Snakehead tct-4

by Peter May

  They continued parallel to the freeway for several more miles, through junctions and under flyovers. Eventually, when there was still no sign of the Lincoln and the Chevy, Margaret began to relax, too. As they approached the next junction, she indicated left and pulled across to the exit lane that would take them back on to the interstate, and they picked up speed again, the cluster of glass tower blocks that was downtown Houston appearing now on the horizon. The sky overhead was so swollen and bruised, it had almost turned day into night. The headlamps of the traffic reflected off the wet surface of the road. Forked lightning lit the blue-black void beyond the skyscrapers. Fifteen minutes later, the road took them around the centre of the city, past Sam Houston Park and down to a huge intersection where they turned off on to the 59 and then the 288. Shortly after, they left the freeway altogether and drifted down on to North MacGregor Boulevard, overhung by the dripping trees of Hermann Park. They curved gently through lush, manicured lawns on to Braeswood and the stop lights at Holcombe. Rain drummed on the roof of the Bronco.

  Margaret glanced at the car in the outside lane, and felt fear like a blade pass through her. It was the white Chevy, and the Chinese who had made the slash-throat gesture with his finger. She looked in her rear-view mirror and saw the green Lincoln on her tail. It flashed its lights, just to let her know it was there. Xiao Ling had not seen them yet. Margaret looked up at the traffic lights overhead. They were still at red. And then back at the Chevy. The passenger opened the left-hand side of his jacket and started drawing what looked like a gun out of a holster. Margaret jammed her foot on the accelerator, and the Bronco lurched forward, snaking through the red light, wheels spinning in the wet. Xiao Ling let out a yelp of surprise and clutched the edges of her seat. Horns blared as cars crossing the intersection swerved to avoid her. She heard more squealing tyres, all the time expecting someone either to hit her, or for a bullet to come crashing through the window. She cleared the lights and accelerated down Braeswood, looking in her mirror to see if anything had followed them, and when she saw that the road was empty, allowed herself to draw breath. Xiao Ling looked terrified.

  ‘Ma zhai,’ Margaret said, still with no idea what it meant. But Xiao Ling nodded.

  Margaret took a left into William C. Harvin Boulevard. Flanked by trees and puddles in sprawling parking lots, she felt the almost overwhelming relief of getting on to home territory. At the end of the boulevard, in the middle of the road opposite the entrance to the Joseph A. Jachimczyk Forensic Center, she saw the glass security booth with the silhouettes of two armed officers inside it. She rounded it, cutting left across the central reservation and into the car park on the south side of her office building. There was a space there reserved for the chief medical examiner. She drove into it and cut the engine. For a moment she just sat there, and then leaned forward to rest her forehead on the steering wheel. Her legs and hands were trembling. Xiao Ling was looking at her in a state of high anxiety. She had no idea that they were safe here. Margaret exhaled slowly, and then took a long, deep breath and sat up. As she opened the door and stepped out on to the wet tarmac, she saw the Lincoln and the Chevy pull up on the other side of the boulevard.

  ‘Oh, my God!’ she whispered, almost frozen to the spot by fear as the car doors opened, and four young Chinese in dark suits stepped out on to the road. She flicked a glance at Xiao Ling who had climbed out of the car and stood on the far side of the Bronco looking at them, a creature immobilised by fear, capable neither of action nor reaction. Her hair was streaked down her face by the rain, her dress soaked already and clinging to her slight frame.

  The security guards in their glass booth were engaged in some private conversation involving much laughter. They were oblivious to what was going on outside.

  The four Chinese simply stood there in the rain, their car doors wide open, looking across at Margaret and Xiao Ling. They gave no indication of wanting to do anything other than stare, and something in Margaret finally snapped.

  ‘What the hell do you want?’ she screamed through the rain. And she started across the car park toward them. Her first few hesitant steps turned into a brisk walk and then, as all four Chinese turned and got back into their cars, a positive run. Doors slammed shut as she sprinted through the downpour, and even as she made it to the boulevard the Lincoln pulled away from the far side, followed by the Chevy, and they headed off at speed toward the junction with Old Spanish Trail.

  Margaret stood, dripping, on the sidewalk, tears of rage and fear streaming down her face. She felt almost as if she had been violated by their silent intimidation and frustrated by her inability to confront them. She knew what she had done was crazy. What if they had simply pulled out guns and shot her? And yet, she also knew that if you didn’t confront your fears then they could crush you.

  ‘You alright, ma’am?’ It was one of the security guards calling over from the shelter of his booth.

  ‘No thanks to you,’ she shouted, and turned and strode back to where Xiao Ling stood waiting for her, marvelling either at her bravery or her stupidity.

  Chapter Nine

  I

  Giant windows threw long arches of light across the marble floor. White pillars rose high into a vaulted ceiling lined with guastavino tile. Where once the smoke and steam and shrill whistle of freight and passenger trains had filled its vastness, only three solitary sets of footsteps now echoed across the concourse of what had been the elegant Union Station. The tracks beyond the terminal were long gone, replaced by a diamond of grass, the rumble of wheel on rail supplanted by the thwack of leather on wood and the roar of forty thousand baseball fans. Designed by the firm that built the Grand Central Station in New York City, and with a one-time reputation as the finest station in the South, this monument to the heyday of the American railroad was now home to the Houston Astros. Minute Maid Park.

  A uniformed security officer sat at a shiny mahogany desk right in the centre of the concourse. She turned a smile as bright as sunshine on Li, Fuller and Hrycyk. ‘Can I help y’all?’

  Fuller said, ‘We have an appointment with Councilman Soong.’

  Soong himself came down to take them up to his suite. He was a large man in every sense. He had an expansive personality and an expanded waistline, a very round, smooth face and a thick head of neatly trimmed wavy black hair shot through with streaks of silver. Incongruously, he was wearing sneakers, a pair of Wrangler jeans and a red leather Astros baseball jacket. Solemnly he shook everyone’s hands. ‘Welcome, gentlemen. I am very pleased you can make it.’ Then he grinned and waved his arm around the concourse. ‘Impressive, yes? Restored to all its former glory.’ He pushed open a tall glass door and took them into the stadium. To their left, a long corridor ran the length of the original terminal building, arches opening out on to the baseball field below. Before them, the field itself glistened in the rain beneath three tiers of seats rising into an angry-looking sky, puddles gathering in the red blaize that circled the mound. ‘They gonna close the roof, I think,’ Soong said. ‘Too much rain no good for grass.’

  ‘Jees,’ Hrycyk whispered in awe. ‘I’ve never seen them close the roof before.’

  Soong beamed at him. ‘You are baseball fan, Mistah Hrycyk?’

  Hrycyk shrugged, suddenly self-conscious. ‘Yeah, I go to the games sometimes. When I can.’

  ‘Then you must be my guest next season,’ Soong said. ‘I can arrange seat for you in enclosure.’ He pointed to a small enclosed area of seats immediately behind where the batsman faced the pitcher.

  ‘Wow,’ Hrycyk said, forgetting his reserve. He was like a kid with a candy bar. ‘That’s where all the celebs sit.’

  Soong beamed. ‘It cost twenty thousand dollar to buy seat there. And two hundred dollar a game. Roughly seventeen thousand a year. In thirty years you pay more than half a million dollar for one seat.’ He paused for effect. ‘I got three.’

  Li looked at Hrycyk. The INS agent might dislike the Chinese, but when it came to baseball he had no
problem accepting Chinese hospitality.

  They heard the whine and hum of a motor, and the smooth sound of gears engaging through syncromesh.

  ‘Yuh,’ Soong said. ‘They close the roof.’

  They followed him out on to the near terracing, where they had a view across the field to the arched walkway they had just passed through. Above it, on eight hundred feet of track, stood a full-size replica vintage locomotive painted black and orange and red, the glass towers and skyscrapers of downtown Houston rising into the sky behind it, like the painted backdrop of a theatre set.

  Soong laughed. ‘Owner of team pay one and a quarter million dollar out of own pocket to install train,’ he said. ‘It run along track, blowing whistle and letting off steam every time Astros score home run. It’s fun.’

  Beyond it, set into the far side of the stadium, the roof was starting to close. It comprised two massive arced sections, one overlapping the other and supported along the open side on glass-panelled scaffolding more than two hundred feet high which ran on rails parallel to the train line. Through the windows of a small control cabin at the base of the scaffolding, they could see the engineer controlling the motors that closed the roof. The cabin moved along the rail with the scaffolding, overtaking the train as the first section stopped halfway and the overlap continued toward the near side of the stadium, above where they stood. Although the whole structure was designed with toughened glass panels to let in as much light as possible, the sky was almost black now, and the engineer switched on the floodlights from his little control room, washing the entire stadium with an unnaturally bright light.

  Soong took great delight in displaying his knowledge of the facts and figures. He said, ‘The roof weigh nine thousand ton and cover six-and-a-half acre. It generate its own electricity and take just twelve minutes to close. Pretty impressive, huh?’ But he gave them no time to respond. ‘You come with me, now. We got important stuff to talk about.’

  They followed him under a bewildering array of hanging signs arranged to guide fans to their seats, and into a stairwell that led them up from the main concourse through club level to suite level. Soong arrived panting at the top of the stairs. ‘I used to take lift,’ he said, ‘but now I take stair for health.’ He grinned again. ‘Only exercise I get, apart from sex.’

  Fuller and Hrycyk gave small, dutiful laughs. Li did not. There was nothing amusing for him in the image of this fat man grunting and sweating over the delicate frame of some poor Chinese girl working to pay off her debt to a snakehead. Soong’s wealth and confidence, his eccentricity — the sneakers and the baseball jacket — reminded Li of those corrupt petty officials back in China who lined their pockets at the expense of the people. Overweight, overbearing, overconfident.

  A door led them into a long, curved and carpeted concourse. Large windows gave on to stunning views of the illuminated field below. After a lengthy walk around the curve of the stadium, they arrived at the elaborate wood-panelled entries to the row of private suites. Opposite, a panorama of windows looked out on to the freeway, the lights of the afternoon traffic a dazzle of reflections in the wet. Li could see rain caught in the headlamps, spray rising like mist. Soong opened the door to his suite and they found themselves entering a large room with a conference table at its centre and a hot buffet counter along one side. Facing the entrance, sliding glass doors opened onto a single row of seats with a spectacular aerial view of the field. Overhead they heard a soft thunk that vibrated gently through the building. Soong looked at his watch. ‘We make good time,’ he said. ‘The roof just close.’

  Eight sombre-looking middle-aged and elderly Chinese gentlemen in uniformly dark suits and dark hair, white shirts open at the neck, sat around the conference table, noisily slurping green tea from tall glasses. A fog of smoke filled the room from their cigarettes. Ashtrays were full. They had been here for some time. Wary, hooded eyes fixed on Li as Soong made the introductions. These were the leaders of the various business associations represented Chinese commercial interests in Houston. The tongs. And they were clearly ill at ease sitting down with agents of the INS and FBI and a police officer representing the country from which they had all, at one time or another, made illegal exits.

  Soong, by contrast, had the appearance of a man supremely comfortable with his own status: as city councilman, director of the Houston-Hong Kong Bank, member of the Astros board. When Fuller, Hrycyk and Li were seated at the table, he offered them green tea from stainless steel flasks. Fuller and Hrycyk demurred. Li accepted. It was a long time since he had drunk green tea. There was a comfort in it. A taste of home. He lit a cigarette and, catching Hrycyk’s eye, reluctantly tossed him one. Fuller coughed ostentatiously into his hand.

  ‘Any chance we could open one of these windows?’ he said. ‘A guy could get lung cancer just breathing in this place.’

  ‘Sure,’ Soong said, nodding to one of the dark-suited gentlemen at the far end of the table who got up and slid open the door. As air rushed in, smoke got sucked out, drawn high up into the enclosed roof space of the stadium where it quickly dispersed.

  Li said in Mandarin, ‘Whereabouts in Canton are you from, Mr. Soong?’

  Soong scrutinised him quickly, searching for some ulterior motive in the question. ‘I’m afraid my putonghua is not very good, Mr. Li.’

  ‘Neither is my Cantonese.’

  ‘Then perhaps we should speak English,’ Soong said in English.

  ‘I’ll drink to that,’ Hrycyk said. ‘Agent Fuller and myself can’t speak Cantonese or Mandarin.’

  And Li glanced at the INS agent, momentarily discomposed. Hrycyk clearly knew more Chinese than he was prepared to admit.

  Ostentatiously avoiding Li’s question, Soong folded his hands on the table in front of him and composed his brows into a frown of concern. ‘I have to tell you, gentlemen, that the people of Houston Chinatown are not happy today, after yesterday’s raids.’

  ‘We picked up more than sixty illegal immigrants, Councilman Soong,’ Fuller said evenly. ‘These people had no papers, no right to be here. They were breaking the law.’

  ‘Of course, Mistah Fullah,’ Soong said. ‘Chinese not above the law. We know this. But even illegal immigrants have rights in United States, yes?’

  ‘Citizens of the United States have rights,’ Fuller said. ‘Illegal immigrants do not.’

  Soong said, ‘But many of these people escape from persecution in China. They have right to claim political asylum. They have right to bail, and legal representation.’

  ‘In my experience,’ Li said, fixing Soong with an unblinking gaze, ‘illegal emigrants from China come to America for economic, not political, reasons. Except, of course, for those who have broken the law and are escaping prosecution.’

  Soong was unruffled. A slightly puzzled, almost amused, frown settled around his eyes. ‘Correct me if I am wrong, Mistah Li, but I understood that your own sister is seeking political asylum. From persecution under Chinese government’s one-child policy.’

  Li felt a hot flush darken his cheeks and wondered how Soong knew about his sister and what had happened in court only a matter of hours before. But it made it almost impossible for him to argue his point. He caught Hrycyk smirking at him across the table.

  Having dealt with Li, Soong turned his attentions back to Fuller. ‘It is important,’ he said, ‘that Chinese people have confidence in American system. There are many illegal immigrant in America, Mistah Fullah, but if Chinese people feel they are being…singled out…then this is ve-ery dangerous for good relations in community. ’

  ‘What exactly do you mean by that?’ Fuller asked sharply.

  Soong was unruffled. ‘I mean, Mistah Fullah, that Chinese people want to be good American citizen. We want to make money, pursue American Dream. Not break the law. But, if always there is fear of raid on business and home, then bad Chinese element, they go underground. And that no good for you, or us.’ He paused to let his point sink in. ‘These people you arrest, you make ge
sture, you release them on bail, then people believe in American justice, people in community happy to help police again.’

  Hrycyk blew a jet of smoke at the ceiling. ‘And I don’t suppose this anxiety to release all these illegals back on the street has anything to do with the money they owe their snakeheads? About three and a half million by my reckoning.’

  ‘We are anxious like you, Mistah Hrycyk, to put snakehead out of business,’ Soong said earnestly. ‘All gentlemen round this table have legitimate business. Banking, import-export, retail sale, restaurant, entertainment.’

  Li scrutinised the faces of the commercial interests around the table. They were all deeply reserved, eyes dark and impenetrable. Whatever was going on behind them was well masked. And none of them looked as if they might be about to give voice to their anxiety. They seemed more than happy to let Soong do it for them.

  Soong continued, ‘Illegal activity of snakehead bad for our business, scare people, depress economy. That why we wanna help. Stop street gangs, illegal gambling, protection racket. These things bad for everyone. But if people scared of police, then the gangs only have more power. You let people out on bail, like sister of Mistah Li, and people not so scared.’

  ‘I’m afraid we can’t do that, Mr. Soong,’ Fuller said. ‘We opposed the release of Li’s sister, but that was a court decision. We have no control over that.’ He took a deep breath. ‘The fact is, we’re holding all the illegal immigrants arrested yesterday in protective quarantine — for their safety, and ours.’

  There was a long silence around the table. Soong leaned forward. ‘I do not understand, Mistah Fullah. Protective quarantine?’