The Great Alone (79 page)

“Very pretty.” Miss Rosie surveyed her with a critical eye. “I like my girls to dress fashionably. But you need to pull that corset another couple inches tighter. Men like a tiny waist.”

“I’ll try to remember that,” Glory muttered, although the rigid whalebone ribbing was so constricting that she could hardly breathe in it now.

“How old are you?”

“Nineteen.”

“Where have you worked before?”

“At a restaurant down—”

“No, no. What saloon or bawdy house?”

“I haven’t.” Glory watched with fascination as the woman deftly rolled a cigarette, slipped an end into a carved ivory holder, and lit it.

“What’s your specialty?” She exhaled a stream of smoke through her pursed red lips. When she closed her mouth, twin trails of smoke came out of her nostrils. Glory wondered how she did that.

“My specialty? I don’t think I know what you mean.”

“Is there anything you do other than fuck?”

“I can cook and sew—” Before Glory could continue, the woman started laughing.

“Deacon was right. You are new at this,” she declared. “I meant with a customer—other than kissing and fondling.”

As much as she hated displaying her ignorance, Glory had to ask, “What else is there?”

“You’ve never heard of the French trick?”

“No,” she admitted, feeling decidedly uncomfortable.

“That’s sucking a man’s cock until he comes. Some men like it better than fucking. Others like to screw a girl in the ass.” She flicked the ash from her smoldering cigarette into the brass spittoon that sat on the floor next to the chair. Glory had the distinct impression that Miss Rosie was deliberately speaking bluntly to embarrass her. And she was succeeding. Her face felt very warm indeed. “Mostly it’s the married men who want the other kind of sex,” Miss Rosie went on. “I need to know what my girls are willing to do, so that my customers are happy and keep coming back.” Her smile became faintly taunting. “How long have you been in the business?”

“A couple of months.”

“I suppose that explains why you haven’t run into any requests like that. What do you use for protection?”

“Protection. You mean, like a gun?”

A raucous laugh burst from the woman. “I mean to keep from getting pregnant or diseased.”

Glory turned red, again hating to admit her ignorance. “I didn’t know there was anything you could do to prevent it.”

Miss Rosie shook her head. “You’re green. I recommend to all my girls that they insert a sponge inside them. And all of them buy packages of condoms—rubber sheaths for the men to wear over their cocks. Some men object, but most of the time they’ll buy them just to be sure they don’t catch any disease.” She paused and studied Glory for a minute. “Didn’t the man that initiated you into all this tell you about such things? No, probably not. Was he the reason you got into this business?”

“Not exactly. I needed the money. It just seemed easy.” Glory was discovering that Deacon was right. There was a great deal she didn’t know.

“But there was a man. There always is.”

“He went to the Klondike.” Although she was reluctant to discuss Justin with Miss Rosie, she also saw no reason to make a secret of him.

“I suppose he promised to come back after he struck it rich. That’s usually what they say. Was he the first man who made love to you?” Rosie seemed to interpret Glory’s silence as one kind of answer. “You never quite forget the first man, no matter how many men come afterward. I don’t know why that is, but it’s true. Either way, I’m glad you don’t like girls. I have enough problems with Belle and Cheyenne Sue as it is. It’s much easier to deal with jealous boyfriends than it is jealous women.”

Glory didn’t know what she was talking about, but she decided not to admit it. The madam took a last puff on her cigarette, then extracted the butt from its ivory holder, and dropped it in the spittoon.

“The fee I charge my customers is three dollars. If they want one of my girls for the whole night, it’s thirty dollars. I get half and you get half. You keep all the tips and get the commission on whatever liquor or condoms you can persuade him to buy. It will cost you seven dollars a week for your room. As soon as the doc checks you out and assures me you haven’t got syphilis or some other disease, you can move your things over to the North Star Dance Hall.”

“I haven’t even said I want to work for you.” Glory resented the woman’s assumption.

“Do you?”

“No. I’m doing all right. And I certainly don’t see why I should give half of what I earn to you.”

“How much do you make a night?”

“I’ve made as much as thirty dollars.” Only on two occasions, but Glory didn’t tell her that.

“You’ll make twice that working for me, maybe more if you aren’t lazy. And I have men on the payroll who make sure none of the customers beat up any of my girls. There’s some who enjoy doing that. You’re lucky you haven’t run into any of them yet. That pretty face of yours wouldn’t be so pretty after they got finished with you.”

The comment prompted Glory to recall the stories her aunt had told her about the way her father had brutally abused her mother—beating her and breaking her arm. She recognized that there were men around capable of committing violent acts on women.

“Perhaps I was wrong about you, Miss St. Clair. Maybe you aren’t as intelligent as you appear. You have the looks to attract a steady and wealthy clientele. You might even acquire the skill to keep it. I am offering you a job where you can make twice the money you are earning now with considerably less risk of bodily harm or disease.” She took her coat off the bed, a fine seal jacket trimmed with silk passementerie and fringe. “The rooming house where you live is not going to allow you to continue your nighttime activities much longer. Soon you’ll wind up in some one-room shack. Crib whores are the lowest. You may be inexperienced in the trade, Miss St. Clair. That is forgivable and easily rectified. We all began as novices. But inexperience is no excuse for stupidity.”

“I quite agree, Miss Rosie.” Glory walked over to the bed and picked up her own jacket. “And I don’t consider myself to be stupid. How soon can I make an appointment to see the physician you mentioned?”

Glory became one of Miss Rosie’s girls and learned the finer points of her profession at the North Star Dance Hall. By springtime, when the first hordes of gold seekers descended on Skagway bound for the Klondike, there were nights when she netted as much as a hundred dollars from her drink commissions, fees, and tips. And she was always able to make some money on the side by pointing out a customer with a hefty bankroll to Soapy Smith or one of his henchmen.

Soapy Smith and his gang of con men, gamblers, pickpockets, and outright thieves virtually controlled Skagway. Soapy made sure his men preyed only on those passing through and left the good citizens of Skagway alone. Jefferson Randolph “Soapy” Smith even helped to build the first church in Skagway. He preached brains, not violence.

His reign of power, however, was short-lived. In July of 1898, he was confronted by a mob of angry citizens and killed in a gun battle, but not before he had fatally wounded the man who’d shot him—Frank Reid, the very man who had led others the previous summer to jump the claim of Captain Moore and sell lots in the renamed town of “Skaguay.”

The tenor of the town changed after his death. The constant flood of “outsiders” bound for the goldfields along the Yukon kept business brisk, but money didn’t flow as freely. By then there was a steady stream of people returning from the Klondike—most of them broke and disillusioned, with nothing to show for all the hardship they’d endured but calluses and loose belts.

Glory had made a few inquiries about Justin, but no one seemed to have heard of him. She didn’t know if he’d struck it rich, died on the trail as so many had, or had come limping back with his tail between his legs.

Those who had been there and returned had an older, wiser look about them. She could always distinguish the face of a veteran from that of a fresh, eager man who had yet to make the arduous trek over White Pass along the trail that had been nicknamed “Dead Horse Trail” for the piles of carcasses and bones of pack animals that hadn’t survived it.

Whenever she walked down the street attired in her latest gown, she wondered whether Justin would recognize her now—and whether he’d ever heard of Glory St. Clair and guessed who she was. By the winter of 1898–99, practically everyone who had ever passed through Skagway spread the word about the golden-haired Glory at the North Star Dance Hall. She was in the enviable position of being able to pick and choose whom she wished to bestow her favors on.

She had more clothes than she could possibly wear, all the latest fashions from San Francisco. Men lavished presents on her—everything from jewelry to a huge golden-eyed husky she called “Nugget.” She had received countless proposals of marriage, some from respectable businessmen. Yet she had formed a lasting alliance with only one man. She had everything she could possibly want—money, clothes, popularity, and the companionship of a man she genuinely liked—still she felt restless.

Rain hammered at the windowpanes of the hotel suite. She covered her ears, trying to shut out the sound. “I hate it when it rains.” It always reminded her of Sitka. “I’d rather have blizzards or sleet than that incessant rain.” She glared at Deacon Cole as he calmly and precisely arranged the ace of hearts on the card trimmer, then pushed down the ivory-handled blade to shave a smidgeon off one side. “I swear nothing ever bothers you,” Glory complained.

“Rain is a sign of spring.” He ran his thumb along the edge of the newly trimmed card, then inserted it in the deck.

“Spring.” She sighed and wondered if she should blame the season for her mood. “I wish there was something to do, someplace to go.”

“Come here.” Deacon shuffled the deck of cards several times, then placed it on the table. “Cut the deck and see if you can find an ace.”

Glory knew he had trimmed the edges of all four aces, making them a hair narrower than the rest of the cards in the deck, but her fingers couldn’t detect the difference. Three times she cut the deck and three times she failed to reveal an ace.

“I give up.” She pushed the deck to him. He cut the deck four times in rapid succession, with no perceptible pause to feel the cards, and showed her all four aces.

“Now the kings.” He shuffled the cards again.

“You altered those, too?”

“The corners.” Again he showed her all four cards. Then he shuffled the deck and dealt out five hands, face up. In one were all four kings and another held all four aces. He gathered up the cards and repeated the procedure, this time changing the location of the hands that received the kings and aces.

Over the last year, she had watched him practice for countless hours—sometimes with “strippers,” cards with their edges altered, or with a “holdout,” a mechanical device sometimes concealed in a sleeve or a coatfront—until the moves were flawless. Always there was the sandpaper beside him to keep his fingers baby-smooth and sensitive. She stared at those long fingers that were equally sensitive and deft when they caressed her.

“Why do you cheat?” It was something she had often wondered. “Is it that important to you to win?”

“Gambling is my profession, the way I earn my living. There are too many good players around to rely on skill and luck alone.” He put the four aces on the top of the deck and the four kings on the bottom, then proceeded to shuffle the cards—or appeared to do so as he practiced the false shuffle. “If a gambler doesn’t know how to cheat, he’s never going to know when he’s being cheated.”

He turned over the top four cards and revealed the aces.

She moved to stand behind his chair and idly stroke the slope of his shoulders, feeling his muscles beneath his linen shirt. She watched his reflection in the mirror strategically positioned on the opposite side of the table from where he was seated so he could observe himself while he practiced dealing “seconds.”

But when Glory looked in the mirror, it was her image she studied instead of his. The tea gown was new—a loose, unboned gown of royal blue cashmere that fell in graceful folds from the shirred yoke. Wide malines lace poufed over the balloon sleeves and trailed from the shirred cuffs. Her hair was swept atop her head in a golden halo effect, a single lock drooping in a curl on her forehead. Her face was sparingly powdered to enhance her naturally smooth white skin. A touch of kohl accented the blackness of her eyes and the faintest hint of lip rouge gave color to the pouting fullness of her mouth.

She glanced at Deacon’s reflection and saw that he was watching her, his face as expressionless as his hard blue eyes. Absently, she smoothed the crown of his coarse dark hair, wondering what he saw when he looked at her. He’d never given her money or bought her a single present. And she’d never wanted him to—not even the first time. It was crazy, she knew, but she didn’t want to put a price on their friendship. She couldn’t say that she loved him, but she trusted him. And that was crazy, too. He was a gambler and a cheat.

“I’ve heard rumors there’s been a gold strike on the Nome River not far from Council City on the Seward Peninsula.” Deacon shifted his attention to the deck of cards in his hand. “Supposed to be a big one. Some miners who lost out on the Klondike are making their way there.”