Twenty-two

July 10, 1897

Gretta adjusted the bodice of her purple ruffled dress as she went to the door, looking down to be sure her breasts were exposed nearly to the nipples. She opened the door and smiled at the man standing there. He was decent-looking and relatively clean but had a mop of brown hair that stuck out from under a wide-brimmed hat, and he looked like he hadn’t shaved for a few days. He wore a clean shirt with its long sleeves turned up, a tie that looked like it had seen plenty of wear, denim pants that were a bit too big on him, and scuffed black boots. He nodded to her. “Ma’am? Might you be Miss Gretta MacBain?”

Gretta smiled. “I might be. Who are you?”

“Can I come inside?”

Gretta shrugged. “Sure.” She stepped back and let him in, ushering him into the parlor. Two of her girls were there drinking with their own customers, one sitting on a man’s lap and giggling when he reached inside her see-through negligee.

“Make yourself at home, big fella,” Gretta told the stranger. “Would you like a drink?”

“No thank you, ma’am,” he told her. “I ain’t here for that, or for…you know…the other.”

Gretta almost laughed at his shy attitude. “Have you ever been to a bordello before?”

He looked her over, his eyes showing more curiosity than desire or bad intent. “No, ma’am. I came at somebody’s request—with a message.”

“Oh? Who?”

He looked around, noticing the woman in the see-through negligee was practically naked now, her customer putting his hand between her legs. The woman made a moaning noise, and the stranger looked back at Gretta. “Can we go someplace else? Where there ain’t no other women?”

Gretta smiled, moving up close and touching his face. “My room?”

“No, ma’am. Maybe the kitchen or somethin’ like that, as long as there ain’t no other women around.”

Gretta thought it an odd request, but she shrugged and indicated he should follow her. She led him to the back of the house and to the kitchen table. “Have a seat,” she told him. “Sure you’re not thirsty?”

“Yes, ma’am, I’m sure.” The man sat down. “A Mrs. Loretta Sellers sent me.”

Gretta instantly sobered. “Loretta!” She sat down across from him, suddenly self-conscious of her nearly naked breasts. She put a hand over her cleavage. “What happened? Is my daughter all right?”

“I don’t rightly know, ma’am. I brought a message from Mrs. Sellers that she said would be important to you. She said you’d probably be open for business, and she was afraid to come in the evening like this. She asked me to come on account of I’m a man, actually a single man, so she said it would be okay.”

Gretta’s heart fell. She’d struggled to keep her worry over her daughter buried deep so she could continue with her business. She’d considered the fact that someone in Mexico might ask for some kind of ransom money, so she’d been saving up as much as possible. Lord knew no decent person in Denver would help her with any of this.

“What’s the message?” Gretta asked. “And where on earth did you come from? That sounds like a Texas accent.”

“That’s on account of I am from Texas, ma’am. I have a horse ranch down there, almost clear to the border in Brownsville, where right now it’s doggone hot.” He removed his hat and set it on the table. “It’s a lot cooler here in the Rockies.”

“No small talk, mister. What’s your name, anyway?”

“Otis Clark, ma’am. I recently took care of a man down at my place by the name of Jessie Valencia, afore he died. He said—”

“Died!” Gretta gasped the word. “From what?”

“From a couple of bullet wounds, ma’am. It happened across the border. He made it as far as my farm, and I took him in. Afore he died, he said he’d gone to Mexico to look for a young girl that was kidnapped. Them that took her put up a big fight, and he got shot when they chased him to the border. That’s all I know, except he said to tell Mrs. Sellers here in Denver that he wasn’t able to get the girl but that he knew where they keep her, so if Mrs. Sellers wants to hire somebody else to go get her, that might help.”

Gretta closed her eyes against tears. One of the girls came into the kitchen and told her one of her regular customers was there to see her, and she snapped at her. “Not tonight, Tillie! Maybe not ever!”

“Gretta! You okay?”

“No!” Gretta wiped at her eyes. “Have one of the other girls take care of him. I know who it is, and he won’t care.”

“Sure.” Tillie left, and Gretta wiped at her eyes with a cloth napkin lying on the table.

“Ma’am, I’m sorry to upset you. I came all the way up here on account of there’s no phones down in Brownsville and on account of it involved a young girl, so I figured this Mrs. Sellers was the mother, and I thought such news ought to be delivered in person. Took me about four days to get here. If it weren’t for trains and stagecoaches, it would have taken me a lot longer, but I have to get back to my farm, you know. Anyways, when I told Mrs. Sellers, she was really bad upset, and she said as how I should come here and tell you on account of you’re the girl’s real mother.”

Gretta nodded, swallowing back more tears. “I truly thank you for taking care of Mr. Valencia and making such a long trip, Mr. Clark. I—would you like a cold beer or something?”

Otis nodded. “Well, I said I wasn’t thirsty to be polite, but a cold beer does sound good. That would be real fine.”

Gretta felt removed from her own body as she got up and went to the icebox. “It’s true. That girl is my daughter, Mr. Clark,” she explained. “I had her at a real young age and…well, I couldn’t raise her in a place like this, so I found a good Christian couple to adopt her. That was Loretta Sellers and her husband, of course. Mr. Sellers died, and my daughter took it hard. She reached those years where girls get all starry-eyed over the first handsome man who comes along, and one did.” She brought a bucket of beer to the table and poured some into a mug. She breathed deeply for self-control. “Did Mr. Valencia say anything about the kind of men who came after him?”

Otis drank down some beer, then pulled a folded piece of paper from his shirt. “He wrote down the name of a…well…a brothel…just across the Rio Grande. It’s wrote in Spanish, but he says it means House of Heavenly Women. He said it was a place where they…well, where they break girls in for wealthy customers. They keep the prettiest ones, and I guess your daughter was one of those. They take the rest of them someplace else. Mr. Valencia, he was mostly Mexican himself, so he fit right in, but when he tried to help the girl escape, they got found out and he had to run. He ended up gettin’ shot. He got infection at my place, and there was nothin’ I could do. He died in awful misery. I felt real sorry for him.”

Gretta put her hands over her face, feeling like she might vomit. “I wanted so much more for my daughter,” she lamented. “I can’t explain how I ended up like this, Mr. Clark, and it doesn’t matter now. What matters is getting my daughter out of there. I just fear too much damage has already been done, but I have to try.” She wiped at her eyes again. “I’ll pay you whatever it cost you to get up here. And it helps so much to have the name of that place.”

“Yes, ma’am. I thank you for payin’ me back. I don’t know how you’ll get her out of there, ma’am. It would take an army. The whole thing is actually headed by a white man, not a Mexican, name of Sidney Wayland. According to Mr. Valencia, a lot of men guard that place. Men good with guns.”

I know someone who might be able to beat those odds. “I just have to…find someone…maybe several men this time.”

“Mrs. Sellers, she said you knew of somebody who might be able to do it—some gunfighter, I think she said.”

Gretta poured herself a beer. “He used to be a gunfighter. Then he was a lawman. He helps his son run a big ranch now.” How can I possibly ask Jake to do this? “I just don’t know if he’s even able,” she told Clark. “He was hurt about a month ago stopping a bank robbery in Boulder. For all I know, he’s in a bad way now.”

“Well, ma’am, it don’t hurt to find out. Maybe once he knows it’s a young girl needin’ help, he’ll do it for you. Is he the type?”

Gretta smiled sadly, remembering the day she told Jake that Mike Holt had visited her brothel and was violent with her. Jake actually cared that she might have been hurt. How many men truly cared about a prostitute? And who knew brothels and prostitutes and this whole sordid life better than an ex-outlaw who’d lived in that world? And he was half Mexican and spoke the language. Besides that, Jake Harkner knew what it felt like to have a daughter in trouble.

“Oh, yes, Mr. Clark, he’s the type.” She picked up the folded piece of paper.

La Casa de Mujeres Celestiales.

Jake would be able to read it. She stuck the paper into her cleavage. I’m so sorry, Jake. I don’t know where else to turn.