The Bridge

15

Ashley cornered me before I left the town hall only to let me know he was planning on being the new territory governor and he hoped to have Virgil and my endorsement come Election Day.

Goddamn rain, I thought, as I crossed the street and headed back to my alley room above the survey office. The streets were now mud and the ruts were beginning to get deep. Got to let up sometime soon.

When I left the boardwalk I walked across a single plank over the soggy narrow passage to the stairs. I took the first step leading up to my room and noticed lamplight in my window. I stopped before taking another step and drew my Colt.

I took one slow step at a time. The stairs were solid. They didn’t creak as I ascended, and I made my footfalls cautious and quiet as I moved up. I stayed low, not showing myself as I passed under the window overlooking the rungs, then eased to the side of the opening and peeked in.

Sitting on the bed was Séraphine. She was looking directly at me through the window as if she knew I would be peeking in.

I was glad it wasn’t Bolger’s bad brother I’d heard about waiting on me.

I opened the door.

“Hello, Everett,” she said.

I stayed standing in the doorway.

She watched as I slowly slid my Colt back in its holster.

I smiled at her. She smiled at me.

“Hey,” I said.

Her blue eyes were catching the light just right from the lamp fire. It was nice to see her looking at me, and it felt good to look at her back.

“You didn’t show for the theatrical town hall presentation?” I said.

“I’m here,” she said.

“Yes, you are.”

She was sitting on the bed with her back propped up on the headboard, looking casually at yesterday’s newspaper. She folded the paper simply and put it to her side. She was relaxed and calm. Her long legs were extended on the bed and crossed at her ankles. She was wearing a pair of Mexican cowboy boots with riding heels that were unusually clean, considering the weather.

She was dressed different from when I saw her the night before. She was wearing a simple cream-colored muslin dress, like a long, thin sleeping gown. The flimsy fabric allowed the valleys, hills, and curves of her slender body to be revealed fully, and I appreciated the contours.

“You look good,” I said.

“Do I?”

“You do.”

“That’s good?” she said.

“It is.”

“Merci,” she said.

“Merci back,” I said.

The mysterious fortune-teller, I thought. I entered and closed the door behind me.

I’d been all over. Met a lot of women in my time, some with taste and some without a lick of it. Some, through the many years, have been refined and some downright uncouth. Some smart and some not so smart, but I’d never run across anyone like this woman, Séraphine.

She had a sense of herself. She was self-assured unlike any woman I’d ever met. Her strange and suspect profession was fitting for her in some ways. Might be the only way this sultry, unusual, almost otherworldly creature could exist.

She had a horsehair belt around her narrow waist. Her long, dark hair was pulled up and concealed under a black bowler hat that was a few sizes too large for her. She was wearing her large gold hoop earrings but was without her long strings of beads and shells.

“I hope you don’t mind,” she said.

“That you look goddamn good?”

“That I am here in your room.”

“I’d mind if you weren’t.”

“Good.”

I took off my hat and slicker and hung them on some long nails next to her slicker.

“I know what happened with you today,” she said.

“Don’t talk,” I said.

I walked over to her and stood, looking down on her.

Her eyes looked slowly up my body and met mine.

I reached for her just as she reached for me. I pulled her up to me, and our lips met but I did not kiss her. I just looked in her eyes and she looked in my eyes as I held her in my arms. She removed her bowler and tossed it. Her long, dark hair tumbled across my arms.

I kissed her and she kissed me back like she was hungry and had not eaten for some time.

I felt as though I was dreaming for an instant.

I held her back away from me and looked in her eyes again. I wanted to see her. I wanted to make sure it was really her I was kissing. Her eyes were moist, almost as if she were crying.

She was looking at me with a calm-but-desiring expression. I reached down and she helped me remove her belt. I slung it to the floor.

She started unbuttoning my shirt and kissing my chest.

I took her by her shoulders and pushed her back on the bed.

I let her lie there for a moment as she looked up at me. Her chest was moving. She was breathing heavy.

She reached up for me.

Then I moved down on her. I put my hand behind her neck and pulled her lips to mine.