The Bride Lottery

by Tatiana March

  “Caught her stealing on the train and traveling without a ticket.”

  Miranda listened in silence as the conductor enumerated her transgressions. She didn’t even try to argue her case. She was guilty of traveling without a ticket, and no one would believe her if she protested her innocence to the theft of the brooch.

  The marshal pulled open a desk drawer, counted out a hundred dollars and demanded a receipt. The conductor pocketed the money and removed the handcuffs. He raked one more lascivious look over Miranda before hurrying back to the train.

  Miranda rubbed her wrists. Her ears perked up when the marshal turned to his teenage deputy, who was loitering in the second chair, balancing on two legs against the unpainted cement wall.

  “Fetch Lucille,” the marshal said. “Tell her I have one for her.”

  The chair crashed down to four legs. The innocent blue eyes of the fresh-faced deputy snapped wide. “Lucille?” His gaze shuttled to Miranda. “But this one looks like a lady...”

  “She’s a lawbreaker who owes the town a hundred dollars.” The marshal made a shooing motion with one hand while using his other hand to lock the receipt in the desk drawer.

  The young deputy—in Miranda’s opinion his posterior should still be wearing out a school desk—loped off. The marshal turned to face her. He eyed her up and down. Now that she thought of it, his short, straight nose and wide mouth resembled those of his teenage deputy. Father and son, Miranda guessed, which made the lawman older than she’d assumed at first glance.

  The marshal lifted his brows at her. “Hungry?”

  Miranda nodded. He gestured for her to sit down in the chair his son had vacated and reached for a parcel in a linen napkin on the desk. Unwrapping a slice of crusty pie, he dumped it on a tin plate and carried the plate over to her. Perched on the edge of the chair, Miranda closed her eyes and took a deep inhale. Oh, the heavenly smell of it!

  “My wife bakes the best pies in town,” the marshal said.

  Miranda blinked her eyes open and gave the food one more appraising glance before she took a big bite. Remembering her manners, she muttered a thank-you through the mouthful. She crammed in another bite. The marshal reached over and tried to take the plate away from her. Miranda craned forward in the seat and nearly toppled over, her fingers clinging to the plate, as if glued to it. The marshal tore the plate free from her grasp.

  “If you’ve been starving, you got to eat slowly.”

  He stood in front of her and waited for her to chew and swallow before he allowed her another bite. Miranda had barely finished devouring every morsel when two sets of footsteps rang outside. A shadow blocked the sunlight through the open doorway.

  Miranda squinted. Lucille—for it could be none other—evidently shared the fashion sense of the lady who had stolen her brooch. Scarlet gown, tight corset, rouged cheeks, red hair in an elaborate twist, all topped with a frilly pink parasol.

  Lucille moved inside, taking up most of the space. She snapped her parasol shut, ran an assessing gaze over Miranda, then glanced over her shoulder at the marshal.

  “How much?”

  “A hundred.”

  “I can do that.” Lucille pointed with her parasol, almost poking Miranda in the gut. “Let’s go, sweetheart.”

  Miranda shrank back in the hard wooden seat. “I can’t—”

  The marshal cut her short with an ushering motion. “Go,” he told her. “I have a bounty hunter with four bank robbers arriving before nightfall. If you stay, you’ll have to share the cell with them. Wouldn’t wager much for your chances.”

  Lucille smiled and pointed to the open doorway with her parasol.

  “I’m not a prostitute,” Miranda said through gritted teeth, but she followed the woman, blinking when they emerged into the bright sunlight.

  The train was just leaving, the whistle blowing, steam rising in the air. In the window, the matron in purple was watching. Miranda’s hands fisted. The cow! She was wearing Mama’s brooch on her bulky chest! Miranda looked about for something to throw, but there was nothing suitable in sight. A cart full of potatoes would have served her well now.

  The tip of the parasol poked into her ribs. “Come along, darling.”

  Miranda turned back to Lucille. “I am not going to work for you.”

  Lucille’s eyes narrowed. “Until I’ve made a hundred dollars from you, you’ll do exactly what I tell you. If I tell you to jump, you ask how high. If I tell you to run, you ask how fast. If I tell you to take your clothes off, you ask if I want it quick or slow. Do you understand?”

  The parasol plunged into Miranda’s ribs, hard enough to bruise. Miranda nodded. She was getting the impression that Lucille’s parasol had no more to do with blocking out the sun than Cousin Gareth’s silver-topped cane had to do with assisting walking. They were weapons, pure and simple.

  She followed Lucille down the street. Fort Rock was a decent-size town, with a central row of timber buildings with false fronts that made them look taller. There were two side streets, both flanked with unpainted log cabins. They were in Wyoming now, Miranda recalled. A cool breeze stirred the air and a line of snowcapped mountains rose on the horizon.

  They entered a saloon through the swinging doors. Four young women in various stages of undress lolled about on padded chairs. Two were smoking and playing cards. A petite blonde was knitting what appeared to be an endless scarf, and a dark-skinned girl was reading aloud from a book that sounded like a penny dreadful.

  The sting of smoke sent Miranda into a coughing fit. She flapped a hand in front of her face to disperse the thick cloud that saturated the air.

  “Oh, we have a delicate one here,” one of the smoking girls said. Tall and thin, with dark hair and a sullen expression, she blew out another plume of smoke.

  “Not fresh meat again,” another one drawled. “Business is slow as it is.”

  “She’s not competition.” Lucille used her parasol to prod Miranda into the center of the room. “Girls, what do we do when business is slack?”

  The black girl who’d been reading grinned. “We run a promotion.”

  Lucille nodded, pointed at Miranda with her parasol. “This one owes me a hundred dollars. But with business so slow, it’s not worth the effort to break in a new girl. We’ll do something to bring in the decent men. The ones who might drink and gamble but won’t pay for a woman unless they get to keep her.”

  Two of the girls burst into a loud cheer. A shiver ran over Miranda. It sounded like they were talking about selling her into slavery. She gathered her courage. Papa had defeated a mutiny on one of his ships and he’d drilled it into his daughters never to show fear.

  She feigned a bored tone. “May I ask, what is this promotion you’re planning?”

  “Well, a bride lottery, of course,” Lucille replied.

  “And you’ll be the prize,” added the knitting blonde.

  * * *

  Miranda had to admit Lucille was an astute businesswoman. The madam instructed the girls to set up a low platform by the window near the entrance. A hooked rug and a rocking chair went on the platform, and Miranda’s task was to sit in the rocking chair.

  All day. All evening.

  Instead of her black mourning gown, she wore a soft wool dress in pale blue, modest in cut, with lace ruffles at the collar and cuffs. Her hair was twisted into an elegant upsweep, the formal look softened by a few strands left loose to flutter around her face.

  During the day, sunshine through the window gilded her, like an impressionist painting. In the evenings, an oil lamp burned on the small table beside her. She was allowed to pass the time sewing or reading. Sometimes, the tabby cat that lived on kitchen scraps would come in and sit on her lap, and she’d stroke the animal, drawing comfort from the gentle vibration of its contented purring.

  Next t
o this scene of domestic harmony, separated with a hemp rope from the saloon floor, the way a valuable exhibit might be guarded in a museum, stood a sign.

  Bride Lottery

  Tickets $10

  One ticket per person only

  The rule to limit the number of entries had been subject to much debate among Lucille’s girls. In the end they had agreed that the banker, Stuart Hooperman, was known to be eager to acquire a wife. If he bought a dozen tickets, it would reduce the odds for anyone else, which might dampen wider interest.

  During the day, most of the men who came into the saloon were polite enough not to stare. Instead, they stole covert glances at her while they sipped their drinks or ate their meals. At night, when the whiskey flowed, some grew bolder and crowded by the rope, ogling at her, whispering comments to each other.

  Miranda blocked them all out of her mind. Growing up with servants, she had developed the skill of ignoring their obtrusive presence, and now she put that skill to use. Mostly, her thoughts dwelled on her sisters, and on Cousin Gareth.

  Was he still pursuing her, or had he given up and returned to Merlin’s Leap? Or had he figured out the message in Charlotte’s letter and was on his way to Gold Crossing? How was Annabel faring alone at Merlin’s Leap? Had she managed to write to Charlotte, alerting their eldest sister that she was presumed dead?

  “Who do you want to win?” asked Shanna, the black girl, as she drained whiskey from the barrels behind the counter, getting ready for the evening. She was the most talkative of the girls, the most eager to find out about Miranda’s past.

  Miranda lowered the canvas fabric she was sewing. In truth, she had not allowed her thoughts to dwell on the prospect of marriage. When she was not thinking of her sisters, her mind was occupied with escape plans. Lucille, of course, had seen right through her, had pointed out the marshal kept an eye on the trains, Miranda would die in the wilderness if she tried to flee on foot, and anyone who stole a horse was hanged, female or not.

  “Makes no difference to me who wins,” Miranda replied.

  Shanna straightened behind the counter. She was solidly built, with big breasts and wide hips, yet she moved with grace. Her face was a perfect oval, her eyes large and almond shaped. She would have been a beauty, had it not been for the jagged scar at the corner of her mouth and two missing front teeth.

  “Trust me, it makes a difference.” Shanna touched her scar. “Some husbands are worse than others.” For a second, she stilled, in the grip of some unpleasant memories. Then, with a brusque, efficient gesture, she slammed the bottles of watered-down whiskey on the counter and hurried off into the kitchen.

  Miranda stared after her. For a moment, the cloak of numbness she’d wrapped around herself flared open, allowing fear to flood in. Quickly, Miranda emptied her mind and filled it with thoughts of her sisters. If Charlotte was managing to survive pretending to be some man’s wife, so would she.

  Chapter Four

  Today she’d know her fate. Miranda sat in the rocking chair, reading the Psalms. Her choice of reading matter was limited to the Bible and a stack of penny dreadfuls. Her feet pushed in a frantic rhythm against the platform beneath her, sending the rocker into a wild swing. She kept reading the same lines over and over again, not taking in the words.

  “Watch out,” Nellie cried. “You’ll do a cartwheel in that chair.”

  Nellie was the petite blonde with a passion for knitting. She didn’t know how to make shapes, only straight to and fro, so she knitted long woolen scarves with brightly colored stripes. The girls already had at least two each. Nellie tried to give them away to her customers, but some had a wife at home which created a problem.

  There were four girls in the saloon. Nellie and Shanna, and two brunettes—the quiet, brooding Trixie and the plump, good-humored Desiree. To Miranda, the girls did not seem unhappy, except perhaps Trixie, who was the plainest and the least popular with customers.

  Many of the men who paid for their services were regulars, and the girls saw them as friends. Fort Rock was a mining town, and sometimes, when a prospector had a lucky strike, he would take on a girl as his exclusive sweetheart.

  And all the girls dreamed.

  They dreamed that one day some man would love them enough to give them the shiny badge of respectability. Take them away from the saloon life, to someplace where no one knew of their past and they could become one of the women who greeted each other on the boardwalk outside the mercantile and went to church on Sundays.

  “Showtime, girls!” Lucille called from the top of the stairs.

  She announced her entrance with the same words every night and she always wore shades of red. Scarlet, purple, magenta, pink—gowns decorated with ruffles and bows and teamed up with elaborate headdresses. Tonight, ostrich feathers bobbed over her auburn upsweep as she made her regal descent.

  Downstairs, Lucille picked up a big glass jar from the end of the bar counter and walked over to the rocking chair where Miranda was seated. She banged the jar down on the small table beside Miranda. “You can do the honors tonight.”

  Inside the jar were folded tickets. The men who wanted to participate in the lottery handed over their money and Lucille wrote down their names on bits of paper torn from a receipt pad. Each ticket was folded into a square and dropped into the jar.

  Nellie shook her head in dismay. “Only ten suitors.”

  “It’s enough,” Lucille replied. “I’m breaking even on the bride. And I’ve sold an extra fifty dollars’ worth of whiskey to the men who came in to inspect her.” She made an airy gesture toward the working girls. “And have you not been twice as busy as usual?”

  Desiree tittered. “Staring at the bride put the men in the mood.”

  The batwing doors clattered. Miranda glanced over. Oh, no. Not him.

  Slater, a huge, swarthy man with a drooping moustache, had been the first to lay his money down for the lottery. Miranda had been on display for six days, but only in the last two days, after Shanna’s grim warning that not all husbands would be the same, had the carefully built barrier around her emotions cracked. From that moment on, she had felt the men’s eyes on her, like insects crawling on her skin.

  Some were reverent and worshipful, some greedy and lecherous, and after tonight she would become the property of one of them. He might be gentle, he might be rough, he might be cruel, and there was nothing she could do about it.

  The terror Miranda had kept at bay broke free, making her hands damp and her heartbeat swift. She kept her eyes on the Bible that lay open in her lap and pretended to read. She was the brave one. She refused to let anyone see her fear.

  Slater sat down, big and bony, the long duster like a tent around him, spurs jangling on his boots. He ordered a steak, as he did every night. He had a narrow, hollow-cheeked face and long yellowing teeth, which he liked to pick clean with the tip of his knife after he finished eating.

  Little by little, customers drifted into the saloon. It was Saturday night, the busiest in the week. Lucille would have liked to keep the lottery going for a month, but she knew the men lacked patience and would start wrecking the place if they had to wait any longer.

  Saturday had been chosen, partly because it was the payday at the mine, and partly because the preacher came over on Sundays and could conduct the wedding.

  By eight o’clock, a sweaty, unkempt crowd filled the saloon. The piano plinked, the whiskey flowed and the greasy smells of frying onions and meat floated in the air. Thick clouds of cigar smoke hung over the tables where men gambled away their weekly pay. Shrieks of feminine laughter mingled with rowdy, masculine voices.

  Two more miners bought a ticket and stood transfixed by the rope barrier, staring at Miranda as if she were about to sprout wings and fly. And yet she understood their reverence would do her no good at all. They lived in a tent, survived hand to mout
h, and the way they pushed and shoved at each other hinted at a violent nature. She’d starve, she’d freeze, and she’d very likely be beaten once the novelty of a having an educated wife wore off.

  The marshal walked in accompanied by a man Miranda had not seen before. Lean, medium height, in his late twenties, he had straight black hair that fell to his shoulders, and sharply angled cheekbones. His skin was smooth and bronzed. From the dark coloring and the long hair, Miranda assumed he might have some native heritage, but when he got closer, she could see that his eyes were pale gray, almost like chips of ice, and just as cold.

  The two newcomers settled side by side at the bar, both with one boot propped on the brass rail. The stranger jerked his chin in her direction and said something to the marshal. The marshal replied, grinning. Lucille ducked beneath the counter, poured whiskey into two glasses—the good stuff, not the watered-down swill—and smiled at the men.

  The stranger listened to the marshal, knocked back his drink, slammed down the empty glass and ambled over to Miranda. He stepped over the rope and came to a halt in front of her. Miranda’s kid slippers hit the floor. The chair stilled its rocking. The man might only be medium height, but it made his presence no less threatening.

  “Read,” he ordered.

  “Wh-what?” she stammered.

  He leaned forward. With him came the scent of soap and leather and the aroma of good coffee and expensive whiskey. His eyebrows were straight, his pale eyes deep set, and they seemed to glitter, as if a flame flickered somewhere deep within. He tapped one lean finger on the book she was clutching in her trembling hands.

  “Read,” he said. “Aloud.”

  She opened a page at random. Psalms. Number eighty-eight.

  Her eyes strayed to a verse in the middle, and she read: “‘I am confined and cannot escape; my eyes are dim with grief. I call to you, Lord, every day...’”