Looking for Henry Turner

by W. L. Liberman

  “That woman…that woman who was just here…what did she want?”

  The eyes grew larger as we greeted her with utter silence. A silence that egged her on.

  “Tell me, do you hear? I demand to know….”

  I stood up slowly. “Take a load off first. Miss…?”

  She looked at me, then at Birdie, then back at me again. I could tell she liked the idea that she could get what she wanted whenever she wanted it. She made a growling sound deep in her throat but sat down in a huff.

  “Mrs. Lawson. Mrs. Alison Lawson.”

  The name seemed vaguely familiar and to appease her, I sat down too. Birdie remained where he was.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Lawson,” I said. “And your interest in the lady is…?”

  “I hate the way you don't finish your sentences. Didn't you graduate from school?”

  Together, Birdie and I guffawed.

  “I graduated from several schools of all different types, Mrs. Lawson.”

  “I see,” she said rummaging around in the tiny bag, although hunting and pecking would be more accurate. A tigress on the prowl. She removed a cigarette case, unsnapped it and placed a Dunhill between her ruby lips. I leaned over with a light, which she took, and she stared at me from under some awfully long lashes.

  “You were saying?” I said and snapped the lighter closed, dropping it into my jacket pocket.

  “Mrs. Turner works for me as a housemaid, well actually, she works for my parents but you can see I have a direct interest in what she does.”

  “Not if it's personal business, Mrs. Lawson,” Birdie boomed not sparing the resonance. She gave him a withering look but needless to say, he didn't melt or flinch.

  “Everything Aida does is my business. Everything.”

  “I'm sorry to disappoint you, Mrs. Lawson,” I said. “Was there anything else we can do for you?”

  She drew heavily on the cigarette, blew a plume of smoke and nodded.

  “Yes, I'd like to hire you.” I raised my eyebrows. “Things have gone missing lately, that's why I followed Aida. I suspect she might be the thief.”

  “What sort of things?” I asked.

  “Money, a watch, a charm bracelet, that sort of thing.”

  “Valuable?”

  “Well, the money was petty cash–a few dollars here and there, the watch and charm bracelet were given to me a long time ago and have sentimental value, their actual worth is minimal.”

  “How many servants do you have on staff, Mrs. Lawson?”

  “Seven.”

  “How many live-in?”

  “Just two–Aida and the cook. Aida has two evenings and Sundays off to go to church. She's a religious woman.”

  “Has Mrs. Turner been in your employ long?”

  “Forever. Since I was a little girl. After I married, I convinced my parents to let me take her along, part-time. She spends two days a week with my mother. My husband had no objections.”

  “And yet you suspect her now, after all these years, of taking things of little real value?”

  “I do.”

  “Yet, given the number of staff you have and likely other service people who come and go, you have quite a few people moving through your house, do you not?”

  “Certainly. I can't keep track of everyone and then I'm not always at home. I do have a life of my own.”

  “Of course. I don't think we can help you, Mrs. Lawson. I suggest you call the police if you have some evidence and they will assist you free of charge,” I said.

  She leaned forward in her chair, arching her back, then stubbed her cigarette out in the ashtray.

  “I don't want my husband to find out and we don't need the publicity. I want this done discreetly. I'll pay you a hundred dollars a day.”

  I paused, letting that sink in.

  “That's very generous of you, Mrs. Lawson but beyond our normal fee for this sort of thing and besides, we have a client already. Perhaps I can refer you to someone else?”

  “So, that's it.”

  “Pardon?”

  “Her money is good but mine isn't?” She stood up abruptly. “You're making a big mistake. More than you'll ever know.” Alison Lawson turned on her sharp, expensive heels and without glancing back, stalked out leaving the office door open. We heard her beating a tough, fast rhythm on the stairs.

  Birdie raised his eyebrows at me. All I could do was shrug. A nutcase. We get them all the time. Most aren't as attractive as Alison Lawson, however.

  3

  John Fat Gai slurped noodles in his restaurant of the same name–Fat Gai's. Bang on the corner of Spadina and Dundas, prime real estate in Chinatown. Most people didn't know that Toronto had the largest Oriental population outside of mainland China. You think San Francisco has a thriving Chinatown? Forget it. Nothing compared to Toronto. All of this played right into John Fat Gai's hands, of course. More shopkeepers to buy his protection racket. More marks for his gambling tables. More addicts for the dope he peddled and the girls he pimped. Nothing but a sweet guy all in all. John the warlord with Chinatown as his kingdom.

  John occupied the corner booth at the back. He sat facing the door so he could monitor who came in and who went out. A mirror hanging on the opposite wall helped him observe the foot traffic but it had been set at an angle so he didn't look into it directly. That was bad luck. I'd thrown a chair through it once but that was another story. Also bad luck.

  Birdie and I pushed our way in. John's cronies sat packed around two wooden tables, laden with food. I spotted barbecued pork spare ribs, kung pao chicken and Shanghai noodles. The aroma hit me and my mouth watered. The high-pitched conversations halted mid-screech as we stepped inside. John's goons wore snap-brim fedoras, padded jackets and high-waist, pleated trousers with snaps. Each man wore a shoulder holster and filled it with their weapon of choice, a nickel-plated .45 pistol. A dozen pairs of hostile eyes turned in our direction.

  Just as a precaution, I packed my service piece. Birdie packed two, one under each arm and he kept a snub .38 down his right sock. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed some legit patrons scurry away. Birdie scorched the room with his fiercest glare. John sat back in the leatherette booth eating calmly, set down his chop sticks, and sipped some green tea, all without looking up. My gaze flitted between the tables of silent gunmen and John, then back to the gunmen.

  “Smells good in here,” I said.

  John smiled. Suddenly, everyone smiled. John beckoned and the animation returned. The gunmen continued attacking the platters in front of them.

  “I certainly wouldn't mind some chop suey,” Birdie said.

  “We're not here to eat.”

  “Well, we could shoot somebody and then eat if that will make you feel better.”

  I paused and turned to him. “It might,” I replied.

  John sat there with an amused look on his face.

  “Ah so, venerable gentleman. To what do I owe dis pleasure?” he trilled.

  “Cut it out, John,” I replied and Birdie tssked again.

  John threw his head back and laughed. He had a slender throat, a clean-cut jaw and a clean upper lip. Unlike his gang, he remained bare-headed, his lank hair parted in the middle falling foppishly over the tops of his ears.

  “Sorry,” he said in the well-modulated tone of a BBC announcer. “Just my little joke.” He'd grown up in London learning the family trade. After he'd gotten into a little trouble bribing some customs agents, John had been deported. He came to Toronto to settle and established a string of enterprises including this thriving restaurant.

  John moved opium through a warren of warehouses all along the docklands. None of this proven, of course. He'd never been charged with anything serious, never had anything stick. John traced his lineage back to the Sung Dynasty around 1100 A.D., marking the rise of the merchant class in cities spread out across China. With the rise of the merchant class, greed, avarice and crime became engendered. In a way, John came by his criminality honestly.

&nb
sp; I knew John to be a contented killer with an obsessive interest in spirituality. He believed in ghosts and evil demons frightened him. He wore a jade dragon pendant around his neck as a talisman. He carried a ring of jade coins to symbolize good fortune.

  On the table in front of him, he spread out a handful of playing cards, all eights from each of the suits. Eight meant good luck. Festooned inside his house he'd planted bamboo, another means to ward off evil intentions. Each common room had aquariums stocked with fish as fish represented the means to overcome barriers in life. He ate peaches every day imported through his own trading company. The peach symbolized longevity and immortality.

  I'd heard rumours that he slept with lights ablaze to deter the spirits from attacking him. He carried firecrackers in his pockets to ward them off. Every night, flares were lit outside his house. His guards patrolled the halls, corridors and elaborate grounds carrying burlap torches soaked in kerosene. I pictured them tripping and setting the joint on fire. Chinese hellfire. I'd bring the weenies and marshmallows. I think that's why Birdie spooked him. John thought Birdie represented a demon that had his number. We did nothing to discourage that notion.

  Birdie and I slid into the booth opposite him. The goons moved to squeeze in beside us when Birdie gave them a look. They hesitated, looked at John, who, with that amused look, nodded slightly and they backed off. Then he barked something in Mandarin and the two disappeared.

  “Ying's dead,” I said.

  “I know,” John replied.

  I took out a pack of Sweet Caps and offered them to John. He looked down and flinched. Only four in the pack. Four–symbol of death in Chinese culture. He shook his head curtly. I put the pack away without taking one out.

  A waiter set a tin pot of green tea before us, ceramic cups flipped over and steaming liquid poured out. I picked up the cup and sipped. Birdie took one sip and sucked the cup dry. Less than twenty seconds later, a plate of spring rolls appeared and some pork dumplings.

  “Please,” John said. “You are my guests.” He scooped up the eights and slid them into his pocket.

  We dug in. Had to admit the food was good–fresh and hot. Birdie could have downed the contents of each platter himself. Keeping him fed had been a problem in the Army. He lost over 50 pounds and always complained about being hungry. Never enough rations on hand.

  “I don't like being used, John. Neither of us do.”

  John accepted this comment silently. If we'd been Chinese and had said this to him, he'd have had our throats slit and bodies dumped in the harbour.

  “I understand,” he replied. “Unfortunately, I didn't kill Ying.”

  I went for a spring roll. It crunched nicely between my molars.

  Birdie shoveled three dumplings into his mouth.

  “Why not?”

  The two men hovering near by tensed, one muttered something I took to be a profanity but John shushed them with a gesture.

  “Simple,” John replied. “He took a great deal of my money and I want it back. If I was going to have him killed, the money had to be recovered first. It is still missing. I had every reason to keep him alive you see. As did you,” he said to me. “This is a most unfortunate occurrence for your brother, unless you can pay his debt, of course.”

  I digested this along with the spring rolls. John wanted his cash, all of it. “Any ideas?”

  John shrugged. “That is your business. For your brother's sake, I hope you come up with a solution quickly.”

  “You don't want to go to war with us, John,” I said and held up four fingers.

  “Agreed,” he replied amiably but glanced at Birdie nervously and worried the dragon pendant. “Better for all of us if you find the money.”

  “How much is missing?” Birdie asked, pouring out more tea for the two of us.

  John shifted in his seat, then drummed his slender fingers on the table. He drummed each hand ten times. I nodded.

  “Okay, John. We'll keep looking.”

  Birdie grabbed the last two dumplings and spring roll, and downed another cup of green tea. We eased out of the booth. As we stood up, the tables of henchmen went silent. I nodded to John. “I'll let you know if we find out anything.”

  John smiled coldly. “Don't make me wait too long.”

  As we pushed through the tables and chairs and the inert, watchful bodies, John kept watch in the mirror. He spread the eights back on the table.

  4

  Aida Turner kept a two-bedroom flat on Symington Avenue not far from the Junction, a run-down crossroads of industrial wasteland mixed with dilapidated residences, a stone's throw from the barren emptiness of the railway lands. Earlier waves of immigration brought Ukrainians, Macedonians, Croatians, Serbs and Poles looking for a better life.

  This section of the city had never seen good times. The bosses of the foundries, the mills and the wire factories liked to keep their workers close by. They felt they could get more out of them that way and they did, working them to death on land polluted with lead and iron. The stench from the tanning factories and meat packing plants lay like a thick, sour slab. Home to the largest stockyards in the country and I swore I could hear the cattle lowing in fear just as they were being slaughtered.

  Fifty years ago, the district had such a serious drinking problem with the workingmen flooding the bars and taverns after their shifts that it voted to go dry after Prohibition. It remained dry ever since. The bars closed and Methodist churches took their place scraping some respectability out of the industrial waste that had been left behind.

  Aida Turner's flat occupied the main floor of a row house at 263 Symington, above Bloor Street but below Dupont Avenue, light years away from Mrs. Lawson's residence, I guessed. At seven-thirty that evening, we paid her a visit. The flat looked small but cozy. She kept it spick and span. A chain-link fence and a well-oiled gate led to a recently swept walk up to the front door. The flat had a decent-sized living room and a faux fireplace, a working kitchen with fitted appliances, a threadbare but clean and well-maintained carpet in the living room, two small bedrooms at the back, the larger of the two was clearly Henry's. It overlooked a small garden. Compact, but neat, the grass raked, flower beds clean where roses and hydrangeas bloomed, a large sunflower perched on either side of the bed with some hosta filling in the blanks. A tiny oasis surrounded by rotting vegetation. I nodded my approval.

  “Nice garden.” I stood in her kitchen gazing out the back window. “I like a bit of gardening myself, find it relaxing, eases the strain of the day.”

  “Do you get many stressful days, Mr. Gold?”

  I looked at her and smiled, like she was telling me that the stress of losing her son could not be equaled. “I've had my share—we both have–depends what's on the burner, if you know what I mean, Mrs. Turner.”

  “Or who,” Birdie said and he gave me a look that told me what he was thinking. I knew because I thought the same thing–my father, a notorious gunsel and thief, currently incarcerated in the Don Jail. The old man had been a blight on my life ever since I could think. Ever since I had a conscious memory and that would make me maybe four or five years old. This time he'd been done for manslaughter and it looked like a life stretch. If he ever got out, he'd be old and decrepit.

  “May we see Henry's room, please?”

  She rose stiffly from the hard backed chair in which she'd been sitting. “It's through here.”

  Henry's room mirrored the rest of the place, neat and orderly. His clothes hung tidily in the closet, dresser drawers filled to the brim, two pairs of shoes, one brown, one black, perfectly polished and placed heel-to-toe on a rack. A high school yearbook lay on the side table. I took in photos of Henry in his football and track uniforms.

  “He fit in there, Mrs. Turner?” I held up the yearbook.

  She looked wistful for a moment. “Oh yes. Henry was always popular in school, he had a lot of friends and not all of them was colored neither. It just didn't seem to matter when it came to Henry, he was friendly with e
verybody.”

  “What were his prospects?”

  “Like I told you, he always worked after school and after he finished, he didn't have any trouble finding jobs.”

  “Then he started working as a chauffeur for the Foster family…” Mrs. Turner nodded. I set the yearbook back on the dresser careful not to disturb any of the photographs or trophies. Two for track and field I noticed, so Henry had been a talented runner. “Do you work for a Mrs. Lawson presently?”

  “I do,” she replied. “And her parents too.”

  “Have you noticed anything going missing in the household? Nothing too valuable, knick knacks and such.”

  “No, I haven't noticed anything missing, Mr. Gold. Why do you ask me?”

  I described the scene after she left the office. Aida Turner opened her eyes wide and then swallowed hard.

  “I should have told you this but Mrs. Lawson is Alison Foster, the girl that Henry was supposed to be driving when he disappeared.”

  That got my attention. “You shouldn't have held back on that, Mrs. Turner.” “I was going to say–it was, just–hard for me to get the words out.”

  “Why you still working for those people?” Birdie demanded.

  Aida turned to him, imploring. “I might learn something, something that will tell me about Henry and where he is.” Aida Turner shook her head and tears squeezed out of her eyes. “I'm willing to do anything to get my Henry back, Mr. Gold, even if it means working in that house until the rest of my days.”