Fortune Is a Woman - Elizabeth Adler [155]
She looked piteously up at Lai Tsin and he sat down beside her and for the very first time in their relationship he put his arms around her. She felt small and fragile, sobbing on his shoulder. He could find no words to comfort her and his own tears ran unchecked down his face as he shared her sorrow. And Lai Tsin knew he had failed Francie. He had made a terrible mistake by not letting the hatchet men kill Sammy Morris all those years ago. Because if Sammy hadn’t kidnapped Ollie, he would be alive now.
On the train to Chicago, Harry read the headlines in the morning papers and his satisfied smile changed to a gasp. He told himself nervously that he hadn’t meant to kill the kid. How in hell was he supposed to have known he was there? They’d told him the Mandarin had left and the place was locked up for the night.
He reread the report uneasily. Then, tightening his tie he walked down the train to the dining car. But somehow breakfast didn’t taste very good that morning. So he hurried back to his private compartment and ordered a bottle of bourbon and some branch water. A few hours later, he summoned his valet and told him to cancel the week’s stay in New York and to book them on the first ship leaving for Europe—anywhere in Europe. Until the speculation died down he wanted to put as many miles as possible between him and San Francisco.
Part IV
BUCK
CHAPTER 33
1927
Buck Wingate was in the Wall Street branch of his law office, waiting for Harry. It had been nine years since he had last seen him. That had been when he had refused to act as his attorney in a libel suit he was planning after the disastrous fire that killed Francesca Harrison’s son. The newspapers had been full of rumors about a mysterious telephone call luring the boy to the empty offices and the police had confirmed that the fire had been set deliberately. But it was the barely veiled references to Harry’s animosity toward his sister that pointed the finger at him. And they had also printed a rumor that Francesca Harrison had accused Harry of killing her son. From a safe distance in his new Monte Carlo villa Harry had expressed his shock at the tragedy and just for the record, proved that he had been on board a train on his way to New York the night it occurred and knew nothing about it until he’d read it in the papers.
The stories had filled the nation’s journals for weeks. There were photographs of Miss Harrison and her “close friend and business partner,” the Mandarin, at the funeral. Francie’s face had been hidden beneath a heavy black veil and she had been clinging to the Mandarin and her friend, Annie Aysgarth, looking as if she were about to faint.
At the time Buck thought he would not have put it past Harry to have had a part in it. When he’d come to see him about a libel action Buck had told him bluntly, “If you take the matter to court they’ll dig up every bit of scandal and dirt they can about both you and your sister. And since your own past is not exactly squeaky clean, my advice to you is to let sleeping dogs lie.”
“What do you mean—my past?” Harry blustered. “I’ve nothing to be ashamed of.” Buck’s steady eyes met his and he added uncertainly, “I mean, I had nothing to do with this fire, nothing at all—”
“Drop it, Harry,” Buck said evenly.
“Goddamn it, I thought you were my friend,” Harry toppled his chair as he got to his feet. “If that’s a friend, then I guess I’d better get myself another attorney.”
“I guess so, Harry,” Buck replied coldly, “because I sure as hell am not gonna touch it.”
The next he’d heard of Harry was the phone call this morning asking to see him. He said he had questions about his father’s estate.
The Wingate and Wingate law practice was an old and established