Rebecca Hagan Lee (23 page)

Chapter Twenty-six

“If you must play, decide on three things at the start: the rules of the game, the stakes, and the quitting time.”

—CHINESE PROVERB

Y
ou’ve been busy,” Jack remarked when Will stepped inside the kitchen through the back door of the Silken Angel later that afternoon with an armload of packages, including another two-pound tin of chocolates from Ghirardelli.

“I had more errands to run.” Will unloaded his packages, setting them down on the kitchen table.

“I see that.” Jack couldn’t keep the hint of amusement out of his voice.

“I had more people to talk to, more port authority officials to bribe. Chocolate works very well for that.” He tilted his head to indicate the Ghirardelli tin. “And cash,” he added. “Chocolate is a powerful inducement on its own, but it works a heck of a lot better when cash is added to the mix.”

“But a gift always helps to open doors that might otherwise remain closed,” Jack guessed.

Will shrugged his shoulders. “What can I say? Everybody expects a saloon keeper to be generous. It was either chocolates and cash or liquor. Chocolates were cheaper.”

“I suppose I should be glad you chose chocolates,” Jack teased.

“And cash,” Will interjected. “Don’t forget the cash.”

“Especially since you might have just as easily given out tokens for free drinks instead of going to Ghirardelli’s, and worked me to death tending bar.”

Will laughed.

“I’m sure you know word is all over town this morning about the Russ House changing hands, and that everyone is speculating about the identity of the buyer.”

“It’s a mystery to me how rumors like that get started,” Will deadpanned. “And how the devil do you know about them?”

Jack’s answer was smug: “Bartenders know everybody’s dirty little secrets.”

“They must,” Will said. “God knows I don’t have any secrets left.”

“You still have one or two up your sleeves,” Jack reassured him. “Like chocolate tins. You know, that might work once we return to Craig Capital. We can change the image of heartless capitalist bankers by giving every customer who opens a new account a tin of chocolates.”

“A tin of chocolates won’t ease the pain of rising interest rates,” Will predicted.

“You never know.” Jack walked to the stove and poured himself a cup of coffee from the pot he’d just finished boiling. “It might catch on.” He lifted the pot so Will could see it. “Coffee?”

“Yes, thanks.”

Jack filled another mug, brought both of them back to the table, and slid one across the surface to Will.

Will stared down at the dark, oily brew. “Did you know that you can buy chocolate-flavored coffee at Ghirardelli’s?” He shook his head in bemusement.

“Who the hell would want to ruin good coffee by putting chocolate in it?” Jack shuddered in mock horror. “It’s un-American.”

“Says the man born and raised in the auld sod.” Will chuckled.

“Look around,” Jack invited. “America is full of Irishmen. We may be poor and downtrodden, but we’re not stupid. Every Irishman knows an opportunity when he sees one. America’s one big, bright opportunity. In America, the son of poor Scots-Irish missionaries can become a rich banker and buy himself a hotel on a whim.”

“A principle, not a whim.” Will straddled a chair, propped his elbow on the back, picked up his cup of coffee, and saluted Jack with it. “And the note
was
overdue. What would you have done?”

“The same thing you did,” Jack told him, lifting his mug, blowing on his coffee before taking a sip. “But I would have done it behind closed doors and refrained from threatening Palmer with the knowledge of it.”

“That would have been ideal,” Will agreed. “Unfortunately, Hammond and I were standing in the doorway of room number eight facing the hall when we saw Palmer accosting Zhing Wu. I reacted before I considered the ramifications. Dammit, Jack, he was hurting the girl. He left bruises all over her upper arm and elbow.”

Jack raised an eyebrow at that. “You know this how?”

“I had Dr. Stone look at Zhing’s arm before she left here yesterday. When I paid her for helping Julie, I explained that Dr. Stone examines all my employees when they start work.”

It wasn’t a lie exactly. Dr. Stone was the Craig Capital physician on retainer. He was also the physician for the employees of the Silken Angel Saloon. But Zhing wasn’t an employee of either business—strictly speaking. Jack supposed Will was going with a loose interpretation of the rules of employment. “And where did Dr. Stone conduct his employee examination?”

“In my office.”

Jack groaned at another loose interpretation of the employee rules.

“Don’t look at me that way. All he did was roll up her sleeve, examine her arm, and advise her to rest.”

“She’s a laundry girl, Will. Do you really believe she’ll follow his advice?”

“No.” He chuckled, remembering. “That’s why I advised the doctor to give her a dollar to pay an acupuncturist. That’s her tin of chocolates, by the way. A replacement for the one our fierce Julia Jane dented.” He fixed his gaze on Jack. “Speaking of which, how
is
our other patient?”

“Whatever you said to her this morning worked. According to our resident Pinkertons, she stopped her incessant pacing.” Jack looked over the rim of his coffee mug at Will. “And they’re grateful. Her walking up and down the hall was driving them mad.”

“I’m familiar with the complaint,” Will retorted dryly.

“Does she know they are staying down the hall from you?”

“She knows
I’m
staying in the room next door,” Will admitted, “but I have no idea whether or not she knows they’re here.”

“She knows,” Jack said. “Sorry. I accidentally let that cat out of the bag.”

“No need to apologize, Jack. She hasn’t breathed a word about it to me.”

“Probably because she thinks she’ll have to reimburse you for their salaries, room and board, and expenses.”

“How would she get a crazy idea like that?” Will took another sip of his coffee and waited for Jack’s reaction. Sometimes the man was honest to a fault.

“From the same person who let the cat out of the bag in the first place,” Jack confessed. “I was tired and frustrated, and I’m afraid I spoke when I should have kept my mouth closed. I’ve no excuse. I simply lost patience with her—”

“Easy to do,” Will confirmed.

“And let it be known that her window smashing had cost a great deal more than just the window.”

Will set his mug on the table. “No harm done. I’m not going to demand reimbursement from her for men for whom we had already decided to send, any more than I’m going to accept payment for the window or for Zhing’s services.” He snapped his fingers. “That reminds me. I stopped in at Montgomery Street Glass. They’ve agreed to install the window on Sunday, rather than Monday, so we can close.”

“Close?”
Jack raised one eyebrow.

“It makes sense to use it as an excuse, Jack. If we close on Sunday in order for the workmen to install the storefront, we can move the new girls early Sunday morning, and we won’t need to send for the old man until Monday night. . . .”

“When the theater is dark,” Jack added. “And the actors are idle.”

“Right. And I changed my mind about the lettering on the window and decided to make a slight change in our hours of operation.”

“I’m all for it,” Jack told him. “Unless you’re adding hours; then I’m opposed.”

“Not adding. Subtracting,” Will told him. “No more staying open until four in the morning. From now on, we’re closing at one on weeknights and two on weekends. I arranged to have those changes made in the lettering we ordered.”

“Thank God,” Jack said. “I don’t know how much longer either one of us could continue keeping those hours along with everything else.”

Will winced. “It isn’t all good news. Part of the reason I shortened our hours of operation is the agreement I made with Julie—or rather, the bribe I used to convince her to stop pacing like a caged animal. . . .”

“Do I want to hear this?” Jack knew the answer before he asked the question.

“I promised to allow her downstairs, give her access to the piano, and teach her how to play billiards.”

“You’re joking!”

Will was startled by Jack’s reaction. “I’m afraid not.”

Unable to contain it any longer, Jack burst out laughing. “You’re going to put a pool cue in that woman’s hands and give her free access to the downstairs. Are you daft?” He didn’t wait for Will to answer. “We’re talking about Typhoon Julia. The reason the window needs replacing in the first place.”

“She’s going mad up there all day,” Will informed him.

“And you’re going soft. . . .”

“The opportunity to come downstairs is enough to keep her on her best behavior.”

“She promised to behave last time,” Jack reminded him. “And look how that turned out.” He glanced at Will. “Did you consider that you have an auction Saturday night? Are you going to allow her to have access to a pool cue once she hears about that? What if you return with girls? What if her missionary zeal returns in full measure?”

“If she plays ‘Bringing in the Sheaves’ on the piano, the deal is off.” He would have to remember to tell her that.

“If she plays that song on the piano, she may wind up dead,” Jack reminded him. “I hate to be the one to point this out, but, Will, the majority of the front of our building is glass.”

“Frosted glass.”

“That’s true, but if you get close enough you can see through it. And what if she plays that song and somebody hears it? It only takes one person, and before you know it, the whole of Chinatown will know that she’s not dead.” He got up from his chair and began to pace. “And that she’s staying here.”

“I ordered shades for the front windows. They’ll be put in right after the new window is installed. And she’ll be in costume.”

“You’re serious.” Jack was taken aback. “What’s she going to be? A Chinese laundry girl working at the Silken Angel Saloon after hours?”

“I thought she might be an anonymous woman who was part of an auction. If she wears her black wig and the dress of a Chinese lady whenever she’s downstairs, she should be safe enough after hours. Her disguise will protect her identity and add to the charade of our second-floor business.” Will gestured toward several parcels wrapped in brown paper and twine. “I bought several more cheongsams for her to wear.”

Jack conceded that the idea might work—that Julia might be able to leave the safety and secrecy of the second floor and live a relatively normal life as long as she pretended to be someone else. “You have given this a great deal of thought.”

“I had to,” Will admitted. “We can’t keep her locked up once she’s fully recovered, and we can’t send her back to the mission as Julie Parham. The only way she could possibly go back would be as her cousin, Jane Burke, or under some other false identity.”

“We could send her back to Hong Kong,” Jack suggested halfheartedly.

“If only she would go.” Will was torn between his desire to have Julie safe in Hong Kong, far away from the danger facing her in San Francisco, and his desire to keep her with him. “But the only way to get her to go back without finding Su Mi or finding out what happened to her would be to crate her up and ship her.” He wasn’t serious. He would never crate a human being and ship her on a cargo ship to a country seven thousand miles away. But there were people—men and women—on both sides of the Pacific Ocean who would do so without a qualm. There were men and women on both sides of the Pacific Ocean who shipped frightened women and girls in the holds of cargo ships from Hong Kong to San Francisco every month.

Su Mi had been one of those people. And Will thought he might have found a record of her arrival—or someone who remembered her arrival and knew something about what happened to her after she disembarked.

Before he knew it, Will was relating everything he’d learned to Jack.

“Are you going to tell Julie what you’ve discovered?” Jack asked when he finished.

“Not yet,” Will said. “It’s better to wait until I have more information than to disappoint her.”

“I agree.” Glancing at the clock on the wall, Jack asked, “When do you intend to put our new operating hours into effect?”

“No time like the present,” Will said. “I made a date with Julie to escort her downstairs after we close tonight.”

“We’ll need signs to post alerting our customers.” Jack was thinking aloud. “And we need to do something about our regular poker players—unless you’re willing to trust them with the secret. . . .”

“I’m not.” Will was adamant about that. He didn’t doubt for a second that the regulars could be trusted with the liquor supply above and below the bar. They could be trusted with the cash drawer and the kitchen larder, but he hadn’t trusted them with the secrets of the second-floor business or the wine cellar. And Will didn’t intend to trust them with the knowledge of Julie’s identity. “I’m thinking the private dining room would work very nicely.” The private dining room had never been used for its original purpose. “It’s adjacent to both the kitchen and the bar, and furnished with a table and chairs. It’s perfect for the poker regulars. It’s close enough to the bar, the kitchen, and the facilities for their convenience, but far enough away from the billiard room and the piano that she should be able to grab a bit of freedom.