Strong Convictions: An Emmett Strong Western (Emmett Strong Westerns Book 1)

by GP Hutchinson

  Yong Xu spoke in Chinese. The six men nodded.

  “These are the fathers of the girls who were stolen,” Yong Xu said. “And the father of Yan, the lovely girl who was murdered.” He extended his hand toward the man whose loss was irrevocable.

  Emmett removed his hat and said to Yan’s father, “I’m sorry, sir. Very, very sorry.”

  The man, dressed entirely in Chinese garb, solemnly bowed again. His eyes looked as though they had no more tears to give.

  Yong Xu asked the three from Texas to have a seat and offered them hot tea. They accepted, Sikes expressing special appreciation.

  “I speak for these men and for the entire Chinese community of Virginia City,” Yong said to the Texans. His gaze rested on Emmett. “I know you are a good man. You too have suffered loss. You have come in search of the evil man who killed your brother. So we have an offer for you, Mr. Strong.”

  “Emmett.”

  Yong Xu glanced back at his peers, then said, “Emmett. We have discussed this, and we are prepared to help you capture your brother’s killer—whatever the task may cost us, however long it may take us. But we also have something to ask of you.”

  Emmett anticipated what was coming. “Go on.”

  “Will you and your friends first help us find and rescue our daughters?”

  The seven Chinese fathers waited, to a man fixed on Emmett.

  Turning to Juanito and Sikes, Emmett said, “I don’t expect you to give an answer until the three of us have had the chance to talk this over in private. But have you heard enough? Or are there other considerations?”

  He badly wanted Juanito and Sikes to agree then and there. But he hadn’t even had the chance yet to tell them what he and Reverend Pine had deduced from Cromarty’s papers.

  “I’m still listening,” Juanito said.

  Sikes took another sip of tea. “Likewise.”

  “Do you have a plan, Yong Xu?” Emmett asked.

  “We Chinese have no recourse on our own. These poor men don’t know who else to turn to. They fear that local officials won’t do a thing because if they start an investigation, miners and other laborers may start anti-Chinese riots—or that the kidnappers themselves will stir up trouble and then pay the lawmen to look the other way.”

  “I don’t know what—if anything—the Chinese community here can do to help us capture my brother’s murderer,” Emmett said.

  He noticed a subtle drooping of Yong Xu’s shoulders.

  “But that doesn’t mean we won’t consider your request,” he continued.

  The seven fathers focused even more intently on Emmett.

  “You must understand. I have to talk this over with Juanito and Sikes. What you’re asking…Well, it’s a serious departure from what my two friends agreed to come up here to do.”

  “We understand,” Yong Xu said eagerly.

  “Then if you’ll allow us a few minutes, gentlemen…” Emmett said.

  The Chinese rose and bowed. Some spoke in heavily accented English, others with scarcely a trace of foreign inflection. But each thanked the men from Texas on their way out.

  Once he was certain they were alone, Emmett recounted a good deal of what he had discussed with Reverend Pine that afternoon, camping heavily on the part about Seth Blaylock and Lucian McIntosh. He spread the papers Stanley Cromarty had given him on the table, then read aloud the entire article from the Sacramento Gazette.

  “Cromarty seems to believe that Seth Blaylock is getting rich by kidnapping especially pretty girls from all over the area for service in McIntosh’s bordellos,” Emmett explained. “The reverend thought the suspicion made sense. He said the girls of the line at McIntosh’s places have a different reputation than they do at your average hookshop.”

  “So you think our interests and those of the Chinese intersect,” Sikes said.

  “I do. And the intersection point is—”

  “Seth Blaylock.” Juanito tapped the notation Cromarty had made right above the newspaper headline.

  Emmett looked back and forth between the two. “That’s right.”

  He couldn’t force them to play for new stakes—higher stakes. Yet inside, he struggled. He wanted to plead.

  “So looking for Li Xu…” Sikes paused and waited till Emmett’s gaze met his. “Trying to rescue her and the other girls doesn’t mean we’ve abandoned tracking down Charlie Blaylock.”

  “Nope. Not if it pits us against the very man who blocks our way to Charlie Blaylock anyhow.”

  “But how can we know that’s truly the case?” Juanito asked.

  Emmett got up and paced to the window and back. “Can we try to meet with Cromarty again? See whether he knows anything else that might help?”

  Juanito and Sikes glanced at one another. Both nodded.

  But that wasn’t enough for Emmett. Without question he still wanted to arrest his brother’s murderer. That could wait, though. Because whether or not going after Seth Blaylock was a matter of killing two birds with one stone, Li Xu and her friends were in trouble. And time was crucial. Even while they stood there deliberating, men might be using and abusing them.

  He slammed his palm on the table. “To hell with it! Juanito, Sikes, if you stay on with me through all this, I’ll be forever beholden to you. If you need more time to think it over, I understand. If you decide to pack it in and go on back to Texas without me, I understand that, too.” Both hands on the tabletop now, he leaned forward. “I’m not trying to twist your arms, but my mind’s made up. I’ve gotta do this. I’ve gotta help Yong Xu find Li and get her back safe—one way or the other. Even if Charlie Blaylock ends up slipping off the hook because of it.”

  His compañeros sat in silence.

  Then Juanito unfolded his arms. Very deliberately, in a low voice, he said, “Damn, you make a good speech, hermano.” His face erupted in a grin. “And besides, I want to see you and that pretty girl together. I’m in with you.”

  Sikes lifted his teacup and studied it. “I probably wouldn’t do it if the Chinese didn’t make such splendid tea.” He looked at Emmett. “As long as they keep the kettle on, I suppose I’m at their mercy. Count me in, too.”

  Emmett blew out a heavy breath. “Gracias, muchachos.”

  “Go on and tell Yong Xu,” Juanito said. “Meanwhile, Sikes and I will put our heads together. Try to decide how the Chinese might help us make sure Charlie Blaylock doesn’t slip away.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  After thirty-six hours in dreary lamplight, locked up in the same second-floor room at Lucian McIntosh’s home, Li Xu waited apprehensively for the inevitable encounter with the big man himself. And it was wearing her down. She had racked her brain for hours at a time trying to come up with a means of escape. Hopelessness would have set in long hours ago were it not for one thing.

  A soft thump at the door interrupted her thoughts.

  At the sound of the key in the lock, both she and Ping sat up in the narrow bed where they had been lying. It was Ettie.

  Of all the kidnappers—or even servants—in this immense, dreadful house, only Ettie had treated them with something other than open disdain or simmering lust.

  She stood at the foot of the bed. “I have to leave,” she said, her face blank, her voice matter-of-fact. “I’ll be gone a few days. Sarah Mae and Margaret will check in on you until…”

  Li swallowed and pushed from her mind the image of Lucian McIntosh looming over her. “They’re going to sell our friends in some other town,” she said. “He wants you to go along, doesn’t he?”

  Ettie inhaled deeply through her nose and straightened her shoulders. “It can’t be helped.”

  Li wondered what it was that kept Ettie tied to McIntosh and his slavers. “You were the one in the long black coat at Zhang’s Restaurant the other night, weren’t you? You never spoke. You walked different. Your h
at and boots and gloves were different. But it was you, wasn’t it?”

  After meeting Li’s gaze for a long moment, Ettie said, “You’re a smart girl. Observant.”

  “Then you’re the one who picked which of us to take and which to leave.”

  Abruptly Ettie turned for the door. “I have to go.”

  Li wondered why, after deliberately choosing her and Ping for what she knew would be a living nightmare, Ettie had treated them so sympathetically. Did she suddenly feel guilty?

  Just as Ettie touched the doorknob, Sarah Mae barged in. Ettie had to skip out of the way to avoid being bowled over.

  The housekeeper was scowling as usual. ”What’re you doin’ back there?” she snapped at Ettie.

  Ettie raised her chin. She pivoted and sauntered to the window where she proceeded to pull back the heavy drapes and hook the gold-fringed tiebacks around their hardware.

  “Mr. McIntosh doesn’t want those curtains opened,” Sarah Mae protested.

  “Tell him I did it.” Ettie glared at the woman. “And don’t you close them again until these girls decide they’ve had enough sunlight for the day. If Mr. McIntosh wants them closed, he can come close them himself.”

  Sarah Mae huffed. “You may have gotten the curtains open for your little China tramps, but the window glass stays closed—Mr. McIntosh’s instructions. You do otherwise, and I’ll go straight to him this minute.”

  “It’s going to be hot again today,” Ettie said, still glowering.

  “Well then, the transom’s gonna have to do, because that window will not be opened. Should’ve left the drapes closed to begin with.”

  Ettie returned to the doorway, brushing the housekeeper as she passed. She paused there with her hands on her hips. “Don’t you be unduly mean to these girls, Sarah Mae. I mean it.” After stealing a glance at Li and Ping, she ambled out.

  Sarah Mae cut her eyes at Li. “Bad enough I have to pick up after you bleedin’ China girls. To have to put up with that uppity princess too…”

  She wrinkled her nose as she took hold of the chamber pot. “‘Don’t you be unduly mean.’ Indeed.” With a disdainful glare, she waddled out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

  Ping whispered in Mandarin, “It’s so hard for me not to hate white people. Even their servants treat us like we’re some kind of animals, not human beings.”

  Under the circumstances—abduction, captivity, McIntosh’s intentions—Li was tempted to agree. But they weren’t all the same. Even though Ettie had handpicked them, Li couldn’t bring herself to hate the woman. Whether it was the ruse or something else, Ettie had dealt with her and Ping almost apologetically.

  Then there was the Texan. Emmett Strong. For some reason, even as she brainstormed how she might escape, she found herself thinking of him—one white man she was pretty sure she could never hate.

  “Not all white people look down on us like that, Ping.”

  “Well, the ones who have us here do.”

  “The ones in this house, yes.”

  Ping climbed out of bed and walked to the window. “Except maybe Ettie.”

  Li got up and joined her. It came as no surprise that, aside from the men taking care of horses and cattle, most of those she spotted outside looked more like armed guards than ranchers.

  “I don’t understand Ettie either,” Li said. “There were times yesterday when I thought that—if she could—she probably would have let us go free.”

  Ping turned to her, frowning. “Yes, but I don’t know how long she’ll keep trying to make things better for us if you keep saying things like you did a few minutes ago.”

  “Like what?”

  “You made it sound as though it was Ettie’s idea to sell Min and Xia and Guiying and Jing.”

  “I was just trying to find out whether I was right—that she doesn’t like what’s happening here any better than we do.” Li leaned against the windowsill. “What do you think?”

  Ping was slow to answer. “She’s gone now, to do whatever McIntosh wants her to do. Probably what you said—to sell our friends.” After peering out the window a short while, she asked, “Anyway, how’s your thigh?”

  “It hurts…but I’m all right.”

  Then Ping unexpectedly resumed a conversation they had begun during the middle of the night when a wave of panic had threatened to overwhelm her. “Do you still think that man from Texas is going to be the one to find us and rescue us?”

  Li was fearful of nurturing unrealistic expectations—especially the kind that might set them both up for a fall. Regardless, it was critical that they hang on to hope. She spoke barely above a whisper, close to Ping’s ear. “You heard all that shouting downstairs the other night. They were saying the very same names downstairs that Emmett, the man from Texas, told me about. He’s looking for Charlie Blaylock. And Charlie Blaylock came here—to this very house. When Emmett finds Charlie, he’ll find us.” She knew that—while factually correct—what she had just voiced was hardly more than a desperate dream. Nevertheless, she clung to it, if for no other reason than to keep despair at bay.

  Ping remained close, turning so she could see Li’s face. Her eyes were moist. “We can’t wait around for somebody from the outside—not even this Texas man—to come find us. Anything could happen to us before then.” Tears began to run down her cheeks again. “You’re the cleverest person I know, Li. I trust you more than anybody. You have to come up with a plan so we can escape.”

  Hugging her friend, Li said, “You’re right, Ping. I promise. I’ll start trying again. We’ll think of something.”

  Ping was quiet for a moment.

  What kind of plan could she come up with for the two of them to escape on their own? It seemed impossible. She surveyed the gunmen down below, then glanced at the transom above the door. The only thing she could do was to stay alert for any change, any opportunity, and make the best of it when the moment came.

  Taking Ping by the shoulders, she eased her away. But before she got another word out, the now-familiar metallic clack of the key in the lock distracted her. She grimaced at the thought of having to endure more of Sarah Mae’s nasty comments.

  In the next instant, however, her stomach knotted and her knees nearly buckled.

  Lucian McIntosh himself filled the bedroom doorway.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  On a little-used road leading to Reno, the wind kicked up a fine spray of dust and grit. Emmett turned his head and pressed on. His amigos—Juanito, Sikes, and Yong Xu—likewise leaned into the stiff breeze with eyes squinched.

  “You’ve got the note I gave you for the newspaperman, right, Yong?” he asked.

  Yong patted his vest pocket. “Right here.” In lieu of his customary baggy trousers and traditional tunic, Yong wore American trousers, a shirt, and a vest today—although he still kept his light-soled Chinese shoes, and his head was shaded by the shallow cone of a Chinese straw hat.

  “Sure hope he agrees to ride out with you,” Emmett said.

  “If he wants you to do what the local lawmen won’t do, why wouldn’t he?”

  “Not sure. Don’t know him that well. Anyway, I appreciate you going in to fetch him.”

  Yong nodded. “I’ll be less conspicuous in Reno than any of you three.”

  Sikes’s horse nearly stumbled. “Whoa! You call this a road, Yong Xu?”

  Emmett eyed the deep, weathered wagon ruts and the dry grass that obscured them in places.

  “If you want to pass through this country unnoticed…” Yong said. “It’s not likely Blaylock or McIntosh will send men to look for the three of you on this road. Only local people use it. And not even them very often.”

  Once they reached a smoother stretch of the old trail, Emmett resumed mulling over Cromarty’s notes and the Sacramento Gazette article. The longer he thought about it, the stronger his conv
iction grew that finding and freeing the Chinese girls would ultimately help him achieve his original goal—locating and dealing with Seth and Charlie Blaylock.

  Atop a rise, Juanito pointed to the east. “Does that town look familiar?”

  “Certainly does,” Sikes said. “And the lake beyond it too.”

  “We camped on the edge of that lake and then passed through the town the first time we rode up to Reno,” Emmett explained to Yong.

  “That’s Washoe City,” Yong said. “And beyond it, Washoe Lake.”

  “A McIntosh town?” Emmett asked.

  “If he wanted it. It’s so small, though, I doubt he cares about it.”

  About a mile farther north, the men reached the top of a higher ridge. Juanito put a hand up, and the four reined in.

  He pointed. “We’re not the only ones out on this old goat trail today.”

  Emmett studied the road ahead where the wind twisted and lifted a low cloud of dust. Two slow-moving covered wagons were wending their way toward them. They were accompanied by six mounted men—two riding point, two riding swing, and two eating the dust kicked up by the others.

  “Hmm,” he said. “It’s not like we’re out in Indian country. Wonder why they’re framing the wagons that way.”

  “Remember,” Yong Xu said. “You’re in mining country now. They could be carrying silver ore down to Carson City.”

  Emmett nodded. “Makes sense. But why not take the main road through Washoe City?”

  Yong Xu shrugged.

  “Looks like they’ve spotted us,” Sikes said.

  The wagons had stopped, along with the swing and drag riders. But the two point men had turned and were loping back toward the cargo.

  “We don’t know that for a fact,” Emmett said. “Let’s just stay put for a minute.”

  At the base of the rise, Seth Blaylock waited for Charlie and the other point rider, Zeke. Ettie eased her horse up alongside him.

  “Trouble up ahead?” she asked.