Thanks to all who have taken the time to read this to the end! Hope you enjoyed it.
Chapter 10
Adam followed Hop Sing through the narrow, noisy, crowded streets of the markets of Chinatown. The noise was the result of loud bargaining between vendor and customer and one vendor cursing out another for intruding on their spots. Children ran the streets barefoot, laughing and playing while women cooked food on grills set up at the side of the streets. Everywhere was the smell of onions, garlic and ginger and the redolent odor of various meats. Finally, Hop Sing stopped in front of a small wooden shop.
"This place where they sell poison," Hop Sing said to Adam, his brow furrowed with worry. "See sign—say he have whatever person want." Hop Sing did not approve of Adam's quest and had been hard to convince; Adam said that if Hop Sing wouldn't go with him to Chinatown, he'd hire someone. At that, Hop Sing puffed up: "No one go with Mistah Adam but Hop Sing. Not trust other—might take money and run away." So in that way, Adam had managed to convince the Chinese cook to go with him.
Hop Sing pushed aside the curtain at the entrance into the small wooden building and stepped in; Adam had to stoop to enter the low door. It took a few second for his eyes to adapt; the inside was dark except for a small window covered by oiled paper.
A middle –aged Chinese man came out from the back and stood behind a counter. He smiled at Hop Sing but when he saw Adam his smiled disappeared. Hop Sing spoke to the man and the man answered gruffly.
"He say he not sell any poison for long time. He say he have no more have poisons in the shop."
"Let him know I'm not from the law—I don't care if he has poisons in the back or what he has. I just want to know if he sold any poison of any type to a young woman—a white woman with dark hair and dark eyes."
Hop Sing talked to the shop owner who asked Hop Sing if Adam wouldn't rather buy some powdered tiger testicles. Adam rolled his eyes. "Ask about the woman." Adam took out three silver dollars and held them up for the shop owner to see. Hop Sing asked. The shop owner looked suspiciously at the money and then put out his hand. Adam placed one silver coin in it and the man closed his fist around it and slipped the coin in his pocket and spoke.
Hop Sing turned to Adam. "Him say no woman but young man come buy poison. He say that Chinese boy, small boy with bag of sugar candy, speak English little bit and he come with young man—young, slender man dressed with nice clothes-expensive. He want poison—say he have rats in kitchen of house. Need to kill rats. Shop owner sell poison but only to kill rats."
The shop owner held his chin up, his arms crossed on his chest.
"Ask him if he would recognize the young man if he saw him again." Hop Sing did as Adam asked and the shop keeper shook his head and spoke sharply.
"He say that young man keep hat down low—room not have much light. Not be able know again."
"I want to know what poison the young man bought. I want to buy a small amount of the same substance."
"Why you want poison?" Hop Sing asked. He didn't like this business.
"To show the doctor. Now ask. I'll pay the other two silver dollars for it."
Hop Sing translated and the shop owner stood, pensive. Then he beckoned and Hop Sing and Adam followed him to the back of the shop where there were endless shelves holding clay jars and glass vials with labels on them. The contents were described in Chinese symbols. Against one side wall, an old man who looked to Adam to be at least 200 years old, he was so thin and bony, lay on a low cot smoking what Adam was sure was opium. The old man glanced over with his hollow eyes and then closed them again, inhaling on his pipe.
The shop owner placed a small ceramic jar on a table. Adam reached for it but the man put out his hand. Adam dropped another silver dollar in it. He uncorked the jar and sniffed. It smelled bitter and slightly familiar; Hop Sing's almond cookies came to mind only there wasn't the fragrant odor of vanilla attached. And with the last silver dollar, Adam bought a small amount which the shop owner placed in a piece of paper that he folded into a packet.
"Paul, since Beauchamp's heart appeared healthy to you, what about this? What if he was fed some of this poison?"
Adam sat in Dr. Paul Martin's outer office. He handed the paper packet to Paul who placed it on his desk and slowly opened it. He stuck his finger into the powder and smelled it. "Where did you get this?"
"I bought it in Chinatown. Hop Sing was my guide. The Chinese make it, he told me, by grinding up peach and apricot pits, mixing it with water and then boiling it down and letting the concoction dry; it becomes these crystals."
"Cyanide. Yes, cyanide could produce the same symptoms and result in death—histotoxic hypoxia. But weren't you and your father with Beauchamp before he died? Are you saying Lady Stockbridge poisoned him?"
Adam shrugged. "I don't know. I was just conjecturing—an intellectual exercise. And yes, my father and I were there." Adam stood up, told Paul goodbye and left. He mounted his horse and rode over to the Palace Hotel. He tied off the reins and went into the lobby and he had just put his hand on the newel post when Tom, the desk clerk called to him. Adam turned.
"If you're going up to see Lady Stockbridge, she's not here. She checked out last night and took the last stage out of town from what I understand. At least she asked me when the last stage left and she was gone in time to make it. It was the stage to San Francisco."
Adam chuckled. "Lady Stockbridge in San Francisco." He grinned to himself. As he mounted his horse, he told himself. "Well, I guess I'm off to San Francisco tomorrow."
Epilogue
"Hello, Giselle," Adam said after Becky had opened the door and he had walked past the young girl to see Giselle at a small desk, writing.
She turned and looked at him, her eyes wide with surprise, her mouth slightly open and Adam was struck again by her beauty and desirability. She quickly recovered her wits and stood, gracefully arranging her skirts. Giselle smiled.
Adam stepped further into the room and Becky closed the door and without waiting to be told, Becky slunk off into another room.
"So you found me," Giselle said as she moved closer to Adam. He heard her skirts rustling as she walked or actually, as she seemed to float toward him. "Won't you sit?"
"Thank you," Adam said and pulled off his hat, tossing it on a chair. He adjusted his holster and sat on a large, elegant sofa. Giselle sat in the chair facing him.
"May I offer you some coffee or tea? Are you hungry? I can have some food sent up."
Adam chuckled. "I think not, Giselle—or should I say Lady Cartwright? Really, Giselle—so obvious."
"I knew it was a mistake but well, I indulged my passion for whimsy. Besides, if anyone wanted me, they would have asked for Lady Stockbridge so I couldn't go by that—I would have been far too easy to find."
"I did look for Lady Stockbridge and each hotel at which I asked said no, but the desk clerk here, he said that the only titled lady they had as a guest was Lady Cartwright. I knew then that I had found you-and I think that you really wanted me to find you; you knew, didn't you, that I would figure things out and come to you."
"I don't know what you're talking about but I'm flattered that you came looking for me."
"Don't be. I didn't come because my heart told me too—not quite so maudlin a reason as that. I don't find you so irresistible that I'd travel all the way just to get another taste of you although..." Adam looked her over and Giselle shifted in her chair; he made her uncomfortable with his appraising glance.
"Well, then why did you come?"
"You poisoned Beauchamp, didn't you?"
"Don't be silly—of course, I didn't. Why would I do something like that?"
"Oh, yes, you did. Of that, I'm certain." Adam leaned forward and Giselle watched him with narrowed eyes. "You were afraid of Beauchamp. After he turned the letters over to Hotchkiss, Hotchkiss would realize that all the letters weren't there—that you had withheld two of them, the two that you say are the most detailed about his perverse tastes. Hotchkiss would be furious with Beauchamp and Beauchamp would be furious with you—he would want to break your neck for making a fool of him and then he would come after you. You killed him all right."
"And how did I do that?" Giselle asked.
"The only way I can figure is the tea."
"That's ridiculous. I drank the very same tea—you saw me. Why, I even offered it to you. The tea couldn't be poisoned. You know I would never take the chance that you would drink it; I like you too much."
"I don't know any such thing. But I do know that the tea wasn't poisoned. I went through everything that was offered that afternoon. It wasn't the cakes—Becky ate those and it wasn't the sugar. My father had sugar in his coffee nor was it the cream. You and he both had cream. So it must have been the lemon slices. You see, Giselle, I think that you sprinkled cyanide crystals on the lemon slices. The spices in the tea as well as the sour of the lemon would have disguised the bitter flavor and the smell. You know I drink coffee—not tea-and that my father does as well and lemon doesn't go in coffee. You must have had tea with Beauchamp at some earlier time when he was badgering you for the letters and you knew he took lemon in his tea. And being British, he would have tea instead of coffee."
"That's interesting but you have really gone too far with your imagination, Adam. Where would I get—what was it? Cyanide?"
"Well, that would have had anyone else stumped. But when I investigated, I found that no one had bought rat poison at the feed stores or the mercantilist's—but then their rat poison is arsenic and arsenic takes some time to kill, even in great amounts; Beauchamp would have become sick and thrown up and taken a few days to die. Arsenic couldn't be used. So I thought of Chinatown. That's where I found out that a well-dressed young man bought cyanide crystals. Very clever, Giselle. You are clever but you see, Giselle, I saw you dressed as a young man—a very beautiful young man."
Giselle smiled serenely. "And I suppose that you have proof for your 'theory' because, Adam, that's all it is—a theory."
"No, Giselle, I have no proof. You have been remarkably clever. I do have to admit that I'm impressed. Why you even have my father and me as witnesses that you did nothing suspicious but behaved as a gracious hostess. You also know that people of different races have trouble differentiating between people of another race—it takes lengthy immersion with another culture in order to know one person from another of a different race. Hence whites say that all Chinese look alike and the inverse is also true-they believe we all look alike. Even if I had brought you in to the shop where you bought the cyanide and had you dressed up as a young man, the shop owner wouldn't have been able to identify you, especially if the sheriff lined you up with two or three other 'real' young men and then asked him to pick you out as I'm sure your lawyer would have insisted—it couldn't be done. You are fascinating," Adam said. Giselle said nothing, merely looked at Adam. "So tell, me, Giselle, are you going to blackmail Hotchkiss with the letters?"
"I don't have the letters. You saw me give them to Beauchamp."
"Yes, I did and I can swear that he seemed satisfied that he had the right letters but I can also swear that the letters weren't on his person—or in his room after he died; I searched. My guess is that when I went downstairs for help, you took the letters back. Have you rolled a dead man before, Giselle, or was that the first time? And I'm also sure that you have the most damning two letters in another safe deposit box-Lady Cartwright."
Giselle stood up. "If you're going to insult me and accuse me of murder, you can just leave."
"Come now, Giselle. I'm complimenting you; I am in awe. I thought I knew everything, that I knew your little game but I was wrong. You outsmarted me, Giselle. I willingly let myself be used as a pawn in your game and I find that—surprisingly erotic." Adam stood and moved closer to Giselle until they were face to face, so close that Adam could see her pupils widen with desire. He pulled her to him and kissed her with more passion than he had ever felt for a woman; she was his match—more than his match in some ways as she had known exactly how to play upon his desire for her, his desire for her lithe body and sharp mind. Giselle was exactly what he needed to excite him and keep his senses alert.
"Shall we, Adam?" Giselle softly asked, caressing his cheek. "One more time—for friendship's sake."
And Adam laughed deep in his throat. "Oh, yes. Let's do." And he bent slightly and swept Giselle up in his arms. He carried her into the bedroom and kicked the door shut behind him. A little danger was the best aphrodisiac.
~ Finis ~