S Rozan - Trail of Blood

“Doesn’t she owe you one, for calling me in the first place?”

“She doesn’t see it like that. Bill?”

“Uh-huh?” I could hear the snap of a match as he lit a cigarette.

“Do you think my mother could have done that on purpose? Called Armpit’s mother to see if she could find out anything to help me?”

Silence while he drew in that first nicotine hit. “I’d say yes.”

“But this is my mother!”

“Did she have any other reason to speak to Armpit’s mother?”

“Not that I know of. But…” I couldn’t think of anything more to explain my inability to believe this than “This is my mother.”

Bill and I made plans to meet; then I spent a useless half hour on the phone and online while Bill showered and pulled himself together. I called Mr. Chen, so Irene Ng could tell me he wasn’t in, and Mr. Zhang, so Fay could tell me he was out. I called Alice, so her voice mail could tell me she wasn’t available. I Googled the Ulrichs, the Fairchilds, and Chapei Camp in all the combinations I could think of, so the Web could tell me the Shanghai Moon wasn’t anywhere. I stared at my cell phone, trying to hypnotize it into ringing the Wonder Woman song so Mary could tell me anything at all. It just sat there.

I did my dishes, swept up, and straightened this and that. When the phone finally played something, it was the Bonanza theme. I grabbed it up. “Took you long enough!”

“Why, something happening?”

“No, and I’m sick of it!”

“A little antsy?” Bill asked sympathetically.

“So antsy I can’t stand it. Come on, I’ll buy you coffee. Meet me at Tai-Pan.”

“Uh-oh. Do I detect disobedience of a direct NYPD order?”

“No way! Do you see me anywhere near the White Eagles? And why can’t I buy my partner breakfast at my favorite bakery?”

“Since when is Tai-Pan your favorite bakery?”

I didn’t bother to answer, because he knew: since we found out how handy it was to Mr. Chen’s shop. I also didn’t comment on how he didn’t comment on my slip of the tongue that brought out “partner.”

My congee being a fairly recent event, I contented myself with tea and a red bean bun at Tai-Pan. I put this measly array on an unnecessary plastic tray and added napkins and knives and forks, the better to colonize space at the counter. Bill showed up soon after and ordered a large coffee and an ugly cream-filled pastry, something Chinese people wouldn’t have dreamed of eating until the Hong Kong British introduced what passed for food back home. When Bill took out his wallet, though, the stone-faced woman at the register waved him off with a nod to me.

“I told you I was buying.” I slid the placeholder tray off his part of the counter.

“You’re a class act. How’d she know it was me?”

“You’re kidding, right?”

He turned and looked at tables crowded with Chinese grandmas chattering in Chinese, Chinese waiters on their way to work in Chinese restaurants, Chinese mothers with Chinese babies. The only lo faan besides Bill were a tourist couple trying in whispers to guess the ingredients in the pastries.

“Okay, I get it.” He sipped his mammoth coffee. “So what’s the plan?”

“We have no plan. Mary has people keeping an eye on Mr. Chen and other people keeping an eye on the White Eagles. I’m obediently staying out of it, even though both leads came from me. If the police department gives a civilian medal of honor, I think I should get one.”

“For leads, or obedience?”

“Both.”

“So we’re just here for breakfast?”

“You don’t like the coffee?”

“It’s great. And this cream horn is even better.”

“Don’t even tell me about that thing.”

“And if Wong Pan shows up?”

“If he does, I want to…”

He gave me a moment, then prompted, “You want to what?”

“See him. I just want to see him.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“I’m lying.”

Across the street, sunlight flashed off the door at Bright Hopes as Irene Ng stepped outside to inspect the window display.

“I wonder if Chen’s in there?” Bill said.

“I would really, really like to go over and find out.”

“Tell me again how long you and Mary have been best friends?”

“Okay, all right,” I grumbled. I sipped tea and watched the comings and goings. I was trying to convince myself the chewy dough and spicy sweet filling of my red bean bun were enough compensation for being forced to sit on the sidelines when Bill nudged me.

“There’s your cousin.”

And damned if Armpit Kwan wasn’t slouching up the other side of the street. His greasy hair flopped over his forehead, and if he’d changed his shirt since yesterday, it only proved his entire wardrobe was equally spattered and disgusting.

“Those two guys,” I said. “The one next to him and the one who just stopped at the noodle cart? They’re White Eagles, too.”

“Big deal ones?”

“I don’t think so. Junior nobodies, like Armpit. I wonder where Fishface is. Or his lieutenants.”

We watched Armpit and his boys meander. They stuck to that block but didn’t pay much attention to Bright Hopes. They smoked, they ate, they ogled girls.

“Must be waiting for the boss to show up,” Bill said.

I agreed; if this was the White Eagles’s big score, nothing would happen without their dai lo.

“That guy with the map, by the mailbox.” Bill pointed. “Fifty cents says he’s a cop.”

“And the man selling folded-paper animals. And the Xpress Messenger van, which doesn’t seem interested in expressing anything and isn’t getting a ticket after twenty minutes in a no-standing zone.”

“Well, everyone’s ready.”

I grabbed his arm. “Maybe not for everything.”

Making his way along the sidewalk was C. D. Zhang, carrying a leather briefcase. He entered Bright Hopes, where Irene Ng led him toward the back. She returned to the counter alone. C. D. Zhang must be in the office with his cousin, Mr. Chen, and I’d have bet a nickel his brother, Zhang Li, was there, too.

“Family conference?” Bill asked.

“Did you see Armpit checking out C. D. Zhang when he went in?”

“Yes.”

“I just got a bad feeling.”

“About what?”

“Our two upcoming crimes. They may be the same. Do you think the White Eagles could have heard about the Shanghai Moon? And they’re waiting for Wong Pan to bring it to sell to Mr. Chen so they can steal it?”

“Well, if that’s the case, they’re walking into the biggest mousetrap in Chinatown.”

We waited for more mice, but none showed. Just as I finished my tea, C. D. Zhang came out again. He headed briskly off in the direction he’d come from.

“What was that about?” I asked, but rhetorically. I pulled my phone out.

“You’d better be calling from Florida,” Mary said.

“C. D. Zhang just went in and out of Bright Hopes.”

“How do you know that?”

“I have a periscope. Look, I know you have people watching the place, but I wasn’t sure they know who he is.”

“I’m watching it myself,” she grudgingly admitted. “That was him just now?”

“You’re in the van?”

“Never mind. That was him?”

That was the cop speaking, not the friend, so I just said, “Yes.”

“He’s family and in the business. Why shouldn’t he drop in?”

“I don’t know. But on a day like this-”

“We don’t know it’s a day like this.”

“Oh, come on! There are three White Eagles loitering on that block, including Armpit. Wait-four. Warren Li just turned up.”

“Another bottom-feeder. No big score is going down just because those four punks are hanging out. Besides which, I know Li’s here, because I have two surveillances going, one on Chen and one on your no-good cousin. On your say-so, Lydia. If at least one of them doesn’t pan out my captain’s going to bust me back to the street and the overtime for all this will come out of my paycheck. And you’re about to ask me to put a tail on another old man who dropped by his cousin’s store? Don’t tell me you weren’t, I know you were. By the way, where are you?”