The Gilded Age Part 2

She shifted on the divan, clutching her prison uniform. She wasn't sure she understood. "But why me?"

He nodded, expecting the question. "We've got evidence that you-or someone like you-were there."

"Really! What evidence?"

"Well, first off. . . .you're a Chinese woman."

Zhu laughed out loud. Was he racist and s.e.xist, after all, this sophisticated cosmicist with his Cosmic Mind rap? "Well, yeah. Just me and several billion other Chinese women."

"And you've got a neckjack. Primitive as it is, yours is better than several billion other Chinese women." He licked his lips nervously. "We'll be installing a monitor in your neckjack that will carry an Archive of relevant files, including Zhu.doc, as I mentioned. The monitor will make sure you get to where you're supposed to go, keep you informed, stuff like that. Muse will have full holoid capability, if you ever need to view a file. Much more advanced equipment than the knuckletop I took on my Summer of Love Project." He gives her another sharp look. "Okay. So prepare yourself, Zhu. The shuttle will be ready in two days."

"Two days?"

"Yes. Because of the unfortunate incident at Changchi"--he was choosing his words carefully, now, which instantly raised her hackles again--"the monitor will also ensure that you're fulfilling the object of the project."

"Oh, I see. You're really installing the monitor because you don't trust me. Because I'm an accused criminal."

"Oh, you've got other qualities," he said as if she'd made a joke. "You're educated. Decent gene-tweaking. Nice eyes, by the way. And no family responsibilities."

"I'm a Daughter of Compa.s.sion, sir. And a skipchild."

"I'm a skipchild, too."

"Yeah, but you're Chiron Cat's Eye in Draco. My skipparents got tired of playing mommy and daddy with me. They abandoned me to the State when I was fifteen."

"I know. The Generation-Skipping Law can be harsh." Chiron was fumbling for the right words, a condition that looked odd on him. "Listen, Zhu. We've researched the project. And we've chosen you. I've chosen you." He plunged on. "There's isn't much data on Chinese women in San Francisco, 1895. Mostly they were smuggled into the city as slaves. Immigration authorities never knew who they were. Their masters changed their names, falsified family relationships. When they died, they were buried in anonymous graves."

"So their ident.i.ties are lost to the Archives," Zhu said. She was getting it, all right.

"Yes. Like so many of the kids who ran away to the Haight-Ashbury during the Summer of Love."

"Oh, man. You're sending me to a dim spot?"

"Exactly." Chiron smiled, a real smile at last, warm and encouraging. "We've constructed an ident.i.ty for you."

"And who will I be?"

"The runaway mistress of a British gentleman. That will explain your presence in San Francisco. Your proficiency in English. You'll go to a home in Chinatown established by Presbyterian missionaries for rescued slave girls. You'll stay there, work for the director. It's all women, you'll like it. I understand that the mission was a lot like the compound you lived in with the Daughters of Compa.s.sion."

"That sounds okay," Zhu said slowly. Why did she sense he wasn't telling her something? Something important?

Suddenly Chiron searched his pockets and, like an old-timey magician, produced something shiny from his pocket. He commanded, "Look at this."

His sudden movements startled her, and an odd p.r.i.c.kly feeling rose in her throat. "What is it?"

"We call it the aurelia. A golden b.u.t.terfly."

It was a piece of jewelry, not a golden b.u.t.terfly. A fantastic Art Nouveau brooch, its elaborate wings crafted out of swirls of gold set with marquise-cut diamonds and bits of multicolored gla.s.s that caught the light like tiny stained gla.s.s windows. Instead of an insect, the body of a tiny, graceful woman cast in gold stood at the center, her outstretched arms bearing the fabulous wings, her shapely legs poised as if she were about to dive. She had the heart-shaped face of a cla.s.sic Gibson girl--large eyes, full cheeks, delicate mouth. Her hair was swept up in a sort of futuristic hood. Her expression was impa.s.sive, yet charged with some hidden pa.s.sion.

Zhu reached out, amazed. "For me?"

But Chiron held the aurelia away, as if teasing her, though his expression was anything but. "This is an artifact of 1895. This is a crucial point of reference for you, Zhu. You must look for this artifact in 1895."

"Look where?" How the gold glinted! How the gla.s.s sparkled like gems!

"She will have it."

"Okay, I give up. Who's she?"

"The Chinese slave girl you're supposed to meet. Muse will guide you to the rendezvous. You'll know she's the one because she'll have the aurelia. Understand? That's the object of your project. Once you've found the girl, the two of you must go at once to the Presbyterian mission. She'll live in safety there, eventually meet and marry a Caucasian man, and bear his child. A daughter."

"Wait, don't tell me," Zhu said. "I'm this girl's great-great-granddaughter."

"No, no, the Archives clearly establish that your lineage is based in China." Chiron tucked the aurelia away in his hidden pocket. "So that's about it. Find the girl, verify that she's got the aurelia, win her confidence so she'll go with you to the mission on Sacramento Street. Meet the new director-a remarkable young woman named Donaldina Cameron-and take a job with her. Make sure the girl settles in. You must stay there, watching over her, till the Chinese New Year in 1896. That's when the dim spot closes and we have data supporting the existence of the girl's daughter. Or a female half-Chinese, half-Caucasian baby like her. Then you'll t-port back to this Now. Okay, Zhu? Sign here."

She took the pet.i.tion he offered, thought about it. The Gilded Age Project did sound simple. Mostly simple. Exciting, even. After the wearying campaign in Changchi, an adventure! She was sick to death of prison. But Chiron still wasn't telling her everything. "And then what?"

"Then we'll see about the handling of your trial. By the time you return, we should know what the charge is."

"You mean you'll know the status of the victim." She swallowed hard. "My victim."

"Yes."

"Is he alive or dead?"

Chiron wouldn't answer. Apparently he didn't like being reminded of the despicable incident any more than she did. "We've arranged for a delay in your arraignment."

Excellent. They'd arranged for a lot of things, apparently. Zhu congratulated herself. It wasn't just a matter of reducing the charge against her. Maybe this was a chance to redeem herself. She hadn't known how badly she'd wanted that till now. Of course, she'd t-port to 1895. Of course, she'd know exactly what to do.

"Now what do I do?" Zhu mutters to Muse as she hauls the girl by her elbow out of the j.a.panese Tea Garden. "She doesn't have the aurelia. She was supposed to have the aurelia, and she doesn't. She doesn't have it!"

"Stay calm, Z. Wong," Muse whispers. "You're attracting too much attention."

"Stay calm? I'm freaking out!" This must sound like Zhu's got two voices coming out of her throat, one answering the other. A devil woman? Oh, yeah. She can sympathize when the girl howls, fear, puzzlement, and dismay s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up her face. "Muse, you will switch to subaudio mode. Now."

"a.s.sume she is the contact," Muse insists, still blasting in projection mode. "She was there. Take her to the mission, and we'll look for the aurelia."

"Look for the aurelia? Look where?"

"I not go! I not go!" the girl wails.

"I don't know," Muse says. "I will a.n.a.lyze, okay? Ask her name. We believe she was called Wing Sing."

Zhu seizes the girl by her shoulders. She's much bigger than Zhu expected, as tall and thin as Zhu. Are they attracting attention? No. No one promenading in the park pays any attention to a woman dressed in Western clothes taking forcible custody of a scruffy Chinese girl. "What's your name?"

"I Wing Sing." She points toward the Pacific Ocean. "I go home, Jade Eyes!"

"Wing Sing." Zhu sighs with relief. "Thank goodness. Yes, home. That's exactly where we're going. We're going to the home, Donaldina Cameron's home. The nice mission on Sacramento Street." Zhu points downtown, in the opposite direction.

"Not go to fahn quai!" Wing Sing cries, struggling. "I die first!"

"You're going to be just fine." Alternately pushing and pulling, Zhu wrestles the girl to the Park and Ocean Railroad station where they can catch the steam train downtown. Zhu puffs, sweat drizzling beneath her corset. The stays gouge her ribcage, making her breath catch. "When is the next train, sir?" she asks the conductor.

Now people in the pa.s.sing crowd begin to take notice of her struggle. A buxom blond woman watches them shrewdly. The woman wears elaborate pink flounces and a grotesque hat studded with carca.s.ses of Brazilian humming birds. A black brougham drawn by two lathered geldings waits at the curb. The driver of the brougham notices Zhu and Wing Sing, too.

"Well, miss." The conductor, a well-whiskeyed fellow in a rumpled uniform, clicks open his pocket watch, checks it with drunken precision. "I reckon it'll get here when it gets here."

Zhu catches his small gesture to the driver. The driver knocks his whip handle on the brougham's door. The conductor pockets the watch. He turns a gold coin through his fingers.

What is going on? A chill runs through Zhu. She picks up at once the covert communication between the conductor, the driver, and whoever waits in the brougham. All of them, on the lookout.

Suddenly three Chinese men leap out. Dressed entirely in black, they wear queues tightly braided, oiled, and wrapped in buns at the napes of their necks. Black slouch hats are pulled low over their foreheads, black slippers on their feet. One is a wiry little fellow, tattoos covering his hands, a curved knife tucked in his belt. The second is a fat man, diamond rings on every finger. Silent and steely-eyed, he surveys the crowd. The third is tall and gaunt, a black eyepatch over his left socket. Beneath his black overcoat, bandoliers of bullets are slung across his chest, two pistols visible in his belt.

The eyepatch spots Wing Sing first. In an instant, the men in black surround Zhu and the struggling girl.

"Highbinders!" shouts the buxom blond woman. "Say, fellas!" she says to the gentlemen standing around. "You gonna let them G.o.dd.a.m.n highbinders ruin our Fourth of July?"

The men laugh nervously, look away. Chinese business is Chinese business.

"Z. Wong, please exit immediately," Muse whispers. "These are hatchet men. Enforcers for a tong."

"Boo how doy," Wing Sing whispers, going limp.

"Queues coiled to the left," Muse says, opening a file. "Chee Song Tong."

"I say, fellas!" shouts the buxom blond woman. "What kinda lousy cowards are ya, anyway? You gonna let them highbinders trouble a lady?"

"I've got no quarrel with you," Zhu says to the eyepatch, boldly staring into his eye. "Let us go."

"This our girl," the eyepatch says. "We pay gold for her. We take now."

"I don't think so," Zhu says, circling her arm around Wing Sing's shoulders. "She's mine." The girl huddles pa.s.sively, casting her eyes to the ground.

"Z. Wong, preservation of your person is the first priority," Muse whispers. "Please review 'The CTL Peril'." Muse posts the text in her peripheral vision.

"I don't think I'm going to review files right now, Muse," Zhu whispers, jerking away when the eyepatch plants his hand on her shoulder.

"Our girl."

"Chee Song Tong," Muse whispers, "sponsors slavery, opium smugging, and a.s.sa.s.sination. These are a.s.sa.s.sins, Z. Wong."

"What about the girl?"

"Let them take her."

"d.a.m.n it, Muse, she's the reason I'm here!"

"It appears you have no choice at the moment," Muse whispers.

"It's a G.o.dd.a.m.n shame!" the buxom blond woman shouts at the crowd. "You all oughta be ashamed!"

"Please step away, Z. Wong," Muse whispers. "They don't want you. I said go!"

"Too late."

The wiry fellow and the fat man seize Zhu's elbows. The eyepatch smacks Wing Sing across her face with the back of his hand.

"Jade Eyes," Wing Sing whimpers.

Heart pounding, Zhu shoves the hatchet men away. She clutches the girl, anger parching her throat. Can she protect her? Or is she too late?

The girl clings to her, murmuring, "Jade Eyes."

The eyepatch stoops, stares at Zhu. He flips up her veil, his eye widening when he sees her Chinese face, her irises gene-tweaked green.

The hatchet men hustle them into the brougham. The driver yells, whipping the horses.

With a lurch and a jolt, the brougham speeds away.

2.

A Toast to the First and Last Chance Saloon Daniel J. Watkins lights another ciggie as the Overland train bound from Saint Louis speeds down the last miles to the Port of Oakland, California. He plays with a miniature Zoetrope, a little drum whirling on a spindle. He peers at slits cut in the drum's cardboard sides all around its circ.u.mference through which he can view watercolor paintings rendered in a sequence. The sequence merges through the persistence of vision, producing the illusion of continuous motion. Typically a toy like this shows a parrot on the wing or a peasant in country dress capering about. The clever fellow who marketed this toy in Paris painted a wh.o.r.e drawing black stockings up her bare legs and down again. Up and down, up and down.

But even the Zoetrope-which usually fascinates him-cannot cheer him now. The jolt of nicotine does little to relieve the throbbing in his head. b.l.o.o.d.y train. Well. The Overland was a very fine train till he ran out of whiskey early this morning. Now the train lurches and rolls from side to side like a ship in a restless sea, and his stomach rolls in sickening counterpoise.

Daniel drags the ciggie down in three great gulps, stubs it out. He tucks the Zoetrope in his ditty bag, finds and lights another, humming the waltz from Sleeping Beauty in a scratchy tenor. Poor Tchaikovsky kicked the bucket in Mexico in '93 from that vile pox called cholera, which they say is contracted by drinking filthy water. Tchaikovsky had not been an old man. Daniel has resolved to drink nothing but bottled fluids during his sojourn in the West. Wouldn't you know that Father-the eminent Jonathan D. Watkins of Saint Louis, London, and Paris--calls the waltz the work of the Devil. An inspiration for lurid pa.s.sions among the young and impressionable. How very true. He hums more vigorously. Daniel adores works of the Devil.

In the dawn sometime after he discovered his grievous shortfall of potables, the Overland had stopped in Sacramento to pick up pa.s.sengers. But the stopover wasn't long enough to scare up a little hair of the dog. By the time he'd roused himself to a functioning consciousness, they were on their way again. Daniel pulls frantically on the ciggie. Must he arrive in San Francisco on vital family business shucked out, half-crocked, and airing his paunch like some overindulgent schoolboy? He is nearly twenty-two, after all, heading for old age and senility by swift and sordid leaps and bounds.

This will not do, sir, indeed it will not. Daniel stands, groggy, and surveys the pa.s.senger car. He roams the narrow aisle, spies the old cowboy who's ridden the Overland out from Saint Louis, same as Daniel. A grizzled coot in rustic togs that have never known soap and water. Nor has the old cowboy bothered to shave since their departure from that thankfully distant city. Skinny bowlegs sprawling, he hunkers down in his seat, talking to himself, cackling, conferring with an invisible companion now and then. And, oh yes, nipping at something under his greasy topcoat.

In a word, the old cowboy looks promising. Daniel slides onto the seat facing him, grinning like all get-out with what he knows is a manly mustachioed face that charms the ladies and the gentlemen. Oh, he charms them all. He gives the old cowboy a wink, taps out a ciggie, and offers it.

"A long haul, sir?" Daniel says, leaning forward on the leather seat, striking a match for the coot, then lighting up another for himself. "But I suppose you've knocked about this great continent of ours by harder means than the Overland train. In the good old days, eh?"

"Them was the days," the old cowboy agrees, drawing down hard on the ciggie like a proper smoker.

"The glory, the wild glory, eh? Knocking about like that. I don't suppose you've got a drop to spare of that libation you've been nipping at?" Daniel grins when the old cowboy squints at him with a bloodred eye, openmouthed that a stranger has discovered his closely guarded secret. "I'm dry as a bone, sir, and we've haven't yet reached the coast."

"'Tain't somethin' fit to drink fer a young gent like yerself," the old cowboy grunts, eyeing Daniel's gray gabardine suit and starched ivory collar, the blue checked silk vest and tasteful French blue necktie, his British bowler of brushed felt. "'Tain't fit fer a bear, if truth be told."