Prologue: Night of the Long Count

September 22, 1927

Watching his own story from this in-between space. Sal Pinelli, an X-ray technician and aspiring doctor, lay dead in a bathtub. His mother’s words echoed in his mind: he would end up like this, another dead Italian in a town that despised them. She was always right.

Time functioned differently in purgatory. Past, present, and future bled together like developing fluid in his darkroom trays. He witnessed himself splashing gasoline across the Lighthouse Club’s dance floor while simultaneously seeing the inferno that would consume both the club and the sanatorium next door. The living experienced only one moment at a time; the dead saw everything at once.

The river had been named “Purgatory” long before the town emerged alongside it. In the 1600s, a group of Spanish conquistadors overstayed their welcome with the local tribes. The Indigenous people tolerated them until they no longer would. One night, they set fire to the brush, driving the Spaniards toward the creek that cut through the canyon.

Some claimed the Indigenous people waited by the water, clubs and blades ready for anyone who didn’t drown. Whether true or not the Spaniards disappeared without a trace, vanishing as if the river itself had swallowed them whole.

The French trappers later called it “Purgatoire,” a fitting name for a place where people came to be cleansed of their sins—or their money, depending on who you asked. Some days, Sal thought they were all just like those Spaniards, trapped on the banks of a poisoned river, waiting for judgment.

The town boosters had a talent for twisting truth into profit. They claimed Wahatoya—the native name for the Spanish Peaks looming over town—meant “Breasts of the World,” then printed the slogan on postcards, pamphlets, trinkets, and other souvenirs no one would have bought if they’d called it by its real name. The truth was simpler: in Comanche, Wahatoya meant “double mountain.” But simple truths never sold in Purgatory Springs.

The double mountain watched Sal strike the match. What choice did he have? No one was supposed to die. But as they say at the Sanatorium: Man plans, and God laughs.

Smoke poured through the sanatorium windows, transforming those squeaky-clean halls where Sal used to walk into a burning hell. His patients stumbled through the corridors like ghosts in their white gowns, their faces lit up orange. The youngest, little Rachel, collapsed on the floor, her nightgown burning at the edges. Her tiny hands clutched an old straw boater hat as the sound of choking and screams pierced through the crackling blaze.

The Lighthouse Club’s marquee crashed down, and the cross Sal had planted burned with it. The Sanatorium burned below the Wahatoya peaks, which loomed in judgment above the town. Sal was doomed.

* * *

By the time anyone spotted the flames on the mesa, the Rubottoms were long gone, leaving nothing but footprints and empty promises behind. What a pair they made, stumbling across the prairie. Cyrus was sweating in the cool night air. His checkered suit strained at the buttons as he lumbered ahead, and his crumpled hat barely covered his thinning gray hair, making him look like a washed-up carnival barker. And Esther—Esther! Ten years younger than her husband at least, her pale face shone through the bruises. Even with her face swollen and marred, her gaze held a calculating look, as if she were weighing odds in a rigged game. She clenched her lips against the throbbing pain, each step behind her husband dragging her deeper into the darkness.

“Don’t turn around, darling,” he said, gesturing at the distant inferno. “You’ll end up like Lot’s wife. Nothing but a pillar of salt.”

Before he could launch into the scriptural tale of divine judgment, Esther silenced him with a quick wave of her arm. “Spare me your sermons. I got enough religion at the girls’ home to last us through Judgment Day.”

They reached a deserted county road. Behind them, black smoke billowed into the sky, carrying the ashes of the Lighthouse and the sanatorium. A truck’s engine rumbled in the distance. Esther stepped onto the road and waved both arms. A malted milk delivery truck slowed, brakes squealing.

Labor Day Morning

Three weeks before the fire…

It was tempting to blame it all on Cyrus and Esther Rubottom, who rolled into town that Labor Day in their beaten-up truck. But Purgatory Springs was already crumbling. Though still known as the “Coney Island of the Rockies,” the tourist season grew shorter each year. Prohibition had reduced old man Schueler’s grand brewery to bottling malted milk, and the mineral pools at his hot springs resort no longer drew crowds. The spas and penny arcades only filled up on holidays now, when the Denver crowd bothered to make the trip.

Up on the mesa at the sanatorium, the tuberculosis patients who came looking for a cure were not finding one. Some stayed a while. Others left when they understood that the mountain air could help them rest, but not save them.

The Good Citizens had chosen Labor Day to march in their white robes and hoods—a real slap in the face to the working stiffs. The miners, farmers, and immigrants represented the genuine soul of this town. But Purgatory Springs had always belonged to whoever ran the best racket, whether they wore badges, robes, or fancy suits. The Rubottoms weren’t the disease but just another symptom of a place built on blood money, snake oil promises, and mineral water.

Drums thundered across the courthouse square as a marching band pressed forward, their horns blasting against the brick facades. Red, white, and blue bunting sagged from the podium, wilting in the heat.

Wallace Birdwell wrestled the microphone with sweat-slick fingers, leaving damp smudges on the metal stand. When he adjusted the mic, a violent screech of feedback sent a collective wince through the crowd and his acne-scarred face burned a deeper red.

“Good citizens of Colorado,” he said, his voice shaking, “guardians of liberty, and all you full-blooded Americans out there, I am proud to introduce the first and only lady bishop in America.”

A polite, dry smattering of applause drifted from the dignitaries behind him.

“She is the founder of our own Fountain of Power Church. And she is someone so dear to me. Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce my mother, the Reverend Bishop Agatha Birdwell.”

The applause swelled.

Agatha emerged in a black choir robe, a dark shadow in this carnival of patriotism. She moved with grace, her silver-streaked hair in a severe bun, her lips caught between a smile and a sneer. Wallace stepped forward to embrace her, but she stopped him cold with a single, surgical nod before turning to the microphone. He slouched away, his face pinched, and dropped down beside his sister, Molly.

Molly’s dress was too short, and she knew it. The scandalized whispers of churchwomen only encouraged the lazy smirk curling her lips. She crossed her white-stockinged legs. Men stole glances when they thought no one was looking.

Agatha cleared her throat. “Wake up, Purgatory Springs. Wake up, Colorado. Wake up, true Christian America. We cannot afford to sleep.”

Beneath the stage, two boys—Arturo and Victor—slid through the dust, slinking with the kind of stealth only born troublemakers possess.

“Our safety lies in eternal vigilance,” Agatha continued. “Just last week, we lost our sheriff and deputy to Catholic bootleggers. How many more must we lose to this foreign menace?”

The crowd rumbled, voices swelling with anger.

“We call for law and order,” she said, casting a glance toward the dignitaries. “And we thank our former governor, Clarence Morley, for attending our rally today. Please stand, Clarence.”

Morley rose, a politician’s smile plastered on his face, probably wishing he was somewhere else. Even in this crowd of Good Citizens, a few jeered at him.

“Unfortunately, our new governor does not care for law and order.” Agatha’s voice sliced through the restless air. “He allows bootleggers and gangsters to shoot it out in our streets!”

Beneath the platform, Arturo and Victor peered through the gaps in the wooden planks, their eyes locked onto Molly’s legs. Looking down, she saw them and shifted just enough to give them a better view.

“If our new governor won’t protect us,” Agatha declared, her voice gathering force, “then we must hail the Ku Klux Klan. We hail the great movement now rising in America!”

The energy in the square crackled. White-robed Klanswomen clutched their protest signs, their mouths pressed into grim lines. Klansmen stood tall, waving American flags and “America First” placards, their eyes alight with righteous fervor.

“America for Americans!” the Klansmen roared.

“Rome and her Hebrew allies have silenced real America for far too long!” Agatha’s foot slammed against the platform, dust sifting through the cracks. The boys flinched below.

* * *

Blocks away, Sal adjusted his tie and splashed cologne across his freshly shaved face. On the dresser, his army photo caught his eye: young Sal Pinelli in uniform, a medic from before the trenches, before the screams, before they settled in and haunted his sleep.

“Salvatore! Why so long? Missing work?” His mother’s voice, thick with that Abruzzi accent, cut through his bedroom door like a knife through an onion. Each syllable dripped with disappointment.

“Five minutes, Ma!” He grabbed worn but good shoes. Respectable. Like he was trying to be.

“Always five minutes. Your father drinks all night, sleeps like the dead. Want to be like him?”

The old rhythm played out. Her voice, his sighs. “Got a good job, Ma. Better than Papa’s.”

“Don’t speak of your father! Santa Maria, give me strength.”

Fanny’s handbill lay on his bed like a love letter—“AHOY! LIGHTHOUSE SUPPER CLUB AND DANCE HALL – FEATURING FANNY AND HER GIRLS” printed in gaudy circus letters. Her body had its way with that sailor outfit, promising everything a man couldn’t get in Purgatory Springs. He knew that body, every inch, through his lens at the Lighthouse. Sal tucked the handbill under his mattress. The dead aunts in their frames turned their faces to the wall.

“Virgin Mary sees what you hide! Don’t degrade yourself!” The door rattled under his mother’s assault. “Open up!”

“I’m not degrading myself!”

But he was, and they both knew it.

Sal heaved a familiar sigh and opened the door. “Can’t I just dress in peace?” There she stood, war paint on, ready for battle. Same housedress, same crossed arms, same disappointment.

“Want peace? Show up at church like your brother Marco did.”

Her face drifted to the gilt-framed photograph on the mantel—Marco in his Sunday best, candles burned down to stubs on either side. Her fingers brushed the glass, a ritual performed a thousand times, before turning that same hand toward Sal, palm up, as if presenting evidence of all he wasn’t.

Sal’s shoulders tightened. He checked his watch, looked anywhere but at that damn picture. “I’m late for work.”

“Eat something!” Her final volley.

Sal slipped out the front door and past his mother’s immaculate garden, where the Virgin Mary statue—his father’s stonework masterpiece from better days—kept watch over the tomato plants and basil. Sal’s thoughts were on Fanny, the way she moved on that stage, all silk, skin, and sin. Then there was Molly, the Reverend’s wild daughter, with bedroom eyes that followed him around town—and all those nurses, showgirls, and the snooty tourist ladies. The thought of them left him distracted, and sweet Angie limped through her brother’s tavern—the girl he should’ve married, the one his mother lit candles for, the one whose heart he kept breaking. He hurried along, avoiding the Virgin’s stony gaze. The uphill railway to the sanatorium waited ahead. Another day of X-rays and tuberculosis. Another day of pretending to be somebody respectable.