Gilded Needles (Valancourt 20th Century Classics)

by Michael McDowell

  The two women paced restlessly around the ring, calling out to their friends in the crowd of spectators, shaking hands over the ropes in a strangely masculine fashion, and giving insult for insult back to their detractors. They smacked the palms of their hands loudly against the low ceiling for emphasis and ignored one another completely.

  The fat gentleman in the center of the ring—Harry Hill himself, Benjamin heard it whispered—explained that the first fight would take place as soon as all the bets were made. Four apprentices would circulate through the crowd, two holding red slips of paper and two holding blue. Those wishing to back Charlotta Kegoe purchased red slips for any desired amount, and those wishing to bet upon Annie Leech should go with the blue. Odds would be calculated immediately, and announced before the beginning of the fight.

  The four apprentices, who were distinguished by the large blue or red feathers that sprouted from their caps, were immediately mobbed by those wishing to place bets, but so efficient were they at their task that in very little time all the wagers were taken. Benjamin, who at first had determined to back the favorite, changed his mind. He had watched the baleful woman in the black jacket, and she and her companions had each placed a bet on Charlotta Kegoe, the lady of the tattooed jewels. So Benjamin, in a vague effort to circumvent the evil effect of the old woman’s gaze, placed sixty dollars on the head of the Sapphic Pugilist. The red slip, with the figure sixty scrawled on it, he folded and thrust deep into his waistcoat pocket, which he then plugged with his thumb. If he won, and the odds proved substantial, he might go a long way toward repaying his uncle. And if he lost, he would have—if nothing else—adequate excuse for departing Harry Hill’s establishment, where he found himself very uncomfortable.

  The announcement that the odds were four to one in favor of Annie Leech over Charlotta Kegoe brought up a cheer and a surge forward in the crowd. Harry Hill withdrew from the ring and a great bell, struck by a man perched on a high stool in the corner of the room, marked the beginning of the match. Annie Leech and Charlotta Kegoe suddenly turned and fell upon one another in a growling fury. A series of vicious fisted blows left their bare skin first red, then blue with bruising. They cracked one another’s jaws and pulled one another’s queues; they screamed inarticulately and pushed one another painfully against the ropes.

  The crowd from the beginning cheered vociferously, and their noses rose yet higher when the first blood appeared—as Charlotta Kegoe was injured just below the right eye by a well-timed poke from Annie Leech. Another terrible blow stunned Charlotta, and as she reeled against the ropes Annie did a little savage dance of triumph while three-quarters of the crowd urged her on to greater mayhem; the other fourth began to groan loudly, mourning the loss of its stakes.

  For these five minutes, Benjamin worried for the fate of his sister’s sixty dollars, five dollars of the sum he had borrowed being already consumed; and losing concentration on the fight that was taking place sometimes no more than inches from his face, tried to think of a way to replace that money before his sister discovered that it was missing. He realized suddenly that he had been foolish in taking the gold: his family thought badly enough of his indiscretion at Morrissey’s, but that at least had not been outright theft. Benjamin’s sole hope now was that Charlotta Kegoe would win after all and that, at the least, Helen’s money could be replaced.

  The Sapphic Pugilist however was taking a dangerous pummeling from her adversary. The lowest row of fringe on her tunic had been ripped loose and dangled about her knees as she staggered back into a corner of the ring. The cut on her face, and another on the back of her hand, oozed blood. The groans of her supporters were almost as loud as the cheers that egged Annie Leech on in hopes of a quick victory.

  When the two antagonists moved suddenly from the center of the ring well to one side, Benjamin had a view of the old lady in the black jacket and the two young women and the two children who accompanied her. All five remained stock still before the agitated shouting mass of spectators. All held aloft their red tickets—for even the children had placed bets—in this manner showing support of their favorite. But not one moved, not one spoke.

  Charlotta Kegoe doubled over in apparent pain and Annie Leech moved in close. But then Charlotta drew up in a flash, her hands clasped rigidly in front of her. Her broad bruised forearm, with all her strength pressed into its service, smashed against Annie Leech’s neck.

  Annie staggered backward, and a great vexated cry went up from the crowd, surmounted by a sharp cheer from Charlotta’s supporters. Benjamin, because so much depended upon the outcome of the fight, remained breathlessly silent.

  Charlotta pursued her temporary advantage and punched Annie repeatedly in the same spot just below the center of the breast. Annie spat up blood onto her black velvet tunic and collapsed in a heap.

  The man on the high stool in the corner rang the bell three times and the fight was over. The dazed Annie Leech was taken up from the platform by her supporters and carefully passed over the heads of the crowd by raised tender hands. Charlotta Kegoe, who had stood by, arms akimbo, watching the ignominious departure of her opponent, suddenly swung over the ropes and landed in the midst of the group directly across from Benjamin. The twins ecstatically embraced her legs, the old fat lady squeezed her hand, and the severe-faced woman with the crimped black hair kissed her quickly but quite passionately upon the mouth. The pretty young woman in the bottle-green frock had disappeared, but returned now, laughingly to distribute the money that they had won. As a group they all pushed away toward the curtained doorway, the children and two young women ahead, then Charlotta Kegoe in dignified triumph, ignoring the derogatory calls of the disappointed. The old fat woman in black lagged behind to cast a glance so hostile toward Benjamin that he was almost unmanned by it.

  Benjamin determined that he would leave that place when he had collected his money. It would certainly be the first time in memory that he had departed a gambling house with more money in his pocket than he had had upon arrival, but he realized that the most important thing now was to return his sister’s gold. Even if he were to remain and recover the eight hundred dollars that he had lost during the afternoon’s play, his family would know that he must have got it all by gambling somewhere—and there would certainly be no gain to him in such a situation as that.

  Benjamin cashed in his red slip, and though he was anxious over the prospect of traversing the dance floor again, and dreaded still more the journey down West Houston Street to the Sixth Avenue el, he pushed his way determinedly toward the curtained door. The crowd surged around the bet-takers for the next bout, whose contestants had just been announced in the ring, and his progress was easier than he had anticipated.

  He was stopped by the burly guardian of the curtained doorway who contentiously informed him that if he wanted to go out now he would have to pay for his entrance again later. Benjamin nodded distractedly, but he had hardly heard the words that the doorman spoke, for just beside him leaning against the wall was the Sapphic Pugilist herself, Charlotta Kegoe. The young woman with crimped black hair was tenderly washing her cuts with a damp cloth, while the pretty young woman knelt at Charlotta’s feet, sewing the fringe back on her tunic. The old fat woman, with one hand on the shoulder of each of the children, was not a yard away from Benjamin; her gaze was menacing and pitiless. She said nothing, but the breath through her open mouth was short and noisy.

  Benjamin plunged through the curtain, and as he skirted the busy dance floor almost running toward the exit, did not dare look back. He did not hear the laughter that had followed him out.

  “Ha!” snorted Charlotta Kegoe, “who was that, Lena? You stared at that boy like you had seen him set fire to the Colored Orphan Asylum.”

  “Oh!” cried Daisy, still at Charlotta’s feet, “he was on the other side of the ring there from us. Bet on you, you know, but maybe it got too strong for him.”

&n
bsp; Rob had seized one of Charlotta’s hands and was minutely examining her tattoos, whispering to his sister that when he was grown he would have just such rings on all his fingers. Ella was more concerned with her grandmother’s cane, which she had been allowed to hold for a time.

  Louisa Shanks turned and made a brief sign to her mother. Who was he?

  “Don’t know,” replied Lena to this silent question. “But when I saw him, it was like a piece of ice stuck between my shoulders.”

  “That one?” laughed Daisy. “Oh, Ma! You stared at him, and his drawers just about drooped to the floor!”

  “Daisy,” said Lena seriously, “it was the eyes. Those eyes I know. . . .”

  Chapter 6

  Just as Benjamin Stallworth stumbled out of Harry Hill’s establishment he collided with a woman who stood directly beneath the red and blue lantern. Benjamin was surprised by her appearance, for she was almost certainly a lady. There was nothing of coarseness in her face or her fashion; and her expression, as she listened with averted eyes to his stammered apology, was exactly that he had seen on his aunt’s face when she had herself been the victim of one of his clumsinesses. But as he passed on he reflected that he was surely mistaken, for no lady appeared unaccompanied at such an hour in such a neighborhood.

  As Benjamin pushed through the dawdling crowds on the sidewalk—dawdling, he was sure, so as to watch for opportunities to pick pockets or expedite other mischiefs—he glanced back at the clapboard front of Harry Hill’s. The sham lady no longer stood beneath the red and blue lantern and he could not identify her retreating figure—so he must suppose that she had entered the place.

  The woman who had passed beneath Benjamin Stallworth’s startled scrutiny was in fact fully a lady in the matters of deportment and dress, and fell short only in the matter of birth. She was an octoroon, her father’s mother having been a slave on one of the Georgia sea islands. Under all but the very closest inspection, Maggie Kizer was a white woman, and bore but two telltale traces of her mixed blood: a thin blue line under her thumbnail and a fleck of black pigment in each of her green eyes. Obsessed with these betraying blemishes, Maggie never appeared on the street or in strange company without a pair of the finest white gloves, so close-fitting that she put on her beautiful diamond and emerald rings over them; and in all but blackest night she wore a pair of round spectacles with smoked-amber lenses.

  Tonight, Maggie Kizer wore a light-blue dress beneath a long dark-blue cloak that was fastened with a gleaming silver chain across her neck. Her veiled hat was of blue velvet with black trim and her gloved hands were encased in a fur muff. She paused nervously in the passage of Harry Hill’s place to put on her amber spectacles, then quickly circling the dancers, Maggie made her way to the curtained door that led to the back. She withdrew one white-gloved hand from her muff and pressed a quarter dollar into the palm of the man standing guard there. Her manner, which had exhibited a certain haste and uneasiness of mind, suddenly altered when she stepped into the back room. Her countenance then was one of dignity and repose, her movement cautious but full of grace.

  Standing at the edge of the crowd, she beckoned to one of Harry Hill’s apprentices, who now wore a cap with a green feather, and purchased from him a slip of green paper for five dollars.

  “Don’t even know who you’ve bet on—” laughed a coarse female voice behind her.

  “No I don’t,” replied Maggie Kizer in a low melodious accent, and quite before she knew to whom she had spoken. Her parted lips warmed into a smile as she turned.

  Charlotta Kegoe, still leaning against the wall, sipped at a schooner of beer. Beside her stood all the Shanks family.

  “Maggie,” said Lena Shanks, “you don’t play this way with money.”

  “No,” replied Maggie, “I don’t. I’ve been searching for you these two hours at least.” She came up close to the group. Rob stared at the young woman in unreserved admiration; Ella surreptitiously lifted a corner of the blue cloak and peered beneath it. Maggie touched each of the children’s heads affectionately.

  “We’ve talking to do, Lena,” said Maggie quietly, “talking that wants doing tonight.”

  Maggie Kizer was married to Lena’s younger brother Alick, a hotel thief serving a nine-year sentence at Sing Sing.

  Lena nodded, took her cane from Ella, and slowly hobbled through the curtain. Maggie Kizer nodded to Louisa and Daisy, and presented Rob with her ticket. Then, with Ella at her side, she followed Lena out.

  Charlotta Kegoe rolled her eyes at what she imagined were Maggie Kizer’s pretensions to gentility, and then grabbed Louisa Shanks around the waist. Louisa fell back against the wall and her head knocked smartly against the plaster there; but if she suffered pain, she did not betray it, and only smiled as Charlotta inclined her head and began to whisper hotly in her ear. Rob and his mother Daisy pushed their way a little nearer the ring, for they possessed not only their own yellow tickets but also the green ticket that had been purchased by Maggie Kizer—so they were sure to win.

  Once outside Harry Hill’s, Lena Shanks, her granddaughter Ella, and Maggie Kizer proceeded slowly along West Houston Street in the direction of the North River. After they had traveled a couple of squares the fidgeting crowds thinned and the way became darker. Those moving along this part of the street were furtive and shy of notice. Noise and light exploded from every tenth doorway, but all in between was closed, black, and silent. As they walked, Maggie talked to Lena in a low, quick voice that was meant only for the old woman’s ear; so discreetly was Maggie’s information imparted to her sister-in-law that Ella, close beside, could hear nothing of it at all, though she strained.

  The metal tip of Lena’s cane struck sparks upon the cobblestones, and Ella knew that Maggie Kizer’s news was not of the best. “Where is he now?” the little girl heard her grandmother demand, but the octoroon only shrugged her handsome shoulders.

  When they had come within sight of the house, Lena paused, drew a key from the pocket of her skirt, and entrusted it to Ella. The little girl ran ahead and opened the door of the pawnshop. She struck one of the matches that she always carried in her pocket and lighted a candle that stood on the sill of the street window.

  The front of the shop was about ten feet square. The two windows to the side of the door were shuttered from the inside; but the glass on them was so grimy that they scarcely admitted more light when the shutters were opened during the day. A square deal table and a couple of red-painted chairs were pushed against one wall; and rickety shelving had been raised against the other. Here were displayed dented tarnished copper pots, guitars with broken strings, a row of mildewed books, a pile of music, cracked and badly painted shades for lamps, a couple of frames of moldy butterflies, an array of rusty surgical instruments, some broken filigree boxes wrought by Confederate prisoners, half a dozen chipped figures of painted chalk, and a stack of men’s hats with the nap all worn off. These same items had been on the same shelves since the shop was opened and no one ever inquired about their prices.

  At the back of the room was a long counter with a closed bottom. Behind this were two high stools, one for Lena Shanks and one for Ella. On a platform in the corner stood a combination-lock safe, large and shining black but whimsically painted with scrolls of flowers along its edges. A wide curtained door led into the back of the house and to the stairs that descended to the cellar.

  The floor of the shop was rough and uneven, and in places sank beneath the lightest step. The walls, wholly without ornament, were covered in a much-discolored and water-damaged striped paper of green and black. Nothing in the room was new or even of recent date, and nothing was overly clean; yet half a million dollars in merchandise passed over that long counter in the course of a year.

  Breathing noisily and with some difficulty, Lena Shanks mounted the steps and came into the shop. Maggie Kizer followed immediately behind an
d took the liberty of closing the door after her. The slow walk from Harry Hill’s had brought back the tension in her face, and her fur muff was held tightly against her breast.

  “What do you have?” said Lena, seating herself at the red deal table.

  Maggie moved over by the shelving, where it was quite dark, and stood with her back to Lena Shanks and Ella. In a couple of moments she turned around, holding in her hands a small green canvas bag, drawn closed with a thick white string. She came over to the table, pulled the string loose, and emptied out a dozen pieces of heavy jewelry: three gold rings set with diamonds, a thick gold wedding band, a gold watch, chain and seals, five shirt studs with sapphires in them, and a sapphire stickpin. All the stones were of more than moderate size.

  In the gentle light of the oil lamp that Ella had lighted and set upon the table, Lena examined each piece carefully and without haste. Ella sat opposite her and looked at the jewels with almost as critical an eye as her grandmother’s but she touched nothing. Maggie Kizer paced the room with a light springy tread, her cloak wrapped closely about her, for the unheated room was cold.

  After three minutes had passed Lena Shanks, without looking up, and as she fingered one of the sapphire shirt studs, said: “Three hundred.”

  “Yes,” said the octoroon without hesitation, “just be sure we’re quickly rid of it.”

  Lena brushed all the jewels back into the green canvas bag, and said to her granddaughter: “Bring the lamp.” Ella lifted the lamp from the table and carried it behind the counter. She held it up before the safe as her grandmother turned the combination dial. In a few moments the safe was opened and a stack of ten-dollar bank notes extracted. Ella counted out three hundred dollars and handed the bills to Maggie.