The Medicine Woman of Galveston

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of mental illness, illness, death, sexual content, sexual violence, ableism, and racism.

The next day, after a morning of preparations for the show, Huey asks to speak to Tucia after the others leave. Huey and Mr. Darby show Tucia what lies in the “GENTLEMEN ONLY” section of the museum: Pictures of scantily dressed women with obvious and grotesque symptoms of venereal disease, leading up to a room where Tucia will be required to independently “examine” the men who come through. Tucia, realizing the men want her to perform sex acts in the name of a genital examination, refuses and flees.

Huey catches up with Tucia and threatens to have Darl and the others thrown in prison if she refuses. He reveals that Darl killed a man when they escaped prison together. He also reveals that he knows both about her secret medical consultations and her affair with Darl.

Trapped and terrified, Tucia ends her relationship with Darl back at their quarters with no explanation, not wanting him to face the fallout of Huey’s anger. She numbly acquiesces when Huey reiterates they will begin their “little upstairs operation” (335) the next day.