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April 1909
JOY AND ROSE BOARDED the narrow-gauge D&RGW to Corinth the following morning. As they headed toward the mountains Rose exulted over the views. Joy never tired of the splendor rising before them. For a long time, they watched in companionable silence as the train chugged toward the mountains and then began its climb into them.
Joy and Rose arrived late afternoon in Corinth. While spring was making inroads upon the prairies and even around Denver City, Corinth lagged behind. They bundled themselves against the chill before leaving the train and found Billy and Marit selling breads and hot coffee to their fellow travelers.
Marit embraced Joy and greeted Rose in her shy way. Billy, who had met Rose many times in Omaha, smiled at her with affection and respect. “I am mighty sorry for your loss, Mrs. Thoresen,” he added.
Rose nodded her thanks, and then Billy offered, “Shall I run back to the lodge and get the buggy?”
“Just the wagon, Billy. Mother has a number of trunks, and we are both accustomed to riding in a wagon.” She turned back to Marit. “How is little Will? I have missed him! And Breona? Mr. Wheatley? Is he well? Oh, how I have missed all of you.”
She longed for Little Blackie and his affections. Perhaps she would even be pleased to see O’Dell again.
—
SEVERAL NIGHTS LATER, sometime after midnight, Mr. Wheatley awoke to a soft knocking at the back door. He roused Billy, and they stepped into the kitchen and cracked open the newly repaired door.
Two figures huddled on the doorstep in the dark.
—
“MISS JOY?” JOY AWOKE with a start. She was disoriented and it took her a moment to recall where she was. She was back in her room in the lodge in Corinth. Breona, Marit, baby Will, and Mei-Xing were in the apartment with her. Joy had installed Rose in one of the guest rooms on the second floor. Little Blackie, snuggled against her feet, raised his head toward the door.
Then she heard the knocking again. “Miss Joy?”
It was Billy.
Feeling that she was reliving other nights, Joy threw on a wrapper and walked through their little sitting room. Mei-Xing’s wide-awake eyes watched as Joy cracked the door.
“It has happened again, miss. Some girls are downstairs in the kitchen.”
When Joy entered the kitchen, she found the girls standing by the back door. One looked ready to bolt at the first sign of trouble. They were both shaking with cold and covered in only the flimsiest of dresses.
“Hello,” she greeted them, keeping her voice soft and gentle. “May I offer you something warm to drink?”
The nervous one studied her. Finally, she nodded.
“Billy, please find some blankets? I will stoke up the fire. Our guests are very cold.”
As Joy was adding fuel to the stove, Rose entered the kitchen. She took in the situation at a glance.
“Please. Come rest yourselves at the table, girls.” She held out an arm and gestured them farther into the room. When they sat down, Rose took a seat beside them.
Both of the girls were incredibly young, perhaps only thirteen or fourteen years old. While their clothes were made of expensive fabrics cut in recent fashions, the girls’ bosoms scarcely filled out the low-cut bodices. Their faces were painted and garish. One girl’s hair was a dirty blond; the other girl’s hair was a plain brown. Both were pinned up in a style beyond their years. They looked like children playing dress-up in their mother’s closet.
Hoping to reassure her, Rose patted the blond on the shoulder. The girl yelped in pain and swatted Rose’s hand aside.
“I am so sorry,” Rose apologized. “I-I did not know . . . are you hurt?”
“It is nuthin’,” the girl shot back in defiance. However, she sent a concerned frown in the direction of her companion. The brown-haired girl had lapsed into a stupor, shivering and glassy-eyed.
Joy set mugs of tea before both of them. The blond wrapped her hands around the warm mug and blew into the cup, anxious to sip on it. The other girl stared straight ahead, oblivious to her surroundings. After a moment, the blond took the other girl’s hands and placed them around the mug.
Joy sat down across from the blond girl. “I am Joy. This is my mother, Rose. What is your name?” Rose came around to Joy’s side of the table and sat down next to her.”
The young woman examined Joy for several minutes. “They call me Ruby.”
“It is nice to meet you, Ruby,” Joy replied. “What is your friend’s name?
Ruby’s hardness cracked a little. “Beth. She’s not . . . in a good way.”
“I can see that,” Joy answered. “What can we do to help her?”
Ruby looked down and when she looked back up, her eyes flashed with a wild, angry light. “Give me a gun. Give me a gun so I can shoot that son of a—” She bit off the curse words and then snarled, “That monster, Banner.”
Joy sat back in her chair in shock. Billy and Mr. Wheatley shifted uneasily where they were standing near the door.
“You would like to . . . shoot Banner?”
“Jest try me!” Ruby shouted. Her eyes lit with a frantic fire.
Joy waited until Ruby calmed a little. “Can you tell me why, Ruby?” She steeled herself to hear what Ruby had to say and she saw her mama, eyes wide, clutch the edge of the table.
“What he done to her, fer starters.” She spat out the words, pointing at Beth and, as suddenly as her anger had flared, it died away. She said in a wistful, childlike way, “What he done to me . . . and others.”
Joy didn’t know what to say or do. She turned to Rose, who shook her head, unable to speak.
Lord, please tell me what to do! Joy prayed silently. She looked at Billy and Mr. Wheatley. Billy gestured outside and Joy nodded. The men eased out the door; they would hide out in the stable until it was light enough to find and cover the girls’ footprints in the snow.
“Can you . . . can you tell me what Banner did to you, Ruby?” Joy kept her voice as calm and soft as she could manage.
“Wouldn’t ya rather see?” Ruby yanked the bodice of her dress from her shoulder. Her shoulder and arm were covered with bite marks, most of them horribly swollen and bruised, at least two oozing blood where the bites had broken the skin.
Rose gasped and put both of her hands to her mouth. Joy, who had been dreading and sensing something this awful, had willed herself not to flinch. If Beth were as badly abused, it would explain why she was traumatized.
She looked Ruby in the face for a long moment, until she had marshalled the right words. “I am glad you and Beth came to us, Ruby, and I am so sorry you have been ill-treated. Would you allow us to draw you a hot bath and find you some warm, comfortable clothes?”
Ruby looked stunned by the offer of simple kindness. Joy continued. “We have some salve that may help with the pain. Then we will tuck you into bed so that you can get a good rest. Tomorrow we will figure out how to help you get off this mountain.”
—
JOY CRAWLED INTO HER bed again just after sunrise but could not sleep. How had Ruby known to come to the lodge for sanctuary?
Should they bring in Sheriff Wyndom and show him the girls’ wounds? Ruby had . . . fire. She was a survivor, but Beth was locked in a world of her own for now.
—
WHEN JOY DID SEE RUBY and Beth late in the morning, Beth was still sleeping so soundly Joy wondered if she would ever wake. Ruby, though, was up and prowling about, needing to know the “lay of the land” and where the doors were. Just in case.
After she had wolfed down a hot breakfast, she addressed Joy. “Can you get us to somewheres better’n Corinth? I grewed up in these mountains. I’d sure like t’ get far away.”
Joy studied her for a moment. “There may be a way.” She took a breath and then asked, “Would it be all right with you if I asked you some questions? If you would rather not answer, that is fine.”
The girl, pale and childish with the paint washed from her face, just shrugged.
“Some of the, um, working girls here in Corinth . . .” Joy fidgeted trying to find the words.
“What about ’em?”
“Some of them were lured to Denver by newspaper ads for honest work, and then they were abducted.” Joy just said it straight out, but Ruby only nodded, not shocked.
“Heared som’thin’ ’bout that,” she admitted.
“That is, um, is not how you . . . started working?” Joy reddened.
Ruby’s sardonic laugh echoed through the kitchen. “Mebbe not the ’zact same way.” She rocked her chair on its back legs and then let it drop with a bang. “M’stepfather. He was always bashin’ me ’round. When m’ mam died, he started lookin’ at me wrong, too. Said I’s ‘evil’ fer temptin’ him. One day he bashes me on th’ head an’ I wakes up in Miz Cleary’s house. Guess he sold me there.”
Joy’s mouth opened but she could not speak. She thought of her papa and the great care he had taken for her life, for her safety, happiness, and nurture.
Ruby talked on, oblivious to Joy’s discomfiture. “—Not to the club, o’ course. Th’ girls gotta be extry special fer that. You know. R’fined an’ s’phisticated-like.”
Ruby added, with a touch of pride, “I grewed up in these mountains—know all them trails. ’Stead a headin’ down on foot an’ freezin’ t’ death, I tore off a piece o’ Beth’s dress and snagged it up on a bush back b’hind the station where one o’ the trails starts. Then we hot-footed it over here.” She laughed. “Bet that old fool Darrow will be runnin’ up an’ down thet trail t’day.”
The girls hugged herself. “We been at th’ house six months, I guess. They only keeps new girls there ’bout that long. When one’s ’bout played out an’ they’re ready t’ ship her off t’ Denver, tha’s when they lets Banner hev ’er.”
“And he . . . they let him do whatever he wants?”
Ruby’s response was a dark, knowing sneer.
O’Dell interviewed Ruby also. He showed her some sketches sent from the Boston Pinkerton office. The sketches were of five missing women who had answered ads and then disappeared when they arrived in Denver. The lead agent had compiled the sketches using descriptions or photographs provided by family members.
Ruby studied each one carefully. “That ’un looks a bit like Cookie. Tha’s what they call her, but she said her real name was Gretchen. No, Gretl, like Hansel and Gretl.”
O’Dell grinned but it was not a pleasant grin. “Gretl Plüff. She went missing eighteen months ago. You said you have been at the house six months and that is how long they usually keep the girls there?”
“Yessir.” Ruby was careful as she answered O’Dell, intimidated by his wolf-like grin. “But they kept her on t’ cook, see? Cookie. She’s a better cook than a whore.”
As O’Dell and Joy exchanged looks, O’Dell’s expression was implacable; Joy was near tears.
Later that evening Joy asked Ruby the question that had kept her awake. “How did you know to come here? How did you know we would help?”
The girl pursed her lips. “Guess it don’t make no difference. Heard that pig, Banner, and his lap dog, Darrow, talkin’ ’bout you. You, ’specially, miss. Said they knew you helped those high-dollar girls. Jest couldn’t figure how.” Her laugh was harsh. “Banner’s got it bad fer you, lady.”
Joy shivered. They were not fooling Banner after all.
Well, that changes things, she thought. That . . . and the date. Joy sought out the calendar on the kitchen wall. April 14.
Joy nodded. “We are going to take you off this mountain. Soon. Within the week.”
“In front o’ Banner’s men?”
“Yes. Right out in the open.” Joy shivered a second time, but she had made up her mind.
This time it was Ruby who trembled. “You’ll take care o’ Beth?”
“Yes. And you, too.”
“’Cause she cain’t take what he done t’ her. Not again.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “Not sure I can neither.”
The following day, in the late morning, Joy called a meeting with O’Dell and her staff. She did not mince words.
“I sent Arnie and Anna a wire this morning and am waiting for their reply. I have asked them to take in Ruby and Beth. As soon as they can meet us in Denver, we will take the girls down on the train.”
O’Dell irritation showed. “And you plan on hiding them how?”
“That is the thing, Mr. O’Dell. I do not plan to hide them. Sheriff Wyndom and I will escort them to Denver. I will ask Domingo and Gustavo to set up here at the lodge while we are gone.”
The resentment and anger toward Banner and men like him smoldered in her eyes. “Ruby is fourteen years old. Beth is thirteen. They have been beaten, bitten, starved, and savaged.”
She took a deep breath. “We do not hide any longer.”
She looked around the room and saw the slowly nodding heads. It was Breona, her feisty Irish friend, still stubbornly resisting God’s gift of salvation, who answered: “Amen t’ thet.”
O’Dell, however, stomped off in disgust because Joy refused to allow him to come on the train with them.
“Can you not see? It is more important for you to maintain your guise as a guest here and protect the lodge while we are gone.”
O’Dell did see, but he did not like it. He chewed the stump of a cigar and pondered when he needed to call in reinforcements and how long it would take them to mobilize.
He would send immediate updates to Parsons in Chicago and Groman in Omaha, but would have to call on the Denver office for men when the time came. He scribbled out the wire’s contents and walked it over to be sent.
After the meeting, Billy and Joy took the lodge’s buggy to the sheriff’s office. She met briefly with him and, later in the day, he paid a visit to the lodge.
Beth and Ruby were staying in the room next to Rose. After long hours of sleep, Beth had wakened and eaten a little. Rose stayed with the girls at all times, hoping to draw Beth out of the stupor she lapsed into so easily.
Mei-Xing helped Rose with the girls, too. For some reason, she was drawn to Rose, and Joy found them talking in low, earnest words several evenings. Once Joy saw Rose lay her hand on Mei-Xing’s cheek and caress the girl. Mei-Xing had closed her eyes, tears streaming down her face, as Rose simply loved on her. She, in turn, was giving what she could to these two lost children.
Joy had explained to Ruby and Beth that the sheriff would come and talk with them. She asked Ruby if she minded showing him the bite marks on her arms and shoulders. Ruby shrugged.
When Wyndom arrived, he was accompanied by a young man wearing a deputy badge. Joy nodded to both of them. “Ruby and Beth are both children. Ruby will show you some of what Banner did to her two nights ago.”
When they returned downstairs from meeting with the girls, Wyndom was gray and sober. Joy lost no time pressing her advantage. “This is your opportunity, Sheriff Wyndom, to do the right thing. I am taking those girls down to Denver in a few days. I expect you to provide an escort.”
Wyndom sighed in defeat. “You win, Miss Thoresen. I will do it.” He turned to the young deputy. “Just so you know, Luke here is my nephew, outta St. Louis. Corinth cannot afford any deputies, but I am permitted to deputize volunteers. He is backing me up on a volunteer basis.”
“I am glad you are here, Luke,” Joy said with sincerity.
“Yes’m. Thank you. Banner’s men have been up and down the back trails searchin’ for those girls. I heard they found a piece of one of the girl’s dresses snagged up on a bush.” His eyes twinkled. “Heard they ain’t had any luck, though.”
The corners of Wyndom’s mouth turned down. “It is not tomorrow or when we take those girls down the mountain I am worried about. We will only be gone maybe eight hours. It is what happens after you poke that snake with a stick that has me concerned.”
Joy nodded. but their course was set.
She knew they could not turn aside.
~~**~~
