Preacher's Peace (11 page)

A beautiful cabriolet carriage, pulled by a team of matching white horses, stopped on Chestnut Street in front of the House of Flowers. Duane Abernathy, well turned out in a gaberdine suit with silver-buttoned vest, beaver hat, and white gloves, was the lone passenger in the magnificent carriage, as befitting his elevated station in St. Louis.

Constable Billings, mounted, had ridden alongside the carriage, eating its dust. When they stopped, he looked over at Abernathy

“Are you sure you want to do this, Mr. Abernathy?”

“I'm sure, never surer of anything in my life as a man of business,” Abernathy said. “Before he left, Mr. Epson disclosed to me that the occupant of this house was in arrears on her payment. Serve the warrant, Constable. I want her, and all the trollops who work with her, out of the house by noon today. Serve the blessed warrant, my man.”

“Perhaps if you would give her an opportunity to pay off the loan in one payment,” Billings suggested. He had pleaded with the banker before, when he had first learned of Miss Jennie's financial problem.

“She cannot pay off the loan,” Abernathy said. “I have reviewed her bank account. It is nearly depleted. In fact, she recently withdrew an amount of money exactly equal to what she owes my bank. One who was seriously trying to avoid arrears would have used that money to clear the debt. Do your duty, Constable. Serve the warrant, I say again.” Abernathy sat back in his comfortable carriage seat and pulled his hat more snugly onto his head. He called to the driver to take him back to the bank.

With a sigh, Constable Billings tied off his horse at one of the several wrought-iron hitching posts in front of the fine white-painted house, then went inside. Jennie met him in the foyer.

“Constable,” she said, greeting him with a genuine smile.

Constable Billings removed his hat and rolled it in his hands for a moment before he spoke. He had never been in such an uncomfortable situation in his life. His heart was bleeding.

“Miss Jennie, I hate being the one to do this, but I've been asked to serve a warrant of eviction.”

“Eviction?”

“Yes, ma'am,” Billings said. By now, several of Jennie's girls had gathered in the foyer as well, to see what was going on. They could see this wasn't good.

“But I don't understand. How can I be evicted from my own house?” Jennie asked. Her dark eyes were wide with question and disbelief.

“Well, ma'am, that's just it,” Billings replied. “This isn't your house anymore. According to the loan contract at the bank, it can be foreclosed at any time if a payment is late. And you are late.”

Jennie shook her head vigorously. “But that's not true, Constable. I don't even have a loan at the bank anymore. I paid it off—in full.”

Billings's eyes opened wide in surprise. “You paid the loan off? When?”

“Why, back in July,” Jennie said. “I wrote a bank draft for the full amount to Mr. Epson.”

“Miss Jennie, would you come with me?” Billings asked. “Perhaps if we went to the bank, we could get to the bottom of this.”

“Yes, I would be glad to come with you,” Jennie said.

* * *

Constable Billings, Duane Abernathy, and Logan McMurtry, the new chief of tellers, stood in the little fenced-off area that was the office of the chief of tellers. His mahogany desk was covered with correspondence, bank papers, and open ledger books. Several inkwells held inks of black, blue, and red.

“As you can see, Constable Billings,” Abernathy said, taking in the papers and open ledgers with a sweep of his hand, “her loan is still outstanding.”

“But how can that be?” Jennie asked, incredulous. She was trying not to be intimidated by these men and the situation. “I have paid off the loan.”

“By bank draft, you say?” Billings asked.

“Yes, four hundred and seventy-five dollars,” Jennie said. “I'm sure if you check the ledger, you will see where I issued an instrument of that precise amount.”

“Oh, I agree, you wrote a draft for four hundred and seventy-five dollars,” Abernathy said. “For here is the entry, made on July twenty-third, in the year of our Lord, eighteen hundred and twenty-four. But, according to this entry, the funds were given directly to you. You'll see as much right here.” He hefted the ledger to show her.

“What? No,” Jennie said. “They were to repay the loan.”

“Miss Jennie, do you have anything to prove that?” Billings asked. “A receipt, a letter, something to show that the loan was paid?”

Jennie shook her head. She now regretted not asking Epson for a payment note and the title on the very morning she had paid him. “No, I don't. Mr. Epson said he would take care of it for me, and I assumed that he would. Perhaps it was delayed by his departure to Philadelphia.”

“You say you gave the money to Epson?” Billings asked.

“Yes.”

“Well, if you gave it to him, but there is no record of it, what do you think happened to the money?”

“I'm sure I don't know,” Jennie said. Although inside, she now had deep suspicions, and she was almost sick with fear and regret.

“Oh, I'm sure you do know,” Abernathy said. “You kept it for yourself.”

“No, I didn't, I can assure you. I gave the money directly to Mr. Epson.”

“And yet, clearly, there is no entry to that fact, your assurances notwithstanding,” McMurtry said, pointing with an ink-stained finger to the ledger book.

“I wish there was some way we could talk to Mr. Epson. He would be able to clear this up, I'm sure.” Jennie looked from McMurtry to Abernathy, but saw no sympathy in either man.

“I did talk to Mr. Epson,” Abernathy said. “Before he left, he informed me that if the bank received no more money from you by the next payment date, you would be in arrears.”

“Mr. Epson told you that?” Jennie asked in surprise.

“He did.”

“But that's not true. He knows that's not true.”

“Why, then, would he tell me such a thing?” Abernathy asked.

“I hate to say this but, if he didn't apply the money to my loan as I assumed he would, the only thing that could have happened to it is that he took it.”

“You are saying that Theodore Epson stole your money?” Abernathy asked.

“That's the only conclusion I can come to,” Jennie replied.

Abernathy let out a long, disgusted sigh, then shook his head. “You know what I think, Constable?” he asked, turning to address Billings. “I think that when this woman learned that Mr. Epson had left our bank to take employment back East, she figured that would be the perfect opportunity to make such a spurious claim. She seeks to defraud the bank at the expense of the reputation of as fine a young man as has ever graced our fair city. I wish there was more we could do to her besides confiscate the house. I wish we could throw her in jail for libel and slander and throw away the key!”

“But I'm telling the truth,” Jennie pleaded. “I swear I'm telling the truth! I gave the money to Mr. Epson.”

“Do your duty, Constable,” Abernathy said. “Evict this woman from my house.”

“I'm sorry, Miss Jennie,” Billings said, and the tone and expression in his voice gave truth to the fact that he really was carrying out his duty under duress. “I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask you, and your girls, to leave the house.”

“But, please, Mr. Abernathy. If you turn us all out, where will my girls go?” For the first time in a very long time, Jennie felt desperate. It reminded her of her days as a slave, when she had absolutely no control over her own destiny, the days before the mountain man had purchased her freedom and given her a chance at a new, independent life.

“Where you and your girls go is none of my concern,” Abernathy replied coldly. “However, I would remind you that, while St. Louis has no ordinance prohibiting a bawdy house, we do have a law against street solicitation for immoral purposes. And I intend to see that Constable Billings and his men uphold that law. So, I wouldn't go out on the street if I were any of you.”

“I'm sorry, Miss Jennie,” Billings said.

Jennie sighed, and with her eyes brimming with tears, reached out to put her hand on Billings's arm. “I know this isn't your fault,” she said. “You are just doing your duty”

“Yes, ma'am,” Billings agreed. He pulled his arm from her gently, embarrassed at her gesture in front of the bank men. “I'm glad you see it that way.” He was caught in a bind, and hated what he now had to do.

Theodore Epson sat across the desk from Joel Fontaine, the president of the Trust Bank of Philadelphia. They were in Fontaine's office, and as a measure of the size of the Trust Bank, Fontaine's office alone was as large as the entire River Bank of St. Louis.

“I've never been to the teeming metropolis of St. Louis,” Fontaine said. “But I would dearly like to visit there sometime. How did you find it during your time there?”

Epson shook his head in disgust and disappointment. “I assure you, Mr. Fontaine, you would not like it. St. Louis is a dirty, lawless, and barely civilized town. Its streets are filled with trappers and fur dealers who are little more than wild savages. Prostitutes conduct their business without fear of the law, though I am pleased to say that I put into motion a means whereby the most notorious of all the brothels will, no doubt, be closed very soon.”

“Oh? And, how did you do that?” Fontaine asked with genuine curiosity

“I denied them access to their ill-gotten gains.”

“Good for you,” Fontaine said. “I'm sure the city of St. Louis was sorry to see such an upstanding citizen as yourself leave its precincts.”

“No doubt,” Epson replied. “But I assure you, sir, that feeling was not reciprocated. I can't tell you how happy I was to get your offer so I could leave that Godforsaken place.”

Fontaine looked down at a piece of paper that lay on his desk. “And I see that you have just opened your own personal account for nine hundred dollars,” he said. “That is an impressive amount of money, so you must've done well by yourself while you were in St. Louis.”

“Yes, I, uh, was quite frugal during my stay,” Epson said, pulling his heavily starched shirt collar away from his neck. Epson had kept the money given him in confidence by William Ashley, and he had executed the draft given him by Jennie, keeping that money as well. Even after the expense of moving from St. Louis to Philadelphia, he still had over nine hundred dollars left. All in all, a profitable enterprise—albeit with other people's money.

Some might consider what he did as dishonest, but Epson was convinced that he had performed a service for the city of St. Louis. It was clear that a majority of the citizens there wanted the whorehouse to be closed, and this would give them a way to eliminate it. He justified keeping the money from Jennie because it was obviously obtained as a result of her immoral and indecent operation. He also didn't feel guilty about keeping the money given him by William Ashley because he was certain this money came from some businessman. The way he looked at it, everyone benefited from his action except for the two people: the whore, and her mysterious benefactor, who was obviously a hypocritical businessman. And no one would feel sympathy for them.

“Mr. Epson?” Fontaine said.

Epson had drifted away with his self-satisfied thoughts, and it wasn't until then that he realized that Fontaine was talking to him.

“I'm sorry,” Epson said. “You were saying?”

“I was just saying, on behalf of the bank, welcome to Philadelphia,” Fontaine said, sticking his hand across the desk.

“Thank you, sir,” Epson said, accepting the handshake. He smiled. “I am very glad to be here—in fact, more than you'll ever know.”

There were tears, sobs, and expressions of concern for their immediate future as Jennie called all her girls together. She informed them silently that they were being forced out of the house.

“But why, Miss Jennie? What have we done to anyone?” one of the girls asked.

“We have committed no offense,” Jennie replied. “It's just that there are some people who are all proper on the outside, but just plain mean on the inside. I fear we have made enemies of such a person.”

“But how can they throw us out of the house? I thought you had paid the bank everything you owed them,” Carla said.

“I
have
paid the bank what I owe them,” Jennie said. “But it would seem that Mr. Epson was not as honest as he appeared. He ran away with the money.”

One by one, the girls came to Jennie, hugged her, then went back to their rooms to pack their few belongings. Jennie lingered in the foyer for a moment longer, allowing her hand to pass over the banister and looking at the crown molding around the room. She realized, with a pang of regret, how beautiful the house was, and how much she was going to miss it.

Slowly, as if by delaying each step she could stave off the inevitable, Jennie climbed the stairs to the second floor and went into the bedroom. This was the same bedroom where, for many years, she had dreamed and fantasized about Art. Recently, as if a fantasy realized, Art had appeared out of nowhere. When she awakened the next morning she saw that it wasn't a dream . . . he was still there. Now, after a glorious reunion, Art had gone back West, returning to the mountains. What if he came back looking for her? Without this house, he might not find her.

Unable to control her tears, Jennie began packing her clothes.

It was more than a loss of livelihood, or even the loss of a roof over her head, that made Jennie cry. The House of Flowers was the closest thing to a real home Jennie had ever had in her life. It had been her plan to make enough money to someday leave the prostitution business. Then the House of Flowers truly would have been a home. Perhaps even a home to which Art might some day come to live.

Deep in her soul, she knew that it was very unlikely that Art would ever settle down in a city, but fantasies of such a future had occupied her thoughts for a long time.

When Jennie came down to the foyer a while later, all five of her girls were gathered in the foyer with all their belongings, waiting for some direction from the woman who had taken care of them for so long.

“What do we do now, Miss Jennie?” Sue Ellen asked.

Jennie shook her head sadly. “I wish I could tell you,” she said. “I wish I knew what I was going to do.”

“I know what I would do if I were a man,” Carla said. “If I were a man, I would leave St. Louis.”

“Leave St. Louis and go where?” Lisa asked.

“I don't know. West maybe,” Carla said. “Yes, I'd go West.”

At that moment, the front door opened and a white-haired old black man came into the house.

“Miss Jennie,” Ben said, “I got the carriage drawed up out front. You want me to put your luggage in?”

“Yes, I suppose . . .” Jennie said. Then she looked at the other girls and suddenly smiled. “West?” she said to Carla. “You would go West?”

“Yes.”

Jennie laughed out loud. “What a great idea!” she said. She grabbed Carla, hugging her as she danced around the foyer.

“Miss Jennie, are you all right?” Millie asked.

“All right? I've never been more all right,” Jennie answered, gathering herself and putting on her best face for the girls. “Ben?” she said to her driver.

“Yes, ma'am?” Sam replied, as confused by Jennie's antics as were the girls.

“Do you think you can find someone who would trade us a good, sturdy wagon for the carriage?”

“Miss Jennie, I 'specs you could get two fine wagons for this carriage. This is a fine carriage.”

“Even better. Get two wagons, and four mules.”

“Mules, Miss Jennie?”

“Yes, mules,” Jennie said. She looked again at her girls. “Sue Ellen, Cindy, Lisa, Millie, Carla, we're going West!”