by Henry Chang
"I need a face, a name."
"You're chasing shadows, man. It's smoke."
"So we dealing or what?"
Lucky was intrigued now, though he couldn't show it in front of the Ghosts. He said, "Give me a sign, Jacky. I'll be listening."
The darkshirts whisked Jack through the courtyard, through a hallway leading to a side street. Lucky held up Jack's chain, let the badge dangle before he tucked it into Jack's pocket.
"You got some fuckin' balls coming down here, boy," he said, suddenly snapping an uppercut into Jack's gut, a sucker punch driving Jack to his knees. As the Ghosts moved off laughing, Jack gasped for air and heard Lucky grinning words through his teeth.
"That's for old times," he snapped.
Busted
When dawn faded in, an FBI/DEA task force took down the Fuk Chou Association leadership, arresting nineteen illegals in connection with the murders in Teaneck and the grounding of the Golden Venture.
Public Morals Division came and shut down the Twenty-Eight after complaints surfaced from gamblers who'd been robbed there.
At noon, Jack watched as the Department of Transportation brownshirts hitched up a line of parked cars, saw the scowls on young Fuk Ching faces as municipal tow trucks hauled away their Firebirds/Trans Ams/Camaros. The trucks lurched off Lafayette, then headed west toward the piers as Jack turned in the direction of Mott Street.
Things were getting stirred up on East Broadway, and Jack was happy to take credit for it.
Send a message to Lucky, he was thinking.
Ghost Brother
The gray nimbostratus sky of October floated in from the Atlantic, dropped over Chinatown in an uncertain change of seasons, from a summer that had been boiling hot to a lifeless autumn that muted the changing of colors.
Gray clouds drifted past the red pagoda motif of the On Yee building, down the ceramic tilework, the wind whipping up the Association's red, white, and black banner, the cloth cut jagged along its perimeter so that it appeared to be a dragon's tail.
Lucky stood beneath the banner, plugged into a Walkman, and lit up. K -Rock on the airwaves.
From the rooftop he could see all of Chinatown, from the river to the east, and west as far as the unending line of tractor trailers dodging into the Holland Tunnel.
He looked north, seeing past Little Italy as far as Soho. South, he saw the Jersey shoreline where it crept behind the torch of Lib- erty,just barely visible above the city skyline.
He could see across the Manhattan Bridge running east west to Brooklyn, a new frontier of opportunities. The streets below filled up with tourists, and he turned up the Walkman, sucking on the stick of smoke that came up sickly sweet into his nostrils. The Chiba smoke relaxed him and he thought about Jack. The truce was on hold. If the cops could find the Big Uncle's girlfriend that would take suspicion off of him.
But Lucky wasn't surprised. He heard it on the grapevine, about Jack stirring up shit on the streets, rousting the Fuk Chings, busting the Yee Bot. Eventually, Lucky wanted pictures of the undercovers from the Asian Squad but figured it was too soon to play that card. He decided to toss Jack a bone, something to keep him busy, out of the way.
Revelations
Things picked up, but not the way Jack expected.
There was a sniper on the roof of the Smith Houses, which scrambled the SWAT boys out of Headquarters, shut down the Brooklyn Bridge, sucked uniforms out of patrol.
A demonstration at City Hall.
A Terrorist Alert at the Stock Exchange.
Jack was the next man up when the B amp;E report came into the squadroom, a breaking and entering into a Henry Street apartment, called in by the night janitor.
Apartment 8H was empty, dead air sitting on top of the silk covered bed. Clothes in the closet, Dior, Versace, Tahari, expensive petites left behind. Designer shoes stacked below. Vuitton bags in every configuration.
It wasn't a burglary, more like someone looking for someone, with a vengeance.
The kitchenette was neat, except for the splash of mahjong tiles on the countertop. The refrigerator empty. No garbage in the covered bin.
No personal papers, no pictures. Nothing to put a face to the tenant of the apartment. Nothing to indicate anyone had lived there the last few days.
Jack envisioned a young woman, someone who'd gone on vacation. He went down to the management office, requested the apartment lease.
When Wah Yee Tom turned up on the ownership document, Jack knew for sure that the Uncle Four deal had a woman in it, the woman who had the answers he needed.
He snatched up one of the mahjong tiles, the bak baan, a white board, a clear slate. He pressed the ivory block inside his fist, squeezing it as if it might yield a clue. He thought of Ah Por again, knew if she could channel anything, the bak baan was the cleanest choice, unencumbered by numbers, characters, or symbols. Then he remembered the keys, and started to see how things were coming together. One of the keys fit the apartment lock, but the mechanism was too mashed up for it to turn. When he got down to the lobby, the other two keys worked perfectly. One for the front door, one for the mailbox. He went back in the direction of Mott Street, thinking of Ah Por and Lucky, fearing that time was running out.
Heaven Over Earth
Now she saw rolling hills and fields in broad open valleys, uplands bisected by steep slopes and wretched soils, an unbroken ridge of shale, limestone. The train climbed up from the plateau toward the Alleghenies. Mona closed the blinds and placed the plastic bag on the table, emptied it out.
There were packets of money bundled inside brown laundry paper, a plastic box with columns of gold Chinese Pandas, a small black velveteen pouch.
She took a breath, unzipped the pouch, turned it so that diamonds tumbled into her cupped palm, their brilliance pulsing even in the shadowy daylight behind the blinds, the sight of there freezing her eyes.
Maybe two dozen there, she thought. She poured them back into the pouch, gathered up the rest of the payback from the table. Count it later. Everything fit perfectly into the empty mahjong case she'd carried the gun in. The case slipped into a neoprene knapsack, all stashed inside the Samsonite. The gun came out of the garment bag, the silencer unscrewed, the magazine ejected. She wrapped all of it in a hand towel, stuffed it into the side compartment of the Rollmaster, and let the light back into the room.
Rugged terrain streaked by, and she could see great lakes far to the north, imagined the Chinese gold coast of Toronto there, considered the possibilities. Seven Chinatowns, newer and cleaner than New York, but lots of Hong Kong Chinese in each. Hip Chings, probably. She watched until the sun began to set behind the mountains. There was no appetite in her stomach and she knew she had to avoid the other passengers.
By nightfall the train had descended into Pittsburgh, then raced west across Ohio and Indiana. She fell asleep in her clothes on the narrow bed, snuggled in beside the knapsack, and awoke fitfully with the first light that filtered in through the blinds.
She brushed her teeth, combed her hair, straightened her clothes. She felt excited and weary at the same time. Coffee and sweet bread came from the dining car. She added XO, finished it off with a chain of cigarettes.
She could keep on the run, she knew, and even be successful in eluding the police, whose energy and resources would dim after a week or so. But Golo would only be satisfied with the return of the gold and diamonds, or if he had a body with which to account to his superiors for the losses. Golo, she knew, would be harder to evade. Johnny was her wild card, in case Golo got too close. She consulted her jade piece, which suddenly felt cool to her touch.
Beware, it said, rain follows thunder.
Move on.
Chicago was a layover where she ducked the passenger lounge in the terminal, keeping the Rollmaster close. Passing the outskirts of Chinatown, she found Wentworth Street, came upon a shopping mall where she filled herself with jook congee and jow gwai, fried bread. On Archer Boulevard she bought melon cakes from a Chin
ese bakery. She searched along Canal Street, combed the shops along Twenty-Fourth. At the Oriental Gift Shop she found a Chinese box of dark mahogany, which had the symbolic Double Happiness etched in brass on top, a polished wood rectangle with ornate hinges and a sliding drawer. The small gold stick-on label underneath read "Made in China."
She paid for it with cash.
The next train, the California Zephyr, god of the west wind, would carry her the rest of the way. There were Chinese families aboard; she avoided them.
The Superliner crossed the Mississippi, passed the vast bulk and sprawl of prairie lands, tilled and planted with grains, soils of black and red loess. From her window the sky was so big she felt no one would ever catch her.
It was midnight when they arrived in Omaha.
Thirty-six hours out of the Big Uncle's power now, only two things worried her and both were men. Golo would surely come after her, backed by the Hip Chings on both coasts. Johnny would want to keep running, jump the country. Keep him calm, under control, she thought. She still needed him, if only for the extra cover he might provide.
The Zephyr surged westward, into the Rockies, through coniferous forests of Ponderosa pine, fir and spruce, sailing through the Divide, passing river canyons and gorges of sedimentary rock. Her window scanned mountain peaks with rolling alpine meadows, timberline savannahs following the Colorado River. A view so striking she had to chase it with brandy to steady herself.
SellJohnny on the jewelry distributor angle-he'd hook into that. Let him dream about Big Money. Daylight awoke her in Salt Lake City. A soft yellow afternoon.
She kept the rubberized knapsack beside her, made a phone call from the platform.
Lost
Jack couldn't find Ah Por. She wasn't among the old women in the park on Mulberry. When he reached out to them, they provided no clues. He squeezed the mahjong tile inside his pocket, felt his palm get sweaty even as he turned toward Mott Street.
Clues
When Jack reached the intersection, Lucky was already on the corner of Bayard. Lucky jerked his chin sidewise and disappeared into the Wah Rue bookstore. Jack crossed the street, followed him inside.
Lucky patted Jack down, saying "You did good, Jacky boy. Was the money good enough? You need more next time?"
Jack clutched Lucky's probing hand, squeezed the fingers hard. "That's funny, Tat, but I ain't wearing a wire. You owe me, anyway."
Lucky jerked his hand free. "That's right," he said, "and I got something for you."
Jack's eyes narrowed. "Shoot."
Lucky grinned. "Shoot, ha ha, a cop joke, ha?" He paused. "I got the girlfriend."
"Where?" Jack asked with a poker face.
Lucky took him over to the back racks, sliding his hand along the display of ink brushes, wrapping paper, periodicals, until he stopped and yanked out a Hong Kong Star magazine. He led Jack through a back exit into a small courtyard lined with boh Choy crates and garbage cans.
Jack held his tongue while Lucky flipped through the pages. He could hear the rattle and crash of a fan-tan game somewhere below the building.
"Her name's Mona," Lucky said, stopping his finger at In Concert pictures. "Here, looks like this one, Shirley Yip, the singer. You know which one?"
Jack took the magazine, studied the glossies of the singer in a sequined dress, in a black miniskirt, in a hat and wig get-up.
"Thirtysomething," Lucky said. "A real looker, maybe a hooker."
"So where is she?" Jack deadpanned.
"Gone with the wind, Jacky. Only the Shadow knows."
"That's all you got?" Jack was impatient.
Lucky made a face, said, "Hey, I still didn't get nothing. I want the undercovers, identities, names."
"Oh yeah. I'm making a list, checking it twice," cracked Jack.
"No, no, cuz," Lucky wagged his finger, "I don't need no list. I want pictures, know what I'm saying?"
Jack spread the magazine, tore out the pictures. "It's gonna take time," he said softly.
Lucky lit up a Marlboro, spread his hands out and said, "You see me? I got nothing but time." And exhaled into Jack's face.
Jack held his stare for a moment, then said, "You know the Twenty-Eight got ripped off the other night?"
"Good for them," Lucky said coolly.
"Took fifty G's out of there. They claim you did it."
"Me?"
"Ghosts, the man said."
Lucky's face changed. "Wasn't my crew," he said.
"Don't know nothing about it, huh?"
Lucky was silent, and stood like that a while. The chatter and curses of the fan-tan game echoed somewhere below them.
"This where it ends for you?" Jack asked. "Gambling? Blood money from poor working suckers?
Lucky let the smoke roll out of his nose. "Hey, Chinese like to gamble. Nobody makes them come down."
Jack sneered. "Yeah they do, everybody makes them. Everything they see makes them come down."
"You're bugging out, cousin."
"They want what everyone else's got, and they know money talks."
Lucky laughed small. "Don't get holy, man. It's a Chinaman thing, okay? You got a beef, go yell at OTB. Shit. It's just a living, man."
"No, it's not. I know how it works. Turn the cash into dope, jewelry, gold. Wash everything through Hong Kong banks. Goes in a big circle, right?"
Lucky flicked the cigarette butt, snuffed it with a twist of his heel.
"What you get over there, Jack? Thirty-five, forty G's with overtime?"
"It's honest money."
"That's what it cost to turn you against people used to be your friends? Against working people who never had no beef with you?"
Jack's face tightened. "We only bust the bad ones, Tat Louie."
"Bullshit. We take care of the bad ones. You guys just come for the money, to keep score of the bodies."
Jack glared at Lucky.
Lucky relented. "Maybe not you, Jacky, but cops, you know it. Look, fifty G's, you work for us. Nobody's gotta know. Strictly information stuff. You don't touch nothing dirty."
Jack looked up from the courtyard, saw the oyster-colored sky above the rooftops they used to run across.
"What?" Lucky smirked. "You think you're gonna make sergeant and retire here? Don't kid yourself. I won't make the offer again."
"It's not about money," Jack said.
Lucky sneered.
"It's all about money, ain't a damn thing funny."
Chase
Jack sat by the open window in Pa's apartment, studied the magazine pictures and repeated Mona quietly, trying to figure her in his head, guessing. Mona, on the run, away from New York City, to somewhere else Chinese where she could disappear, come back in another guise. A major Chinatown, but away from Boston, Philadelphia, Washington. The picture was getting clearer. Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle. From Lor Saang she could flee into Mexico. San Francisco, Seattle, she runs north to Canada. He took a shot of the mao-tai.
Was she still in the country? He thought so, hoped so. Uncle Four would never have allowed her a passport, and the cheap seemistress-wouldn't have had the nerve to troll the underground for fake identification. She probably didn't speak English, so all the arrangements would have to be in Chinese.
He began to list her characteristics on a sheet of paper. l raveling by plane? They'd have to cover the airports, just in case. More likely she's in a car, something low key, a bus or train maybe. Or a boat? Heading east? Chinese in London, in Amsterdam. He doubted it, didn't figure her to head into bad weather.
Going west, he decided, adding details of Mona to the composite.
She's a Chinese woman, Cantonese, maybe traveling alone, probably traveling light. Thirtysomething, five-foot-two, short hair. Fashionably dressed. Might have booked passage to Mexico or Canada.
He buffed up the profile, made it bilingual, offered a reward, sent it by e-mail via the squadroom computer to the thirty-seven travel agencies in the Chinese Business Directory, to the ninet
y agencies in Lower Manhattan. Then he thought about covering the funeral, and cleaned his Detective Special while he tried to dope it all out.
Chaos
The Dragon war-wagon cruised to a stop, a huge black sedan with four doors, lurched back out of the crosswalk and sat on the corner of Crosby and Broome.
The three Chinese hard boys inside wore black leather jackets and beat-boy sunglasses. Straight black hair cut to fades. The one with the small ring in his earlobe came out and walked diagonally across the street to where the black Lincoln Continental was parked at the curb. He saw the triple eights on the license plate, saw the car was empty. He crossed back to the Buick and they waited, playing thirteen-card poker and smoking cigarettes. Waited for the six-o-clock rush.
From the Buick they saw the old man approach the black Lincoln, stop at the driver's door. Put the key in the handle. By the time he noticed them closing in, the door had swung open.
Gee Man yanked the keys out and took a step backward, turning to flee. But they were upon him, grabbing at him as he lurched down the street. The keys fell from his hand. He noticed people stopping to watch, the words go meng, save me, stuck in his throat. The hard boys brought him down.
"Matsi!' he yelled, "What's up?! I have no money."
He did his best to kick out at them in his desperation. He heard himself shouting, like from inside an oil drum, an echo. Pressure building up inside his chest. They were dragging, halfcarrying him back toward the car.
"What do you want?" he kept screaming, until the pumping in his heart seized and the lights inside his head went to black.
The Dragon boys dropped Gee Man when he clutched tip and foamed from his mouth, left him lying on the cobblestone street, his eyes rolling and flickering, a block from the radio car.
The Buick roared away from the corner, as the evening-rush crowd continued trudging into the sunset.
It was a quarter to eight, almost the end of Jack's shift, when the patrol caught it. Old Chinese man, DOA at Downtown Hospital from a heart attack. Witnesses claimed deceased was attacked by gang kids, who rifled his car.