Bordello Walk

by Melissa Bowersock

  “So, what you have here isn’t enough?” he asked.

  “No,” she sighed. “We need to know exactly who they are in order to validate them. Sometimes all they need is for someone to see them as they really are, to recognize their existence and their experience. If we can find out what led up to their deaths, we can usually figure out what emotions are holding them, and why.” She tapped the list of names again. “I’m hoping Sam will be able to glean more from these names than I can. Right now, the only one I’m sure of is Michelle.”

  He sat quietly for a moment, biting his lip. Abruptly he seemed to come to some decision, and he pushed to his feet. “Hang on a sec,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”

  He left the room and Lacey flipped her notebook closed and tossed it into her pack. By the time she’d pulled the strap up over her shoulder, Zane was back, carrying a fairly hefty hardback book in his hands.

  “You might want to get this book,” he said. He held it up so Lacey could read the title.

  “The Tenderloin District: Prostitution in the Old West.” She took the book and paged to the table of contents.

  “There’s a separate chapter for each state, and she has several pages about the most well-known madams in Jerome,” Zane explained. “I don’t know if you’ll find your ladies there, but if not, this woman has other books.”

  “About prostitutes?”

  “Yeah. she’s done a ton of research all around the west.”

  Lacey glanced at the author’s name: Francine Sawyer.

  “Can I buy this from you?” she asked abruptly. “Or borrow it? Check it out?”

  Zane frowned. “It’s our office copy, not for sale,” he said. He shoved his hands in his pockets, looking apologetically at Lacey. “You could order it…”

  Lacey tried to keep a lid on her frustration. They didn’t have time to order books and wait for mail delivery.

  “Go ahead,” Zane said. “You’ll be here a few days? You can bring it back before you leave.”

  Lacey beamed at him. “Thank you!” she enthused. “I’ll take good care of it, I promise. And I’ll get it back to you in a day or two.” She unslung her pack from her shoulder and carefully set the book inside. “You’ve been really helpful, Zane. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate all you’ve done.”

  The man’s face pinked with embarrassment, and he grinned sheepishly. “Glad to help,” he said. “Would you, uh, let me know what you find out?”

  “Absolutely,” Lacey said. She pulled a card from her pack. “Here’s my number, just in case, but we’ll definitely let you know.”

  “Thanks,” Zane said. He grinned and waved as she left the archives.

  ~~~

  EIGHT

  She checked her watch as she jogged down the stairs to her car. Almost 11:30. That had taken longer than she’d anticipated, but she felt good about the progress they’d made. When she reached her car, she slung her pack onto the passenger seat and called Sam.

  “Where are you?” he asked on answering.

  “I’m just leaving Jerome. Be there in fifteen or twenty minutes.” She started the car as she spoke.

  “Good. What’d you find out?”

  “I think I have several good leads,” she said. “What about you?”

  “Eh. Most of what I found was just general history. Interesting, but not real helpful.”

  “No problem,” she said. “I’ve got enough to send us in a few new directions. I’ll be there as quick as I can.”

  “Okay. I’ll be waiting.”

  She resisted the urge to pull out into the street while still on the phone; the narrow, twisty road was not a good place to multitask. She keyed off the call and tossed her phone down, then pulled away from the curb.

  Sam was waiting. His tall, slim figure was leaning up against the wall of the motel as she pulled up. He circled around to the passenger side and climbed in, shifting her pack to the back seat.

  She leaned across the console for a quick kiss. “What sounds good for lunch?” she asked. “I’m starving.”

  Sam hooked a thumb back the way she had come. “I found out about a retro diner down that way. Sounded pretty decent.”

  “Works for me,” she said. “Lead on.”

  Seated in a padded booth with burgers and fries before them reminded Lacey of their first cases. How many hauntings had they analyzed this way? It was still their favorite way to brainstorm.

  “So you didn’t find anything that fired up the old synapses?” she asked him.

  “No. Accounts of the fire from surrounding newspapers like Prescott and Phoenix, but no useful details.” He pointed a French fry at her. “I don’t know how you do it. Hitting dead end after dead end would drive me nuts.” His voice reflected his exasperation.

  Lacey chuckled. “I know; it can be pretty tough. You just have to keep hammering away at it. Once you find that one good lead, that one bit of information that breaks through the wall, it’s all worth it.”

  “I’ll take your word for it,” he grumbled. “What’d you find?”

  “Lots.” She grinned at him as she pulled her notebook from her pack. Flipping through pages, she found her latest notes.

  “The woman who died in the fire is Michelle ‘Mai Oui’ Schulter. This was the 1898 fire; practically the whole town was wiped out.”

  “Yeah, I read about that,” Sam said. “All those wooden structures? The dry Arizona climate? It’s no wonder.”

  Lacey agreed. “Once we found out her name, we looked at 1890 and 1900 census records. I’ve got a whole list of working girls at that address, plus the proprietor. The problem,” she said, “is that so many of them went by nicknames or aliases, it may be hard to find their given names.”

  Sam considered that, chewing thoughtfully. “Nicknames might work, but I’d be happier with real names.”

  “Me, too,” she said. “So we’ll just have to do more digging. We still need to piece together their stories.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that,” he said. “I may have to walk again.” He did not sound pleased at the prospect.

  “Yeah,” Lacey said. “I was thinking the same thing. We’ll dig as much as we can this afternoon, then see if we—I—need to go back up for more help.” She pulled the book from her pack. “Take a look at this,” she said. She pushed the book across the table top.

  Sam turned it his way and licked salt off his fingers before he opened it. “Wow. A whole book about prostitution?”

  Lacey snorted. “This woman has written multiple books about it. Zane said there’s a whole chapter on Arizona, with several pages devoted to Jerome.”

  “Who’s Zane?” Sam asked. He flipped to the table of contents.

  “Guy at the Historical Society archives.”

  Sam ran one finger down the contents, found the chapter he wanted and turned to that page. Lacey watched him scan page after page as he looked for mention of Jerome.

  “Holy cow. Did you look at this?”

  “Not yet. Why?” she asked.

  “This is super detailed, tons of references.” He set down his burger, wiped both hands on a napkin and flipped to the back pages of the book. “Look at the end notes. Pages and pages of them. Talk about research. I think this woman even has you beat.”

  Lacey stopped chewing, surprised by the slight sting of that remark. “Let me see,” she said, reaching for the book.

  “Huh uh,” he said. “I’m reading. She has stuff here about Tombstone, about Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday, Big Nose Kate and Josephine Marcus. And about Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. And Etta Place.” He glanced up. “Jeez, were all these women prostitutes?”

  Lacey put down her own burger and grabbed a napkin as she left her side of the booth and slid in next to Sam.

  “Let me see,” she repeated. “Come on, we can share.”

  Sam pushed his plate aside and laid the book where they could both see it. “Look at these end notes,” he said. “This is phenomenal.”

 
Lacey agreed. She had to admit, she was impressed. Although the book was a big one, she had not expected this level of detail.

  “Let’s find the part about Jerome,” she said.

  Sam flipped back toward the front of the book. “Here’s the chapter on Arizona.” He paged through, and Lacey saw references to Tucson, Prescott, Phoenix and Flagstaff. Interspersed were pictures of ladies of the night, some grainy portraits that could have been any pioneer woman, some boudoir shots with little clothing but lots of attitude.

  “Jerome,” Sam said. He tapped the name where it first appeared, then flipped quickly though. “Lots of pages.”

  Lacey had a thought. “Is there an index?” she asked.

  Sam returned to the back of the book. “Yeah.”

  “See if there’s an entry for Michelle Schulter.”

  Sam quickly scanned the index, flipping page after page to get to the S listings. He ran a finger down that page.

  “No. No Schulter.”

  “Bummer,” Lacey grumbled. She eyed her notebook, knowing full well she had a litany of other names. Next to her notebook, her burger cooled.

  “We’ll have all afternoon to read this,” she said, making a decision. She moved back to her own side of the booth and retrieved her lukewarm hamburger. The fries, too, were cool to the touch. “Sam, our food is getting cold.”

  “Huh? Oh, yeah. I’m not really that hungry.” He took one last look at the book, then closed it reluctantly. Picking up his hardly eaten hamburger, he raised his eyes to Lacey. “Okay. So maybe this research stuff isn’t so bad,” he said with a crooked grin.

  She laughed. “Told ya.”

  ~~~

  Back at the room, they divvied up the workload. Sam took the book while Lacey got on her laptop to search out the names she had. She typed up a copy of the names, then gave Sam her notebook so he could look for the names in the book as well.

  First thing she did was get into her favorite genealogy sites and search for a death certificate for Michelle Schulter. After narrowing down the results by death year, she hit gold.

  Michelle Mae Schulter, born January 19, 1870; died September 11, 1898 in Jerome, Arizona. Cause of death: fire.

  Lacey scanned the other details. Born in River-something, Louisiana. The handwriting was so small and spidery, it was hard to read. But Louisiana made sense with Michelle’s alias, Mai Oui. The woman had surely grown up hearing French, maybe even spoke it herself, and the nickname could have been a play on her own middle name, as well. Lacey guessed that sense of the exotic added to the woman’s allure.

  On a hunch, Lacey searched for an 1880 census record for that name—and found one: San Antonio, Texas. She was listed as the ten-year-old daughter of a Mae Schulter, age thirty-four. No father, though. Lacey wondered if the small family fell on hard times as they drifted west, or if perhaps a young Michelle had been groomed for prostitution by a practiced mother.

  Maybe Sam could find out more if he walked again.

  She went on to the other names. One by one, she plugged them in, looking for death records, the problem very often being the nickname. A last name like Stewart or Brooks brought up a raft of hits, but coupled with Shorty or Cookie produced nothing. Ruby Mills, surprisingly, came up—perhaps that was her given name?—but she died in 1924. Helen Altus and Susan Springer both came up, but both died after 1905, as well. She came up empty on Moonlight Mozelli and Queenie MacKenzie, no big surprise.

  The good news, she supposed, was that she could cross three names off their list.

  She drummed her fingers on the table. What was Michelle’s story? Was dying in the fire enough of a trauma to tie her to the building? Trauma enough, to be sure, but was it the reason she was there? It’d be nice to know for sure.

  She heard Sam close the big book with a resounding thud, and glanced over to where he lay on the bed.

  “What?” she asked.

  He sighed. “None of those last names. Hundreds in this book, and none of them ours.”

  Lacey turned in her chair to face him. “There had to be thousands all across the West,” she reasoned. “Maybe tens of thousands.”

  “And we’re looking for three,” Sam said with exasperation. “Do you know how many people died in Jerome over the mining years? The hospital—what’s now the Grand Hotel—had something like 9,000 deaths. We’re looking for three needles in a haystack.” He shook his head. “What’d you get? Anything?”

  “I’ve nailed Michelle down, but we don’t know exactly what ties her here. She was born in Louisiana, then drifted west with her mother. Still don’t know how she ended up here, or what her life was like.” She regarded Sam quietly. “Maybe just her name and the fire will be enough?”

  “It’s possible,” he allowed. He stared down at the book under his hand. “I’ll tell you, I never thought this would be so difficult. I mean, look at all this information.” He tapped the book. “And not a shred about the women we’re looking for.”

  “Guess they just weren’t famous enough,” Lacey mused. She, too, stared at the book.

  And got an idea.

  “Hang on,” she said. She went back to her computer and tapped out a search string. The screen blinked, then came up with dozens of results.

  “What are you doing?” Sam asked.

  “Well, it occurs to me that in this age of social media, everyone is out there somewhere. I mean, even J.K. Rowling and Stephen King tweet. I’m looking for contact info for Francine Sawyer… and bingo.”

  “You found it?”

  “I’m sending her an email right now.” She hunched over her laptop and typed excitedly. “The tricky part, of course, is to not sound like a crackpot.”

  “Crackpot?” Sam snorted. “You mean everyone doesn’t go chasing after ghosts?”

  “Yeah, no,” Lacey laughed. “We’re part of a very select group.”

  She introduced herself, and Sam, and hoped their rather limited notoriety might lend distinction to their names. Then she explained their quest and listed all the names still in play. Besides Michelle, there were four: Shorty Stewart, Moonlight Mozelli, Queenie MacKenzie and Cookie Brooks. Not too many to look up, she hoped. And of course she hoped Francine read her own emails, and frequently, and would be of a mind to answer…

  She hit the send button with slightly less enthusiasm than when she had started the email. Now that she’d thought about it realistically, she felt the chances of a reply seemed slim. They couldn’t sit on their thumbs waiting.

  “Okay,” she said, turning back toward Sam. “It’s out there, but I think it’s pretty much a long shot. Going solely by what we have right now, what do you think is our best plan to move forward?”

  He set the book aside and sat up on the bed.

  “With only what we have now,” he said, “I guess I need to walk again.” She saw him flex his shoulders, as if staving off a chill. “I can talk to Michelle, see if I can get more from her or if it feels like she might be ready to let go. I’ve thought I could read out all the names. It’s a shotgun approach, but it might produce results.”

  Lacey nodded. It was an imperfect plan, but probably the best they had at the moment.

  “When?” she asked.

  Sam reached out and took her wrist, checking her watch. “I don’t want to go tonight. How about tomorrow morning?”

  That was her thinking as well. “I’ll call Lorraine and set it up. Then want to go get dinner?”

  “Sure.”

  Lacey made arrangements to meet Lorraine at the Crystal Slipper at nine a.m. Then they set out on foot for a likely looking restaurant.

  “There’s a steakhouse,” Lacey said, pointing across the street.

  “That’s as good as any,” Sam said.

  The sun was setting beyond the western hills and sending streamers of orange and gold across the sky. A few stars were already winking on. Halfway up the Mingus Mountains, the lights of Jerome beckoned.

  Seated in a booth in the dim steakhouse, Lacey perused the menu.
“This looks good,” she said. “Lots of choices.” She decided on the shrimp scampi, while Sam ordered grilled shrimp. “So much for steak,” she laughed.

  Sam didn’t join in. She reached across the table and took his hand.

  “You okay about this tomorrow?” she asked.

  He pulled in a breath and let it out with a sigh. “Yeah.” He didn’t sound totally convincing.

  “What do you need to do?” she asked softly. “How do you prepare?”

  He sipped his water. “It’s hard to explain,” he said. “I have to… armor myself. Psychically. Put up walls. Then just focus really tightly on the ladies there.” He lifted his water glass, but instead of drinking, he set it back down, making interconnecting rings of water from the condensation that dripped down the sides.

  “You know the Titanic? The movie?”

  Puzzled, she nodded.

  “Remember when people in the water are trying to climb in a lifeboat that’s already filled to capacity, and the people in the boat have to beat them away?”

  She swallowed tightly. “Because if they don’t, the people will sink the boat and they’ll all die,” she said softly.

  “Right.” He added another ring of water to his row of circles. “I would love to help all the spirits in Jerome, but…”

  “It’s too much,” she finished. “It would be a noble cause, but you can’t sacrifice yourself for a cause you can’t win.” She squeezed his hand. “You’ve helped so many souls,” she said. “And you’ll help very many more before we’re through. What we’re doing here is chipping away at it. Maybe, in years to come, another medium will come along and free a few more. And another, and another. Maybe, at some point, Jerome will be free of all its ghosts. But not this week.”

  He nodded solemnly.

  The shrimp was excellent. They ate in silence, letting the succulent flavors wash away the apprehension. Lacey found herself wondering what could happen to Sam if he did allow all the ghosts of Jerome to overwhelm him. If he let every one of them climb into the lifeboat, would they all sink? And what would that be like? Would Sam burn out? Go crazy? Even… die? She shoved the troubling thoughts away and bent to her meal.