House of Mirrors: Life in the Demimonde

By Ada Prell

Surrounded by 14,000-foot mountain peaks and stunning yet dangerous wilderness, Leadville, Colorado is where silver kings make their fortunes, miners fight to survive, and women struggle in the brutal world of coarse men, where laws are loose, yet harsh Victorian mores are rigid and unforgiving.

 

As Sheriff Lachlan Cooper wrestles with his failure to capture elusive stagecoach robbers, his wife Rachel quietly grapples with her desire to loosen the reins her husband holds her back with.  Laura, Bronwyn, Squirrel Tooth Alice, and the other prostitutes of the House of Mirrors bordello walk a razor's edge as they negotiate the moral terms of survival and social acceptance, seeking moments of meaning and happiness along the way. 

 

Drawn from the pages of history, the people and events of the 1800s West are returned to life in this historical fiction. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ada Prell
• Release date: Aug 17, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201385590

Ada Prell

Ada Prell has lived in Boston, the deep South, and Los Angeles, but the inspiration for this story comes from her current home in the high elevations of Colorado, surrounded by imposing mountains, deep glacial lakes, regal trees, pure air, fierce weather, and spellbinding wildlife.  In these wilds, she has been enthralled with stories of the varied mountain inhabitants from the recent and distant past, especially those whose lives were dwarfed by the judgments of niggling minds, inhabitants whose voices were subdued and stifled by the petty and powerful.  The historical fiction House of Mirrors: Life in the Demimonde is her first novel, written in retirement after 32 rewarding years of teaching literature, film, and composition.  She lives with her husband Rick and a long line of rescue dogs, currently starring Molly Brown and Jack Kerouac.

Book preview

CHAPTER 2 ~ ELVA’S FUNERAL

Inside the church, it felt dark, airless, claustrophobic. Elva Shue lay stiffly in a rudely built pine box. She wore a dark, high-neck dress and crimson silk scarf. Dick, her husband, looked stiff and uncomfortable, his small, close-set eyes black and watchful, a lock of dark hair falling onto his forehead, his crooked bowtie rigid.

Maud was just stepping back from viewing Elva as Laura entered the church with Opal and Lola and approached Elva’s corpse. Opal stopped and stood stone still when she saw the coffin. I’ll just sit here. She lowered herself uneasily onto the bench several rows back; she held the back bar of the pew in front of her tightly with both hands.

Laura and Lola continued up the aisle to where Elva lay. Laura whispered to Lola, Look how Dick dressed her. Looks tense. Just hasn’t been our joyful Elva in several years. Doesn’t look like her, does it?

Lola shook her head. Looks like a woman prayin’ for a back door to escape through. What’s Dick doing dressing her anyway? That’s for the women to do. Her mother, anyway.

As the women drew closer to the pine coffin, Dick stepped in front of her, as if protecting Elva.

In a hurried voice, he began to justify his dressing her. Her dress, well, she like the high collar, her bein’ so modest an’ all, an’ that there scarf ‘round her neck, well, that’s her favorite, she done tol’ me many a time . . ..

Laura interrupted to slow him down. Good o’ you to think of what would please her, Dick. She looks just fine.

An’ I propped that there rolled-up sheet under her head so she rest peaceful, see?

Thoughtful touches, Dick. Laura and Lola turned and walked to sit with Opal and Maud. Lola turned and eyed Dick suspiciously. I tell you; sumpin’ unnatural ‘bout poor Elva, other than her bein’ dead, ‘course, she whispered.

Maud whispered, Elva’s mother, when she heard Elva done died of so called ever’lastin’ faint and then childbirth, said the devil done killed her daughter. First thing she said. An’ look at that sheet all rolled up un’er her head.

Opal, eyes wide, added, Woman ain’t at rest, that’s fer damned sure.

After the funeral, the mourners proceeded to Evergreen Cemetery, some in carriages, some on horseback. Dark clouds darkened the day; drizzle chilled the crowd. As the pallbearers carried the casket, still open, so all could see Elva on her journey to the grave, Opal grabbed Laura’s arm.

Do you see it? Opal asked in a hushed tone, panic beginning to choke her voice.

I see it, I see it, Laura affirmed.

Maud murmured, Well, I’ll be . . ..

Several mourners craned their necks to confirm the odd sight. Laura and Maud looked at each other in alarm.

CHAPTER 3 ~ SAVOIR FAIRE

The next morning, Bronwyn , the newly arriving sporting girl at House of Mirrors, was disembarking from a stagecoach, alighting as Pastor Earle and Sarah passed by. Bronwyn smiled. Tall, regal, and proud, she surveyed the street. From under her hat, Sarah offered Bronwyn a kind look and the barest nod. At this small sign of welcome, Bronwyn turned, and in her Irish brogue, spoke crisply. Kind sir and madam, do you know the way to the House of Mirrors? I’ve only just arrived to Leadville. Could you tell me directions to the home of Miss Laura Evens?

Earle, his lips twitching slightly, raised his chin, as if to look down on her, but she was his height. He cleared his throat. It’s unlikely that this is a place a lady like yourself wishes to go, but if you are indeed looking for Laura’s . . . house . . . then you have only to turn yourself around and find yourself there. You have arrived.

Bronwyn, eyebrows raised in curiosity at his comment and tone, but smiling nonetheless, replied courteously, I’m sure I’m most thankful for your assistance. Good day to you both.

Pastor Earle, not acknowledging her thanks, looked forward and walked away from her, whispering to wife, Another woman who loves Satan more than she loves God.

Sarah stopped. Maybe she just feels the pinch and needs a job.

Earle took her arm brusquely and hurried her to the end of the street.

Inside the brightly sunlit House of Mirrors, Bronwyn, greeted by Laura, entered the brothel and was introduced to the other women. Ladies, this here is Bronwyn. She’ll be working with us here at the House of Mirrors.

Bronwyn stood straight and tall at five feet ten inches, beaming at her new workmates. She wore her soft brown hair loosely under a black velvet mushroom hat wrapped with deep purple silk. Over her Lorraine work blouse, she wore a charcoal gray wool cloak with a lavender silk scarf around her neck. Her eyes were full of inquisitiveness and amusement.

Maud, coldly resisting this possible threat, pursed her lips. Y’aren’t thinkin’ of doin’ any entertainin’, are ya? Olivia could use a bit o’ help with th’ cleanin’ an’ cookin’ an’ such. You’re looking a bit long in the tooth.

Bronwyn laughed. With mirth and laughter, let old wrinkles come.

Maud raised one eyebrow. Bronwyn smiled broadly. I’ll just take my plunder to where I’m to be staying. Laura touched Olivia’s arm and asked her to show Bronwyn the way. Help her tote that trunk, if you would, Olivia. The two ascended the stairs, and after a moment, descended again, laughing, and returned to the front parlor.

Opal looked at Maud but spoke to Bronwyn: Pay no mind to Maud. She’s always in a pucker ‘bout something. You’re as comely as any here.

That’s right, Laura added. The jammiest bits of jam! We’re glad for your company! Besides, a woman’s face is not near so important as her talent for the trade.

‘Though I look old, yet I am strong and lusty!’ Bronwyn replied. Maud scrunched up her face and scowled. "Where do you come from? Why don’t you talk normal?"

Two years I worked in Denver, and before that, New York, but you surely guessed by my speech that I’m an Irish lass. A married one, once, even. But I love two men best, William and Geoffrey.

Maud raised her eyebrows. You were married? To both William and Jeffrey? At the same time? Snickering, she turned to Opal and whispered loudly, Musta stopped ‘round Utah somewhere in there!

Bronwyn smiled. No, William and Geoffrey were my teachers; it was their words I spoke to you. But I did have a fine husband, and a handsome one. He was rich, but he had to hide our marriage because had his family discovered he married a simple woman with no means, they’d have separated him from the family riches. As it happened, they discovered he married a poor woman and cut him off after all. So proud he was, he couldn’t bear to live a simple life. He asked me to give my body to his friends to earn us a wee bit of spending money. So in love I was, that I began to consider it, but as a good Catholic girl, I just couldn’t. He soon became desperate, begged me piteously, and at length, I did it. For love of him. I’d have done more than even that for him. But my Catholic conscience, well, it wore me down. I confessed to the church, and straightaway, the priest ex-communicated me. And wouldn’t you know, my dear husband, he had an aversion to hard work—truth be told, an aversion to any work—and one day, I woke up a whore, and my husband seemed none so dear anymore. And so I left him and came west. I’m damned in the eyes of the holy church already, whether I left him or not, so there was nothing left to lose.

Bronwyn closed her eyes, and in her mind’s eye, she watched, like an old film in sepia tone, her husband encouraging her to go off to their bedroom with his friends. Then she saw the vision of a small man, hollow cheeked, with thinning hair, a slight forehead, and a scratchy looking throat beard. He was wearing a biretta and a black button-down cassock, scolding her, walking her out of the church where he closed the massive wooden doors on her. She opened her eyes again, and the other women looked on, their faces solicitous, disgusted, empathetic—but not surprised.

Squirrel Tooth Alice uncrossed her legs and leaned forward on her settee. "Seems we women’s jist damned from birth. Yer husband drove you to yer work. He were a no-‘ccount scoundrel, an’ I know he din’t care fer you one hooter, long as his own se’fish ends was gained. But lissen here: here’s you a tale to match that’un. Were my own daddy what sent me to this vocation. My daddy, James Haley, he found the instertution of slavery mighty conveniernt, but then we lost a damned fortune durin’ the Civil War. So thar we was, strugglin’ mightily, back home in Belton, Texas, and our town were attacked by Comanches. I weren’t but nine years ol’, an’ them Comanches, they took me off with them. What happen’ there, I’ll save that fer anuther time."

She sighed. But four years later, I got away, so t’ pile on th’ agony, my family said I were a womern now and jes’ assumed I’d been ‘spoilt,’ an’ to them, all I was were jes’ some Injun’s squaw. They weren’t in the least happy to see me—kinda sour, if you want to know. Outcast, I was, fer all pra’tical purposes. At fourteen, I got lucky: met me an older man, an’ he loved me, wanted t’ marry me, spoilt or not, an’ so I brung ‘im home. You’d’a thunk they’d’a been happy I were gonna git respectable. But ooh, Daddy, he were so wrathful, so I figured it best t’ tell ‘im I done a’ready married th’ man. That was when the cheese fell off the cracker, an’ he took leave of his senses. Grabbed his Winchester and shot my Jim in the chest. Impact was so pow’rful that Jim flew off the front porch—never knew what hit ‘im. He wasn’t so fetchin’, and not young, but he loved me dear, and I was most aggrieved to see him die so fiercely. Me so young and poor as Job’s turkey, well, I didn’t see as I had no other choice than to be a dad-blam’d adventuress, as you might say. As I sez, we women jist damned from birth.

She closed her eyes and watched, in her mind, the chaos of Comanches on horses stirring up dust around her home, scooping her up as a child, and carrying her off to a Comanche settlement. She watched herself hauling water in buckets, carrying sticks on her back, and then, one quiet day, while alone at the river, wandering away from camp, thereby escaping, walking for days, showing up at her family’s home in rags, looking dirty and unkempt. Refined passers-by gave her snooty looks; her father spat in the dirt off the porch when he saw her. She watched herself later, cleaned up, in a simple but pretty white dress, being courted by an older man who she then introduced to her father, who picked up the rifle and blasted Jim. She saw herself as in a dream, screaming, soundlessly.

Celeste, sunk deep into the chesterfield, looked at her hands, as if they weren’t her own. And if marry, nighttime, morning time, any time, have to sleep with husband, no time off. She sighed. This life here, at least, sometimes have time to enjoy. Men of all breed rough on woman, but marriage—it not guarantee nothing.

Or he’ll be wanting in the proficiencies that satisfy a woman in the boudoir, Bronwyn added.

Maud sighed disgustedly. "What?"

Lousy lover, Laura explained.

Coulda jes’ said that, Maud mumbled.

Madeleine looked quizzical. To hear you all tell it, it seems as if to marry a man just brings bad luck. I don’t know that I should ever marry, my circumstances being what they are. Maybe this life we live here is the best to hope for, or to ask for. It’s not so bad.

Maud frowned. You’re as apt to meet a wicked end bein’ a wife as you are bein’ a harlot. Cast your chances and see which way fate takes you. And they may lead to the same place.

Raising her eyebrows, Bronwyn shared, Hark this: the bard advises, ‘Get thee a good husband, and use him as he uses thee.’

Tarnation, woman, you talk like a book! Who the criminy is the bard? Maud asked, her voice full of both wonder and irritation.

William is the bard. William Shakespeare, the best philosopher, father, friend, a woman has. He and Geoffrey. Geoffrey Chaucer.

Nodding, Maud commented, Welp, I don’t know where you met these men, but I like William’s thinking. Use the bastard! she cackled. What’s it mean, the bard?

A bard is a poet, one who writes beautiful lines containing the savoir-faire you need for life. I met both William and Geoffrey in their plays and stories—they’re long dead now—but their counsel carries me safely through many of my own dramas, their words burned in my heart, and they join with me, in my mind, when I’m alone and sometimes even when I entertain men. Growing up, I was alone, and William Shakespeare and Geoffrey Chaucer became my best friends. A neighborly man back in Ireland, he was well learned and would read to me, until I caught on for myself how to read, so hungry I was for words that set me afire. For hours, my mind rose above melancholy and misfortune, for the world became a most remarkable place and my heart grew stout.

Opal, barely following, squinted. What’s savoir-faire?

Lola, her long black ringlets flowing over her shoulders and collar bone, gold earrings dangling by her neck, her black lace shawl hanging loosely around her upper arms, her eyes wide and black, stepped in to explain Opal’s predicament in her thick Spanish accent. The accent she faked. Like her name. Elizabeth Rosanna Gilbert was born in Ireland, but she loved a tall tale, and her own history proved to be her tallest, though she had indeed lived a life of glamour, taking King Ludwig I of Bavaria and composer Franz Liszt as lovers and dancing the tarantella in San Francisco. She chose her exotic name, Lola Montez, and looked every bit the part. Opal, she don’ read. She was mending a dress. Not looking up, she asked, What’s savoir-faire?

Bronwyn closed her eyes to savor the beauty of the phrase as she repeated it. Savoir faire. Savoir faire is know-how. The sense you need to maneuver through the world safely. So you make sense of it. And have some grace and style doing it. Eyes widening, she suggested, So, ladies, during slow times, why not perform a Shakespeare scene here some time, or maybe you’d like it if I read to you from Geoffrey Chaucer or Will Shakespeare?

Maud was quickly warming up to Bronwyn. Welp, I’m here to tell you ladies, I’m all for this sav-warr fay-er. I know how to—how you say it?—maneuvert safely through this world. I take care of my own self. And I cain’t wait to hear more from ol’ Jeffrey and William.

Madeleine leaned forward and inquired, expectantly, I s’pose you’ve read much from the Bible, being a sort of woman of letters as you are, haven’t you?

Bronwyn tilted her head to the side and thought for a moment. Aye, but the ones that wrote the Bible don’t seem inclined too kindly toward the very few women who are mentioned; most of the women in the Bible don’t have names, nor do they get to speak. Tamar and Rahab have all but been forgotten. Jesus himself did right by women, of course, but through most of the Bible, men fare better, and while Miriam is a true inspiration, and there may be heroines in a page or two of scripture, females are displayed as deceivers and destroyers of men, often treated rather despicably—your Jezebels, your Delilah’s, your Dinah’s, Gomer, Lot’s wife, and such. To hear the authors of the Bible tell it, Eve is the root of all evil. Vilifying embellishments, it seems to me. Unnecessary and maybe even untruthful melodrama, to my mind, written by men who felt women to be too much of a challenge. I fast grew discouraged and wearied of those tales. All the real wisdom for my life is from my two literary idols.

Opal and Madeleine rose. Madeleine smiled warmly at Bronwyn. It is so lovely to meet you. I look forward to getting to know you. I need to prepare for our afternoon and evening visitors. We will converse more, but for now, if you’ll excuse me.

Opal smiled at Bronwyn and ascended the stairs with Madeleine.

Laura, glancing up the stairs to ensure Opal was out of earshot, sat rolling a cigarette over a small walnut table. Bronwyn, coming from Denver, have you heard of the Denver Strangler?

Lola, eager to hear more of this new drama, bent in. Yes, an’ his sister, Madame Fouchette?

Celeste offered what she’d heard: Her brother a killer, may killed many women, and his sister, she so distraught that, well, she go all the place disturbed.

Squirrel Tooth Alice rose to her feet, arms akimbo. And can you blame her? The one what played with her as a child, pertected her as a big brother should, who sat at dinner with her, an’ there he is, dear brother, savage as a meat axe . . . he slays women, women not o’ this country—two French, one Japernese—as easy as he’d order a ale at th’ Silver Dollar Saloon. My skin goes plumb cold thinkin’ o’ that por sister havin’ ta contermplate on ‘er own flesh and blood engagin’ in such . . . well, it’s jes’ more than a body can cogitate on. She shuddered.

Bronwyn nodded knowingly. This story I know well. It happens I was outside the courthouse on the day that Richard Demandy and his ill-fated sister both were there. Lena Tapper, a young lady, working, as we do, making her own way in the world, died with her own waistband wrapped ‘round her neck. The papers said the walls of her room were splashed with blood, furniture shattered, bedding all strewn about the room. She was powerful built and no doubt fought. Kiku—Kiku Oyama—she ran a house in the Japanese Quarter—did so well that she was able to send her mother in Japan $50 every month. In downtown Denver it was. Strangled with a Turkish towel. Blood on her sheets, and as with the other, and the room looked like there’d been plenty o’ fight. Marie, too, she was serving clients. Working girls all, and then murdered to add to their lot.

But Madame Fouchette—a woman, a beautiful woman, abroad, alone except for her brother, and now her brother, this passing dreadful scandal . . .. I saw them both outside the courthouse, him, prim and proper, looking sharp and dapper, hair slicked back, eyeing the ladies in the crowd, proud as a prince . . . her, hysterical, crying, seeing phantoms in front of her very face, from her own muddled mind, the ghosts of her brother’s victims torturing her, dogging her. There she was, feeling the guilt her brother should have felt, collapsing in a dead faint on the steps of the courthouse until some ‘kindly soul’ finally ‘rescued’ her. Bronwyn arched one eyebrow and looked cynically at the women around her.

Lola, smoking her large Cuban cigar and clearly dissatisfied with this turn of events, asked, "Why di’n’t the ghosts visit Demandy himself? He murders, but she gets apparitions of horror?"

Lola closed her eyes, drinking in the scene of Madame Fouchette in her room, alone, seeing before her eyes the vision of her brother killing each victim before he exited the brothel under the garish light of the gas lamps, quietly slipping in the back door of the home he shared with his sister, washing his hands in their shared kitchen sink, and sitting down to the table with his sister, palavering, daintily wiping his moustache with a thick white napkin. Then Lola imagined Madame Fouchette gripped in terror, fleeing the waking nightmare of strangled victims, bloodied, in front of her as she was roughly thrown, shackled, into a stagecoach which arrived at Woodcroft Insane Asylum in Pueblo where she was dragged in, fettered, and hours later, sat frightened and wide-eyed in a corner of a crowded room, walls desecrated with excrement, surrounded by people clawing, coughing, crying, cackling, screaming, and rocking in a bone-chilling cold that penetrated the building even on the warmest days.

THE ROOM WAS SILENT a moment, and as if to break the heavy spell of dark visions, Virgil knocked and re-entered the parlor, tipped his hat, and greeted the ladies, who hailed him with welcoming hellos.

Got one more box o’ supplies, ladies. He set the crate down gently.

Laura walked over to Bronwyn. Virgil, this is Bronwyn, our new girl. We’re right glad she’s here.

Oh, I’m familiar with this lady. I jes’ come from the hotel, where a woman there with her little girl told me ‘bout Miss Bronwyn. During that wicked storm the other night, when the stagecoach broke down on the pass, Miss Bronwyn bundled ‘em in her furs an’ he’ped ‘em into that ol’ abandoned cabin near the top—you know, the ol’ Douglas homestead. She give ‘em her own buff’lo blankets fer travelin’. They was all foundered—they’d a-froze sure were it not for Miss Bronwyn here. Exceedin’ kind of you, Miss. They was dreadin’ fer their lives what with that awful cold an’ wind, and they’s most beholden to you, Miss. The lady, she tell me th’ story with eyes full o’ tears. If anyone showed more gratitude than that there, I ain’t seen ‘em. A pleasure, ma’am.

He tipped his hat to her, then, addressing the group, bowed his head and started for the door. Well, I jes’ come to leave yer a few more supplies. I bes’ be goin’. Virgil departed, and the ladies ascended the stairs to ready themselves for their afternoon and evening customers.

CHAPTER 4 ~ SPECTRES & SMOKE

Once dressed, in the dimming late afternoon light, they stepped out onto the porch. After a while, the lamplighter came around with his ladder, lighting one streetlight at a time. Bronwyn’s eyes widened.

Look at the strange glow ‘round the streetlights. Both ghostly and enchanting. I can’t help but watch to see if a phantasm will suddenly emerge from the mist.

The women surreptitiously glanced over at Opal. Bronwyn noticed.

Some of us git a bit skeery come candlelight time, Lola explained.

I hope never to see specters in the night. I seen aplenty a’ready, Opal whispered.

Bronwyn turned to her. Do you believe in ghosts?

Peering warily up and down the dim street, Opal crossed her arms on her chest. I seen what I seen.

You? Bronwyn turned to face Laura.

Laura paused a moment, leaning on the porch railing. Truth be told, I’m not afraid of the dead. It’s the cockeyed living that scare the Jesus out of me.

Bronwyn laughed.

But truly, Laura added, I’m not sure what I believe when it comes to what I can’t see. Maybe sometimes it’s just our own thoughts that haunt us. Or it’s just loose ends we’ve got to tie up inside ourselves. Or maybe, someone in our lives planted something disquieting in the fertile soil of our mind, and we’ve not got shed of it. But I’ll say this: what I believe during the light of day and what I feel wary of in the dark night are two different truths.

Bronwyn laughed softly. As with most of us. When the eye is weakened by darkness, the mind withdraws from the outer world to dwell for a time in our inner worlds. Sometimes its visions are frightening. Geoffrey Chaucer says, ‘How potent is the fancy! People are so impressionable, they can die of mere imagination.’ She continued to look wonderingly at the strange mist around the streetlights. The misty haze does enthrall!

Eager to leave supernatural thoughts behind, partly for herself, but mostly for Opal, Laura explained, It comes from the sulfur from the smelters. During the day, it can be kind of blackish yellow. You can predict the weather by watching how the smoke behaves. If the smoke rises up straight from the stacks, the weather will be pleasant. If it slides back down the stack and hovers over the rooftops, you know a storm is coming. It seems that here in Leadville, a storm is always coming.

Lola, also eager to veer off the subject of spirits, suggested, Laura, you tell Bronwyn how you came to be here.

Celeste nodded. Yes, tell story of who is your famous father.

Oh yes. Daddy. He was a real leader, and a real good man to those he reckoned to be worthy allies.

Bronwyn clapped her hands at the prospect of a great tale.

Laura held one hand up to prevent Bronwyn from getting her hopes up. So. Daddy. After the War between the States, he was head of the Klan Kavern—Grand Cyclops—in the KKK in Mobile, Alabama, and . . ..

Bronwyn looked puzzled. The KKK? Sounds intriguing. Mythical. Mysterious.

Laura snorted in disgust. It’s grown men wearing sheets with holes in them over their heads and parading around on horseback. And lighting crosses on fire.

Looking sideways at Laura, Bronwyn scoffed. Surely you’re ribbing me! Grown men, you say?

Yes ma’am, it’s all true. Only thing mysterious about them was how so many men could act like such dunderheads. But daddy’s leadership and membership in that club made him prince of the city. He used to come home and tell us all about his exploits fighting ‘evil doers.’ I was so proud of him. Until I found out that the evildoers translated as colored folks. I tried to put it together in my mind, tried to match up people I felt uneasy around or knew straight out were dodgy, but skin color hardly ever matched up. More times than not, the ones I was most jumpy around were the ones my daddy called friends. Just couldn’t balance it up in my mind. When I was fourteen, Daddy took me to my first lynching; it was a man I used to see at the general store in town, a real dear man, Mr. Foster.

Always had a kind word for me, Mr. Foster did. Sometimes, I’d see him buy candy for his kids. But then, there he was, hanging. Didn’t even look like him. The big smile was all gone out of him. His head was all to the side, most unnatural. His hands hung, palms together since they’d bound his wrists together, like he was about to pray. I remember looking at the pockets of his waist overalls, wondering if he still had a few lemon drops or peppermints in there for his children. When I asked what he had done to be punished that way, Daddy told me he had touched a white woman while helping her pick up the groceries she’d dropped. The woman couldn’t tolerate him touching her food or her. That woman had just burst her stay-lace—over a good man’s natural kindness and courtesy.

She snorted. A white woman with overly delicate sensibilities having a conniption. Over what wasn’t anything but a kindness. That was it. That kindness was repaid by the world getting to watch Mr. Foster hanging there, not buying candy for his kids, not offering me gentle and reassuring words. I remember looking up at Daddy, his arms crossed upon his chest, smiling and joking with some of our neighbors as Mr. Foster swung. It was then that everything in my mind began to shift around. Before my very eyes, my daddy turned from people’s prince to monster . . . to . . . marauding menace. I couldn’t bear to look at his face after that. He looked dirty to me. Cruel. I wanted no part of him—I wanted out of that house as soon as possible. That was about the time I met Amos Drake and married him at age fifteen, had a daughter at age sixteen, and then, by the horn spoon, come to find out, my husband belonged to KKK as well—that was a day of sore reckoning. So I left Mobile, Amos, and my new baby. Never looked back. Didn’t even leave a note. Been on my own ever since. Except for my companions here, of course, she added, looking around, a small smile on her face.

As she spoke, memories and imaginings spun in her head. She pictured her father on his escapades with the Grand Cyclops, rearing back on his horse, terrorizing black men and women, sometimes even young children, in his red outfit with the Confederate flag sewn onto the arm. She saw, in her mind’s eye, Mr. Foster hanging from a tree as men, women, and children stood around chatting, playing, and picnicking as if he were no more than a holiday decoration.

Then, she summoned the image of a handsome young man, her former husband, Amos Drake. She remembered how he looked the day they met, his bowing to her in the street, then his bringing her flowers. He had bright, smiling blue eyes, tousled brown hair, and a grin wider than she imagined possible on a human face. When he gazed in her eyes, she understood what the poets meant when they poured out words in an attempt to capture what no one could truly feel without living it. In that moment, she envisioned rose petals and adoration far into the future.

She then saw herself, so young, holding a baby, red faced, squirming, then yawning and dozing. And then she evoked a memory of Amos tripping a young black girl while he was leaving the general store—he had laughed at the child, stepped over her, and turned to spit in her direction. To break the trance in her mind, Laura looked around to reassure herself that she was now surrounded by friends. What was outside her head was of great relief to her, like awakening from a bad dream.

Never looked back? Bronwyn asked sadly.

Laura looked down and began rolling a cigarette on a small table next to her porch rocking chair.

Can’t say I never think of my little boy. Truth is, I think on him every day. But I was poorly prepared to be a mama at that age. Come to think of it, he’d be older now than I was when I left. Probably Klan, like his daddy and my daddy.

To leave a child behind. It’s a sorrow you never shed, ‘s God’s own truth. But too often a woman has little choice.

Laura let out a long sigh. It’s a pang that never perishes. But both my daddy and my husband were of the same cloth. Gentle and generous, downright jovial, to the right kind. But those not the right kind? Seems Daddy and me, or Amos and me, we seldom had the same understanding about any given body we’d come across. We’d run across a person, and daddy, or my husband, would take kindly to them while my skin would crawl. Or I’d meet someone I’d think seemed a welcome presence, but Daddy or my husband wouldn’t cotton to them. Anyway, once they saw that—first Daddy, then Amos—once they saw that my judgment of folks didn’t match theirs, they kinda soured on me. Like something was wrong with me. It was turning mighty prickly. Couldn’t’a saved my child from being what a man in Mobile likely becomes, if it’s a family tradition.

CHAPTER 5 ~ LIKE BUTTERFLY

From down the street came the sound of men, laughing and talking boisterously. Laura stood at the edge of the railing and looked down State Street. Seeing four men turn the corner, she yelled out to them. "Welcome, gentlemen. You’re in good cheer tonight, Nathan! They can hear you laughing out