The Chinatown Death Cloud Peril

by Paul Malmont

  “What was left of the man who stood there was a massive, shambling wreck. Oily folds of greenish skin hung from its outstretched arms. Shreds of a shirt and tattered pants hung from it in a parody of decency. The top of its head had flattened and drooped back as if the skull had softened and lengthened. Its eyes were wide and terrifying and a sickening slurping sound issued from the gaping maw that should have been a mouth. I realized that the liquid which flowed from its eyes was tears. In its hand it held a hanging lantern.

  “I had found the night watchman.

  “I don’t know how much faculty the man had had before his exposure to the gas. I think he may have been feeble to begin with. Whatever his previous mental state had been, there was no reasoning with him now. His blind fury and grief had reduced him to trembling.

  “The night watchman pointed at the body on the stairs and tried to speak. Its mouth encircled a word that I could barely distinguish.

  “‘Daddy,’ I realized it spoke.

  “I tried to reason with it. I shook my head to indicate that I had had no part in this. But the motion only seemed to snap it out of its stupor. It lurched toward me. I tried to dodge but I slipped in the blood and fell to the staircase. I could feel the hot, slimy hands fumbling to get a grip on my neck. There was tremendous strength in the grip. He won’t just choke me, I realized. He was going to completely crush my throat.

  “The night watchman stank like a tidal pool at low tide, like rotting crustaceans and seaweed. I felt an electric stab of fear bolt from my stomach and spread into my body: panic was setting in. I twisted and at the same time pushed against the creature’s bulk. It slipped on some of the blood and stumbled back toward the lab. At least I could breathe. The creature regained its balance.

  “I put my hands out to push myself up as it charged toward me. I felt the knife in the corpse’s chest. I seized it and pulled it from the torso. It was heavy, and well balanced. The night watchman was nearly upon me.”

  He stopped speaking and rubbed his right hand. No one spoke for quite a while. Driftwood arched a skeptical eyebrow. Hubbard cleared his throat and in a high, nervous voice said, “This is pulp, right, Walter? Not real.”

  Gibson flexed his hand a few times, watching it critically as if it needed to explain how it ended up at the end of his arm. “Anyway,” he told them at last, “I lived to tell the tale.”

  Episode Twenty-Four

  HE RODE unescorted to the frontier, the far western lands, as an emissary of Zuolin. Dr. Sun Yat-sen’s death had not led to the collapse of the Kuomintang Nationalists as Zuolin had predicted. General Chiang Kai-shek was emerging as their leader and he was making it clear that he would use the mighty Army of the South against Zuolin rather than keep it sheathed awaiting an outside invasion as his predecessor had.

  Zhang Mei was sent to the west to meet with the young leader of the revolutionary Communists, to persuade him to ally with Zuolin against the general. Another alliance, as with the Japanese, that Zhang Mei had deep misgivings about.

  He had met the professor once before, at the library, early during the occupation of Beijing. The professor was not a bureaucrat; he was a scholar and Lu Zhi thought highly of him. Only a few years older than Mei, he had fought the civil wars, although on which side it was unclear. He had a fierce mind and a penetrating gaze. More importantly he had the adoration of a growing number of the restless peasants in the countryside.

  Zhang Mei and the professor took jasmine tea and soft cakes filled with red bean paste under a grove of willow trees near a spring in the late afternoon as the heat of the day waned. Mei studied the man’s face and sensed that he was even more powerful and self-possessed than he had been in Beijing. Although his Communist force was small—Zuolin’s spies estimated that he had the ability to raise only a thousand to two thousand men-at-arms—his reputation was growing among the farmers and villagers and others who toiled for the landlords.

  “Zhang Zuolin believes in your cause,” Mei began. The words felt empty, as if they were the platitudes that might fall from the mouth of Mi-Ying. “He believes General Chiang means to destroy us both.”

  “Zuolin is a bandit,” the scholar said, “and he has increased the influence of the Japanese within China to the extent that they now see our land as a colony. You know this to be true. Your true feelings toward your father’s advisers are known.”

  “That may be,” Mei replied, “but as long as China is weak, Japan will be a power here. If General Chiang launches a war against the northern provinces, the chaos will only create more opportunity for foreigners of all kinds. Not just the Japanese but the British and French as well. Even the Americans.”

  The professor shrugged. “Perhaps the next war will be a just war,” he said. “Perhaps the chaos it will create will sweep away old obstacles—the landlords, the bureaucrats, the merchant class, the corrupt, the imperialists. Even the warlords. Then the heel would be lifted from the throat of China’s sons. This would be a just war. I see disappointment in your eyes. This is not the expression you hoped to take back to your master?”

  “It is not what I hoped to hear, that is true,” Mei said. “But not for my father. For me. I seek to end the wars.”

  “Through a political solution?”

  He nodded.

  “War can only be abolished by war.”

  “Wars!” Mei spat. “Zuolin has been a warrior his entire life and while he is fortunate to have survived, he knows no other way than war. I and my brothers have been trained as warriors, ensuring that the legacy of war will survive yet another generation. I would like my son to know another way, perhaps a scholar’s way such as the one you chose. Or an artist’s. I do not wish to perpetuate the warrior line.”

  “Do you not think that the farmer wishes any more for his son? Or that the laborer any more for his? You feel the weight of the oppression of your circumstances. Does any man not feel it just as keenly? The wars you seek to end will only be eliminated through progress. Progress itself is a war, and the struggle against it is a war as well. Do you understand the inevitability of war yet?”

  “I do not accept it, Professor.”

  “Only when men are free of class will wars end. That may happen in our lifetime. This choice is for men like you and me to make. A revolution to purge the body politic and end wars is within our grasp. Politics is war and war is politics and the only difference is the amount of blood spilled.” He paused and grimaced slightly with distaste. “Just as some would wish that diplomatic negotiations can be resolved with an assassination. Do you understand?”

  They sat in silence for a great while. The spring gurgled and bubbled. Mei thought that if the spring had consciousness it would think as the professor did, that as the water carved a path through the rock, it was unaware that in mere miles it would be swallowed by the vast waters of the mighty river which it fed into. In this same way would the professor be devoured by the greater armies of Chiang’s Kuomintang. Mei understood the professor’s true meaning about the inevitability of war. The professor would have no alliance with Zhang Zuolin. Perhaps he had already allied himself with Chiang. Perhaps not. Perhaps he would simply wait, growing stronger out here in China’s farthest reaches, until either Zhang or Chiang was victorious but weakened. Then he would make his move.

  “You could stay, you know,” the professor said, at last. “A dragon is always necessary in war.”

  Mei stood and dusted himself off. Then he ceremoniously bowed to the little man, who also stood. He knew at this moment that there were archers, with bows pulled, just out of sight, waiting for a gesture to strike and bring him down. For the third time in his life he prepared for his immediate death. The professor kept his arms stiffly at his side.

  “Professor Mao, my wife sends her respect,” he said, “and you have mine as well.”

  The professor flinched slightly at the mention of his wife. He nodded his head. “Lu Zhi is a rare woman,” he said after some consideration. “Her perceptions of the tales of
universal balance are unique. She has done well to marry you and bear you a son. Take my greetings back to her as well.”

  He gestured and Mei prepared for the stabbing pierce of the arrows. The thought of his son and the sound of the spring brought him peace.

  Instead, Mei’s horse was brought to him, and he rode out immediately, unprovisioned. As he rode, he sensed the arrows of the archers upon his back day and night until he reached the border of the province.

  Episode Twenty-Five

  WALTER COULD feel the night watchman’s clammy, moldering hands around his windpipe, crushing it. He could feel the hilt of the knife shudder as the lethal blade sank through muscle, tissue, and veins. He could feel the hot spurt of blood on his hand. He could hear the creature calling out one last time for its father.

  He sat up in his bunk. The train had stopped moving. Early dawn light crept through the wood slats of the blinds. He heard snoring from the guest compartments, Driftwood in one and Hubbard in another. His traveling companions had turned in soon after the conclusion of his story, for what else could be said? He wondered what Driftwood thought of him; his piercing dark eyes were intelligent and quizzical. He hadn’t spoken much during the story of the night watchman. He seemed like a straight-up guy, but Gibson wondered who he really was and where he had come from.

  For a moment he thought that the police had stopped the train and would be swarming in to question him. But some distant angry car horns reassured him that he was back in New York.

  He had tried to sleep but it had been difficult. He had always been prone to nightmares, and living through one had made it hard to tell where his day had ended and his slumber began. He had spent the late hours of the ride at his magic work desk concentrating on spring-loaded strikers.

  He lay back for a few moments. Maybe the question he should have asked Hubbard that night in the White Horse was really where does pulp end and reality begin, not the other way around. His world seemed twisted out of sorts. His life reminded him of one of those awkward first attempts at sound pictures a few years back; the moving image would often lose synchronization with the sound recording so that the actors’ voices would trail the movement of their lips just enough to be noticeable and irritating. That’s how he felt now. A few seconds behind his own action.

  His body was sore and aching, not only from the various bruises and scrapes but from the actual exertion which had begun with carrying the coffin. He was a writer, after all, and not given to exercising much.

  He could smell coffee. He got up and padded across the small chamber to the door and opened it. Chester had placed a carafe outside his door, along with some eggs and toast. He brought the tray inside and set it on the bunk. He drank his first cup, black, staring at the window. He finished his second cup after washing up and had emptied the carafe by the time he was dressed.

  He stepped into the main cabin and walked over to his writing desk. He looked at the manuscript. It wasn’t his best work, by a long shot. But it was probably good enough, and, more importantly, it was done. Nanovic would always prefer to have a poorly written book in on time than a late masterpiece. He drew out a brown envelope and dropped the pages into it.

  He heard the galley door open. “Everything all right, Mr. Gibson?”

  “I could use another year of sleep, Chester,” he said. “And I already gotta get a move on. This book’s gotta be dropped off.”

  “I called Manny as soon as we got in, so he’s waiting for you. You want me to drop your luggage off later?”

  “Thanks. That’d be a help.” He saw the issue of Bronzeman and picked it up. “Congratulations, by the way.”

  Chester beamed. “Thank you, Mr. Gibson. I’ve been using your typewriter.”

  “I would hope so. Mind if I take this with me so I can read it?”

  “Oh no, sir. That’d be real fine.”

  “What’s it about?”

  “It’s about the fire. Only I turned it into a story so it wasn’t so real, y’know?”

  Gibson nodded. A few years ago several prisoners at the Ohio State Penitentiary had set some paint cans on fire hoping to escape during the commotion. Instead, the fire quickly spread out of control. Men were trapped in cells that wouldn’t open. The guards had no evacuation strategy. The building was over a hundred years old and stuffed to twice its capacity with poor saps, most of whom had been caught by the circumstances of the Depression. Over 320 men died in the space of an hour. Many of the men who survived, including Chester, had been given an early parole. It was still no compensation for his scars.

  “I’ll give it a good read.” Gibson folded the magazine into his coat pocket. “Just keep writing, keep writing,” he offered.

  “I will.”

  Gibson went to the door and opened it. “Listen,” he said. “If those two want breakfast or anything, help them out. And if Mr. Driftwood, the new guy, wants to stay onboard a night or two before he gets straightened out, let him know he’s welcome to. It’s not going back to the yard until next week.”

  “Yes, sir. Are you still planning on going to Miami next month?”

  “I’ll let you know.”

  He stepped off the train into the chill of the clear morning air. The train yard was slowly coming to life; the shouts of teamsters and rail-men mixed with the low rumble of the big engines and the occasional squeal of metal grinding against metal. He saw Manny’s Checker Cab and the big heavyset man eating dunkers behind the wheel.

  Manny knew his way around the city as if a map of its entire road network had been tattooed upon the back of his eyelids. In addition to his flawless, instinctive sense of direction, he seemed to be related to one half of the city and on a first-name basis with the other half. To Walter, who was originally from Philadelphia but wrote about New York, Manny was a library on wheels. It didn’t matter that his knowledge was sometimes suspect; what mattered was the accent of authority he gave it. He had given Gibson a lift home once and had easily drawn out who he was and what he did. Gibson had given the man a couple of signed mags for his kids and the man was eternally grateful. From that point on, whenever he had the chance, he acted as Gibson’s self-appointed chauffeur. All he had to hear over his radio was that Walter needed a lift, and there he’d be. No one else was allowed to pick him up, even if it meant that Gibson sometimes had to wait a little longer.

  Manny tossed him a wave and started his engine. Gibson waved back. He stopped and stretched his sore arms over his head. The air was brisk but it was warmer than it had been in Providence. He took a deep breath of Gotham air and began to feel better. His Pullman was still hitched to the longer passenger train and people were disembarking. Suddenly Gibson froze.

  He saw The Shadow again.

  The Chinese man was in New York. As he stepped off the passenger car, his eyes swept the train yard like a wind that could blow dust from its every corner. Gibson stepped back between the train cars, hoping the long early shadows would conceal him so he could watch. It worked. Not noticing him, the Chinese man began to walk toward the parking lot. He parted the small crowd with what seemed to be a palpable emanation of energy. People moved out of his way without realizing they were doing so. Gibson began to follow him. The man walked with assurance; once he was certain of his surroundings, he gave them no other thought and never looked back to see Gibson.

  The dark character slid smoothly into the back seat of the cab parked in front of Manny’s. Gibson could see his hawklike profile framed in the window. The car headed toward the street and Gibson realized there was no way he could make it across the yard in time to get to Manny’s cab in order to follow. But he had to know about this Chinese stranger who had saved his life but probably ended Jeffords’s. The story had not ended with the death of the night watchman. The true ending to the story was about to turn onto the avenue.

  He gave Manny a whistle and when the cabbie looked at him, Gibson ran his hand back and forth across his hat brim a number of times. Then he pointed to the departing cab. Manny n
odded. Gibson watched him plop his cigar between his thick lips, and a moment later the cab spun out of the yard, gravel spitting away as the wheels dug in for traction.

  Gibson rubbed the stubble of his chin thoughtfully for a moment. Every bone in his body ached to follow them. He broke out his pack of Chesterfields and lit his first cigarette of the day. The Chinese man hadn’t seen him. He was positive of that. He wondered what could have brought this man to New York, and as his mind began trying to draw connections from Providence, trying to create a story, he looked for another cab. He would have loved to follow them, but the brown envelope in his hand was growing hot. No matter how much this new story begged to be told, the fact of the matter was that he still had a manuscript to deliver.

  Besides, Manny had understood the meaning of his signal. While Gibson was a Phillies man, Manny was a Brooklyn Dodgers fan. During the summer his radio was locked on to Ebbets Field. Gibson’s signal, the rubbing of the hat brim, was a classic Casey Stengel command to his pitcher, Van Lingle Mungo, when a man at first was preparing to steal second.

  Keep your eye on the runner.

  Episode Twenty-Six

  CHINA WAS shattered.

  All the previous wars Mei had fought in were mere squalls to the typhoon which engulfed the land from mountain to sea, and from border to border. It touched all lives. It was as if the concept of peace had been vanquished from life and memory. His son learned riding and swordplay from soldier masters as he had, and spoke of winning battles as eagerly as he had. He was only six.

  Loyalties changed as often as the tides. Chiang had been ejected from the Kuomintang but had regained control. Chiang and the professor’s Communists had briefly allied, but that alliance had fallen apart when Russian meddling in the affairs of the Communists surfaced.