by Henry Chang
The thug took several steps in her direction.
Save me, kwoon yum, Goddess of Mercy! She took three deep breaths before stepping off the pier, letting herself fall.
At the access road, a squad of SPD uniforms had bagged the two Chinese from the minivan. There was no one in sight down the long length of the pier. When Jack and Alex got to the end, there was only the sound of waves and the distant churning of motor boats across the bay.
“Gone,” Alex said in disbelief. “All gone.”
“A woman went into the water,” Jack informed Nicoll. “And maybe a man, as well.” They stared into the dark water beneath the pier as Alex gave Jack a napkin to sop up the blood clogging his ear.
“Harbor Patrol will pick up anyone in the water,” Nicoll offered.
“Was a boat here?” Jack asked aloud.
“Coast Guard can check that out, too,” advised Nicoll.
The three of them scanned the surface of the bay, looking for a body, clothing, something. All they saw were a couple of dead birds and the usual debris, shards of driftwood, a plastic soda jug.
The Seattle cops were out in force now, cordoning off the place where Jack had left two men dead.
“Did she witness any of that?” Nicoll nodded toward Alex.
“Unfortunately,” Jack answered hesitantly.
“We’ll need a statement from her,” indicated Nicoll. He escorted Alex back along the pier toward the uniforms securing the scene.
Looking south down the waterways, Jack saw Harbor Island, and Duwamish beyond that. Northward lay an endless waterfront of piers, green parks, and commercial landings. Directly before him was the wide expanse of Elliott Bay, with freighters and ferries and assorted pleasure craft plying the frigid waters in every direction.
But no woman, and no man. No Paper Fan.
Jack checked the edges of the pier and saw a small dark stain on the wet planking. Upon closer inspection he saw it was dark red: a smear of blood. He stepped carefully, seeing several more tiny droplets that led to a pair of bollards.
Beside the bollards he saw what appeared to be a human hand attached to some kind of elastic strap. A man’s hand, he thought, smeared with blood. The fingers were clenched around something red. Jack could see a curved fragment of a red bangle caught in its grasp. Examining the broken piece, he wondered if the unusual color was the result of its being covered in blood. In the rain, it felt slick. The bangle had broken clean through but the blood-red color held fast when he rubbed it.
He took out his plastic camera and snapped a few shots of the hand and the broken bangle. The hand felt heavier than he thought a prosthetic hand should, and he wondered if there were metal joints within.
He put it back near the bollard before advising the crime scene techs to bag it.
When he got to the turnoff, he saw that one of the SPD uniforms had found the knife more than twenty yards from where Alex had flung it. It had bounced and skidded along the concrete until it stopped beside the driver’s door of a parked car. It was a tantō-style Japanese blade but with a serrated edge.
Watching them bag it as evidence, Jack felt chills thinking that the eight-inch razor-sharp blade was meant for his neck.
Alex leaned on the Dumpster with her fist against her chin, looking toward the bay. It had taken her a half hour to tell, and retell, her story. Jack could see the fatigue in her eyes, could hear the drag in her voice when she said, “I’m sorry, Jack. I’ve got to get back to the hotel, to catch an evening flight back.”
“Can I get one of the uniforms to drive you?” Jack asked.
“No, it’s all right,” she declined. “I’ve got to return the car anyway.”
“Sorry for the craziness,” he said, giving her a big hug. She responded with a gentle kiss to his cheek, and he felt awkward, knowing she had to have the missing woman on her mind.
“Call me when you get back,” she said.
“Sure,” he answered.
“Promise,” she insisted, knowing his police work always came first.
“Okay, promise,” he repeated, watching her go as Nicoll took possession of the bags of evidence.
“These two are done,” Nicoll said as CSU finished photographing the bodies.
Jack recounted events to Detective Nicoll, explaining how he’d tailed the men in the two vehicles, and how they tried to stop him from getting to the woman.
Dead on the wet concrete pavement was the big nunchakuwielding man, with wounds to the upper chest and shoulder, and two closely spaced gut shots, courtesy of Jack, for trying to stab him in the back. He had a driver’s license in his pocket that identified him as Shi Man Chun, from San Francisco. Jack could still feel the welts on his shoulder.
The other dead man was the big guy’s partner, who’d fancied himself a ninja assassin. Jack had drilled two hollow points into his chest that ripped out his back and shredded his rain jacket. One shot had missed, but the last one tore through his eye and blew out the back of his head. A puddle of blood was spreading in the rain.
He definitely wasn’t assassinating anyone anymore.
Fuck him, Jack thought. He tried to kill me but I beat him to the punch. Deal. Next.
In his pockets they found keys, a small sum of cash, and an international telephone calling card. There was a New York driver’s license that identified him as Tsai Ming Hui, rubber-banded together with several business cards. One of the cards was from a Hong Kong law firm, Wo Sun Partners, with a Tsim Sha Tsui address. Another card represented a New York firm, Chi and Chong, Esq., located on East Broadway. The last card was from a Mong Kok Jewelers Association. What surprised Jack was the name scrawled across the back of the New York lawyer’s card: SHELDON LITTMAN. Next to it was the Chinese word TONG. It made clear who was paying Shelly high legal fees.
The techs bagged the bodies for the morgue wagon as Nicoll interrupted Jack’s discovery.
“Congratulations, by the way,” he said. “I heard you got your shorty, Eddie Ng.”
“Patrol did a great job,” Jack answered evenly.
“So you did good up here, Jack.” Nicoll smiled under his mustache. “Killing two bad guys, taking a cold-blooded murderer home. Not bad for a few days in Seattle, huh?”
“Yeah,” Jack agreed reluctantly, flashing back on the dead men’s faces.
“And if anything new develops here, I’ll update you.”
“Thanks.” Jack forced a smile. “I’d appreciate that.” He felt the shock of the day slowly seeping into him.
“If there’s a woman, we’ll find her. And if anyone calls looking for a fake hand …”
Jack nodded, watching them load the body bags. Nicoll got into his unmarked car and followed the meat wagon to pick up the paperwork. Out by the access ramp the cops were hauling away the two remaining goons, and the terminal was quiet again.
Jack went back to the end of the pier and stood there looking out over the water for any signs from the Harbor Patrol or the Coast Guard. The harbor cops had responded to a boating accident off West Seattle, and Jack finally spotted them coming around the point. The Coast Guard had come through Puget Sound, a twenty-five-minute trip. Neither service had reported any sightings over the police band.
Jack waited on the pier until the last of the light, still hoping something would float up. In his mind, he reviewed the two times that he’d seen the missing woman, Mona. Once on a San Francisco rooftop, and now, on a Seattle pier. Based on the running glimpses he’d had, he couldn’t say for certain that it was the same woman. Same general height and weight, sure, but between the short hair and the long hair, the sunglasses, and makeup or lack of it, he couldn’t swear to it.
She’d eluded him again. Floating not only in the wind this time, but out to sea as well. He thought of the broken jade bangle in the prosthetic hand’s grasp. How did it figure? Sooner or later, he knew, Mona was going to surface again.
He returned to his motel room, so exhausted that he didn’t need the little vodka bottles from the min
ibar to help him crash.
On the Waterfront
Daylight found Jack back at the pier, watching the rain dapple the dark surface of the bay. The terminal area was busy with delivery trucks, tour buses queuing up, ferries docking, and smaller craft making ready to cast off.
He imagined the smell of coffee and croissants flavoring the salt sea air.
They never saw a body surface.
A Coast Guard cutter sliced across the rippling water, its wake white and choppy. Several times, Jack saw things floating: a waterlogged piece of luggage, an oil drum cloaked with barnacles and seaweed, a dead seagull drifting on a black garbage bag.
Nothing.
The icy water beneath the pier was maybe twenty feet deep, he thought, plenty deep enough to drown in, especially if someone was unconscious, or in shock, when they fell in.
Still, the divers hadn’t found anything.
He was there an hour before Nicoll approached him, a cardboard cup of Seattle joe in his hand.
“I tried calling your cell,” Nicoll said.
“My battery died,” Jack explained.
“You know Harbor Patrol’s on top of it, right?” Nicoll asked pointedly, firing up a cigarette.
“I know that.”
“And you know your being out here won’t make anything float up faster, yes?”
“I know that, too.” The Coast Guard was checking flow charts, analyzing the currents, tides, the drag of big ships. The harbor cops had advised him that the riptides were fast, strong, and deep, twenty-five feet in some spots. The tides could suck a body down, swirl it around for days before giving it up. Bodies had been known to float up way south or north along coastal Seattle, and as far out as Alki Point.
Still, Jack felt the same way as he had that night beside Lucky’s bedside, that somehow his presence at the scene might spark an idea, a memory, provide some clarity. He remembered that Ah Por’s clues had been yuh, rain, and seui, water. Water over water, she’d concluded. Now he saw the connections: The attack had occurred in the rain, in a city known for rain. Mona had disappeared, possibly into the water, and water over water could mean the riptides.
He made a mental note to visit Ah Por when he got back to New York.
“So here’s the update on the tong war,” Nicoll announced with a grin. “The two we arrested were illegals. We’re transferring them to INS for deportation. The two dead hatchetmen”—he finished his cigarette and flicked it into the bay—“came up from San Francisco. Motor Vehicles is still checking on the car and the minivan. And the license numbers your pretty lady friend copied down. The big man has a long sheet from Oakland, for gambling, and bootleg cigarettes. The Jap knife’s got his prints on it. The other kung-fu fighter, was a little different. He freelances, somehow, for law firms, and he has a New York driver’s ID. That’s your neck of the woods, isn’t it?”
“I think he’s a player, but I’m not sure in what game yet,” Jack added. How was he going to explain to ADA Bang Sing?
“A boat turned up abandoned near Harbor Island,” Nicoll continued. “There were a few drops of blood and a Vicodin pill on it but nothing else. We’ll see if there’s a blood match with the hand, and we’re canvassing the island for any witnesses.”
“They were triads, dodging a Red Notice,” Jack offered. “You’ll get a call from INTERPOL.”
“Yeah, okay. Plus we got this prosthetic hand. Bionic, real neat. Fingernails, knuckles, and creases even. Last made by a British company ten to fifteen years ago.”
“And a piece of red jade,” Jack added quietly. “Part of a broken bangle.”
“What is that? Some kind of voodoo?”
“It’s a Chinese thing,” Jack said. “I’m not sure you’d understand.”
“Well then, don’t worry about it, Jack.” Nicoll smiled. “Remember …”
“I know, I know,” Jack responded wearily. “It’s Chinatown.”
Nicoll laughed, and Jack walked him back to his car.
“Look,” Jack apologized, “I know I dumped on you during a red ball, but—”
“Hey, Yu, you came to my turf,” Nicoll interrupted. “Dropped two bodies on my desk, and I closed it the next day. That’s kudos for me, so don’t sweat it, okay?”
“Thanks,” Jack answered, watching Nicoll get in his unmarked Ford and drive away.
He’d figured them wrong, Jack realized. The Seattle cops had expressed racism in their tone and content, but they had been up front with it, unlike in New York where they’d play you with a smile and a wink before stabbing you in the back. He’d never condone racism but knew in the end that actions spoke louder than words.
Nicoll was a cop’s cop above all, and Jack respected him for that. At game time, it was diligent police work by the Patrol Division that had brought about Eddie’s collar at Julio’s Place. And the SPD’s arrival at the terminal pier had definitely interrupted the abduction.
They were professionals, after all, working the job.
Jack felt grateful as a Harbor Patrol boat cruised by. He left the pier, walking south through the mist. Gradually, he found the place by the bus stop, the El Amigo, where he ordered up a six-pack of cerveza and assorted dishes, and thanked Carlos and Jorge for their assistance. He gave them his detective’s card and offered help if they ever needed it.
They finished the Dos Equis before the fajitas and enchiladas.
Back at the Sea-Tac Courtyard, Jack fell asleep thinking about cerveza frio and the icy waters of Puget Sound.
Swept Away
The full moon hung above the harbor and calmed the currents of the winter night. The freezing waters of the bay had welcomed her, embracing her in its tides and icy backwash, swirling beneath the piers and past the submerged pilings.
She’d held her breath into the murky depth, shock surrendering to numbness even as she saw the dim light above at the surface. In the whirling commotion of jetsam and wreaths of kelp, she imagined sea nymphs and sirens with beckoning smiles.
The gripping currents pulled her toward a stretch of pilings as she began her ascent from the bottom’s darkness. No bot gwa, no fung shui, no red jade of luck. She kicked furiously, reaching upward with desperate arm strokes, clawing toward the surface, toward kwoon yum, her lungs ready to burst….
Dead Man Flying
Eddie was quiet the whole plane ride back from Sea-Tac to JFK. Except once when he used the toilet and once when he was allowed to stretch his legs, Eddie stayed cuffed at his waist, braced in the window seat in the back section of the plane, blocked in by Jack.
Here was a guy, Jack thought, who showed no remorse for what he’d done, a guy who was looking at long-term lockup, and yet thought somehow his life was going to be normal again.
Jack remembered Ah Por’s clues taken off Eddie’s juvenile poster. Yuh, she’d said, rain. And lo mok, which he’d thought meant Negro. Rain was a symbol of Seattle, as in Mona’s case, but lo mok here meant the surname Mok, or Mak, the same in written Chinese. Willie Mak, lo mok, was one of the killers at the Wah Mee Massacre, Seattle’s worst crime ever.
Ah Por had pointed him in the right direction, though, of course, Jack didn’t realize it at the time. He’d focused on the red star and monkey tattoos.
They landed without incident.
Jack cabbed Eddie back to lower Manhattan, feeling oddly enough that both of them were home. Jack could feel Eddie scheming even as he was turned over at the Tombs for detention. By the time he’d get a public defender he’d be at Rikers, with the rest of the New York City bad boys. Maybe he’d get Punitive Segregation, for his own good, which, ironically, was where Johnny Wong was being held.
By the time he’d completed the transfer of custody at the Tombs it was 9 PM, too late to find Ah Por. Snow flurries filled the air. Captain Marino wasn’t at the Fifth and Jack already felt jet-lagged. He was hungry, and considered calling Alex like he’d promised, but it was very late for dinner and he thought better of dragging her out in the snow and cold.
He
’d been gone a week and really wanted to get back to Sunset Park, eat some Shanghai dumplings, shower, and sleep in his own bed. He went down to East Broadway and caught a Chinese see gay. The driver whizzed him across the Brooklyn Bridge with the window down a crack. He watched the night colors playing across the river, the thousands of sparkling lights dancing between the snowflakes, and imagined everything calling to him.
Welcome home.
Legal Blows
Overnight flurries had left a sloppy inch of frozen snow on the ground, and Jack was glad to be wearing his Timberland boots and down jacket again. When he arrived at the 0-Five the captain was in a morning meeting. The door to his office was closed and the desk sarge groused, “It could be a while.”
Jack decided to get some hot tea and see if Billy Bow or Ah Por was around. He peered into the steamy window of the Tofu King and didn’t see Billy. Ah Por wasn’t on line for free congee at the Senior Citizen’s Center. He decided to give Alex a call.
She was busy preparing a case but they agreed to meet at the Golden Star later that night. Jack decided to visit Lucky at Downtown Hospital before coming back to see the captain.
In the captain’s office, Shelly Littman placed his silver Halliburton briefcase down at the short edge of Captain Marino’s desk. He leveled his blue shark eyes at ADA Bang Sing and announced, “I’ve had witnesses come forward lately who will swear that my client couldn’t have been at the scene, but that’s just more background. Now, it seems, Detective Yu has even less of a chance to make his case than before. If I have INTERPOL testify about the possible abduction of this woman, with witnesses, mind you, and the corroborating reports of Seattle PD, not to mention that Detective Yu shot and killed my legal assistant who was investigating this same woman suspect, there’ll be a ton of questions and a ton of doubt as to my client having been the lone shooter of Uncle Four.”
Captain Marino shifted uneasily in his seat behind the big desk, and ADA Sing twisted his mouth into a frown.