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D aisy and Lily hustled on Sunday morning, but they were still the last ones to make it inside the church. From behind the lectern, Maggie smiled at them when they came inside and took a seat in the back row.

“We might not live to see women at the voting polls, but we do get to see this,” Lily whispered as she eased into a pew beside Beulah.

“And that is . . . ?” Daisy asked.

“A woman standing in the pulpit in a church,” Lily answered as Daisy wedged into the small space left for her.

“We have a lot to be thankful for this morning,” Maggie’s clear voice rang out through the sanctuary.

“So I thought maybe we could simply sing a few songs, have a moment of silence, and then go on about our business of survival in less-than-normal conditions. I don’t reckon the day will come in my lifetime when a woman is allowed to really have this position, but these are unusual circumstances, so raise your voices to the heavens.

” She began singing a hymn that most of the women knew.

Daisy eased out of the pew and went forward, sat down at the piano, and picked up the melody.

She was surprised to hear Frannie’s sweet soprano voice right there on the front pew, only a few feet from her.

Daisy remembered what Frannie had told her in the stillness of the early morning about her son and his death.

She wondered if maybe singing the hymns brought back happy memories of sitting in church with the little boy beside her.

Elijah came through the doors with his hat in his hand. He sang right along with the group as he made his way to the front and stood beside Maggie until the song ended. “Could I have just a moment of you ladies’ time?” he asked respectfully.

“Of course. And we want to thank you and your family once again for all the support you have given us in our mission,” Maggie said and took a seat beside Beulah on the front pew.

“You are very welcome,” Elijah said. He looked out over the crowd.

“I’m here as a go-between for the men in town.

There are several men who, like me, are not against whatever demands you have, but you have to write them down before they even know what to agree to.

So I’m here today to ask you to do just that.

If you can get them ready by the middle of the week, I will deliver them to Judge Wesley Martin, and negotiations can get started.

You are missed, all of you”—he made a sweeping motion with his hand to include the whole crowd—“and your point has been made. Not only do your families need you, but so does the town. Many years ago, men who got the gold fever and rushed off to California found that that glittery stuff wasn’t the be-all and end-all.

Wagon trains full of mail-order brides were ordered so they could have wives and families.

Women are the lifeblood of a town, and the men in Autrie have learned that the hard way.

That’s all I’ve got to say, so continue with your service here.

Matt and I will bring more supplies on Wednesday, so maybe you will have something ready for me then. ”

“We will do our best,” Beulah said.

“I’ll see you then.” Elijah walked back down the aisle and eased the door shut behind him.

“Well, ladies,” Maggie said on her way back to the lectern, “it looks like we’re making progress.

Daisy, I am appointing you to be the person that each woman brings her list to.

You can compile all of them, maybe with a number out to the side as to how many want that to be included in our petition. ”

“Why a number?” Frannie asked.

“That’s so we can list them in order of priority,” Maggie answered. “But rest assured that no matter what the request, we will add it into the list.”

“Thank you for that,” Frannie said. “There’s only a few of us saloon girls, and what we ask for will be different than—”

“Than me, who is going to ask for the sheriff to not turn a blind eye when my husband knocks me around?” Amanda stood up and turned to face them.

“Just because you work in a saloon and endure abuse does not mean that some of us don’t get the same treatment.

Maybe even more so. If the sheriff can arrest some drunk in the saloon for hitting another one, then he should be able to throw a man in jail for being ugly to his wife. ”

“I agree,” Frannie said. “And that should be near the top of our list. Do we really want to do this as individuals or as a group? I vote that we start making the list right now. Daisy can find a pencil and some paper and start writing while we are all together.”

“Is everyone in agreement with that?” Maggie asked. “It really would simplify things.”

All hands went up, and then Daisy went to the front and sat down on the deacon’s bench. “Is there a pencil and some paper on the shelf under that thing, Miz Maggie?”

She pulled out a tablet and a couple of stubby pencils and handed them to Daisy. “I’ll go first: we want to sit as a family with our husbands in church.”

Amanda stood up and said, “And like I already said, I want to be able to call the sheriff when me or my kids are being abused. If I wasn’t married and a man hit me, he could hang for it. Why should it be any different just because I’m a wife?”

Daisy agreed with both issues and wrote them down on the paper. “Next?” she asked, looking up.

“I want to say something,” Hattie said, “because I’m not sure the sheriff will do a thing about your situation.

My husband was bad about hitting me until I stood up for myself.

I waited until he went to sleep, then gently rolled the sheet over on him and sewed the edges shut.

Then I took a broom and used the handle to beat on him until my arms got tired.

He didn’t go into Autrie for a month, not until the bruises healed.

And he never raised a hand toward me again.

Some things we have to handle on our own, ladies.

I’m not saying to beat the hell out of anyone who is treating you like dirt.

But you have to stand up for yourselves.

We won’t always be there as a group, and you’ll be alone when you go home. ”

“Where is your husband now?” Frannie asked.

“Out there in the cemetery, not far from the preacher Joshua Jones. He died of the fever a couple of years back. I did not kill him—after that night, he might cuss at me, but he never raised a hand to hit me again,” Hattie answered.

“I’m not saying that we need to exclude having the law protect us.

Maybe it will work, maybe not. One time seeing an abuser sit in jail might teach all of them a lesson.

I’m just telling you that with or without it, you can fight a battle or two without the rest of us standing behind you.

That said, if you need us, just yell and we will be there as soon as we can.

This empowerment and togetherness does not end when we leave this camp. ”

“I’m offering this,” Beulah said. “If the law don’t do its job, you can always stay in my old house until the guilty party comes to their senses and comes around to apologize.”

“A safe house?” Frannie asked.

“Exactly,” Beulah replied. “And that goes for everyone in this room.”

A woman with dark hair stood up at the back of the room and said, “I am Rachael Davies, and have been one of the two schoolteachers here in Autrie for the past five years. I’m supposed to get married soon, which means I can’t keep my job, so I want to have it put in the demands that the rules be changed and married women can continue to work at the Autrie school. ”

Another lady from a few pews back stood up, tucked a strand of blond hair up under her bonnet, and said, “I’m the other teacher in the school, and rule number eight says that any teacher who smokes, uses liquor in any form, frequents public halls, or gets shaved in a barbershop will give good reason to suspect his worth, intention, integrity, and honesty.

I do not intend to start smoking or get shaved in the local barbershop .

..” She waited for the giggles to die down and then went on.

“But I would like to make a hot toddy when I get a fever or a head cold. If any busybody calls the male superintendent and tattles, I can lose my job. So I want it in writing that I can use liquor for medicinal purposes.”

Amanda stood to her feet. “Speaking of that, I want it in writing that any woman can walk into the saloon and buy whiskey. What if something happens to our husbands and what we have at home to use to clean out wounds or help with whooping cough has all been used? We’d sully our reputations if we went into the saloon to buy another bottle. ”

“Send Daisy after it!” Frannie yelled from the back of the room.

“Don’t test me, Frannie!” Daisy looked up from her writing. “I’ll be glad to buy it for any woman in this room if you need it.”

“I want to be able to get on the train and go over to Jackson to see my family without a male escort,” a large woman named Eulalia said. “My husband can’t leave the farm on a whim, and it’s frowned on for me to travel even that far alone.”

“Something I want for the future,” said a woman from the second pew, “is for married women to have the right to have their own passport, and to file for divorce, and to wear pants in public.”

“I agree, Lucy,” Beulah said. “But today we’re talking about what we can do to change things right here in Autrie.”

“I understand that,” Lucy continued. “But I want more than the right to vote—and put down that I want to come to town without a male escort, too. Do y’all even realize that in order for us to come to the meeting at the new seamstress shop, several of our husbands went to the saloon and waited for us? ”

“And grumbled the whole way,” Edith added.

After an hour, Daisy looked up from the demands and asked, “Anything else?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Bea stood up and waved at Daisy. “I’m hungry. Can we eat now?”

“Beatrice!” her mother scolded.

“All of the ladies, young or old, can have a say-so in this meeting,” Lily said.

“This little girl is a hero—and quite frankly, I’m hungry, too.

So let’s adjourn and feed this crowd. I understand that Beulah has a cauldron of mutton stew ready to be dished up, and Frannie has made several loaves of sourdough bread to go with it. ”

“I agree with Lily,” Daisy said. “I’ll get this all written up in the next couple of days and ready to send to the judge on Wednesday.”

A loud round of applause came from the crowd. When it died down, they all filed out of the church on their way to Beulah’s old place for the noon meal.

“What are you smiling about?” Lily asked as she and Daisy brought up the rear of the group.

Daisy looped her arm through Lily’s. “The way that the children have acted so freely this whole week. That first day, their eyes darted around like they were scared of their own shadows, but not anymore. I don’t remember ever being so uninhibited as our little Bea when I was a young girl.”

“Me either. ‘Act like a lady. Don’t run after butterflies. Don’t cross your legs except at the ankle. Do not ever, ever, for fear of hellfire dancing up your skirt tails, wear your hair down after you are twelve years old,’” Lily said.

“‘Grow up to be a good mother and wife,’” Daisy added and then frowned. “If you had a chance and circumstances were different, would you marry Matt Maguire and be a good mother and wife?”

“I’m not sure either of us can have children,” Lily whispered. “Not after all the monthly tea we drank to keep us from having kids. And Matt deserves a wife who is as pure as an angel with white wings and a halo.”

“He likes you,” Daisy said.

“And Claude likes you,” Lily snapped. “Are you going to marry him someday?”

“In my dreams, every night,” Daisy answered. “But in reality, probably not. It’s just one of those bad-timing things. Had I met him before I got married, I might have had a different life.”

“Choices and consequences,” Lily said.

“Exactly. Every choice—whether bad, good, or somewhere in between—has consequences, and if we’re honest with ourselves, we are smart enough to know that we made the decisions that brought us to this day.”

“So now we have to pay the fiddler, right?” Lily asked.

“Absolutely,” Daisy agreed, and wished that her life had taken a different path.

You can’t undo that part, Miz Raven whispered ever so softly in her ear. But what if you told Claude and he didn’t hold it against you?