“When you are not on stage, dance with the men, circulate and talk to them like a hostess and be friendly-like. You can bunk in the room at the top of the stairs. If you need anything, ask Charlie.”
As Belle went up the beautiful arched staircase to look at her room, she saw O’Reilly and Flo go back into his office. A cold shiver ran down her spine. What they were saying to each other behind the closed door? Was Flo making arrangements with O’Reilly to sell her body?
Belle sat on a fancy brass bed in the little room with a chamber pot and washstand and a red velvet settee against one wall. She loved the idea of dancing and singing and to think she’d get paid for it. But she wasn’t sure about this place. Was she getting into a situation that would be as dangerous as it had been at the Du Cartiers’? It wouldn’t do any good to worry about it. If worse came to worse, she could walk away and seek employment elsewhere. But doing what?
Chapter Five
Belle’s wounds were healing. It didn’t hurt to move anymore.
While her costumes were being fashioned by Gladys, Belle proudly wore her Mackay tartan, kilted skirt with a velvet jacket and her plaid, neatly folded and pinned by a brooch on her shoulder. Every day she embellished her Harry Lauder act. A handsome young man in cowboy duds was in the audience every night. He sat with a man, a little older than himself. She set her eyes on him as she did her routine. He realized what she was doing, and he blushed. When she finished, she mustered all the nerve she could find and flopped into a chair at his table and introduced herself. She found out that this shy fellow was Ben Herrington and he was a drover. The older man was his brother Bob. She liked Ben’s shyness and his rosy cheeks and the way he looked at her. The more she pushed, the more he opened up, and before long she was teaching him to dance.
“So you’re a drover.” She smiled at him. “Where do you hail from, Ben?"
“From North Carolina.” His words were soft and slow as syrup. “Bob and I came out West a year ago and haven’t been home since. I like the open spaces and living under the stars.” Belle was fascinated with his southern drawl and his politeness. “And you, ma’am. Where are you from?"
“I’m from Aberfeldy, Scotland, and I’m on my way to Idaho.”
“Why Idaho?” he drawled.
“Family friends there are expecting me.”
“Well, so you’re not--one of them? What I mean is, you’re not--"
“Oh, my goodness no. I’m just hired to entertain, and dance with the men. I’ll be leaving here as soon as I earn my train fare.”
Ben sat back in his chair and grinned at her. “Ma’am, would you like to dance again?”
The next day, Ben was back inviting Belle to go on a picnic. She waited for him in front of the Silver Slipper. He rode up on a white Arabian leading Rondo, his brother Bob’s black gelding, for Belle. Rondo was big and easy and Belle liked riding him. As they went up through a ravine into the mountains, she marveled at the purple hills, the crisp fall air, the way the sunshine had turned everything golden and at the boy who looked as a cowboy should look. Straddling Blue, with the foamy dappling on his flanks and his fancy saddle, Ben reminded Belle of the picture she’d seen on the cover of a magazine called the Golden West. He wore his Stetson tipped back just right on his dark curly hair; hair that never seemed to get messed up no matter how hard the Wyoming wind blew. Whiskey and Brandy, his black and white border collies pranced beside him, grinning and yipping.
Before they reached the top of the mountain, Ben came right out with it. “Ma’am, the Silver Slipper’s not the best place for you to be living. Have you thought about how--” Ben hesitated. “Well, I’m afraid some guy is going to take advantage of you.”
“I worry about that, too,” she admitted. “Ben, for heaven sakes call me Belle or Isabelle if you prefer.”
“Well, Belle,” he drawled.
Belle smiled at the way her name sounded when it rolled off his southern tongue.
“I’ve got an extra pistol. I’d feel a whole lot better if you kept it by your bed.”
“No. I don’t think so. I wouldn’t know what to do with a pistol, Ben."
“I could teach you. No telling when it might come in handy,” he said.
She thought about it. If it meant she’d be spending more time with Ben Herrington it was not a bad idea. “I’d like that, Ben.”
After a few days of target practice, he told her he’d never seen a girl take to a gun like that. “You’re a natural,” he said, “good as a man.”
In a maneuver that she was sure he must have practiced, he stood behind her and put his arms on hers while she was concentrating on her shot. Before he took his arms away, he kissed her on the neck and it sent a tingle through her body.
“Oh, Belle, darlin’, I love you.”
Belle jerked free of him. “Ben Herrington. How can you say that? You hardly know me.” This was too fast. He was being impetuous. Had she given him any reason to presume--? “We hardly know each other, Ben,” she huffed.
“I didn’t mean to offend you. I’m very sorry.” His eyes concentrated on the dust he was kicking up with the toe of his boot. “Please accept my apology.”
“Oh, I’m not offended, quite the contrary, I’m flattered. I guess I was taken by surprise.”
“I do love you. I can’t take that back like I’d never said it. But I didn’t mean to rush you. I’ve not thought of anything but you since the first day I laid eyes on you. I can wait. I’d wait forever if you asked me to, but I want you to be my girl.”
Belle found herself comparing Ben to her dead brother Tommy. They were the same age, both were tall and boyishly handsome and even Ben’s way of thinking reminded her of Tommy. At odd moments, as she watched him, she felt she had almost rescued her brother from beyond the veil. Ben had a more serious nature, didn’t have Tommy’s humor, but there was something about him that brought back the brother she had lost.
“I like you, Ben, I really do. But I’ve never been anyone’s girl before.”
“Some day I’m going to marry you, Belle Mackay. Say you’ll be my girl?”
“Well, I do like you.” The more she thought of it the more palatable the idea became. “Yes, I’d like that, but about getting married that’s something I don’t even want to talk about. Maybe some day in the future.” Ben’s girl, she thought. Now she wouldn’t feel so dreadfully alone. In Scotland she belonged to a family, to a town and with Ben maybe she could have the feeling of belonging again.
Mornings were generally a lolling-around time at the Silver Slipper; the place didn’t come alive until after sundown. The girls worked on their clothes, curled their hair and lounged about gossiping or playing cards. Of an evening as the landscape darkened, they would appear like china dolls all done up in silk, satin and lace. Their painted faces disguised who they really were.
Looking for something to do, Belle decided to teach Flo how to knit. Flo pried for information about her “mush-mouthed southern boyfriend,” and Belle happily reported on the wonderful time she was having with him. Flo seemed to be waiting for Belle to ask about the men in her life but Belle wasn’t sure she really wanted to know. When Flo did speak about a man, it was always on the shallow level of his looks and never his character.
Flo was awkward with the knitting needles and didn’t seem to have any homemaking skills at all. “Why don’t you know how to do things that girls learn to do at home when they are growing up, things expected of a girl as her contribution to the family?”
Hesitantly, Flo revealed her story. Flo’s mother had nine children, too many to provide for after her father was killed in a Great Northern railway accident. Flo had been farmed off with some local folks. Cyrus Logan was mean and vicious and Greta, his wife, couldn’t seem to do anything to stop him. If Flo disobeyed him in any way, he beat her with his shaving strap. Her bed was in a cold, dank cellar with a dirt floor just down the stairs from where their half-witted son had his. Ott wouldn’t leave her alone. He threatened her with a
hunting knife because she wouldn’t let him look down her blouse. One night he cut her blouse and then her breast. She was afraid of him. She told his parents. Surely they would stop him, but they didn’t believe her. They said she was just trying to make trouble. There was nothing left to do but run away.
She was only thirteen and didn’t know where to go or what to do. Wandering the streets of Chicago, she met George Lambert, a dapper man with good manners and expensive clothes. He stopped and talked to her quite casually and offered to buy her a meal in a nearby diner. Flo was hungry and he seemed like a kind man so she went with him. As they sat at the table, he said nice things to her, things no one had ever said before. They laughed and talked until the diner was almost empty.
When they were back out on the street he asked her where she lived and she told him she didn’t have a place to stay. He took her to a little hotel over a bakery and paid for her room. The next morning, he came to see her and after he bought her breakfast, he took her to his room in a nice hotel and he made love to her. No one had ever cared that much about her. Flo fell in love with him.
Only a few days later, he told her he knew how she could make some money. He left her in his room and brought a man back with him and told her if she really loved him, she’d be nice to his friend. He walked out of the room and closed the door. The man was nice enough but Flo didn’t like the idea. Yet she was so beholden to George, she loved him so much, she didn’t want to disappoint him so she let the man do what he wanted to. And that was how it all started. There were a lot of men after that.
All too soon, George grew tired of her and one day he took her to a red light house, saying he had business there. Flo didn’t realize that she was that business. She overheard him talking to a man and George turned and walked out the door without her, as he put a stack of bills in his wallet. Flo ran after him but he pushed her back into the arms of the Silas Jacobs. She thought she was his lady--that he cared about her--he had told her he did, but she never saw him again. “He left me in that terrible place.”
Belle cried as Flo unfolded her story. “No wonder,” she thought, “no wonder.” Flo sobbed uncontrollably.
Belle felt nauseous. A cold shiver ran down her spine. She realized how often she had felt uneasy lately.
“Flo, ye don’t have to live like this--it isn’t right.”
“I don’t know how to do anything else, Belle.”
“For God’s sake Flo.” Belle made no effort to keep her impatience out of her tone. “Ye can learn.”
Belle’s thoughts went back to Du Cartier. Maybe the day would come when she might be able to tell Flo about it. But not yet, it was still beyond talking about.
Before sunup, while the girls were still sleeping off the night before, Belle wandered down the stairs as the early morning light cast soft shadows across the deserted floor, like ghosts of last night’s dancers. Charley, the bartender, was already pushing tables around and straightening chairs.
“How about some coffee?” he asked as he caught sight of her. “I have some brewing on the fire.”
Belle didn’t drink coffee but Charley’s invitation was irresistible. “I’d like that,” she said. She watched him as she leaned against the bar waiting until he finished straightening the last table. He was a big solid man with an easy grin, yet there was an unsettling sadness in his dark eyes.
“Tell me about your family and what it was like growing up in Scotland,” he said as he poured two cups of coffee and motioned to a table where they sat together.
“I don’t know where to start with the telling. Scotland is a bonnie place. People don’t move around like they do in the U. S. of A. Here everyone seems to be from someplace else. Most folks there haven’t been a day’s ride away from home.”
“Tell me about your family.”
“Me mother has been buried five years now, God bless her. Me father is a tailor and a fine one he is. I have two brothers, Norman and Ian off fighting in France, an older sister, Meg, and three pesky younger ones, Nan, Tina and Mary, and then,” she hesitated. “Me brother Tommy died three months ago as we were crossing the sea.” Tears welled in Belle’s eyes and Charley reached across the table and took her hands in his. The compassion in his eyes reached deep into her heart and as they sat there in silence, the dreadful solitude that had weighed so heavily since Tommy’s death lifted for the first time.
“Oh, Belle, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”
“Of course, ye didn’t know.” Belle trembled. “Sometimes I have a cold shiver . . . it makes me wonder if it's Tommy trying to tell me something. “
“Maybe it’s part of grieving.”
“Maybe. But it seems to be getting worse instead of better.”
“Look, Belle. My work is done for now. It’s a beautiful day out there. After we finish our coffee, would you like to go for a walk?” Belle could think of nothing she’d rather do.
They walked along a lane amid tall dry grass, with harvested fields, beyond. It began to rain. There was something surprisingly pleasant about it. The surfaces of the leaves on the bushes glistened and reflected the light that filtered through the trees. Although they were getting wet, the sun was still shining. As a carriage passed them, Charley took Belle’s arm to guide her out of the way, but once it was gone he made no effort to let go of her. Something unsaid happened between them. It was as though she had always known him. Then another carriage passed them, its wheels spun in a mud puddle spewing dirty water everywhere. It dripped off his stricken face and Belle couldn’t hold back her laughter. “If you think I look funny, I need to find you a mirror,” he chided.
Belle brushed her face with her fingertips.
He produced a white handkerchief and offered it to her. She felt as if she was doing little more than smearing the mud around. Finally, he took the handkerchief from her. He gently wiped her face, as he intently studied it. “There, you’re beautiful again. You’re stuck on that guy with the baby-face good looks, aren’t you?” he asked.
“Ben? I like him.” Her eyes followed him as he held the door of the Silver Slipper open for her. “I like him a lot, but I’m not thinking I’m in love with him.”
“Love isn’t something you think about, my dear. It is or it isn’t,” he said, as if he knew from experience.
Once they were back at the Silver Slipper, Belle sat in her window and watched Cheyenne awaken and recalled everything they had talked about. Charley had read literature that she had read and a lot that she had never heard of.
“Have you read any of Aristotle, Plato or Socrates?” he had asked. Belle admitted she hadn’t.
"An extraordinary line of men that little Greek corner of the earth produced four centuries before Christ,” he said. “It’s heavy stuff but worth your time. Maybe I can find you a book or two.”
Her curiosity got the better of her. “What is a man like you doing in a place like the Silver Slipper, Charley?”
“What is a girl like you doing here?” They laughed but neither of them had an answer. He had tried then to explain the “if so, then so” of Aristotelian logic and he made it sound so simple. His philosophical abstractions teased her mind and made her want to spend more time with him. Charley and her father would have a jolly good time together--their minds went into some of the same obscure corners.
As he talked--and he did a lot of that--Belle studied him. He was older, maybe thirty. He was not really handsome but she liked him, straight away. Something in his life had torn at his heart. Belle wanted more than anything to know what it was but she didn’t have the nerve to ask.
Every evening, except Sundays, Belle was expected to dance with anyone who asked her. She didn’t mind unless they wore big heavy logging boots or had two left feet. Too many of them were guilty of both. But it didn’t matter much because she felt safe. Charley was always on hand to save her from the drunk and disorderly.
At night, her feet throbbed. How she would have loved to just do her song and dance on stage; she was good a
t it and she knew it. But O’Reilly wouldn’t hear of it. Yet he must have been satisfied with her because he’d given her a raise of a dollar a week. She was making more money than she had at Du Cartiers' and having a lot more fun. She’d not squander it. At any early age, she’d learned to make a penny do the work of three. Her train fare to Idaho was her first concern. Someday she would be able to send money home to her family. She extended her repertoire to include some lively flings and jigs and a wide variety of Scottish songs.
Belle fought her fear when the sun went down and night swept across her room in the brothel. Her eyes followed the monstrous shadows that played across her wall during the long nights of winter. Her fear was threaded with guilt for being there in a brothel in the first place. It was knotted with the frightful memories of Tommy’s death on The Caledonian and horror of what she’d suffered at the hands of Du Cartier. Thoughts of her father plagued her. Was she disgracing his name? He would have little patience with her decision to stay there, of that she was positive. The dark was filled with murmurings, squeals, twittering. The rhythmic thumping and creaking of bedsprings penetrating the thin walls of her room. She fretted over the sinfulness of those idiot girls giving their virtue away to pleasure a man in order to induce him to part with a few coins.
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