John Dobbyn - Neon Dragon

Harry never lost a beat. He trudged up the stairs as if he were coming home from a day’s work. I felt a cold draft from behind and turned around. The three faces glared up at us from the bottom of the steps behind us. They were well under twenty, and closer to the Chinese proportions I expected, but the bulges under their coats in the neighborhood of their right arm sockets kept me close to Harry’s heels where the odds were better.

I stuck, in fact, close enough to Harry to be able to whisper.

“You were always a friend, Harry, but right now you’re my life insurance.”

Harry’s eyes never left the top of the stairs, but I could hear the whisper.

“It’s the other way, Michael. You’re my life insurance.”

I neither understood that nor found it comforting.

Harry kept climbing. I took it that the ploy was bluff, rather than fight or even cut and run. Considering that they had us boxed in like a runner between first and second base, it was the only option that might possibly not involve suffering.

I think I jumped when a burst of guttural Chinese came out of the hulk at the top of the stairs. Harry took three more steps without acknowledging the temper tantrum. He was two steps from the top, and close enough to make it possible for one swipe of the side of beef our host used for a right arm to send us both to the bottom of the stairs. Fortunately, he chose to listen instead.

Harry’s nose came up to about his navel. To his credit, Harry never succumbed to the indignity of looking up. His voice was calm, deliberate, and pure business.

I couldn’t imagine what he was saying in his native tongue. The three of us seemed to hang in suspended animation. I saw those lethal arms poised for a strike that would have decapitated Harry and sent me halfway to Chelsea. I said a few words to the Lord and braced for whatever came in my direction.

When Harry finished, there was a pause for a few electric seconds that seemed longer than the bar examination while King Kong looked at me like something he could put in an egg roll. I had no idea what Harry was saying with astounding composure, but it had a most desired defusing influence. When Kong spoke again, it was with deference, and it sounded like a question. Harry gave him a few clipped words, and he backed out of our way. I heard the door behind us open, and when I looked back, the gang of three had vacated.

With Kong receding into the passageway, I could see a short, plump Chinese woman of what I guessed to be something over fifty years standing by the first door to the right. She was decked out in a green silk-brocade sheath that did not need a lengthy slit to reach her hips. Fifty pounds and thirty years previously it might have been becoming. At this point, her wearing of the uniform of the profession seemed as pointless as a baseball manager wearing cleats.

I assume she had followed the exchange, because she was all grins and welcome in English, more or less.

“You most welcome. Come in. Come in.”

Harry and I finished the last few stairs and followed her into a room that would have worked as a sumptuously decorated living room in any home in Brookline. Chinese red was the predominant color in fabrics that could have adorned a silkworm’s museum. The lighting was dim, the music was lush, and the aroma would make a water buffalo amorous.

She spoke in a tinny voice, strained through a grin that suggested that she was at our service.

“How we please you, gentlemen?”

Introductions seemed out of place. Since Harry had accomplished the impossible in getting us this far, I took it from there. The object of the moment seemed to be to get alone in a room with Mei-Li with as little explanation as possible. I came directly to the point.

“Mei-Li.”

That did it. The toothy grin opened as her head went back.

“Ah. Excellent choice. Very beautiful. And you, sir?”

For the first time that night, Harry was stuck for an answer. The best he could do was, “I’m with him.”

I have no idea what that suggested to the honorable madam. Whatever it was, it did not upset her sensibilities. The grin was a fixture, but nothing even registered in her eyes.

“So. Please follow.”

She opened a second door and welcomed us to a room that made the first room look like a freshman dorm. She closed the door behind us. I assumed that she went to hustle up Mei-Li.

I looked at Harry, but not before taking in the essence of our surroundings.

“I take it the clientele here is not off-the-street.”

He exhaled as if it were his first breath since we came out of the cold. He was smiling, but shaking his head. The message he was sending was something between conflict and frustration.

“You can’t understand. There’s just no way.”

I came close enough for a whisper to work below the level of the music.

“I’m willing to learn, Harry.”

Something caught in his throat that made his voice sound like gravel.

“You still don’t get it. The people they serve here have more wealth and power in their own world than you could dream of.”

“Drugs?”

Harry edged closer and dropped his voice below the level of the music. His hands went up in a gesture.

“Tip of the iceberg. Drugs are big, but this empire runs on everything illegal. Extortion big time. Illegal alien smuggling. Slavery, prostitution, those two go hand in hand. Police corruption. That’s a commodity they can sell to other organizations in other states. You beginning to get it?”

“What I don’t get is how you know about it. You’re not into this.”

For a fraction of a second I was tempted to end that last sentence with a question mark. I decided to go on faith. It probably saved our friendship.

“You don’t have to be a part of it to know about it if you’re Chinese. There isn’t any Chinese I know, no matter how far out of Chinatown, who doesn’t have family or friends who are being victimized.”

Questions were running wild in my mind, but there was one I had to get in before that door opened. I whispered this one.

“What in the world did you say to that ape on the stairs?”

“I used the two words they fear more than death.”

“Which are?” He was dragging it out. I didn’t blame him.

“Immigration Service.”

“The hell you did! You told him you’re an immigration officer?”

“No. I told him you are.”

I took a deep breath while I counted the number of years following disbarment I could get for impersonating a federal officer. Then I considered what could happen if any of these bozos compared notes with the crowd at the Ming Tree restaurant where I was known as Bradley’s defense lawyer. I figured disbarment and jail time would be the good news.

“One question. If this place is populated with illegal aliens, how come they let us in?”

“I told them you’re a good INS agent.”

“Meaning?”

The knob turned on the door as Harry whispered the last few words.

“Meaning I told them you’re on the take. They may not love you, but they sure as hell want to please you.”

The ramifications of that were beyond computing. I had about two full seconds to dwell on it before my senses were sent into overload.

There’s striking. There’s astoundingly beautiful. And then somewhere beyond that there’s Mei-Li. The woman that came through that door carried poise, radiance, and charm to a level I’d never experienced off of a movie screen.

You could say it was the cascade of midnight hair flowing to the waist of a lithe body that moved with an almost choreographed grace. Or it could have been the exquisite facial features that expressed elegance without intimidating the male ego. It could even have been the packaging of form-fitting turquoise silk from alabaster neck to floor.