Quietly operating since 1926

Speakeasy.

Leave the weather at the door. Leave your proper name with it.

Consult the cold-tea list ↓
EVELYN VOSS
& HER MIDNIGHT SIXSHIRTS 8¢
COLLARS 3¢
ONE NIGHT
NO QUESTIONSDAMP WASH
BY THE POUND
THE PIANO KNOWS YOUR ALIAS◆NO RECEIPTS AFTER MIDNIGHT◆ASK FOR MRS. VALE◆THE PIANO KNOWS YOUR ALIAS◆

For one blue week only

Evelyn
Voss & her Midnight Six Every evening the moon cooperates

Mercer’s Monday Economy

4 lb.
25¢ Rough dry · honest starch Buttons accepted without complaint

This week below stairsThis week above board

Music with its hat pulled low.Whites with their standards high.

The Velvet TelegramFirst Boil

Slow fox-trots for unopened letters.Kitchen cottons and sensible towels.

Nocturne for a False NameBlueing Hour

Miss Voss at the piano; house lights at half-confession.Yellowed linens restored to civic confidence.

The Last AlibiLast Collection

Six brass chairs, one tune nobody admits knowing.Unclaimed parcels moved to the rear shelf.

The house remembersThe books balance

A ledger of small disappearances.A ledger of clean accounts.

17½17

The addressLoads collected

Mercer Street says seventeen. The fire map says eighteen. We prefer the fraction between them.Seventeen family bundles, each tagged, boiled, blued, and returned by supper.

312

Names misplacedCollars starched

Aliases checked with hats and reclaimed before dawn. Only “Moth” remains uncollected.A respectable quarter’s work, entered in ink and witnessed by the pressing room.

8

Candles nightlyPresses daily

Seven for the room. One in the dumbwaiter, so the bottles know when to travel.Steam raised at seven. Irons cooled at five. Nothing whatever occurs after closing.

“I heard absolutely no cornet. The shirts, however, were immaculate.”“No garment leaves Mercer’s without a square fold and a defensible button.”

— Patrolman O. Pike, inspection note, 1927— Mrs. Vale, proprietor’s guarantee

For friends arriving lateFor parcels arriving damp

This week’s perfectly innocent phrase.This week’s collection ticket.

Say it once through the brass grille. If asked to repeat it, admire the weather and keep walking.Present the number below at the front counter. Unclaimed shirtwaists move to the top shelf Friday.

Valid until Sunday’s first trolleyMercer claim office · carbon copy The canary owes me cab fare.
LOT 62–B · THREE COLLARS · ONE BLUE SOCK

A final courtesyA final care instruction

Tell no one.
Bring someone interesting.Tell everyone.
Mercer gets the grey out.

Coats at the left. Opinions at the door. The last trolley is none of our concern.Whites on Monday. Delicates on Wednesday. Buttons are returned in a paper envelope.

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