J.A. Johnstone - The Loner - Crossfire

She led him toward a staircase on the other side of the room. Conrad looked up at the second floor and saw a large number of rooms arranged along a balcony.

They were rooms only in the strictest sense of the word. Thin wooden partitions a foot short of reaching the ceiling separated them, and curtains closed off the front. The room where Carmen was taking him wouldn’t provide much privacy, but it would be better than nothing.

She kept bumping her hip against him, seemingly out of habit, as they went upstairs. When they reached the balcony, she led him to the nearest room where the curtain was pushed back, but he steered her toward one farther along that had an empty room on each side.

“You’re going to be yelling in pleasure,” Conrad told her with the leer still on his face. “We don’t want to disturb anybody else.”

“Oh, señor, I am sure I will be,” she said listlessly. She didn’t argue as Conrad took her into the room and jerked the curtain closed.

As he turned toward her, she had already reached down and grasped the hem of her dress to pull it over her head. “Wait a minute,” Conrad said. “Just hold on.”

Carmen frowned at him in confusion. “You do not want me to take off my dress?”

“Not just yet. Why don’t you sit down?”

She shrugged and sank onto the narrow bed. It was little more than a cot, and it was the only piece of furniture in the room other than a small, rickety-looking table. The light came from gas fixtures hung over the balcony. Their glow spilled over the short partitions, making the room a little dim, but Conrad had no trouble seeing the puzzled expression on Carmen’s painted face as she looked up at him.

“What is it you wish me to do?” she asked.

“I thought we’d talk for a few minutes first. I like to get to know a girl before I—”

“Then you are an unusual man,” Carmen said. “Most men don’t want to know anything about me.”

“I’m not like most men. You should know that because I have that token from the Golden Gate, right?”

She nodded. “Oh, yes, only the best people go there. Well, the best people for this part of town, anyway. I have heard there are crystal chandeliers. Is this true?”

“I never paid that much attention to the lights.” Conrad dodged the question.

“And a long bar made of the finest mahogany. I would love to see it.”

“I’m sure you will, one of these days. Maybe I’ll take you. How’d you like to go sporting in there on my arm?”

“Oh, señor, that would be wonderful.” She sounded more like she meant it. She started to push her dress off her shoulders, obviously figuring she would disrobe in the other direction, since he’d stopped her from pulling the garment over her head.

“Hold on, hold on. It’s been a long time since I’ve been there. The Golden Gate’s on Kearny Street, right?”

Carmen shook her head. “No, no, on Grant, near where the Chinese live.”

“Oh, yeah, that’s right. On Grant Street. I told you it’s been a long time.”

Carmen reached for her dress again. “Please, señor, if we do not do what we came up here for, I will get in trouble.”

“I never said we weren’t going to.”

“But I am only allowed so much time with each customer—”

Conrad took the token from his pocket and held it up. “You have to show one of these before they’ll let you into the place, right?”

“Into the private rooms on the second floor, yes, or so I have heard.” Carmen frowned again. “But you would know that, if you have been there.”

“I just wasn’t sure what the procedure was now, since I’ve been gone for a while.”

His explanation didn’t lessen the suspicion in her eyes. She stood up suddenly. “Did you bring me up here because you like me, señor, or because you are some sort of spy?”

“Spy?” Conrad repeated. “That’s crazy. I just—”

Without warning, she darted past him and jerked aside the curtain that closed off the room. As she rushed out, Conrad reached for her but missed. “Dutchy!” she cried as she ran onto the balcony. “Dutchy!”

Conrad hurried after her. She was at the landing at the top of the stairs. The fat bartender had come out from behind the bar and was waiting at the bottom of the stairs with an angry expression on his florid face. “What in blazes is goin’ on up there?” he demanded as the men drinking at the bar and the scattered tables looked on with interest.

Carmen ran down the stairs. “He asks too many questions, Dutchy! I think he is a spy for one of your competitors ... or a policeman!”

“I’m not either of those things,” Conrad insisted as he reached the top of the staircase. “I was just talking to the girl—”

“Men who come here aren’t interested in talking,” Dutchy said with a glare. “I don’t know what you’re up to, mister, but I don’t like it.”

Conrad knew he had found out everything he was going to. Actually, it had been a pretty productive visit. But it was time to go. He wasn’t worried about the bartender being able to stop him.

But then Dutchy shouted, “Hans! Ulrich!” and two men emerged from the shadows, one at each end of the balcony. The huge, blond bruisers stalked toward Conrad, each with scarred fists and broken noses of men who had dealt out and received plenty of violence in their lives.

“Take him!” Dutchy ordered. “I show you what we do with spies, mynheer !”

Chapter 11

Hans and Ulrich were big, but they were slow. Conrad avoided their lumbering rush by bounding down the stairs toward Dutchy and Carmen. The girl shrieked and ran, but Dutchy stood his ground, bellowing, “Help! Stop him! Help!”

Several burly customers sprang to his aid. As Conrad reached the bottom of the staircase, a man pushed Dutchy aside and swung a mallet-like fist at Conrad’s head. Conrad ducked the punch and hooked a hard right into the man’s midsection. The man grunted in pain, doubled over, and staggered backward.

Unfortunately, that delay was long enough for one of Dutchy’s bouncers to leap down the stairs and slam into Conrad from behind. He wrapped his arms around him and lifted him off his feet. They crashed onto a table that splintered under their weight. Conrad landed amidst the debris with his attacker on top of him, knocking the breath from his lungs, stunning him.

“Hold him, Ulrich!” Dutchy shouted.

Ulrich’s arms tightened around Conrad, preventing him from drawing in any air to replace what he had lost. Almost instantly, Conrad’s head began to spin and a red haze drifted over his eyes. On the verge of losing consciousness, he drove an elbow into Ulrich’s belly, hoping to loosen the man’s grip, but it was like hitting a wall made of thick, sturdy planks and didn’t seem to have any effect.

The roaring in his head rose to a thunderous level. Conrad knew he was about to pass out. Then he heard a shout that was muffled by the pounding of his pulse, and the vise-like grip around his chest and the great weight on his back was released. He rolled over and lay with his chest heaving as he dragged in great lungfuls of air.

His blurry eyesight cleared after a moment and he saw a large, black-clad shape flashing back and forth. He pushed himself to a sitting position and got a better look at what was going on. His rescuer was a tall, broad-shouldered man who kept Dutchy, the bouncers, and the patrons of Spanish Charley’s at bay by slashing back and forth with a large, heavy-bladed hatchet.

Conrad wasn’t surprised when he saw the man’s yellow-hued skin, dark almond-shaped eyes, and black hair braided into a pigtail that hung down his back between his shoulders. The man also had a peculiar scar shaped like a half-moon on his right cheek. The hatchet men of Chinatown were famous—or notorious was probably a better word to describe them—but Conrad didn’t know any reason why one of them would be helping him.