No Place for a Lady

by Vivian Vaughan

  “What if he did try? Maybe he is good, tender, kind, like he acts. But I can’t—”

  Morley tucked a loose curl back behind her ear. “Take a chance, little girl. That’s what life’s made up of, chances. Don’t run away. From what I hear you’re good at fightin’ other folks’ battles. Stand up and fight for yourself.”

  “I don’t know…I can’t…”

  “At least, talk to him again,” he urged. “Don’t run off to Boston without tryin’ again. Come on. Let me take you out there. I have a horse to get from him anyhow.”

  She was tempted. Oh, my, she was tempted. What she wouldn’t give to see Tyler again, to look into his eyes again, to feel his arms around her. The old glow returned, just thinking about it. But, oh, the pain it would cause later.

  Commotion in the street became louder. Madolyn gathered her wits. “I can’t, Morley. I don’t have time.”

  A knock at the door was followed by a feminine voice. “You ready, Maddie? Time to get over to the barn.”

  “Coming, Angie.” She hugged Morley, then stood back and rubbed tears from her face. “Thank you for coming to town. It’s so good to talk to you again.”

  “I’ve missed you, little girl. Wondered about you. Worried about you.” He held her by the shoulders and grinned into her teary-eyed face. “You’ve made one hell of a woman, Maddie. I’m proud as can be of you.”

  Angie Thompson called again.

  “I’d better get along, too.” He snatched his Stetson off the dresser. “I’ve got work to do.”

  “On Independence Day? You should stay around and enjoy the festivities. You should have brought your family.”

  “They’re out there,” he acknowledged with a wry grin. “Biggest fit Carlita ever pitched. Wouldn’t hear of not comin’ to town today an’ bringin’ all the kids.”

  Madolyn took heart. “Don’t you run off, either, Morley. I promise you, this is one Independence Day you will never forget.”

  “She’s long gone.” Goldie stood in the foyer tapping an impatient foot. Tyler raced down the central staircase. Maddie’s rooms had been cleaned out.

  “What the hell do you mean? Where’d she—”

  “Moved across the tracks, lock, stock, and barrel. Into the Buckhorn Hotel. Didn’t spend one night after you brought her back from wherever you’d taken her. Wanted to get as far away from you as possible, I reckon.”

  “She said that?”

  “Didn’t have to. It was written plain as day all over her face. Morley’s accommodations likely aren’t as fancy as mine, but at least she can go to sleep without worrying whether you’re across the hall sleeping or downstairs with one of my girls.”

  “Damnation, Goldie. You’ve got to talk to her.”

  “Wouldn’t do any good. Besides, I don’t have time.” She called up the stairs. “Come on, girls, we can’t be late.” She winked at Tyler. “We’re fixin’ to take our town back, hon. If you don’t want to miss the fireworks, come along.”

  “Take my town?” But Tyler’s mind wasn’t on fireworks or towns. His mind was on Maddie. Had been for the better part of the week. Damnation, he couldn’t get the woman off his mind. Determined to make one more attempt to talk sense to her, he had come to town, only to find her gone. Hell, it must have taken the whole town to move her and all that paraphernalia of hers. And into Morley Damn-his-hide’s hotel.

  Independence Day! Wasn’t that what Goldie said? He hadn’t even realized what day it was. Maddie was gone; that’s all he knew. Except that he had to find her.

  And he would. If she thought she could hide from him by crossing a set of railroad tracks, she had another thing coming. It was a free country, wasn’t it? Wasn’t that what she was always harping about? Freedom. Independence. Well, he was free, too, and it was high time he started acting like it.

  Eighteen

  “Quiet, ladies! Quiet!” Madolyn shouted above the chatter of two dozen women gathered in the mayor’s barn. “Form your lines,” she encouraged. “Four abreast. Time to get started.”

  They were all there: Constance Allen, Angie Thompson, Pansy Handleman, Thelma Rider and Nancy Peebles.

  “Take your places, ladies,” Madolyn called again. “Everyone now. Hold hands. We shall march out singing; don’t stop until we meet the ladies of Buck at the railroad tracks. And remember what I told you: We have one chance to influence those men out there; today’s the day. Today’s our day. Ready?”

  “READY, MADDIE!”

  “On three, then. One. Two. Three.” The resounding shout raised the mayor’s rafters.

  “Buckhorn reunited! Reunite it now! Buckhorn…”

  Chanting as they marched, the women followed Madolyn out into the street. In addition to shouting their slogan, they carried black parasols on which they had carefully lettered the words in white. Each lady held hers aloft.

  Parasols had been Madolyn’s idea. More women would march longer, she reasoned, if sheltered from the July sun. Also, the parasols would prevent them from having to look into the intimidating faces of their husbands and neighbors.

  As Madolyn expected, by the time they rounded the side of the building and emerged onto the main street, a group of men had gathered. Most just gawked. Several chuckled. A few shouted wisecracks.

  “Lookit, Jeb. The parasol brigade.”

  “Ain’t never seen nothin’ like it.”

  “Eyes front,” Madolyn called, holding the parasol that Constance Allen had painted for her while she was in Mexico. “All together now. Sing it out!”

  “Buckhorn reunited! Reunite it now! Buckhorn…”

  She led the chant, ever faster and louder, until by the time they stood at the edge of the tracks, they were breathing hard. They paused to catch their breaths.

  “¡Tía Maddie!” The small voice took what breath Madolyn had left. She glanced toward the boardwalk. Little Jeff stood hand in hand with his sisters and Carlita. Emotion overwhelmed her. Her composure fled. There stood the children she had thought she would never see again. Without a moment’s hesitation, she dropped to her knees and held out her arms. Little Jeff broke free and raced into her embrace. His little arms grabbed her in a tight neck-hold. Tears rushed to her eyes.

  “¡Donde está tio?” His innocent question tore through her heart, forcing her back to reality.

  She stood, glanced behind her, embarrassed. She had stopped the entire procession, for something so personal, so…She squared her shoulders, glanced at Carlita. Betsy and Clara stood beside their mother. Morley and the older boys were nowhere to be seen. She wondered whether he had taken them back to the ranch to work. She hoped not. Everyone should celebrate Independence Day. She tried to stiffen her spine, but thoughts of Morley, her brother, and these children, her family, left her weak and weepy. Pride came to her aid.

  Morley said he was proud of her. She hoped he was watching now. She wondered whether he would be proud of her after she reunited the town he had split apart in a fit of anger.

  She beckoned Carlita. “Come. Bring the girls.”

  The idea took the very life out of the woman. Like a turtle hiding its head from danger, Carlita cringed into her rebozo.

  “There they come,” someone behind Madolyn called, drawing her attention back to the march.

  “The ladies of Buck!”

  “Hooray! Hooray!”

  Joyous greetings rang out from both sides of the tracks. The men might sneer at this demonstration, but the women themselves—for the time being, at least—paid them no mind. All were serious, yet it was plain to see that they were enjoying every minute of it.

  The women of Buck stopped on their side of the tracks, and Madolyn stood face to face with Goldie and her girls. A desperate longing lodged in her chest. Gripped by emotion, she couldn’t speak. What lessons she had learned at the House of Negotiable Love! Above all, that all women are created equal. She prayed she never forgot that.

  “Hidee, Miss Maddie. Hidee.”

  Two-Bit. Daphne.

 
Penny-Ante.

  Goldie. Attired in the fuchsia suit she had worn to that first meeting so long ago, dyed ostrich plumes dipping helter-skelter around her painted face, Goldie’s smile wavered, revealing the lack of confidence that always surfaced when the madam ventured out of her domain. Madolyn dropped Little Jeff’s hand and embraced her.

  Goldie pulled away, disconcerted. Color tinged her face beneath the heavy application of rouge. She patted the sides of her henna-tinted hair, which was pinned into a severe bun today. It did nothing to diminish her aura of sensuality.

  “I’ve missed you, Goldie.” Madolyn was unable to keep the words from tumbling out. She looked for Lucky, found her a couple of feet behind Goldie. “You, too, Lucky. And the girls. All of you.”

  Goldie recovered, tugging on her overly tight bodice. True to her nature, she spoke what was on her mind. “And Tyler? Have you missed him, too, Maddie?”

  Madolyn blanched. “No…” The lie stuck in her throat. Goldie would have seen through it, anyway. Goldie was a wizard at seeing into one’s heart.

  “He misses you—”

  “No. Don’t say it…” she begged. Through gritty determination, she regained her composure. She looked around for Little Jeff and saw him clinging to Carlita’s skirts.

  “Come along, ladies.” The position of march director came in handy. “Line up on the tracks. Mix it up. Two from Horn and two from Buck in each line.”

  The women complied eagerly. Goldie took the hand of Frances Arndt, the parson’s wife, and they joined with Angie Thompson and Constance Allen from the Horn side; Bertie and Annie teamed with Thelma Rider and Emma Butler; Nancy Peebles and Ol’ Miz Watson joined Lucky and Inez Bradford. And so it went, until the women stood like a brass band down the middle of the tracks, four abreast, more than ten rows deep.

  Watching them, Madolyn strove to recapture the joy she had felt earlier with Morley, but Goldie’s claim was all she could think about. Did Tyler really miss her? How did Goldie know? Questions.

  Questions she would never ask. Could never ask. She should have known Goldie would mention Tyler. She should have prepared herself to hear his name.

  But she hadn’t. Wasn’t still. Never would be, from the way her heart fluttered. Loretta James rushed onto the tracks.

  “Sorry I’m late, Maddie. I ran into Tyler. We had to settle some things about the school.”

  Tyler? Lord in heaven. He was in town?

  Tyler and Loretta? Loretta James, who surely had her cap set for him. She would likely catch him, too, come fall when she returned from St. Louis. If not before she left.

  If she left.

  Oh, the misery of it! The sheer misery. She couldn’t be gone from this place soon enough. Dredging her senses from the depths of despair, Madolyn signaled for the instruments to begin. The first few notes effectively silenced the crowd on both sides of the tracks.

  “Forward, ladies!” She stepped down the center of tracks to the strains of “Shall We Gather at the River,” raw and unschooled though the rendition was.

  “Shall we gather at the depot,” the women sang.

  “Hey, Jack, that Emma playin’ your tuba?”

  “By damn!”

  “Lookee there! That’s ol’ Miz Watson playin’ a fiddle. Who’d’ve ever thunk it?”

  Hearing the comments, Madolyn knew her biggest difficulty now would be to keep the women from being overcome by self-consciousness. Keep them busy, Miss Abigail advised.

  “Ready, ladies! One, Two, Three…”

  And the march began.

  “Buckhorn reunited!”

  To her relief, the shouts rang loud and clear.

  “Reunite it now!”

  She led the little band up the tracks past both depots. When they neared the bend that led to the loading pens and railroad trap, she stopped and steeled herself to finish the demonstration. Then, and only then, could she return to her room at the Buckhorn Hotel. The thought had never seemed so lonely.

  “Turn around, ladies. We shall sing our way back. Sing your hearts out!” And to her gratification, the marching songs burst forth with the vigor of a camp-meeting choir.

  “Were you there when they tore apart our town?”

  “Goldie!” someone shouted. “Whatcha doin’ in there?”

  “Figurin’ to improve business, Pete!” Goldie hollered back.

  “Hip, hip, hooray!” came the cry of a man from Horn.

  Headed east, she passed the dual depots again, determined to remain on the tracks in accordance with the communities’ rules until they presented their proclamations to the two mayors.

  “We’ve been that way, Maddie,” Hattie Jasper called from behind. “Let’s march plumb through town.”

  Madolyn hesitated. She wanted to present the proclamations first, but she hadn’t seen either mayor. Since Tyler was in town, she dared not look too closely on the Buck side.

  “Do you see the mayors?” she questioned Hattie without breaking stride.

  Her mind remained on its own single track: Tyler Grant. She doubted he would come down during the demonstration, yet…Resolutely, her eyes trained straight ahead, she stepped back down the tracks with the women of both towns following.

  Then, suddenly, she felt it. The awareness deep inside her. By the time it prickled on her skin, her feet had faltered. She had to force them to move down the tracks.

  He was here. Like all those other times, she felt his presence. And it was the most devastating experience of all. For it told her, as nothing else could have, that she would never be free of him. Never.

  Always. Whether she went to Boston or China, his presence would be with her always.

  She couldn’t keep from looking. Indeed, it seemed senseless not to. She spied him through the melee, as though the crowd had parted for that purpose alone. She glanced quickly away. Then back, unable to keep from it. Unable to keep from staring at him. The way he stared at her.

  He lounged against the depot in the same arrogant pose that had frightened her the day she came to town, so long ago, a lifetime ago. Would she had remained frightened! Now that look, that man, fired her to her very toes. She tore her gaze away from his.

  “Forward, ladies!”

  “Join us, hon,” Goldie called when they passed him.

  “I’d better watch, Goldie. Keep an’ eye on my town.”

  His voice trilled through her; inside, the glow leaped into flame. By sheer force of will, she managed to stiffen her spine and lead her band of determined, unsuspecting women past the depot. At the edge of town, she executed an about-face. As much as she now dreaded it, she walked to the head of the group and started them back up the tracks.

  But it wasn’t Tyler who awaited them between the two depots. The mayors of Buck and Horn stood shoulder to shoulder, blocking the tracks. Madolyn noted the indignation in the eyes of both men, Buster Nunn, mayor of Buck, and Clyde Thompson, mayor of Horn. Obviously they intended to defend the honor of the men of their respective towns.

  Wordlessly—and self-consciously now that she knew Tyler watched from the crowd—Madolyn withdrew the two proclamations from her reticule and handed one to each mayor. Each man studied the paper he held, then glanced at his neighbor’s.

  “The proclamations are identical, gentlemen,” she confirmed. “On this day of Independence, we, the women of Buckhorn declare our town reunited.” She waved her parasol in signal for the women to make their planned march through first Buck, then Horn.

  Buster Nunn stopped her. “You know the rules, Miss Sinclair.”

  “Residents don’t cross the tracks either way,” Mayor Thompson elucidated.

  Madolyn gradually lowered her parasol, as if she planned to stand there and argue the point. She trained her eyes on Buster Nunn. She hoped the women remembered the tactics she had drilled them in. Sliding the mechanism of her parasol along the shaft, she closed it, then sighed in relief, at the echoing swoosh behind her. She pictured each lady sliding her own parasol closed.

  �
�Move aside, Mayor Nunn.” She kept her voice low, conversational. Miss Abigail had warned about antagonizing men in such confrontations. An antagonized male was more difficult to deal with, by a country mile.

  “We are engaged in a peaceful demonstration, Your Honor, which is our right in the United States of America.”

  “Be that as it may, miss. I can’t let you pass.”

  “And I, sir, shan’t allow you to stand in the way of progress.” She raised her parasol. “I will thank you to remove yourself from our path.”

  Mayor Nunn stood his ground.

  “Ladies,” Madolyn called, “follow me.” With a slow, deliberate gesture, learned through both practice and experience, she whacked her parasol across the mayor’s arm and held it there, attempting to force him aside. “Ladies,” she called. “You know what to do.”

  Without further delay, the women spread out to either side of her, coming to a stop in the center of the tracks. Then of a sudden her decorum was shattered.

  “Buster.” Tyler’s drawl hit her like a hammer to an anvil. “I’m agreeable to allowin’ the ladies who live in Horn to travel into my town today. In the spirit of keepin’ this little demonstration nonviolent.”

  “Nonviolent!” Involuntarily, Madolyn glared at him.

  “Can’t have you whackin’ the good mayor with that parasol, Maddie. I, for one, know how wicked you can be with it.”

  Angrily, she pulled her gaze from his, lest he see how affected she was by his arrogant, humiliating presence.

  After a glance at Tyler for confirmation, Buster Nunn stepped aside. The women prepared to follow Madolyn, but were stopped by another voice.

  Clyde Thompson held his ground, or tried to. “You ladies from Horn best be rememberin’ your place.”

  “Let ’em go, Clyde.” Morley’s voice, like Tyler’s, held more humor than anger. “They’ll get it out of their systems soon enough in this heat.”

  But Morley Sinclair didn’t know his sister, nor the determination of the women from both towns who had been deprived of their freedom too long now.