeles. I lived with you in that horrid little rooming house. But when we went back to San Francisco, you moved in with Ruby.”

This accusation Grace willingly accepted. “I wanted to get ahead.”

“You chose Ruby. You cut me out entirely. I had a baby, but you didn’t even visit.”

Grace glanced from Helen to me and then back to Helen. “You didn’t want visitors. You were obsessed with Tommy.”

Wow. Another truth from Grace. Maybe Helen was getting somewhere.

“You dumped me when I was no longer useful to you,” Helen went on. “You got rid of Ruby when she stood in your way. You did your best to have George Louie blackballed-”

“He lied about me!”

“Sounds like he was saying things you didn’t want to hear,” I had to throw in.

But Helen continued, as persistent as my FBI interrogators. “You even fired Max Field when you saw Sam Bernstein could get you up the ladder faster. You did whatever you could to have your name in bigger lights. You’d do anything to get to the top. And now we have this opportunity. Have you-either of you-imagined for just one moment what this means to me?”

Actually, I hadn’t. And, as much as I hated to admit it, what she’d said about Grace’s ambition could just as easily have been addressed to me.

“Everything you say is accurate,” Grace also agreed, “except that I didn’t report Ruby.”

“Ha!” I exclaimed, like I was a five-year-old.

The room went quiet again, but it practically vibrated from the intense emotions. I’ll admit it. Right that second, a part of me wanted to laugh. The three of us in such a crazy fight. My blowing my top-so not my usual style. Helen going all samurai on Grace, who, in turn, was suddenly acting the part of placating queen. Toss a little Joe into the mix for fun. Ridiculous.

Oh, and Tommy, too. Where was he? Over there in the corner. He’d been hearing all this, but Helen hadn’t done a single thing to protect him. She hadn’t covered his ears or rushed him out of the room. She’d temporarily forgotten about him. That was so singularly shocking that my thoughts suddenly shifted in a frighteningly new direction. I blinked several times as memories skimmed across my mind: how Helen had reacted after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the way she wouldn’t meet my eyes when she repeated George Louie’s gossip about Grace, the way she instinctively clutched at her breast when the subject of Japan or the Japanese entered the conversation, and, farther back, the way she’d said that Charlie hadn’t hired me because I was Jap (when actually he didn’t like that I’d made a pass at him), and the way she’d always called attention to my race when I could so thoroughly pass that no one had suspected until…

I backed away. My spine hit the wall. “You reported me, Helen,” I said from a place so deep inside that my words came out a bare whisper.

The accusation shuddered in the air. Helen stared up at me. Cornered… Then, accepting… Then, proud…

“Yes, I did.” Helen owned up in a chillingly matter-of-fact tone.

Grace shook her head like some disbelieving cartoon character. “What?”

Helen remained utterly still, except for her eyes, which moved to Grace. “I did it for you. Ruby broke your heart first by sleeping with Joe and then by saying yes to his marriage proposal. Getting rid of her gave you a chance to be with him.”

I could see Grace struggling to catch up as she seemed to replay those days in her mind. Then she said, “That doesn’t make sense. I accepted that Ruby and Joe were going to be married. I didn’t do a single thing to slow or stop it.”

Helen’s lips quivered as her reason instantly fell apart. She tried another excuse. “You can’t tell me you didn’t want to be in Aloha, Boys! I gave you what you wanted.”

But we’d already covered that territory.

Helen’s eyes now searched the room until they came to her son. She reached out to him, beckoning. He ran across the room and put his arms around her neck.

Take pity on me.

Maybe her ploy worked, because my anger was gone and I was weirdly back in my body. Of course, all this was a lot more self-awareness than I was used to, which meant I was unnerved as hell. Still, I needed to know why Helen had turned me in. With some effort, I pushed myself away from the wall, moved to Helen, and put a finger under her chin to lift it. “During the war, it was our national job to hate the Japs,” I said, trying to speak her language. “We wouldn’t have been Americans if we hadn’t hated them. They attacked us, and we dropped atomic bombs on their country. But why hurt me, Helen? What did I ever do to deserve what you did to me?”

Helen suddenly jerked her body and pushed Tommy away from her. He scrambled to a corner. She sat as still as death, her head hung low. I don’t know about Grace, but I felt like my heart was in my mouth.

“They killed my baby,” Helen murmured.

“Baby? Honey, Tommy’s right here,” Grace said.

Helen’s head moved from side to side-no, no, no-as she slowly rose to her feet. “I knew love once.”

“Yes, your husband,” Grace prompted softly.

“Lai Kai,” Helen said. “We were so happy. I got pregnant. I had a son. His name was Dajun.”

“Oh, Jesus,” Grace rasped.

“Dajun was three months old when the Japs invaded.” Helen’s eyes seemed to focus on a scene about a foot before her face that only she could see. “Like everyone else, we ran. The whole family. We couldn’t believe that the soldiers would kill civilians, but we passed bodies everywhere-women with their pants pulled off and sticks shoved up inside them, babies tossed in ditches, men with bullets in their heads, people burned and still smoldering, limbs blown from torsos. We heard gunfire and screams.”

I covered my mouth with my hands. Next to me, Grace shut her eyes and held her two closed fists against her cheeks. Tommy whimpered in the corner. In a way, Helen was like I was earlier-unleashed. She didn’t need us to ask questions. Her secret was out, and she was going to tell the whole story. Another one of those godforsaken dams broken. Shit.

“We saw smoke billowing from a village and the bodies of its inhabitants-shot and bayoneted-dumped in an open trench for dogs to eat,” Helen intoned relentlessly. “Beneath our feet, the ground shook with thousands of boots pounding the earth. We dropped down into a rice paddy. After the soldiers killed Lai Kai, they found the others one by one. They used bayonets and swords to slash and stab. They killed my mother-in-law and father-in-law. They killed my sisters-in-law, brothers-in-law, and all their children.”

I listened in horror as the enormity of what had happened to Helen ruptured for good the silly way I’d chosen to the view the world, even when “bad” things happened to me.

Helen sucked in a breath in an attempt to steady herself. “I tried to run, but I tripped over bodies. One of the soldiers… He held his bayonet before him… Blood covered his face… His mouth was open wide… I could see the white of his teeth. I held Dajun to my heart. I could do nothing to save my son, but at least we would die together.”

Tears streaked down her face as she opened her blouse to expose the scar on her breast.

“The blade went through my son and into me. The soldier yanked his bayonet back. He took Dajun on the blade.” She collapsed to her knees. “My baby died to save me, and I failed as a mother. After that… The soldiers ruined me… One after the other… They left me for dead. Except I wasn’t dead. I had to live with what had happened.”

Grace and I stared at each other-mute, paralyzed. She moved first, putting a hand on Helen’s shoulder. I felt soul-sick.

“You are so courageous, Helen,” Grace said. “I don’t think I could have survived what you went through.”

“Me either,” I said gently. “I probably would have killed myself. But I hope you realize none of that was my fault. And I wish more than anything that I could have done something to make you hate me less.”

“I don’t hate you,” Helen said, and I thought that despite the terrible-and unwarranted-punishment she’d inflicted on me, I could forgive her because she’d suffered the worst losses a woman can endure and in the most horrific and terrifying ways. Then she went on. “Being around you was like picking at a scab and sucking the blood.”

Jeez. But I could see it. She’d taken perverse pleasure-from the first moment we met-in attaching herself to me.

“I never had much in the way of inner strength.” Helen wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “I didn’t need it. I was raised to be cared for by my husband and his family. I was taught that my son would look after me when I became a widow. All that changed the night my husband and baby were killed. After that, I had no family protection and no purpose. I was lucky Mama and Baba allowed me to come home, but I was an embarrassment to them. When you are held under water, you only think of air. I needed air, and you gave it to me. I needed help, and you took me in. But I also wanted to destroy you as my husband and son were destroyed.”

“You did a pretty good job,” I said, attempting buoyancy, trying now to find a path back into the light for her.

“When Grace came back alone from Hollywood, I didn’t feel one drop of guilt,” Helen went on. “And I now had Grace to myself.”

I know Grace had been devastated by all we’d just heard. Nevertheless, the comment sent her, with unexpected speed, straight up onto her high horse. But then none of us was acting normally. “Me? Don’t throw me in with what you did to Ruby!”

Did this mean she might be able to forgive me for accusing her?

“I love you, Grace,” Helen said. “You are my true-heart friend.”

“I love you too-at least I thought I did,” Grace replied. “And I’m sorry about what happened to you. I really am. But what does any of that have to do with what you did to Ruby… and to me?”

“I loved you, but you always preferred her,” Helen said, going back in time. “We’d all barely met when the two of you got an apartment together…”

“You found the apartment for us. You orchestrated that.” Grace shook with anger and frustration. “And that was ten years ago.”

I’d flipped and shown my true emotions, and look what it had let loose. Alliances were shifting and battle lines were being redrawn. But what else could have happened? I mean, this was Grace, Helen, and me. Had it ever been otherwise between us? Still, now that I was back to myself, it was startling to see Grace get het up on my behalf when only a few minutes ago I’d been accusing her of such terrible things.

“I saw you, Grace.” Something ravenous scuttled below the surface of Helen’s skin. “I picked you. Yes, I found the apartment for the two of you. I knew it would only be a matter of time before you’d see Ruby for what she is. So again, yes, I figured out about Ruby and Joe and what it would do to you if you discovered the truth about them. But I didn’t guess that you’d run away and leave me. I went to Los Angeles with Eddie to find you. And later, when Ruby was sent away, you still thought about her.”

“How could I not?” Grace asked. “She’d disappeared and-”

“But we were supposed to be true-heart friends at last-just you and me.”

“True-heart friends?” Grace repeated the words like they were poison in her mouth. “Did you start the rumors about me?”

“You were right about George Louie,” Helen answered. “He’s a bad man, but the more those rumors damaged you, the more you needed me. Then you deserted me again by running away to the Chop-Suey Circuit. In your own way, you hurt me as deeply as Ruby did.”

As I listened, I understood at last that the dark shadow side of love had been much stronger among the three of us than it had ever been among Joe, Grace, and me.

“But what about later?” Grace asked. “When we were all together again, you ganged up with Ruby against me.”

“I couldn’t let Ruby learn what I’d done.” Each word Helen spoke came out a jagged shard. She had planned and plotted from a place of such misery that looking at her was like looking at a mortally wounded animal.

I’d never been one to put the welfare of kids at the top of my list, but I glanced over at Tommy. He’d coiled his arms around his calves and pulled his knees under his chin. His eyes were twin black pools.

Helen now appealed to me. “It wasn’t until you wrote from Topaz that it finally sunk in what I’d done to you. I felt guilty and knew I had to atone. Once I joined you on the road, I arranged your travel and your hotel rooms.” Her voice darkened. “I’m from a good family-one of the best in Chinatown-and yet I lugged your suitcases, cleaned your bubble, and served as your maid. Every night I stared into your private parts to glue on your patch.”

“I paid you to do that,” I said, as though that would make a difference. I glanced at Grace. She’d gone pale. Yes, I’d made Helen and Grace share the same indignities-the puffs, the powder, and my vagina just inches from their faces. My shoulders slumped.

“I thought all that was finally over,” Helen stammered mournfully. “I was going to find Grace the perfect house in Miami. We were going to be neighbors. We were going be together. Now what am I supposed to do?”

“You can still come with me to Vegas,” I offered in a true display of friendship… or did I just want to prove once and for all I was the best and most desirable?

“I don’t want you,” Helen said, which had a deflating effect on me, as you might imagine. She appealed to Grace. “Even after everything I’ve done for you, you never once saw me. I only wanted a true-heart friend, who would be all mine. I didn’t want to share you.” Her voice cracked as she began to weep again. “But how could I have a best friend when there was someone like her”-she inclined her head toward me-“who was funny, beautiful, talented, and always trying to keep you for herself? You two always left me out.”

Helen stared at us so piteously that Grace sunk to the floor and embraced her. There were no secrets left between us. Despair over the terrible mistakes each of us had made and the cruelties we’d inflicted on each other swam through my body. Tommy finally got up his courage to approach his mother-tears rolling down her cheeks, her entire body emanating sorrow, grief, and guilt. I reached out, grabbed him by the shoulders, and held him to me.

THE NEXT AFTERNOON, a car picked us up at the Victoria to take us to the Maxine Elliott Theatre at Broadway and Thirty-Ninth, where Toast of the Town would be filmed live. We sat together in the backseat, staring straight ahead, our arms and thighs touching, Tommy on Helen’s lap. None of us spoke. I’d lived much of my life by my mother’s saying: The crow that was crying a few minutes ago is already laughing now. Not this time. We were exhausted from restless sleep, nervous about how the day would unfold, and still undone by last night’s revelations. The car pulled to the curb in front of the theater. Helen cracked open the door. Without looking at us, she said, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry for everything.” Then, she swung the door wide, set Tommy on the sidewalk, and slid out behind him. They headed for the entrance. Grace scooted across the seat, hesitated, and turned to me.

“Are we really going to do this?” she asked.

“Of course, we are. We’d better catch up, or she’ll go on without us,” I said, trying for a joke. Could Grace hear the depth of my remorse for suspecting and disbelieving her? Please, but begging wasn’t my way.

Once inside, we were taken to a dressing room, where we wordlessly changed into our costumes. I glimpsed Helen’s scar, and my entire body ached for her.

Someone knocked on the door.

“Come in,” I called, using my lilting professional voice.

Ed Sullivan entered and closed the door behind him. For someone who was so powerful through his writing he didn’t seem to have much personality. He scanned us up and down, nodding approvingly at our satin shoes, our fuchsia-colored costumes that showed plenty of thigh, and our hair and makeup that made us look simultaneously American healthy and accessible and Chinese exquisite and alluring.

“Do this right, young ladies,” he said, his voice toneless, “and I’ll have you back plenty of times.”

We may have been hurt and disheartened, but when a man like that presents you with the world, you get swept up in the possibilities. Grace put a hand on the small of my back, where it met Helen’s hand.

“Would you consider returning next month to do an Indian number?” Ed asked. “I’m imagining something to Artie Shaw’s rendition of ‘Indian Love Call.’ Viewers will get a bang out of seeing three girls come out dressed as squaws and then turn into little Chinese dancers with pretty American voices. Hilarious!”

“Anything for you, Ed, darling,” I cooed. But could I work with Helen again? And what about Grace? Ha! What was I thinking? Maybe they wouldn’t want to work with me.

“No question about it,” he went on in his monotone, “I’m going to make the Swing Sisters a household name.”

After he left, the hands that had been holding the three of us together behind my back loosened and dropped as Grace and Helen twisted away. How many times over the years had we been in a dressing room together? Too many to count. How many times had an opportunity like this come along? Never. Adrenaline pulsed through me. I was sure that a similar buzz surged through Helen and Grace too. I motioned for them to come close, then solemnly pinned white gardenias over each of our left ears. Something flickered in the air around us as ambition and hope tried to push away blame and self-reproach.

“We truly are going to be famous now,” I declared. “All across the country, like Ed said.”

“What about Joe?” Grace asked.

“If he can keep flying for pleasure, won’t he want you to keep performing?” I replied. “If he can do what he loves, won’t he want you to do what you love too? Do you think he really wants his very own China doll at home with a new vacuum cleaner, washing machine, and dryer-”

“Five minutes! Five minutes!”

We hurriedly made last checks in the mirror. Then we left the dressing room, went stage right as we’d been instructed, and waited as a man spinning plates finished his routine. I peered around the curtain to the audience and spotted Joe. Man, talk about looking like something the cat dragged in. The expression on his face, however, painted a very different picture. He seemed excited and proud. That’s my future wife and the mother of my children up there. Joe, what a boob, but he’d probably make a great husband and father. Tommy sat next to him, dressed in a seersucker suit. It was hard to imagine what was going to happen to him in the future. But this wasn’t the time for me to start getting maudlin! I needed the Swing Sisters to be fantastic, which meant putting last night-and many more months and years before that-behind me, behind us all.

“We owe it to ourselves and those who sacrificed for us not to have regrets,” I whispered to the others. “That’s what I feel in my heart. This is what we always wanted.”

“What we all wanted,” Grace murmured in a vague, distracted manner.

I took Helen’s hand. I could forgive her all she’d done if she repaid me by going out there and dancing and singing her drawers off. Helen nodded. Together, we each clasped Grace’s hands.

“Friends?” I asked, because I was the only one who could speak the word and have it be meaningful.

“Forever,” Helen and Grace answered together. What passed between us-as we stood there with our hands linked-wasn’t just a matter of the-show-must-go-on or personal ambition. After everything that had happened, we needed to make this moment perfect-perhaps even make it the beginning of Heaven and Earth, epoch-making, as Helen hoped.

Ed Sullivan began to speak. “I have three little gals I’d love for you to meet. Ruby, Helen, Grace, come on out here and say hello to the folks.”

I went first. My smile was warm and enveloped everyone in the studio. I extended my fingers like the undulating tentacles of a sea anemone, luring Helen to come to me. More applause. Wouldn’t you know it, but Ed gave Grace special preference. “I bring you the toast of New York for Toast of the Town. Miss Grace Lee.”

The three of us chatted with our host, following our script perfectly. Then he stiffly raised his arm, awkwardly lurched back, and announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, please give a hand for the Swing Sisters…”