Beverly Jenkins (2 page)

Chapter 2

O
n a rainy, chilly day three months later, a stunned Billie left the doctor’s office. She was carrying a child. She didn’t waste time wondering who the father might be because truthfully, she didn’t know. Her lone concern lay in how to break the news to Madam Pearl. When facing similar circumstances, many of the girls remedied the problem either through a concoction Pearl kept on hand or by paying a visit to a doctor who specialized in such things. The last time Billie
got caught
, as Pearl called it, the solution had been the drink. The foul liquid made her so ill she vowed never to take it again. Undoubtedly, Pearl would want her to down the stuff immediately so the matter would be resolved and Billie could return to the floor as soon as possible, but it wasn’t what Billie herself wanted. A child born to her would face a bleak future, so it was her hope that Pearl could find someone to take it in after the birth and raise it away from the teeming cesspool that was the Barbary.

As she hurried through the rain, she saw very few people on the streets. Most of the residents slept during the day. According to what she’d learned from Drew, San Francisco’s “Barbary Coast” took its name from an older, similarly named place off the coast of Africa, where danger, pirates, and slave traders ruled. Her own Barbary Coast ran along the streets and alleys of the Pacific from Stockton to Montgomery, then peeled off into Kearney and Grant. She worked at the Black Pearl. Like the other Black and Mexican establishments, it was located on Broadway. Billie considered herself lucky to work there because it was a parlor hall. The Barbary had three types of prostitution establishments, or
bagnios
as they were sometimes known: cow yards, which were combined apartment buildings and brothels; cribs, which were the most crowded and the lowest, dirtiest places a girl could work; and parlor houses, considered the cock of the walk because they catered to a more upstanding clientele. The Chinese parlor houses were the finest, however. All had sumptuous furnishings made of expensive teak and bamboo with silk hangings and soft couches in the rooms. A majority of the girls were enslaved by their owners but always elegantly clad and exotically perfumed.

The Black Pearl didn’t come close to rivaling the Chinese houses, but Madam Pearl went out of her way to make sure her girls were clean and well-spoken.

Finally reaching her destination, Billie found the girls inside getting ready for the evening. “Where’s Pearl?”

“In her office.”

Inside the office, Billie stood silently and waited for Pearl, seated at her big ornate desk, to look up from the papers she was perusing. In her younger days, she’d been a fabled Creole courtesan who’d come to California to take advantage of the gold in the pockets of the forty-niners. In the years since, she’d made herself rich as a queen, but hadn’t aged well. The long, lustrous black hair was now graying and sparse; her pale-as-moonlight skin jaundiced and lined. “Well?” she said finally, not looking up.

“I’m carrying.”

The eyes slowly raised to her own. “What?”

Billie didn’t bother repeating herself.

Pearl’s features were a mix of impatience and disgust. “Tell Addy to give you the drink.” Her attention dropped back to the papers. “You’ll be right as rain in a few days.”

“I want to have the child.”

“Take the drink.”

“No. It made me so sick the last time I thought I’d die. I don’t want to do that again. Once it’s born, I want you to make arrangements to give it away.”

Pearl’s eyes rose to her face. “And in the meantime how do you propose to feed yourself and it?”

“By working.”

“Where?”

“Here. I can help with laundry, housekeeping, cooking. Wherever you need me.”

“I already have help for that.” And as if on cue, Addy, the wizened old Black woman who did the lion’s share of the house’s laundry, cooking, doctoring, and whatever else Pearl needed, slipped in silent as a shadow and placed a steaming cup of tea on the desk within reach. As always Pearl didn’t acknowledge her presence and Addy exited as soundlessly as she’d appeared.

Pearl raised the cup to her thin lips and sipped, all the while eyeing Billie speculatively. Billie had been at the Black Pearl for many years and knew Pearl was weighing her proposal. On the one hand there were enough servants to handle the day-to-day work duties, but then again, Billie was one of her top moneymakers. Losing her to another establishment that might take her in until she got back on her feet would cut deeply into the Black Pearl’s profits, and profits were as dear to Pearl as breathing.

“Are you certain this is what you want to do?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Then I’ll make the arrangements for the doctor and midwife, but I expect to be paid back with interest as soon as the child is a year old.”

Billie agreed. Due to the times, many children died before their first birthday, so Billie couldn’t fault her for wanting to make sure the baby lived long enough to justify the investment.

“You’ll continue to work for the next few months, and afterward, you’ll stay off the floor and out of sight.”

Billie found that agreeable as well.

“But get caught again, and you either take care of the matter, or you’re out on your arse. It sets a bad example for the other girls. Understood?”

She nodded, hoping there’d be no next time.

“Now get out.”

Billie made a hasty retreat.

Up in her room. Billie dressed herself for the evening. In less than an hour, the Black Pearl would be awash with noise, gaiety, and eager-eyed men bent on whiskey and women. For the first time in her life Billie allowed herself to admit how tired she was of it all. At the age of twenty-four she was now the oldest girl in the house. Her career began in the virgin room, duping gullible clients both young and old into believing the extra five cents they were paying was actually for her innocence. Back then, she’d looked young enough and was a decent enough actress to successfully pull off the ruse but those days were long past. Now she plied her skills for those who could pay the most: doctors, lawyers, men of stature whose wives would be appalled if they knew; men who’d never publicly admit to patronizing houses of ill repute, let alone ones with girls of color.
Where will my future lie?
Her choices were limited. Opening her own house could be an option if she had the necessary funds, but on a salary of twenty-five dollars a week, saving any amount of money was akin to teaching pigs to fly. Rumor had it that Pearl had established her place with funds blackmailed from clients back in Louisiana. Billie had no such power over the men she knew and even if she did, she didn’t see herself stooping to something so dastardly; she was already a whore, she didn’t need to be a blackmailing one. Some of the girls she’d worked with had been lucky enough to marry their way out of the life. She didn’t see that in her future either. Being known as one of the best whores in the Barbary seemed to preclude being escorted home and introduced to the folks as a prospective bride.

Taking in her reflection in the cloudy stand-up mirror, she saw a woman wearing a gaudy low-cut red dress that barely contained her breasts, well-darned fishnet stockings, and high-heeled shoes. The face was passable, although it was hard to tell beneath all the paint, but it wasn’t her face the men paid for. She placed a light hand over the child forming inside. That she was carrying was still hard to believe. If Pearl did find a good home for it, she’d have one less worry, but the uncertainties surrounding her own fate made her future as cloudy as the old mirror.

Turning away, she cast a critical eye around her small room to make sure it was ready for the evening. Seeing everything in place, she squared her shoulders and went downstairs to start her shift.

At a quarter past five in the morning, her work was done, so she peeled off the dress and stockings now smelling of smoke, drink, and sex and settled into a tub of warm water. It was always the best part of her day. Gone were the men and their demands. The house’s raucous atmosphere faded to a quiet peacefulness that brought with it solace and reflection.

When the door opened and Pearl’s son Prince entered, Billie didn’t veil her disgust. “What do you want?”

Pearl was a delicately boned
mulatress
but Prince was a big hulk of a man. He had skin as bumpy and pale as the underbelly of a toad, and protruding toadlike eyes that stared out of a round, almost feminine face. He had small, always well manicured hands but it was the missing shell of his left ear and the pulled-taut eye and mouth that people noticed the most.

“Mama says you’re carrying.”

“And?” She didn’t bother hiding her nudity from him, there was no point. He made a habit of intruding while the girls bathed.

“She wants to know if you’ve changed your mind about the drink.”

“I haven’t.” She wanted him gone. “Anything else?”

He scanned her slowly. “Carrying is going to make you fat as a farmer’s cow. Once you drop you may have to find work elsewhere, but I can see to it that you stay, for a price.”

And she knew what that price would be. “I’d walk into the Bay first.”

Malevolence glittered in his bulging eyes. “That can be arranged, too, you know.”

She did. Scores of dangerous men slithered through the streets and back alleys of the Barbary and Prince was among the elite. Like a malevolent octopus, he had tentacles everywhere: whoring, gambling, usury. Patrons or girls who crossed him suddenly went missing, or were found floating facedown in the Bay. The police never found evidence linking him to the incidents, but everyone knew the truth and as a result gave him a wide berth. Billie was no exception. He was like a feral dog. Showing fear only increased the odds for attack, so she didn’t allow hers to show.

“You always were an uppity bitch.”

“Thanks. I’ll take that as a compliment.”

A few days after Billie began working there, he’d stolen into her room to try her out as he’d done some of the other girls, and she’d bolted awake with him on top of her. Outraged and terrified, her struggles to stop the assault were useless until she managed to grab the derringer beneath her pillow and put two shots into the side of his head. It hadn’t killed him, but were it not for Addy’s doctoring, he’d’ve bled to death. Addy had to stretch the skin in order to cover the damage, then stitch it closed, which accounted for the offset eye and lips. He also sported a nasty scar from hairline to chin and was deaf on that side of his head.

He’d never forgiven Billie for being the cause of the disfigurement, and she was certain that one day he’d try and exact his revenge, but she’d replaced the small derringer with a Colt that now sat within easy reach on the stool by the tub, so it wouldn’t be then. “Again, if there’s nothing else, please leave me.”

“One day soon, bitch.”

“Just get the hell out.”

Slamming the door, he did, and Billie let out a shaky breath in the silence that swept over the room. One more reason to take up life elsewhere.

Chapter 3

B
y February Billie was in her seventh month and sagging beneath the combined weight of her pregnancy and her chores. Having to spend her days scrubbing floors and doing laundry in lye-laced water left her knees aching and her hands red and raw. Because her condition prevented her from adding to the Black Pearl’s ledgers, she’d been moved out of her large bedroom. Although it had been hers for nearly five years, it now belonged to a vain young thing from Denver named Cherry, who’d worked her way up from newcomer to queen bee in less than six weeks’ time by making herself available to Prince from the day she arrived. Billie and the other girls would’ve warned her that no woman held Prince’s interest for long, but she was so full of herself they decided to let her learn her lesson on her own.

Billie now slept on a small thin cot in the basement. She didn’t complain about the poor accommodations or the backbreaking work because it wouldn’t change things, nor would anyone care, so she got up each morning before dawn, had breakfast, then sought out Addy to be given the tasks for the day.

But on this particular morning, Prince stopped her on the way. “Mother wants to see you.”

She had no idea what Pearl might want, but from his smug, ghoulish smile guessed it would be yet another challenge to her severely tattered existence.

Pearl was in her office standing in front of the windows.

“You wanted to see me.”

“Yes. I’ve made arrangements with Addy to take you in until your brat’s born. It’s bad luck having a woman in your condition on the premises. You’ll leave with her this evening.”

Billie had no desire to move in with Addy. The old woman with her silent ways and ever watchful eyes was unsettling. “But—”

“No discussion. Just do it.”

And when Pearl said nothing else, Billie knew she’d been dismissed.

A
ddy was midwife to half the Barbary’s population and roots woman to the other half. Those who couldn’t afford the patent medicine hawked on street corners, or the pricier stuff prescribed by the city’s physicians, patronized Addy instead. Very few people crossed her or ducked out on their bills because of her reputation for revenge. Lurid tales were told of people walking into the Bay while asleep and of others setting their own houses afire after not showing the old woman the proper respect.

Billie sat on the hard seat of the listing wagon while Addy held the reins to an ancient mule named Jessup. The persistent cold winter rains left the streets rutted and full of mud so the going was slow. She had no idea where Addy lived but from the direction they were heading and the tang of the Bay filling her nose, she assumed near the docks.

And she was right. After passing the shipbuilding docks, then skirting ones where whale carcasses were rendered into oil—prompting her to pull up her cloak to shield her nose against the foul smells—they finally turned onto a narrow street near the area where hundreds of tons of hay were imported to feed all the horses used in the city. The old woman pulled back on the reins in front of a small house that stood out from the tumbledown shacks and weathered lean-tos on either side of it like a shiny nugget in a miner’s pan. The sturdy, well-constructed outer walls were painted blue and there were no holes in the roof that she could see. The place sat back from the street inside a matching blue picket fence anchored by a wooden gate.

“Surprised are you?” Addy asked, uttering her first words since leaving the Pearl. Due to her advanced age, she had very little hair and even fewer teeth, but the black eyes were sharp as a raven’s.

“I am.” Billie had no idea what she’d been expecting but it was not the neat-as-a-pin place they were in front of now.

“Thought you would be. Go on in the house and light a fire. I’ll tend to Jessup here and be there directly.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Billie picked up her old weathered carpetbag holding everything she owned and headed for the entrance.

Inside, the place was cold and filled with shadows of the fading day. Slowed by her advanced pregnancy and chilled to the bone beneath her damp black cape, Billie set her carpetbag on the floor then lit the logs in the grate and prayed warmth would spread quickly. As the flames grew and offered a bit of illumination, she spied a lamp on a table. Lighting it, she peered around. There were Chinese rugs on the floors beneath a few pieces of serviceable furniture that appeared to be as aged as their owner but well cared for.

A glance to the far side of the room showed Addy watching her and Billie jumped with alarm.

“Get out of that wet cape and put this on.”

Only then did she notice the claret red robe in Addy’s gnarled hand. “It’ll keep you warm while the heat rises up.”

Grateful to get out of the cape, Billie exchanged it for the robe. By its shoe-brushing length, she assumed it had been owned by a man at some point in its past. The soft fabric went a long way in ridding her of the chill. “Thank you.”

“You sit there and I’ll get you something to eat.”

Unaccustomed to being waited on, Billie wanted to help with the food but before she could voice the offer, Addy melted back into the shadows and disappeared.

Later, the two of them sat on a bench in front of the now roaring fire and consumed the best fish chowder Billie ever tasted. Fat, succulent pieces of fish and small squares of potatoes were the prizes in a rich, creamy soup that was so excellently seasoned and smooth it could have been served to a queen. “I could eat this forever.”

“Fish will help the child form.”

Billie had no idea if that was true, but was disappointed when she finished the last spoonful in the bottom of the wide white bowl.

“More?” Addy asked.

She did, but was afraid she might be eating the woman out of house and home so she declined. “No, but thank you. It was very good.”

Addy took the bowl from her hand and left the room, only to return with it filled again. “Eat.”

Billie smiled inwardly and ate.

When she’d finally had her fill, she handed the empty bowl to Addy. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Sated and a bit sleepy, Billie nonetheless pushed herself to her feet. “If you show me where, I’ll wash up the dishes.”

“You will sit and rest.”

“But—”

Addy paid her no mind and stood. “I’ll handle the dishes.”

Billie sighed her frustration and watched Addy leave the room.

Alone by the fire she mulled over the old woman. Her kindness, cozy home, and the sumptuous meal were a sharp contrast to the Addy she’d known at the Black Pearl who rarely spoke and whom Billie assumed lived an impoverished hand-to-mouth existence. The skirt and blouse Addy changed into upon their arrival there, though humble, was of a finer quality than any clothing Billie had seen her dressed in before. It made her wonder if Pearl knew anything about Addy’s true life.

“Come. I’ll show you where you and the babe will sleep.”

The back room was small but a sizeable fire crackled in the grate. The air was warm and a lit lamp illuminated a brass four-poster bed covered by a large quilt made of indigo squares. Billie spied a fine upholstered chair the color of caramel that was so well made it would’ve looked right at home in some of the fancy hotels she’d been in with Drew. For just a moment his face flitted across her mind’s eye. She wondered if he was still in Mexico and what he might think of the condition she found herself in. Pushing away thoughts of him, she turned her attention back to Addy and found herself being watched with that same unsettling intensity. “I wish you’d let me earn my keep in some way.”

“You can help me with my deliveries.”

“How about the wash and cleaning? I can help with that also.”

“No need. Only me, you, and the babe here. Won’t be a lot of mess. Sit.”

Billie took a seat in the caramel chair. Weariness materialized out of nowhere and she was suddenly so tired, she thought she might fall asleep then and there.

“If you want to sleep do so.”

“Are you certain there’s nothing you need me to assist you with?”

“I am.”

“What about tomorrow while you are at the Pearl?”

“Not going back there. Today was my last day.”

Another surprise.

“You and the babe lie down as long as you need to. There’s more chowder if you have a hankering for it when you get up.”

Billie wanted to be able to thank her in some way but Addy seemed intent upon denying her the means to do so. It occurred to her that the aged midwife might have a hidden motive for being so nice but Billie was too tired at the moment to dwell on the possibility. All she wanted was to take the woman’s suggestion and sleep.

She awakened later with no idea where she was. The room was fully dark but for the fire burning brightly in the grate. As the fog of sleep faded from her mind, memory returned, so she left the bed to find her benefactor.

Addy was in the front room seated before the fire. A tray on her lap held tied-up bundles of herbs and a mortar and pestle. Without looking away from whatever she was grinding, she asked Billie, “Did you sleep well?”

“I did. What time is it?”

“A bit past midnight. Would you like more chowder?”

“I’m fine for now.”

Abby nodded. “Sit with me if you’ve a mind to.”

Wrapped in the voluminous claret robe, Billie sat and watched the woman separate some of the herbs and place them into small drawstring bags. The powders went into glass jars.

“Where’d you learn your doctoring, Miss Addy?”

“From my grandmother, who taught my mother, who taught me. We were all captives in South Carolina back then.” She paused and stared into the fire. Silence filled the room for a long moment before she added quietly, “Nobody left but me, now.” The dark eyes questioned Billie. “What about you, any family?”

“Not that I know of. My mother was a whore in Kansas City and one night she didn’t come home. Been on my own since. Never knew my pa.”

“How old were you?”

“Ten. It was so long ago, I have trouble even remembering what she looked like.”

“Was she good to you?”

“Not particularly, no.” Billie’s entire life had been one of hurt, pain, and no love to speak of.

Addy was again staring into the fire. When she finally spoke her voice was soft. “Had a daughter and one night, she didn’t come home, either. Fishermen found her a few weeks later washed up on the banks of the Bay.”

Ice filled Billie’s blood. “I’m so sorry.”

“So was I.”

The sparks and pops of the fire punctuated the silence.

“Was she your only child?”

Addy nodded. “Gone ten years now.” Focusing on the undulating tongues of red and orange, she remained quiet for a few long moments, then asked, “What do you see?”

The question stumped Billie because she wasn’t sure what the woman meant.

Addy explained. “When you look in the grate. What do you see?”

Still confused, Billie shrugged. “Flames.”

Her response evoked a soft smile. “I see flames, too, but I also see life and death, the past, and the possibilities of what might come to be.”

The hairs stood up on the back of Billie’s neck.

“Women in my family are seers. My grandmother read the wind. My mother saw the channels of life in the moon. My gift is fire. Hurricane took my grandmother’s life. My mother met her death beneath a full moon. Mine will come by fire.” She turned her head and looked into Billie’s face. “The night I buried my daughter I saw you and the babe in the flames.”

Billie’s heart pounded.

“I had no idea who you were until the night you shot Prince DuChance and Pearl called on me to save his life.”

A long-buried memory surfaced. “You came to my room.”

“I did. I wanted to see the woman who shot my daughter’s murderer.”

“Prince killed your daughter.”

She nodded.

“How do you know?”

“A few months after her death, a man came to my door. Said his wife was very ill. He admitted that he didn’t have any money but asked if I’d see to her if he paid me with what he knew about my daughter’s death.”

Billie listened as Addy related how, on a moonless night ten years ago, Prince entered a wharf-side tavern seeking a boat to hire. The barkeep pointed him towards the man who’d come to Addy’s door, and a deal was struck.

“Prince told him the bag held the bodies of his wife’s three dogs poisoned by a neighbor, so the man rowed Prince out into one of the channels and they pushed the bag overboard. The next morning when he went to take his boat out, there were bloodstains in the spot where the bag had lain. He assumed it was from the dogs.”

Billie waited for her to continue.

“When the bag washed ashore, and word got out that it was my Chassie’s body inside, he realized what he’d been involved in. He didn’t come to me then because he was afraid Prince would somehow find out and kill him. He also thought I’d accuse him of having aided in her death.”

“Then Lady Fate brought him to your door.”

“Yes, and although I was angry, I didn’t fault him for remaining silent all those many years because a part of me was grateful to finally learn the truth. I do fault Prince and Pearl.”

“Why Pearl? How was she involved?”

“My daughter was one of her maids. When Prince began making advances, she went to Pearl and complained but was told she should be honored by his interests, and ordered back to work.”

Billie’s lips tightened. After her assault, she’d been given short shrift by Pearl, too.

Eyes on the fire, Addy took up the tale again. “The unwanted advances continued, along with threats that had her so scared she left the Pearl and found work at a boardinghouse. It didn’t save her however.”

“Did you go to the police with the man’s story?”

“I did, but they said both Pearl and her son denied any knowledge.”

“So you have no further recourse.”

“Not with the authorities, no.”

There was something in her tone that drew Billie’s attention to the herbs and powders on the tray. “So you work for her even though Prince killed your daughter?”

“I had my reasons. I began working for her right after you shot Prince. Neither of them knew Chassie was my child and far as I know they still don’t. They believe I’m just an addled old crone, but I’ve seen their deaths just like I’ve seen my own.”