Skulduggery Read online

  THREE

  The flashlight landed on its side, its bright wide beam parallel to the floor, affording one sharp spot of light against the back wall and a dim illumination for the rest of the room. Everyone moved at once in an ominous silence, the only sounds a sharply indrawn breath, the scuff of shoes, the slither of leather.

  I knew what they wanted. And I didn’t care how Jimmy talked about bundles of cash, my immediate instinctive reaction was that Peking man was better off in his hands.

  I was moving, too, scrambling sideways toward the tool bench. Scarcely able to make it out in the gloom, I remembered the neatly hung tools—and a claw hammer at the near end.

  Everybody was moving, although Dan was slowest. I guessed that he had no idea of the contents of that gym bag. His head swung from the thugs toward Jimmy then back to the two who were almost upon him now.

  I yanked the hammer free. As I turned back, I saw Jimmy ducking down, yanking up that shabby cot, thrusting it forward. Dan took it, hesitated, then swung it straight up. For an instant, I was delighted. Both of them, I thought, he’s taken on both of them. I looked around, hoping Jimmy would take this chance, maybe the only chance, to slip past them and run out the door. Then perhaps Dan and I . . .

  I was holding the hammer up, waiting, and realized with a sick sense of shock that Dan hadn’t got both of them—and that Jimmy was scrambling toward the back of the room! Why wasn’t he running for the door? Why on earth would he turn that way, a brick wall ahead of him, the sad row of orange-crate shelves to his left, the tool bench to his right?

  Then I stopped worrying about Jimmy because the cot had caught only one of the attackers. The shorter heavier thug sidestepped and moved into Dan.

  Now there was noise, lots of it, a strange screeching like old metal, the horrid thump of fists on flesh, breathless harsh grunts of pain and an agonized yelp when my hammer whanged into the shorter thug’s shoulder—he’d moved his head at the last minute. I must have numbed him good because he staggered into the tool bench, slumped over it for an instant, then swung around and landed a vicious kick that caught me in the thigh and I yelped, too, and flew backwards and brought up painfully against the wall then crumpled to the floor. Someone toppled to the floor near me, swearing in a low monotonous voice. He landed on the flashlight, there was a crackling sound and it was abruptly absolutely dark. I heard scuffling sounds, a dull thump, a sickening crack. Someone ran heavily. Then a cold damp current of air swept me and it was suddenly quiet. Deathly quiet.

  “Jimmy?” My voice wavered.

  No one answered, no one moved. There was nothing but that odd eddy of air, cold, dank and smelling of earth and age.

  “Dan?” My voice was sharp now, frightened. Damn yes, I was frightened. Who was in that cold cellar with me? Who lay on that hard-packed earthen floor? For I was sure that I wasn’t alone.

  A rustle, a groggy moan of pain.

  What if Jimmy and Dan were both gone? What if they had deserted me down here, damn them, and that moan came from one of those toughs?

  It was obviously everybody for himself and I had better see to Ellen before the moaner came to.

  I was on my hands and knees now, my right leg still throbbing from that kick. Cautiously, I began to get up, reaching out to the wall for support.

  “Uhh.” Someone moved not far from me.

  I began to limp quietly, sliding my hand along the wall. I touched the doorframe. The hall lay just ahead of me. I could feel my way to the stairs and get up and out of this nightmare.

  “Uhh.”

  I hesitated by the door. It might be Jimmy lying there, moaning. Or Dan. And what if somewhere in this dark eerily cold cellar lay the gym bag with Peking man’s skull stuffed inside?

  Down that hall lay safety. Or, at least, a chance at it.

  “Uhh.”

  I took a step nearer the door. Why should I care who moaned? No one was a friend of mine. Then, almost angrily, I turned away from the doorframe and began, step by cautious step, to move toward the center of the room and whoever lay there. One step, another, then I was falling, yanked off my feet by the hand that had closed roughly around my ankle. I went down heavily, landing on my sore right hip.

  “Ouch!” I yelled.

  “Oh, oh sorry. Sorry,” he said muzzily, “didn’t know it was you.” Letting go as suddenly as he had grabbed, he began to struggle to get up. “Jimmy, hey Jimmy!” and his voice was stronger.

  The silence must have hit him as it had me. It was such a cold empty silence.

  “Goddammit Jimmy, where are you?” Harshly, he turned on me. “Where is he? What’s happened? Where did they go?”

  “If I knew,” I said drily, “you would be among the first to hear.”

  He was on his feet now. I couldn’t see him but he was close to me, so close I could hear him breathe. “Don’t try to be funny. What’s happened to Jimmy?”

  He didn’t ask if I was all right or put out a hand to help me up. No, he loomed above me in the utter darkness and yelled about Jimmy.

  “Why on earth do you care?” I demanded pettishly. “He wasn’t so very damn glad to see you, was he? And you don’t even know what it’s all about, do you?”

  He did pull me up then, but not nicely. His big hand swung down, found my elbow and hauled me up like a sack of meal.

  “But you do know.” His voice was almost ugly. “And you’re going to tell me!”

  I tried to pull away from him. “Why should I tell you anything at all?”

  “Because Jimmy’s my brother.”

  “Oh.”

  His hand hurt my arm. But I wasn’t mad any more. I understood now why Dan had fought even though he didn’t know what the gym bag held. He didn’t know why toughs trailed his brother—and what I was going to tell him wouldn’t help much. It would only give him more reason to fear for his brother.

  “Let go,” I said quietly. “I’ll tell you what I know. But it isn’t much, isn’t enough. And I’m sorry. He’s your brother. I didn’t know.”

  His hand fell away from me. “Where did they go? Did they get Jimmy? Hurt him?”

  “I don’t know,” I answered uncertainly. “Everything happened so quickly. I saw Jimmy push the cot at you and then I thought, when you swung it at those two, that Jimmy would try to get to the door. But he didn’t. He turned toward the back wall. Then I lost track of him. I’d found a hammer and taken a swing at one of the toughs but, unfortunately, I missed his head. He kicked me and the next thing I knew the middle of the room was erupting, then the light went out.” I shrugged. “That’s all I know. It was dark and, suddenly, quiet.”

  “They had to go somewhere,” Dan muttered. “Here,” and he flicked a lighter and there was a tiny quivering tongue of flame. He held it up and the flame danced and promptly went out. He clicked the lighter again and this time shielded the wick.

  We looked around and, even in that wavering uncertain light that more softened than dispelled the gloom, we both saw the darker splotch of blackness in the wall where the cot had stood. Saw and half understood that cold damp eddy of air, saw and cautiously moved nearer.

  It was cleverly done, cleverly, painstakingly, artfully done. Bricks had been split then mounted in a wood frame and fitted into the wall. Closed, the squat square door merged into the brick wall. Opened, it revealed a low entryway. Dan knelt, still protecting his tiny flare of light from the cool damp air that flowed into the cellar.

  “I’ll be dammed,” he said softly.

  He poked his head and shoulders into the darkness, held the little light inside the opening. It immediately snuffed out. “There’s a narrow space behind this wall.” His voice was muffled. “I can feel air, fresher air.” Then his voice was close again and I knew he had pulled back from the opening. “At some time, probably after the big earthquake in 1907, the building was rebuilt with a double wall at the cellar level, leaving room for a passageway.”

  The raspy click sounded again and the lighter once more burned. It cast
uneven jumpy shadows that made the dark cellar seem alive with sinister movement. He turned toward me and I wished I could see his face more clearly. His voice was strong, reassuring. “It has to be a way out. We know that. Jimmy and those guys must have gone this way. Look, do you want to wait here . . .”

  His voice trailed off. I understood his dilemma. He didn’t want to leave me here. How could he trust me to stay until he returned? And, he needed me to find out what was going on. However, he couldn’t insist that I follow him blindly to who knew what.

  “I’ll come along.” I had no intention of remaining in that unlighted room by myself. He might not be my champion, but he was certainly better than being alone. Under the circumstances.

  He went first, taking the lighter with him, of course, and the cellar was suddenly much darker. It took me a moment in the scant light to find my purse and to take one last hopeful look around for that gym bag. He was back in the cellar, wary and suspicious, when I didn’t come.

  “Ready?”

  “I’m right behind you.”

  The opening was low, beneath the bulletin board that had hung over the cot. I stooped and stepped into the narrow passageway. We had to turn sideways to move. I kept close behind him. I wondered how many years this passageway had existed—and for what purpose? It was bricked underfoot unlike the cellar floor. The bricks were uneven, more like cobbles, and slick. In the wavering light I could see a darkish spread of fungus on the wall near my face and I wondered if the whole passageway was coated and slimy. I shivered and kept right behind Dan. So near, in fact, that I bumped him good when he stopped suddenly.

  “Shhh!” he warned.

  I stood on one foot, massaging my right ankle where it had come up under his heel and trying to listen over the sudden uneven thumping of my heart.

  Then I heard it, too. A skittery rustle just ahead. We waited. The sound came again, seemed louder now that we listened for it.

  Dan bent low, held the lighter forward.

  Tiny eyes glittered at us. A sleek rat, his fur ghostly in the dark, watched us then tentatively nosed a step nearer.

  Dan stamped his foot, grey fur flashed and was gone.

  “Just a rat,” he said easily. “Come on.”

  Just a rat. Damn, I wanted out!

  We must have walked almost fifty yards with just space enough to squeeze between the two brick walls when the passageway ended at the foot of a narrow wooden stairway, the treads not more than a foot in width. We could see a square of light not too far above.

  Dan climbed up first and looked out cautiously then gestured for me to follow. We stepped out into a ground-floor entryway. This small squat door was a movable piece of paneling and would, like its counterpart in the cellar, be well disguised when closed.

  Dan gently touched a finger to my lips, but he didn’t need to caution me for I, too, heard the sounds, an intermittent clicking noise, the low indistinguishable mutter of voices, then, abruptly, a loud whoop of laughter.

  Dan raised his head and I realized the sounds came from upstairs. A stairway, scarcely visible in the dim light, twisted upward, out of sight.

  I watched Dan’s face, what I could see of it in the faint light that seeped through the narrow opening of a door not too far from us that stood ajar. Now he put a finger to his own lips, then nodded for me to follow him. He began to step, softly as a cat, toward that opened door.

  I didn’t know why he moved so quietly, what threat he recognized, but I tiptoed, too. We were almost to the door, his hand was reaching out for the knob, when we heard the sharp click of shoes on asphalt.

  Dan looked back toward the stairs, then again at the door—and the footsteps came nearer.

  Dan’s arm swung around me and he almost carried me as he moved us quickly to the side of the door where we would be hidden when the door opened.

  The steps came close then abruptly stopped and I knew someone stood just past that partially-opened door, stood and listened as we did.

  Seconds passed, interminable seconds. Upstairs the clicking sounds continued and the soft murmur of voices. I could hear the feather-light sound of Dan’s breath.

  The door began to open, slowly, so slowly. It swung back against us and someone walked lightly into the room.

  I heard a shocked mutter and running feet. The hidden door was still open!

  That’s when Dan won my confidence. He didn’t hesitate. He didn’t wait too long or move too soon. Grabbing my arm, he edged us around the door and then we were dashing out the open door. I just glimpsed a figure peering into the passageway. Hearing us, he whirled around, shouted. Answering shouts came down the stairwell and, as we jumped into the street, we heard the running thump of feet coming down the stairs.

  “Run like hell!” Dan ordered.

  FOUR

  We reached the end of the street and tumbled out into Grant Avenue and were immediately caught up in the flow of restaurant goers and sightseers.

  Huge Chinese characters, incomprehensible to me, flickered in brilliant neon on both sides of the street. Little shops offered candy, art goods, paintings, ivories and every other doorway led to a restaurant.

  We merged into the stream of unhurried pedestrians and didn’t look back when we heard our pursuers reach Grant. Dan held my elbow and hurried us straight ahead for another block. Once across the intersection, we ducked into the alcove of a shop which was shuttered for the night.

  It was light enough in that alcove for us to see each other plainly and I was struck once again by the character and force in his face. I could well see that he and Jimmy were brothers, though Jimmy’s face was much more gentle and diffident.

  I could also see that Dan’s right cheek was beginning to swell.

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Hurt?”

  “Your face.”

  “Oh, that. No. Not much. Son of a bitch hit me a good one.” His voice was grim. “I’d like to know why. I’d like to know a hell of a lot. I’ll start with you. Who are you? Why were you with Jimmy? What the hell’s happening?”

  “I’m Ellen Christie. I was with Jimmy because he wanted to show something to me. I’ll try to tell you as much as I know, but, first, I have some questions of my own. Who are you? Where did that passageway come out? And, why did we have to run?”

  His face was immobile for a long moment then his mouth spread in a wide grin. His very attractive mouth.

  “Have you ever spent much time in Chinatown?”

  I shook my head. “Lunch. Once.”

  “Tonight should make up for that. To begin with, we walked through a secret passageway. Right?”

  I nodded.

  “Every Chinese will tell you there’s no truth to the old tales about Chinatown being honeycombed with tunnels. That’s just the old hokey anti-Chinese newspaper tong-war publicity. I grew up three blocks from here and I would have told you there wasn’t a tunnel in town. I would have laughed at the idea of hidden passageways, too, which goes to show that nobody knows everything. As for where it came out,” he laughed, “that’s what the tabloids like to call a ‘gambling den’ and we ran because they don’t like strangers dropping in. Especially strangers popping in through what is obviously their pet exit.”

  “I see.”

  “And I’m Dan Lee. A lawyer by trade. I have a little brother named Jimmy.” The good humor left his voice. “And I’m afraid he’s in trouble.”

  I nodded slowly. “Trouble—and danger,” I said somberly. “I don’t know how or where but somehow he’s come up with an incredibly valuable collection of fossils and I’m afraid he’s out to sell to the highest bidder.”

  Dan bent closer as if to hear better. “He’s come up with what?”

  “Fossils. At least one fossil, and I’m guessing he has them all.” I hesitated, then plunged ahead. “I won’t swear to it because scientists won’t just from a look and, besides, I’m no expert on Sinanthropus, but he showed me a skull—and it’s Peking Man. I know it is. Damn, I just know it is!”r />
  Dan took a deep breath, folded his arms and stared down at me. “Miss Christie . . .”

  “Ellen,” I interrupted.

  “All right, Ellen. But, you lose me. Are you trying to say those toughs were after a skull? An old fossilized skull?”

  “Not just any old skull,” I said impatiently. “It’s Peking Man.”

  Dan just shrugged and it finally became clear to me that the name meant nothing to him.

  It’s hard sometimes to realize that intelligent well-educated people may not know a thing about our own particular specialty. I probably wouldn’t know a tort from a torte except my father is a small-town lawyer, oil and gas, civil trials and probate his areas.

  I just stood there for a moment, uncertain how to begin.

  “Bone, skull, whatever,” he said, “you think those toughs were out to take it away from Jimmy? But that he has as much right to it as anybody?”

  “The first, yes. The second, well, that’s anybody’s guess. I’d say whoever has the bones in hand is in a position of strength, either to claim a reward or to sell them.”

  Dan nodded. “Then, if I can’t find Jimmy,” and he paused and I knew he was afraid for his brother.

  “If you can’t find him,” I repeated soberly.

  “Then I’d better get the police.”

  I looked out onto Grant Avenue, at the cheerful pedestrians enjoying the color of an exotic enclave. All kinds of people passed by and none of them looked dangerous. But that didn’t mean much. That red-haired woman looking up at the curly-haired sailor or that impassive Navajo staring into a shop window or that middle-aged paunchy man in the ill-fitting suit trying to keep up with his very young companion, what would they do for a hundred thousand dollars? Or, perhaps, for two hundred thousand dollars? Multiply them by all the people in San Francisco who read newspapers. Out of these thousands of people, some of them would know who Peking man was and would know quite well how much he was worth.