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T he setting sun was throwing out a beautiful array of colors when Beulah stopped the wagon in front of the seamstress shop. “What the hell?” She spit out the swear word like it was a nasty taste in her mouth. “The window is broken, and there’s something nailed to your door.”

Lily hopped down off the buckboard and didn’t need a light to read “Eviction Notice” written in big letters across the top of the paper that had been fastened to the door with a huge nail.

“What the hell?” Daisy echoed Beulah’s words in an even harsher tone. “Why are we being evicted? The rent isn’t even due for a couple of days.”

Lily marched over to the door and ripped the paper away. She removed a key and unlocked the door, went inside, and lit a lamp. Holding the notice close to the light, she paraphrased the words.

“Because we have been unsavory tenants and created havoc in the town, we will no longer be allowed to rent this building. When the rent is up, Judge Wesley Martin will take possession of the place and everything that is left in it.”

Daisy balled up a fist and slammed it against her other hand. “I’m so mad, I could chew up railroad spikes. He will pay for this.”

“He owns the building,” Beulah reminded her. “Where is your contract? Does it say that as long as you keep things in good repair that you can continue to rent?”

“We didn’t sign anything. It was verbal.” Lily felt as if she had lost the paddle to her small canoe that was out in the middle of the ocean, and the tiny boat had just sprung a leak.

Frannie rushed into the shop. “Hey, one of the hired hands came home and said the men in the saloon are all riled up, and he’s afraid there’s going to be a riot.”

Lula followed close behind her. “He said that it had something to do with y’all, so we borrowed the buggy and came to see if you need us.”

“We are being evicted, and we have to get out in two days,” Lily said in a voice she hardly recognized as her own. “Why are they throwing such a fit over us being put out of a building?”

“You ever hear of a man named Cooter Wilson?” Frannie asked.

“Sweet Jesus!” Daisy gasped.

“No!” Lily raised her voice. “There’s nothing ‘sweet’ or religious about Cooter showing up here. This is a holy hell situation!”

“Our hired hand said that he has fired up an angry crowd at Otis’s place, and some of them are getting ready to come over here and demand that y’all own up to who you really are. He’s the one that put the rock through the window. What is going on?” Frannie asked.

“The guy who was in town said that Cooter is so drunk, it was a miracle he even hit the window when he threw the rock,” Lula added.

“He’s yelling that you two and five more worked at that brothel you talked about,” Frannie said.

Lily’s heart tumbled down to her toes. “He’s right about all that, and we will gladly explain ...” She plopped down on the sofa. “Y’all better have a seat. Daisy and I will tell you the truth.”

“I can’t believe he’s followed us down here,” Daisy whispered and began to pace the floor.

“Me, either, but it’s happened.” Lily was glad that Matt and Claude hadn’t had to hear the news from anyone else.

Everything was quickly falling apart, and all because of one man who’d gotten turned away at the Paradise gate more than once because he was so drunk that he could hardly walk.

Who had yelled obscenities at them when they were in town one morning, and who swore he would get even with them no matter what.

Evidently that day had arrived, just in time to ruin the most perfect day Lily had ever known.

She wondered if any of the many women who had gone to the camp with them would stand by her and Daisy now.

They’d stood by Frannie, but neither she nor any of the saloon women had lied.

“The truth will out, and it has,” she whispered, feeling as if the other women, including Beulah, stared at her and Daisy like they had horns and a spiky tail.

All she and Daisy needed was a pitchfork and some red paint to wallow around in, or maybe a big red S to hang around their necks—for Shady Ladies or even Soiled Doves .

“I guess y’all better start talking,” Beulah said.

“I’ll go first,” Lily said. “Let me begin by saying that I’m sorry we haven’t come clean with you, Beulah.

You’ve done so much for us. You deserved the truth from the beginning, but in our defense, we really were trying to make a new life here in Autrie.

Remember that story I told at the first women’s meeting?

The one about my abusive fiancé? We’ve all got similar stories, I’m sure, but that’s the one that drove me to Spanish Fort.

And that town is where I ran out of money and went to work at the Paradise, which was a brothel.

It’s no longer in business, but yes, I was just like you, Frannie, and the saloon girls, except the Paradise was pretty fancy and we didn’t have to put up with anyone like Otis. ”

“And,” Daisy picked up the story, “like we told you before, we were paid well, and we didn’t have to entertain more than one man a night. We didn’t lie to you about how it was run, although we did beat around the bush a little about Jems.”

“He is a real person, though, and he’s on his way to England with Miz Raven,” Lily added. “We lied about either of us living next door, and for that, I apologize. I wanted you ladies to have a better life than you had working for Otis, but it looks like we just made things worse.”

Frannie pursed her lips together. “So, Cooter is telling the truth?”

“Yes,” Daisy answered, “and we will probably lose most of what we have here. We’ll have to pack our trunks and get on the train to go to Nechesville or Jacksonville, where our other friends are. That rock through the window is most likely just the beginning.”

“No one else is going to rent to us, even if there were a vacancy.” Then Lily remembered what Matt had said about putting in their seamstress business at the ranch, and her mind began to run in circles like a dog chasing its tail.

“I have a question for Beulah ...” She finally grabbed a thought long enough to hang on to it.

“Will you still be willing to put our creations in your shop?”

“Hell yes,” Beulah swore. “I don’t give a rat’s behind about what you did to survive. We’ve all done what we had to do to stay alive. I just wish you would have thought I was trustworthy enough for you to tell me the truth.”

Elijah poked his head in the door. “I hear there’s been some trouble. Anything I can do to help?”

“What do you know about this?” Lily held up the eviction notice.

“That judge is taking his anger about Sally Anne out on y’all, and some guy named Cooter is over at the saloon shooting down whiskey like it was water and spouting off stuff about you and Daisy,” Elijah answered. “Any of it true?”

“Most of it,” Daisy said.

Lily paced around the room a couple of times and then asked, “Think you might ride out to the sheep farm and take a message to Matt and Claude?”

“I reckon I could,” Elijah said. “But why would I do that?”

“Matt asked me today if I could do my seamstress work out there,” Lily answered, and handed the eviction notice to him.

“If you would go ask him if he was serious, and if we could rent one of those empty houses on the ranch, maybe that would be a place for us to go. We’ve only got two days.

We don’t even have a formal rental agreement.

The judge said that his word was good enough, but I guess his isn’t, because he’s now saying that anything left will belong to him when our rent runs out. ”

“Well ...” Elijah rubbed his chin. “My old house is sittin’ empty now.

My last tenants left with the wagon train that came through back in the spring.

They told me when they moved in that it wouldn’t be forever, that they were just stopping over until they could join up with another train going to California.

They both worked on the ranch, but they had the wandering fever and moved on when they got the chance. ”

“Could we rent it?” Lily asked.

“No, but you can live in it,” Elijah answered. “I’ll ride out there and tell Matt and Claude to each bring a wagon tomorrow. And I’ll add mine if we need more room to get you moved.”

Tears began to flow down Daisy’s cheeks. Alma might not even want to be friends with a couple of reformed soiled doves. “What if the women out there shun us and treat us like this?” She waved her arms toward the broken window.

“Honey, don’t you be worryin’ none about that. Shepherds are a different breed of people,” Elijah assured her.

The short argument with Abigail came back to Lily’s mind, and she wondered if even asking Matt for such a big favor was the right thing to do.

“My wagon is available, too,” Beulah said. “If you need it, I’ll drive it out back to the ranch tomorrow afternoon. Seeing Alma two days in a row would be a treat.”

“And we’ll help pack,” Frannie said. “It’s the least we can do after all y’all did for us—but the way the town seems to be backing Cooter, it might be best if some of us stand watch tonight.”

“But aren’t you mad at us?” Daisy asked.

“Maybe a little—especially with you, for looking down your nose at me in the saloon when you wasn’t no better than me,” Frannie answered. “But we are past that now, and I don’t turn my back on friends.”

“Let’s load up my wagon with all we can.

He can take it out to the farm and bring it back in the morning.

No telling what might happen if that crowd over there turns violent.

They could burn down the place or vandalize it,” Beulah said.

“Damn that Cooter feller to hell and back. Why did he have to come to town and ruin things? Now y’all will be gone, and I’ll still be here. ”

Frannie gave Beulah a sideways hug. “You can come out to our place anytime you need company. We’ll be itchin’ for some gossip, anyway.”