Forgiven (11 page)

We were engaged in that slow dance of predator and prey, my taking one step back, his taking one step forward, all the while knowing which of us had the upper hand on this forgotten back street; which of us had few—or no—friends in San Francisco; which of us had something that the other wanted.

“So where is that key, Miss Kula? Is it, perhaps, on your person?”

My hand twitched, and he saw that at once and gave me a broad grin.

“Yes, indeedy.”

How many steps were there to get back to that infernal intersection?

“You know, Miss Baker, this is my home, this city. I have a commission here. I have a job to do.”

I found the nerve to speak. “Your job? Your home?”

“That’s right. I am a respected citizen of the city of San Francisco. I’ve been appointed a marshal here, and I work for a powerful outfit in this town. And part of my job involves one Nathaniel Baker. Now your old pa, he got in over his head with something, didn’t he?” He raised his eyebrows. “And you deserted him, now, didn’t you? Shame.”

My jaw clenched, and I edged closer to the avenue, closer to safety. “He asked me to come here.”

“You want to know why? You want to get the whole picture? Your pa thought he could save you. But he made one mistake after another. See, that box I been looking for, that one for which you have the key, I already found it. Right before I put your pa in jail. And you, you’ve got nothing. Course, your pa, he don’t know that.” He examined his hands, turning them to pick at his fingernails. “I think you need to head back to him, now, don’t you? I think maybe it’s time you left San Francisco.”

The box—my reason for being here, my only hope to save Pa—was in the hands of Josiah Wilkie. My thoughts swirled. Snake-eyes Wilkie had found it. He was right—it was time for me to go home. But to what home? And why did he care if I left San Francisco? I pulled my shaky self together. “That’s my pa’s box, and I’ll go to the authorities to get it back.”

“I
am
the authorities,” he said. “Remember?”

“You got yourself a shiny pin, that’s all.” I practically spit the words at him.

“I got me some powerful friends. And I turned that box over to them, just as I was hired to do.” He leaned toward me. “Time for you to run along home. Before you step in something . . . nasty.”

He wanted me out of this town—he wanted me gone and bad. But why? If he already had the box, had already turned it over to . . . who? I was of no use to him. He was setting me up, this Wilkie, but for what, I didn’t know. I knew my pa wasn’t a killer, but Wilkie. . . I took a chance. “Pa didn’t commit that murder. He didn’t kill that man Black. You did.”

Wilkie eyed me for a minute. “Maybe I did, and maybe I didn’t. Either way, you’ll never prove it.”

I was right. Kula Baker has a good sixth sense. “Watch me.” Brave words, backed by nothing but air.

He shook his head. “You have no idea what you’ve stepped into here, girl. This is bigger than you; there are things you don’t understand. Why, this is even bigger than me. Your pa’s in the way, and he’s a problem. I solve problems.”

What Miss Everts had said—“things you don’t understand”—echoed in what he said. “I don’t care. I’ll find a way to bring you to justice. You’ll see.” My legs shook; my strength was all gone to my brave words.

“Now, I’m sorry you feel that way. And so it looks like we got us another problem. You keep meddling where you don’t belong.” He took a step closer again. I clenched my fists and set my legs to run. “But we can fix that.”

A rush of fear ran up my spine. “Get away from me.” I turned to dart off, but he was too fast for me. His hand gripped my wrist hard, twisting it.

I pulled, but he tightened his hold. “Let me go!”

I tried to wrench my wrist from his grasp. A movement behind Wilkie caught my eye, and I sucked in air: Min stepped from a doorway and moved swiftly toward us.

Wilkie heard her coming and turned, letting me go, leaving me so he could strike out at her. “I told you to leave!” He raised his fist at her.

I edged back away from them even as I cried, “Don’t!”

Min, as fast as a cat, moved to Wilkie and dropped, right there in the alley, to her knees and then facedown, placing her forehead on the toe of his boot. I gasped, my hand covering my mouth.

Wilkie stood still, his hand raised to strike her, and Min lay prostrate at his feet, clutching his foot, a sacrifice in the filth of the alley. My heart pounded. I knew I should run for safety, but I couldn’t leave Min . . .

And then, for an instant, an expression crossed Wilkie’s face that I wouldn’t believe, couldn’t believe—something like affection, a softening of his features. But it was fleeting, and it vanished as he lifted his foot away from her, his rough gesture kicking her in the face, causing her to whimper. “Go on,” he said to her, his voice quiet. “Get out.”

She didn’t move. I crept backward toward the busy avenue. He reached down and yanked Min to her feet. As he lifted her, our eyes met, and I saw in hers a plea, but not for her. She was trying to tell me to leave, to get away, that I couldn’t save her, she was already lost. Telling me to save myself, yes, get away. I backed toward the street as Wilkie pulled Min down the alley in the other direction. He lifted his chin to me, his eyes narrowed. “We’ll finish this later.”

I turned and made for the corner.

She was his. He owned her, or so he thought. I shuddered to think of it. She was like me, an outsider, a foreigner, judged by how she looked and not by who she was. She was Chinese, and that was enough to allow Wilkie to think that he owned her and could do as he please. That he might have felt a shade of fondness for her didn’t matter to me.

I stopped and looked back. The slap of Min’s feet echoed as she tripped and stumbled on the cobbles, as Wilkie pulled her away. It made me want to retch. I vowed, there and then, that I would save Min from Snake-eyes Wilkie. I wouldn’t care at what cost.

Chapter
FIFTEEN

April 3, 1906

 

 

 

 

BUT FOR THE MOMENT, HELPLESS AS I WAS, I HAD TO MAKE my way out of this alley. I forced my shaky legs to carry me toward the avenue, and I lurched in that direction, when, like drawing magic out of a hat, I ran smack into David Wong.

“Miss Baker?”

I was flooded with relief, so much so that I had to hold my knees rigid to keep from collapsing into a heap right there. I looked back down the alley to see Wilkie and Min disappearing into a dark doorway, her skirt a flag of defeat.

“Miss Baker?” David repeated. “Are you all right?”

I turned back to David. “Mr. Wong. You have no idea . . .”

“What were you doing down there?” David’s arm pointed down the alley.

“I . . . I ran into this, this man. Josiah Wilkie—”

“What were you doing with
him
? How do you know Wilkie
?
” David asked, anger storming his face.

“I wasn’t doing anything with him! I wish I’d never met him!” Just what was David accusing me of? I’d never felt such hurt. “I hate that man!”

“Then you do know him.” David lowered his arm, loosened his fingers.

“Yes, I do. He’s making my life miserable.” I caught myself. I braced my shoulders. “But wait. How do you know him?”

David’s eyes went dark. “He traffics in evil.”

I thought about Min. “Yes. Indeed he does.” I still breathed hard.

“I don’t think you can imagine. He—or those he works with—they . . .” He couldn’t finish and looked away, hiding his face, before turning back to me.

We regarded one another in silence. My heart eased, just seeing him there. And then something passed between us. I reached my right hand out to touch his left, a brief touch of my fingers on the back of his hand. And still we stood there.

I spoke softly. “This is the second time you’ve come upon me in distress, Mr. Wong.”

“I wish you’d call me David.” Warmth flooded my skin, a swift and bracing change of mood from fear to longing. David Wong reached right into my heart.

“David. Do you make a habit of showing up when I need you most?”

“I wish even more you’d tell me your given name.”

“Such presumption!” But I was smiling now. “It’s Kula.”

“That’s a beautiful name.”

My cheeks burned. “It comes down from my father’s side. I don’t know the whole story of it.”

“Why not?”

“I . . .” Why not. I examined the ground, mining the road for pebbles with my toe. I fidgeted with my jacket. I was ashamed, I could have said. My grandmother was native, an Indian. But to say this to a Chinese man, to admit my fear of the stigma attached to someone who looked like me, whose blood clearly ran with the taint of native blood, to admit to David that I was ashamed, why, he might not forgive me. And I’d discovered how much I wanted him to like me. “I never pursued it.”

“Miss Kula, it suits you.”

That blush crept right down my neck, and all my skin tingled so, and I met David’s smile. “Thank you.” I cocked my head. “And just how did you happen to be here?”

“I was meeting someone. And you?”

I adjusted Miss Everts’s hat, fiddled with the ribbon under my chin. “I was shopping.”

“Did you recover your other things?”

“No.”

“That’s a shame.” His gaze strayed from me to the alley behind me, to where Wilkie had disappeared. “Stay away from him if you can.”

David’s words reminded me of Pa’s words. “I didn’t come looking for him. He came looking for me.”

His eyes shot back to meet mine. “Why?”

“He . . . knows my pa.” I didn’t know what else to say.

“He’s dangerous.”

“I know that already. What exactly do you know?”

David’s voice came out low and deep, thick with emotion. “There’s another side to San Francisco. Other than the stores on Market Street and all the wealth of Nob Hill. San Francisco is an old seaport. Lots of sailors come and go. And with the gold rush came other types. And those types brought their new wealth and a desire for pleasures of all kinds.” He dipped his head. “I shouldn’t speak of these things to you. They’re ugly.”

“And Wilkie is mixed up in them.”

“Yes. I hate what he’s done. Everything.”

“Well.” I reached my hand to him again, this time letting my gloved fingers rest on his arm. “That makes two of us.”

A silence settled over us. Then David shifted, his hand covering mine. “May I escort you back to a safer place?”

“Please.”

We walked back toward Market Street. When we reached the intersection, we stopped again. “Which way are you headed?” he asked.

Back on Market we were again in crowds of people. Right away scathing looks met us as David and I stood together, arms linked, on the sidewalk. I glared back at them, but I didn’t want David to bear insult for my sake. “I have to walk in this direction. There’s an automobile waiting for me,” I said. “I’ll be safe now.”

He squeezed my hand. “I hope the next time we run into each other we’ll be somewhere we can talk without feeling that the eyes of the world are watching.” He smiled, a shy smile.

I returned it, shy myself. Then, seeing a scowl on a passing gentleman, I lifted my hand to David in a quick good-bye, slipped my arm from his, and turned away.

And I promptly stopped. I turned around; David was still watching me. “I’d welcome a visit. Should you wish to pay that call you mentioned last time we met.”

“Can I call on you the day after tomorrow?”

I nodded, my tongue having become tied up in unaccustomed fashion. I did so much like that David Wong. He was not the right man for me; he wasn’t what I was looking for. Still and all, I liked him. I turned away again and left him watching me, feeling his eyes on my back. Liking that feeling.

Now I had to face Miss Everts. Had she played me for a fool to recover my pa’s box for herself?

Chapter
SIXTEEN

April 3–4, 1906

 

 

 

 

THE AUTOMOBILE SAT IN THE SAME SPOT AS WHEN I’d left it. Jameson stood stiff as a rail by the passenger’s-side door, scanning the street. When he saw me coming, something passed over his stiff features before he was once again a closed book. Was that relief? Why should he care even one whit about me? He leaned over the door and spoke to Miss Everts, who sat waiting in the back of the conveyance.

Jameson opened the door. I stood on the paving, shifting from one foot to the other, trying to form whatever words I could pull together to express my jumbled thoughts.

Miss Everts leaned forward. “Well? Does it please you to so upset an old lady with your whimsies?”

“Whimsies?” I stopped shifting. “Upset you?”

“Jameson tells me that you ran off down the street without a thought to your own safety or the worries you’d impose on me.”

Now I was mad, and my tongue flew off by itself. “Oh, that’s rich. You leave me out of knowing what you’re up to . . . I think you’ve been using me.” I planted my hands on my hips and glared.

She leaned close to me, gazing at me with wide-open eyes. “Kula. Get in.” Concern and sadness all rolled together in her. I hesitated; but at last I slipped into the seat next to her as she made room. “Jameson, if you could give us a few minutes to converse, we’ll sit right here.”