Henry Chang - Chinatown Beat

The Hip Ching tong elders all knew about their leader's mistress, the one called Mona, the Hong Kong slut, the one they never mentioned for fear of causing him loss of face. Now they were faced with a dilemma. They'd discovered that money was missing, a hundred thousand dollars, from their benevolent community services account at the New Eastern Bank. It had been withdrawn, signed out in the Big Uncle's hand, four days before his untimely demise.

Now the loss of face was theirs. The free congee breakfast at the Senior Citizen's Center they sponsored would be affected, and they would have to cut back the supply of Similac formula and flu shots to the Children's Health Clinic. There would be no more elaborate Chinese NewYear's banquets.

Perhaps they could pay it off with money from other accounts, like the secret fund for free coffee and cakes at their daytime mahjong parlors? But quickly enough their words came back to the murder and the missing money. It had been all too clean and clever and they did not believe that the see gay to, lowly car driver, was smart enough to have pulled it off. Not without help, anyway. Now they needed his help to find the mistress. Find her, find the money, and wash the whole affair. They needed to show the driver something, in good faith, for his cooperation, even from the small jail cell he was in.

San Francisco, after all, was just another Chinatown away, and with the Chinese world so small nowadays, how far could she have gotten? Not so far that their tentacles could not reach her.

The white lawyer with the blue shark eyes and the easy suntan walked in wearing a Burburry raincoat, gripping a silver Hal- iburton briefcase like it was a fashion accessory. Captain Marino remembered him from past encounters. Sheldon Littman, celebrity lawyer, who'd gotten an acquittal for master-of-the-universe broker Robert Cox, in the "rough-sex "killing ofJane Levsky. Reasonable doubt was the name of his game.

"Shelly Littman," the captain said, deadpan. "That's impressive for a car jockey, Shelly. How can he afford an expensive suit like you?" "Couldn't be the Hip Ching paying, could it?" asked Jack.

The lawyer dismissed Jack with a glance and a smirk. "'C'hat, gentlemen, is none of your business. I'm here to confirm his pretrial deposition testimony, taken by the Legal Aid lawyer, with the good detective here, and I'd appreciate it if you didn't cast aspersions on anyone who might be involved in this case."

"Aspersions?' chuckled the captain. "I like that, Shelly. I gotta get a new thesaurus. So, okay, we won't say bad things about the lowlife player who got dragged in here for killing an old-time low-life bloodsucker." He gave Jack a wink. "He's all yours, counselor."

Littman coughed to clear his throat, then started. "Okay, Detective. You track my client all the way across the country, while you're on suspension, because some woman, you claim, called you on the phone and told you Mr. Wong's the killer, here he is, come and get him?"

"It wasn't that simple," Jack answered.

"Of course not, Detective, it never is, is it? Okay, and then, you receive, via UPS, from someone unknown, according to you, a weapon with an attachment of some kind, supposedly used to kill someone." He shook his head like he'd just recited a fairy tale to a three-year-old. Jack nodded in agreement. "And why does this "alleged informant" call you? Detective, do you have some personal interest in this case?"

"I'm interested in seeing justice done," Jack answered coldly.

"You see where I'm going with this, Detective? Even if the judge doesn't grant Mr. Wong bail, there's enough doubt here that no jury will convict him."

"Well, that remains to be seen. Johnny Wong's prints are on the murder weapon. At the very least, he's an accomplice."

"Yeah, Tight. See you in court." Littman left the captain's door open as he walked out, not bothering to look back.

Captain Mario said to Jack, "What do you think?"

Jack looked off into the distance. "The woman who took a pot shot at me in San Francisco? She's definitely involved. This guy, Johnny Wong, maybe he's dumb enough to be a fall guy, or maybe he's really in deep. But he's a flight risk, and no judge is going to grant him bail and let him walk, not with his prints on the piece."

His eyes focused, came back into the room and settled on the captain. "I'm willing to bet that the old men on Pell Street are paying for Littman because they're sniffing at something in the wind. They need Johnny's help to figure out what happened and they're buying time."

There was a brief silence. Then Jack said, "If Johnny's not the shooter, then it's the woman. Give the Hip Ching a couple of weeks and see what they turn up."

"What makes you think they can find out what you can't?" the captain asked.

"Chinatown doesn't end at Delancey Street, Captain. It stretches to Hong Kong, and Taiwan, and China. It reaches out to Chinese settlements everywhere. Sooner or later, there won't be enough space in the yellow world for a pretty Chinese woman to hide."

Marino frowned.

"At any rate," Jack finished, "Wong's arrest takes the pressure off us. And headquarters, too."

"Keep me posted," Marino said.

Jack went down the creaky stairs to the street. Night rain began to fall. He was off duty now and thirsty. He headed toward the Golden Star bar.

He'd talked a good game, but he was uneasy. He didn't see Johnny for the perpetrator, yet keeping him in custody was necessary. The longer he was incarcerated, the more pressure would build up. The longer it took to bring him to trial, the more time the Hip Ching would have to conduct their own investigation. If Mona was guilty, they had the best chance of scouring the world to find her. And then, eventually, the old men from Pell Street would produce evidence givingJohnny an alibi; witnesses would suddenly come forward with dated racetrack tickets, or cancelled passes to some Atlantic City concert featuring Hong Kong singers. They'd provide testimony as to Johnny's whereabouts at the crucial time that would be hard to disprove, that would be just believable enough to sway a jury, and the DA would decide to quash the indictment. The press was another matter, especially the Chinese press. While Johnny was in custody, the media feeding frenzy would abate. For the mainstream newspapers, the case would quickly fade, become just another seedy Chinatown killing. In the Chinese-language press, the left-wing journals would cheer for Johnny. The right-wing conservative papers would like Johnny lynched, but they would never mention Big Uncle's mistress. By the time the case resurfaced-with Littman for the defense playing for delay Jack knew he'd be in a new precinct and out of the spotlight.

Finally, he reached the bar. The sounds of jukebox music spilled out of the door as he came through it, out of the cold rainy night.

At One Police Plaza the auditorium was packed with cop families, police cadets and veterans creating a proud field of deep NYPD blue. The Emerald Pipers band wailed, then applause punctuated the presentation of awards.

Jack stood on the stage in his neatly pressed blue uniform, before the mayor, the commissioner and an array of department brass, all applauding as the deputy chief pinned the Combat Cross above the gold badge over Jack's heart. It had taken him two shootouts to earn the little green-lacquered stripe with a cross in the middle, plus a promotion to Detective Third Grade, a step up in rank that carried a pay raise. The Internal Affairs investigation had been quashed.

When he looked out over the auditorium, Jack felt exhilarated yet sad. There was no family in the audience waiting for him.

He thought of Pa, and how proud he might have been. Maybe.