Mercer Girls

by Libbie Hawker

  In fact, the Torrent had arrived well after ten o’clock at night. The residents of Seattle seemed to be abed. The waterfront was quiet, the black monoliths of its warehouses and shops perfectly still. She watched the women make their careful way across the great span of mud, their exposed petticoats pale against the night, the swaying of their laces and ruffles the only movement in the darkness. As each woman reached the firm cobblestone, they clustered together, exchanging fearful whispers.

  “I heard the sailors talking this morning,” Annie said, pressing close to Sophronia’s side. “There are Indians in the hills. They’re violent and full of hate.”

  Sophronia turned, peering over her shoulder at the dim suggestion of hills to the east. She could sense in the cold depths of the woods—between the tiny islands of candlelight—the steady, dark gaze of countless unseen eyes. The wilderness seemed to tower overhead, leaning, curving the great, tangled mass of its body to peer down at Sophronia and her friends.

  Indians. A tremor of dread wracked her. Uncivilized heathens, knowing nothing of the Lord. What terrible fate might wait for her here, crouching in the dark forest? With a pang that nearly wrenched a cry from her throat, Sophronia longed for Boston, for Lowell—its ordered streets, its predictable citizens, its streetlights. But in the next moment, she pushed fears and longings both aside. She had committed herself to God’s work. By His grace, she had reached her destination—her mission—and she would not fail the Lord. Not now, when she had come so close to her reward: the love she craved. Here she stood, in Seattle’s dense, clinging muck. She was more than halfway to a husband already. Not even the threat of violent Indians would drive her from her object now.

  Asa Mercer was the last to cross from the Torrent to the road. He tiptoed over the mud with surprising alacrity, as cheery and practiced as a schoolboy.

  He grinned at them when he stepped into their huddled midst. “Well, ladies, we’ve made it at last. Here it is!” His arm swept wide, taking in the silent dockyard, the empty, unlit street, and the bleak, towering, black-shouldered hills with a grand gesture. “Seattle!”

  “It sure is bully.” Dovey’s voice came drily from the crowd.

  “The sailors are already unloading your goods,” Mercer continued, “and will bring your baggage to the hotel. But now, I’m sure you could all use a good night’s sleep. We’ve rooms waiting at the hotel.” He clapped his hands, a gesture of brisk readiness. “Follow me!”

  The women fell in behind Mr. Mercer, hurrying in his wake like ducklings after their mother, fearful of being left behind. The party rounded one especially large warehouse, revealing the cheerful glow of a tall, whitewashed building with wooden cornices, carved in the ornate curls of flowering vines. The building was grandly high, rising to an ambitious height of four stories, which seemed to Sophronia rather too hopeful for a place as empty and untamed as this city.

  “The Occidental Hotel,” Mercer announced.

  Two streets crossed in front of the Occidental at an acute angle, squeezing the building’s frontal facade to a point. Sophronia, used to the well-planned grids of East Coast cities, hesitated for a few steps. The odd proportions of the Occidental rising above that strange intersection produced an effect altogether disorienting.

  She tore her eyes from the Occidental and found Josephine walking calmly at her side. “I would have expected some fanfare,” the older woman said. “One would think the men of Seattle would be eager to see their new brides … few though we are.”

  “Something seems odd here,” Sophronia agreed, “and it’s not just the shape of that hotel. But we’re all tired; perhaps we’re making too much of this. I’m sure the lack of a welcome is only due to the late hour.”

  “According to the sailors’ talk, Seattle is a bawdy town,” Josephine said. “I don’t think late hours ever held any man here back from celebrating.”

  A doorman emerged from the Occidental and exchanged a few words of greeting with Mr. Mercer. Then he stood back, holding the gleaming oak door wide, and doffed his cap with a smile that bristled his thick mustache. “Ladies, Seattle is most pleased to welcome you!”

  The women filed into the warm, well-lit lobby, and as Sophronia edged past the doorman she heard him mutter, “Most pleased—no matter what some might say.”

  Jo nudged Sophronia in the ribs. “Did you hear that?” she whispered.

  Sophronia was about to reply, but a shrill bluster from farther in the lobby froze the words on her tongue.

  “So you’ve gone through with your mad plan after all, Asa Mercer,” a woman’s voice cried. “We’d heard about your telegram from San Francisco, but none of us could quite believe you would truly go through with this.”

  The weary girls of Mercer’s party had stopped just inside the Occidental’s door. They milled about rather helplessly, glancing between Mr. Mercer and whomever was speaking. Each girl, Sophronia noted, looked pale and shaken, and some seemed on the verge of tears. Sophronia shared a dark look with Josephine. Together, they pushed to the fore of the crowd.

  The Occidental’s lobby was well appointed, its shining wood floors covered with fine carpets, the seating area boasting several carved couches upholstered in deep-green velvet. A broad, mahogany staircase rose from the bellman’s desk to the railed landing above, and several quality portraits adorned the large room’s walls. Gas lamps glowed in sconces along the wall, their light playing merrily through cut-glass shades. The effect was altogether rich, and doubly welcome after weeks of living in cramped boardinghouses and the cabins of stinking, slime-cold boats. The Occidental’s beautiful interior gave Sophronia her first glimmer of hope that Seattle was not all mud and darkness.

  But the women who stood waiting in the lobby, straight-backed and high-headed, made an image somewhat less than lovely. There were seven of them, all middle-aged or close to it. Bedecked in stiff, watered silks and sober velvets with hats as generously plumed as any bird, they glared at the new arrivals with sharp, suspicious eyes.

  Mr. Mercer gave a little wave of his hand, a placating gesture. “Mrs. Garfield. How pleasant to see you again, after all these weeks.”

  “Pleasant, my foot, Asa Mercer! There is nothing pleasant about this business.” Mrs. Garfield, tall for a woman and ample in her figure, stood at the head of her compatriots, quivering with outrage. Her steel-gray hair gave the appearance of advanced age, yet her face was still quite smooth, if heavy in the cheeks. She met Mercer’s eye with a forbidding glower. “This is a protest, sir—a protest! The upstanding women of Seattle do not approve of your carting in a load of wagtails to unsettle the already dubious morals of our unmarried men.”

  A collective gasp went up from the travelers.

  Wagtails! Sophronia cut a nervous glance toward Mr. Mercer, who stood pale-faced beside the bellman’s desk. Was his wide-eyed shock due to outrage at Mrs. Garfield’s unjust accusations—or was he startled that a woman had guessed his true intentions? Sophronia’s early apprehensions came crowding back into her mind. Perhaps, after all, she had sold herself into danger and shame. But I am no loose woman, she thought fiercely, leveling her icy stare at Mrs. Garfield and her friends.

  “Please, ladies!” Mercer moved toward the protesters, but Mrs. Garfield hissed a wordless warning, and he stopped short. “These young women are of the finest quality. They haven’t come all this way to unsettle any man’s morals, I assure you. They’ve come full of hope for good marriages—to make proper homes and contribute to our youthful city.”

  The bellman, with a rather regretful expression, tapped Mr. Mercer’s arm, then spoke a few low words into his ear.

  “You must excuse me for a moment,” Mercer said to the Seattle women. “My business with the hotel compels me … but I shall return, and …” He glanced around his party of women, caught Josephine’s eye, and cast her a look of agonized pleading.

  Josephine, as the eldest traveler, was evidently expected to take on a role of shepherdess. She drew an uneasy breath, shrinking into he
rself as Mrs. Garfield advanced on the girls.

  “I won’t tolerate this,” Mrs. Garfield said, shaking her head like a mother scolding a pack of naughty children. “It is, in its very essence, intolerable.”

  Her friends murmured their assent.

  “My husband is a powerful man in Seattle,” Mrs. Garfield said, “a well-respected member of our community. And these women, too”—she gestured at the other protesters—“are well connected.”

  “Three cheers for you,” Dovey muttered under her breath.

  “We don’t approve of you Mercer girls,” one of the protesters said.

  Catherine, tears shining in her eyes but still unshed, sputtered, “But whyever not?”

  “Importing women like cattle!” Mrs. Garfield’s already ample chest puffed to an even greater circumference. “Shuttling girls about like goods for the trading! No woman of virtue—of true morals—would ever consent to such a thing.”

  “And believe me,” one of her friends added, “Seattle has enough women already who lack for morals.”

  “But you don’t understand what it’s like in Massachusetts,” Josephine said. “The rebellion has made such an impact, you see, that the prospects for husbands are so terribly slim. What are these girls to do, if they can’t find good men to marry at home?”

  “Marriage!” Mrs. Garfield sputtered. “Look at the lot of you! None of you is fit for marriage. I’ll tell you the type of young lady who’s fit for marriage: a bright-eyed, bouncing lass, who can darn a stocking, mend trousers, sew her own frock, command a regiment of pots and kettles, milk a cow, and still be a lady at the end of the day. You lot, pining and lolling, fashion addled, slipping off from your hometowns to chase men across the country—why, if I were a gambling woman, I’d place a wager that every last one of you reads novels! And East Coasters … you’re probably mortgaged by consumption, to boot!”

  Sophronia’s outrage expanded in her chest with a sudden force that nearly choked off her breath. Who were these women, untroubled in their fancy hats and their fine, watered silks, to judge any of Mercer’s party? And how dare they judge Sophronia herself, who had suffered long—and nearly died in the grip of fever—to do the Lord’s bidding?

  She brushed past Josephine, stepping boldly across the ornate carpet until she stood face-to-face with Mrs. Garfield.

  “You’re right,” Sophronia said. “Only a certain type of woman would make such a journey, long and difficult as it’s been. Shall I tell you what kind of woman travels with a man like Mercer? The kind who isn’t afraid of sleeping five to a cabin on a cold, rocking ship. The kind who can live off of stale oatcakes and hard sausage for weeks at a time. The kind who will nurse her sisters when they fall ill with the fever. Women who can do all this, and who will never raise a word of complaint!”

  She felt the Mercer girls rustle and gasp behind her, and felt, too, their approval and gratitude.

  Mrs. Garfield raked Sophronia head to foot with a cool, judgmental stare, taking in her disheveled hair, her worn, rumpled dress, the thick mud that caked her boots and stained her petticoats’ hem. “Yes, indeed,” she finally said, her voice flat with dismissal. “I can see that it takes a special kind of woman to submit herself to such a trial.”

  Sophronia’s face burned. “Jesus said, ‘Judge not, lest ye be judged.’ If I were you, I wouldn’t—”

  Mrs. Garfield broke in smoothly, turning her face away as if the very sight of Sophronia was a grave offense. “If I were you, Miss, I wouldn’t presume to quote the Lord. Scripture does not sit pretty on a harlot’s tongue.”

  The girls let out a collective gasp.

  Sophronia gaped at Mrs. Garfield, struck mute by the blow. A roiling heat flared in her chest, sending a fury unlike any she had felt before racing along her veins. She held the woman’s cool, distant eye—then, while her better sense shrieked at her to stop, to walk away, to maintain her dignity, she stepped forward deliberately, ducked her head, and spat on the hem of Mrs. Garfield’s dress.

  A chorus of shrieks erupted, from protesters and travelers alike. Mr. Mercer came running with the bellman, waving his hands and imploring the women to maintain order. Mrs. Garfield gathered her insulted skirt in her hands and made for the Occidental’s door, cleaving a path straight through the flustered newcomers. She paused beside Mercer, her flushed cheeks puffing with outrage.

  “Never in my life have I been so ill used—never, sir! You have brought a plague upon our city. I hope you are pleased with yourself!”

  The protesters sailed out into the night, vanishing in the gloom beyond the Occidental’s lamps.

  Sophronia turned to Mr. Mercer, hot with shame. “I beg your pardon. I behaved poorly; I did no credit to your good name.”

  Dovey laughed aloud. “You behaved magnificently! Sophie, I never thought you had such gumption in you.”

  Mr. Mercer smiled wearily at the girl, then took Sophronia’s arm. “Mrs. Garfield got what she deserved. Put it out of your mind, Miss Brandt. It has been a long and tiresome journey. None of us are quite ourselves, but we’ll feel better for a good night’s rest. I’m afraid Seattle has more than its fair share of Mrs. Garfields, but you’ll soon find that all the city isn’t so hostile to your presence. You’ll see in the morning: we’re to welcome you with a reception. To bed now, and put Mrs. Garfield out of your mind. You’ll want to look your freshest tomorrow.”

  The girls’ trunks and bags were already waiting beside their beds. Each room contained two beds—narrow but soft as clouds—piled with plush bedding and so many pillows that they seemed an absurdity.

  Sophronia was quietly pleased to learn that she would room with Josephine. The older woman lost all her air of sensible self-possession at sight of the beds. She fell face-first onto one, luxuriating in the pillows.

  “Down,” Josephine sighed, in a tone that said, There is balm in Gilead. “Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve laid my head on a down pillow?”

  Sophronia inspected the small closet beside the washstand. A scented pomander hung inside, and she breathed in the sweet perfume of rose petals and lavender. “I can almost forget that I’ve got mud to my knees.”

  “Mrs. Garfield certainly noticed your mud,” Jo said, a twinkle of mischief in her eyes.

  “Mrs. Garfield, indeed! Well, she won’t forget me in a hurry, for better or worse.”

  “And we’re to have a reception tomorrow morning.” Josephine rolled onto her back, staring up at the ceiling in thoughtful silence. Finally she said, “I’m troubled, Sophie. If this is what the women of Seattle think of us—wagtails and harlots!—then what are the men expecting?”

  “It can’t be as bad as that termagant made it seem.”

  “I hope you’re right,” Jo said. “Let us pray tomorrow’s reception will be kinder than the welcome we found tonight.”

  PART 2

  MAY–JUNE 1864

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  THE RECEPTION

  Morning came too soon. Josephine lay in her bed, her still-weary body reluctant to wake, the aches of long travel seeping all too slowly out of her limbs and into the deep, soft mattress. Muffled through the solid door, drifting down the long hall outside, she could hear women chattering together, their words lost but their excitement plain in their high, eager voices.

  A brisk tap sounded on the doorframe. Sophronia sat up in a rustle of bedding, but Josephine shut her eyes tighter, refusing to acknowledge the morning. She heard Sophronia pad across the rug, heard the door creak as it opened.

  “Rise and shine,” Dovey called, too loudly. “The sun is up, and it’s time to get ready!”

  Josephine groaned and rolled away. Just the thought of standing—of forsaking the first good bed she’d slept in for more than a decade—made her bones tremble.

  “I’ve brought your breakfast.” Dovey’s voice came nearer as the girl bustled into the room. Josephine heard the soft thump of a tray landing on the little table at the foot of her bed. “It was left in the hal
l outside. I’ve already had mine. It’s simply delicious! Come on, Jo—get up! We have an exciting day ahead! You haven’t forgotten about the reception, have you?”

  Josephine’s eyes snapped open. The fleur-de-lis pattern of the wallpaper, inches from her face, seemed to spring at her with a sudden, predatory fury. The reception. No, she had not forgotten—how could she? Her intrinsic dread of the day to come had colored her dreams with unsettling shades. Guilt had assailed her even in her sleep, gnawing at her gut and tensing her body. Mr. Mercer, who had been so kind to her—and indeed, all the men of Seattle—expected something of Josephine that she simply could not provide. When they learned that she could wed no one—not until Clifford freed her, at least—would they turn their judgment upon her, pile on her head a crueler scorn than even Mrs. Garfield had shown?

  Dovey noted Josephine’s frantically alert state. She nodded vigorously, her loose curls dancing over her shoulders. “That’s it; get up and take in the day!”

  There was nothing for it. The reception would go on, whether or not Josephine willed it. And as one of the newcomers to the city—a Mercer girl, as Mrs. Garfield had disdainfully dubbed the travelers—she would be expected to attend.

  Josephine sat up in her bed, frowning at the tray. Two bowls of porridge waited there, along with a pot of tea and an array of sliced apples and cheese. A perfectly lovely repast, yet her stomach turned at the sight of it. How could she eat at a time like this, when at any moment her shame might be revealed—paraded before the whole of Seattle?

  She shook her head. “I’m not hungry.”

  “Well, I am.” Sophronia sat and tucked into one of the bowls. “It seems behaving like a perfect hellion is good for the appetite.”

  “You,” Dovey said slowly, toying with the neckline of her parrot-green wool, “spitting on one of the fine, upstanding ladies of Seattle—a pillar of the community. I’m still in awe.”