He tapped the waxed curl of mustache held on with spirit gum, and the men laughed. At that moment, Pin glimpsed a strange flicker in Max’s green-glass gaze. He stood with his eyes half closed, as though recalling some distant memory, and for a fraction of a second she could imagine that he once really might have played Romeo. Then he turned his head slightly sideways again, displaying Maxene’s face, and his expression shifted once more: no longer a woman’s disdain, but violent hatred for the crowd of men.

She quickly dropped the canvas flap, unnerved, and hurried around back to Max’s dressing room. She let herself in, noticing that the photographs of the wasp-waisted girl had been tossed back on the barrel, alongside a glass of some murky liquid and a dead mouse, its head crushed.

Averting her eyes, she brushed aside a shawl, opened the drawer where Max kept the Omar and Helmar cigarette boxes, and added the Omar box that Lionel had given her. Later Max would check for it and count the dollar bills inside. She knew better than to steal from him. She’d seen him deck a would-be pickpocket outside the Casino and leave him moaning in the dirt.

And Clyde told her that, back in New York, Max had knifed a man who’d propositioned him. “Never mistake a fella dressed as a lady on the stage for a fairy” had been the moral of that story. “Not if he’s bigger’n you.”

She left the trunk and went to Max’s dressing table, where a glass ashtray held spare change. She picked out two quarters—her arrangement with Max, if he wasn’t around to pay her. As always, she considered pocketing a nickel to cover her fare back, but decided against it.

She grabbed the silver flask that stood beside a bottle of laudanum syrup. She’d tried it once, but it made her sick to her stomach. She preferred beer, or schnapps. She gulped a mouthful of whatever Max’s silver flask contained, something so harsh it brought tears to her eyes. Turning to leave, she saw Max in the doorway.

“Checking the wares?” He cuffed her head, but lightly. He sounded more amused than angry. “You make the drop?”

She nodded, one eye on the door in case he came at her. But he just pulled off the blond wig and tossed it onto the dressing table.

“That stuff’ll give you the willies.” He reached under the table for a bottle, poured a small amount into a glass. “Here, take a snootful of this.”

Pin drank it, grimacing. Max laughed. “Well, you’ll learn.”

He took the glass from her, filled it, and downed it. “‘Shallow draughts intoxicate the brain; drinking largely sobers us again.’” He lit a Helmar and glanced at the ashtray. “You take your pay?”