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entire effect was of a great-looking mannequin made of leather.
    That said, I was still in awe of Marge. She’d made it on Broadway, still filled the house for any show she chose to do, and turned acting into a good living. She was my role model (minus the tan).
    “Sorry about transposing those house numbers, chickie.” She led me into a white-carpeted, high-ceilinged living room. “Put you in the wrong place at the wrong time. Poor Charlie.” She shook her head. “I called his daughter as soon as I heard. Thought she should hear the news from someone she knew.”
    “Don’t worry. I just wish there was something I could’ve done,” I said. “You look great. Big date?”
    “Not really.” She sat down on a peach loveseat and crossed her legs, jiggling one foot. “Arnie’s taking me to some charity thing. Asked me to sing a song or two.”
    As a dancer in the show, I had to be at rehearsal tonight. Marge didn’t. I wasn’t sure if it was because she was the Mother Superior, who appeared in just a few scenes (because she was Equity, and they’d already gone over the allotted number of rehearsal hours), or because Arnie was the theater’s producer (and Marge’s boyfriend) and he wanted her at this charity thing.
    “What songs are you going to sing?” I sat across from her in a matching loveseat. The room’s furniture and art were all Southwest pastels—mint greens, soft blues, and peaches. A dark brown cuckoo clock stood out like a lone European tourist amongst the desert landscapes on the walls.
    “‘New York, New York,’ ‘There’s No Business like Show Business,’ and ‘Everything’s Coming up Roses.’”
    I nodded. Marge’s big brassy voice was made for those songs.
    She must have read more on my face because she said, “Listen, kiddo. I know I’m miscast as the Mother Superior, even in this…” she frowned, “this…potato thing.”
    “Potato thing?”
    “You know.” She waved her hands in the air. “ Cabaret and The Sound of Music mixed up. Like potatoes.”
    “I think you mean ‘mash-up.’”
    The Sound of Cabaret used the Germanic pre-World War II era settings of both the original musicals, and then combined the plots and characters. In the new show, feisty postulant Mary is sent to teach singing to the dancers at the seedy Vaughn Katt Club. Her secret agenda, of course, is to save their souls and return to the nunnery, but along the way she falls in love with the owner of the club, Captain Vaughn Katt. The captain is like a father to his ragtag troupe of dancers, and a hero: he is actually hiding them—all of them Jews—in plain sight by disguising them as performers. When the Nazis find out, the captain, Mary, and the Jewish dancers escape over the mountains in borrowed nuns’ habits.
    “ The Sound of Cabaret ,” Marge shook her head. “When Arnie first asked me to do it, I laughed out loud. Thought it was a joke. But he was serious as a heart attack. See, the theater is in a bit of trouble, and—”
    “Cuckoo!” sang the clock.
    “Really, five thirty already?” Diamonds sparkled in the late afternoon sunlight as Marge turned her wrist to look at her watch. “I gotta run, sweetheart. Sorry I didn’t get to give you the ten-cent tour. Just make sure to water the plants. Bernice’s got ’em everywhere, even in the bathroom.”
    “Okay,” I said, following her back down the entry hall.
    “Keys to the house are on the kitchen table.” Marge clicked to the door, where she picked up a gold clutch purse from a small hall table. “Instructions for the burglar alarm are in the drawer underneath the stereo.”
    “Burglar alarm?” I said.
    “And there’s a checklist for all the pool stuff there too.”
    “Yeah. About that—”
    “Oh, I almost forgot,” she said, turning to face me. “I told Charlie’s daughter you were a PI. You’re hired.”

CHAPTER 7

      
    “Okay, let’s take a look at your PI license,” Uncle Bob said. “Oh, that’s right. You