Sarah Sunshine: A Montana Romance Novella by Merry Farmer Page B

saloon porch in spite of the November chill, shawls around their shoulders and paint fresh on their faces like an advertisement.  They glanced up in mild curiosity as the biddies and Sarah stopped in front of them.
    “Witness the most wretched abomination in our unfortunate town, Sarah!” Miss Jones declared, flinging out her arm.  “Our own plague of locusts!”
    The saloon girls blinked and exchanged looks.  “There ain’t no locusts in November,” one of them said.
    Miss Jones hissed in exasperation and dropped her arm heavily to her side.  “What you see before you is the worst kind of licentiousness, Sarah.  Fornication.  Women whose sole purpose is to tempt mankind into forsaking the path of righteousness.”
    “They lure the men of our town away from their homes and families and pollute them!” Miss Archer added.
    Miss Jones pursed her lips at the interruption and went on.  “They are evil harpies, every one of them, and this building they inhabit is a nest of damnation!”
    “Charming new friends you got, Sarah,” one of the saloon girls, Gertie, said, rising from her seat against the porch railing.  She flipped the long corkscrew of her honey-brown hair over her shoulder and crossed her arms under her ample bosom, looking down her nose at the biddies.  One of the other girls got up and slipped sideways into the saloon, leaving the door cracked open behind her.
    “Insolence,” Miss Pickering said.
    “That’s just Gertie,” Sarah mumbled, working herself up to meeting Miss Jones’s eyes.  “She’s loud, but she don’t mean no harm.  And the others, why, they’re just doing what they have to do, same as I was.”
    “They are not the same as you are,” Miss Jones contradicted her.  “You had the good sense to get away from this life and to come to us to reform you.  They continue to wallow in their sin.”
    “My contract is up next spring, and I’m going to Sacramento, to my sister’s family,” Lacey, another of the girls, said.
    Splotches of red formed on Miss Jones’s face.  “Harlots, the lot of them!” she ignored Lacey.  “This blight corrupts our entire town.  It should be burned to the ground.”
    “Now hold on there!”  Roy stepped forward at last.  “You can’t just go saying people’s businesses should be burned down because you don’t like them.  That’s a criminal offense.  Do I need to go get Sheriff Porter?”
    The biddies and the saloon girls both scoffed and snorted at the suggestion.  As soon as Miss Jones saw that she and the saloon girls agreed on something, her back went straighter.
    “Mr. Porter is a decent enough fellow,” she said, “but as a sheriff-”
    “He’s horse hockey,” Gertie finished.  She and the girls laughed.  The biddies clucked and fussed.  Sarah twisted the edge of her shawl.
    The saloon door swung violently open and Paul Sutcliffe stepped out onto the porch, the girl who had disappeared into the saloon peeking out behind him.
    “What the hell is going on out here?” he demanded.
    “Sarah?” Miss Jones snapped.
    “Good morning, Mr. Sutcliffe,” she greeted him, her head lowered and her hands pulling at the edge of her frayed shawl so hard that long threads were coming out.  “We’re on a Tour of Sin.”
    Paul gaped at her, concern warring with indignation in his eyes.  At last he clamped his mouth closed.  “I don’t even want to know.”  He shook his head.  “Sarah, get away from those dried up old spinsters.  Come home.”
    The biddies yelped and shivered in indignation.  “Why I never!” Miss Archer cried.
    “No, I don’t expect you have,” Gertie muttered.  She and the other saloon girls burst into snorts and giggles behind their hands.  Miss Archer’s face grew red enough to match her hair.
    “How dare you suggest that we are dried up old spinsters when our fates are your fault?” Miss Jones demanded.
    Paul blinked at her, then narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms.  “For the