“I’m not real keen on leaving Rapid, personally,” Miss Francina said. I could see it took some courage for her to speak up against Dyer’s glare, too. “We built a lot here, and we have a customer base. Some of us had our money in the bank, or got it out — and I know the house was fire-insured. Once it pays out, can’t we rebuild?”
Madame lifted her chin, stretching the soft skin underneath. “Assuming the insurance company doesn’t spend two years making me jump hoops to get what I’m entitled to, half the payout would go to my investor.”
That took us all aback. “Investor?” Miss Lizzie asked.
Madame nodded. “Some years back — before the Gold Rush — we hit a tight patch, and I sold forty-three percent of the house to an investor. Lately, he’s been urging me to sell out.”
She didn’t say another word, but she looked at Mayor Stone and so did all of us.
Well, that’s Peter Bantle and his mind control rays again.
Stone shook his head. “Rapid’s not going to be the Wild West for too much longer, girls.” I could tell Madame was included in that “girls,” and it put my back up. She had years and miles on Dyer Stone, and brains to boot. But he had a prick, and inherited money, and a prick. I guess that gave him the right to lord it over her.
And I thought about his upstairs bedrooms and their serviceable furnishings, and I thought that maybe he needed the insurance money more than he was about to let on. Don’t get the wrong end of it: I didn’t think he’d burned down Madame’s house. There was more than enough candidates for that bit of evil, and all of them was named Bantle. But I realized he weren’t above capitalizing on it. And if Bantle had blackmailed or mind-gadgeted him out of mayoring, he’d have to get money some other way than kickbacks and bribes from now on.…
“Mayor Stone,” Madame said, as if casually. I’d never seen her work feminine wiles before, and I am ashamed to say that it surprised me. But she got to be Madame somehow, and it weren’t by taking no for an answer. “Is Bantle blackmailing you?”
He didn’t answer, but he flushed. He shrugged. Pollywog leaned in closer to his arm.
She said, “If you don’t run against him, you know it’ll be seen as an admission of guilt.”
“So I should spend a lot of money to lose to him?” Mayor Stone asked. His eyebrows arched. “Spend money to make money,” she said.“A businessman knows when to cut his losses. Something maybe you should study up on, Alice.”
“Now, Mayor,” Mr. Colony said in tones that sounded like they was meant to be appeasing — or maybe the better word is “reasonable.” “A beautiful woman thinks you should keep your job. Is there some shame in that?”
Stone shook his head. “I’ll leave you ladies to talk it over. Mr. Colony, will you join me in the library for cigars?”
Cigar smoke being the best thing for books, of course. But maybe it made Mayor Stone feel some kind of cultured.
Madame’s fingers twitched. I knew she was pining for her pipe, though she usually won’t let nobody but us girls see her smoking. Mr. Colony, though, he seemed a bit reluctant. Nevertheless, while Mayor Stone was patting Pollywog’s hand and making sure at her that she’d be taken care of he stood up. I thought he gave me a sly kind of wink, too, but maybe he was just tossing his ponytail over his shoulder.
They left, the door shut behind them, and Madame sighed. “I built a life here in Rapid,” she said. “And I ain’t gonna let Peter fucking Bantle fuck me out of it, neither.”
“We ain’t gonna get no help from him,” Miss Francina said, her lip curled, meaning the mayor.
“Now, Francina. Our host wouldn’t leave us out in the cold,” Madame said. “But we’re to be gone as soon as possible, and in the meantime we’re to stay out of sight and stay hid.” I could tell from her tone that it griped her.
I cleared my throat. “What if Peter Bantle wasn’t a problem anymore?”
Everybody in the room looked at me.
I looked at Madame. I didn’t want to give away more than she wanted me to — but she nodded permission, and so I gathered myself. It felt like I was pushing those words out through the weight of all those gazes on me, but I managed.
“Peter Bantle’s got a machine.” My voice sounded like it was being dragged over a wood rasp. Just talking hurt my throat sore, and before I could finish everybody had to wait through another damned coughing fit and me wiping more black muck off my lips. Miss Lizzie got me some more tea, and that helped — or maybe it was just the lemon and the honey in it.
I continued, “He can use it to change people’s minds, sometimes make ’em do things they might not, otherwise. Maybe tell him things. Definitely vote for him, some of ’em. It might be it works especially well on drunks. He used it to make those tricks bust up our parlor, remember?”
I could feel all of ’em doubtful at me. But Miss Francina nodded and said, “I’ve seen it work,” and Miss Lizzie — who had walked over to perch on the arm of the chair beside Miss Bethel and Effie — said, “It’s theoretically possible,” at the same instant.
“Priya said it was in his house. If I was to destroy it…”
“Karen, honey,” Miss Bethel said, “that’s a lot of risk.”
“I think the bastard as is whipping girls to death is his mechanic,” I said. “Don’t it serve Bantle to have us all afraid, cowering? I could take a swing at both of ’em at once. We could change things up, maybe provoke ’em into making a mistake where we could prove something!” It all came out on a rush, which was probably a mistake, I reckoned, looking at their faces. I should of been chewing on my words some, so everybody else would have had a better chance of swallowing them.
“Madame,” Miss Bethel said. “Are you listening to this nonsense? Are you really going to let her take these kinds of chances? Especially if it turned out that there is a multiple murderer working for Bantle? Do we want Karen to be the next girl flogged to death?”
Madame said, “She’s a grown woman. She can make her decisions. And this would benefit us all.”
“I can’t listen to this,” Miss Bethel said. She slipped out from under Miss Lizzie’s soothing hand and stalked to the door. She was wearing a borrowed dress, too, and where mine strained at the shoulders, she swam in hers. “I’ll be upstairs.”
We all watched her go. I knowed I should say something, should maybe back down. But I couldn’t think of another way to keep us together. We could go to San Francisco, go work for different houses. None of those houses would be Madame’s.
And Priya was here in Rapid. And I couldn’t help but be scared that Bantle had her back. I had to go find out.
So yes, I guess you could say I had an ulterior motive.
My frown stung my face, but it weren’t no worse than some sunburns I’ve had, and I gritted my teeth and ignored it. Before I took up sewing, I didn’t used to scorch so easy, but I’m out of the sun most days now.
“Wait!” Bea cried suddenly, and darted after Miss Bethel. The door swung shut behind ’em, and I sighed and settled back.
“We’re in a bad box now,” Madame said. “And no mistake about it. Does anybody have a better plan?”
“I want to go with her,” Effie said, shaking her red hair back. “For Connie’s sake.”
A lot of faces hardened when she said that, but I knowed they weren’t hardening at Effie. She’d just said out loud the thing that had changed everything. Everything else Bantle had done to us — even burning down the Hôtel Mon Cherie like that and pauperizing the lot of us — weren’t a patch on killing Connie. We’d get him for that, and no mistake.
It didn’t even really need saying out loud, but still I felt a kind of relief that Effie’d up and said it.