by Sharpe, Jon
No one, not Han, not Lo Ping, or any of the Tong, so much as batted an eye. They took the death with the same detachment they would the swatting of a fly.
“Are you satisfied?” Han asked Fargo.
“You did this for me?” Fargo said.
“It was you Nan Kua and his companions tried to slay. It is only fitting you witness his punishment.”
Fargo watched a pool of scarlet spread under the body.
“What about those friends of his?”
“They, too, have been punished although not as severely,” Han said. “Since he was the instigator, his was the most severe.”
“What did you do to them?”
“Each of them has had a hand chopped off.”
Fargo stared.
“You act surprised,” Han said. “They were a party to the insult. They had to atone.”
“I wasn’t insulted—” Fargo began, but Han cut him off with a wave of a hand.
“Oh, the insult wasn’t to you. When I give orders they are to be followed. After I learned of your fight with Nan Kua and the others over the boy who took the ax, I gave word that you were not to be interfered with in any way. By defying me, Nan Kua insulted me. And insults cannot be borne by a man in my position.”
“I reckon not,” Fargo said. The blood was within inches of his boots.
“I ask you again,” Han said with a smile. “Are you satisfied? Have I redeemed my honor and made my sentiments clear?”
“I savvy you down to your bones,” Fargo said.
“Excellent. Then there are no hard feelings between us?”
“Why would there be?”
Han appeared enormously pleased. “Our business is concluded. Lo Ping will guide you out.” He waited until Fargo started to turn to add, “I should imagine you have no reason to stay in camp. A prudent man would be on his way in the morning.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Fargo said.
Han smiled. “Please do so. And if your travels should ever bring you near Hunan again, you are welcome to pay us a visit.”
Fargo started to turn, but stopped. He’d had a troubling thought. “What happened to the boy?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The boy who was chopping wood. What happened to him?”
“Do you remember his name, by any chance?”
“He never told me what it was,” Fargo lied.
“Ah. Well, stealing is discouraged, most strongly. When I find out who he is, he will be punished.”
Fargo looked at the hatchet sticking out of the dead Tong’s head. “He’s just a kid.”
“His age is irrelevant. It is the insult. I trust I have demonstrated they are not to be borne.”
Fargo got out of there before he uttered one.
They were almost to the bottom of the stairs when Lo Ping said, “If I were you, I would take my master’s advice.”
“I don’t aim to stick around any longer than I have to,” Fargo said.
Lo Ping’s cat smile widened. “You are being more reasonable than I gave you credit for.”
“I can be reasonable as hell every blue moon or so.”
“Blue moon? You Americans have the most peculiar expressions.”
Fargo strode out. Climbing on the Ovaro, he reined in the direction of the O’Briens’, and when he had gone forty or fifty feet, he stopped and looked back. Near as he could tell no one was following him.
“Reasonable, my ass,” Fargo said to himself, and gigged the Ovaro to the bridge.
Every window in the House of Pleasure was lit. A pair of painted dolls stood out front, enticing passersby.
Fargo reined on up the street to an open grassy space between cabins. Halting the stallion next to a spruce, he tied the reins. He sat and removed his spurs and placed them in his saddlebags.
Loosening the Colt in its holster, Fargo glided around the cabin and on to the rear of the House of Pleasure. He was worried the door might be bolted but it creaked open. He waited in case someone had heard and when no one investigated he slipped inside and eased the door shut behind him.
A long, narrow hallway stretched ahead. From off in the distance came the murmur of conversations.
Fargo crept forward. He was moving past a flight of stairs that led down when he heard sounds from below: a harsh voice, and rattling, and what might have been a whimper. He ducked down the stairs.
There wasn’t much light at first. He reached a landing, and crouched. Below was a storage area stacked with crates and containers, nearly all with Chinese writing or symbols on them. An aisle had been cleared through the center, and from behind a high wall of crates rosy light filtered in.
A man barked in Chinese. A woman mewled as if in pain. Chains rattled, and there was the unmistakable sharp crack of a slap.
Palming his Colt, Fargo continued down. He peeked up the aisle. All he could see was a Tong with his back to him.
There were more barking and more blows.
Fargo moved on silent soles. He was about ten feet from the Tong when he came to another aisle at a right angle to the first. It ran along the wall of crates. He moved along it until he spied a gap between two of the crates.
One look, and his blood boiled.
Three young Chinese women were bound to chairs; one was Mai Wing. They had been stripped to the waist and their bodies bore scores of bruises and contusions. Their faces, though, hadn’t been touched. Each sat slumped with exhaustion, their heads hung low.
As Fargo watched, another Tong came into view and cupped Mai Wing’s chin. He raised her head and grinned and said something.
Mai Wing spat on him.
The Tong punched her in the gut and she sagged, gasping.
A third Tong, out of sight to Fargo’s left, voiced a comment that brought a chuckle to the hatchet man who had hit her.
Fargo debated. Shots were bound to bring more men in black. The quieter, the better, then. Sliding the Colt into his holster, he hiked his pant leg, dipped his hand into his boot, and slid the Arkansas toothpick from its ankle sheath.
Retracing his steps to the main aisle, Fargo peered around. The first Tong still stood there with his back to him. He heard the other two talking.
Quickly, with no wasted motion, Fargo reached around and clamped his left hand over the man’s mouth even as he thrust the toothpick in to the hilt into the side of man’s neck. The Tong stiffened and clutched at his arm but was dead within heartbeats.
Catching the heavy body as it fell, Fargo dragged it behind the crates and quietly placed it on the floor. He moved to where the man had been standing and craned his head out.
The other two Tong were facing the three young women.
The same one who had cupped Mai Wing’s chin before cupped it again. This time she didn’t spit on him. Her eyes were dazed, almost glassy. From her bruises, they had been hurting her a good long while.
Fargo crept to a point directly behind her tormentors.
They were enjoying themselves, these two. The one on the left was slightly behind the other, and Fargo took him first. In a long bound he reached him and did as he had done with the first: hand over the mouth, cold steel in the neck. Fargo knew exactly where to stab so that death was near instantaneous. He didn’t bother trying to catch this one as the body collapsed. He sprang at the other, seeking to dispose of him just as quickly.
The last man spun. He snarled in Chinese and suddenly an ax was in his hand. He sidestepped Fargo’s thrust and swung his ax at Fargo’s head.
Fargo caught his wrist. The Tong caught his. Locked together, they struggled. Fargo was strong but so was the Tong. Fargo used his advantage in height to slowly bend the Tong back. The man did more snarling. Without warning, he drove a knee at Fargo’s groin and wrenched to break free.
Fargo let go, and drove his boot at the Tong’s knee.
The man cried out and staggered. Fargo slashed him across the wrist but the Tong held on to the hatchet and aimed a blow at Fargo’s neck. Dodging, Fargo cut him across the other leg. The man tottered and retaliated. Fargo ducked, shifted, and rammed the toothpick into the Tong’s jugular. He grabbed the man’s wrist and held it as life ebbed. Defiant to the last, the Tong tried to gouge out his eyes. Then he went limp.
Fargo let him drop. He wiped the toothpick clean of blood on the dead man’s shirt and moved to Mai Wing.
“You,” she croaked in some amazement.
“Can you walk?” Fargo asked as he cut at the ropes with short, swift strokes.
“You came to find me?”
“I’m here,” Fargo said, listening for sounds from above. More Tong might show at any moment.
“You hardly know me.”
“I can go and leave you tied to the chair if you want,” Fargo said. He sliced through the last loop and put an arm around her shoulders. “Can you stand?”
“I think so.” Wincing, Mai Wing stiffly rose. The first thing she did was bend and pick up her top, which had been shoved under her chair.
“How long have they been working on you?”
“After you were struck down, Lo Ping and the Hu brothers took me to Han and then here,” Mai Wing related as she painfully slipped an arm into a sleeve. “The Pou sisters were already being tortured. They, too, do not want to be whores.”
“Lean on the chair,” Fargo directed. She was terribly weak. He made short shrift of the ropes on the other two and helped them to stand. They were weaker and had more contusions and black and blue marks.
Mai Wing helped them put their tops on.
“I’ve got to get you out of here,” Fargo said when she was done. “Are the three of you up to it?”
“I am,” Mai Wing said. She addressed the Pou sisters, and after a brief exchange, she frowned. “They have not had food or water for three days. They do not know if they can.”
“They have to try,” Fargo said. “I can’t help them and protect you at the same time.”
Mai Wing said more to the sisters and both responded with what sounded to Fargo like she or shi. “They say they will try their best.”
“Stay behind me.” Fargo drew his Colt. With the six-shooter in one hand and the toothpick in the other, he led them to the foot of the stairs.
Mai Wing could move fairly well but the other two were turtles. One wobbled every few steps and her sister had to steady her.
Fargo frowned. It was a long way up. “Is there another way out?”
“There is the ramp. It is how they bring things in.” Mai Wing motioned at the front wall.
“Show me.”
They turned and had no sooner taken a couple of steps than voices wafted down from the top of the stairs.
12
Fargo raised the Colt but Mai Wing put her hand on his arm.
“No,” she whispered. “They are on their way out the back.”
Sure enough, the voices faded.
The ramp was about six feet wide. Double doors were fitted with large rollers at street level.
Fargo took hold of a handle and tugged. The door slid easily enough, and he cracked it open a few inches. He could see the stream, and across it, Han’s towering Pagoda. He could also see several Tong loitering near the bridge. If he opened the door all the way, they were bound to spot him. “We’ll wait a few minutes.”
Mai Wing put her hands on her knees and bent over and groaned.
“How bad?” Fargo asked.
“I am dizzy,” Mai Wing said. “They hit me on the head.”
“But not in the face.”
“No,” Mai Wing said bitterly. “So we could go to work for Madame Lotus that much sooner. The face is very important.”
Fargo recollected the painted faces of the women in the parlor. “They took it for granted you’d give in.”
“They bragged that everyone does, sooner or later. There is only so much pain a person can take.”
One of the Pou sisters fell to her knees and the other sister comforted her. They whispered, and one spoke to Mai Wing.
“She says that her sister is badly hurt inside. One of the Tong kicked her. She does not know if she can go on.”
“She has to try,” Fargo said. He peered out again. The Tong by the bridge were drifting up the street. The moment they were out of sight he opened the door wide enough for them to slip through. He helped Mai Wing and then the Pous.
Off to the left was the entrance to the House of Pleasure. Two painted girls were leaning against the wall and hadn’t noticed them. Nor did anyone passing by pay any attention.
Minding one’s business might as well have been a law in Hunan.
“Where can I take you?” Fargo wondered if the O’Briens might help. Then again, it might put the family in danger.
“My grandfather,” Mai Wing said, and pointed to the east. “If we can reach his cabin. But there are always Tong out and around.”
“I have an idea,” Fargo said, and ushered them around the corner. “Stay put. I’ll be right back.”
Fargo practically ran to the Ovaro. Swinging onto the saddle, he rode back up the street. The two girls glanced at him and went on talking. He went around to the side and drew rein. “Give me directions as we go. I’ll go slow.”
“The Tong will see you,” Mai Wing said. “On your animal you are conspicuous.”
“But they won’t see you on the other side,” Fargo hoped. It wasn’t much of a plan but it was the best he could come up with.
With the Ovaro moving at a walk and the sisters leaning on the stallion to keep from falling, they covered the quarter mile or so to a short side street. Along the way Fargo spotted half a dozen Tong. Apparently word had gone out from Han not to give him any trouble, which worked in their favor.
“This is the one,” Mai Wing said as they neared the last cabin on the right.
The windows were dark. She had to knock for a good two minutes before a light flared and shuffling steps came from the other side of the door. A man evidently asked who it was, and she answered.
Fargo rode around to the side so the Ovaro was out of sight, and dismounted. He reached the door just as an old man in a nightshirt was about to close it. His presence seemed to startle the oldster and he drew back in alarm.
Mai Wing calmed him. The old man helped her—reluctantly, Fargo thought—seat the Pou sisters, and commenced to put tea on.
Fargo shut the door and leaned against it. “You can’t stay here long,” he said to Mai Wing. “The Tong must know he’s your kin.”
“They do,” Mai Wing confirmed. “But we should have time to eat and drink and tend our wounds. After that, I do not know.”
Fargo thought of the O’Briens again. “I know some people who might be willing to help. It shouldn’t take me more than twenty minutes to get there and back.” He didn’t like the idea of leaving her. Once the bodies in the House of Pleasure were discovered, the Tong would be after them like bloodhounds on a scent.
“You have already done so much. I cannot ask you to do more.”
“Who said you had to ask?”
“If the Tong find us, they will kill you for helping us escape.”
“What’s your point?”
“Please. Do not make light of this. I would not have your life on my conscience.”
“Twenty minutes,” Fargo said, and went back out. He saw no sign of the Tong until he was almost to the bridge, and once again they showed no interest in him. Crossing over, he was passing the blacksmith shop when a brainstorm struck like a thunderclap. “Why didn’t I think of it sooner?” he said to the Ovaro, and reined over.
; Fargo knocked but there was no answer. He tried the latch. The door was bolted. Walking around to the side, he looked in a window. A lit lantern hung from a peg, casting enough light to show that no one was there.
A noise drew Fargo to the rear.
A horse had been hitched to a buckboard and Tom Bannon was loading tools and personal effects into the bed. He had on his leather apron.
“Bannon,” Fargo said by way of greeting.
The blacksmith whirled and grabbed for a hammer. “You!” he blurted, and relaxed and smiled.
Fargo nodded at the buckboard. “Are you still fixing to leave?”
“Need you ask?” Bannon rejoined. “I can’t take any more of this place. I’m getting out in the middle of the night, as planned.”
“Is there room for three more?”
“What are you talking about?”
Quickly, Fargo explained about Mai Wing and the Pou sisters.
Bannon swore luridly, then said, “It doesn’t surprise me a bit, Han forcing girls to sell their bodies.”
“Does that mean you will or you won’t?” Fargo was eager to get back.
“There’s not a lot of room left,” Bannon said. “But I suppose if one of them rides on the seat with me and the other two are willing to sit in the back, we can manage.”
“I’ll go give them the news.”
“One thing,” Bannon said as Fargo turned. “I don’t mind taking them so long as they don’t mind going east. I’m heading for Denver. They can ride with me the whole distance or I’ll let them off anywhere they want along the way.”
“What time are you leaving?”
Bannon took a pocket watch from his apron and opened it. “Let’s say two o’clock. Have them here by one thirty.”
“They’ll be here.”
Fargo didn’t spot any Tong on his way back to the cabin. He knocked, and Mai Wing opened the door to admit him. She had cleaned herself up and combed her hair.
The Pou sisters were huddled by the fireplace. The one who had been kicked was leaning against the other, and pasty with sweat.