Lou was studying her ragtag group of girls. Most of them were still dressed in the gowns they escaped in, bedraggled despite faithful laundering. There wasn't a gown among them that would catch the eye of a single one of their high-class clients. What a damn waste! Their entire wardrobe up in flames! Her regular seamstress, Mrs. Green, had lost her sewing machine in the fire and left Seattle in despair to live with her sister in Chicago. Which left Lou in a bit of a predicament. There were few enough women around who had the skill to design and sew for her girls. And even fewer, perhaps not one, who would agree to.
Lou turned her gaze across the crowd to Fayth. "Where did she get that gown, do you suppose?"
Coral answered enthusiastically. "She made it herself. Fayth sews like a whirlwind. I saw the sketch of that very dress on her drawing board just days before the fire."
"That's her design? Very nice. She has talent." Fayth just might be the solution to Lou's problem. She had to act quickly to maintain her status as Seattle's premier madam. Everyone expected better of her than shabbily clad girls. Most of her clients had lost something to the fire—a business, an investment. They wanted entertainment. They wanted to forget their misery. She needed Fayth’s designs to create the proper lighthearted illusion that all was well.
"That's not even one of her best, but I'm guessing it was one she could make up fast." Coral's words interrupted Lou's thoughts. "She has sketchbooks full, or did."
A slow smile spread across Lou's face. "Time to call in a favor," she said lightly. Her eyes did not leave Fayth.
Word came by way of a reporter let in to cover the excavation. The Finn vault held! Fayth jumped up and down, screaming at the news. The logger next to her grabbed her in a bear hug. Men slapped each other on the back and pumped each other's hands. The banks were solvent. There would be money for loans. Savings were safe! The masses went wild with euphoria. She had a chance to recover now. A slim chance, but it was better than nothing.
Con watched Fayth as she was swallowed up by the crowd, half relieved by the news, half upset. Fayth would never have him now. He met Bailey on the Eliza and joined him for a celebration drink. The mayor of Seattle had pulled all liquor licenses the day after the fire; Seattle was dry. That didn't stop them. No one but them commanded the waters of the Sound. Bailey showed him to the captain's quarters and offered him a tankard of the beer he'd hauled up from Tacoma A couple of beers in, Con unburdened himself to his old friend.
"You turned her down?" Bailey's tone was incredulous.
"I've told you I did at least a dozen times." Con was losing his patience.
"Yes, but go over your reasons again, Con. They're so damned amusing."
Con scowled at him and slammed his beer mug onto the table.
"Let me see if I have this right. You turned down Miss Sheridan's marriage proposal, damned amusing in itself, now if some gal proposed to me—"
"Not a chance in hell, Bail," Con interrupted.
"Now you want this woman," Bailey continued smoothly, "always did, but you had a brilliant, highly logical plan for courting her, which is, not to court her. Forgive me if I miss your logic."
"Careful, Bail. I'd dump this brew on you if it weren't so hard to come by." Instead he lifted it to his lips and chugged half the glass in a single gulp. "I told you, I didn't want some business arrangement. I wanted her."
"Never knew you were such a romantic, Con."
"I'm not sure it's romance, Bail. Maybe it's simple lust."
"You are a romantic, Con."
Con shrugged and shoved the copy of the Seattle Post Intelligencer toward Bailey, tapping on an article. "Read this."
"So?" Bailey said when he finished reading the PI's account of the beautiful and stylish Miss Sheridan who worked at the relief tents. The article stated she handed out colorful ribbons, and clothes for children. A brief quote said that her mission, in her own small way, was to bring color and life back to Seattle. Bailey had seen a few of those ribbons himself. The article ended with a quip about Miss Sheridan being a beautiful spot of color herself.
"It's her," Con said. "She's going around all dolled up. You figure out what it means."
"Why don't you tell me what you think it means?" Bailey said.
"Why do women usually get fixed up?"
"I assume that's a rhetorical question."
"To catch men," Con said. "Before the fire, she dressed in mourning clothes." Con leaned back in his chair. "She's wearing her hair up in some fancy knot, with bunches of curls around her face. Curls!"
Bailey laughed again. "Spare me the fashion details. What's to say she hasn't just decided to change her look? Women do, you know. My sisters—"
Con waved him into silence. "No."
"Well, why not? She was trying to lure you into wedlock and she wasn't dressing up then."
"Nice of you to point that out, old friend." Con shoved his mug across to Bailey. "Pour me another. You're by the keg."
Bailey talked as he held Con's glass beneath the spigot. "You told me she changed her mind about marrying. What's changed?"
"Before she only thought she was desperate. Now, she's got to be panicked for real, wild for money. Everyone is." Con took his glass from Bailey and stared at the white foam on top for a minute. "The whole city reeks with the odor of a wild, desperate euphoria. Ordinarily decent folks looting. Scams everywhere. What crazy thing is she going to try now?"
"So? Save her the trouble. Propose to her yourself, Con." Bailey's tone was only half serious.
"I can't, she wouldn't have me. I kissed her the night of the fire. Right there on the deck of the Aurnia. My men would be sucking bilge water, or looking for another job if I ever caught them courting onboard. I'm not any happier with my own conduct. For more than one reason. It scared her off. The next morning she left without a good-bye."
"Then I'd say you need some practice kissing, my boy. You better stop by Lou's for a little drill in the intimate arts before you pursue this matter further. Maybe there's a reason a kiss is all you got for your trouble." The teasing light was back in Bailey's eyes. He was no help at all. "I'd have expected a greater show of appreciation."
Con's glower silenced him.
"I see. This must be something serious if you're protecting her reputation." Bailey was silent for a moment. "Lend her the money yourself."
"Haven't got it."
"Use your connections to throw some her way."
"How? Who do I know who needs a seamstress?"
Bailey shrugged. "As a last resort, you could try courting her, for real."
"I don't have time. I've whiled away all I can making these peanut runs between Seattle and Tacoma. As soon as I get Jacob to lend me the money to rebuild the wharf, I'm going to have to take on the longer runs out of town. No one in Seattle is shipping timber now. I need money myself. Seattle's crying for goods. There's a pile of money to be made long hauling—something you mailmen don't have to worry about."
Bailey laughed. "True. The government keeps paying me despite the fire."
"Yeah, lucky you. Unfortunately, my mail subsidy is too small to bail me out and if I don't make my next run to San Francisco I lose that, too." He drummed his fingers on the table. "I can't chance her being scammed or accepting some fool's proposal while I'm gone. If she hasn't already. I told you about that fancy gentleman Billy saw?"
"You did."
"I don't think she'll embarrass herself by proposing to me again." Con didn't like the dark turn his thoughts kept taking. "But there are enough rutting bucks around, she'll be able to snare one quick enough. Somehow, I have to link her to me."
Bailey was silent for a moment, thinking. When he finally spoke, his words hit Con with a strange profoundness. "Then you'll just have to force her into marrying you. Quickly."
From the parlor, Fayth saw Mrs. Beard in the entry, surreptitiously pulling back the curtains that shielded the narrow window flanking the door. Curious, Fayth looked out her own window and spied a fancy carriage as it
came down the block.
A plain young woman, no more than sixteen and dressed in worn clothing, alighted from the carriage. Fayth turned away from the window and came around to the parlor entrance where she could see the guest over Mrs. Beard's shoulder. The girl at the door held a cat with a tiny tinkling bell on its collar.
"I've been told Miss Fayth Sheridan is a guest here. I believe I've found her cat and have come to return her—"
"Coral!" Fayth rushed past Mrs. Beard. "I barely recognized you." She addressed the cat. "Olive! You're alive." She hugged them both before taking Olive into her arms. "Oh, you naughty girl! You gave me such a fright!" She caught Mrs. Beard's disapproving look.
"It's all right, Mrs. Beard. Coral is a friend of mine."
Mrs. Beard stood in the entry like a scowling sentry, apparently intent on blocking Coral's entrance into the Kelleys' home. "You ought to choose your friends with more discrimination," she muttered under her breath.
Fayth took the hint and stepped out onto the stoop to talk to Coral.
"Fayth, you look stunning. What convinced you to trade away mourning clothes?"
Fayth laughed. "I've decided to be more colorful. Look at you! Looks like we've traded places."
"I left the face paint off when I realized I had to come here to find you." Coral's voice lost some of its gaiety. "Our whole wardrobe was destroyed in the fire."
"Oh, poor baby." Fayth held the purring cat to her cheek. "Both of you! Where did you find her?"
"She was wandering in the street when we evacuated."
Fayth looked up to the carriage at the end of the drive. Lou Gramm waited inside for Coral, watching their conversation with interest. "What's she doing here?"
"Lou wants to talk to you."
"Another time." Fayth nodded toward the matron in the window.
Coral shook her head. "Either you come out to the carriage, or Lou marches up here to their door. Sorry, but those are your options."
Fayth set Olive inside the door, called to Mrs. Beard to look after her, and turned toward the drive.
At the carriage, Lou greeted her with a measured smile. "Miss Sheridan, how nice of you to join me." She offered her a hand up. "Please come up and sit with me. I insist."
It was futile to defy Lou. Fayth ignored her hand and climbed up unassisted. Coral climbed in behind her.
"Thank you for allowing Coral to look after my cat."
Lou opened her hands in a magnanimous gesture. "You're most welcome." Her gaze flitted over Fayth.
"Why did you want to see me?"
"My! How you cut to the quick of the matter, Fayth." The madam gave her a generous smile. "I've come to make you a business proposal. Your beautiful gown caught my eye when we were out the other day. You're the only woman in Seattle dressed in anything even reasonably fashionable. I wondered to myself where a woman of your simple means would get such fine gowns."
"I'm a seamstress." Fayth resisted the urge to snort. "I designed and made them myself."
"So Coral informed me. You have talent, Fayth."
Fayth let the compliment pass. A compliment from a madam was no compliment at all.
"All our finery, our beautiful wardrobe," Lou sighed, "lost in the fire. And now my regular seamstress has run off to Chicago. Our men have a sophisticated eye, and prefer to see their lady friends dressed in the height of fashion. We'll lose their business if we mope around in these scorched rags. The girls in the cribs are dressed as well as we are." She shook her head in disgust. "I will pay you handsomely to design and sew your gowns for us."
"I don't sew for women in your profession." Fayth tried to hop down, but Lou's grip on her arm stopped her.
"I'm asking for the return of a favor."
Fayth shook Lou's arm off. "What favor? I was innocent! I didn't need you bailing me out."
"But I did just the same. Don't you don't feel any debt of honor?"
Fayth set her jaw.
Lou laughed. "Even if you don't, I know you're pinched in the pocketbook. That's where I can help. I have cash, plenty of it. Can you afford to turn it down?"
"Yes."
Lou laughed, loud and cynically. "You're a naive girl, Fayth. That little shop of yours burned to the ground, just the same as my poor house. You'll need to get a loan to rebuild the business, to survive, my dear."
"Fortunately, there are bankers."
"But that's the point, isn't it? There are so few bankers, and so many people needing loans. As I see it, the bankers have the upper hand. They can be very discriminating in handing out their money. What do you have to recommend you, Fayth? You're a woman in a man's venue. A proprietor of a small shop." Her smile spread nastily across her face, lighting her eyes with a malicious glimmer. "I have influence in the banking arena. I could throw it in your favor." She paused and delicately shrugged her shoulders. "Or not."
A cold wave of fear ran down Fayth's back. She sat up straight, trying to ward it off. She wouldn't cower before the madam. She needed a loan to start again. The only item of real value she had salvaged was her machine. In a bold move calculated to help her secure the money she needed, just yesterday she used her savings to buy the lot where her leased shop space had stood. She needed the land as collateral against a building loan. She got it for a steal, but the purchase left her cash poor.
Lou was rumored to be extremely powerful in Seattle. The madam had many influential clients, and obvious influence over them. Coral had told Fayth stories without mentioning names. They came flooding back with crushing clarity. Lou had the power to make good on her threat. "You wouldn't."
"Try me."
Fayth stared ahead, her mind racing at a frantic pace, trying to come up with a way to extricate herself from the situation. "I don't sew lingerie. Find someone else."
"Oh, dear." Lou was laughing. "I didn't come to you for lingerie. I need elegant gowns to wear out, to bring in the crowd. Lingerie is the last thing we'll be needing to replace. Unveiled, my girls’ natural assets don't need any embellishing."
Fayth's thinly disguised discomfort only seemed to heighten Lou's amusement. Blast the woman!
"I'll tell you what. I am a fair-minded woman. I'll give you a day to think about it and send a driver over for your answer day after tomorrow. I'll need a day or two to see what material I can scrounge up, anyway. Someone in Tacoma should have something suitable." She handed Fayth a slip of paper. "If you make up your mind early, you can reach me at this address."
"She hasn't come to see you yet, Jake?"
"You know I can't divulge client information, Con. But if I recall correctly, the last time I saw Miss Sheridan was just before the fire. She was interested in buying the building she was renting. Of course, that deal is surely sour now, assuming she hadn't already put her money down. And she would have had to do that the day of the fire, before it struck."
"She'll be coming to see you soon. For all I know, she's in line right now." They sat in Jacob Finn's temporary quarters where he, as one of the financiers of the rebuilding, held court. The line to see him was a spectacle in itself, but Con was an old friend.
"What is your interest in the woman, Con?" Jacob looked over the stack of papers before him. "I can lend you enough to repair your wharf. But let me warn you, you hook up with her, I can't lend you enough to repair both businesses."
Con didn't shift in his chair. "I won't take the loan out today, Jake. Put a hold on enough cash for the wharf, will you? I'll be back tomorrow, if not, the next day."
"Certainly, Con. And if she comes to me in the meantime?"
"You have reasonable grounds to deny her."
"You're not asking me to doing anything unethical, are you?"
"You know me better than that." Con took a deep breath and leveled his gaze on the banker. "I'm asking you not to use extraordinary means to get her the money."
After a grueling wait in line, Fayth sat facing Jacob Finn in his office. "What do you mean, Mr. Finn, that I can't have a loan unless I have a man to over
see the rebuilding? Surely I can hire a contractor for that, and my cousin, Sterling Kelley, has offered to assist me. You insult me by insinuating that I can't run my own business, when you know very well that I can. In the months that I've been here my business has grown very nicely and your bank has seen the results in the increase of my deposits."
"I mean no insult, Miss Sheridan. I'm only following orders from the bank's board of directors. As you well know, we've had a run on loans. We only have so much capital. We must lend it discriminately.
"I've seen what a capable businesswoman you are, but that does not assure me you can manage a construction project. There will be dozens of con artists flocking to Seattle and they will be targeting the most vulnerable people as victims. Please illuminate me on any experience you have, and I'll be happy to reconsider."
He'd trapped her on purpose. He knew very well she had none.
"I don't have any. But I learn quickly. And I'll hire a reputable contractor at your recommendation."
Finn shook his head. "That's only the first strike against you, Miss Sheridan. Your cash assets are small. Speaking plainly, you're undercapitalized."
"Isn't everybody, Mr. Finn?" Her voice involuntarily pitched an octave higher in frustration, making her sound weak. It was times like this when she longed for a nice, deep voice.
Jacob Finn smiled. "Not all. What you need, Miss Sheridan, is a private investor, a backer, or a partner with assets. Come see me again when you've worked something out." He dismissed her.
Fayth stormed out of his office and down the street, muttering to herself. Lou’s show of power.
Two hours and two more failed loan attempts later, she arrived at Lou's temporary parlor house, a house Lou was renting while she rebuilt. What could Faythe do? Unless she wanted to live off of Sterling and Elizabeth's charity for the foreseeable future, she was out of options.
"Call off your dogs, Lou," Fayth said as she stepped into Lou's office. "I'll sew your dresses."
The Last Honest Seamstress Page 11
