Rebecca Hagan Lee (26 page)

“I do what I can, Galen,” Will said. “I try to keep girls from reaching the brothels and cribs, but . . .” He held out his hands in a gesture of surrender. “I fear I’m fighting a battle I cannot hope to win.”

The doctor nodded. “We have two very powerful forces working against us, Will.”

“Time and money?” Will asked rhetorically.

Dr. Stone’s shoulders seemed a little more stooped, as if the weight he carried was pressing down on him, bending him. “We have
four
very powerful forces working against us—a thousand-year-old culture that views women as chattel; greed; time; and the lack of money.” He met Will’s gaze. “If we had the richest men and women on earth working for our cause, we still couldn’t buy all the unwanted girls in China—or anywhere else in the world.”

Will sighed. “I know I can’t save them all. But I have to try.”

“I suspect that you and James Craig and I share the same motivation,” the man who had once been a respected surgeon named Dr. Grandon Stonemeyer said.

“What motivation is that?” Will’s question might have sounded cavalier to the casual listener, because the man played his cards close to his vest, but Dr. Stone knew better.

“Our failure to save the one who mattered most.” The doctor knew Will had a good idea of his history. He knew nothing of James Craig’s or Will Keegan’s history except that it was shared. But failure had always been a powerful motivator, and the failure to protect human life was one of the most powerful motivators in history. Seeing the surprise on Will’s face, the doctor added, “I’ve been a physician nearly half my life. I’ve seen more pain and suffering than I care to recount.” He gave a little snort. “I never cease to be amazed at man’s ability and willingness—no, eagerness—to destroy other men in unimaginably horrible ways. But I believe man’s willingness to prey on the weak and defenseless is the most heinous crime of all. These girls did nothing wrong except have the misfortune to be born female and into poverty and indifference. For that they’re enslaved and used in the worst possible way, and discarded when they’re no longer wanted.” He caught himself. “No, not wanted. These girls were never wanted; they were never anything more than something to barter.”

Will met the doctor’s gaze. “I’ll do what I can tonight, Doctor.”

“I know you will,” the doctor said. “What time should I expect to hear from you?”

“Starts at nine.” Will tried to calculate the time it would take to conclude the auction and get the girls back to the Silken Angel. “Before midnight if we’re lucky.”

“I’ll be waiting.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

“In doing what we ought we deserve no praise.”

—LATIN PROVERB

T
he Nightingale Song was crowded with customers when Will entered the cellar shortly after eight o’clock. The basement was smaller than the one in the Jade Dragon or the Lotus Blossom. There were several tables and chairs, but the majority of the men and women present were forced to stand. The lighting was poor and the air inside dank and musty, smelling of pickled fish and brine and the city refuse along the waterfront. Everything about this auction was inferior in every way to the previous auctions.

The Nightingale Song was situated on the far edge of Chinatown in real estate occupied by the tongs between the area designated as the Barbary Coast and the San Francisco Bay. All around him were the sounds of the shrill, plaintive singsong voices of the crib girls calling out until late in the night the price they charged for looking, feeling, and doing.

It was deep into dangerous territory for a white man on foot without bodyguards.

Jack had wanted to send Seth Hammond along once again to watch Will’s back, but Will had asked Seth and the other Pinkertons to stay and guard Jack at the Silken Angel Saloon.
Guard Jack and Julie.

Everyone in Chinatown knew the saloon was missing its glass storefront, and it was rumored that the gangs of young hoodlums who existed to terrorize the Chinese were looking to broaden their reach and had decided the Silken Angel was vulnerable.

Will wasn’t worried about the Silken Angel. He knew it was well protected. His concern was for himself. If he survived the auction without being knifed or robbed, he had to make it home without being knifed or robbed—most likely with girls in tow. And although he had been raised in a household without them, he’d become proficient with firearms at university. In order to complete his education as a gentleman, he’d had to learn to hunt grouse and pheasant and stag on foot, and foxes on horseback. Hunting was part of being an English gentleman. Will hated it, but he’d learned to use the weapons—pistols, shotguns, and rifles—with a skill that was surprising in the son of nonviolent missionaries. He had hidden a pistol on his person tonight and prayed he wouldn’t be forced to use it.

The hardest thing about this evening, other than getting here, Will thought as he made his way through the throng of people milling about, was canceling his billiards session with Julia Jane. He had used the excuse that Saturday was the saloon’s busiest night, and with the new window being installed on Sunday morning, the place would be turned upside down to accommodate the workers. He made it a point not to lie to her. Everything he’d said was true, but he hadn’t told her the whole of it. He couldn’t. Not until he knew what he might find. He would be returning to the Silken Angel with girls. But he had no idea how many girls or in what condition. And he had no way of knowing whether Su Mi might be among them.

After, he promised himself. He’d tell Julie about all of it after the auction.

Now, waiting for Li Toy to appear and for the auction to begin, Will made his way to the back wall. If he had to stand up, he preferred to do it with his back against the wall. Reaching it, Will elbowed his way to the brick surface and leaned against it, his shoulders touching the brick. He held on to his satchel containing the association ledger and pen and ink. He didn’t dare bring his private ledger to a place like this, where it was in danger of being stolen. He had left it in his office safe and would have to memorize as many of the details about the girls as possible and record his impressions when he returned to the Silken Angel later.

“Keegan, what you doing standing up?” Li Toy had appeared at his elbow and sidled up to him while he was lost in thought.

Will gritted his teeth until his jaw muscle began to throb, in order to keep from jumping or showing any emotion. “Good turnout. The place is full.”

“It not too full for Will Keegan to have table I save for him.” She was wearing another lovely dress. It was gold and, if he wasn’t mistaken, an exact replica of the one he’d bought for Julie after his meeting with Pete Malcolm on Wednesday. “Come with me.”

Li Toy led him to a small table and urged him to set out his ledger and pen and ink. “I see you send box of your favorite whiskey from the Silken Angel here tonight. You sit down. Make yourself comfortable while I go fetch you your drink.”

Fetch him a drink? That was new. Li Toy didn’t fetch anything. She had servants to do it. Will watched as she toddled off to a makeshift table containing drinks, tea, and lemonade and one bottle of Irish whiskey. He furrowed his brow in concentration as he pulled the ledger and the pen and ink from his satchel and spread them out on the table in front of him. It was his brand of Irish whiskey. From the case he knew Jack had sent over from the Silken Angel. Will frowned again. He had never seen Li Toy like this, and that worried him. Whatever Madam Harpy was up to, it wasn’t good.

He waited while she returned with a bar glass half-filled with whiskey and set it down on the table within comfortable reach. The glass was cloudy. “Thank you.”

“You welcome, Keegan.” She stood before him. “You try whiskey, see if you like.”

Alarm bells went off in Will’s head, and he wondered whether she’d coated the rim of the glass with poison or slipped it into the whiskey or both, and if she had, whether it was enough to kill him or just make him sick. But there was no getting around it. Lifting his glass, Will took a sip. He couldn’t smell poison, whatever it was, but he knew in his gut that it was there.

“You not drink very much,” she complained.

“Whiskey is meant to be sipped and savored,” he told her. “You are meant to take your time.”

She sighed, and Will realized that whatever she’d put in his drink wasn’t going to be quick, but slow and probably painful. Li Toy twirled in front of him, showing off her dress. “You like dress?” she asked in her flirtatious voice.

“It’s very pretty,” he replied.

The look in her dark eyes changed, hardened, and her voice took on an edge. “I thought you must like, since you go to my dressmaker and buy three or four beautiful dresses like this to take home to someone else.”

Will sat up on his chair. He was feeling very uneasy and decided the best course of action was to brazen it out. He had already sipped from the tainted whiskey. He was either poisoned or not. There was nothing he could do about it except stay alive as long as he could. “I liked your lavender dress so much I decided to send my sisters two dresses apiece as gifts.”

“Keegan have sisters?” She eyed him suspiciously. “Where?”

“One in London and one in Dublin.”

“Older or younger?” she demanded.

“Both older,” he said, fighting off a sudden wave of dizziness, trying to focus. He couldn’t tell whether Li Toy believed him or not. For all he knew she could be sharpening her chopsticks, ready to finish him off.

“What their names?” Li Toy seemed to be deciding whether he could be believed.

“Molly and Colleen.” Knowing she was testing him, Will decided on a test of his own and reached for the glass of whiskey. If she didn’t call his bluff, he could be helping her commit murder by killing himself.

Li Toy bumped the glass out of his nerveless fingers. It bounced against the table and onto the floor, spilling its contents. “Li Toy clumsy.” She looked at Will. “And Keegan ill.” Reaching out, she quickly closed his ledger and shoved it into his satchel, followed by his pen and ink, then closed and buckled the satchel. She lifted her hands and clapped twice.

Two big burly bodyguards rushed to her side. “What are you doing?” Will barely managed to get the question out.

“Keegan go home to Silken Angel Saloon.” Li Toy instructed her bodyguards, “Bring sedan chair. Hurry.” She slipped her hand into Will’s coat pocket and dropped a glass vial inside.

“What’s that?” He was dizzy and feeling ill, but he still had some of his wits about him.

“Antidote. Mix in water and drink,” she whispered.

“What about the auction?” he demanded.

Removing his wallet, Li Toy took out ten hundred-dollar bills and showed them to him so he would know she took only the thousand dollars. “You pay me for five girls at two hundred dollars a head. I send girls to Silken Angel after auction.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Only two virgins this time.”

“Why?”

“Li Toy jealous of Keegan’s young lover. . . .”

“I don’t have a young lover,” Will said. “I don’t have any lover.”

“Li Toy believed gossip. She think you have lover. She think if her
special
friend, Keegan, need comfort, he should come to her, his
special
friend. Not Wu’s laundry girl.” She placed his wallet back in his inside jacket pocket and patted his chest.

Will’s heart nearly stopped. He didn’t know whether it was from his fear for Julia Jane or the poison he’d ingested. “Wu’s laundry girl?”

His astonishment was genuine, and it must have convinced Li Toy, because she explained. “His son’s widow.”

“Zhing?”
Will was furious but too ill, at the moment, to do anything about it. “What do you know about Zhing?” He didn’t know what she would say or how he would answer, but whatever he said had to sound authentic. Madam Harpy had just poisoned him out of jealousy. What would she do to Zhing? Or Julie if she found her . . . ?

“Zhing Wu goes to Silken Angel every morning.” Li Toy fixed him with a clever look. “And every night.”

“She washes my shirts,” Will bit out. “She collects in the morning and delivers in the afternoon, not at night. Our relationship is strictly business.”

“Market Street Laundry does the Silken Angel Saloon laundry,” Madam Harpy corrected. It was a point of honor for Market Street Laundry that they did the laundry for the newest and finest saloon in Chinatown, and everybody knew it. “Market Street has saloon business.”

“Market Street does the saloon’s laundry. Zhing does my personal laundry.”

“Since when?”

“Since last week, when I decided I didn’t like the way Market Street starched my shirts.” He didn’t have to pretend to be irritated by her interrogation. He was angry.

“You protect Zhing from hotel man,” she accused.

“Why shouldn’t I?” Will demanded. “The hotel had a ‘no Celestials’ policy. He hurt her because she went inside to collect laundry. Yes, I protected Zhing.” He looked at Li Toy. “I would have protected any woman from a man of his size and strength—including you, madam.”

The ruthless madam old enough to be his grandmother beamed. “You would give me a dollar for acupuncturist, too?”

“If you needed it.”

Li Toy chewed on her thumbnail. “You do all these nice things for Zhing and you give her a tin of Ghirardelli chocolates and she not your girl?”

“No.” Will shook his head, then wished he hadn’t. He tried to bite back his groan. “Who told you she was?”

“Wu.”

“Wu?” Will repeated the man’s name, and it sounded to his own ears as if he’d never heard it before. The word of Zhing’s honorable father-in-law would be hard to refute. He shared a house and a business with her.

Li Toy nodded. “If Wu want to keep his laundry, he tell Li Toy what she wants to know.”

“I see.” Everything became clear except his vision. He was seeing two Madam Harpys, both of them blurred and fuzzy around the edges. Will closed his eyes.

Li Toy patted his chest. “Go to sleep, Keegan. Not to worry. Not die tonight. Just sick.”

“I’m relieved to hear it.”