She held her gaze on me, but I saw the way her eyes brightened. “Why don’t you go get yourself a drink in the bar, Bob? Roxy and I have a lot to discuss, and your standing there looking like an expectant father is disconcerting.”
Mr. Bob laughed. “If there is one thing I don’t want to be, it’s an expectant father.”
He winked at me and left. She waited until he was completely gone and then turned back to me.
“If you join my organization, you’ll be dependent on only one person,” she said.
I tightened my lips and nodded. “I guess that’s you,” I said.
“No, my dear. You’ll be dependent only on yourself.”
4
“I don’t understand what that means,” I said. “If I’m working for you, how am I only dependent on myself?”
She smiled. “If I think you’re right for us, I’ll do my best to get you where you should be to be a success, Roxy, but whether you are or not is up to you. You have to have the ambition, the attitude, and the determination, not me. I’m already a success. What’s the matter?” she asked when I didn’t respond. “Do I sound too much like your teachers?”
“Yes, you do.”
“Let me clue you in. They’re not speaking in platitudes, telling you what they are told to tell you. They’re not giving you advice that’s not useful. What you do with it is your choice. Apparently, you’ve decided to ignore it. No one gets along well in this world without something of value to offer other people—a talent, an education, some skill. What did you expect to find when you left your home? Some sugar daddy to replace your father?”
“No, and he was far from a sugar daddy.”
“You don’t have much of a formal education, apparently, and it remains to be seen if you have any talent. Your looks can get you just so far on their own, and there are many girls your age who are just as attractive, if not more so. You probably have fifty cents in your pocket, no friends or, according to you, close relatives to turn to for some sort of assistance. You’re as close to being a homeless creature as can be. Have I summed you up correctly? Well? What do you say about all this?”
No one, not even my father, could bring tears into my eyes this quickly, but when I thought about what was outside her door for me and how right she was, I did feel sorry for myself.
“I don’t know what to say,” I said. “You seem to have said it all.”
“Well, I do know what you should say,” she said, her nostrils flaring. “I’ve seen girls like you all my life, and I know what happens to you. You’ll either go home or become a street prostitute and eventually a drug addict and die in some alley like the butterfly who died on the water and thought he had died on the moon.”
“What?”
“Can’t you imagine why he thought he had died on the moon?” she asked, smiling. It had the ring of a teacher testing to see if a student had read her homework assignment.
“Yes, I know why he would think that. He died on the reflection on the water.”
“Exactly. Not real, an illusion. Here we deal only in reality. I want to know more about you,” she said, folding her hands over each other on her lap and changing her tone to a more officious-sounding one. “I want to know about your family, what sort of things you have been doing, what you like and don’t like. But before I waste my time learning about you, I want to see if you can fit in here. My time is very valuable to me and to those who depend on me.”
“I still don’t really understand what being here means. Mr. Bob told me you train girls to be escorts. He said it’s something like geisha girls.”
“Geishas are probably more artistic, more talented, and more intelligent,” she said dryly, “but we’re something like that.”
“What about sex?” I said, convinced that Mr. Bob hadn’t told me the whole truth.
She bristled. “My girls are not prostitutes. You’ll never see any one of my girls on the street, and no one, and I mean no one, gets to any of my girls without first going through me and a highly selective process. In all the years I’ve been in business, I’m proud to say I have never had a single one of my girls harmed. They know how to handle themselves in just about every situation they might confront. More important, however, is the fact that the men they escort respect them, know they are bright and resourceful women. We have no bimbos here. My girls are refined, educated, and full of poise and self-confidence. You’re full of defiance. There’s a difference.”
“If you see so much wrong with me, why don’t you just ask Mr. Bob to bring me back to the city?” I shot back at her. I was tired of hearing how dreadful I was and how helpless.
She shrugged, undisturbed by the sharpness in my voice or the fury in my eyes. “Well, I haven’t seen enough of you yet, nor have my people, who will give you an honest assessment. Besides, Bob raved about you, and when Bob raves about a girl, I listen. Don’t tell him I said so. I don’t want his head to swell up, but he has an eye for just the sort of young woman who can be a success in my company.”
“Company?”
“Business. Don’t act thick,” she shot back, her eyes now taking on a blazing fury. I remembered what Bob had told me about her not suffering fools gladly. “This isn’t some hobby of mine. I’d think even someone like you, in your state of mind and with your background, could realize it.”
“I resent being anyone’s punching bag. Maybe I should leave,” I said.
“Maybe you should. I can see why you couldn’t stand being told what to do, whether it was your father or your teachers. Believe me, Roxy, as good as it might make you feel, being headstrong is not an advantage. Nine times out of ten, you’ll just hit a wall and land on your derrière. Here, obedience and following orders are not a disadvantage.”