Then Lu started pulling the curlers out of her hair and throwing them at the audience. There was a drumroll from the orchestra, and Lu did a funny little movement with her hips. Rose heard a sharp gasp from Nonna and turned to see that the smile was gone. But the rest of the audience kept on laughing. They laughed when Lu took off the furry slippers and did several barefooted high kicks. They were roaring by the time she peeled off her big fluffy bathrobe slowly, one sleeve at a time, and let it fall to the floor. She was wearing some ugly pajamas and she peeled those off too, slowly, in the rhythm set by the drum.

“Madonn'a mi!” Rose heard Nonna whisper at her side. That was as close as she ever came to cursing. Meanwhile, Lu stood on the stage dressed only in a flesh-colored silk teddy. The garment itself wasn't all that skimpy; Rose had seen actresses in the movies wearing bathing suits that were worse, but, of course, her prudish grandmother was scandalized.

The audience around them had started to clap for Lu. They clapped harder when twenty men came onstage and danced with her. They stood up and cheered when she did three cartwheels off the stage at the end of her number. Only Nonna stayed in her seat.

For the rest of the act, every time Lu came out onstage, the audience laughed. Everyone except Nonna. When the curtain finally came down to huge applause, Nonna sat staring grimly at the stage. That was when Rose had an idea that would end the intrusion of Lu into her life forever. “Wasn't my mother wonderful, Nonna?” she said. “When I grow up I want to be just like her.”

Nonna grabbed her by the hand and took her home right then and there. They didn't stay to see Act Three.

Later that night as she lay in bed, Rose couldn't believe her mother had been stupid enough to let Nonna see that dance. Lu had to have known how Nonna would react, so what was she thinking? The next day, Lu came to the house to explain what had happened.