Kissing Comfort (30 page)

Comfort wondered if that was her destiny. She'd been kept alive for a reason. Was that it? There were hundreds of young Chinese girls brought into the city every year to replace the ones who had come before. Suey Tsin had been one of them, held as a sex slave in a crib where she could neither stand nor stretch. Relief from those confines came only when someone spent fifty cents to lie between her legs, or a dollar, and engaged her in some far worse depravity.

Comfort remembered the auctions where girls were paraded across the bar as though it were a stage lined with limelight. Some of them seemed to enjoy the attention and notoriety that making the walk gave them. Most were unsteady on their feet, plied with drink or drugs, so their steps were slow and halting and gave the customers, who were often equally as drunk, more time to appreciate the offerings.

Were there still auctions? She hadn't heard about them for years, but then she was considerably more distant from that hard life than she'd been as a child. Her uncles would be horrified to learn what entertainments she had glimpsed while they were living in the dance hall. The memory of it all made her stomach churn uncomfortably, and the thought that something like it could be her fate brought acid to the back of her throat.

What she did know was that there was traffic in women that went opposite of the tide. There were stories in the papers, mostly dismissed as rumor and sensational reporting, that women on this side of the Pacific were prized for what they could bring on the Far East shores. Suey Tsin told her it was true, that she'd seen it for herself. Young women, mostly fair-skinned blondes and redheads, were lifted off the streets when certain ships discharged their crews into the Barbary Coast.

Comfort touched her nape and uneasily fingered the short strands of hair that had fallen free of her combs. Perhaps her dark hair wouldn't be prized at all. It was nearly as black as Suey Tsin's. She laid the back of her hand against her cheek. She'd always disliked how fair her skin was, how easily it showed angry or embarrassed color. Now she might have another reason to regret her pale features.

She shook off the thought. It wasn't worth her time lamenting what couldn't be changed when every consideration needed to be given to what could.

 

 

Bode heard the first inklings of Comfort's fate from one of the crew from the steamer
Demeter Queen
. Tapper Stewart reported back to him within an hour of being loosed on Pacific Street at nightfall. All of the men from the ship were prowling the alleys and streets that defined the Barbary Coast. With the assistance of the shipmaster, Bode sketched the Coast in detail and then divided the area into sections. Nathan Douglas made the assignments, giving each group of men a list of establishments they should most particularly enter.

No man who sailed for Black Crowne was unfamiliar with the deadfalls, melodeons, gambling palaces, and brothels that made up the Barbary Coast, but there wasn't one among them who'd seen them all. Bode directed them to correct that oversight. He gave them money to purchase drinks but warned them they shouldn't take more than a swallow, and even then they should keep their wits about them because in some of the deadfalls, the drink would blind them.

He asked to see their weapons and was shown a wide assortment of serrated blades, daggers, filleting knives, brass and iron knuckles, garrotes, and in one case, a small and supple leather bag of buckshot that, when held in a capable fist, worked every bit as well as the knuckles. This armament was what passed for calling cards in the Barbary Coast. Bode didn't need to remind them to keep their weapons hidden but also to keep them close.

It was the rhythm of the Barbary Coast's activity that forced Bode to hold back the men until dusk. A widespread foray into the saloons and cheap groggeries during the daylight hours would have attracted suspicion, especially since the
Demeter Queen
was known to be leaving the harbor in the morning. As difficult as it was to wait once their plans were in place, there also existed the hope that Newton and Tucker would be contacted for the payment of ransom. It was what the police wanted them to believe. It made their slow advance on the Coast seem more prudent than cowardly. By nightfall, there was no police presence left. Bode understood their reluctance to remain anywhere on Pacific Street between Montgomery and Stockton. Even traveling in pairs, the police were targets. His men were not; they were marks.

Bode encouraged the crew to make a thorough sweep of each establishment they entered, but at the same time, not appear to linger. He instructed them on what to look for and how they might be able to identify the Rangers from the rest of the riffraff. He described what the Rangers had been wearing at the time of the attack, and because they feared no one in the Coast, the probability was high that they were still wearing the same black hats and jackets. Bode explained that the Rangers would organize themselves into some kind of hierarchy wherever they were gathered. A leader would always emerge in any group, and if Bode's men were fortunate, they'd see this shift of power happen in front of them.

Bode made it clear he wasn't sending them out to find Comfort. She was the proverbial needle in the haystack. What he wanted from them was information, and to get that, they had to listen . . .
everywhere
.

Not long after Tapper Stewart came back to the
Demeter Queen
with what he'd heard, Jimmy Jackson and Dennis Plant arrived slightly breathless with a similar story to report. Another hour passed with no one returning to the ship, but shortly after midnight, two teams of men arrived within minutes of each other. What they'd learned was from different sources and filled in the gaps of the earliest reports. If the information they'd received could be trusted, then it was both better and worse than Bode expected.

Comfort Kennedy was alive, but if her captors had their way, she wouldn't survive until morning.

 

 

Exhausted from the lingering effects of the chloroform, her efforts to keep warm, and the futility of continuing to plot her escape, Comfort slipped into sleep. She had no sense of how long she slept, but it was no surprise to her that she woke ravaged by thirst.

She sat up and used what she hoped was a clean part of her dress to swipe at her eyes. Her eyelids felt thick and puffy, and her lashes were matted as if she'd been crying in her sleep. Lifting her head, she pretended she could see the ceiling of her prison and beyond it. Something was different than it had been before she slept, and she was so fuzzy-headed that it required several minutes for her to realize what it was.

Quieter. That's what she finally decided had changed. Not quiet, not by any means, but the ribald cries were less wildly boisterous, the laughter less raucous, and most notably, there was an absence of feminine voices.

No women? That not only struck her as odd; it tripped a shiver that began at the base of her neck and traveled all the way to her toes.

She set her palms hard against the wall behind her as something scraped the floor above. It was the carpet that was being moved, she thought. It thumped and rolled, thumped and rolled. Her heart hammered. It roared so loudly in her ears that she almost didn't realize that the room above her was falling silent. The last piano chords were dying. Fiddle strings twanged hard and then ceased to vibrate. If there was laughter, it was a low rumble. There was shuffling, some footsteps, but the customers were no longer crossing the room from the door to the bar.

Were they gone? Or were they waiting?

She scrambled to her feet as the overhead door was thrown back. She shielded her eyes from the lantern light, though it wasn't particularly bright. After so many hours in darkness, a single candle flame would have been as blinding as the noonday sun.

Stepping as far away from the opening as she could, she was already cornered when a ladder was thrust through the hatch. No one came down. Instead, she was invited to come up. The first invitation was rough, but relatively polite. The second time there was profanity. It was the third summons, which included a threat to throw a fookin' net over her and haul her up like the fookin' baggage she was, that made her leave her corner and take hold of the ladder.

When she looked up, she made out two men standing above her. One of them held the lantern. The other, indeed, held the fookin' net. They both wore black derbies. Twisting her skirts in one hand to lift them, Comfort gripped a rung and began to climb.

Before her head cleared the opening and she could look around, two pairs of hands, neither of them belonging to Lantern or Net, grabbed her under the shoulders from either side and lifted her out with enough momentum that she expected to be tossed to the floor like the day's catch. They didn't do that, preferring to dangle her several feet above the hatch until one of them kicked it closed and they could set her firmly on top of it. Her knees would have buckled if they hadn't maintained their bruising grip on her arms.

The concert saloon had exploded into a cacophony of shouts, cries, fist thumping, and stomping the moment she cleared the hatch. The piano player pounded out dramatic chords, and the fiddler plucked his instrument in earnest. The tables she could see were crowded with men. Since she was in the middle of the saloon, she supposed the ones behind her were crowded as well. Men stood two and three deep along the perimeter. If there was a door, it was either at her back or being blocked. It was the same for the windows.

Someone thrust a glass of stale beer at her mouth. She set her lips mutinously even though she was so parched she wanted to down all of it. She was given no quarter, and the hold on her arms didn't ease. While she tried to twist and avoid the crush of the glass against her lips, fear that she'd be forced to swallow her own teeth made her open her mouth. Someone's fingers yanked on her hair. A comb fell out, but she never heard it hit the floor. The crowd was so loud now that she couldn't distinguish her thoughts from their voices.

The moment her head was pulled back, the glass was tipped and beer poured into her mouth. She gargled and spat and felt some of it slide over her chin, run down her neck, and soak through the ruching of her shell pink bodice. Most of it, though, went down her throat. There was a brief moment of respite before a second tall glass was put to her. She thought of a fledgling eager to take food from its mother. Except for her open mouth, she was not at all like that. She stamped hard on the toes of her captors, kicked sideways at their knees, and more by accident than design, literally bit the hand that fed her when fingers strayed too close to her teeth.

Her efforts were encouraged and applauded by the men who'd come specifically to see this entertainment, but the ones holding her were not so appreciative. After the third glass of beer was emptied, she took an open palm slap to her left cheek and then a backhanded one to her right. She tasted blood and saw stars.

“The bar! The bar! The bar!”

The cry started with a few men at the back of the room who wanted a better view of the proceedings and was eventually taken up by nearly everyone else. Their coarse, drumming chant shook the building. Comfort dug in her heels, but the floor was slippery with spilled liquor and damp sawdust, and there was no purchase to be had. Her show of resistance incited the crowd and angered her captors. She was lifted again, this time only the few inches necessary to make it appear that she was floating. The alcohol was already clouding her senses, making her think she might be floating in fact. Chairs and tables scraped the floor as men scrambled to make way for her.

Her captors also served as her protectors, at least for as long as they had to carry her, and they roughly pushed aside the hands that tried to paw her breasts or finger her gown.

Someone was already standing on the bar when she got there. The man was dressed exactly like the men who held her, but he was clearly the one they were answering to. He carried a silver-knobbed cane that he tapped lightly against the top of the bar, indicating precisely where he meant them to place her. Partly because she was feeling the effects of the alcohol, and partly because she refused to assist their lift, they had some difficulty hoisting her as high as the bar. The man standing on top of it didn't lift a finger to help them.

The chanting was so loud now that Comfort's heart had taken up the rhythm and her head had begun to swim. She faltered a little as she was set in place and found her footing only after the man with the cane casually gave her his elbow. He made the offer with such mannered ease that he might have been escorting her to dinner.

He raised the cane above his head. The silence was immediate and profound.

“You all know me,” he said in a voice thick with an Irish brogue. “And if it's not me you're knowin', then it's me reputation. I deal fair, but I deal hard, and I give no man a thing he hasn't earned . . . or stolen.”

There was some laughter; a few glasses pounded the tables.

“So what I have for you tonight is a lottery. You buy a ticket, you buy a chance. More tickets, more chances. That's the way it works. Everyt'ing on the up-and-up. There'll be no high bidders takin' it away from you that can't spare a few dollars. If you have a ticket, you have reason to hope.”

There were murmurs of approval and a few whistles. Someone shouted, “Hear, hear!” Comfort closed her eyes. She swayed.

The man gave his cane a little wag, and the room quieted again. If he felt Comfort still swaying, he let it pass. “There's more,” he told them. “While our lovely bird is entertaining the first lucky winner, we'll be selling tickets for the second go round. Fresh start. Fresh chance. Alas, our lovely bird will not be as fresh as she once was.”

“Soiled dove,” someone called out.