Henry Chang - Red Jade

“Yeah, go on,” said Jack, figuring the update was from Detective Nicoll.

“So we figured we’d bring him to the car, check him out. Okay. Once we leave Julio’s and hit the street, he gets free and we gotta chase him, like six fuckin’ blocks. Jimmy caught him first, took him down hard.”

Jack nodded, an offer of respect and appreciation.

“He was uncooperative after that,” the cop continued. “Started bitching police brutality.” He gave Jack a business card that read JOON KOREAN GINSENG DISTRIBUTOR, with a Jackson Street address. “We found that on him. Nothing much else. Anyway, we can hold him for disorderly, resisting, or assault on a police officer. Anything like that, he’s got at least a few days chillin’ with the bad boys.”

Jack understood that meant Eddie would be in custody a while, and since it was a weekend, it’d be harder to find a public defender even if he demanded one.

They turned back toward the cruiser.

“Bring him out,” Jack said.

The man could have passed for a kid, short enough, his head well beneath Jack’s chin.

“I was just shooting pool,” the Chinese man protested, “I didn’t do anything. ”

“Heard you did the marathon, trying to cut out.” Jack yanked down the shoulder of the man’s jacket. Even in the dim street light, the Red Star tattoo was clearly visible.

“What the fuck,” the man complained. “Yeah, I ran. Those gwailo cops were looking to fuck me over!”

“Okay, cut the bullshit,” Jack said, pulling back the handcuffs to reveal a monkey tattoo on the man’s wrist. Curious George. “This is jing deng ,” marveled Jack. Destiny.

“What’s that?” puzzled Eddie.

Ngai jai dor gai , remembered Jack. Short people are shrewd.

“So what’s your name again?” Jack pressed.

“Carl Lim.”

Jack chuckled “You mean like in ‘Carlos Lima’?”

The man’s face froze.

“How about ‘Jorge Villa’?” Jack challenged. “Who would you be then, George Hui? Curious George, huh?” Jack could see the man’s resemblance to the face in the juvenile offender photo, and decided to bluff. “Guess what, Eddie?” Jack deadpanned. “Your own dailo placed you at OTB.”

“Dailo?” sneered Eddie. “Bullshit.”

“He said you guys had a beef over watches, and money,” Jack prodded.

“Right. Last I heard,” Eddie said defiantly, “he was brain dead in Emergency.”

“Yeah, you keep believing that,” Jack snapped. “He put your shorty ass at the scene. In the alley.” Jack noticed Eddie flinch at being called “shorty.” “That’s right, you’re bad ,” Jack added sarcastically, “so bad you’re good for Murder One, monkey boy.”

He pushed Eddie back into the cruiser, and took a better look at the Korean ginseng business card. The address was just off the fringe of Chinatown.

“Let’s roll,” Jack said as he slipped in beside Eddie.

Number 818 Jackson was on a street that slanted off the intersection of Jackson and Rainier, a quiet street this time of day. It was an old-style house with an addition built onto the back of it. There was a street-level back door that led inside.

An old Asian couple came out as the patrol car killed its flashing strobes.

Eddie stared at them from the backseat, his mouth quiet but his eyes scheming.

Jack came out of the cruiser and walked toward them. Korean, he guessed. The cops kept the cruiser’s interior lights on so the old couple could see Eddie behind the back cage partition.

Eddie finally bowed and twisted his face away.

Jack showed the man the business card.

“ Ai goo ,” the old man said. “He rent room from us.”

“Can I see the room?” Jack asked respectfully, offering a slight bow.

“ Ari seyo ,” the man agreed.

The inside hallway smelled like bulgogi and kimchi , with the menthol hint of salon pas drifting off the old couple. They led Jack to a side room. The small room had only enough space for a single bed with an all-purpose night table and a freestanding metal cabinet that doubled as a closet and a dresser. Some clothes were draped around a chair. No windows. No bathroom. Not many places to hide anything.

Jack considered the obvious: toss the bed, the cabinet, check the knapsack, and under the chair and night table. He gauged the concern on the faces of the Korean couple. Remembering the East Broadway railroad flat that Eddie and his victim Koo Jai had shared in New York’s Chinatown, he pictured the loose floorboards covering their stash spots.

The floor here was covered with old linoleum, and Jack didn’t see any loose edges or pried-up corners. He guessed Eddie was smarter than that. He heard a click, like a timer, then the hum of a fan unit nearby. Air. Since there were no windows, he looked for the vent, and saw the aluminum grate high on the wall, covering the extension of the ductwork into the room addition.

Too high up for Eddie to reach. Unless he stood on a chair.

Jack pulled the chair over, flashed his Mini Maglite into the grate. A shallow recess, empty. But there was a bend in the air duct. Although barely visible, he noticed a tiny plastic loop wrapped around the bottom slat of the vent grate. It looked like fishing line.

Jack opened his army penknife to the Phillips screwdriver and unscrewed the grate. It came free after a slight pry, but was caught on the nylon line. Jack tugged gently and saw a dirty plastic bundle emerge from the bend in the duct. He dragged it out and saw metallic watchbands inside. In one corner of the clear plastic bundle he could make out the denomination on a wad of fifty-dollar bills.

He unwrapped the plastic, then admired the expensive watches within: three Rolex Oysters, four Cartier Tanks, six Rados. And five black-dial Movado Amorosas. Probably fifty grand’s worth of deluxe timepieces, guessed Jack. He thumbed through the wad of cash, maybe five thousand, that had probably been ripped out of the victim’s pants pocket as he lay dying in the snow of the Doyers Street alley.

Damn clever, thought Jack, turning to the old couple as he scanned the room again. “Where’s the bathroom?”

Going back through the hallway, they came to a closet-size bathroom that consisted of a sink, a toilet, and a narrow shower stall with a sliding door and a vent fan in the ceiling.

Eddie was clever, Jack concluded, but in a predictable way.

Removing a roll of toilet tissue and a can of air freshener, Jack lifted the cover off the toilet’s water tank. The water was murky and he shined the flashlight into it. At the bottom of the tank there was a roll of black plastic. The cold tank water had pressed the plastic into the contours of a gun.

Jack felt the chill of the water as he pulled it out.

Inside the black plastic was a revolver, a.22-caliber Taurus with a nine-shot cylinder. The murder weapon from the OTB shooting. Jack took a breath. It had barely taken him a half hour inside the Korean house. He knew some of his effort here bordered on illegal search and seizure but he didn’t care. He had the killer, the murder weapon, and the swag all bundled up, just in need of a lab match for ballistics and forensics. What mattered was that the perpetrator was in custody, he thought. A lawyer, like Alex, might disagree, but Jack wasn’t feeling the need to be legally correct at this exhilarating moment.

Eddie was somber as Jack leaned into the back window of the cruiser and said, “We’ve got the gun, kid. You’re good, though, shooting.22s. A hitman’s caliber. You’re good for two kill-shots, and one critical hit.”

“Don’t know nothing about no gun,” Eddie insisted.

“How long do you think before we match up the ballistics? Before your prints come back off the watches? And off the vic’s VIP card from the titty bar, that you used for ID?” Jack shook his head dismissively.