The men were dapper in their business suits and fashionable hats. Besides in magazines, I had never seen so many folks in expensive clothing. In front of big buildings, Negroes and whites stopped to chat with each other, talk weather, business, and the order of the day. I stretched my neck toward one building called the Top Hat Club. Horns sounded, and automobiles slowed as drivers shouted out greetings to passerby.
Shop bells jingled and lured the cheer of ringing cash registers.
Walnut Street had hypnotized me with its energy, and I stood gaping, enchanted and swept up with the wonderment of it all.
I hooded a hand over my eyes and looked up and down the street, gazing at the handsome buildings that kissed sunny skies as folks bustled under shaded concrete lips and sloped awnings.
Breaths of savory cooking and baking bread drifted out of swinging doors and open windows, swirled around, teasing and inviting. My belly grumbled, and I wiped drool from my mouth, tasting the tempting spices, smoked meats, and cinnamon-sugared treats.
“Hurry, Cussy.” She rushed back and grabbed my arm again.
“Never seen so many wonders on one street, ma’am. Why, this street goes on like the coal rails back home.” I crooked my neck and looked back, absorbing it all.
“Mr. Calloway.Mr. Calloway,” Mrs. Claxton called out, breathless, rushing us toward the handsome man and the woman and the other man who accompanied him. “My, he’s looking sharp as a tack,” she stopped to whisper into my ear while straightening her scarf.
Dressed in an expensive-looking suit, he lifted his sunglasses and dipped his brown fedora. I glimpsed the black satin band and flat side ribbon that was attached.
The woman next to him looked like she’d just stepped out of a movie picture. Her black hair was styled in the latest fashion, and she wore a soft green satin dress that was sleek and fitted to her shapely figure, with a bodice pinched into a puffy silk flower that lifted to her chin.
She fiddled with a clip-on earring, a cluster of matching rhinestones, and waited when Mr. Calloway stopped and smiled broadly while the other man held a briefcase.
“He’s one hep cat. Uh-huh, a real dicty if there ever was,” Mrs. Claxton whispered again into my ear.
Her words were puzzling.
“Mr. Calloway,sir, may I please trouble you for an autograph?” She could barely catch her breath.
“Ma’am?” I had never seen so much fussing, and alarm pricked at my brow. Worried her ticker would stop dead and lose its last tock for a man stripped clear off the magazine pages of movie star royalty.
Mr. Calloway nodded ayesand pulled a gold pen from his breast pocket.
The librarian dropped my arm and dug into her pocketbook. “Let me get something for you to write on, sir. Hold on. I— Now where is my—” Exasperated, she rummaged through it again, then patted her chest as if something would magically appear.
Suddenly, she looked at me and pried one of the Bibles out of my hand.
“Mrs. Claxton! Ma’am, please—” I searched around the sidewalk for paper, anything that could be signed other than Reverend’s Bible. “Let me find something else.”
To everyone’s surprise, she flipped to the title page and shoved it in front of him, the book jumping in her shaky hand.
Mr. Calloway studied her a few seconds, and then the star dazzled her with a blinding smile as he took the Bible and set his pen to paper.
“If you’ll just make it out to Effie Claxton, sir—no, make thatEffie Ruth Claxton,” she said, hovering over him and the page, spelling out her name, twice, slow and measured, and then once more to be certain. “E-f-f-i-e…”
When he closed the book and handed it back to her, he motioned to the man next to him, who pulled out a small record from his briefcase. Cab scribbled his name over the red label and gave it to the awestruck librarian.
“‘The Calloway Boogie.’Law.Thank you, Mr. Calloway!” She clutched the Bible and record to her chest.
When he winked, she looked like she would faint from sheer excitement, and I grabbed her arm.
Tipping his hat, the famous man walked briskly with his friends down Walnut Street and disappeared into a tall building with a large fancy sign that read STRAND THEATRE.
The librarian stared after him, youthful and dreamy-lipped.
When Mrs. Claxton finally opened the Bible, her face lit up.
She tilted the script toward me.
Effie Ruth Claxton,
