But regardless of how inappropriate her elegant dresses might be, they were all that she had, and she couldn’t stay here in her room forever. There was no reason for her to procrastinate any longer about going into the village of Tampa and looking for a buyer for her pearls.
She wondered if people here would expect her to observe a period of mourning. In truth, although she did feel very sad about the tragic death of her fiancé, and especially in knowing the agony he must have suffered at the hands of the Seminoles, she realized now that her love for Allen Fairchild had been based on a young girl’s fantasy. Perhaps she would have grown to love him in time, but having been deprived of that chance, she must now put the past behind her and look to the future.
She was not the same naïve young girl who less than a month ago had left her Savannah home seeking romance and adventure. Her experiences of these past weeks had begun to give her a maturity and insight that she would never have attained in the protective custody of her father. She had a new life now, with new responsibilities, and she must go out and face them on her own.
For her trip to the village, she chose a forest green gown of softest piqué, fashioned along princess lines. Her dressmaker had made a stunning bonnet of the same material, lined with a softer shade of green that she was told brought out the color of her eyes. Her face was circled with a narrow band of pleated ruffling that outlined the bonnet’s brim, with a small cluster of purple violets nestled over one ear.
Margaret adjusted the bonnet over her hair and tied its satin ribbons beneath her chin. Smoothing her skirts, she set out for her first visit alone into the little village of Tampa, her single strand of pearls tucked securely in her reticule.
Walking along the street toward the market, she lifted her skirts just a little to avoid the dust that swirled around her ankles. She was aware of the curious stares of the people she passed, both men and women, but she walked along at a brisk gait with her head held high.
The sun beat down on her shoulders, causing her to wish that she had brought along her parasol. In Savannah, she would not have expected such heat at this time of the year.
She did not pause at the open-air market, but continued instead to a long, rectangular building with a tin roof and an open front porch. The sign over the door said Bowden’s General Store.
Margaret gathered her courage and entered through the double screen door. The buzz of shoppers was abruptly silenced the moment she stepped inside, and she felt all the eyes turn in her direction.
“Kin I he’p you, miss?” A white-haired gentlemen clad in overalls approached her cautiously, letting his eyes travel over her elegant green gown.
“Why, yes. I would like to speak to the proprietor, please.”
“That’d be me, ma’am. What kin I do fer ya?”
A curious circle of people gathered close to hear what the lady had to say.
“Is there some place where I could speak to you privately?” Margaret asked. She had no desire to share her problems with all the customers in the store.
The old man looked puzzled for a few moments. Then his face brightened. “I reckon we could step out on the porch.”
Margaret supposed that this was the best that she could hope for, so she followed him out the door. “Sir,” she began, “I am new to this area. Is there a merchant here who deals in fine jewelry?”
“Well, no ma’am, not exactly, but I do have a few nice pieces I keep in my lockbox. What was you alookin’ fer?”
“No, you don’t understand.” Margaret lowered her voice to a whisper. “I don’t want to buy anything. I have something I want to sell.” She pulled the pearls from her reticule and spread them across her palm. “These are genuine, natural pearls. I–I find it necessary to dispose of them. Do you know who might help me find a buyer for them?”
The merchant scratched his white head and squinted his eyes. “Well, there ain’t nobody else but me, and I reckon I could try to sell ’em fer you. How much was you awantin’ fer ’em?”
Margaret quoted a figure that was not even half of their value, but she was desperate to conclude a quick transaction. “I–I’d sacrifice them for two hundred dollars.”
The old man’s eyes bulged. “Ma’am, they ain’t many people in Tampa with that kind of money. I do git some of the wives of the Fort Brooke officers in here lookin’ fer somethin’ extra special, but I don’t know as they would go that high.” Seeing Margaret’s crestfallen face, he added, “If’n you want to leave ’em here, I’ll see what I kin do. Check back with me in a week, an’ if I’ve had any offers, I’ll tell you. Then if’n you decide to sell, you can pay me ten percent. How does that sound to you?”
Margaret was reluctant to hand over her precious pearls to a complete stranger, but she did not know what else to do. “Would you write me out a receipt for them?”
“Yes’m. I kin do that.”
She followed him back into the store where he found a pencil and a scrap of paper. “You write what you want on here, an’ I’ll sign it,” he said.
Margaret wrote in her ornate penmanship: Received from Margaret Porter, one perfect strand of natural pearls. She dated the note and gave it to him to sign.
Much to her surprise, the man summoned his wife. “Ola May, come over here, honey. I need you to he’p me sign this paper.” As the man carefully drew a large X on the paper, a plump woman in an apron-covered calico dress stepped up to sign as his witness.
She fingered the pearls her husband held in his hand. “My, ain’t them pretty?” she said, smiling at her new customer. “You sure you want to let go of these?”
“No—I mean, yes. Of course. I’m sure,” Margaret stam-mered, and turned to go. The doorway was blocked by two women who stood whispering together. Each of them wore pastel muslin gowns, causing them to stand out against the other customers, most of whom wore plain, homespun frocks faded beyond color recognition.
Margaret was sure by the focus of their eyes that they were talking about her. As she tried to move past them, the taller woman spoke to her. “Please excuse me for being so forward. I’m Katherine, and my friend Meli and I were just admiring your bonnet.”
“Thank you,” Margaret said. She returned their smiles, thinking that one of these ladies just might be the customer who would purchase her strand of pearls.
“You’re new to the area, aren’t you?” Meli asked. “We were remarking that we had not seen you in the store before.”
Margaret introduced herself and explained that she had only been here for a little better than a week and that she was exploring the village today so that she would know where to shop.
“Shop?” Katherine said with a laugh. “You won’t be able to do much shopping in Tampa. Every few weeks a boat comes in from the States, and new merchandise is purchased for the store here, but anything good goes out the door the same day it comes in. You really have to keep an eye out for the boats when they dock and be on hand to buy what you like before someone else does.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Margaret promised, knowing full well that she would not be able to buy anything beyond the bare essentials. She tried once again to move past them, but Katherine laid a hand on her arm.
“Margaret, I don’t want to be rude, but I simply must know where you purchased your bonnet. I have a new green dress, and I’d give anything to have one like it.”
“You would?” Margaret’s mind was already beginning to whirl. Her hand reached up to pull the ribbons and release her bonnet. She slid it off her hair and handed it to Katherine. “Would you like to examine it more closely? Really, I have more bonnets than I can possibly use down here. I don’t know whatever possessed me to bring so many. If you really would like to have this one, I suppose I could part with it for—say, about five dollars?” Margaret held her breath. Five dollars was a lot of money. Had she gone too far?
But the words were barely out of her mouth when Katherine reached into her reticule and pulled out five silver Liberty dollars. It was appa
rent that she intended to seal the transaction before Margaret could change her mind.
Margaret slipped the coins into her own handbag, listening to the satisfying jingle they made when they dropped inside.
“Well, that’s not fair,” Meli pouted. “I’m the one who noticed your bonnet first. If I had known you would part with it, I’d have offered you six.”
Six dollars! Almost enough to pay room and board at Miss Priscilla’s for two more weeks! “Meli, I don’t want to see you disappointed. Do you like blue? I have a lovely blue satin bonnet that would just match your eyes. I could bring it to you to-morrow, if you’d like.”
Meli’s eyes lit up like a child who’d just seen a Christmas tree. “Oh, yes, yes! I do love blue. What time shall I meet you here tomorrow?”
“Let’s come early before the sun gets too high,” Margaret suggested. “How about nine o’clock?”
“I’ll be here,” Meli exclaimed. “Are you sure the blue one is just as pretty as Katherine’s?”
“It’s even prettier,” Margaret promised. “That’s why it’s worth an extra dollar.” She did not want to give Meli a chance to forget that she had promised to pay her six dollars.
This time the ladies let her pass through the door. As Margaret walked down the porch steps, she could hear the silver coins jingling in her reticule. She was not sure whether Mr. Bowden would find a buyer for her pearls or not, but as long as her supply of bonnets held out, she could take care of herself until the money from her father arrived.
five
After supper one evening, as Margaret sat in the parlor leafing through a copy of Ladies’ Companion, Lucy White came in and sat beside her on the sofa. Lucy was wearing a severely styled black dress, just as she always did, but she eyed the colorful pages wistfully. “I’ll be glad when my period of mourning is over,” she said. “It’s been almost a year since I’ve worn anything other than black.”
“But why do you have to always wear black?” Margaret asked. “Wouldn’t a soft, pastel dress be just as appropriate?”
Lucy looked as shocked as if Margaret had suggested she appear in public in her underwear. “But it wouldn’t be proper. Not for a year, anyway.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to sound disrespectful. I’m sure that losing your husband must have been very painful for you. Were you married for a very long time?”
“Only ten days,” Lucy said. “I was just getting to know him. You see, I came to the territory from Massachusetts as a mail-order bride, but two days after Tom and I were married, he came down with pneumonia, and in just one week, he was dead.”
“How very sad,” Margaret sympathized. She had never met a mail-order bride before. “Will you be returning to Mass-achusetts soon?”
“Oh, no. As soon as my year of mourning is over, I aim to get married again.”
Margaret did not know how she should reply to this. “That. . .that will be very nice for you. Who is the lucky man?”
“Well, I don’t know yet,” Lucy told her. “There’s lots of men in the territory advertising for wives. Would you be interested in meeting one?”
Margaret felt the blood rush to her cheeks. “Oh, no! No thank you. Isn’t it a little scary marrying a stranger?”
“Indeed it is! But good men are scarce up where I come from. At least, they are when you get to be my age.”
Margaret thought that Lucy was not an unattractive woman, and she wondered why she had needed to come so far to find a husband. But she did not need to ask, because Lucy had al-ready begun to explain.
“During the years when all my friends were getting married, I was nursing an invalid mother. My sisters both married and moved away, and there wasn’t anyone else around to take care of Mama, so I stayed. By the time she died, I was already thirty years old, and most of the men I knew were already married. Those who were left were courting girls in their twenties. I felt that time was running out, so I answered an ad in a Boston newspaper and packed up my things and came down here to the Florida Territory. I don’t think I’ll marry a soldier next time, though. I’ve decided I want a man who stays home.”
“Then what kind of man will you be looking for? A farmer?”
“Maybe. Or a cattle rancher. There’s plenty of pioneer settlers in the territory who need wives. Next time you’re in Bowden’s Store, take a look at the board on the back wall. It’s covered with ads. Men come down here to stake out a claim on a piece of land and think they’re going to get rich, but it seldom works out that way. But that’s another story. Anyway, some of them are bachelors, but some come down with their families. There aren’t many doctors down here, and medicine is scarce, so if the wife dies in childbirth, as many of them do, or succumbs to one of the terrible tropical diseases, the man is left alone to take care of his homestead and his family. I like children; I really do. I wouldn’t mind marrying a man who had a ready-made family.”
“I–I’m sure you would make a very good mother,” Margaret said, being unable to think of an appropriate comment. “I wish you success in your choice, Lucy.”
“I’m going out for a stroll,” Lucy told her. “I don’t like to go outside until the sun goes down. It’s not good for your skin, you know.” She stood and smoothed her black skirt. “Would you care to go along? It’s very pleasant until the mosquitoes come out and start to bite.”
“Thank you, Lucy. Perhaps I’ll join you another evening, but not tonight.”
Margaret watched Lucy amble out of the room. Poor Lucy! I cannot imagine a woman coming all the way down here to this desolate territory to marry a man she didn’t even know, Margaret thought, before she was struck by the startling realization that she had almost done the same thing. At least, her situation would have been very similar, for she was now able to admit to herself that she had scarcely known Allen Fairchild. She realized now that she had wanted to marry him for all the wrong reasons. But still she grieved for him and for the terrible waste of his life.
❧
As word spread among the military wives, the demand for Margaret’s bonnets escalated. The women who could afford them scooped them up so fast that Margaret scarcely had enough of them left in her trunk to cover her own head.
Three weeks had passed since the Windsong sailed out of Tampa Bay, and still Margaret had heard nothing from Mikal Lee. Perhaps he had forgotten her the moment his ship had pulled away from the Tampa docks.
Although her coins were multiplying at a satisfying rate, Margaret knew that there was no way she could replenish her supply of hats. The very fact that they were so unattainable was what had created such a great demand for them.
She was rather handy with a needle and thread and entertained the thought of making more hats, but the fabrics available from Bowden’s General Store were sturdy and plain, not at all the quality she would need to satisfy her discriminating clientele.
She looked in her trunk and eyed the last two bonnets left from her bridal trousseau. If she sold those two, she would have to go bareheaded herself. With the trunk lid still open, she allowed her eyes to travel over her beautiful, handmade gowns, expertly crafted of the finest fabrics in all of Savannah.
She calculated that just one gown would make half a dozen bonnets if she cut carefully. But to cut up her lovely dresses would be like cutting off part of her own body. Unthinkable! There had to be some other answer.
She ran her hands over the soft silks and laces, caressing their folds with her fingers. Tears dropped into the trunk and landed on a pale, blue velvet skirt, creating dark polka-dots on the plush pile of the fabric. She closed the lid quickly. “No! I won’t cut up my pretty dresses! They’re all that I have left to remind me of the life I left behind.”
But next morning, as soon as she finished breakfast, she went upstairs to her room and selected a silk lavender afternoon dress from her trunk. Its leg-o’-mutton sleeves would be much too hot for this tropical climate anyway, she rationalized. She stretched its wide skirts across her bed and held her scissors in
the air. God, help me! And it startled her to realize that she was praying again.
Her hands were shaking so that the blades made a rattling sound. This will be like performing surgery on someone I love! But gritting her teeth together, she made the first long slash into the soft, lustrous folds. Swish! As the silk gave way beneath her hands, her heart skipped a beat, but after the first painful gash, her task gradually became easier, and she began to slice into the fabric with a great deal more assurance than she actually felt.
All morning she worked, measuring and cutting, saving every scrap and sliver of cloth as a possible source of trimming. By the time she went downstairs for dinner, her back ached, but she was proud that she had cut out six bonnets. She would have to figure a way to trim each of them differently, because no two women from Fort Brooke would want to go out in matching bonnets.
The gentlemen boarders did not appear at the table for the noon meal. “They aren’t able to eat dinner with us during the week because they can’t leave their offices until evening,” Miss Priscilla explained. “Each morning I pack them each a sack of food to take along.”
Dinner was a simple meal of collard greens and corn pone. Margaret enjoyed Miss Priscilla’s home-cooked meals, and she was particularly hungry today after her morning’s work.
The Rosada sisters sat side by side, arguing about what colors should be used for the windmill quilt they were making. “I favor blue,” Miss Hope declared. “Don’t you like blue, Mrs. White?” she asked, trying to acquire an ally to support her choice before her sister voiced an opinion.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Miss Charity said before Lucy could answer. “Blue would be all wrong with as many yellow and green pieces as we’ve put into the windmills. It has to be green, don’t you think, Miss Porter?”
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