Page 25 of If Looks Could Kill

As I’d suspected, there was no living with Pearl once she’d heard about my encounter with the girl in the window.

“How could you let her get away without learning her full name?” she fumed again, for the dozenth time, the following evening as we walked home from teaching night classes at the Mission School. “How many Coras can there be in all of Connecticut?”

“One less than there ought to be,” I pointed out, but Pearl was not amused.

We passed Iceland Brothers delicatessen, and a blast of fragrant hot pastrami almost yanked me off the pavement.

“We’re no closer to finding her than we were before,” she lamented.

“That’s not true,” I told her. “A first name is something. Maybe Freyda can help us find out more about a Cora at that particular, er, establishment.”

“Freyda,” Pearl scoffed. “Much help she’s been.”

“You’re in quite the mood,” I told Pearl. “Of course Freyda’s been helpful. Without her, we wouldn’t even have known where to look.”

“If I’d been there last night,” Pearl said, “I wouldn’t have let Cora get away. I would’ve pulled her away from that wretched life right then and there.”

I pictured Pearl arm-wrestling with Cigar Man. “I’d have enjoyed watching you try.”

“You don’t have much faith in me, do you?”

I ignored this.

“What we learned,” I said at length, “is that she is indeed trapped in this place, and she wants out of it. Enough that she was willing to take the risk of giving me a message.”

“Of course she wants out of it,” Pearl said. “How could she not?”

“My point is, if we find a way to help her escape, she’ll cooperate. That’s important.”

“Not if ,” said Pearl. “When.”

“Fine. When.”

“We need more information,” Pearl said. “We need that name and that city or town.”

“No problem,” I said. “I’ll just knock her over in the street one more time and say, ‘Oh, excuse me, I didn’t catch your surname last time, and where exactly should I send your family their Christmas card?’?”

“There you go again,” said Pearl, “being flippant when you ought to be serious.”

There you go again, I thought, being a killjoy of the first water.

But I didn’t say it, and for such noble self-restraint, I deserve a blue ribbon.

Freyda stopped by our flat a few nights later to say hello, and she had no news to report. I felt six shades of significant when I, in fact, had news to report. In no time I’d told her about my encounter with Cora Something from Something, Connecticut.

Her eyes bulged at my story. “You knocked her over on the sidewalk?”

I nodded sheepishly. “She only stumbled,” I said. “I couldn’t think of a better way.”

Freyda whistled. “With her pimp standing right there?”

“It’s probably just as well,” I admitted, “that I don’t know much about that world.”

“It’s hardly anything to go on,” Pearl said. “We’re scarcely better off.”

Freyda pursed her lips. “Cora is a unique name. I’ll bet I can learn something.”

“How?” I asked her. “What will you do? Go inside the crib?”

“Ha,” said Freyda. “I value my life, thanks. But I may be able to do something. Sit tight.”

“For how long?” asked Pearl.

“I’ll get back to you before a week is out,” replied the investigative reporter.

Pearl turned away, dissatisfied. A week for Cora was a lifetime of misery. But we’d already taken months to come this far. We would have to be patient and not lose heart.

A thought seemed to occur to Pearl. “Thanksgiving is in a week,” she told Freyda.

“Oh!” I said. “Freyda, you should stop by the Salvation Army base and have a piece of pie with us.” I laughed. “We’re feeding half the Bowery, or so they say.”

Freyda smiled. “Another time, maybe,” she said. “My family will be celebrating that night. Thanksgiving and Hanukkah fall on the same day this year.”

“What will you do?” I asked.

“Eat turkey,” she said with a wry face. “Light the menorah.”

“And be together,” Pearl added, almost wistfully.

Both Freyda and I turned to her in shared surprise.

Pearl didn’t seem to notice. I thought of my own dad, and even Aunt Lorraine, who ran herself ragged each year putting out a beautiful Thanksgiving spread.

Give Aunt Lorraine her due—nothing the Salvation Army could serve up would touch the hem of her cooking. If cooking had hems. Never mind.

“In the old country, my family couldn’t observe Hanukkah,” Freyda said softly. “It was too dangerous. The tsar…” Her gaze drifted off, then she caught herself. “So, here, they make a great fuss over it. My mother will make latkes. My brothers will play the dreidel.”

“It sounds delightful,” I told her.

Pearl couldn’t bring herself to agree. Nor, however, could she find it in her to disagree.

Freyda rose to leave. “You’ll hear from me soon,” she said. “Like I said, around a week.”

“Happy Hanukkah,” I told her. “And thank you. We’re indebted to you.”

“What are you thanking me for?” she teased. “I haven’t done anything yet.”