Cloudy. Cool. Coffee prices skyrocketing.
Bells and whistles. Hoof beats, hammers, hawkers. A constant murmur of voices, and bawdy laughter. For one so attuned to only the sounds of nature, Skagway bursts upon Eliza’s senses like a runaway train. For the first couple of months, Eliza can’t help but notice the incessant noise. She is surrounded by men. Not one familiar face enters The Moonstone Café. Every now and again she half expects to see Steiner, or Indian John, or even Mad Virgil and Samuel in Skagway, but every face is new.
Some men crawl and others race through Skagway. Some take their time to refresh appetites for women and vittles before heading up White Pass toward the Yukon. Others barely stop to piss. Business is brisk. By early June, Skagway boasts more than four hundred merchants: bankers, barbers, blacksmiths, and builders. Dentists, doctors, and drygoods. Hotels, nineteen in all. Launderers. Meat markets, and even a musical instrument maker. Outfitters on every corner. Painters, photographers. Saloons, sometimes two to a corner. Tobacconists: a polite cover for whorehouses.
Why, there are more whorehouses in this town than I can count.
Eliza works fourteen hours per day. Breads, cakes, and cookies fly off the shelves. She hardly has time to sleep before waking up at dawn to start over. Her hands are strong and smooth.
The railroad men have now arrived in Skagway, with plans to build the new White Pass and Yukon Railroad right up the middle of Broadway, north and over the mountain pass toward the interior. The furor has turned the muddied, crowded street into an even muddier and more crowded thoroughfare. The incessant sound of sledgehammers, picks, and men yelling out orders renders the atmosphere chaotic. Eliza overhears plenty of grumbles about the new railway slicing through the heart of town, but she keeps her opinions to herself. More men equals more business. Profits swell her bank account, and that is a welcome prospect. She tailors her baked goods accordingly. More cakes, fewer pies. Eliza works in as little vanilla as possible to preserve her precious supply. She breathes in the intoxicating smell as she turns the batter. Vanilla reaches her nose in direct contrast to all the repulsive smells on Skagway streets—ever-present smoke, grease, manure, wet wool, tobacco, exotic Japanese cooking.
“Met Sugi yet?” Pearly asks. “Only madam catering in the Jap trade. They’re over at Jap Alley, west of State, between Fifth and Sixth, not far from your place. Certainly you’ve seen her. I’d love to play with her hair. Voluminous and jet black. And you should see her dresses! She wears the most expensive silks. Can’t pin her down, she walks quicker than a polecat. Perfect English, when you chance to talk.
“Talk is the Jap girls perform at the top of the line. Heard it first-hand more than once. I’d love to be a fly on those walls. Might garner some secrets from the Orient. Don’t mean to brag, but I’ve done it a thousand times, and I always want to know new tricks.”
Eliza can’t fathom pretending to like the sex act, especially with a stranger. But Rose and Cilla work every night, and rarely see the same man twice, unless he’s one of the regulars, or “the regs,” as Pearly calls them. She rattles off a string of names, some familiar now to Eliza.
“One of the best specimens of the male sex to ever darken my door,” Pearly says. “You’ve seen him, town surveyor, one of the regs. Frank Reid’s his name. Can’t get enough of Cilla. Hmmmm. Can’t get enough of him, if you know what I mean.”
Pearly puts her left hand to her groin and gives a quick yank. Eliza blushes, looks down.
Pearly laughs from her gut. Eliza admires Pearly, despite Eliza’s indifference to the trade.
“Rose gets stablemen, mostly. And railroad men. Saloon-keepers, too, those that want a little more than what their dancing girls offer. Hell, we had near ten thousand men come through Skagway last year alone. I think Rose knew all but one or two of them.”
Rose flaunts her womanhood in ways that amaze Eliza. Eliza admires the way Rose sashays, and the quickness of her ready smile. Cilla looks steely in comparison. Cilla reminds Eliza of the snow-capped mountains lining Skagway’s boundaries, silent and regal. Cilla entertains ragged mountain men, fancy-dressed shopkeepers, confidence men, and swindlers peopling Skagway’s muddy streets. In contrast to Rose, Eliza has never seen Cilla smile.
Eliza does the math. Every encounter equals two dollars, and with a certain tip, two dollars and fifty cents. With four men per day, a member of the demimonde could earn ten dollars per day, or sixty dollars per week, excepting Sundays. Sixty dollars per week equals two hundred and forty dollars per month. In Skagway’s economy, that sum would never be in doubt. From a purely business standpoint, Eliza calculates the cost of offering her body to men for pleasure. But she knows in her heart of hearts that prostitution would only satisfy men and her pocketbook. Eliza watches the dregs of humanity that lumber up and down the lawless streets, and shudders at the thought of sharing a bed with a stranger.
Eliza does not have a crystal ball, but a gnawing ache inside sidetracks her. Maybe in this sea of men, one will rise to the top, like cream in a milk bottle, she thinks. In the meantime, Eliza has hours of baking to go, and a shop full of men waiting for her to open the door at six a.m. sharp.
At the end of the week, Eliza taps on Pearly’s door again.
“Don’t know where you’ve drummed up the cash, my dear. But who am I to ask questions?”
Pearly works from a well-worn set of patterns, and adjusts accordingly to each customer. Eliza is by far the tallest woman Pearly has ever sewed for, and probably one of the thinnest. Eliza’s bustline is minimal, but Pearly uses tricks she’s learned over many years of dressmaking to fill dresses out to a woman’s best advantage.
“You may undress behind the curtain. Just leave your bloomers on.”
Eliza has never been naked, or nearly naked, in front of a woman before. As she lifts her camisole over her head, she notices that her small nipples harden in the chill. Eliza runs her hand over several sets of fancy bloomers. She has never seen, let alone touched, such finery. She fingers a plush cream-colored robe that hangs on a brass hook behind the curtain’s wall. She takes a deep breath before she steps tentatively out from behind the silk curtain.
“Over here,” Pearly says, and motions with her head to a round platform in front of a full-length mirror on the far wall. Her lips sport straight pins and in her hands she holds a measuring tape and a small pad and pencil. A pair of scissors and a rough muslin cloth perch on the platform’s edge; the muslin drapes in disarray and cascades onto the floor by Pearly’s feet. Pearly sticks the straight pins into a pincushion attached to her wrist and eyes Eliza’s figure.
“Hmmm,” she says, and then, “Yes.”
As Pearly works, Eliza examines her near naked body in the full-length mirror. Pearly’s hands fly around Eliza’s torso and hips, first measuring Eliza’s bustline and waist, and after notating the measurements on the pad, pulling the tape tight across Eliza’s hips. Eliza stays silent as Pearly registers the measurements and talks to herself. As she works, Pearly’s fingers brush Eliza’s skin and Eliza feels a tingle up her spine. Eliza stands in her nakedness and begins to feel more comfortable with her body, and with Pearly. But soon she shivers in the late afternoon chill.
After ten minutes, Pearly puts her measuring notions down.
“There. Go and put my robe on to keep warm. We’ll look at some material and sketch out some possibilities before you go.”
Pearly opens the oversized trunk at the foot of her bed and paws through layers of fabric until she finds a dark flannel. She turns, goes across the room to her dresser, and opens the bottom drawer. The drawer contains yards of cotton sheen fabric in plentiful colors. Pearly studies the stash carefully and draws out a dusky rose-colored piece. She tosses the fabric over her left arm and opens the next drawer above to select matching trim.
“You’ll look swell in this color,” Pearly says, using one of those newfangled masculine words heard on the streets.
Eliza feels the soft material and eyes the trim.
“This won’t be too dear?” she asks. “I’ve not worn such finery in a long while.”
“A woman’s got to show off her curves in this place,” Pearly says. “Don’t worry, the plaid will be dull. But this rose! I have ideas for this dress.”
The front door opens, and Pearly looks at the clock on her dressing table. It is just five, and she has other business to which to attend. Eliza dresses quickly as Pearly straightens up the room. As Eliza passes Pearly, Pearly leans in and gives Eliza a peck on the cheek.
Startled, Eliza blushes a deep rose.
“That’s the ticket,” Pearly says.
“Got to keep those cheeks rouged to match the dress. You’ll look like a stunner, Lizzie. Mark my words; you won’t recognize yourself when I’m through with you! Why, as soon as this dress is done we should march you right over to Case & Draper’s or to E. A. Hegg’s for a proper photograph. Never know when a suitor might ask for your portrait. You’re quite the looker, my dear. I’d die for that hair.”