Fortune is a Woman (44 page)

He lifted him onto his shoulder and staggered back down the corridor into a wall of heat. A pall of black smoke crawled toward him and he ducked his head, fighting against it as it filled his lungs. There were only a few more yards to go, a few more steps to safety. The boy's weight grew heavier and his knees buckled. He couldn't breathe but he knew he must go on, he must save Josh this time. And then the black smoke filled his lungs and his head and he knew no more.

***

Harry was preparing to leave. His valet had packed his bags for an extended trip abroad and the chauffeur was waiting with the de Courmont ready to drive him to Union Station. Time was passing. The train would leave within the hour, yet Harry was still pacing up and down the vast hall peering every few minutes at his wafer-thin gold fob-watch. It was another expensive self-indulgent gift to himself, but he was in no mood to admire it. He stared hard at the telephone on the table across the hall, willing it to ring. He was still boiling with rage at the newspaper article about Francie and himself and now he was waiting to learn if his first act of revenge had been accomplished.

He thought about his plan, reminding himself how clever it was of him to use the Mandarin's own people against him. The hired tongs should have done their work by now, but they were late in calling and he wondered anxiously if something had gone wrong. Surely they wouldn't dare take his money and welsh on their deal?

He resumed his pacing as another ten minutes ticked by. His valet, waiting by the door, reminded him that the train would leave in half an hour.

"I know, I know, goddamn it," he snarled. And then the telephone rang. He leapt across the hall and snatched up the receiver. A faint smile crossed his face as he listened to the man's garbled report.

Still smiling, he put down the receiver without a word and walked to the door. Revenge felt very sweet.

***

From the cab driving to the port, Francie saw the red glow in the sky ten blocks away. Then she heard the wail of the fire engines and saw the flashing lights of the police cars as they sped past them.

"Looks like trouble ahead, lady," the cabbie said.

She felt that first fateful tug of dread. "Hurry, please hurry," she begged. A policeman stopped the cab two blocks from the warehouse. Ignoring his protests, Francie leapt out and ran toward the blaze. A second policeman grabbed her and she turned, screaming at him to let her go. "My son is in there," she cried. "I must find him... help me, oh
please
help me." Fighting her way out of his grasp, she ran into the street leading to the offices. The heat came toward her in great waves. She stopped, stunned by the fiery inferno. The whole complex was ablaze. Flames leapt from the windows. The corrugated tin roofs had already buckled and melted.

Lai Tsin, summoned by the police, saw Francie from the top of the street and ran toward her. Taking her by the shoulders, he helped her away. Shaking with terror and shock, she told him about Sammy's call and her fear that Ollie was in the warehouse. He shook his head in disbelief.

When Lai Tsin tried to guide her to his car, she pleaded that she had to stay with Ollie. But finally she climbed in and sat beside him, quiet and biddable as a child. In her state of shock, she reminded Lai Tsin of the night when he'd first met her. Now he was driving her back to her own home on Nob Hill and if what she had said was true, tragedy had struck a second time.

He put his arm tenderly around her waist, helping her up the stairs to her room. He summoned the servants to put her to bed and a doctor to give her an injection to make her sleep.

"Whatever shall I do?" she cried, as the Mandarin sat by her bedside, waiting for the sedative to take effect. Her eyes were wild with horror and her face ashen. He shook his head slowly, not knowing what to say. "Leave it all to me, Francie," he said gently. "I will find your son for you."

But as her eyes closed under the influence of the drug, for the first time in many years Lai Tsin felt fear in his heart.

The fire was so fierce it gutted the entire complex, though the firemen managed to prevent it from spreading to the adjacent buildings. By midnight it was all over. There was nothing left of the warehouses with their treasure troves of goods. Later, when the ashes were cool enough, the firemen discovered evidence that the place had been deliberately torched, doused from end to end with so much kerosene it had exploded into flames and been virtually gutted within minutes.

Later that morning they confirmed that the remains of two people had been found in the ruins, one a man, and the other an adolescent boy.

Lai Tsin's face was bitter with sorrow as he mounted the stairs to face Francie. She only needed to look into his eyes to know the truth and she watched him silently. He reached out for her and she thrust him away. She flung herself onto the bed, screaming and flailing her arms in a rage of despair. "Harry did this," she cried in a strangled wail, her face awash with tears. "I know it was him.
He
killed Ollie—not Sammy Morris. It was all a ruse to get him there."

She looked piteously up at Lai Tsin and he sat down beside her and for the very first time in their relationship he put his arms around her. She felt small and fragile, sobbing on his shoulder. He could find no words to comfort her and his own tears ran unchecked down his face as he shared her sorrow. And Lai Tsin knew he had failed Francie. He had made a terrible mistake by not letting the hatchet men kill Sammy Morris all those years ago. Because if Sammy hadn't kidnapped Ollie, he would be alive now.

***

On the train to Chicago, Harry read the headlines in the morning papers and his satisfied smile changed to a gasp. He told himself nervously that he hadn't meant to kill the kid. How in hell was he supposed to have known he was there? They'd told him the Mandarin had left and the place was locked up for the night.

He reread the report uneasily. Then, tightening his tie he walked down the train to the dining car. But somehow breakfast didn't taste very good that morning. So he hurried back to his private compartment and ordered a bottle of bourbon and some branch water. A few hours later, he summoned his valet and told him to cancel the week's stay in New York and to book them on the first ship leaving for Europe—anywhere in Europe. Until the speculation died down he wanted to put as many miles as possible between him and San Francisco.

PART IV:  Buck

CHAPTER 33

1927

Buck Wingate was in the Wall Street branch of his law office, waiting for Harry. It had been nine years since he had last seen him. That had been when he had refused to act as his attorney in a libel suit he was planning after the disastrous fire that killed Francesca Harrison's son. The newspapers had been full of rumors about a mysterious telephone call luring the boy to the empty offices and the police had confirmed that the fire had been set deliberately. But it was the barely veiled references to Harry's animosity toward his sister that pointed the finger at him. And they had also printed a rumor that Francesca Harrison had accused Harry of killing her son. From a safe distance in his new Monte Carlo villa Harry had expressed his shock at the tragedy and just for the record, proved that he had been on board a train on his way to New York the night it occurred and knew nothing about it until he'd read it in the papers.

The stories had filled the nation's journals for weeks. There were photographs of Miss Harrison and her "close friend and business partner," the Mandarin, at the funeral. Francie's face had been hidden beneath a heavy black veil and she had been clinging to the Mandarin and her friend, Annie Aysgarth, looking as if she were about to faint.

At the time Buck thought he would not have put it past Harry to have had a part in it. When he'd come to see him about a libel action Buck had told him bluntly, "If you take the matter to court they'll dig up every bit of scandal and dirt they can about both you and your sister. And since your own past is not exactly squeaky clean, my advice to you is to let sleeping dogs lie."

"What do you mean—my past?" Harry blustered. "I've nothing to be ashamed of." Buck's steady eyes met his and he added uncertainly, "I mean, I had nothing to do with this fire, nothing at all—"

"Drop it, Harry," Buck said evenly.

"Goddamn it, I thought you were my friend," Harry toppled his chair as he got to his feet. "If that's a friend, then I guess I'd better get myself another attorney."

"I guess so, Harry," Buck replied coldly, "because I sure as hell am not gonna touch it."

The next he'd heard of Harry was the phone call this morning asking to see him. He said he had questions about his father's estate.

The Wingate and Wingate law practice was an old and established one; Buck's entrepreneurial grandfather, a poor immigrant from Ireland, had made his first small fortune at the age of twenty trading furs in Alaska. Then, bored with the freezing north, he had turned to building railroads and then to grain. Finally, he was rich enough to satisfy his own high standards and he grew bored again. An orphan with little education, he endowed a small mid-western college with a new library. In return they allowed him to enroll as a student at the age of thirty-two. He amassed credits quickly, the way he'd amassed his money, and he graduated with honors, summa cum laude, a mere two years later. Then he'd applied to Harvard Law School.

When he received his Doctor of Law degree, he left the world of commerce behind and devoted himself entirely to his new profession. He married the daughter of another rich speculator, hoping she would give him a brood of sons to staff his newly founded law firm. But only after three girls did she bear a boy—his son, Jason. Jason followed in his father's footsteps, expanding the law firm from Sacramento to San Francisco and New York. Now Jason's only son, Buckland Aldrich Wingate, had inherited the firm. But Buck's passion was politics, not law. He'd left most of the practice in the hands of his partners while he served as senator for California. He was on several important senate committees, particularly in the trade sector, at which he was an expert.

Jason Wingate had died a few years ago, but his tall, gray-whiskered presence was maintained in the full-length portrait on the wall in Buck's New York office. Looking at him now he remembered how much his father had despised Harry Harrison—and he knew he had good reason. Still, the Wingates had looked after the Harrison legal affairs ever since they'd started and he must do his duty.

Harry was late, as usual. When he finally sauntered into his office, Buck thought he looked heavy, but his face was sun-bronzed and still handsome and he was wearing an impeccably-cut Savile Row suit and a conservative French silk tie. He was clean shaven and he wore his receding fair hair slicked back. He looked as immaculate as an excellent valet could make him. Even the soles of his shoes shone from the layer of polish applied each night. Buck smiled cynically; he knew the real Harry who lurked behind that English-gentleman facade.

"Morning, Buck," Harry said, offering his hand and smiling genially as though nothing had happened and they had seen each other just the other day. "Sorry to have missed your wedding, but I was in Monte Carlo at the time. Or was it London?" He shrugged. "I forget. Still, how is your wife?"

"Maryanne is well, thank you, Harry." He watched as Harry's eyes swiveled to the silver-framed photograph on his desk. Harry's brows shot up. "I heard she was a stunner, Buck, but you sure did yourself proud. Money and looks—and an old aristocratic family. An unbeatable combination, I'd say."

"Would you, Harry?" he replied dryly. "And what about your own marriage prospects?" He knew all about Harry's escapades with follies' stars and movie actresses. He hoped he wasn't about to indulge himself in another expensive misalliance, because he knew he could not afford it.

"Ah, the hell with all women I say," Harry retorted bitterly. "I'm here because I need your help. I suddenly find myself in a small financial predicament and I need to raise cash. Of course, it's only temporary," he added quickly. "You know how the commodities market's been behaving lately. I've taken a bit of a beating on cocoa futures and I thought maybe it was time to open up the rest of the trust fund." He smiled winningly. "Kind of an emergency, Buck. You know how it is."

"From what I recall the second half of your trust does not become available until you are forty. And you have a few years to go yet."

Harry heaved a theatrical sigh. He lit a cigarette and leaned lazily back in his chair. "Surely we're not going to let four years come between me and my money? My father would have wanted me to have it if I needed it. And I do need it, Buck. Now."

"That trust is watertight until you reach the age of forty. That is the way your father wanted it. I'm afraid there's absolutely nothing I can do about it."

Harry sighed again, contemplating the glowing end of his hand-made Egyptian cigarette. "I had a feeling you'd say that and I've thought about what I would do." He looked at Buck, smiling. "I can always borrow against it, can't I?"

"At exorbitant interest rates."

Harry drew on his cigarette and blew a perfect smoke ring into the air. "I'm sure the Harrison Mercantile will be pleased to offer me the loan of a few million at a very favorable interest rate."

Buck leaned forward, his hands clasped on the desk in front of him. "Look, Harry, banks have their rules, too, you know. As you are the bank's owner, I'm not at all sure of the legality of what you are suggesting. I'm advising you to watch your step."

Harry laughed, but he was not amused. "Well, thanks a lot, fella. That's just about all the advice I've had from my old family lawyers in years. Still, we won't allow these things to get in the way of our friendship, shall we? We've known each other since we were kids, Buck. Remember that trip to Paris all those years ago? God, that was fun, wasn't it? All those wonderful sexy Frenchwomen in those racy bordellos? I've never forgotten it, have you?"

"I've never forgotten your escapades in Paris."