R. MacAvoy - Tea with the Black Dragon

“What do you mean?” Liz wailed. “They’ve killed my mother! They’re going to kill…”

“Mr. Long. Mayland Long, M-a-y-1-a-n-d,” interjected the sergeant. His eyes were sleepy, his girth considerable.

“Yes, that’s his name.”

“And your mother’s first name is Martha?”

“Oh God, yes, what of it? Do something.”

“We have,” the policeman said. “Two days ago a Mr. Mayland Long reported your mother missing. He didn’t have anything more for us to go on, so there wasn’t much we could do, but an hour ago a kid walked in on the Palo Alto police with a crazy story about this man Long. And a tape. Since then all the departments on the Peninsula have been on the alert. ’Course, we hadn’t thought to check the Bay until you came to us with your information. Miss Macnamara.

“Thrown into a tree?” He dropped the pencil.

The young woman before him wriggled in her seat. There was a leaf sticking out of her hair, a long slender leaf like a donkey’s ear. Her arms were scratched and that bathrobe deserved an R rating.

The sergeant was a fan of old movies. He couldn’t decide whether Liz Macnamara looked more like Marlene Dietrich or Greta Garbo, but despite her tangled hair and grease smears she sure looked like something.

“Tree or bush. A laurel. In Golden Gate Park. What does it matter?” Liz folded her arms tightly, hugging herself.

“I’m sorry about your mother,” the sergeant said.

Liz nodded miserably.

“And considering what you’ve said about your relationship with these two kidnappers I think you need a lawyer.”

“Hell with that,” moaned the young woman. The sergeant’s mouth twitched sympathetically.

“Still, there’s not much more I can say to you until you’re represented by counsel…”

At that moment the outer door opened and Fred Frisch walked in, carrying his tape recorder and tugging on his moustache. Seeing Liz, he escaped the guiding hand of the officer who had brought him in, and he picked his way among the desks to her.

“I’m sorry, Liz,” he began. “I tried… I mean, do you remember me at all?”

She stood, examining him closely. Loose jointed, with limp blond hair, and eyes like a Bassett Hound: was this the fellow who had saved Long’s life? “Of course, Fred. Mr. Long talked about you tonight. He said you… kept him going.”

“You’ve seen him since? Is he…”

She shook her head. “I’m afraid they’ve killed him by now. They killed my mother.” She sagged back into the chair. “And it’s all my fault.”

Fred swallowed. “Hey. It’s not that way. I know all about it. I found your disk file at RasTech and printed it.”

She glanced up in amazement and Fred shifted from foot to foot. “He wanted me to. Mr. Long—the Black Dragon.”

“The what?”

Ignoring the sergeant behind his desk, Fred dragged a chair across the floor and sat. “His name is really Black Dragon, in Chinese. I really admire the guy, you know?”

“He liked you,” responded Elizabeth, blinking away tears.

“Did he say that?”

“Yes, and that he loved my mother. But they’re going to kill him. Even he thought so, when he threw me out of the car.”

“I don’t know,” said Fred, frowning and blowing out his moustache. “He’s a hard man to kill.”

Liz turned to him with the dawning of real curiosity. “Have you always had that moustache?” she asked.

“Hummm,” snorted the sergeant behind his desk.

Martha held the glossy, many-spoked wheel, leaning against it. The fat red sun had climbed a few degrees into the sky, and she had turned the nose of the Caroline toward it. Daylight touched the cold water, making the air milky with fog.

Mayland Long stood beside her with a glass of water in his hand. She started, for she had not heard him approach. Gratefully, she took the glass and drank from it.

“Oh yes, that’s better,” she said. He stood behind her and said nothing.

“Talk to me, Mayland. My head hurts.”

His answer came slowly. “I can’t think of anything to say.” With great care he ran his finger through her loose hair, combing it. Martha’s battered features eased into a smile. “I can’t braid it for you without my other hand.”

“That feels wonderful,” she murmured, peering into the pale obscurity at small dark shapes that had not been there a minute ago. Were they rocks?

She shivered. “I think I’ve been cold forever.”

“There I can help,” chuckled Mayland Long, and he put his arm around her waist as he pressed her body against his.

“Oh my!” she exclaimed. “You’re a furnace!” She touched his bare arm wonderingly. It was smooth, with no trace of the sticky tape. It radiated heat. He bent his face over hers. It, too, was very warm.

“So hot! You’ve used yourself up,” she said.

He raised his head and stared out. “No, I’m not quite used up. But I thought I was, early this morning.” Frowning, he added, “My understanding was… imperfect.” A movement on the water distracted him.

“Look.” She did so. One of the dark shapes in the fog had become a boat, a Coast Guard cutter. It veered by the bow of the Caroline, which bobbed in the faster boat’s wake.

Mr. Long strode to the stem to turn off the engine, that being the only action in their power to assist the boarders, while Mrs. Macnamara smoothed her dress. With old-fashioned courtesy and a certain degree of self-satisfaction, they welcomed their rescuers aboard.

The door opened to Martha’s triplet knock. In Long’s sitting room rain beat against the windows, but a tall lamp was lit, and soft light drew a circle around the antique gold chairs.

“I just called the hospital and they said you checked out. You weren’t supposed to do that; the doctors said you weren’t ready.”

Mayland Long smiled quietly, almost shyly, at Martha and ushered her in. Except for the cotton sling around his right arm, he looked as he had a week ago: a slight Eurasian man of indeterminate age, whose dark features faded into the shadows of the room.

“They didn’t like their test results,” he stated. “I didn’t like their tests. We were, neither of us, happy about the other, so I came home. Have you seen Elizabeth today? Have they set bail?”

Martha sank into the nearest of the chairs. “She’s out on her own recognizance, because she turned herself in, I visited her this morning, before the rain started. That young man was there—the one with the talking car—I mean the car you talk to.

“I hope Liz won’t have to go to prison.” Martha’s small jaw was set and her forehead creased with worry. “But I think the judge will be lenient, under the circumstances.” Her face in the lamplight showed every trace of the mistreatment she had suffered. She smiled a round-faced smile as he pulled his chair beside her and took her hand in his.

“How long have you been… a human being?” she asked him.

He glanced from her face to the gray world outside. “Less than a week, I think.”

She snorted. “You know what I mean.”

He looked back to her. “Six years ago I found an old man in the hills outside Taipei. He was a master of Tao: not my master, he informed me, but nonetheless he was very wise.”

Martha Macnamara frowned. “Tell me. I don’t approve of mysteries.”

Long looked down at his hands. His lean face expressed doubt. “What do you know of dragons, Martha.”

“ ‘How many times,’ ” she quoted, “ ‘have I entered the cave of the green dragon!’ ”

He turned halfway, and looked away from the brooding weather. “Delusion. Yes. But I don’t speak of a green dragon, but a black one.”