by Maureen Tan
I moved out of earshot.
Again and again, I plunged the rag into the bucket, gave it a quick twist to wring out the excess water and scrubbed another table. By the time the last one was done, Mrs. Yang was smiling her approval and I had a focus for my undercover work.
Just as I had in Mexico, I would identify the criminals and gather specific details about their activities, beginning with the extortion racket in Little Vietnam. If Uncle Tinh was correct, such an investigation would lead me to the reasons for the murders. And, perhaps, the murderer. But I didn’t kid myself. I was not a cop. And now that I no longer worked for Uncle Duran, I had no authority, no credentials….
I steered my thoughts away from renewed uncertainty about my future, back to today’s plan of action. I would provide Beauprix and the N.O.P.D. with the information they needed, but it would be up to them to break the gang’s stranglehold on Little Vietnam and to bring a murderer to justice.
Except for the jungle of potted plants that flourished in the heat and light and partially blocked my view, the restaurant’s broad plate-glass window was ideal for watching the busy sidewalk and street beyond the Red Lotus. Between taking orders, picking up plates and bowls full of food from the serving window that linked the kitchen to the dining area, delivering food to the customers and cleaning up, I kept my eyes on the window. I watched the traffic passing by—pedestrian and vehicular.
Certain vehicles quickly became familiar. Some passed by early in the morning every morning—people on their way to work, kids getting dropped off at school, folks who stopped at the bakery across the street for pastries and coffee. Cars and delivery vans belonging to shop owners and employees parked in many of the metered spaces along the busy street. Other vehicles became familiar simply because they drove by often throughout the day. I memorized makes and models and—whenever I could—license plates, creating a list of cars and schedules that grew longer with every day that passed.
I also drew people with an eye, once again, to those who were regular customers or frequently walked past. Because of the restaurant’s busy schedule, I held each day’s faces in my memory and moved them to paper at night. Using the candles in the bedroom, I sat in the center of the surprisingly comfortable bed and drew quick studies of customers or passersby who had caught my eye.
Some of the sketches I made were the basis for more thoughtful portraits. I drew the Yangs, including the twins and the elderly cousin. Family, I thought, united by love and blood and ambition.
I created a portrait of the baker, who pretended not to see me when I served him his food; his eyes were sad and I wondered about his experiences during the war. I drew the nervous fish vendor, who seemed to know that her clothing reeked of the seafood she handled; she never lingered at the restaurant to eat but scurried away with her daily carryout order clutched in bony hands. And I sketched the face of a woman of about fifty whose hair hung raggedly over most of her face; she never spoke and her eyes were focused on some faraway scene. Shell shock, Mrs. Yang explained, and we never charged her for meals.
Each day, the hours at work passed quickly. Before I knew it, it was late afternoon and the Yangs’ two younger daughters would be coming in through the front door. The pair made a point of responding to my daily greeting with silence and matching frowns of disapproval. Then they would tip identical noses upward, stalk past me to tuck book-filled backpacks beneath the counter and march into the kitchen. I would always continue waiting on customers as the twins greeted their parents and the elderly cousin, pulled their glossy dark hair back into thick braids and slipped on big white aprons over blue Catholic school uniforms. Finally, they would emerge from the kitchen, scowl at me, and that was my signal to go home.
On Wednesday, my third day of work at the Red Lotus, I was once again washing down the counters and tables. It was late afternoon and, at the moment, there were no customers in the restaurant. So I was hurrying to complete the task before anyone came in.
Mr. Yang was on his stool behind the cash register, counting dollar bills and facing them all in the same direction. The important job of counting the receipts was his exclusively.
I looked up from washing one of the tables when he called my name.
“Finish. Then we talk,” he said.
My first thought was that he intended to fire me. Though I’d been scolded once or twice about daydreaming as I stared out the window, I was generally a hard worker and couldn’t imagine why I deserved firing. But I could think of no other reason that Mr. Yang would want to converse with me.
I had discovered that he was as abrupt as Mrs. Yang was gregarious, rarely speaking more than a few words to me in the space of a day. Communications between us were generally limited to a pointed finger or a nod in the direction of a task. As was appropriate for a male of Mr. Yang’s generation, he spoke to his wife or to the elderly cousin if he needed to tell me something more complex. It was left to them to pass on his comments, which is why I knew he’d noticed that I liked to look out the window.
A few minutes later I’d finished cleaning and stood behind the counter just a few feet from Mr. Yang. I waited politely as he ran a quick total on a hand-size calculator. Beside the cash register was the money he was counting.
Mr. Yang hit the total button on the calculator, made a noise in his throat that I interpreted as approval, and put a number in the final line of the deposit slip. He put the slip on top of the bundle of cash and rubber-banded it all together. Then he swung his stool a half turn and handed the money to me.
My eyes widened with genuine surprise.
“You take today’s deposit to the bank,” he said.
As he described the location of the bank, I worried about my cover. Was there a problem with the persona of Squirt, I asked myself, that Mr. Yang had been able to look past my bright hair, odd clothing and age to see someone he could trust? The bank might only be a block away, but the loss of the lunchtime receipts to a dishonest employee would devastate the little restaurant. Maybe, I thought, Mr. Yang simply understood teenage girls.
“More responsibility for good employee,” he was saying. “Maybe, next month, a raise.”
I sincerely hoped that I wouldn’t be here that long, but I nodded my head, unsure of what else to say.
“Little Vietnam is very safe,” Mr. Yang continued. “Very protected. But do not be careless.”
Unlikely that Mr. Yang would tell me who, exactly, protected Little Vietnam. But I asked him anyway.
“Protected?”
I’d caught him off guard.
He hesitated, his eyes darting around the room, landing anywhere but on my face as he worked to come up with a good answer. After a moment he pointed at a lighted niche mounted on the opposite wall, overlooking the dining area. In it was the Infant of Prague, a baby-faced statue of a standing Christ child. No more than eighteen inches tall, the statue’s porcelain body was dressed in lace-trimmed red satin. A heart and a cross hung from jeweled chains around its neck and a gold crown topped its golden curls. A globe of the world was in its left hand; the right was lifted in a blessing.
I had knelt many times in front of similar statues in Catholic churches in Saigon and Illinois. Each time, I lit one of the dozens of votive candles that were arrayed at the statue’s feet. And always I prayed that my real father would find me.
Inside the Red Lotus, there was no candle to light, no childish petition to make and no faith to be devastated.
“Jesus protects,” Mr. Yang intoned.
But I doubted he provided the kind of practical, on-the-streets protection Mr. Yang had mentioned. That was usually achieved by handing over a percentage of profits.
I raised an eyebrow, looked disbelieving. But Mr. Yang was apparently done answering questions. He swung his stool around, took a copy of the weekly Vietnamese language newspaper out from a shelf beneath the cash register and spread it out on the counter.
“Thoi gio la vang,” he said without looking up. Then he repeated the old proverb in English. Jus
t in case, I suspected, someone of my generation might not understand. “Time is money.”
His attention remained on his paper as I tucked the deposit deep into my apron pocket, waved to the elderly cousin as I stepped briefly into the kitchen to grab my jacket from a peg in the utility closet, backtracked through the dining area and headed down the street.
As promised, the short walk to the bank was uneventful.
During my first week in Little Vietnam, I spent my evenings becoming familiar with the neighborhood. I walked and shopped along Alcee Fortier Boulevard, Dwyer Road and Chef Menteur Highway. I mingled with tourists and residents, looked in shop windows and wandered through stores. I bought groceries, treated myself to ice cream and Vietnamese pastries, thumbed through racks of clothing and bought the kinds of inexpensive items that would catch a teenage girl’s eye. I wanted those who lived and worked in Little Vietnam to become familiar with my presence, to see me as someone who belonged in the neighborhood, too.
Then I strolled along streets like Saigon Drive, Henri, Cannes and Lourdes. In old New Orleans neighborhoods bordering the Mississippi River, statues of the Virgin Mary were traditionally faced toward the levees with hands outstretched, symbolically holding back the floods. But in Little Vietnam, religious statues dotted manicured front lawns and were surrounded by flower gardens. Children played in fenced yards and snatches of conversation drifted from patios and porches and open windows. I strolled along the streets like the teenager I was supposed to be—a girl apparently going to or from a friend’s house.
My intent each night was to observe the environment in which I had placed myself. Patience was essential to understanding the community’s normal patterns. Persistence was key to revealing anything that deviated from those patterns. Instinct and luck would, I prayed, put me in the right place at the right time.
Each night after I returned home and settled in for the night, I phoned Beauprix to check in. One night, I chatted with him as I drew the butcher, who I’d seen for the first time that day. Beauprix didn’t seem to be in any hurry to hang up, so I told him about the man I was drawing.
“He looks like a storybook villain,” I said. “He’s a giant by Vietnamese standards. Well over six feet tall and large. Not fat, just big. He has scars on his face, a crooked nose and uneven teeth. When I first saw him, he reminded me of the legendary Raksasa, who carries away maidens.”
“Best be careful, little girl,” Beauprix said. “Else he’ll eat you.”
I laughed at the suggestion and, much to my surprise, found that I was more touched than offended by being called “little girl.”
“Only if I’m covered in crushed hot peppers, which he shakes in a thick layer on all his food. Besides, he’s in love with the owner of the florist shop next door. She’s as pretty as he is ugly, which sounds like another fairy tale, doesn’t it? Today, when she was having lunch, he brought in a basketful of newborn kittens for her to see. She likes him, too.”
I drew the butcher with one of the kittens cuddled against his cheek and, on the same page, started a sketch of the lady who owned the florist shop. She had glossy hair, a bow mouth and sculpted eyebrows that winged out over chocolate-brown eyes.
After we stopped talking and just before I blew out the candles and slept, I drew Anthony Beauprix. Partly because on several occasions I’d noticed him walking or driving past the Red Lotus. But mostly, I admitted to myself, because I liked the man and because there was nothing more isolating than working undercover. And I warned myself that my feelings were based on nothing more than a little lust and a lot of loneliness.
By my fourth day of work at the Red Lotus, I was certain that something odd was going on around me. There was a palpable tension in the business community. I saw it not only among the Red Lotus’s customers, but observed it on my evening walks. Those who owned or operated businesses along Alcee Fourtier seemed particularly fearful. They were quick to startle and I noticed their eyes darting toward windows and doorways when they spoke to each other. Spontaneous laughter was often cut short, as if humor was somehow unacceptable. A failing economy might have explained the atmosphere, but business was booming in the little community. Unfortunately, my perceptions didn’t solve or prove anything. Undoubtedly, Beauprix’s coworker, Remy, would quickly judge me delusional.
That afternoon, I saw Tommy again.
In a lull between customers, Mr. Yang had set me to cleaning the inside of the plate-glass window. When the young man walked past, I was balanced on a chair, holding a bottle of cleaner in one hand and a wad of newspaper in the other. I was, at that moment, attempting not to add droplets of my own blood to the tiny red flowers of the Crown of Thorns. The plant—Mrs. Yang’s favorite—had overflowed the bulbous ceramic pot on the ledge and climbed up a corner of the window almost to the ceiling.
I saw distinctive pink-and-blue-streaked hair through a screen of barbed, woody branches and ammonia-streaked plate glass and recognized Tommy even before he paused. He did a classic double take and turned an acne-reddened face in my direction.
As we scrutinized each other through the window, I noticed the same careworn face and tired eyes that I had in Uncle Tinh’s kitchen. But since I’d seen him last, he’d added a piercing above his right eye. Now two small silver balls, connected by a slim silver post that slid beneath his skin, framed his dark eyebrow, top and bottom.
After a moment’s staring, he backtracked to the door.
For a moment I feared that somehow he’d seen through my disguise. If he came in asking why Tinh Vu’s visiting niece was working in a place like the Red Lotus, I would be hard pressed to provide a reasonable answer.
He pulled the door open, setting off the jingling bell that alerted the staff to customers, and leaned into the restaurant, his feet still outside on the sidewalk. Mr. Yang looked up briefly from a Vietnamese-language magazine, then ignored the youngster to go back to his reading.
I had worn a short black skirt and a tight double-knit red top to work that day, and Tommy’s eyes made the trip from trim ankles to outrageous hair before settling back on my face. Judging from his expression, I decided the only thing he’d recognized was the potential for a kindred spirit to be lurking beneath the ragged cap of black, magenta and pink hair. The quick smile I shot him as I continued rubbing the window with my damp wad of newspaper was inspired mostly by relief.
“Um,” he said by way of introduction. He cleared his throat, then added in English, “You’re new.”
“Uh-huh.”
He looked better rested than when I’d last seen him, but there was still a pinched look to his face. As if, despite the rebellious teenager that his bright hair and body piercings suggested, he had matured well beyond his years.
“My name’s Tommy,” he said.
“They call me Squirt.”
“Squirt,” he repeated, nodding. “Cool. Well, I’ve gotta go to work. ’Bye.”
“’Bye,” I said.
He backed out of the doorway and took off down the street at a jog. I went back to washing the window, but not before I noticed that the elderly cousin had watched our exchange through the small window into the kitchen where I dropped off the customers’ orders and picked up prepared dishes. It had taken very little time to discover that he and Mrs. Yang competed to know as much as possible about other people’s business. Their willingness to gossip with a harmless girl was an asset that could quickly turn into a liability. Given the tension that seemed to permeate Little Vietnam, I suspected the Yangs would fire me if ever they began questioning my curiosity.
When I finally returned my cleaning supplies to the utility closet in the kitchen, the elderly cousin was busily chopping onions. I stood by his elbow, watching, as I asked the kind of question a teenage girl would ask.
“That kid with the cool hair… Do you know him?” I said casually.
The rhythm of his chopping remained unchanged as he nodded.
“Tommy Nguyen. Very nice boy. He is Mr. Yang nephew.”
<
br /> And I suspected that Mr. Yang’s nephew was also the third victim’s younger brother. Nguyen Tri’s name was arranged in the traditional manner—family name first, then the individual’s name. But Tommy Nguyen was all about being nontraditional.
I recalled Tommy’s care-worn expression. Was he just a boy in mourning? I wondered. Or did he know why his brother was killed?
“Does Tommy live around here?” I asked the elderly cousin.
He nodded again.
“Kim Drive.”
Then the bell above the front door jingled, Mrs. Yang called my name and I ran to wait on new customers.
I called Beauprix as soon as I left work and immediately heard the stress in his voice.
“Is everything okay?” I asked.
“Everything’s fine,” he said, but from the speed and tone of his reply, I knew it was automatic.
“Okay,” I said neutrally.
His deep sigh carried over the phones.
“Oh, hell, Lacie. Nothing’s fine at the moment. I just took a fourteen-year-old child into custody for killing her baby. Social services placed them with a relative who apparently left town weeks ago. The girl figured she could handle things on her own and she did. Right up until last night. Then the baby got sick. An ear infection from the sound of it. Baby screamed and cried into the night. Neighbors banged on the walls and finally one threatened to call the cops if she didn’t keep it quiet. So the girl pressed a pillow against its face.”
Nothing I could say would improve that situation, so I just let him talk. After describing the absolute futility of his job and swearing that it was long past time to quit, Beauprix went on to eventually convince himself that maybe it was all worthwhile.
“Thanks for the advice,” he said finally, though I’d done little more than listen and make encouraging noises. “So, how are things going for you?”
I gave him a quick recap, quickly turning to the subject of Tommy Nguyen.
“There’s a boy of about sixteen who works in the kitchen at Uncle Tinh’s restaurant and lives in Little Vietnam. I think he’s the younger brother of the last murder victim, Nguyen Tri. Do you know about him?”