ONE - JULY 1881

Tent, canteens, bedrolls, pemmican, mess kit, hunting knife.

"This is considered stealing, right?"

Sergeant Evans hoisted the saddle onto his mount. The whisper of leather against the horse's flanks was an awful racket in the silence before dawn. "I suppose it is," said Evans, "since we're not coming back."

"That's too bad. I hate to be a thief."

Evans buckled the cinch and put a foot in the stirrup. "We can place each other under arrest, if it will make you feel better."

Evans and Sergeant Hewson mounted their horses, and for a moment they were perfectly still, waiting for sight or sound of a curious party whom they might have woken. None showed. The two men rode slowly and silently at first. They headed west without any discussion, but before long Evans said, "Where exactly is it you want to go?"

Hewson didn't say anything right away, which surprised Evans, because usually Hewson was just waiting for people to ask him questions, so he could answer them.

At last he said, "I want to see the sea again. Can we go that far?"

"We'll go wherever you want to go," said Evans.

Hewson led a third horse. He wanted to find a trading post, so they could sell the horse and buy proper clothes and food. They could not travel in their uniforms.

Once they were far enough from the Mounted camp, Hewson and Evans gave their horses a kick and increased their speed. They wanted to put some distance between themselves and the camp. For many miles, they were too terrified to speak. Long after the sun came up, they listened and waited for anyone who might be pursuing them.

"How far is it to a trading post?" Hewson asked finally, as the morning sun warmed their backs.

"I couldn't find a map," said Evans. "I guess we just keep riding until we find a road, then follow the road. We've got enough food and water for a couple of days."

When it was warm enough, they took off their dingy scarlet coats and put them under their packs. Hewson hoped to reach a post by nightfall, so he would not have to put his on again, ever.

***********

The little town of Yellow Road, Montana had a general store. Hewson and Evans sold their spare horse and bought themselves civilian clothes. Evans also purchased canned food and an opener, oil for their lamp, and other essentials. Hewson wandered around the store, returning to the counter with his hands full.

"Soap!" he exclaimed. "Real soap! Not like what we had."

Evans made Hewson put most of what he had in his hands back on the shelf, but conceded to the soap. "This too," he told the shopkeeper. When the shopkeeper gave him the total, Evans asked him, "Do you know of the Mounted Police?"

"Yes," said the man.

Evans showed him clearly that he was paying a third more than what the bill came to, then pushed the cash across the counter. "Now, if the Mounted Police ask you if you know of us, you'll say 'No,' alright?"

"Understood," said the shopkeeper. Hewson and Evans went on their way.

Hewson looked down at himself in his new civilian clothes. He wouldn't mind not being a policeman anymore. "Do we have enough money to stay at the hotel?" he asked.

"We shouldn't. We need to keep moving on."

"Please? Do you know how long it's been since I've slept in a real bed? A bed that didn't leave you feeling worse when you woke up than when you went to sleep?"

"There are beds west of here. We'll find them."

***********

It wasn't long before the civilians Paul Hewson and David Evans were venturing into the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. The July sun was thwarted by thick trees, and the two men rode in the shade most of the day.

Paul was quite anxious, much of the time. He had gone on many long journeys, but before now he had always known exactly where he was going, and more or less when he'd arrive there. And even though he'd spent a number of years in the wilderness, it never felt like wilderness, really, because he'd been in the company of so many people. Paul could never have deserted without David. He would have perished from loneliness, not even having known where he was going.

***********

It was a tiny noise, but David could discern it between the dull roar of wind in the trees and the chatter of birds. The sound of water, rushing. They followed the sound, and their hearts pounded.

The sun was going down, but light still sparkled on the waterfall, which was narrow, and only the height of a man. Beneath it was a pool, ringed with stones. The depth of it David could not make out, but it emptied into a stream and was not stagnant enough to become a breeding place for mosquitoes. "Start unpacking the horses," he said. "I'm going to have a look around."

A clean, fresh water source like this pool should rightfully have had a settlement nearby, but David found none. Neither were there any burnt-out campfires or boot-prints. David went back to the pool, dipped his hand in the water, and wondered if he was the first human to do so. The water was refreshingly cool, and he splashed his face. He could feel the dust and sweat washing off. On the other side, the horses were drinking their fill. Paul had built a fire.

"It appears there's no one around," David said.

"That's good news," said Paul. He roped the horses to trees nearby and returned to the pool with his pack. "I can't wait," he said, and started stripping. "No more baths at the Fort for us. No more sharing a tin tub with seventy other men."

David laughed. "No more waiting a week for your turn," he added.

"…And wearing the same clothes for the whole week!" Paul grabbed his soap like it was gold bullion and climbed down the stones into the pool. David shrugged and grabbed his own bar of soap from the pack. He followed Paul in, leaving his clothes in a pile by the fire.

Out of politeness, he kept to the other side, with his back to Paul, who was humming a tune. David got to work scrubbing himself down, but before he realized what he was doing he turned to look at Paul, to check on him, perhaps. Paul was singing unself-consciously and working the soap over his arms. David's eyes traveled from Paul's arms down his back, then lower, then he cringed and looked away. That was quite rude, what he'd just done. He turned the soap over and over in his hands, then set it down on a rock and ran his lathered hands over his chest and belly. Behind him, Paul sighed as he sang. Then David felt it, the tingling, the quickening of his heartbeat. There was nothing he could do to stop it, what with the feel of the soap on his skin, and Paul singing so sweetly. He was quite noticeably aroused, and the more he tried to think it away, the worse it became.

He turned again to look at Paul, just to make and sure Paul couldn't see the shameful state he was in. Paul was washing his hair, oblivious, but he'd stopped singing. David watched the muscles in his shoulders flexing.

Only seconds had gone by, but to David it seemed much longer. Not even the cold water could remedy his situation. He snuck one more look at Paul, and jumped when he saw that Paul was sneaking a look as well.

David uttered a sharp, mortified "Oh." He turned back and hid his face in his hands, and his toes curled with embarrassment, scraping against the rock he stood upon. He felt the movement of the water behind him, and then Paul was standing there, soap in hand.

"D'you want some help? I mean, scrubbing your back?"

David could not move. In his mind he answered a hundred different ways, but Paul didn't hear any of them, so he just went to it. He slid the soap over David's shoulders, working up a rich lather, then dropped it to do the rest of the job with his hands.

It was not a quick, efficient scrubbing. Paul went at this simple task with unusual attention to detail, exploring the ridges and valleys of David's backbone, pushing and kneading between his shoulder blades. A noise escaped David's throat, like a bird taking flight; he could not keep it inside.

"I'll bet that feels good," Paul said cheerfully, giving no indication that he understood what he was doing. "Alright. Now you do mine."

David found Paul had already turned his back, and was just standing there, waiting. David put the soap in his hands and did his best to reciprocate. His hands were shaking. Paul didn't waste any time; he immediately started groaning with pleasure, and gently rocked against David's hands. David's fingers pressed against the back of Paul's neck, touching gently behind his ears, then he realized that he was lingering at what he was doing, and swiftly returned to the thick muscles of Paul's shoulders. "Oh, that's good," Paul said, quite loudly. As he leaned back, he bumped against David's erection, and David leaped backwards to keep it out of the way so he could continue.

Paul heard David's labored breathing, and he laughed, "It's alright," he said and twisted around so David could see. "I've got one too." He resumed his position. "Go on, then, you're not finished."

David was reaching the point where he was no longer afraid or embarrassed. His mind was soaring above and beyond human emotion. He was outside himself, and could continue washing Paul's back only because his body had escaped his control. His hands were quite low, now. They slid around Paul's sides, a slippery finger gliding into place between each rib. Paul continued his little groaning noises, punctuated by the occasional sigh.

Gradually, David became aware of himself, of the pleasant tingling in his whole body. Never in his life had his senses been indulged so thoroughly: the sight of Paul's body, the sounds he made, the smell of him, the smoothness of his skin. There was only sense not being engaged; David wished to correct that. Leaning forward, he pushed his nose against the nape of Paul's neck. Wrapping one arm around him, David kissed this spot, and felt the shudder that ran all through Paul's body. He tasted like he smelled, of soap and clean water. David's free hand traveled down the whole length of Paul's back, and he cupped one firm, round buttock. Paul had stopped making noise, but his breath had become a soft series of grunts.

David rubbed Paul's rump a little more, and gently slid two fingers into the cleft, and kissed the back of his neck again.

"David?"

"Yes?"

Paul's mouth was dry. "Is that…Is that just your fingers?"

"Yes. Do you like it?"

"Yes."

With his soapy fingers, David explored this very private part of Paul's body, one fingertip gently circling the little dent there. He stopped when he felt the rhythmic shaking of Paul's shoulder. Paul had begun pleasuring himself.

"Wait. Come here." David took Paul's hand away and led him to a large, flat rock that rose up out of the pool. With soap in hand, he climbed up on it, and invited Paul to sit between his legs. Paul did, and leaned back so his head rested on David's shoulder.

"Are you warm enough?" David asked.

"I'm burning up."

David got up another handful of lather, then reached down to do to Paul what Paul had been doing to himself a minute ago. He had never done this with another man before, but the mechanics were familiar. He gently pushed back the petal-soft foreskin, and watched with fascination as the smooth pink head of another man's prick disappeared into his slippery fist, then emerged, then disappeared again. Paul wriggled and pumped his hips, and when David's other hand slipped down to cup the soft, delicate sack, he climaxed; his seed spurted out and landed on his belly.

Paul lay still, and he could feel David throbbing and twitching against the small of his back. He leaped back into the pool and turned to face David, urging him to scoot forward. David's legs dangled in the water, and Paul stood between them, so they could kiss while Paul returned the favor David had done him.

David loved the tightness of Paul's grip, the smoothness of his strokes. Neither Paul nor David had ever felt pleasure like this before, a slow, gradual, all-over pleasure, and when David finished and they'd rinsed off their bellies, they weren't sure what to do next. For a while they both stood there, close together in the water, looking down at each other's bodies.

"I don't know about you," Paul said, "but I'm really hungry. Can we eat now?"

"We can do whatever you want." David smiled fondly at Paul and helped him out of the water.

***********

First they saw a circle of small stones, where someone had built a campfire. Then there was a trail, little-used but apparent among the trees. When they came to a clearing in the forest, they saw it, stretching away into the distance, to the Rockies: the railroad.

Far off, barely visible, was the train station. Paul and David gave their horses a kick and followed the iron road straight to it. There was a train halted at the station, and people milled about, getting on and off the train, or going into the tavern next to the station.

"We can sell our horses and buy tickets," said David. "I don't know how far the railroad goes, but it will at least get us over the mountains."

"I'm all for selling the horses," said Paul, "but why waste the money on tickets?" He pointed to a boxcar. The door was wide open. "We might need the money later, for something else," he added.

David was not sure how safe or wise it would be to try to stow away in a boxcar. He was not familiar with the methods of the police in the railyards. But Paul had a point, and the bustling crowd was a ways down the line, and not likely to notice them. So they said goodbye to their horses and anything else they couldn't carry on their backs, pocketed the cash, and made for the open boxcar. David boosted Paul inside, who then turned and pulled David up with him.

"What do we do now?" Paul asked.

"I guess we just wait for the train to leave."

On the other side of the door, something moved in the darkness. Paul reached for his pistol, still at his side under his jacket.

"The name's O'Reilly," said the shadow, and revealed himself as a man, old, toothless, and shabby. "They call me O'Reilly the Old-Timer."

In the spirit of Irish camaraderie, Paul introduced himself as "Hughes," eschewing the over-Anglicized form of his surname. O'Reilly didn't seem to care if he was Hughes or Johannsen or D'Abruzzo, but he was friendly. As the train started up, he asked, "Where you fellers headed?"

"West!" said Paul, over the noise of the engine.

O'Reilly laughed rustily. "Well, I reckon you're on the right train, then."

David and Paul crossed over to where O'Reilly was seated on a crate. David noticed, as he got a closer look, that although O'Reilly's clothes were well-worm, they had been meticulously mended, and were not filthy.

"We're trying to get to the coast," David said.

"Ah, then it's no good staying on this train too long. You'll freeze to death if you go over the Rockies in an open boxcar."

"Oh." David looked out the door, and the ground rushing by.

"Don't worry. You lads can get off with me at Kalispell. Gonna meet some acquaintances in a jungle, look for work."

"A jungle?" Paul said.

"A hobo jungle. If you like, you can come along. Everyone's welcome, I suppose."

The train ran all night. O'Reilly had a tin bucket half-filled with sand, and he poured some kerosene on the sand, and they had a fire. Paul and David shared some of their pemmican with him. They did not know if they could trust the old man, and whispered an agreement to take turns sleeping.

In the morning, the three men, with O'Reilly leading, snuck off and down the hill to a little wooded area. They hadn't seen it from the tracks, but as they got down the hill it came into view; a camp amongst the trees, buzzing with activity. Paul and David ducked under clothes-lines, dodged some large, bounding mutts, and struggled to remember the names of all the men O'Reilly introduced to them. Along the way, O'Reilly explained some hobo etiquette. For instance, he said, the clean pots and pans that hung from the branches of trees were for anyone to use, but one must hang them back up, clean, when one was finished with them. The longer Paul and David were in it, the clearer it became to them that the hobo jungle was a well-organized brotherhood, with protocol not only for survival but for social exchange.

When O'Reilly met the men he was looking for, he sat down at their camp fire and started right in on catching up on news and stories. He seemed to forget about Paul and David entirely. He did not invite them to sit, and it was crowded around the fire, so they were too shy to ask. They just walked away, and no one said goodbye. Wandering about, keeping an eye on things, they began to understand that O'Reilly and his friends were not being rude; there was just not enough food in the group to go around. If a man approached a fire, and was not invited to sit, he just moved on until he found a group who had food to spare. Hobos would always share, if they had enough.

Some men had musical instruments, a harmonica or a Jew's-harp, and if, as they wandered, Paul recognized a tune, he would sing softly to himself. But there seemed to be no campfires with a vacancy for them. They kept going further and further out, to the edge of the camp, and they sensed that they were moving into a very different sort of place. Paul began to get scared, but he did not tell David, and could not know if David felt the same way. The men at the edge of the camp looked meaner, and walked with the same swagger as the whiskey-traders they'd chased out of Fort Whoop-Up so long ago, and had the same stony eyes. But these men were much bigger; they were laborers, who'd hardened their bodies hauling railroad ties and shoveling coal.

The youths in the camp were smaller and skinnier, and their faces were old. Some of them roamed at the edge of the jungle, offering sexual services for the price of a meal. Others clung to men who were older, brawny, and extremely possessive.

Paul and David walked past a fire attended by three men and two youths. One man was reading a newspaper while the others listened. When he saw Paul and David, he folded the paper. "You fellas lost?" he called to them.

Paul and David turned around. "Not lost," said Paul, who wanted to appear brave. "Just looking for a place to sit down and have some supper."

"Looks like you've found it," the man said, and gestured to an unoccupied patch of earth by the fire. "I'm Black Jack. This is Dollie." He indicated the boy huddled next to him.

"Dollie," Paul said, and tried his best not to make it sound like a question. He shook hands, and sat by the fire next to David.

Black Jack also introduced Joe, Randy the Rat, and Jaime, a young blond boy who never left Randy's side, save to fetch him coffee. Judging by the way the men treated the youths, and spoke to them, David guessed that they provided similar services as the roving boys they'd seen earlier, on a long-term basis. They never spoke, except when spoken to, but the men seemed quite protective of them, and would not let any other man touch them or speak ill of them.

"We're movin' on to Wenatchee first thing in the morning," Black Jack said. "Train goin' that way. See if we can find some work cuttin' trees before the season's over."

"Where's Wenatchee?" Paul asked.

"Couple hundred miles west, over the mountains."

"We're going that way. Can we come with you?"

"You got any food? Money?"

"Some," Paul said. David gave Paul a jab with his elbow.

Black Jack smiled. "You stick with us, and we'll show you all about this life. You're new, I can see. You won't make it without our help."

Late into the night, the men, who were tramps, rather than hobos, sat around the fire and told stories of their years on the iron road. They did not often speak directly to Paul and David, but made it clear that they were welcome. Paul and David whispered to each other, agreeing that it was only the promise of their food and money that made them welcome. But if they were vigilant, they could learn a lot from the tramps, and might not have to part with their cash. They discussed how far they should risk traveling with the men, but stopped when they saw they were being stared at. Randy the Rat looked particularly suspicious of them, his arm weighing heavily on Jaime's shoulders as he glared. David and Paul stopped whispering. They thought perhaps secrets were considered rude.

After a while, though, Joe and Black Jack warmed up to them, including them in the conversation, asking them questions about their pasts. Paul began telling incredible lies about his life in Dublin, pretending he'd only arrived in the New World that summer. Because the stories included much carousing and disrespect for authority, the tramps were entertained, asking again and again to hear more. David could detect Paul's accent getting thicker, the way it had sounded when they first met.

"…I tell ye, Maggie's eyes were like saucers, and she says to me, 'That English soldier gave ye a kicking? Why, the bastard.' And I says, 'Now now, darlin', 'tis not polite to speak ill of the dead.'" Paul grinned a wicked grin, and the men burst into laughter.

"Did you really kill that Englishman?" Joe said.

"Why'd ye think I had to get on the boat to America?"

Paul was getting comfortable around these men, and, seeing their affection for the youths, thought nothing of putting his arm around David. This elicited another sudden round of suspicious looks, and killed the conversation stone dead.

For the first time since they were introduced, Dollie spoke. "Why, you guys are just a couple of fairies!"

Paul yanked his arm away from David, but the men just kept staring. Neither Paul nor David knew what they ought to do. They waited a moment, for the men to forgive them reluctantly and then give them a chance to win back the favor they'd lost. But it didn't happen. Finally, they got up, grabbed their packs, and left without a word.

The jungle was difficult to navigate in the dark. Many of the fires had been put out, and men were sleeping. Paul tripped over someone and fell, landing face first in an extinguished fire-pit. Tears of frustration were streaming down his face before he'd picked himself up. "I don't understand," he said, spitting ash as they hurried out of the camp. "What I did wasn't so different from that Joe and Black Jack had been doing."

"The difference is, I'm not a fifteen-year-old boy who ran away from home to sell his body for food and protection."

"I'm sorry! I thought it would be alright!"

"I'm not angry at you," David said as they trudged up the hill. "I didn't want to stay in that jungle anyway. Those men saw in a second that we were green. We'd have woken up in the morning with nothing but our skins."

The train station was closed. They went around back and threw down their bedrolls. David took out a rag and wiped the ash off Paul's face. He had a cut on his forehead, but it had already stopped bleeding. Paul sighed.

"Remember when I said we shouldn't buy train tickets because we might need something else more?"

"Yes."

"Well, what we need more is train tickets."

TWO - AUGUST 1881

It was a tiny town, carved into a narrow patch of silt between the forest and the bay. Northern Pacific did not even bother to build their railroad that far. The line ended at the rival port city to the south, and to complete their journey Paul and David had to board a steamer, as ugly as a sea-going vessel could be and still float. It was a mud-caked, tumble-down town, populated almost solely by transient workers and loose women. Seattle.

Standing on the dock, David looked across Elliott Bay and said, "You wanted to see the sea. Is this good enough?"

Paul smiled. "For now."

The sun was setting behind the Olympic Mountains, and David couldn't help but smile as well. But when he turned around to have a look at their new home, the smile faded to a thin line. "This place looks like it's about to fall into the sea."

"I'm tired of traveling," said Paul. "We've gotten here and I want to stay here." [1]

***********

When inland trees were harvested, a method was devised to get the logs into the bay, so they could be floated down to the mill. This method was a Western innovation called Skid Road: logs were laid on the forest floor, like a track. These were the skids. The skids guided logs as they rolled down the hill and into the bay. Paul had been hired to do the lowest-paid and nastiest job in the logging industry: he poured dogfish oil on the skids to ease the passage of the logs. David worked a half-mile south, hauling logs back out of the water and up an incline to the saw. They did these jobs from dawn to dusk, six days a week. Work in the lumber industry was crippling, and sometimes men were dismembered or killed.

Paul and David shared a bed in a rooming house, and at night they would collapse together, too exhausted to do anything in the bed except sleep. Even on Sunday, when they had a little time and energy to spare, David resisted any advances Paul made, and Paul was sure that David hated him now. He was the one that got them into this. Life in the Mounted did not seem so bad to Paul anymore. He could have swallowed his pride and kept at it. He did not blame David for ignoring him.

But then again, David was still here, lying by his side every night, even though he stank of fish oil, and there had to be a reason for that.

In December it was too cold and dark for logging, so Paul and David lost their jobs. They were told they could return in March.

The weather was no good for wandering about. They sat on the bed in their room and counted what was left of their money. "The rent is paid up until the end of the week," David said, "and we now have…one dollar and ten cents. It's enough to buy us each one more meal."

"Good," said Paul. "Let's go. I'm hungry."

There was a little restaurant on Third Avenue, and Paul and David sat by the window there and ate sandwiches. The street they looked upon was a river of mud, with plywood laid at the intersections for people to cross on. Outside the restaurant, a man was trying desperately to push a horse-drawn carriage out of the muck. Others at the window simply watched with amusement, commenting on exactly how the man was going about it all wrong. But Paul and David had too many years in the Mounted Police under their belts, and couldn't stand not to help him. As they were getting up, they heard a woman screaming. Standing in the doorway, they saw a man race up the sidewalk towards them, fleeing from the screaming woman. "Thief!" she cried. Paul crouched in the doorway, and when the thief ran by, he was ambushed. Paul knocked him to the ground, and saw that he had something clutched in his fist.

"Let go of it!" Paul growled, and squeezed the thief's wrist, but he would not cooperate. He was gasping for air; Paul had knocked the wind out of him. David walked over, opened his jacket just enough to reveal his sidearm, and said, "I think you should drop whatever it is you've got in your hand."

When the thief saw the pistol, he conceded. A silver necklace, encrusted with diamonds, fell from his hand and into the mud. Paul snatched it up just as the woman arrived, her high heels clicking on the sidewalk. She was a short, plump woman, and her black hair was swept up and held with a silver clip. She wore a stunning evening gown and a long fur coat that was perhaps fox.

"Oh, thank heavens! I was afraid it was gone for good." She took a white silk handkerchief from her purse, and David dropped the necklace into it. "Of all my diamond necklaces, this one is the most precious to me."

"It was nothing, ma'am," Paul said. "All in a day's work." And he cringed, remembering that he was not a policeman anymore. Soon, a proper policeman was along to take the thief in.

The woman put the handkerchief in her purse and pulled out a card. She handed it to Paul. "A token of my gratitude. You gentlemen come by anytime and I'll make sure you're taken care of. Now, you must excuse me, I'm on my way to the opera house, and I'm already late."

Paul looked at the card. There was no name, just an address: Three Hundred South Washington Street.

"Her husband probably owns a mill, or a mine," David said. "She'll have us in for tea and call it even."

"I wouldn't say no to a cup of tea," said Paul. "Shall we go tomorrow?"

***********

Three hundred South Washington Street didn't look quite like the mansion they were expecting. It was a large building with a discreet façade, like a hotel. There was no garden or yard in front. It was downwind from Chinatown; they could smell pork and yen shi.

Paul knocked on the door, but when it opened, a man was storming out, spitting epithets which were generally directed at the fairer sex. Paul and David looked at the open door, then at each other, and went inside.

Through a small, unfurnished anteroom was the parlor. It was as extravagantly decorated as had been the woman they'd met. Turkish rugs on the floor, gold brocade on the walls, china cuspidors, an elegant maple upright piano, gold lamps shaped like nymphets, and a fully-stocked bar with crystal champagne flutes lining the shelves. The most unusual feature was not the furniture, however, but the young women perched on it. Girls with painted faces, dressed in satin, some festooned with sequins or marabou feathers. The two men were overcome by the thick, unfamiliar odor of the room; the smell of women's bodies and expensive perfume.

Paul and David stared at the girls, and they stared right back, until a few burst into giggles at the sight of their grubby, gaping expressions. It was then that a woman entered, at once exuberant and graceful. She was the one who owned the necklace. She was dressed just as finely, but today she wore more rouge, and her hair was teased out.

"Darlings! How did you get in?"

"The door," said David, barely loud enough to be heard. "It was open."

"That filthy rat Sam Keys must have left it open," she said gruffly, but did not let her anger show too long. She put on a smile and said, "Well, it's the last trouble he'll give me. As for you gentlemen, you've come for your reward? By all means. My name is Lou, by the way, Miss Lou Graham, I run this establishment." [2] [3] She gestured to the girls. "You may each take one of my girls upstairs for the afternoon, free of charge."

Some of the girls looked sullen, some cheerful and inviting. "Go on, ladies," the madam said, "introduce yourselves. These are the men who rescued my diamond necklace from that crook last night."

The girls started to get up, but David stopped them and said, "Ma'am, your offer is very generous, but you see, we…ah…" The madam looked at him curiously. "He and I…"

Paul put his arm around David's shoulders with confidence and said, "We're fairies, ma'am."

"Oh, how charming!" the madam said. The girls sat back down, and seemed quite relieved. "Hm. But then how shall I repay your good deed?"

David's gaze fell upon the piano, which was across from the bar. No one was sitting at it. "May I play your piano?" he asked. The madam nodded, and he went over to it and began to play the Minute Waltz. [4] It was apparent that he was an experienced player whose practice had lapsed. As he went on, the tempo picked up and he hit fewer wrong notes. The girls looked on and nodded to express their approval. David played it through a second time, flawlessly. When he finished, he laid his hands in his lap and said, "That was nice. It's been awhile." He got up and returned to Paul's side.

Paul was astounded. "You never told me you could play the piano!"

David shrugged. "You never asked."

"Darling, that was beautiful!" Madam Lou gushed. "Would you like a job here? As my piano player? I'm afraid my previous one took his leave rather abruptly."

"Oh, was that…?" Paul pointed at the door.

"Sam Keys, yes. I caught him with one of the girls. Absolutely against the rules, of course. But I don't think I'll have to worry about you doing such a thing."

"No ma'am," said David, and blushed.

"I don't suppose you have another job available?" Paul said, and gave the madam his most charming smile.

"Hm. I suppose I could use some extra help in the kitchen. Can you cook?"

"Of course I can cook," Paul said.

"I guess that settles it, then. Welcome, gentlemen. I'm afraid I didn't catch your names."

"I'm Paul Hewson. This is David Evans."

"Oh!" the madam laughed. "Are those your real names?"

Paul was perplexed. "Yes…"

"How charming. But no one in this house uses their real names."

Paul thought for a moment. "Well, when I was in the---" David elbowed him in the ribs. "When I was in Canada, that is, there was a Blackfoot Indian who called me Sokapi Mohksiston. It means Good Voice."

"Sok--- well, that's a little long."

"Bono Vox," said one of the girls in the parlor. Paul and David turned to look at the stunning, olive-skinned seductress in the red dress. "That's how you say Good Voice, in Latin."

"That would be Vanessa," said the madam. "She is without a doubt the most educated of our girls."

"And she makes sure no one forgets it," another girl sneered.

The madam considered Vanessa's suggestion. "Bono Vox. I like the sound of it." She turned to David. "And you?"

"Eh, this one's a tough read," said Paul. "I think his will have to wait."

"That's fine. In the meantime, I have a room made up that you gentlemen can have, if you have no other lodgings? I'll show you up, then."

The madam led her two new employees up the stairs. David whispered to Paul, "You never told me you could cook."

Paul shrugged. "I can't."

On the second floor, two hallways stretched away into the distance, lined with doors. "The rooms are divided by shift, so the girls who are off-duty can sleep in peace. You'll both be working the day shift. This room is a little small for two people, but I hope you'll find it cozy. It has a tub and washbasin. There's a flush toilet down the hall. I've got to return to the parlor now. Duty calls." She smiled. "Report to me at eleven tomorrow morning, both of you, and I'll see that you get started properly."

"Eleven?" David was shocked. "Are you sure you don't mean, say, six? The crack of dawn?"

Lou laughed. "You are adorable!" And she was off.

***********

The room Paul and David were given appeared to be one of the rooms the girls typically lived and worked in. There was a full-size bed with white sheets, a deep red velvet bedspread, and too many pillows. The thick curtains were a matching red, with gold trim. There was an empty nightstand, that might have been carved from the same great oak as the bed frame. And in the corner was a porcelain washstand with a mirror, and a brass bathtub, which sat in front of a modestly-sized fireplace. David had seen gaslights in and around the building, but this room was lit by oil lamps.

Paul was fascinated by the tub. He kneeled beside it, tapped it with his knuckles. It was barley big enough for one person, but it's size, and quality, far exceeded that of the tin washtub at Fort Walsh. There was even a pump in the room to fill the tub with water, but what flowed out was ice-cold, and had to be heated by potfulls over the fire.

"I want to take a bath right now," Paul said. "I haven't had a proper wash since…well, since we were in Montana." For a moment he thought about that evening, and got a little shiver.

"We don't have any clean clothes to wear, though," David said. But as Paul was filling the tub for himself, there was a knock on the door. David answered it and met the madam's servant, a Chinese man. Speaking broken English, he presented them with clothes that he said were more appropriate for Madam Lou's establishment. The clothes were finer than what Paul and David wore, but were nothing special; linen shirts and silk ties, with jackets and trousers of heavy dark fabric. The servant explained that when they went out in public, they would need to look like gentlemen, just as, on the rare occasions when the girls went out, they appeared as perfect ladies.

Paul bathed by the light of the fire, singing to himself, while David looked out the window at the sun setting on the city. David did not recognize what Paul was singing, but he noticed that each time Paul sang the verse, he mumbled less and less, and so David suspected that he was making it up.

David took his turn in the bath while Paul dried himself with a thick bath towel and babbled about their good fortune. The fire had warmed the room, and Paul lay naked on the velvet bedspread, running his hands over his clean skin, in full view of David. David watched Paul as he lolled on the bed, and found himself desiring his friend again. He finished up his bath hastily, drying off with the towel a bit but joining Paul on the bed still damp. Paul rolled to face him with bright eyes.

"I thought you might not want to, ever again," Paul said.

"I want to right now."

"Is it just because you're not angry at me anymore? Because I got us to a good place for once?"

"I was never angry at you."

David was overcome with luxurious sensation; the feel of clean skin, the plush velvet, and the warmth of the air. He wanted to take Paul in his arms and wrap the two of them up in the bedspread and just roll about; but Paul was already reaching out for David, and when he felt those hands on his body David forgot about his idea.

Paul was sure that when he had David's prick in his hand, he was the one in control. He stroked it at a leisurely pace, so he could concentrate on the effect his touch was having on David, on his breathing, his expression. And he liked the feeling of it pulsing in his hand. Paul let his fingers travel down David's thighs, up and around his belly, teasing him a little, watching his prick jump when he touched a particularly good spot. He had a question for David, but he was so embarrassed to ask it, he had to put his lips right against David's ear and whisper in his softest voice.

"Do you want me to put it in my mouth?"

David pulled back to look Paul in the eyes.

"Because I could do that, if you like."

David turned away and pressed his face into the bedspread. He was also embarrassed. But he nodded.

Paul slowly moved down the bed, and rearranged himself a bit until he found a way to be comfortable. David lay on his back and closed his eyes, and he only felt the bed dip with the shifting of Paul's body.

There was a little pearl of fluid on the tip of David's prick, and Paul's tongue darted out to take it. He continued to fondle it until another droplet formed, and this he also took on his tongue. Then he took the head between his lips, and instinct told him how to do the rest. He sucked gently, until David began to move in an insistent way, and then he put a little more in his mouth, and then his lips moved up and down the whole length of it.

He didn't know what to do when David propped himself up on one elbow and tapped him on the shoulder. He stopped, and David scooted closer to the middle of the bed, and reached out for Paul, guiding his body, caressing it more than necessary as he moved it. Paul found that David wanted him to reverse himself, so that his head was nearer the foot of the bed. It wasn't until they had fully assumed this position that Paul understood why. David lay on his side and, where he was, could easily take Paul into his mouth the way it had been done to him. Paul stared at David doing this, watched his prick being caressed by David's lips and tongue. That was the part he liked best, when he saw David's tongue come out and slide over the head. His attention was refocused when David's prick tapped his cheek, and he returned to what he had begun.

When Paul felt his climax approaching, he released David from his mouth and instead stroked him with one hand while he groaned and savored his release. Before, at the pool, Paul had had a suspicion, but now he was certain that the pleasure of it was sweeter when David helped him to attain it.

He meant to get right back to work, but felt wetness on his cheek and realized it was over, and that made him a little sad. He had missed David's climax while he was enjoying his own.

David got up and found a washcloth, and wiped Paul's cheek clean. Paul turned his head and cringed with embarrassment. They kissed, and their lips felt different, swollen and a little raw, and they tasted like each other. The thought of this nearly got Paul excited again.

The fire was just about gone, and they crawled under the sheets, not sure if or how they were supposed to look at one another, or touch one another. Finally, they lay on their backs, and Paul scooted close enough that their shoulders touched, and that was fine for both of them.

***********

Paul and David worked the day shift, which began at eleven in the morning and ended at eleven at night. There were two other men, one who cooked and one who played piano, for the night shift, but Paul and David did not see them often.

Paul had no skill in the kitchen, but the girls had simple requests, usually light fare, like a sandwich. The girls took their breaks at different times, so it was not demanding work for him. A girl would wander in, and Paul would fix something for her, then turn his attention to something that cooked slow, perhaps a stew, until the next girl showed up twenty minutes later.

Some girls took their food to their rooms, though most didn't because they thought of it as a workplace. Most ate in the dining room, but as they got to know Paul, more and more often they stayed in the kitchen, perched on a stool at the counter, and they would chat with him while having their sandwich and tea. Though he was not able to tell them that he was a policeman, he had an enormous cache of stories to entertain them with, not all of them entirely true. Even Vanessa, who took great pains to show how unimpressed she was with everything in the world, enjoyed Paul's stories, though she did pride herself on being able to tell which parts were real and which were made up. They also talked about David, since David didn't speak much on his own behalf.

"Your friend isn't like Sam Keys. The girls like David better. Sam would leer at us, and he tried to, how shall I say, be a part of it all. He would tell the customers which girl to pick, and that's very rude. David just plays that piano as if we weren't right there, selling our wares. Sometimes that makes the girls nervous too!"

"That's just how he is," Paul replied. "He doesn't like to get in the thick of it if he doesn't have to. He just stays at the edge of it all, and keeps an eye on things."

"Hm. The Edge." Vanessa said. "Well, you tell Mr. Edge that we girls appreciate his staying there. But he doesn't have to stay there all the time." And she left. No one in Lou Graham's house called Paul or David by their real names after that day.

THREE - DECEMBER 1881

At the end of their first day on the job, Bono and Edge had returned to a room that looked very different than the one they'd left in the morning. One the table were fresh-cut flowers and a box of sweets. Having a look around, they found razors, combs, soap, and some more clothes.

As time went on, they noticed that all these things were not only provided but replaced regularly. It took a few weeks for them to understand why. Although Madam Lou was quite the socialite herself, she kept those she employed in the parlor house at all times, if she could possibly manage it. It was a part of the appeal of the parlor house; a customer, once inside, was in a different world, a world separate from the one his wife and children lived in, from the one where he toiled. Walking down the street and seeing someone you'd met in that house broke down that fantasy, and fantasy was no small part of what Madam Lou was selling. Any time Bono or Edge expressed a need to leave the house for some item or service, Madam Lou would laugh at the ridiculous notion. "Why go out in those cold, muddy streets when we can have it delivered to our door?" she said.

***********

There were a few days when the girls were allowed to leave, and one of them was Christmas. But even then, many girls chose to stay at the parlor house, on account of they had no family nearby, or were ashamed to visit relatives because of their profession. Christmas was a strange day to be working at Madam Lou's. The staff was reduced and business was slow. Those who were left, for want of a family, became a family themselves for the day. They gathered around the piano, sang, drank, had a laugh. The odd soul who for one reason or another found himself visiting Madam Lou's place on Christmas Day was invited not just to choose a girl but to join the merriment. Some men did not take a girl upstairs, but bought rounds of drinks. The parlor was a plush, cozy, inviting place year-round, but on Christmas Day it was so warm and cheerful, those in attendance couldn't imagine that the ones who'd gone home could be enjoying themselves as much.

The night cook, whose name was Chicago because that's where he was from, conjured up a fantastic Christmas dinner, with an enormous goose and all the trimmings, and Bono assisted him. Chicago knew that Bono had no culinary experience when he was hired, but he didn't resent it. Perhaps Bono wasn't such a good cook, but he was pleasurable company, and that counted for a lot in a place like Madam Lou's. Bono even got a couple of girls to join them in the kitchen, so that he and Chicago wouldn't feel left out of the festivities.

After dinner, everyone gathered around the piano and sang every Christmas song they knew. Some sang songs in other languages. When they ran out of Christmas songs, it became a free-for-all, and whatever anyone sang, Edge could put a little accompaniment to it, once they'd done a verse or two.

Bridget wasn't her real name, but Madam Lou suggested she use it because that's what Americans thought all Irish girls were called. When she sang, Edge was able to play along immediately, because he'd learned the song from Bono:

I'll tell me Ma when I get home
The boys won't leave the girls alone
They pulled my hair, they stole my comb
But that's alright 'til I go home

Bono joined in for the chorus:

She is handsome, she is pretty
She is the belle of Belfast City
She is courtin' one two three
Please won't you tell me who is she? [5]

Bridget was delighted to hear another Irish voice. When the song was over, she and Bono sat on the chesterfield in the corner and chatted.

"I'm from Cork," she said, pushing a strand of hair behind her ear. Bono was listening to her so intently, she got nervous. "My brother came here and opened a shop. When he'd made enough money, he sent for me. But it took so long for me to get all the way here." She turned away and looked out the window. Though there was not a tear, nor a break in her voice, she simply could not face him as she explained, "He caught pneumonia. By the time I got here he was dead."

"And that's why you came to this place," Bono said.

"I had nowhere else I could go. But Madam Lou has been very good to me. I wish it weren't so that I must take up this profession, but since I must, I am glad it is with her."

Bridget told him all about the carriage ride she took when she'd first arrived. "I didn't want to do it. I was so embarrassed. But Madam Lou told me she does it for all the girls when they arrive. She rented the carriage and just paraded me through the streets, to show everyone that she had a new girl. That was a month ago. And I haven't been outside since."

"Same here," said Bono, "only I didn't get a carriage ride."

When the others retired to the couches, they demanded another performance from Bridget and Bono.

"Teach us some Limericks!" said Chicago.

"Ah, well," Bono said, and smiled mischievously. "I don't know any Limericks, but I do know a Cork."

Bridget looked at him inquisitively. "What's a Cork?"

Putting on his best poker face, Bono said, "It's an epic poem, that consists entirely of bragging."

No one got the joke except Bridget, but Bono didn't intend the joke for anyone but her, and it made him happy when she laughed.

Edge came over and sat next to Bono, and Bono slung an arm around him, confident that no one here would look at them strangely. And indeed, even the one customer who was in the parlor at that moment was too enthralled by all the pretty, giddy girls to notice that any other men were there at all.

When they returned to their room in the early morning hours, Bono and Edge found a box on the table, tied with narrow red ribbon, and a card was attached that said, in elegant script, Merry Christmas, Lou. Bono opened it and found inside bottles of colored glass, each one a different shape, and all of them filled with scented oil. Some had words in French on the labels.

Bono sat on the bed and examined them one by one, while Edge lit a fire. "I don't understand. What is all this oil for?"

Edge squeezed his eyes shut and smiled. "Think about it for a minute."

Bono shrugged. He tipped a few drops onto his fingers and rubbed them together. Then his face lit up, and he blushed deeply. The idea was still a novelty to him. "Oh," he said.

Edge laughed. "Yes. Oh."

"Can we try it tonight?"

"By tonight, you mean this morning?"

"Please? It's not that late. I'm not tired."

Bono started taking off Edge's clothes. He wouldn't let Edge take off anything himself. When he was done, he made Edge do the same for him.

"Is it supposed to feel good? I mean, for both of us?"

"I think so," Edge said, just because he thought it would be the best thing to say. He really had no idea.

"How do we start?"

"Well, come here and get under the covers with me, and we'll figure it out."

Edge thought it would be best if at first Bono laid on his belly and Edge lay alongside him, to get him ready. Because Edge needed to use his right hand, he pushed Bono over to the right side of the bed. He took up the different bottles, and decided that one wasn't very different from another.

"It's peculiar, being on your side of the bed," Bono said while he waited, and Edge had nothing to say in response. He poured the oil on his fingers, then put his fingers where he'd put them that evening in the summer, when they'd bathed in the pool. This time, though, when he found the little dent, he pushed a bit. Bono groaned. Edge stopped trying to get his fingers inside, and instead put oil on them again and just rubbed some more, kissing Bono's neck and shoulder as he did so. Bono started to move his hips, rubbing himself against the clean, soft sheets. Edge followed Bono's rhythm, bit by bit, pushing with his fingers, gently. Bono began to make high, bewildered noises, but he kept moving, so Edge saw no reason to stop. He could feel the powerful muscles clenching around his finger, and he thought about how that would feel on his prick. Bono was grunting now, pushing back harder, and suddenly he said "Oh, Edge, it does feel good, now." Edge thought he should try another finger. Getting the second one in was easier than the first. The slick oil was so helpful. He was sure Bono was ready now.

He slowly took his fingers out, and Bono made another noise. Edge took hold of Bono's hip and rolled him onto his side, so they were back-to-front. With Bono's body so close against his, hot and shaking with anticipation, Edge had to be careful when he put the oil on himself, that he didn't finish then and there. He whispered to Bono, little reassuring words, as he grabbed Bono's thigh and pulled it back over his own. Bono felt Edge's prick pressed up against him, warm and hard and smooth with oil. The slippery feeling brought all sorts of noises out of him. When Edge pushed, Bono pushed back, and it happened so fast. The feeling of Edge's prick going in, all the way in, was more than Bono could stand, and he started to whimper and squirm uncontrollably. Edge had to hold him tight, lest he wriggle his way off the bed. He wasn't sure what he should do, except wait for Bono to calm down. He tried not to move; all he could think about was the way his prick was being squeezed, and he had to restrain himself.

It seemed that Bono had gotten comfortable, and he settled down, and they lay still for a moment. Edge had his arm around Bono, a hand over his heart, feeling the thundering of it behind his ribcage. He slid the hand, slick with sweat, down to Bono's hip, and held it tight. He slowly pulled almost all the way out, and them pushed back in. Bono clutched at the sheets as Edge did this again and again. After a while, he switched to shorter, quicker strokes, and Bono unclenched one fist from the pile of sheets and began stroking himself, in time.

"I'm almost there," Edge warned him, and grunted with each thrust until he finally cried out, a sharp animal sound. In the heat of the moment he bit Bono's neck, and Bono howled as his own climax washed over him, and the pain of penetration came afresh, his muscles tightening around Edge involuntarily. But for a moment, a tiny moment, all the pain felt good.

In the thick silence that followed their bout, Edge feared that the whole planet had heard them, and knew what they had done. He imagined the effect that this worldwide awareness would have on their daily lives. But after a moment he felt the little slip of separation, and he was too exhausted even to lift his arm off Bono, and Edge decided that he didn't care how much noise they had made. With his last scrap of energy, he pulled Bono tighter against him.

***********

It is said that, in a house of ill repute, the girls tend to be like their madam. Well, Madam Lou's house was not of ill repute; it enjoyed a favorable reputation, in fact, among Seattle's governors, entrepreneurial elite, and law enforcement. But the axiom held true.

Lou Graham was a woman of many facets. At the Opera House, she could pass for a duchess, and in her parlor, she could tell a bawdy joke with a wink and a smile, to the delight of all present. This versatility was essential to her appeal, and Lou Graham set up her establishment to complement it. No man who surveyed her parlor would be disappointed, for it catered to any taste: Vanessa, the dark temptress who could dance the tango and deliver steamy pillow talk in French or Italian; Kitty, the good-time girl who never tired of showing off her pearly smile and her bottomless catalogue of flirty one-liners. Sophia, a blushing flower of a girl who convinced every man that he was her very first customer; Kim, a Chinese girl with tiny feet and a demure gaze that promised to reveal all the mysteries of the East, should she be chosen. Madam Lou kept these girls, and twenty more besides, for every taste, every whim, every desire.

Bono and Edge were timid around the girls at first, for fear of offending them or seeming too forward, but the girls took to them promptly, drawing the two men into their world. Soon, Bono and Edge knew every girl's story; perhaps she was saving money to travel or go to school, or she might secretly be waiting for the day a gentleman customer fell in love with her and married her, so she could leave the profession. When the girls invited them to play games to pass the time, they learned which girls were strategists, and which ones were gamblers. They also quickly learned about all the rivalries in the house. Madam Lou had to keep some girls on different shifts, if two were enemies but each too valuable to lose. Bono admired the way Madam Lou managed these two dozen clever females. And he enjoyed getting to know the girls, finding out who showed their true selves in the parlor, and who was play-acting…

***********

Bono was trying to re-create a dish that Chicago had taught him when Kitty came into the kitchen. She was all smiles, as usual, and was on the arm of a customer. Bono moved to shove them back out the door.

"What are you doing? He can't come in here!"

Kitty would not let Bono push her. "This gentleman has an offer for you," she said. The customer, a well-heeled man holding a top hat in his free hand, looked everywhere except at Bono and stammered. He could not get a proper word out.

"He picked me," Kitty said on his behalf, "but he was wondering if perhaps there was another man who could join us. I told him about you, and ---"

"You told him what about me?"

"I only told him you were here. He offered to pay the evening rate for each of us, five for you, and five for me."

Now that the proposal was out in the open, the gentleman looked directly at Bono, straight-backed and no less dignified than if he'd just asked Bono to have a share in one of his textile factories. Whatever it was that he wanted another man to join him in bed for, he made it clear that Bono was just the man for the job.

"I'm sorry, sir," said Bono, "but I'm not available for any service that is not immediately concerned with this kitchen."

"I'll pay you ten," the gentleman said, his eyes daring Bono not to accept the offer.

"The madam would not allow it."

Kitty was thrilled by the thought of such a princely sum as ten dollars for an afternoon's work. "Bono, Madam Lou wouldn't have to know."

"His name is Bono?"

"Well now, that's not his real name, sweetie," Kitty said, a patted the gentleman's arm. Kitty never lost her good-natured disposition; that was why men picked her.

The gentleman did not seem to be overly concerned with names. "Fifty. That's my final offer."

"I'm sorry," said Bono, "but I cannot. In this house I have interests beyond Madam Lou's disapproval." Then through clenched teeth he added, "And Kitty should know that."

The gentleman seemed to suspect that Bono was just playing a game. "Fine. One hundred. It's all I have with me."

The gentleman held out a fistful of cash, as though he knew it was a sum greater than Bono had ever held in his own hands. But the sight of it had little effect on Bono. Really, what use did he have for all that money? Perhaps he didn't earn very much working for Madam Lou, but she furnished nearly anything he could ask for. His whole life, he had never had money, and still he lived and breathed. All he'd ever had was Edge, and he'd lost his desire for everything else.

"Keep your money," Bono said. "There are boys on the street who will do anything you want, and they need the cash more than I do."

The gentleman left in a huff, promising as he went that he would never return.

"Are you stupid?" said Kitty, as soon as there was no one else around to see her. The fury in her eyes made Bono take a step back. "Think of what we could have done with that money. A hundred dollars could have sent Bridget back home to your precious Ireland." She turned and left before he could say anything.

Bono never told Edge about what had happened.

***********

That night, as they undressed, Edge said, "I want to show you the object that I treasure most in life right now." He went over to the door and made a big show of turning the lock. "A lock," he said. "Privacy. It's all I wanted when we were in the Mounted." From then on, the word "privacy" would always sound erotically charged, to Bono's ears.

They sat on the end of the bed, their bodies turned toward each other, and they kissed with sumptuous slowness. Edge reached out a hand to Bono's shoulder and pulled him down, so they both lay on their backs. They looked up at the ceiling, while their hands wandered to play with each others' pricks.

"Did you really want to be with me," Bono said, "when we were at Fort Walsh?"

"Sometimes, at night, it was all I could think about."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Bono's playful hand slowed down, so Edge could speak coherently.

"What good would it have done?" Edge said. "If we were caught at it, we would have been thrown out." There was a long silence, where both their hands stopped. "Sometimes I thought about it. Telling you. I imagined that we were on patrol together, and we had to camp somewhere in the wilderness. And we would be all alone, in our little tent, and we could do whatever we wanted, and no one would have to know."

Bono laughed and returned to his task while he spoke to Edge, his hand traveling down Edge's prick to cup the sack and rub the insides of his thighs. "I guess you're more practical than I am. I used to think about just crawling in bed with you. After lights-out, I'd wait until everyone was asleep, and I'd get into your bed, and we'd unbutton our shirts and our trousers, and just rub against each other. I thought about how my prick would feel against your warm belly, on a cold night. Then just before dawn, I could get back in my own bed and no one would be the wiser."

"I think I knew…oh…sometimes, when you'd been imagining that. The next morning…faster…the next morning you would look at me like we'd actually done that." Edge's hand tightened around Bono, trying to match his pace. Bono lifted his other hand and tightened his fingers around Edge's, to get him to squeeze harder.

"Oh, I wanted to so badly," Bono said. "Sometimes I thought I would die of despair, when I was at Fort Walsh. That was when I wanted you the most. I didn't want to die not knowing what you felt like."

"Was I worth the wait?" Edge managed to say between breaths.

"I would have waited another eight years, if I'd known how good it would be." With that, Bono climbed on top of Edge and began to rub himself against Edge's belly. With a big cozy bed and a lock on the door, it was much different than the fantasy he described, but the excitement of being with Edge was still fresh, and what they were doing was as thrilling here as it would have been in the barracks.

Bono pumped his hips, keeping his mouth close to Edge's ear. "Your prick feels so good against my skin. And it feels so good inside me." This was as much as Edge could take. He cried out, and Bono loved the sudden warm slickness between them, and did not last much longer.

As they lay spent on the bed, Bono thought about the lock on the door, and how unnecessary it seemed at that moment, because it felt to him like there was no one else in the world except for him and Edge.

FOUR - MARCH 1886

As the years went by, new girls arrived and others left. Vanessa bid the house farewell to tour the Mediterranean with her savings. Sophia, the blushing flower, had married, but the rumor was that her husband had fallen on hard times, and he was forcing her to continue her profession. Bono and Edge were sad to see their friends leave, some for far-off places, but they knew it was for the best. A brothel was no place to grow old.

Edge felt strange whenever a girl left. For him, this life of velvet, champagne, laughter, and rouge was a dream-state, and seeing others wake up from it made him think that one day he ought to do the same. Something kept him rooted here, happy enough to stay but not so thoroughly satisfied that he didn't think about leaving. The world outside, the waking world, just seemed so difficult. Out there it was hard to make money, to keep warm, to stay in good health.

Edge never bothered to ask Bono if he felt the same. He knew how Bono felt, and how he would always feel, no matter what happened. Restless.

***********

When Bono came down the stairs to begin his shift, he found the parlor unoccupied and the curtains closed. The eerie silence told them something was very wrong, because there was not one hour of the day when the parlor was empty. Madam Lou came bustling in, peeking through the curtains and muttering.

"What's going on?" Bono said. "Where are the girls?"

"The girls are in their rooms. We're closed for business today."

"Closed? What for?"

Two gunshots rang out; Madam Lou dropped the curtain-edge and stepped away from the window. "That is what for," she said. "They're trying to drive the Chinese out. It's turned into a riot."

"A riot? What about Lee? Is he alright?"

"Lee is fine," said the madam. "He's at my house, and no one knows he's there."

Bono had a look out the window. South Washington Street seemed to be the fringe of the commotion. Men raced by, one or two at a time. Most of them were white, with guns, a few were Chinese, without. The most recent immigrants could easily be identified by their braids and coolie hats.

"You and Edge should stay upstairs today."

"I'll take some food to the girls," Bono said. "Then I'll go back upstairs."

"Tell them, then, that the governor has declared martial law. No one is to leave this place under any circumstances."

Bono made sandwiches, then went knocking on doors. He wanted to hurry back upstairs to his room, where he could get a better look at what was going on.

Edge had been at their window for a while, ever since the shots had been fired. When Bono came in, Edge waved him over. "So far as I can tell," he said, "they're not shooting at the Chinese. They're shooting at the rioters. See the ones who are all wearing the same color cap? I think those are militia men. Someone tried to take a gun from one of them, and that's when the shooting started."

The bodies of white men lay in the muddy streets, but no Chinese. Bono's gaze traveled from the street below to the sliver of the bay that was visible between the buildings. Hundred of men were gathered on the pier, some of them being herded onto a steamer. [6]

"What is this? This just came out of nowhere."

Edge shook his head. "You haven't been reading the newspapers. The economy is sinking. People don't like the Chinese because they're taking jobs from white men."

"I haven't heard anyone around here mention the economy."

Edge rolled his eyes. "Bono, we work in a brothel that caters to millionaires and politicians. Business is always good here, no matter what's going on out there."

By now, there were no more Chinese to be seen in the streets. They'd all been forced onto the pier, with what little luggage they could collect. The battle in the streets now seemed to be white-on-white. Few shots were fired, but there was much striking with the butts of rifles.

"This is ridiculous," Bono said. He spoke directly to particular men he saw down in the street. "Yes, that's the way, meet violence with violence, that will calm the rioters right down! How can there be any Americans left if they spend all their time shooting at each other?"

"That's the policeman in you talking," Edge said. "We're not policemen anymore. We've got no right to be down there."

"I've had it with all this not being a policeman anymore!" Bono started to pace, like a prisoner. "I've had it with being cooped up in this place! I'm thirty-five years old; my life is half over, and all I am is a cook in a brothel. That's how far I've gotten. Maybe in the Mounted I wasn't happy all the time---"

"You were incessantly miserable."

"Maybe in the Mounted I was incessantly miserable, but at least I had a feeling every so often that I was doing something worthwhile! People are dying down there, and I've been trained to help them, and so have you."

At last Edge moved from the window. He followed Bono as he paced.

"Now you regret deserting," said Edge.

"Don't you?"

"No. Because in the last five years, you and I have shared something we couldn't have had, if we'd stayed in the Mounted."

What Edge said froze Bono in his tracks, and he was struck silent. His mind raced, but in the end he had to admit Edge was right. The duty he felt he had to his country, to the world, could not be reconciled with what he felt for Edge. He thought about a time and a place where he could march out that door and subdue that angry mob, provide aid to those who were hurt, but where Edge would still be beyond his reach. And he cursed himself, for being so selfish that he would abandon the world and its problems just for Edge's affection. What had happened to him, to make him feel that way?

Deep down, so deep that he could not form the words to speak it, he feared that this love would keep him places where he would not otherwise allow himself to be kept.

***********

Neither Bono nor Edge had had a proper haircut since their days in the Mounted Police; they had let it grow long. It just never occurred to them to cut it, and Madam Lou never brought it up. It seemed to Bono that one day he felt his hair getting in his eyes, and he tied it back, and only then did he realize it was indeed long enough to tie back. He thought the look suited him, so he kept it. Perhaps Edge felt the same way; he never mentioned it.

One night, when they were in their room, Bono came up behind Edge and whispered, "You've been hiding something from me." Edge's puzzlement left him still as a statue, until Bono pushed his hair aside and said, "Never mind, I've found it," and kissed the nape of Edge's neck. He heard the little stutter in Edge's breathing, and smiled. Then he came around for a proper kiss.

For Bono, kissing was the best, because if the kiss was good and long, he could feel it all over his body, without even having to take his clothes off. And if Edge's tongue darted in and out of his mouth, well, that was practically making love right there.

Once, Edge came into the kitchen for his lunch, and there was no one around, so he gave Bono a quick kiss. But to Bono, there was no such thing as a quick kiss; he turned it into a long kiss. In the close heat of the kitchen, the tip of Bono's tongue traced Edge's lips, the part just inside, where it became moist. Bridget walked in and saw them. She apologized, turning bright red and racing out the door almost before they realized she was there. They were a little embarrassed, but really, the girls all knew about them. Edge laid his hand flat on Bono's chest, over his heart.

"I just realized," he said. "You know, what we do is against the law."

Bono chuckled. "I guess we're in the right sort of place, then, if we're going to be social deviants."

"And you know," Edge whispered, "that it is also a sin in the eyes of God."

Bono put his hand over Edge's, and as he went in for another kiss, he said, "God will forgive us."

***********

It was too warm to keep the fire going. Instead, Edge burned candles to illuminate the corner of the room where the bathtub stood. Bono was in the tub, hunched over with his arms around his knees, while Edge scrubbed his back. Bono's strategy was to never actually suggest anything, just to lean forward or back, or shift himself to expose whatever part of his body he wanted Edge to wash next. When he was bored with the back-scrubbing, he reclined and put his arms on the rim of the tub, and Edge soaped his chest, then down to his belly. But when Bono spread his knees until they touched the sides, Edge decided to be a tease, and kept to Bono's legs.

"You are completely spoiled," Edge said.

As the sponge gradually made its way to the insides of his thighs, Bono groaned and moved his body in any way he could to get Edge to wash where he really wanted to be washed.

"You love to spoil me," Bono said, and the tone of his voice made Edge give in. He pressed the sponge right up between Bono's legs, and Bono rubbed himself against it. Edge leaned forward, hoping to get a kiss, but Bono had his eyes closed and didn't see him. He rubbed a bit more, then said, "I want to get out now."

Dropping the sponge, Edge put a hand on Bono's shoulder, to keep him in the tub a moment longer, so he could put down some towels. One towel he folded up, and laid it alongside the tub. The last one he held up to wrap Bono in as he got out.

"What's the folded-up towel for?" Bono asked.

As he helped Bono to get out, Edge replied, "For your knees."

Edge guided Bono to a kneeling position at the tub, and placed Bono's hands on the rim. He kneeled behind him and began to dry him. Leaning over him, Edge rubbed Bono's skin until it was pink.

"What does that mean," Edge said, "that I spoil you? Does it mean I treat you better than you deserve?"

Bono sighed happily. The towel felt so good, and Edge rubbed just a little harder and rougher than he would have done himself. "It means you've ruined me for anyone else, because no one else will ever care for me the way you have."

When Edge dropped the towel, Bono's skin was still damp. Touching damp skin was different; he couldn't skim lightly over it with his fingertips. The friction slowed him down, forced him to savor the texture of Bono's skin, feel the muscle and fat underneath it.

Edge always took his time. When he first poured the oil into his hand, he just rubbed it in, starting at the base of Bono's spine and working down, all the way until he was gently kneading the sack. He went back for more oil, but still did not use it to try to penetrate. He knew that if he was patient, Bono would ask to be penetrated. Edge liked it better when he was asked. And if he hesitated, Bono would ask again, more urgently.

Leaning forward, Edge curled one arm around Bono's ribs. When his finger was in the right place, Bono whispered "Please" for the third or fourth time, and Edge finally complied.

Edge nudged at the pleasurable spot inside Bono a few times, then slowly retreated to put more oil on his fingers. He used too much, spreading it liberally, because he knew Bono was excited by the slippery feeling. Edge started to push his finger in again, but Bono protested. "I don't want to wait anymore," he said.

For the first time, Edge hurried, to get out of his clothes. Bono did not turn his head to look; he waited to feel Edge get close to him again, to feel Edge's warm, dry, naked skin against his own. Edge tapped the insides of Bono's thighs, to let him know it was time to spread his legs much wider. Edge looked down as he got his knees between Bono's, and became more excited at the sight of it, the way their bodies moved into place against each other. He understood that once he was inside Bono, he would have to hold still for a short while, so after he pushed up inside he grabbed Bono's hips and pulled down, so he could sit comfortably on his heels while Bono rested on top of him.

Edge knew the sound of Bono getting comfortable. The first noises he made where high whimpers, sounds of pain, but he would move around on Edge's prick, finding the way to make it feel better, and then the low noises would come; deep groans, and then short, quiet grunts as he began moving up and down, up and down. Edge did not really need to move; once Bono started feeling the pleasure, he did all the work. He gripped the rim of the tub, fingers squeaking against the wet brass, and pushed Edge's prick into himself at just the angle he wanted. There were some moments where Edge didn't feel directly involved; he just liked to watch Bono, and listen to him.

Bono worked himself into a frenzy, his movements and sounds spiraling almost out of control. But suddenly he stopped, took his hands off the tub, and fell back against Edge's chest, knowing Edge would support him. His head tilted back to rest on Edge's shoulder, and they were cheek to cheek.

"Help me finish," he pleaded, breathlessly.

Edge's arm tightened around Bono, his fingertips resting on a stiff pink nipple. With his other hand he stroked Bono's prick, hard and fast, knowing that at this point teasing would not be tolerated. Bono was already so close, and when Edge began to thrust, matching the short strokes of his hand, it was all over. Edge could feel the sudden, hot wetness on his hand, hotter even than Bono's skin.

He waited while Bono came down, unwound, collapsed in his arms. Bono was aware that Edge was still hard inside him, but he felt powerless to do anything about it. Edge held the limp body in his arms for a while, patient, feeling a little awkward. Finally, Bono whispered, "What do you want me to do for you now?"

Edge cleared his throat. "You can just… I mean, you can lean over the tub again. I'll only take another minute."

Edge's body was screaming for release, but Bono's slow, luxurious movements, the way he lifted himself out of Edge's arms, the pull of the muscles in his shoulders as he settled back into position, made Edge want to continue slowly. He tried, but found it was no good. Slow was for the beginning. He thrust two, three, four times in a quick, no-nonsense fashion, and reached his peak, feeling he could not top the passion, depth, and splendor of Bono's climax. But for Edge, it was not about himself, it was about it being good for Bono.

There was a moment of stillness, and then a little contraction of muscles that pushed Edge's soft prick out of Bono's body. "A lot of good that bath did," Edge said, and grabbed the sponge to give both of them a once-over before bed.

Bono grinned, weakly. "Did you think the point of bathing me was to get me clean?"

Bono would not get up. He waited for Edge to stand, then sighed, "Put me to bed, Edge," and stayed on the floor until Edge helped him up. Edge pulled back the blankets for him, and covered him up when he was in the bed. Some of the candles had guttered; the rest Edge put out, save for one, which he took with him as he walked to his side of the bed. Bono was already asleep.

FIVE - JUNE 1889

Edge was just finishing up for the night; one could always tell, because the last song he played every night was Oft In the Stilly Night. [7] As he gathered up the sheet music, a man approached. He sat right down on the bench next to Edge. Though finely dressed, he smelled like he'd had too much to drink.

"Piano player. Listen, I'm new in town." He clapped a hand down on Edge's shoulder. "Help me decide which of these slags I should take to bed."

Edge swatted the man's hand and stood up. "Sir, there are no slags here. These girls are my friends."

"Right, right." The man was swaying back and forth, trying to whisper. "But come now, you must have had a few yourself. Which ones are worth my money?"

Edge gave the man a hard shove straight off the bench and to the floor. The girls looked to see what the commotion was. Edge got down on the ground to get eye-to-eye with the man again, grabbing and twisting his starched collar. "No one talks about the girls here that way. Your money is worth nothing if you do. Now, there are two ways you can leave this establishment. One of them doesn't involve me knocking your teeth out first."

The man sobered up considerably at that moment. Edge helped him get up, and pointed him in the direction of the door. Stumbling every step of the way, the man beat a hasty retreat.

The girls stared. All Edge could do was shrug. "New Money," he said. "So uncouth." He left them agape and made his way upstairs. He couldn't believe what he'd just done, any more than they could.

Bono was already upstairs, shirt unbuttoned, standing at the window. Edge was growing tired of finding him like this. "Why don't you come to bed?" he said, as he undressed. The sheets were pleasantly cool on his skin.

Bono did not move. "In a minute." He continued to gaze out the window. Electricity lit the streets now, and the docks.

Edge shifted. "I mean, if you don't want to…"

"I want to. Just give me a minute."

"If you like, I can come over there, and you can lean on the windowsill…"

That got a smile out of Bono. Edge could see it reflected in the window. "Alright," Bono said. "I'm coming." He stripped and got in bed. Edge had been kind enough to warm Bono's side of the bed as well.

"I'm going crazy in this place," Bono said for the thousandth time, keeping himself propped on one elbow. "It's not healthy to live this way."

"Do you want to leave?" Edge asked, for the thousandth time. He put a hand flat against the small of Bono's back and drew him closer.

"Well, no, I mean, not right this second…"

Edge played with Bono's prick to get it hard, rubbing the foreskin against the head with his fingertips. Bono continued, "This is a lucky life we have. We're safe, we're comfortable. But being…oh…being safe and comfortable isn't…oh…isn't everything."

"You just need some air. Tomorrow we'll go outside and have a walk around the city. You'll feel better."

Edge pushed the covers down, because he liked to watch what he was doing to Bono. He squeezed Bono's prick, gave it a few quick, tender tugs. Bono was starting to forget about the agony of being a shut-in. He pushed into that hand, and his head dropped onto Edge's shoulder. It must have been a little cold in the room, to be having the covers off; Edge saw goosebumps all down Bono's body. But his breath on Edge's neck was so hot. His seed shot across Edge's belly, and Edge kept squeezing his prick until Bono pushed the hand away.

Bono thought that he was completely spent, but when he opened his eyes, Edge had his fingers in the seed on his belly. When he lifted them to his mouth to have a taste, Bono felt one more deep pulse of pleasure at the sight.

Edge's prick was twitching, and Bono watched it for a moment. Then he said, "Do you want me to use my hand, or my mouth?"

Edge smiled. "Mmm..I like your mouth."

Bono pushed his hair behind his ears and scooted down to where Edge's prick waited for him. He was sleepy from his own climax; he didn't try any tricks or do anything special. He just took Edge lazily in his mouth and sucked, slowly swirling his tongue. Edge didn't push, he didn't try to make Bono go faster. He waited for the climax to come to him, thinking about how soft the sheets were on his skin, and about the warm wetness of Bono's mouth. In the dim candle light he watched Bono's head bobbing up and down.

"I'm close," he whispered. Bono speeded up a bit, and Edge was overcome with a feeling of warm sweetness. Bono's mouth was flooded with the familiar taste of him, hot and too salty.

Bono didn't bother to move back up the pillow. He lay curled up next to Edge's thighs and dozed off.

***********

It was Monday afternoon. Edge walked into the parlor to find the girls relaxing, basking in the gentle sunlight coming through the sheer curtains. They chatted with Madam Lou and had tea and biscuits.

"Madam Lou," he said, "do you have any errands that I can run for you today?"

"Isn't today your day off?"

"We'd like to go out, if it's alright with you." Whenever he said "we," everyone knew who Edge meant. "If you need something picked up, or…?"

Madam Lou put a finger to her pursed lips and thought for a moment. "As a matter of fact, there is something." She went into her office and returned with an envelope. She took Edge out of the parlor and told him, "A gentleman caught a dose from one of the girls last month. I of course offered to pay his doctor's bill. Can you take this to Doctor Brown? His office is up the hill, one block north of the college."

"Yes, ma'am." Edge took the envelope and went to fetch Bono.

When he explained what the trip was for, Bono asked, "Which girl?"

"Excuse me?"

"Which girl did he catch a dose from?"

"What does it matter?"

Bono grinned. "So I know not to go to bed with her!"

They took a roundabout route to Dr. Brown's office, walking through the part of town known as the Lava Beds. This was where Bono and Edge had roomed while working for the lumber mill, and it had gotten much worse in the years since. Saloons, cheap hotels, and brothels of a lower caliber than Lou Graham's rose from this marshy patch of land, a lagoon that had been built up with sawdust and debris from the mills. Here, nearest the water, toilets emptied right into the bay, and the stench was overwhelming. The pollution discouraged all living creatures except rats, who were breeding out of control and spreading disease. As for Seattle's human population, it had quadrupled since Bono and Edge had arrived, but the quality of the plumbing had not. The city seemed in danger of drowning in its own filth.

Edge was mortified. "Well now," he said, "I'm glad I made this suggestion. I'm sure we'll both feel better now, going out for a stroll, getting some fresh air…" He sighed.

"You know what would be good for this city?" said Bono. "If it burned to the ground." As they went up the hill, he said, "I just can't believe it. Did the city look like this when we got here? Or does it just seem nastier because we've been living in the lap of luxury?"

Edge shook his head. "There's more horse manure in the street than there is street."

Where the avenues once seemed wide and empty, they were now overcrowded with carriages. Some streetcars had been installed, but they were not enough to stem the flow of traffic. Bono and Edge had to step off the wooden sidewalks and tramp through the mud in order to get through the pedestrian crowds. And all around, clapboard tenement houses threatened to collapse on them.

***********

It was a sound that Bono had not heard before: the clanging of an alarm bell. He looked up from the stove, and determined that the sound was coming from the south. He pushed the curtains open to look out the window. What he saw drained the blood from his face; a plume of black smoke rose from two blocks over. Paralyzed, he watched in horror as the smoke filled the sky. The sound of Madam Lou's laughter from the parlor made him move. He raced out to where she was greeting a customer, a first-timer, and instructing the girls to introduce themselves. In this room, the faint ringing of the alarm was drowned by the din of conversation and the lively sound of the piano. Bono did not want to frighten anyone. "Madam Lou," he whispered. "Will you come to the kitchen, please? There's something I think you need to see."

By the time the madam was at the window, they could see not only smoke, but flames.

"Oh, merciful heavens," she said, and her hand flew to cover her heart.

"The fire will surely spread here. We need to get everyone out. If you tell the girls in the parlor, I'll go knock on doors."

"Yes, go, go," said Madam Lou.

First Bono fetched Edge, who was still at the piano. He whispered about the fire. "Go upstairs and get our money," he said. "And get everyone off the third floor. I'll take the second floor. Meet me outside."

Edge nodded and calmly got up, just as the girls in the parlor began to scream.

"Ladies!" Bono hollered over them. "Ladies! There is still time to take anything precious from your rooms, but please do it quickly and calmly. Don't try to take anything you can't carry yourself!"

Bono darted up and down the second-floor hallways, pounding on doors. Girls and customers emerged, one by one or two by two, some in clothes which had obviously been put on in haste. The girls carried jewelry, letters, and money in their fists.

When Bono met Edge outside, they could see that the fire had not yet reached Madam Lou's block, but it was headed that way. They would not allow any of the girls back in, but Bono told Chicago he should quickly find another man to help him save as much as he could from the house. Lou asked him to start with paintings and sculptures, things which could not be replaced. Then, without a word to each other, Bono and Edge set out for the nearby buildings, making sure everyone had evacuated safely. The landlord of a rooming house told them, "There are two people left in my building. A young lady, she won't leave her grandfather."

"What room?"

"Sixteen. Second floor!"

Flames licked at the south side of the rooming house, and smoke was coming in the windows. Bono and Edge could hardly breathe. In room sixteen there was indeed a girl, who sat at the bedside of an old man.

"Miss, you've got to get out of here," said Edge. "This whole building is going to be on fire in a few minutes!"

"Fire?" said the old man hoarsely.

"I'm not leaving my grandfather here," she said, coolly, as though she were refusing an offer to take a stroll in the park.

"You don't have to," said Edge. He went over to the bed and lifted the old man out. The man was just skin and bones, hardly anything to carry. Edge told Bono to grab the sheet off the bed.

Bono led the way out, taking the woman's hand and guiding her down the stairs. When they were in the street, Bono laid the sheet down and Edge gently set the old man on it. He barked orders to Madam Lou's girls, who were sitting idle on the sidewalk while the men rescued furniture from the buildings. "Ladies! I need you to grab the corners of this blanket. Carry this man as far north as possible. Don't leave him, or the girl!"

Edge then took off down the street to the livery, the place where Madam Lou would rent carriages to show off new girls. There were horses still in their stables; they had seen the fire, and were going mad, locked in their stalls. Edge took off his jacket and covered their eyes so they would let themselves be led. Once out, Bono herded them north. But when the sawmill burst from the heat, the noise spooked the horses and they took off, too fast and too many for Bono to catch. Instead, he turned around and organized the girls into a bucket brigade, which stretched from Madam Lou's to the bay.

By now, the parlor house was being consumed by the flames, as was the church across the way. The priest stood outside and wept. Madam Lou watched Bono and Edge as they darted up and down the street, seeing every living creature they encountered to safety. "I've had those men in my employ for eight years," she said, "and I thought I knew them well, but I had no idea they were so heroic. They're behaving like policemen." This was not entirely true, as the actual policemen were focused on firing at looters.

The noise became unbearable. Alarm bells rang and steam whistles shrieked. Twenty tons of cartridges in a hardware store were exploding, and more bursts came from saloons full of whiskey barrels. A person couldn't discern the number or direction of policemen's gunshots; anyone could have been in the line of fire. But worst of all were the screams of women and children.

Human effort was no use. The fire just burned itself out, in half a day, which was all the time it took to level the city. Miraculously, not a single human life was lost. But nearly everything was gone. All the buildings had been wood, and the fire devoured everything in its path. [8]

Bono and Edge found Lou and her girls after the fire was out, huddled along Third Avenue as the evening winds blew. Clustered around them were the madam's works of art, and furniture.

"I'm so sorry, Madam Lou," Bono said, and put his hand on her shoulder. "But no one is hurt, at least."

Madam Lou dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief. "Yes, that is the most important thing." She gazed at the ruins of her parlor house. "You know, I think I'll build another one," she said, her voice suddenly inspired. "Only this time it will be brick. Yes, I imagine this whole city should be rebuilt in brick. And as soon as it is built, you gentlemen are welcome to be my cook and piano player once more."

Bono and Edge glanced at each other. "Actually, Madam Lou, I think that Edge and I…" Bono looked to Edge once more for a nod of approval, and Edge gave it. "I think that the time has come for us to be moving on."

"Moving on? You mean you're going to leave? For good?"

"I think so. You've been very good to us, but…Working in your house, it's just not the life for us. We're going to leave Seattle."

"But where will you go?"

"We're not sure yet. We're going to the docks to see what ships we can buy passage on, and where they're headed. Maybe San Francisco."

Madam Lou managed a giggle. "Yes, Seattle is quite the amateur city next to San Francisco. Why, that place has burned down three or four times already!" She folded and unfolded her handkerchief anxiously. "Are you sure I can't convince you to stay? The girls love you so."

"And we adore them. But we can't stay. We'll say goodbye to them before we go."

The girls were shocked by Bono and Edge's sudden departure, but in the end it was envy that took them, rather than grief. "I wish I had the courage you have," Kitty told them, "to just pack up and go, especially now, when there's nothing to pack up. I imagine I'll be here forever, or at least until I get too old and Madam Lou throws me out into the street."

"Don't be ridiculous," said Edge. "Madam Lou will always take care of her girls. Even tonight, she's going to put you all up in her home. Have you seen the house she lives in? I'm sure it's big enough for all of you to stay."

While Edge chatted with Kitty and the other girls, Bono sat next to Bridget. "Did you get your savings before you got out?" he asked her.

"I did," she said. "You know, I've had enough to go back home for a while now. It's just, you were all like a family to me, and I wasn't sure I could leave. But I think this is a sign that I should return to Ireland."

"I'm sorry the New World didn't agree with you."

"It's alright," she said. "No one in Cork will know what I did when I was here. But while I'm on the way home I'll have to think of some stories to tell them. Can I borrow some of yours?"

"You can," Bono said.

Edge stepped up. "Are you ready to go?" Edge knew it was no use to wait politely for Bono to finish saying goodbye to Bridget, because he never would.

"I think I'm ready. Farewell, Bridget, and may the road rise to meet you." He gave her a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

He stood up, and as he turned to go, she said, "Patricia."

"Excuse me?"

"My real name. It's not Bridget, you know. It's Patricia."

"Alright," he smiled warmly, "one for each of you, then." And he gave her another hug and kiss. She blushed. Bono and Edge waved one last time to the girls, then headed down deserted South Washington Street, toward the docks. The sun was setting.



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