“Oh, yes.” Sarah hurried back to the stove. “I’m sorry. Please sit down.” She set out the napkins she’d made out of blue checked gingham. “I hope you’ll enjoy this honey cake. It’s a recipe from the cook of a very dear friend of mine in Philadelphia.” As she offered the plate, Philadelphia and everyone in it seemed years away.
“Thank you, dear.” Anne waited for Sarah to sit down, then said, “Alice is sleeping now. I wasn’t sure you’d done the right thing by taking her in here. Truth is, I drove out this morning because I was concerned.” “I had to take her in.”
“No, you didn’t.” When Sarah bristled, Anne laid a hand on hers. “But you did what was right, and I’m proud of you. That girl needs help.” With a sigh, she sat back and looked at her own daughter. Pretty Liza, she thought, always so bright and curious. And safe, she reflected, adding a quick prayer of thanksgiving. Her children had always had a full plate and a solid roof over their heads-and a father who loved them. She made up her mind to thank her husband very soon.
“Alice Johnson has had nothing but hard times.” Anne took a sip of tea. Her mind was made up. She had only to convince her husband. At that thought her lips curved a little. It was never hard to convince a man whose heart was soft and open. The other ladies in town would be a bit more difficult, but she’d bring them around. The challenge of it made her smile widen and the light of battle glint in her eyes. “What that girl needs is some proper work and a real home. When she’s on her feet again, I think she should come work at the store.”
“Oh, Mrs. Cody.”
Anne brushed Sarah’s stunned gratitude aside.
“Once Liza’s married to Will I’m going to need new help. She can take Liza’s room in the house, as well…as part of her wage.”
Sarah fumbled for words, then gave up and simply leaned over to wrap her arms around Anne, “It’s kind of you,” she managed. “So kind. I’ve spoken with Alice about just that, but she pointed out that the women in town wouldn’t accept her after she’d worked at the Silver Star.”
“You don’t know Ma.” Pride shimmered in Liza’s voice. “She’ll bring the ladies around, every one.
Won’t you, Ma?”
Anne patted her hah-. “You can put money on it.”
Satisfied, she broke off a corner of the honey cake. “Sarah, now that we’ve got that settled, I feel I have to talk to you about the…visit you paid to the Silver Star yesterday.”
“Visit?” Though she knew it was hopeless, Sarah covered the bruise under her eyes with her fingers. “You know, when you tangled with Carlotta,” Liza put in. “Everyone in town’s talking about how you wrestled with her and even punched Jake Redman. I wish I’d seen it.” She caught her mother’s eye and grimaced. “Well, I do.”
“Oh, Lord.” This time Sarah covered her entire face. “Everyone?”
“Mrs. Miller was standing just outside when the sheriff went in.” Liza took a healthy bite of cake. “You know how she loves to carry tales.”
When Sarah just groaned, Anne shook her head at Liza. “Honey, you eat some more of that cake and keep your mouth busy. Now, Sarah.” Anne pried Sarah’s hands away from her face. “I have to say I was a mite surprised to hear that you’d gone in that place and had a hair-pulling match with that woman.
Truth is, a nice young girl like you shouldn’t even know about places and people like that.”
“Can’t live in Lone Bluff two days and not know about Carlotta,” Liza said past a mouthful of cake.
“Even Johnny-”
“Liza.” Anne held up a single finger. “Chew. Seeing as you’re without kin of your own, Sarah, I figured I’d come on out and speak to you about it.” She took another sip of tea while Sarah waited to be lectured. “Well, blast it, now that I’ve seen that girl up there, I wished I’d taken a good yank at Carlotta, myself.” “Ma!” Delighted, Liza slapped both hands to her mouth. “You wouldn’t.”
“No.” Anne flushed a little and shifted in her chair. “But I’d like to. Now, I’m not saying I want to hear about you going back there, Sarah.”
“No.” Sarah managed a rueful smile. “I think I’ve finished any business I might have at the Silver Star.” “Popped you a good one, did she?” Anne commented studying Sarah’s eye.
“Yes.” Sarah grinned irrepressibly. “But I gave her a bloody nose. It’s quite possible that I broke it.” “Really. Oh, I do wish I’d seen that.” Ready to be impressed, Liza leaned forward, only to straighten again at a look from Anne. “Well, it’s not as if I’d go inside myself.”
“Not if you want to keep the hide on your bottom,” Anne said calmly. She smoothed her hair, took another sip of tea, then gave up. “Well, darn it, are you going to tell us what it looks like in there or not?” With a laugh, Sarah propped her elbows on the table and told them.
Scheming came naturally to Carlotta. As she lay in the wide feather bed, she ran through all the wrongs that had been done to her and her plans for making them right. The light was dim, with only two thin cracks appearing past the sides of the drawn shades. It was a large room by the Silver Star’s standards. She’d had the walls between two smaller rooms removed to fashion her own private quarters, sacrificing the money one extra girl would have made her for comfort.
For Carlotta, money and comfort were one and the same. She wanted plenty of both.
Though it was barely nine, she poured a glass of whiskey from the bottle that was always at her bedside. The hot, powerful taste filled the craving she awoke with every morning. Sipping and thinking, she cast her eyes around the room.
The walls were papered in a somewhat virulent red-and-silver stripe she found rich and elegant. Thick red drapes, too heavy for the blistering Arizona summers, hung at the windows. They made her think, smugly, of queens and palaces. The carpet echoed the color and was badly in need of cleaning. She rarely noticed the dirt.
On the mirrored vanity, which was decorated with painted cherubs, was a silver brush set with an elaborate C worked into the design. It was the only monogram she used. Carlotta had no last name, at least none she cared to remember.
Her mother had always had a man in her bed. Carlotta had gone to sleep most nights on a straw pallet in the corner, her lullaby the grunts and groans of sex.
It had made her sick, the way men had pounded themselves into her mother. But that had been nothing compared to the disgust she had felt for her mother’s weeping when the men were gone.
Crying and sniveling and begging God’s forgiveness, Carlotta thought. Her mother had been the whore of that frigid little town in the Carolina mountains, but she hadn’t had the guts to make it work for her.
Always claimed she was doing it to feed her little girl, Carlotta remembered with a sneer. She poured more whiskey into the glass. If that had been so, why had her little girl gone hungry so many nights? In the dim light, Carlotta studied the deep amber liquid. Because Ma was just as fond of whiskey as I am, she decided. She drank, and savored the taste.
The difference between you and me, Ma, she thought to herself, is that I ain’t ashamed-not of the whiskey, not of the men. And I made something of myself.
Did you cry when I left? Carlotta laughed as she thought back to the night she’d left the smelly, windowless shack for the last time. She’d been fifteen and she’d saved nearly thirty dollars she’d made selling herself to trappers. Men paid more for youth. Carlotta had learned quickly. Her mother had never known her daughter was her stiffest competition.
She despised them all. Every man who’d pushed himself into her. She took their money, arched her hips and loathed them. Hate made a potent catalyst for passion.
Her customers went away satisfied, and she saved every coin.
One night she’d packed her meager belongings, stolen another twenty dollars from the can her mother kept hidden in the rafters and headed west.