Miss Lily's Place

A little tale I spun, loosely based on a visit I made to Miss Hattie's Bordello Museum in San Angelo, TX in 1997."

          “Dad, are you sure this is what you want to do?” Dana asked as she looked through the windshield at the crumbling facades of three buildings on Main Street of Kramerville, Texas.  “These buildings look like they're about to fall down!”  The tang of rain was sharp in the air and she frowned at the ominous gray and black clouds that sat like squatters on the dusty brown hills beyond the town.

            Her father's East Texas twang boomed through the speaker on her car phone.  Dana winced and pulled the receiver several inches away from her ear as he said, “'Course I do!  That university they're building is going to be a gold mine and is going to pump some money back into Kramerville.  This is just the economic kick-in-the-pants that the town needs. That place is a ghost town.”

            Dana glanced around the empty street and had to agree with her dad.  Nearly all the buildings were empty, the glass storefronts boarded up long ago or the glass broken by vandals.  The town looked like it had suffered a long, slow death.  Around two hundred citizens remained in a town that had once been five times that size.  The final blow had come when the railroad had stopped running twenty years before, in 1965.  The state was building a university nearby and her father, who had grown up in Kramerville and was now an investor, had figured that the town's economy would be revitalized by the growth.  He had bought three of the buildings at a very cheap price and had plans to turn them into profitable businesses.  He hadn't had time to look at the buildings before buying them and had asked Dana to view the properties and take photos.  “All right, Dad,” she told him.  “I'll take a look, but I think you may have been a little too ambitious.  I'll talk to you soon.”  She hung up the phone as a sudden crack of thunder announced the arrival of the deluge.   

            Dana sighed in irritation and twisted around in her seat to rummage in the back of her Trans-am for an umbrella.  The rumbling sound of a diesel engine made her look up and she smiled as she saw her grandmother and grandfather pull their old pickup truck into the space next to her.  She shoved the door open, scurried out while popping open the umbrella, and slammed the door shut with her foot as she ran for an awning nearby.  Her grandparents joined her a moment later, her grandmother grumbling, “Three months without a drop and it finally decides to rain the day we have to go out.  Figures.”  She smiled at Dana and gave her a kiss on the cheek.  “Hello, dear.” 

            Dana greeted her grandparents.  They still lived nearby on a ranch and she had asked them to join her because she thought they might know a little bit about the history of the three buildings before they had gone derelict. Her grandfather was a tall man and balding.  He wore a green and brown John Deere ball cap on his head, a red flannel shirt, and dark blue jeans over dusty work boots.  Her grandmother was petite and wore lilac polyester pants that most old ladies were fond up, plus a flowery top with pastel white, pink, and purple hibiscus flowers.     “These three are the buildings your daddy bought?” her grandfather asked.

            “Yes, these three.  I was hoping you could tell me more about them,” Dana answered, turning around to point at the three buildings that stood next to each other.  The first building was built of the local yellow limestone.  It was two stories tall and stood at the intersection of B Street and Main.   Large sheets of rotting gray plywood were nailed over what must have been plate glass windows that overlooked both streets.  Dana imagined it was a drugstore.  Old awnings covered the sidewalk and these were the awnings where Dana and her grandparents huddled now.  The second building was smaller, squatter, made from grey bricks.  The windows were smashed in, though someone had thought to duct tape clear plastic tarps over the windows to keep the weather out.  The last building was one story and built of red bricks.  The faded gold letters of “Kramerville Kafe” were just visible in one of the dirty front windows.  Ratty red-and-white checkered curtains hung in sad remnants and framed the words on either side.

            “Well, that was the cafe,” her grandmother answered, pointing at the building.  “Had a fine Reuben sandwich.  I guess it shut down about five years back.” 

            “They made a terrific apple pie,” her grandfather reminisced.  “Used to go in there every Saturday.”

            “That was the town's newspaper office,” Grandma continued, indicating the grey building.  “The Kramerville Courier.  But it was on the second floor.  The first floor was a doctor's office, I think.”

            “And this one?” Dana asked, jerking her thumb over her shoulder. 

            “Drugstore,” her grandmother snapped as if the question had irritated her.  “Just the old drugstore.”

            “I thought so, “Dana replied, wondering what had made her grandmother so annoyed all of a sudden.  The wind had picked up and the temperature had dropped, causing all three of them to shiver.  “Let's go inside, it's too cold out here.  Dad gave me the keys and I need to take pictures anyway.” 

            Dana stuck the key in the lock of the front door and had to wiggle it around to entice it to turn before it clicked loudly.  “Needs some WD-40,” her grandfather told her.  “I got some in the truck, but let's wait until the rain stops.”  The three of them hurried inside and closed the door against the rain.

            The plywood covering the windows and the storm outside allowed very little light to enter the room.  Dana had a small flashlight on her key-chain.  She switched it on and played the light around the gloomy room until she spied a light-switch on a far wall behind the counter.  Her grandmother flipped it on and only half the lights came on.  “Better than nothing,” Dana commented and looked around.  The room was almost empty, with bare shelves and a long wooden counter with a broken soda fountain.

            “Used to bring the kids here for sodas back in the day,” her grandfather remarked.  “This building's over a hundred years old.  Before this was a drug store, it was a saloon.”

            Dana noticed a closed wooden door on the back wall and she opened it, figuring it was a storeroom.   A short hallway led to a room and she could see more bare shelves.  A dark staircase on the left loomed in front of her.  She walked to the bottom step and pointed her flashlight up at the top.  Another wooden door with a cracked china doorknob appeared in the pale white beam.  “Grandpa?” she asked.  “What's up here?  An apartment?”

            Both of her grandparents appeared and the irritated look had come back to her grandmother's face.  Her grandfather cleared his throat.  “Well...that,” he drawled and a sly grin crossed his face.  “That would be Miss Lily's place.”

            “Raymond!” Grandmother warned.   

            “Just answering the girl's question,” he cranked at his wife.  “Anyway, that was years and years ago.”

            “And something that's best forgotten!”

            “Why?” her grandfather argued.  “Besides, not like anyone didn't know what this place was.  This is part of our town's history, whether you like it or not.  This place is important!”

            “What are you two talking about?” Dana demanded, baffled at her grandparents' sudden squabbling.

            Her grandmother turned to her and raised an eyebrow.  “You're so curious?  Well, you're a grown woman.  You got the key, so you just go on up and see for yourself.”

            Annoyed with her grandmother's evasive answers, Dana narrowed her eyes and snapped, “Fine!  I don't see why you can't answer a simple question!”  She stomped up the stairs, unlocked the door, and twisted the lock with impatience.  The lock gave off a high squeal and the door hinges groaned in protest as she pushed it open. 

            Dana stepped through the door and turned to the left.  A long hallway ran the length of the building and she counted eight doorways.  Faded, peeling wallpaper in a rose pattern made up of tacky bright pink, red, and green lined the walls.  A threadbare Chinese rug in a matching red and pink pattern covered the whole hallway and ended at the doorway at the front of the building.  Dana followed the hall and stepped into the room.  The floor was brown parquet and she spied several expensive sofas and side tables that she guessed dated to the 1920's.  Heavy, red velvet draperies framed the three large windows that overlooked the street below. This was a parlour and it was as if the room had been frozen in time.  At the far end was a large, oval-shaped mahogany dining table.  The places were still set as if waiting for the diners to arrive. Gaudy golden charges sat under expensive china plates.  An antique player piano occupied a corner near the windows.   A thick layer of dust covered everything and swirled up around Dana's feet as she moved around the room.

            She explored the other rooms leading off the hall and discovered a small kitchen, a bathroom complete with antique water-heater, and five bedrooms that were completely furnished and covered in dust.  Each room was a different color.  Tarnished brass plaques were affixed to each of the bedroom doors.  At first, Dana thought the second floor must have been a boarding house.  She took a better look at the plaques, though, and made out, “Miss Ruby, Miss Sapphire, Miss Honey, Miss Taffy, and Miss Lily.”

            “Oh...” she said as realization dawned on her.  A big grin crossed her face as she walked back down the hall to the parlor.

            Her grandfather had come up the stairs and was waiting for her there.  “I've never actually been up here,” he said.  “A couple of my friends patronized the place, though.  Miss Lily was the madame for over forty years here, from 1901 to when the Texas Rangers finally shut it down in '46.  I was still fighting in the Pacific back then and my father told me all the 'ladies' had to leave in a hurry.  Poor Miss Lily was heartbroken and no one knows where she went.”

            Dana's laughter filled the air.  “I always thought Kramerville was a boring old town,” she replied.  “And now I find out that it had its very own bordello!”

            “I can see what your daddy could do with an old cafe, office and medical spaces, and a drugstore.”  He crossed his arms and cackled in amusement before adding, “But I don't know what he's going to do with a fully-furnished relic of a whorehouse!”

            “I'm sure Dad will think of something,” Dana replied.  “He's pretty resourceful.”

            Two years later, Dana stood with her father at the corner of B and Main Streets at lunchtime.  The sidewalks were lined with dozens of cars as students and their families arrived to move into the dorms the week before classes started.  Her father beamed with pride as several families wandered into the newly opened Kramerville Koffeshop where the old cafe had been.  The old newspaper office was rented to a campus religious group and the doctor's office was now a small craft and hobby store.  The beautiful, clear plate glass display windows of the old drugstore (and bordello) were filled with books and signs welcoming the students to town.  Dana's dad had decided to turn the downstairs drugstore into a bookstore, but retained a small eating area for the soda fountain, which had been repaired.  The awnings had been removed and replaced with a sign that read, “Sodas and Stories.” 

            A smaller sign hung in the window on the right side of the doorway.  It read, “Miss Lily's Parlor Bordello Museum.  Open M-F 2 PM-6 PM and by appointment. Admission: $3.  Please pay at soda fountain.”

            “Dad,” Dana said as a group of young college girls strolling down the street caught sight of the sign and broke into peals of laughter, “You sure it was wise to keep the museum?  It would have been more profitable to turn the place into student apartments, like Grandma suggested.”

            “It's history,” her dad replied, smirking at the girls as they rushed inside the bookstore.      “Apartments would have been more lucrative, but I couldn't bring myself to finally shut down Miss Lily's place.  Her parlor was part of this town for over forty years.”

            “Do you ever think Grandma will speak to you again?” asked Dana.

            Her dad laughed.  “I think she'll come around.  Every town has their shameful secrets and some are far worse than a bordello.  This town had no future and now it does.”

            An old woman who was bent over with age had come up to stand next them.  She was dressed in a red and pink floral-print dress and she clutched a cane.  She wore a floppy straw hat that was trimmed with a red ribbon. Her head craned back as she peered up at the windows of the bordello above them and she suddenly beamed.  “Miss Lily would have been proud,” she commented to no one in particular before hobbling down the sidewalk to disappear into the thickening crowd of young people.