A Promise of Ruin

by Cuyler Overholt

  “Here they come!” someone shouted.

  The procession appeared at the foot of the block like a shimmering mirage, the white banner with the Madonna’s life-size picture seeming to float unsupported above it. It moved closer in fits and starts, coming to a stop each time someone darted off the sidewalk to pin money or jewelry to the banner, swelling and narrowing as congregants joined or left the fray. She spotted the grand marshal in his gorgeous regalia, followed by men of the various Italian societies in their own colorful uniforms. As the banner drew closer, the women around her began dropping to their knees and stretching their arms toward the painted Madonna. One cried out for help with her daughter’s difficult pregnancy, while others asked for help with a sickness, or a debt, or a quarrelsome husband.

  Once the Italian societies had marched past, the women on the sidewalk rushed out to join the ranks in its wake. The young virgins walked first, dressed all in white and wearing flowers and ribbons in their hair. They were followed by the married women, many of whom carried wax body parts or staggered under the weight of thick, colored candles nearly as tall as they were. Teresa longed to join the throng, but her feet remained planted on the sidewalk. Her sin was too great to bring to the Madonna’s ears, she thought, hanging her head in shame.

  When she looked up again, the murmuring ranks of penitents, nearly all of them women, were moving past her, bringing up the rear of the procession. They walked barefoot over the blistering pavement or crawled slowly past on their hands and knees, their hair hanging loosely about their shoulders. Some of the crawlers, she noticed, placed pieces of flint beneath their knees to make their penance more complete. Others dragged their tongues along the paving stones. One woman walked past as if in a trance, wailing and beating her chest.

  Teresa felt something stir inside her, thinking of what the American woman had said, about God being all-merciful. If the Madonna could intercede on the behalf of all these others, was it possible she could help Teresa as well? Hope bubbled up through the thick sludge of her despair. With shaking fingers, she untied her shoes and pulled them off, laying them neatly on the edge of the sidewalk, then unpinned her hair and laid the pins by her shoes. Fixing her eyes on the receding banner, she stepped off of the curb.

  “Blessed Lady of Mount Carmel,” she whispered, falling to her knees. “I humbly beseech you, though I do not deserve the name of daughter, to treat me like a mother and intercede on my behalf with your divine son, asking for his forgiveness and the cleansing of my sins.” Although she couldn’t really believe the Virgin would hear her prayers, just saying the words brought a few seconds of relief. Picking up a piece of flint that someone had dropped on the paving stones, she pulled one knee forward and wedged the flint underneath. “Forgive the unholy acts that I have committed,” she murmured as she crawled forward, wincing as the flint ground against bone. She pulled the flint out, preparing to plant it under her other knee, but stopped as a hand landed on her shoulder.

  “Teresa, don’t.”

  She looked up to see Antonio standing beside her, his face stricken.

  “Go away, Antonio,” she said, shrinking from his hand.

  He crouched beside her. “Please, Teresa. Talk to me.”

  “You shouldn’t be with me.”

  He reached out and cupped her cheek with his hand. “Why should I not be with my betrothed?”

  She squeezed her eyes shut, burning under his fingers. “We are no longer betrothed. I release you from your bonds.”

  “And if I don’t wish to be released?”

  She opened her eyes. “I have been touched by another man,” she spat out. “You cannot truly wish to marry me.”

  “Did he touch your heart, Teresa?” he asked with a frown. “Did your love for me ever falter?”

  She stared at him without answering. Of course her love for him had never faltered. But that didn’t change the fact that she was ruined.

  “‘The sun passes over filth and is not defiled,’” he said, holding her gaze as he quoted the old Italian proverb. “You are my sun, Teresa. You were before, and you always will be.”

  Hot tears sprang to her eyes. If only it could be true. If only she needn’t be forever defiled by what that demon had done. But it wasn’t true, and they both knew it. Waving him aside, she dropped to her hands and started crawling again.

  To her horror, he dropped onto his hands and knees beside her.

  “No!” she gasped, coming to a halt. “Antonio, don’t.”

  “You were entrusted to my care, and I failed you,” he said, his eyes bright and his voice ragged. “If you are ashamed, then the burden must be shared by us both.” He pulled the flint from her hand and thrust it under his own knee.

  “Antonio, no, I beg you. Please, stand up…”

  “Only if you will stand with me.”

  She stared at him, her heart pounding. Was it possible? “If you really still love me,” she whispered, “why didn’t you come to me when they found us?”

  His shoulders sagged. “I didn’t know how to face you, knowing that I had let you fall into Carulo’s hands. I assumed you blamed me for what happened, as I blamed myself. It was only after the American woman talked to me that I understood what you were feeling.”

  She sat back on her heels, unable to quench the ember of hope his words had sparked. Had the Madonna, perhaps, heard her prayer? “But what would people say,” she asked in a daze, “if you were to marry me?”

  “Who cares what they say?” His eyes smiled at her behind his tears. “This is America! We’ll move somewhere else if we have to, and start over again.”

  She swallowed. “You would do this for me?”

  “I would do this for us.” He stood and held out his hands.

  She gazed up into his face, feeling a deep ache in her chest as her withered heart came slowly back to life. She placed her hands in his palms and he pulled her to her feet.

  “Shall we continue to the church, mia cara?” he asked.

  She looked up ahead at the banner with the Madonna’s picture, bobbing over the heads a block ahead of them. “Yes, to the church,” she said. For today, it seemed, she had much to be thankful for.

  Reading Group Guide

  1. Sex trafficking is still a major industry today. Why do you think it has managed to persist through the centuries? Do you think anti-trafficking efforts should be aimed at traffickers, prostitutes, customers, or the illegal status of prostitution itself?

  2. Genevieve’s textbooks suggest that women are evolutionarily programmed to take a coy or passive role in sexual relations, and that they encourage and are excited by aggressive male ardor. Do you think this is true? If it is, does it create a conflict with contemporary women’s desire to be treated as an equal in other spheres of life? How can the two be harmonized?

  3. Genevieve feels compelled to help find Teresa, regardless of the risks involved. Simon argues that she is putting herself in unnecessary danger. What would you have done, if you were in Genevieve’s shoes? Do you think she is being unduly influenced by her past? Where would you draw the line between altruism and self-preservation?

  4. Although Genevieve is deeply drawn to Simon, she is also well aware of the difficulties a marriage with him might entail. Do you think she is being wise, overly practical, or something else in her desire to take more time before she commits?

  5. Do you believe Simon’s refusal to engage in physical intimacy with Genevieve is an attempt to protect himself, or merely to manipulate her into marrying him?

  6. Pauline tells Genevieve that while many women are tricked into the prostitution trade, the majority enter it voluntarily as a way to escape a life of hard work and near destitution. Can you imagine making such a choice? How do you feel about women who do?

  7. Why do you think Genevieve finds Pauline and Angela such good company? Are there characteristics the three women shar
e?

  8. Katie has little sympathy at first for Teresa’s plight, seeming to believe that the girl somehow brought her troubles on herself. Psychologists explain victim blaming as a way of making ourselves feel safe, by assigning other people’s misfortunes to forces within their control. Can you think of anytime you might have done something similar, without realizing it?

  9. Antonio decides to stand by Teresa, despite everything. Do you think many men at that time would do the same? What about today?

  10. What role do the members of the Wieran Club play in the story? What aspects of Simon’s and Genevieve’s personalities are revealed by their interactions with the boys?

  11. “The test of civilization is the estimate of woman,” according to a quote in the story. Do you agree? How would you say our society measures up today?

  A Conversation with the Author

  Why did you choose to write about the white slave trade?

  Because sex trafficking is still a huge problem today, and it horrifies me. Like Genna, I am confounded by the mind-set of people who perpetrate this crime and the customers who keep them in business (to the tune of some $30 billion a year). I wrote about it in part to try to understand it, and also because it touches on the broader question of the balance of power between the sexes, and how that balance, or lack of it, is maintained. In a world where many women are still treated like property or, at best, second-class citizens, I find this a compelling question.

  How big of a problem was sex trafficking in Genevieve’s time?

  It was big. Contemporary writers tend to downplay the white slave panic as a figment of the sexually repressed, nativist, post-Victorian mind. While there is undoubtedly some truth in that view, investigations undertaken by municipal, state, federal, and international bodies during the period documented that thousands of women, both foreign and domestic, were being seduced through deceit or coerced into prostitution. A 1909 report by the U.S. Commissioner-General of Immigration concluded that “an enormous business is constantly being transacted in the importation and distribution of foreign women for the purposes of prostitution, which business includes the seduction and distribution of alien women and girls who have entered the country in a regular manner for legitimate purposes, and to some extent of American women and girls.” A Special Immigration Commission report to the Senate that same year pointed out that instead of working in brothels run by women, as in the past, the vast majority of these new prostitutes were controlled by men who “made it their business to plunder them unmercifully.” A number of state and federal laws were passed as a result of the various investigations, as well as an international agreement requiring signatories to place lookouts in ports and railway stations, supervise employment agencies, and facilitate repatriation of abduction victims. The plethora of criminal convictions that resulted from these laws attests to the reality of the problem. So do the records of the many private organizations that dedicated themselves to patrolling ports and terminals in search of potential victims, which included the Travelers’ Aid Society, the International Catholic Girls’ Protection Society, and the National Council of Jewish Women.

  Although your stories touch on issues that are still relevant today, they are firmly rooted in another time. How do you keep them true to the period?

  I feel a real obligation to try to depict the period accurately. To that end, I immerse myself in newspaper articles, memoirs, photograph collections, and science texts from the time, gleaning not only facts and figures, but also patterns of speech and cultural biases and other nuances that might help make my fiction as true as possible. A great advantage to setting a series in the early 1900s is that there’s still a large amount of print material around from that period that’s being digitized and made available online. I’m especially cautious when I put words into the mouths of characters who are based on real people, such as Detective Petrosino. Many of the things the detective says in the book come from actual quotes that were reported in newspapers at the time.

  What’s your writing process? Are you a pantser or a plotter?

  I’m a plotter. Writing a mystery pretty much demands that you figure some things out ahead of time—like who did it and why, where to sprinkle your clues, and what the red herrings will be. But I don’t know everything in advance. I use more of a stepping-stone approach, identifying key points along the story path ahead of time and then filling in around them as I go. Often, new twists will occur to me as I’m writing, or a character will demand more space, making the story more complex or taking it in a slightly different direction from what I’d originally envisioned.

  What drew you to the mystery genre?

  Crimes, especially murders, are usually associated with strong emotions, and strong emotions tend to make for good stories. I view the mystery plot as a device for examining how people behave when they’re in extremis, which is where all the interesting stuff happens. I also like the challenge of building a story on two levels, trying to lead the reader astray at the same time I’m laying a foundation that will support the big reveal.

  Acknowledgments

  As always, I am deeply grateful to my husband, Larry, for his support. Every writer should have someone like him in their corner.

  My sons, Tucker and Chance, inspire me with their own creative ventures. At the end of the day, it really is the journey that counts. I’m glad to be on the road with them.

  Being a first reader is a delicate task, and Catherine Clark performed it beautifully. Thank you, dear friend, for your reassurance and suggestions. Jody Scala was also there with answers to my medical questions when I needed them.

  Thanks again to my agent, Victoria Cappello, for her efforts on my behalf, and to the wonderful team at Sourcebooks. My editor, Anna Michels, continues to make the publication process a fun and collegial one.

  Finally, a big thanks to the readers who have embraced Genevieve and her world and shared their enthusiasm with me. You make it all worthwhile!

  About the Author

  Cuyler Overholt worked as a litigation attorney and freelance business writer before turning to fiction. She lives in Connecticut with her husband, a psychologist, who is still working on perfecting her. When she isn’t reading or writing, she can usually be found on a bike, in the cobra pose, designing her next dream house, or enjoying a good movie. To contact her or to learn more about upcoming books and events, visit her website at cuyleroverholt.com.

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