The Island of Doves (12 page)

S
usannah inhaled and opened her eyes, sleep receding like a tide. She glanced around. The room was small, with bare walls and a ceiling of mottled boards. A low lamp burned on a table in a corner. Underneath it, twin black shapes loomed in the darkness. She sat up. A pair of boots, connected to two long, motionless legs. Then she heard it, the sound that had in her sleep become the sound of the steamboat’s engine: a snore.

Susannah screamed. Helplessly, she reached for her head, and found that her bonnet was gone. Her hair hung loose around her shoulders. Someone had removed her pins. She touched the sleeve of her dress, where she had tucked the necklace after running from the goldsmith. It was still there.

The door opened, and a petite woman wearing only a corset and petticoat knelt down next to the bed. She had dark eyes and the pert nose of a storybook fairy. She put her hand on Susannah’s shoulder. “It’s all right. You’re all right.”

“Where am I?”

“It’s all right. You’re safe here.”

“Who are you?”

“My name is Clementine, but the men call me Tiny. What’s yours?”

“What men? Is he one of them?” Susannah gestured toward the man snoring on the floor.

“Christ Almighty!” Tiny turned her face toward the door and shouted into the hall. “Bettina!”

A plump girl with cheeks caked with rouge appeared in the doorway. “What?”

“Did you leave Amos Sharp in here with our poor scared foundling?”

“What—him?” Bettina shrugged. “He needed to sleep it off and Molly said we was wasting enough rooms taking in street trash.”

Tiny shook her head. “Can’t you see this girl’s awake? She can hear what you’re saying.”

Bettina pursed her lips. “Why should I care?”

Tiny raised a slim dark eyebrow. “Get that drunk weasel out of here before I tell Molly you’ve been giving it to Sam Clark for free.”

“But he’s sweet on me!” Bettina whined, her jaw slack.

“Get!” Tiny shouted again, as if at a rat that had found its way into the kitchen.

Bettina scrambled over to the man and wrenched one of his legs up off the floor. She tucked it between her forearm and the breast bulging out of the top of her dress. Like a child pulling a wagon, she dragged the man across the floor. His headed thudded over the threshold and he moaned softly but didn’t wake.

“Where am I?” Susannah asked again. She raked her fingers through her hair and then began lacing it into a braid.

“You really were out cold,” Tiny said. She reached into her pocket. “Here—your pins. Where you are is Molly’s. Finest house of entertainment in Detroit.”

Susannah coiled the braid and pinned it in a bun. The black bonnet lay upside down on the table beside the bed, and she pulled it on. Tiny nodded at what she was doing. “That’s a good idea. The men who come around here would be awfully interested in that red hair of yours. Are you hungry?”

Susannah’s eyes filled at the mere thought of food.

“Well, come on then.” Tiny helped Susannah out of the sagging bed and they crossed into the hallway and down the stairs to the parlor. Upholstered chairs lined the perimeter of the room. A few were empty but men sat in most of them, holding their hats on their knees. One was looking through a large book of drawings. He came to one he liked especially well and showed it to the man next to him. Susannah could see only half the picture: the curve of a woman’s bare behind. The second man turned the book on its side and leered.

Tiny pulled out a chair at the end of a table, farthest from the men, and motioned for Susannah to sit down. “I’m going to get you some food. Don’t talk to anyone, you hear?”

Tiny came back with a piece of fried whitefish on a plate and a bowl of soup, potatoes, and beans. Next to the fish was a hunk of bread slick with butter. Susannah looked at her in disbelief, then spooned the steaming soup into her mouth. The beans were tender and smooth, sweet with butter and onions. She tore into the bread, sopped up the oil from the fish, and shoveled it in.

“Molly makes sure we eat well here. To keep up our strength. Am I right, boys?”

“Right you are, Tiny,” said the man with the book.

Tiny winked at Susannah, then lowered her voice. “Now then, why don’t you tell me about yourself.” She glanced at Susannah’s bandaged left hand resting on the tabletop but didn’t ask about it. “Underneath all that grime you’re a looker. You’re not in the market for a job, are you? Because, if you are, Molly always wants—”

“No, thank you,” Susannah said quickly, glad her mouth was full of food to hide the mortification in her voice. She chewed, swallowed, marveled at the fact that she was at this moment concerned about offending a prostitute. “I mean, thank you, really, thank you for all of this. But . . .”

“Oh, I know,” Tiny said with a laugh. “I’m just having a good time at your expense.”

The floor creaked behind Susannah’s chair. “Oh, why’d you bring her down here in that widow’s garb? She’s gonna ruin the mood.” Bettina scoffed as she walked around the table. “What’s she doing here anyway?”

Tiny sighed with the weariness of Job. “Bettina, you . . . daft . . . cow.” She spoke slowly. “Let me explain something to you. These men”—Tiny gestured at the other end of the room—“are drunk or on their way to getting there. And money isn’t the only thing they’ve got in their front pocket for you.
Mood
isn’t really on their minds.” Bettina pursed her lips, and Tiny shook her head. “I’m sorry if I took the romance out of it for you, girl. If you don’t get out of my sight this instant you’ll lose your day off. I’m trying to have a conversation here.”

Bettina opened her mouth to respond, then thought better of it. She turned to the men. “Daniel Burke, I believe you’re next.”

A man with his sleeves rolled up to the elbows and dark hair that curled over his collar jumped to his feet, then tried to cover up his eagerness. He followed her out of the parlor.

Susannah watched them ascend the stairs. She could hear Bettina’s chatter. “Now, see here, Daniel. I’m going to be Lady Worthington and you’re the duke. And you’re very, very rich . . .”

“Anything for you, Bettina,” Daniel said as he swayed on the stairs.

“I said Lady Worthington!”

“That’s right. Okay.”

Tiny was listening to the exchange too and shook her head. “We all have our crosses to bear,” she said to Susannah. “And that girl is mine.”

The food was easing the pain in Susannah’s stomach, sweeping the dust out of her mind, and she felt warmth coming into her cheeks. “Clementine,” she said, the words awkward. “I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t—”

Tiny waved her hand. “I only did what anyone would when they saw a woman passed out on their front steps.”

“Not one person—not one—would help me today. I think I’ve wandered every inch of this city.”

Tiny pursed her lips. “Well, I suppose I was raised right.” She laughed. “So, where did you come from? I don’t even know your name.”

Susannah wondered what, if anything, she had confessed in her stupor. Now that she was in Detroit, the story she had told the teacher on the boat no longer made sense. If she really was on her way to becoming a nun, why hadn’t she gone to a church for help? If she was bound for St. Louis, why had she gotten off the boat in Detroit? And why didn’t she have a penny to her name? She decided she would simply tell the truth, or a sort of truth, which, Susannah was discovering, was the only real kind.

“Susannah,” she said. “I’m trying to get to Mackinac. But all my money is gone.”

Tiny appraised Susannah’s dress. “Are you a missionary?”

“Something like that. You of all people must understand the importance of secrets.”

Tiny giggled. “What, me? I’m an open book. Raised in the lap of luxury. Always dreamed of growing up to become a whore. It’s a marvelous life.” Her voice turned hollow on the last part, and Susannah must have winced because Tiny rushed to say, “It’s really not so bad here. I make more money than my father ever did, and he was a cordwainer for twenty years.”

“In New York?”

Tiny shook her head. “In New Hampshire. Concord.” Then her face spread into a devilish grin. “Or Portland, or Boston, or Springfield, or Albany. Depends on the night. Depends on the man. Sometimes I ran away from a girl’s school. Sometimes my mother was killed in a fire. Sometimes my family warned me out of town because I was a bad seed, right from the start.” She lowered her voice to a throaty whisper. “A very, very bad seed.”

“Well, which story is the truth?”

“Does it matter?” Tiny looked tired. The early-morning sun shone through the window and revealed wrinkles in the corners of her eyes.

“It should,” Susannah said. She suddenly wanted very much for Tiny to trust her, but her words sounded like a reproach.

“Fairly haughty for a woman who dresses like a nun but isn’t one, and won’t say why she’s traveling north.”

Men began to clomp down the stairs, tucking in their shirts as they went. They passed through the parlor and turned toward the kitchen, where a back door would let them out into the alley.

“Funny,” Tiny said. “They always come
in
through the front door, but they never leave that way.”

“Morning, darling,” said a portly man in a silk waistcoat. He nodded at Susannah, then placed his hat on his head.

“Good morning, Jim. See you Friday.” When they all had left the room, she looked at Susannah. “If you need money, you could try it out here for a while. It probably seems impossible to you, but you’d be surprised what you can get used to.”

Susannah gave her a weak smile. “What do you do now, this time of day? Washing and things?”

Tiny held up the back of her hands to Susannah. “Do these hands look like they’ve seen the washboard? Wouldn’t touch it with a ten-foot pole. We have servant girls who do that for us. They cook too, bring wine up to our rooms in the evening. Now’s the time of day when we sleep. Molly’s not going to let me keep you around here eating our food for free, but why don’t you stay long enough for a rest before you go?”

Susannah meant to demur, but she was so tired. “It sounds wonderful.” They rose and pushed their chairs in beneath the grand dining table, then moved toward the staircase. The banister curved toward a landing on the second floor, its surface slick from the thousands of palms that had passed over it, some belonging to eager men, some to hesitant men, visiting Molly’s for the first time. The house was as quiet as a church now, all the visitors gone home except for Lady Worthington’s duke.

When Susannah and Tiny were halfway up the stairs, the front door swung open and the knob crashed into the wall behind it. They turned back to see a man swaying in the door frame.

“Now,” he said, “which one of you is going to give me back my money?”

“Oh, Christ,” Tiny said under her breath. “Sir, we are closed until the evening.”

“You’re not closed until I get my money.”

“Do I know you? I don’t think I’ve seen you here before.”

“No, I’m only passing through. But I passed here last night and was the victim of a grievous theft.” He slurred the last few words.

Tiny glanced at Susannah. “This is why I tell them to lock the damn door, but do they listen?” Then, to the man, “You were dissatisfied with your service here?”

“The blasted girl stole my wallet. I had money in it when I arrived and now it’s all gone.”

“Perhaps,” Tiny said, approaching him slowly. “Perhaps you indulged a bit too much in our fine spirits and cannot recall how many hours you spent with your . . . What did you say the girl’s name was?”

“Rosie. Dark hair and . . .” He cupped his hands at his chest. “Tall.”

Tiny nodded and stepped off the bottom stair. “I see what’s happened. All the row houses on this street look alike. The place you want is two doors down. Alice’s. That’s where Rosie works.”

The man squinted at Tiny. In one swift motion he reached for her shoulder and yanked her against him, his arm locked around her torso, holding her back against his chest. Her feet hung a foot above the floor. “I know where I was last night. Right here.”

Susannah stood frozen at the banister. Tiny shrieked, kicking her legs. “Let me go.”

“Don’t scream.”

Tiny turned her face toward his upper arm and bit at his sleeve, but he jerked his body away before she got her teeth into him. He grabbed her jaw with his free hand and squeezed it.

“Oh, please,” Susannah cried. “Don’t hurt her.”

He laughed. “Oh, how you’ll be sorry for that bite. I’ll say it once more. I want my money.”

“Rot in hell.” Tiny spit on his shoe. He gave her petite frame a violent shake. “I can’t breathe, you beast.”

Susannah saw the light glint off an object in his left hand before her mind registered what it was. He pressed the flat side of the blade against Tiny’s throat and her eyes widened. She looked at Susannah.

And suddenly Susannah knew what she had to do. “Sir, I have something for you, if you will just please let her go.” She unrolled her cuff. “This necklace is worth probably a hundred times what you say you lost last night.”

He narrowed his eyes at it, then looked at Susannah as if for the first time. “What the hell kind of whore are you, dressed like that?”

“Please take it, and please let her go.”

He hesitated, weighing his options, then finally cast Tiny toward Susannah, and she fell to the floor at the foot of the stairs. He grabbed the necklace with the knife still in his hand. The stones gleamed in the morning light as he slipped it into his jacket pocket along with the knife. “I cannot wait to leave this wretched city.” He stepped out into the street and closed the door behind him.

Susannah helped up Tiny, who rubbed the skin of her throat with her fingers to confirm that it was still intact.

“Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Tiny said. “What a maniac. If you had that necklace all along, why didn’t you try to sell it?”

“I did try, yesterday, but the goldsmith told me it was a fake. It belonged to my mother.”

“A fake? It certainly looked the part.”

“Well,” Susannah said, the reality of what she had done in giving it away beginning to sink in. “The gold was real. It
was
worth something. Maybe he’ll give it to his wife.”