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Tag: American Western

Tittle Tattle from the Banker’s Wife

A report from teatime at the home of Mrs. Woods, Banker’s wife:  Deadwood, SD, June 30, 1879

“I asked you all here to talk about our new schoolteacher and her sister.” Mrs. Woods leaned forward to whisper to make sure the women understood the importance of what she was going to say. “They boarded the stagecoach in Iowa and rode the rest of the way with me. I could tell they were lower class just by the way they were dressed in obviously homemade clothes. Why I heard there are ten children in their family. I would think their parents would know when to stop.”

“I hear she’s a very good teacher.” Mrs. Kincaid frowned. “I know my Thomas likes her and makes learning fun.”

“Hmph. I heard about some of her ways. Classes outdoors? Teaching needlework to boys and about bugs to girls? Why children should be taught by the rod. Memorization from the Bible is the best way to teach our young.”

Mrs. Kincaid set down her cup. “Have you seen what she’s had the older children do with their needlework? Why Thomas stitched the entire Lord’s Prayer. Sounds to me like she’s using the Bible.”

The other women nodded at Mrs. Kincaid’s comments. She needed to get these women and their husbands behind her to get an older, sterner man to teach their young, not some young, pretty thing that probably flirted with the older boys.

“Did you hear that as soon as Miss Lindstrom stepped from the stagecoach, Mr. Winson, owner of King’s Restaurant, had her on the ground and was laying on top of her? I’d say that’s a poor example for our youth.” She smirked at each woman. “Why, you would have thought she was destined for Al Swearingen’s brothel.”

“I was there.” Mrs. Kincaid said.

Good, it sounded as if the woman was on her side. Now to get the rest of them to see how improper the new teacher was.

“And I know you were, too, Mrs. Woods. So, you couldn’t have missed how Mr. Winson was trying to help her from the coach and that pack of dogs knocked them both into the mud.”

“Yes, but . . .”

“And being the gentleman he is, he tried to help her up.” Mrs. Kincaid sipped her tea, then set her cup on the matching saucer. “Have you ever had to step in that mess in the street? If you have, then you know how hard it is to extricate yourself.”

“But, then she and that sister of hers stayed at King’s Hotel.”

Mrs. Kincaid shook her head. “Where else were they supposed to stay? King’s is the only proper hotel in this town. Why didn’t you offer them your place if you’re so concerned about their virtue?”

The last thing she wanted was for two pretty young things to stay at her house. She wasn’t so naïve that she didn’t know what her husband was up to while she was back East. Time to change tactics.

“Well, then there’s her sister.”

“What about her sister?” Mrs. Kincaid sighed. “I hear she’s an excellent seamstress.”

“Humph. Mending for the men around here is being a seamstress? I suppose you approve of men going out to their house to bring their clothes to her. And I heard some of those brothel women approached her at King’s asking her to sew for them.”

Mrs. Kincaid set her cup down with enough force to crack the saucer. “I don’t know what your problem is, but you’d better learn the facts before you spread gossip. The men take their clothing to Haywood’s store. Then Sadie’s husband takes them to the Julia and picks them up when they are done. As for those women, I was in the restaurant, and I can assure you she turned them down.”

Mrs. Woods checked the watch pinned to her large bosom. She wasn’t making any headway. It was time to end this little tea party. “Needless to say, I’m going to keep my eye on them.”

“I’m sure you will, Mrs. Woods.” Mrs. Kincaid stood. “But I think your time would be better spent keeping any eye on that husband of yours.” She turned to her friends. “Come, ladies, I’m in need of some fresh air.”

About the Book

The Balcony Girl is the first book in “The Darlings of Deadwood,” series. It is a candidate for the InD’Tale RONE Award.

Deadwood teatime

When Julia Lindstrom and her sister, Suzanna, made the decision to move to Deadwood, South Dakota in 1879, Julia never suspected that she would meet her future husband, secretly befriend the madam of a brothel, or jump in to assist when disaster strikes the turbulent mining town. Can she survive all three?

Daniel Iverson followed the gold rush to Deadwood back when it was in its heyday, only to discover gold prospecting wasn’t the life for him. Now working as a lawyer, a case falls into his lap regarding a rash of recent illnesses affecting the men visiting the town’s saloons and brothels. Is it a disease or something more sinister?

Will a secret tear them apart or bring them together?

You can buy it here.

Coming soon

Deadwood Teatime

The School Marm, the second book in “The Darlings of Deadwood,” is still a Work in Process. This is Suzanna’s story. It started out a short story in the “Wild Deadwood Tales,” anthology and is being expanded into a full-length novel. Release is planned for later this summer.

Suzanna Lindstrom travels as a school marm in fledgling Deadood. Having left her parents’ struggling farm, she dreams of a better life in Deadwood with a man who’s struck it rich in the gold fields. Fresh off the stagecoach, she meets Kingston Winson, whom she disregards as disreputable. Is he who she thinks he is? What lesson will she learn?

“Missing Ellis,” is a short story in “Getting Wild in Deadwood,” anthology. It is a time travel involving the characters from both books.

Buy Link: Getting Wild in Deadwood

Deadwood

About the Author

Tina Susedik is an award-winning, Amazon best-selling, multi-published author with books in both fiction and non-fiction, including history, children’s, military books and romances. Her favorite is writing romantic suspense where her characters live happily ever after with a lot of problems in between. Tina also writes spicier romance as Anita Kidesu. She lives in northwestern Wisconsin where winters are long, summers short, and spring and fall beautiful.

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The Agent and the Lady

Your Teatime Tattler once again has the pleasure of receiving scandalous news from afar, this about a notorious Pinkerton agent.

Dear Mr. Clemens,

You may not be able to print this scandalous story. I am reporting to you an event that has horrified my friends and me! Miss Lydia Wood was seen in the company of a man, Mr. Jake Hunter, in a saloon for commoners. To make matters more appalling, she wore a scandalous dress that exposed her ankles and a bit of her… appendages. His dress presented him as a riverboat gambler. This was not to a costume ball, Mr. Clemens, but a night on the town. She even sang in the saloon!

Miss Woods said she and Mr. Hunter are agents of the Pinkerton Detective Agency’s Denver, Colorado, office. I hesitate to call her remarks into question. Nevertheless, have you ever heard of a woman Pinkerton detective? You can understand why I am dismayed beyond words!

Pinkerton Agency Reward Poster

The two rushed off to some ridiculous place called Hole-in-the-Wall, Wyoming, to chase after robbers. Don’t you agree that a woman going to a place where robbers congregate is outrageous? Miss Wood is from a prominent Kansas family and knows society’s rules. I am surprised she would act so boldly in public. I pity her poor parents, who must be distressed at their daughter’s choices. You may remember Miss Wood was left at the altar two years ago by this same Mr. Hunter. She said they are now in a marriage of convenience for this assignment. If that is true, her parents know nothing of the arrangement.

As I learn more of this distressing affair, kind sir, I shall keep you informed further.

Miss Lilith Black

About the Book

AN AGENT FOR LYDIA, Pinkerton Matchmaker Series #56

When Lydia Wood is left at the altar, she believes something beyond her groom’s control has happened. Two years with no word have hardened her heart. She has to get away from her parents’ constant urging her to choose an acceptable husband and wed. Becoming a Pinkerton agent suits her plans.

Pinkerton Agent Jake Hunter has recovered from injuries that put him in a coma and a long convalescence. He realizes Lydia would have been injured had she been with him. To protect her, he vows to distance himself from the one person who means the world to him. 

When they are paired for an investigation of robbers they must follow the trail to a dangerous hangout of men on the run. Can the two successfully pull off their charade and capture the robbers and their stor will this trip confirm Jake’s worst fears?

An Excerpt

Lydia gazed out the train window at Wyoming’s desert landscape, recalling how terrified she’d been last night in the saloon. The man who’d wanted to take her upstairs was huge and smelled as if he hadn’t bathed in months. He carried a bottle of whiskey in one hand, some of which he had spilled on his shirt.

Thank goodness she had her gun and her knife. Would her little gun have stopped such a large man? With any luck she’d never have to learn the answer.

Forcing herself not to snuggle up to Jake for comfort had been almost impossible. His presence reassured her. He’d had several years experience at Pinkerton’s and knew how to deflect and defeat combatants.

An older couple sat in the seats facing theirs. Lydia avoided eye contact with the prune-faced woman across from her. The woman had snubbed her and Jake as if they carried leprosy. 

Prune-face ceased staring long enough to tug on her husband’s sleeve and whisper, “Horace, doesn’t he look like the man on that wanted poster we saw in Cheyenne?”

Horace frowned at her. “Hush, Mattie.”

Did those two think she and Jake couldn’t hear them?

Lydia gestured to the window. “I’ve never seen so much sand and scrubby bushes. Barren as it is, it emanates a serene beauty.”

 “Wait until you see where we’re headed. I’ve heard it’s picturesque as well.” Jake flashed his bone-melting grin.

No, thank you, she couldn’t weaken now. She’d had the vaccination for that grin’s affect. Too bad the inoculation hadn’t proven very effective.

About the Author

Through a crazy twist of fate, Caroline Clemmons was not born on a Texas ranch. To compensate for this illogical error, she writes about handsome cowboys, feisty ranch women, and scheming villains in a tiny office her family calls her pink cave. She and her Hero live in North Central Texas cowboy country where they ride herd on their dog and three rescued indoor cats as well as providing nourishment outdoors for squirrels, birds, and other critters.

The over fifty titles she has created in her pink cave have made her an Amazon bestselling author and won several awards. She writes sweet to sensual romances about the West, both historical and contemporary as well as time travel and mystery. Her series include The Kincaids, McClintocks, Stone Mountain Texas, Bride Brigade, Texas Time Travel, Texas Caprock Tales, Loving A Rancher, and Pearson Grove as well as numerous single titles and contributions to multi-author sets. When she’s not writing, she loves spending time with her family, reading her friends’ books, lunching with friends, browsing antique malls, checking Facebook, and taking the occasional nap.

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Is a Publishing War Brewing?

Dear Mr. Clemens,

I write to request your assistance in correcting a grievous wrong. Your publication is highly regarded in all circles and any cause you endorse must be regarded as just, right and worthy of action. The wrong against which I need your assistance is the devious and unprincipled revelation of a character’s life story without requesting permission from the character so revealed. This heinous invasion of privacy has happened to every character I know and even to some ‘real’ persons who have suffered the embarrassing and often difficult consequences of unauthorized biography.

One Night's Desire by Rue Allyn

This is the book in which Ms. Allyn cruelly details the demise of my family and my testimony against my father.

My own case is typical, and I along with all the private details of my life will soon be exposed. Thus, I use my experience as an example of the outrageous lengths to which these invasive authors will go.

My name is Elise Van Demer—yes, that Elise Van Demer. I am indeed the woman who as an innocent and untried girl on the cusp of adulthood reported to the law her own father as a liar, cheat, thief, and murderer.** My public involvement in that scandal was unavoidable. I was after all a witness to his crimes and swore testimony in a court of law, which placed every detail of that humiliating experience on public record. Public record, mind you, which is no invasion of privacy no matter how mortifying the details.

Also a matter of public record is the fact that my father subsequently and spitefully disowned me and denied me my birthright. He actually imagined that I was in the wrong to report his crimes. Confessing that a parent, an individual who is supposedly an example and protector, is a criminal of the worst sort is not an easy thing. There are characters who have tarred me with my father’s brush, and despite the unkind rumors they spread, I persevere in my attempts to restore my birthright and my good name.

As you can see even the public facts of a character’s life can be difficult. However, the sort of invasive authorship to which I firmly object and against which I seek your hearty endorsement involves the exposure of very private details to the reading public. The guilty party in my case is a Ms. Rue Allyn. She has a history of investigating the most intimate details in a character’s life then presenting those details to the public thinly disguised as a romantic novel. I say thinly disguised because she does not even bother to change the names to protect the innocent. Note, she had the gall recently to pen an article claiming that she herself chooses the names of the characters in her books. (https://wp.me/p2d2BX-CT). Balderdash. I know my name and knew it long before ever encountering this conscienceless female. But I digress.

ShAMEtext.

Kissing-Couple-Silhouette

The artist has more sensitivity than Ms. Allyn and refused to show our faces when he captured this moment of passion between Boyd and me.

To continue my example, I have worked very hard to erase the name of Elise Van Demer from the memories of characters throughout the world and most especially in the Wyoming territories. I have managed to disguise myself as a muleskinner (no one would expect delicately reared Ms. Elise Van Demer to be driving a mule team that hauls necessities to outlying Wyoming ranches and farms). This disguise has allowed me to remain in Wyoming, developing helpful connections, and gathering resources and information with the purpose of regaining my birthright. However, along comes Ms. Allyn, poking her authorial nose in where it most definitely does not belong. (Can you imagine, she even discovered intimate details, physical details, regarding my relationship with former Pinkerton agent, Boyd Alvarez.) She is ruining everything.

MULEteam

I include this image to prove to you and your readers that I know whereof I speak regarding mules and driving mule teams.

For myself, my only hope is that she is unable to publish her insidious narrative before I accomplish my goals. That has been the saving grace for most of my character friends. Ms. Allyn is no fly-by-night author. She is meticulous, if invasive, in her research, thus causing much delay in the publication of her supposed novels. I am now in a race to succeed with my plans before she can expose me and ruin all that I hope for.

You may ask why I reveal so much to you and your readers, if I still have a chance for happiness before Ms Allyn publishes her torrid tale? My purpose is to warn the public that thousands of unprincipled authors like Ms. Allyn exist. They must be stopped. Also, I regret to say, that while the Teatime Tattler is very popular in Wyoming Territory, we often receive copies six to twelve months after the periodical’s publication. I sincerely hope to have achieved all my aims before anyone in Wyoming can read this particular article.

Hopefully the experiences I’ve related will prompt you to wage war in print against authors such as Ms. Allyn, and gain respect for a character’s right to privacy.

*Note to the readers of the Teatime Tattler. In fairness, I have offered Ms. Allyn the opportunity to rebut Ms. Van Demer’s claims and will publish said rebuttal as soon as I may receive it.

**Ms. Van Demer’s involvement in her father’s trial is detailed in a novel by Ms. Rue Allyn titled One Night’s Desire which can be found at various retailers most notably, Amazon along with all of Ms. Allyn’s other currently available novels.Author Rue Allyn Head Shot

About Rue Allyn:  Award winning author, Rue Allyn, learned story telling at her grandfather’s knee. (Well it was really more like on his knee—I was two.) She’s been weaving her own tales ever since. She has worked as an instructor, mother, sailor, clerk, sales associate, and painter, along with a variety of other types of employment. She has lived and traveled in places all over the globe from Keflavik Iceland (I did not care much for the long nights of winter.) and Fairbanks Alaska to Panama City and the streets of London England to a large number of places in between. Now that her two sons have left the nest, Rue and her husband of more than four decades (Try living with the same person for more than forty years—that’s a true adventure.) have retired and moved south.

When not writing, learning to play new games, (I’m starting to learn Bridge) and working jigsaw puzzles, Rue travels the world and surfs the internet in search of background material and inspiration for her next heart melting romance. She loves to hear from readers, and you may contact her at contact@RueAllyn.com She can’t wait to hear from you.

What Rue likes best about the belles is their can-do spirit. This group isn’t afraid to try anything the publishing world can dish out. The only other place I’ve found such completely supportive energy is with my fellow sisters-in-arms, the RomVets.

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