Lone Star 02 (23 page)

What it looked like was beside the point. It was going to be very difficult to
climb.

Ki was dressed in worn denim jeans, a collarless cotton twill shirt, and a loose, many-pocketed well-broken-in brown leather vest. He was barefoot, but the sharp-edged litter of the city's streets was no threat to him. His feet were callused, their soles tougher than any shoe leather.

He'd memorized the layout Moore had sketched. The detective had also told him that Jessie had most likely been assigned to a room somewhere on the second floor of the house. That was the procedure followed for all the other girls, so there was no reason to think it had not been followed for Jessie.

Assuming that her cover has not been broken,
Ki thought as he stared up at the row of narrow windows, each barred with a scrollwork grating.
And assuming that she is not somewhere else in the bordello.

There were ten windows on the second floor, which meant that there were ten rooms. None of the windows were lit.

Where to start? Ki wondered. The logical thing to do would be to begin at either comer of the house, and then progress in an orderly fashion from one end to the other. But to climb at a comer would expose him to view from the sides of the house. That was too risky. He would have to start in the middle and work his way along to one end, hoping he'd see her through one of the windows on that side. If he didn‘t, he would have to retrace his steps, leaping from ledge to ledge until he could begin to peer through the windows making up the other half of the floor.

Throughout it all, he would have to avoid being seen by any other of the girls who might be resting, and, of course, if he didn't find Jessie in any of the rooms, he would have to enter the bordello, start at the top, and then work his way down until he did find her. Without being seen, of course.

Ki was slightly worried about that last part. It would be very nice to find Jessie in one of those second-floor rooms. Yes, that would be quite excellent...

If he had to enter the bordello, the chances of his being seen were greatly increased. There were armed guards inside; Moore had said so. If he was spotted, Ki knew that he would be forced to begin something of a rampage, killing his way through the house until he'd found Jessie, and then killing his way
out
of the place, with Jessie safely tucked under his arm.

It was not the killing that bothered the samurai. He would be merciful. Everybody who ran away from him would be spared. It was confronting Jessie's anger that concerned him. She would be distressed over the fact that his clumsiness in being spotted had spoiled her plan to infiltrate the enemy.

Oh, well,
Ki thought.
One's
karma
is one's
karma.
One learns to live with it, and live it out ...

He remembered what his honored teacher, the master samurai Hirata, had drummed into his brain when he was only a youth:
A samurai never makes mistakes; other people do, when they cross his path at an inopportune moment...

Ki felt himself smiling. Perhaps it was the hot Yankee blood of his father coursing through his veins, and most certainly his soul would pay for it in sume future incarnation, but
oh!
how he preferred
action,
or even the thought of action, to thinking serene thoughts in a flower garden!

From one of the pockets in his vest, Ki removed a tightly wound spool of cord, similar in its thickness to fishing line, but many times stronger. Attached to one end of the cord were several razor-sharp hooks of tempered steel. Ki stepped back several paces, unwound a sufficient length of cord from the spool, and began to twirl it in an underhand motion until he'd built up enough centrifugal force to send the hook flying upward. It rose to land on the sloping, shingle-covered roof of the bordello. Ki tugged the hooks along until their barbs caught. He gave the line an experimental tug, to make sure that the anchor was a secure one.

Ki went into the position known as the “horse stance.” His legs were bowed, as if he were straddling a horse, while his head, neck and back formed a straight line, even with the heels of his feet. He gazed at the dangling cord, just a foot in front of his face, and focused the energy of his body, in preparation ...

Then he sprang up, not like the falcon, but like the locust taking wing. At the apex of his jump, many feet above the ground, his fingers locked about the cord as the soles of his bare feet soundlessly braced themselves against the side of the building.

Ki scuttled up the cord. He covered the remaining few feet to the level of the second floor's windows in an instant. He could have climbed the entire four stories in less than ten seconds. Early in his apprenticeship, he had learned to move vertically up walls and across ceilings, like a human fly.

Ki now began to leap from window ledge to window ledge. Once, the rotted wood gave way beneath his feet, but Ki did not fall. He darted onward to the next ledge, the way a bee darts to the next flower, and then the next. His trained eyes only needed a split second to penetrate the darkness of each room's interior.

The resemblance of Ki's movements to those of the locust, fly, and bee showed his good form, for the ancients had long ago devised this climbing technique by studying the ways of the insects. The technique's secret was a simple one: if a man moved fast enough, there was no time to fall.

Ki hopped from the third window ledge, cartwheeling sideways through the void, his arms and legs extended straight like the points of a
shuriken
star spinning through the air on its deadly journey. He did not come to light at the fourth window, but only glanced through it—

He touched down briefly on the fifth ledge, using that impact to hurtle himself back to the fourth window. He hooked his fingers and toes through the wrought-iron grating, and hung like a spider in the center of its web as he peered through the metal and glass at Jessie's sleeping form.

The samurai congratulated himself on his good fortune. It had turned out to be very easy, indeed!

Ki tapped upon the windowpane. Jessie, lying on her back, did not stir. He tapped louder, finally resorting to scratching one of his
shuriken
blades against the window.

Something was wrong. Ki had never known her to sleep so deeply.

He had a file that would make short work of these iron bars, and breaking the window itself was no problem, but then Jessie would have to explain the damage to the bordello's proprietors. No, it looked as though he was going to have to do this the hard way. He was going to have to make his way into the bordello after all.

The windows above the second floor were not barred. It would have saved a bit of time to have gone directly up the side of the building, but Ki did not trust the bordello's exterior walls. The hand and footholds available were simply too pitted with rot to support his weight. He made his way back to the cord dangling down from the roof, and scurried up to the third floor. Several of the rooms were occupied by women and their clients. In some, the lamps were lit, in others, only the shadowy forms of the figures entwined in copulation could be viewed. Ki finally came upon an empty room. He slid open the window and went in.

It took him a moment to get his bearings in the hallway. Moore's diagram showed a stairway at the far end of the corridor. It would take him down to the second floor.

Ki hurried along. He was not worried about being discovered at this point. There were no guards posted on the third floor, and the couples behind the closed doors on both sides of him were all making too much noise on their own to hear his swiftly passing bare feet upon the carpet.

Raucous laughter, and tinny strains banged out upon an out-of-tune piano floated up the stairwell as Ki made his way to the second floor. Just one flight below was the front parlor of the bordello, according to Moore's drawing. Curiosity impelled Ki to stick his head around the comer of the landing and catch a glimpse of the goings-on down there.

He had the chance to see several women dancing, and wearing some very interesting—and exciting—costumes, before another woman, leading a gentleman up the stairs by the front of his trousers, forced Ki to duck back around the comer. The woman's silvery giggle faded as he went through, and then slid shut behind him, the set of unlocked double doors that led to the second-floor hallway. Ki went to Jessie's closed door and swung it open, hurrying to her side. She was still sound asleep. Ki had not realized that she was so naked; the slip of clothing she was wearing covered nothing.

“Jessie!” he whispered, trying his best not to gaze at her lush, lovely form. It was not proper to stare. “Jessie! Come now! Wake up!” Ki said as loudly as he dared, more than a note of pleading in his voice.

Jessie stirred, but did not wake. She spread her legs lan guorously, while stretching her arms above her head, so that her breasts rose and tightened. Every inch of her was exposed...

“Jessie!” Ki fairly begged. It was awfully warm inside the bordello. Perhaps that explained the perspiration suddenly coursing down his body...

“Jessie...” Why wouldn't she wake up? Was she ill? Ki bent over her. He pressed his lips against her forehead, only, of course, to see if he could detect any trace of fever...

Jessie's eyes sprang open. “Ki!” she murmured through lips still thick with sleep. Her fingers brushed against his thigh, and then feathered along his groin in an instinctive movement. She'd only wanted to prove to herself that he was
real,
that he was truly
here,
and not just a remnant of a dream brought on by the opium.

Ki leapt back, quite flustered, and positively on fire where Jessie had touched him. He wished that his jeans were several sizes larger, and mourned the fact that there were some parts of the body over which even a samurai had no control...

“Uh, Jessica,” Ki stuttered, blushing bright red, and looking everywhere in the room but at her. “You're...
nude!”

Jessie laughed richly. “Well! This is no dream. That's
you
all right. And am I glad to see you! I've got a lot to tell...”

 

 

“You make it sound as if Jessie had been expecting you!” Moore laughed in astonishment. He poured Ki a large measure of brandy and set it down before the samurai, who was sitting by the hearth, warming his hands before the fire. Ever since Ki had arrived back at his apartment, the detective had been positively giddy with relief over the news that Jessie was alive and well. “Wasn't she surprised to see you?”

“Why should she have been?” Ki took a moment to savor the brandy's bouquet, and then took a sip, letting the mellow fire of the liquor warm his innards. “She knew I would find a way to get to her. And when I did,” Ki added ruefully, “It was I who got the surprise. Should you come to know her for any length of time, my friend, you will find that it is usually Jessica Starbuck Who does the surprising.”

“I still don't understand why you didn't take her out of there,” Moore grumbled. Ki had already filled him in on what Jessie had learned. “We can't strike against the cartel if their cargo hold is going to be filled with coolie slaves. Attacking the clipper would cost the slaves their lives. Burning a ship loaded with opium is one thing, but—”

“It can be done,” Ki interrupted.

Moore looked at him questioningly, and Ki went on, “Tonight we can still strike against the cartel. That is why I did not bring Jessie with me. She agrees with my plan.” Ki raised his hand to ward off Moore's objections. “Hear me out,” he demanded. “The slaves—meant for you, my friend, or supposedly for your father's lumber yards in Oregon—are worth much more to the cartel and the Tong than just another shipment of opium. If we can intercept their slave ship, rescue the poor souls locked within it, and then destroy the vessel, we will throw our enemies into turmoil.”

“Without hurting the slaves?” Moore asked.

“Without hurting them,” Ki promised. “Indeed, we shall give them back their freedom.”

“Just the two of us?” Moore asked dubiously. Then he smiled. “Are you that good?”

Ki took another sip of brandy. “Are you?” he asked.

“You bet!” Moore laughed. “What the hell! Let's do it!” He raised his glass for a toast.

Ki did the same with his brandy snifter. “As you so aptly put it, my friend, ‘What the hell!'”

“But why did you leave Jessie there?”

“Divide and conquer,” Ki smiled. “Jessie told me that the bordello's madam blames Smith for babbling about the slave shipment while he was under the influence of opium. Now, since nobody saw me enter the bordello and speak with Jessie—”

“I get it!” Moore exclaimed. “As it stands, if something should happen to disrupt the shipment, Foxy Muscat is going to blame it all on Smith. She'll figure that he spilled the beans somewhere else, as well. That's beautiful,” the detective said admiringly. “As long as Jessie stays in the bordello, nobody can suspect her.”

“As far as they know, she's talked to no one,” Ki agreed. “They will
have
to blame Smith for their misfortune.”

“Greta Kahr and Chang will fight over who gets to slit Smith's throat.”

The samurai nodded. “You'd better get ready to go,” he said.

Moore went into his bedroom to change his clothes, leaving Ki alone with his thoughts. He stared into the fire, wishing he could see his future in the flames. Neither Jessie nor Moore had guessed at his ulterior motive for fostering the daring plan. What Ki had kept to himself was the fact that he intended to take the rescued coolies to Chinatown, to present them to Su-ling's family, and in that way prove himself worthy of her. Surely her family could no longer forbid Ki to see her, once he' d rescued so many of their fellow countrymen from a life in shackles?