“Now wait just a damned minute!” Brad put his tumbler on the desk with a bang.
“Out of the question,” Lillian snapped. “I cannot accept dirty money that those girls have earned by…well, you know.” She felt her face burn.
Brad glared at her. “Then you buy me out, sister, and do whatever you want with the place.”
“I have considered that,” Lillian chewed the end of the pencil. “I have only the five thousand that my aunt left me. However, if you would let me pay you off in installments—”
“No way, sister,” Brad snapped, “In God we trust, all others pay cash.”
She thought a moment. “Very well, if I control the upstairs and the girls, I think I am going to move in.”
Dewey Cheatum choked on his drink and burst into spasms of coughing while the gambler stood up so suddenly, his chair went over backwards. “What? Hell, you can’t be serious.”
She gave him a steely green stare. “Mr. O’Neal, swearing is the measure of a small vocabulary.”
“Lady, I reckon you could make a saint swear.”
“Which you definitively are not.”
“I never claimed to be. Your Aunt Lil liked me just fine as I am.”
“We’ve already determined that my late aunt had questionable taste in lifestyle and men.”
Brad turned a pleading look toward the lawyer.
Dewey put down his pipe, somewhat reluctantly. “Bradley, I think we need to have a talk. Can you wait, Miss Primm?”
She smiled, feeling like she was in the catbird’s seat. “Certainly.”
“But, Dewey—”
“Come on out on the sidewalk, Brad, we need to talk.” He grabbed the gambler by the arm and dragged him out front, carefully closing the door behind him. Lillian sat waiting, mildly amused by the angry voices and gesturing she could see through the office’s big front window.
After awhile, the pair returned inside, Brad slamming the door so hard, the glass rattled.
They both sat back down.
Dewey leaned on his desk and smiled at her. “Dear Miss Primm,” he began, “Mister Bradley O’Neal has generously decided to—”
“I saw you almost twisting his arm out there.” She said, “I think what he’d really like to do is throttle me.”
“Oh, sister, don’t tempt me,” he growled.
“Now, now.” Dewey made a soothing gesture. “This is getting us nowhere and I have a pinochle game I’d like to get to before tomorrow night. Oh, where was I?” He seemed to give it some thought.
“My offer,” Brad said through gritted teeth.
“Oh, yes.” The lawyer nodded. “Miss Primm, your partner, after much thought, has decided to offer you the very generous sum of twelve thousand dollars for your share of the business.”
She leaned back in her chair and smiled. “No.”
“What do you mean no?” Brad’s voice raised. “Didn’t you hear that I’m offerin’ more money?”
“I heard. You seem very eager to be rid of me, Mr. O’Neal.”
“Oh, lady, you don’t know the half of it.” He reached for the bottle.
“Tsk! Tsk! You’d better keep your head clear or I might best you in this deal.” she said.
“Miss Primm,” he warned, “I have never been bested by a woman. Do not try my patience.”
“You are trying mine.”
“Now, now,” Lawyer Cheatum gestured frantically, “Let’s keep our mind on the goal. That’s a lot of money, Miss Primm.”
“I know that.” Lillian shrugged. “Mr. O’Neal seems too eager to be rid of me and there’s rumors around that my aunt hid a large treasure somewhere in the house.”
Brad leaned back in his chair and groaned. “That old story? Miss Primm, I live in that house and I never—”
“But of course I wouldn’t expect you to level with me. You’d want the gold for yourself. I hear my aunt didn’t trust banks,” Lillian said.
The older man cleared his throat and picked up his pipe. “Miss Primm, I was your aunt’s lawyer, and she never said anything to me about money hidden in the Texas Lily. Now even considering that faint possibility, Miss Primm, we might work out a contract that if you sold out and Mr. O’Neal ever found such a treasure, you’d have some prior claim—”
“Ha!” Lillian snorted, “you think I’d trust that sleezy rascal to let me know if he ever found anything?”
The lawyer sighed and pulled out his pocket-watch again. He looked resigned to being here for the foreseeable future. “She’s right, Brad, you ain’t exactly what the average citizen would call a model citizen.”
“I thought you was my friend, Dewey. Hell,” he snapped, “there ain’t no money hidden in the house, that’s just an old tale. If there was, I’d think Lil would have told me or left it to somebody in her will, wouldn’t she?”
Dewey shrugged and looked at Lillian. “He’s got a point there, Miss Primm.”
“I see we are getting nowhere.” Lillian said briskly, looking at the tiny lapel watch on the front of her severe dress. “Lawyer Cheatum, I am a teacher and I was touched by the plight of those poor, unfortunate girls—”
“They ain’t poor, Miss Primm,” Dewey leaned across the desk confidentially, “why, on Saturday nights, there’s a waiting line—”
“Mister Cheatum!” She felt her face burn.
“Or so some of the men tell me,” Dewey said hastily and took out his handkerchief and wiped his face.
“Nevertheless, I feel duty bound to help them.” Lillian said.
Brad looked puzzled. “By doin’ what?”
“I said I was a teacher,” she said. “If those girls were educated and knew a little etiquette, they could fit into society.”
Both men looked puzzled.
“I mean they could find respectable jobs and perhaps get married.”
“Married?” The gambler said the word as if speaking the name of some dread disease. “Who’d marry a wh—?”
“Mister O’Neal, she said, “I understand there is a shortage of women in all the Western states. If I could reform the girls, they could find husbands and—”
“You mean,” croaked Dewey, “Close the upstairs rooms at the Texas Lily?” He looked a bit faint.
“We shall see,” Lillian said.
Both men jumped to their feet, their mouths hanging open.
“Speechless?” she asked. “That must be a first for both of you. Mister O’Neal, if you will get a locksmith to put a strong lock on my aunt’s bedroom door, I shall move in sometime tomorrow.”
“Move in?” Brad opened and closed his mouth like a fish gasping for air.
“I said move in, didn’t I? How else am I to reform these unfortunate girls?”
“Fif—fifteen thousand,” Brad croaked, “I’ll give you fifteen thousand for your share.”
Lillian smiled. “Save your money, Mr. O’Neal, I cannot be bought off.”
“But