A Tyranny of Petticoats by Jessica Spotswood
Plenty of us kids snuck over in the middle of the night and filled our shirts with what we could carry. There was only so much we could haul off in the dark, though. It made Daddy so mad he went hard silent every time we walked past that field full of ruined crops.
Pretty soon, Swan’s Holler was more ruined than not. The couple stores we had closed up. The families I grew up with faded out one by one. Boys joined the army; girls run off to get married — everybody hoped there was something better somewhere else.
It was the same all over — our town in Indiana, yours wherever you are, all them ones out in dusty, dusty Kansas. The money dried up. The work did too.
Finally, so did the people. They turned into husks, blown away by bad fortune. It was hard times, and we all knew who to blame.
The bankers. The fancy money men up in New York who gambled when the rest of us knew gambling was a sin. Herbert damned Hoover too — at least him we run out of office. Roosevelt promised us a New Deal when he got elected, but so far all we had was a raw deal.
And Mr. Shepherd on our doorstep.
I stood behind Mama, one hand in the middle of her back. I was propping her up, because I could feel her shaking. It made me nervous too, but I was trying to be grown. So I glared over her shoulder while Mr. Shepherd handed over legal papers. I listened while he explained that what we had due was due, and we had two weeks to come up with it. Valiantly, I thought, I did not punch him in the face when Mama started to cry.
That’s when I knew I had to do something. I had to fix this for my family. And since I knew who was to blame, I knew what I’d do. I wound a bandage around my new breasts, put on my daddy’s pants and suspenders, and whittled a gun out of scrap wood. Then I hitched a ride to Boswell and robbed their bank at lunchtime. It wasn’t fair, those bankers calling everything due and hoarding all our money.
By God, I was gonna set it right.
Now, here’s a puzzle.
Is it better to jump a hundred feet into a river and hope you don’t hit the rocks? Or is it wiser to turn yourself in when you’re about caught?
Well, I don’t know from wise, but I knew the banks of the Wabash were hungry. Sharp limestone jutted all around it, gnashing for a bite of somebody foolish enough to get close. Or damned fool enough to jump in blind.
Of the many things I cared to be, a fool wasn’t one of them. Therefore, I did the next best thing and got as low as I could. Down in the weeds, covered in poison ivy, my nose pressed to the ground, I didn’t dare breathe deep.
No matter what lying arithmetic I figured, I had no idea how many bullets Caleb had left. Since he was determined to chase me all over creation, I figured I’d better use the one advantage I had over him: I was a little bit smarter than a sack of hair.
Flattening out on the ground, I grabbed an exposed root. Then I dragged myself slowly forward.
Caleb crested the hill I’d slid down, then stopped. Gun raised, he looked all up and down, searching for me. I could tell from the way his eyes darted back and forth that he hadn’t spotted me. Otherwise, I might have believed his bluff.
“Come on, Baby Boy,” he called, tromping a few feet closer. “Nobody has to get hurt. Just come on out.”
That’s right, that’s what they called me. Baby Boy Wabash. Unlike some bank robbers, I went out of my way to keep my real name to myself.
Since I was knocking over banks in boys’ clothes all up and down the western border of Indiana, the newspapers picked a name for me. Baby Boy because I was small, I imagine. Wabash because I didn’t stray far from the river when I was working.
It didn’t have much of a ring to it. But it wasn’t too bad. It emphasized who he was, and who I wasn’t.
Caleb tried again. “Please don’t make me hurt you. I don’t wanna make your mama cry.”
Aww, that was sweet. Like hell was I coming out, but I had to give him credit for trying. Sweat pooled in the small of my back and in the backs of my knees. Already, I was itching. If I didn’t get that poison ivy washed off soon, I’d be a sight at the church social. Even Caleb might manage some simple addition: Yesterday, I was chasing a bank robber through the woods. Today, my girl’s covered in bruises and blisters. Hmmm.
Nah, I was giving him too much credit. That was the beauty of being a girl going around in boys’ clothes. Nobody saw you. When I hitched rides, nobody warned me it was dangerous. Likewise, when I walked into a bank and ordered them to give me what was in the drawer, they did it. Now, fair enough, they probably did that in part because I jabbed the wood gun in my pocket at them.
Still, I knew what kind of attention a bandit got when she was a member of the fairer sex. Bonnie Parker looked real pretty sitting on the hood of that Ford Fordor, I had to admit. But she was shot dead on a lonely back road because everybody knew her too well and too many people wanted to take her and Clyde out.
Here’s the thing: I didn’t want to be famous. I just wanted to take care of my folks.
Mama thought I was off helping a lady doctor deliver babies. Daddy believed that too. Maybe it’s because they wanted to.
When I went to the bank and paid off our loan, I warned Mr. Shepherd not to come back to our door ever again. We were done doing business with his like. From here on out, we’d be keeping our savings in our mattress. Where it was safe. Where sons of bitches like him couldn’t lose it in one afternoon.
I was careful to never give Mama too much money. Sometimes I bought a live chicken or a canned ham and told her that was my payment. Quietly, I left ten-dollar bills in my neighbors’ mailboxes and back porch doors.
The funny thing is, the rumor never got around. Even while I Robin Hooded it up, the people in Swan’s Holler clamped down tight. It was like they were afraid if anyone knew they had money, it would melt away. Fool’s gold, mayhaps.
Caleb got tired of staring and waiting. Without holstering his gun, he started sideways down the hill. His path put him on course to step on me if he kept going. I had to run. There was no way to drag myself out of the way fast enough. Excitement gave in to fear.
This was the first time in three years robbing banks that I was close to caught.
Blood rushing in my ears, mouth dry as a desert, I didn’t have the luxury of weighing my options anymore. Closer and closer, Caleb stalked. So close, I smelled his cologne. My idiot stomach fluttered some. It needed to knock it off. This wasn’t the time or place to be sweet on Caleb Newcastle, no matter how good his sweat and skin smelled.
I figured my best bet was to scare the socks off of him and then run as fast as I could. Pressing hands and knees into the soft forest floor, I hitched back. Taking a deep breath, I popped up like a jack-in-the-box. Only my jack-in-the-box screamed like a banshee. Caleb shouted too, and pumped off another shot. Something hot streaked over my shoulder.
The time for rumination was over. Money washed and dried just fine. So did I. I bolted for the edge of the river. It was dark and green, shaded by the trees. Guarded by sharp stones all the way down.
With one held breath, I jumped.
It turns out that after you jump, you wanna change your mind.
Unfortunately, by then, gravity has done made up your mind for you. There was no backing up on this one. It was me and empty air. Plummeting. Falling. The river slapped me hard when I hit it. My ribs hurt, like I’d run too far. The strength drained from my arms and legs. They were weights, pulling me down.
I sank deep, swallowed by cold water the color of a patent medicine bottle. It tasted like medicine too, herbs and mud and all manner of things dying and living and doing what all ever in it.
At first, I didn’t even try to swim. My hips hurt like I’d yanked off both legs at the joint. Skin burning from hitting the water so hard, head dizzy and blank from terror, I floated down below. Beneath the surface.
Raising my face, I saw sunlight. At least I knew which way was up. Not a damned bit of good that would do me if I didn’t get some air. The thing was, it was kinda pleasant down below. I wasn’t
My parents would think I’d run off. Got a wild hair and never looked back. That was a cruel thing to do to a body. Seeing as I was Mama and Daddy’s only, twice as cruel in my case. I started robbing banks to save them. I couldn’t let it ruin them.
I suppose disappearing would have been better than getting arrested by Caleb Newcastle. Or anybody, for that matter.
A beacon of pain pulsed in my shoulder. That boy shot me. My lungs burned, and spangles flashed in front of my eyes. Swim or die, I told myself. Swim right now and run on home. Put some money in the neighbors’ mailboxes. Tell Mama we delivered twins to some rich city people and they gave us a hundred dollars because they were burning them for warmth.
Up, up, and out of the water and back to Swan’s Holler. Into the Pings’ barn, trade out my robbing clothes for my good-girl dress, and get back to life. Get to the church social. Eat pound cake, talk with Maisie, let Caleb put his hand on my hip.
He wasn’t so bad. Mostly he was pretty good. Emphasis on the pretty, and sweet to me too. He brought Mama flowers and talked to Daddy about the weather. He didn’t blush when people joked we’d be married before twenty.
Up!
My head pounded, but I finally connected it back to my arms and legs. Scrambling and clawing at the water, I fought to the surface. Once I did, I hit a big old branch hanging low. It knocked the stars right into my eyes. I sunk under again, then remembered that I had planned to survive today.
Up!
It was so sweet, breathing. I had river in my nose, and my shoes were lost in the current, but I was alive. If there wasn’t a chance of Caleb sighting me from the shore and shooting me for good, I woulda whooped.
Instead, I took a mouthful of water, then spat it. I breathed, and I swam. When the water went shallow, I hauled myself up. Bandy-legged, I staggered along the rocky bank.
It was a good thing I only ever asked for what was in the drawer. If I’d been greedy, carrying as much money as I could manage, I woulda lost it all, or drowned saving it. Pulling the powder sack from around my neck, I loosened the leather strings. Coiled up like baby snakes, greenbacks nestled down in the dark.
They were wet, but they were still mine.
Mama didn’t believe me when I said that a rich lady with twins gave me a hundred dollars.
Lips tight, eyes narrow, she grabbed my chin between her fingers. Turning my head back and forth, she scoured me with suspicion.
In the end, she said to go wash the stink off and come help with supper. She looked me up and down, then folded the damp bills into the box where she kept her pin money.
Tucked up in some privacy, I washed myself best as I could from a pitcher. Studying myself in the mirror, I said, “You look a fright.” Because I did, bedraggled and scratched, but whole.
Mostly whole, actually. There was a little half-moon taken right out of my shoulder. My first gunshot wound and, God willing, my last. It looked almost like a burn and didn’t smell a thing like gunpowder. That kind of disappointed me, to be frank.
Dinner was biscuits and gravy. Sleep that night was good and hard and deep. And in the morning, I put on my patchwork dress and let Mama braid and twist my hair into a chignon. Baby Boy Wabash was sitting in the Pings’ barn, filthy shirt and suspenders stuffed behind a bale of hay. Marjorie May Johnson was putting on a touch of her mama’s rose water and striking poses in the front room.
The knock at the door startled me. I was still jumpy from my close call, but I had to slough that off. Daddy opened the door. With a big, booming voice, he invited Caleb inside and asked after his granny. She’d been sick with a fever, but according to Caleb, she was all better now. Once he finished yammering with my daddy, Caleb finally turned to look at me.
When he did, his blue eyes widened. He clutched his hat against his chest, his blond hair falling in messy waves across his brow. Not one inch of him looked worse for the wear. If anything, his golden tan made him glow. It deepened the pink of his lips. It reminded me why I let him be forward with me. Why I liked it when he clasped his hands against my waist and pulled me tight.
In fact, that’s exactly what I let him do as soon as he got me out the door and down the street a little. Wrapping my arms around his neck, I drank him up — sweet, sweet lemonade. When he picked me up, I laughed in surprise as he spun me around. Then, like I was delicate, he put me back on my feet.
“You gonna dance with me at this social?” he asked, slipping my arm through the loop of his.
With a champagne bubble laugh, I said, “I just might.”
We walked on, side by side, and I was happy. I robbed banks, I ran from the law — and then I ran right into his arms, once I turned from boy to girl again.
The way I saw it, that was the real mistake the Barrow gang had made.
It seemed to me that they’d have been a lot less likely to get gunned down if Bonnie had just had the sense to be Clyde.
When I was invited to write a story for A Tyranny of Petticoats, I had two ideas. One was a murder mystery — I’ve written that kind of thing before. The other was a cross-dressing, bank-robbing teen bandit on the run. I’ve never written that kind of thing before. How to choose, how to choose? As Mae West once said, I went with the evil I’d never tried before.
There’s a fine tradition of cross-dressing girls in fiction, from Alanna in Tamora Pierce’s Song of the Lioness novels to Mary Faber in L. A. Meyer’s Bloody Jack series. I love the twists and turns, the constant tension, and the total subversion of expectations these stories offer. I hope that you find my story “Bonnie and Clyde” a worthy addition to the world of adventurous historical girls in pants!
WHEN THERE’S FOOD AROUND, A hobo jungle is like a high-school wiener roast — everybody huddled into groups, laughing and eating and talking about each other. Pretending the real world isn’t out there, just beyond the tree line and across the tracks.
This world feels as small as my little Nebraska town did, but in this ragged piece of shade on the banks of the Columbia River, I am a misfit.
I’m not the youngest — there’s a handful of teenage boys by the fire, and I’ve got Billy waiting for me way back near a thicket of huckleberries — but I am the only girl. To look at me, none would call me feminine, but I can feel the men watch as I pass.
I saw two of them at the orchard this morning. They got into a dustup because only ten pickers were hired and there were thirty of us. They’re all friends now, though, bolstered by alcohol squeezed from Sterno cooking gel.
There’s no work here and I’ve got nothing to add to the pot of mulligan stew — not even an onion — so I need to get Billy and get out. I don’t want to be around when the canned heat fuels more than just loud voices and swagger.
I don’t see Billy or his bindle, and worry rises in my throat, dry as the dust bowl winds. Billy’s just a kid and as annoying as all get-out, but we stick together.
There’s someone else back by the huckleberry thicket, though. I know him for a hoaxter as soon as I spot him, sitting on a fallen tree with his legs stretched out, deliberately nonchalant. His pants are pressed, and though his shirt’s unbuttoned at the collar, it’s clean. He’s got a hat pulled low on his forehead and the thinnest mistake of a mustache I’ve ever seen.
He thinks he’s Clark Gable in It Happened One Night.
A flash of blue and brown catches my eye before Billy catches me right in my midsection and knocks me to the dirt.
“Where’ve you been?” he cries. “I’ve been waiting!”
I bite back an uncharitable reply and hug him quick till I see Gable watching. Then I push Billy off. He’s little, but he’s twelve. When I was twelve, I was already taking care of my three sisters, before they got scattered to relatives.
He can’t replace them.
“I got something,” he says, his dir
“You need a haircut.”
He pulls it back with one hand so I can see his baby blues and the smear of dirt across his forehead. “I like it this way.” He sets his chin like Celia used to at home.
I shrug and stagger to my feet, bone weary from hard traveling.
Billy coughs but grins around it. He’s the reason we’re heading west, toward the ocean. Toward Seattle. Hopefully toward work. Away from the dust that brings on his asthma.
Billy unwraps his bindle carefully, like what he’s got there is precious.
And it is. It’s a feast. Bread and apples and cheese and something that looks suspiciously like —
“Roast beef,” Billy says proudly.
My mouth waters.
We can’t eat it here. Much as I’d like to add to the mulligan, this beef would cause a riot. I glance over my shoulder. No one’s looking — not even Gable. I wrap the food quickly and stuff it back into the bindle.
“How did you ever do it?” I whisper. The men at the orchard said times were hard. No work. No money. No food.
“I went into town just like you said,” he rattles. I try to quiet him, but there’s no hushing Billy once he starts talking. “I stood on a street corner. There’s folks everywhere. And just like you said, when I saw a lady wearing gloves, I sat down on the curb and I put my head in my hands and I told her the story you said to tell.”
“It’s your story, Billy.” I look over at Gable again. He’s studying his fingernails.
“The way you tell it is better.” Billy puts on a sad, mewling voice that makes him sound younger. “We lost our farm in . . .”— he hesitates — “foreclosure, and my pop just up and left. He fought in the War and thought he could get his bonus and find some work and feed us all, but he never came back from Washington.”
I nod. He’s doing pretty good. Laying it on a little thick.
“So I came out to find work!” he crows.
I rub his head, making the hair flop back into his eyes, and he grins up at me like I’m better than roast beef, and for a second things don’t seem so hard. Then someone starts clapping.