A Lady in Defiance (18 page)

During her shift at work, as men pawed at her, or did worse,
Daisy kept the sisters in the forefront of her mind. They knew who she was and
what she did for a living and yet they had responded to her with kindness and
respect. They had made her feel that if there had been a pastor’s wife or
school teacher in the room, she still would have been treated the same. Feeling
valued again was not something she had expected−

A drunken, smelly, and barely-still-vertical miner
practically fell on her as she approached the bar with her empty tray. A
toothless grin filled his face and dried mud caked his beard. Fondling and
grinding on her with no shame, he waved two sizable gold nuggets at her.

“Wan’ some of this, don’ ya, girlie,” he mumbled in her face,
breathing whiskey and rotten vegetables all over her. Daisy’s stomach nearly
rolled over as she grimaced and pulled away. “This’d buy you s’ perty dresses,”
he slurred heavily as his hand claimed her bottom, stopping her retreat.

Setting the tray on the counter, Daisy gritted her teeth and
turned her head away to seek fresh air before his reeking breath brought up her
lunch. “I don’t know, Jed. I think you’ve had too much to drink to manage a
poke.”

“Oh, I’ll manage!” Wildly waving his one free arm, he held on
to Daisy firmly with the other and started dragging her to the steps. “Just get
me up these stairs, Daisy, girl, and I’ll do the rest.”

The men drinking nearby pointed and laughed. “Don’t rob him
blind, Daisy,” one yelled and the others hee hawed in drunken hysteria over the
irony. Daisy was known for her honesty; she never went through her customers’
trousers. She could only hope that this foul smelling body of debauchery would
pass out the moment he touched her bed. She would happily sleep on the floor to
avoid a roll in the hay with him.

Helping the unbalanced, unwieldy miner up the stairs, Daisy
caught sight of Rose watching them from the end of the bar. Her eyes glittered
like a snake’s and a cold, satisfied sneer spread slowly across her face. Daisy
stopped for an instant, jolted by the gratification in the look…and the promise
of more torment.

~~~

Like red silk rolling off a cloth bolt, Rose poured herself
into the lap of a handsome, dark-haired youth and bestowed a passionate,
bewitching kiss on him. The boy beamed drunkenly, dreamy-eyed over the promises
Rose’s sparkling, cleavage-baring dress was making. The men at his table
cheered and slapped him on the back. Rose had chosen young, dark and handsome
Hank carefully because she thought he would work to perfection. She led the
hypnotized boy upstairs to her room then threw him on her bed. As he struggled
with fumbling, drunken hands to undo his shirt buttons, she hiked her dress up
and straddled him.

Wiggling suggestively, she stretched out over him ever so
slowly and tasted the salt on his neck and throat. She heard him gasp as the
curves of her flesh seared his pathetic, little brain. He ran his hands up and
down her, touching her fiery flesh quickly, over and over as if she were as hot
as a buck stove. Knowing she had him in her power, Rose whispered, “I need you
to do something for me, Hank.”

Chapter
14

Daisy assumed that Lily and Iris did not consider themselves
mischievous by nature, but by virtue of boredom. The girls stood in the store’s
middle aisle, perusing bath water scents stocked specifically for the sporting
gals in town, but looked up when the door opened. Evil glee glittered in her
co-workers’ eyes instantly when Naomi came in to shop. They kept their heads
lowered and watched as Naomi approached the counter. Smacking her chewing gum,
Lily ribbed Iris as a fiendish idea dawned in her black eyes.

Dreading the trouble coming down the pike, Daisy quietly
slipped down to the wall stacked with bolts of cloth, distancing herself from
the two troublemakers. Naomi handed Mr. Boot a list and he smoothed it out on
the counter so the two could study it carefully. Watching them get lost in
their conversation, Lily removed the grey wad of chewing gum she’d been
enjoying and grinned at Iris. The two girls had to slap their hands over their
mouths to suppress their giggles. Iris nodded and nonchalantly meandered up to
the candy at the counter. She pretended to study all the jars intently as if
she just couldn’t make up her mind which item appealed to her sweet tooth. She
and Naomi exchanged tense nods then Naomi went quickly back to her business.

Iris frowned. “I’m Iris. You remember me?”

Naomi did not look at her again, but nodded. “Yes.”

Iris stuck her chin out. “I don’t reckon it would kill you to
exchange a pleasant howdy.”

Boot straightened up, as if preparing to move away from a
fight. Naomi raised her head, but still didn’t look at Iris. “I wasn’t trying
to be rude.” But she sounded fed up.

As the tension between Naomi and Iris increased, Lily
slithered up behind Naomi and studied that long cascade of flowing, golden
hair. It wasn’t braided and she exchanged a pleased glance with Iris. Deciding
on the best way to handle this attack, Lily flattened the gum in her hand then
slapped Naomi right in the middle of her back in a friendly, but forceful,
greeting.

“Mrs. Miller, isn’t it? How nice to see you again.”

Naomi spun on the Negro girl like a badger ready for a fight.
Lily raised her hands in mock surrender. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle
you.” She started backing away towards the door, and tugged on Iris’s sleeve.
“Tell your sisters we said hello. Especially the one with the bun in the oven.”
Collapsing into a fit of laughter, the two prostitutes ran from the store,
delighted with their evil prank.

Naomi watched them leave, daggers fairly flying from her
eyes. Feeling like a coward, Daisy dropped her gaze to a shelf stocked with
sewing kits. The joke the two girls had played made her sick to her stomach.
Weren’t their lives bad enough? Why did they have to go around spreading more
misery? Ashamed of them, and herself for not saying anything to Naomi, Daisy
sneaked out of the store like a beaten dog avoiding its master.

Naomi did not discover the sabotage until a few hours later,
when she wandered out back to the stoop to braid her hair in the last few
minutes of twilight. Rebecca stumbled across her there, working in vain to peel
and strip the hairs, one by one, out of the sticky mess. Her older sister
grimaced at the disaster. “What is that?”

Naomi glanced up, well aware that her expression could singe
the hair off Satan’s tail. “If I’m not mistaken, it’s chewing gum.”

“How in the world...?”

“I took a little trip to the mercantile today and two of our
neighborly saloon girls were in there. The black one slapped me on the back by
way of a
greeting
. I suspect that’s when she left me this little gift.”

Shaking her head with obvious dismay, Rebecca grabbed the
nest of gum and examined it more closely. The confection was matted and tangled
in Naomi’s locks as stubbornly as manure in a sheep’s coat. “Sister, I think
I’d better get my scissors.” Naomi felt her stomach drop. If there was one
single thing over which she had ever allowed herself some vanity, it was her
rich, thick golden head of hair. Oh, how John had loved to run his hands
through it. Rebecca tried to comfort her with the brighter side. “I’ll have to
take off about four inches, but it’s not a disaster. It will still be plenty
long.”

Naomi had worked for years at getting her hair down past her
waist. Now that was to be stripped away too. Deciding, however, with a
tenacious resolve not to give those
girls
the satisfaction of the small
triumph, she straightened. “Take what you have to. It’s only hair.”

Rebecca brought an empty box outside and Naomi dropped down
on it. Arms crossed tightly across her chest, she sat scowling in silence as
her big sister carefully and gingerly cut her shimmering tresses. The hair fell
in heaps around their feet.

“I know this is the kind of thing that makes you see red,
Naomi, but before you get too mad and go claw out their eyes, I was wondering
if you might consider what would prompt these girls to do this.”

“Meanness? Vindictiveness? Pure evil?”

“Self-loathing?” Rebecca spoke softly and patiently.
“Hopelessness…maybe even jealousy?” Naomi considered that. No doubt, their
lives were probably something less than pleasant. Rebecca stroked her sister’s
head. “I just think that turning the other cheek is far more important than
it’s ever been. We’re in a different place now, Naomi, and I’m not talking
about geography.”

“That’s easy for you to say. You’re not having licorice
chewing gum cut out of your hair.” When Rebecca didn’t respond, Naomi relented
and dropped her chin. “I know, Rebecca. I know. I’ll try to turn the other
cheek.” She pivoted on the box and looked up at her sister. “But I’ve only got
two and they’re both stinging.”

~~~

McIntyre was distracted, a problem that had been growing in
intensity since that night he caught Naomi praying. And the more distracted he
grew, the more irritable he got. His card playing skills, however, had not been
affected and he walked away tonight with several hundred dollars in gold dust.
It had tired him, though, staring into the inebriated, hopeless eyes of miners
and prospectors. Their lack of passion had taken the challenge out of the game.
Or was the lack his?

He was even getting bored with Rose. She dutifully came when
called, shared her passion, ignited his, but afterwards, lying with her in the
dark, he could barely stand to touch her. He wondered if that was how his
Flowers felt after each and every customer.

He shook his head. From where was this creeping
dissatisfaction with life coming? And why, when it tried to rear its ugly head,
did he repeatedly wander back to that moment when he had found Naomi praying?
Why did that haunt him so?

Desperate for a break, but determined to avoid the stream, he
excused himself from the pointless game, tossed Brannagh the bag of winnings
for safekeeping, and snatched his hat off the table. Stretching, he ventured
instead to the boardwalk. The chilly temperature bothered his leg and begged to
make his limp more pronounced, but he wouldn’t give in to his reminder from
Chickamauga. Enjoying the crisp, clean mountain air, he lit his ever-present
cheroot. Seconds later, Ian joined him. The two men stood in silence, watching
their breath and the cigar smoke curl and dance in the cold night.

Ian looked up at the distant mountain silhouette. “I believe
winter is comin’ early this year. I was thinking it would be no problem to be
done here by the end of September, but
now
I’m thinkin’ Defiance has
become a wee bit more interestin’. Wouldn’t ye say?” He quirked an eyebrow at
his friend and offered the smallest hint of a smile.

McIntyre shrugged noncommittally as he watched the men and
horses flow by. Saturday was always busy. Men wandered, either on foot or
horseback, drunk and sober, back and forth between the Iron Horse and the tent
saloons in the other part of town. Faintly, in the distance, they heard the
popping sound of small caliber gunfire. Probably a Derringer going off over at
the Wolf’s Head.

Ian shoved his hands in his pockets and tapped his foot in
time with
Buffalo Gals
floating out from the Iron Horse. “Are ye serious
about cleanin’ up Defiance?”

McIntyre inhaled. There was a change in the air tonight, more
of a bite to it. Winter
was
coming. His favorite season, it was
extremely unforgiving in Defiance. “You know I am. We’ll never get the railroad
in here if we don’t.”

“Then I’m thinkin’ ye need to start with that marshal. Does
he actually know how to do anything other than take orders from ye?”

“Well, that is why I hired him. He’s one of my best
employees. Wade is loyal to a fault.”

“Precisely. He won’t arrest anyone or enforce a law unless he
checks with ye first. Defiance can’t keep being this wild-and-wooly Donnybrook
if ye want respectability. Ye need laws and ye need a lawman who can enforce
them.”

McIntyre raised an eyebrow and looked up at his friend. “Why,
Ian, you sound as if you think I’m dragging my feet. I thought we were going to
start working on that again in the spring. Is there a reason to hurry now? “

“I started thinkin’ maybe I have more reason to stay in
Defiance than half-ownership of a mine.”

McIntyre rolled the cheroot around in his mouth. “It’s the
black-haired one you’re fond of. What makes her so special? Other than business
meetings, you’ve hardly talked to the woman.”

Ian grinned like a schoolboy. “Aye, and I’d like to talk to
her some more to see if I want to talk to her some more.”

The mischievous expression on his friend’s weathered face
made McIntyre laugh. “I think the lot of them maybe more trouble than they’re
worth.” He tapped Ian lightly in the gut. “But it is good to see you taking an
interest in something. I swear I believe you’re even looking younger.”