Southend U3A

Writing for Fun

A scene in downtown San Diago - Vivian Burdon

July 2013

Times are changing in the Stingaree.

It's not been this cold in these parts since . . . well since no one can remember when.

Wyatt is slumped lazily in the chair swinging his leg as snow falls softly outside. 'These are strange times indeed Josie' he drawls to his wife. She is too is resting, elegantly draped across the overstuffed chaise lounge, fluffing her petticoats and preening her hair, appreciating her reflection in the grainy glass windows. She is too close to that window Wyatt considers. It is dusk, and in the warm lights she looks a little too much like thosewhores plying their trade in the bars and brothels of the Stingaree.

Don't misunderstand,Wyattis no prude, he had met Josie when she was working in that Dance Hall back in Arizona. She'd danced fine, and lately she'd taken to acting and was pretty damn good at that too. Wyatt was very much the businessman now. Settled.His name on the lease of four saloons and gambling halls in San Diego thanks in no small part to the talents of his lady.

They are passing the time in Wyatt's favourite place, the Oyster Bar. His dear friend Isidor Louis had opened the Oyster Bar in the former Bank of Commerce building.Wyatt loved the building and what it stood for . . . Enterprise. Audacity. It was a jewel, San Diego's first building to be built of granite, pre-built in the Baroque style on the east coast and shipped around Cape Horn to San Diego. These are truly incredible times mused Wyatt.

He had chanced upon San Diego just at the start of a land boom driven by Mister Alonzo Horton back in 1867. Mister Horton,from San Francisco way,had managed to persuade several business men to buy up land in the bay area and start a New Town away from the old Spanish mission. The result had been swift and radical. Thanks to Horton the main street is cobbled and lit up like a 'barn on fire' on account of all thosegas lamps. It was growing too. It occupied 16 blocks from the waterfront to Market Street. It was a bustlinghome to gunslingers and gamblers and teeming with the sailors from the new harbour.Wyatt and the neighbourhood were thriving under the infamous red lights of the Stingaree.

That evening, Wyatt and Josie arelazily waiting on a European, a Frenchman, to discuss some new business proposition. Monsieur Claude had been animated at the first meetingand had babbled incomprehensibly about the future, how his new invention would bring fame and fortune to Wyatt. 'Imagine Monsie . . . my 'neon sign' in your café window flashing pink and blue'. Imagine indeed. Wyatt wasn't too sure. He gazed past Josie into the street, the wrought iron gas lamps were beginning to glow. He liked that glow.

But maybe there had been too much change. Take that automobile parked by the door of his café, Horton was threatening to import more of those devil contraptions. Horses are what Wyatt knew. 'Aw honey, you fret too much' Josie had whispered in his ear. She had got up without him noticing. A dog is barking. He looks at Josie as she starts to gather her things.

'Josie don't.'

'I've got to Wyatt, Bum needs me'. Damn that dog, nothing but trouble since it came to town as a stow-away. Why the hell the townsfolk loved it so much he would never know. Letting it sleep in their porches, taking care of its every needs like it was some sort of big wig not some scraggy St. Bernard/Spaniel cross. Josie said it was because 'he was a free spirit who belonged to no one but was loved by everyone.' Even the Chinese butchers fed it, which is probably where it was right now and why he didn't like the idea of Josie running off to check on that dam dog's welfare.

May be he should forget the Frenchman and go after Josie. It was turning into a wild night at the Oyster Bar and he needed her to calm the usual rowdiness as only she could. Madame Cora, fortune teller and madam of the Golden Poppy brothel on the upper floors of the building was doing a roaring trade. Wyatt had watched earlier as she sent her ladies out to parade through the streets handing out coloured marbles that matched the colour of their dresses. Tonight the 'gentlemen' had been arriving with their marbles expecting matching woman. Or not! Had one of the girls got over enthusiastic with her marbles. Someone was running into the street, shouting. No one noticed, the people in the café, his café, are oblivious to the man's obvious distress, or undress . . .

Wyatt laughs quietly. It certainly was a wild place, but times are changing. Yes sir, changing fast and he was part of it. He had come a long way. It had been a lifelong journey that had taken him throughout the western frontier, from teenage stagecoach driver to lawman. All that killing at Tombstone and the OK Corral. A lifetime away now. He stretches as he stands slowly. He figures he should go help that lady of his, neon can wait awhile.