Green Ace by Stuart Palmer

could hear soft strains of music. She opened the inner door and peered in.
    She saw part of a long, bare hall, with a practice bar under the windows and a full-length mirror opposite. A ponderous, elderly automatic phonograph was grinding out The Sweetheart of Sigma Chi, and in the center of the polished floor a tall, fair man was dancing. He danced all by himself, except for the two enormous fans of tinted ostrich feather, and he wore only an undershirt and a pair of Paris-green slacks.
    “Whoops!” she gasped, and then “Excuse me !” But the solitary dancer was so engrossed that he did not turn his head. She suddenly realized that this was no pixie drag act. Apart from the soft, sinuous femininity of the gestures there was nothing effeminate about him at all. “ Pssst !” she whispered.
    The man turned, stared at her with china-blue eyes, and then said without breaking the rhythm, “All right, come on in if you want to join the class. There’s extra fans in the corner over there.”
    Somebody giggled, and Miss Withers stepped inside far enough to see that there were three scantily clad young women, completely equipped with ostrich feathers, facing the teacher and trying to copy his technique.
    The music suddenly ended, and he said, “Get it, girls? The whole thing is control. And lag on the beat. As you turn, make ’em think you won’t get the fans in place at the right time, only pick it up one, two— three ! See?” He looked at his watch. “Okay, it’s eleven-thirty. Only work on this at home during the week, all of you. And Irma, quit dieting or nobody will care whether you shake a fan or not.”
    The girls scampered noisily toward a dressing room, and Nils Bruner came over to Miss Withers, dropping the fans and mopping his forehead. “Yes, ma’am?”
    “I want to take a dancing lesson,” she said. “But not fan-dancing.” As she spoke she could see herself in the full mirror on the opposite wall, and realized how silly her prepared opening must sound.
    But Bruner did not smile. “Of course,” he said. “A private ballroom lesson. The waltz?”
    He was so fair that he seemed almost an albino. No trace of the pomade, the long sideburns, that she had expected. Indeed, if this tall, strange young man ever had five o’clock shadow it must look like frost or perhaps mold on his decided chin.
    “Yes, I think the waltz,” Miss Withers admitted.
    He looked sad. “Shall I make an appointment for one day next week?”
    “You couldn’t possibly make it today?” Next week would be too late, at least for Andy Rowan.
    Bruner looked sadder still. “I am sorry. But honestly, I’m booked solid. In a few minutes I have a class in tap and soft-shoe—a roomful of screaming teen-agers.”
    “Skip it,” the schoolteacher said abruptly. “Mr. Bruner, I’ll break down and confess that I really didn’t come here for a lesson, but on business. Do you remember a girl who studied with you a couple of years ago, named Midge Harrington?”
    The pale lashes flicked only once, then he said quickly, “Of course! Such a tragic end! The girl had great talent if she’d only stuck to her dancing. Such personality, such beauty …”
    “Do you happen to have a professional photograph of her around anywhere?”
    This time the hesitation was noticeably longer. “I might have,” Bruner said. “Only it’s autographed, and it has certain sentimental associations. I suppose you want it for publication in some newspaper? Could you go as high as fifty dollars?”
    Miss Withers said, “No, not a newspaper.” She thought she could go as high as twenty-five. After some haggling they settled, and she received a large studio portrait of a tall young woman in heavy make-up and ornate Spanish costume, clicking castanets and grinning like La Argentinita. “ To mio maestro Nils Bruner who taught me all I know, Midge ,” was scrawled at the bottom in a round, childish hand. Somehow that unformed, girlish writing touched the