Daniel Rose - Larry's Kidney, Being the True Story of How I Found Myself in China

“Oh, that’s right, Twenty-four, you’re moonlighting on the sly?”

“Double agent, license to kill,” she snickers. “Martini shaken, not stirred.”

I love that she can make fun of all the spying silliness. Situation splendid.

“Heat so hot you shirt is wet already,” she notes. “You are very schvitz.”

“It’s hot, all right. Where’d you pick up the slang?”

“I jabber on Internet so make this day worthwhile for you.”

The market, when we get there, respires the electrifying odor of garlic and incense. We are jostled by local vendors with beaten-up toenails and Westerners whose toenails look as if they’ve never done an honest day’s work in their lives. Merchants and customers alike use finger symbols to signify numbers, a kind of bartering sign language I don’t remember from last time I was here. It’s pleasant to be under the wing of my young protector. “Be wary of pickypocks,” Jade warns, and she shows me how to discern between antiques that are genuinely old and those manufactured two weeks ago. She scratches the surface of an ancient-seeming jewelry box where particles of sand have been glued to make it seem as weathered as something from the Ming dynasty, and sure enough there’s a shiny staple underneath. I’m impressed: The art of instant Minging manifests an ingenuity that’s almost worth the price. But Jade is embarrassed about her countrymen’s duplicity.

“Don’t worry, we have fibbing in our country, too,” I assure her. “We even have our own finger gesture to symbolize it.” I demonstrate crossed fingers. “It means the person is faking.”

Jade is confused-she thought crossed fingers meant hoping for good luck. I’ve never thought of it before, but I tell her that the gesture actually means both-faking and hoping. What an odd combination. Jade crosses her thin fingers. “Good luck, I trick you,” she says, grasping the double concept right away.

I don’t actually mind losing money at this sort of bazaar, because there’s some justice in having Westerners spread the wealth like this-paying a few extra dollars for an imitation Cartier helps make up for the ways we’ve always exploited the Chinese, sort of individualized reparations. But Jade seems determined to get me my money’s worth. At a stall with yellowing, chipped animal bones, I eye an eagle skull with a black beak. Jade confirms that the dried cartilage is real. But what’s this other beauty?

“Walf. Small walf,” Jade says. “Not find this on Canal Street!”

She decides I’ll never fully grasp the Chinese soul until I own a small Chinese wolf skull, and to negotiate with the vendor she uses a range of lovely sounds my brain scrambles helplessly to make sense of. “Boozy boozy Negev Desert!” she scolds with finger upraised. “Who has chiggers?

She! She! She!” she laughs, putting her hand on his forearm as they chortle together, all part of a prescribed game. She cajoles most artfully, tugging on his sleeve, swinging her hips coquettishly, calling him uncle- and periodically accusing him of trying to pass counterfeit bills. “But not too crispy to travel?” she asks me after winning the sale for two dollars. It’s just coming to me that she means “brittle” when my cell phone rings.

“What’d you lose now?” I ask, but it’s not Larry-it’s the Australian accent of Antonia, telling me she reached someone, something, somewhere…?

“Listen, Antonia, there’s a crowd around me, can you hold on while I go someplace that’s quieter?”

But there is no quiet place in the market. Jade leads me to the back of a booth away from the main foot traffic, yet even here my English attracts a small crowd, including three schoolboys with their arms affectionately around one another’s necks. While I cover my ears from the ambient noise, Antonia tells me she’s learned that kidney transplants have indeed been drastically reduced because of the Restriction, but that if I can promise confidentiality, there’s a surgeon out in the city of Shi a few hours west of Beijing who may still have access to some.

“How can he skirt the law? Will it be a healthy organ?”

“My understanding is that this Dr. X is so highly placed, if he wants an organ-which will be immaculately screened-he knows how to make the authorities look the other way. But time is of the essence. If you can get there by this evening, he’ll be able to meet you. Don’t fool around with trains; just take a taxi and go. The fare will cost maybe eight or nine hundred RMBs-less than two hundred dollars.”

“Is it safe?”

“Safe?”

“I mean, if they catch us, will they lock us up to make an example?”

“I know what ‘safe’ means, I’m just framing my answer,” Antonia replies. There’s the wail of a siren from her end as a police car hurtles by. “I can’t say anything for sure,” she informs me after it passes. “Nothing is guaranteed. But I’ll tell you that if I were desperate to save a family member, this is the place I would go.”

That does it for me. I agree to run it by Larry and, if he’s good to go, to get started immediately.

“When you can commit a hundred percent to getting out there today, call me back and I’ll confirm with my contact,” Antonia says. “I have an hour and a half before my flight.”

“Where you off to?”

“Conference in London. I’m almost at the airport now. I won’t be able to hear you in a few minutes, but I’ll keep my cell on vibrate.”

“Antonia, you’re an angel…”

“Just call me back within ten minutes so I can let my contact know. Then, when you procure a cab, have the cabbie call the surgeon’s secretary so he can get directions. Here’s the number…”

“Thank you, thank you. When I woke Larry last night to tell him there was a ray of hope, he nearly wept with gratitude,” I say. Am I laying it on too thick? He might have wept-if I’d actually wakened him, and if he were that kind of person. The main thing I want Antonia to know is how much her efforts are appreciated.

“I want to make very clear that I’m not guaranteeing anything, and I’m formally absolving myself of all responsibility for your actions. But good luck. And Daniel?”

“Yes?”

“Be careful…”

Hanging up, I look at Jade. Her seal eyes allow no light to escape. She’s heard everything, understood everything. She’s my instant ally as I dial Larry and get his okay, call Antonia back with our commitment. As we rush to the market exit, Jade asks me something only an ally could.

“This lady you speak with, she is someone we can trust?”

“I think so. I met her at a Jewish synagogue last night.”

“You are Jew?”

I flag a cab. “Yes.”

She stops me and lifts my hat. “But where you horn?”

“Only about half of us have horns these days,” I say, ushering her inside the cab. “It’s part of a PR push. So where shall I drop you?”

Jade waves her hands no as we begin flying through the traffic. “Of course I halp you in this task,” she says.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I say. “Shi is hours away. I don’t even know what time we’ll be back tonight.”

“Don’t ridiculous you,” she says adamantly. “This my country. You are guest. I only worry how you manage in Shi?”

“Don’t know yet,” I say. “We’ll play it by ear.”

“Your ear not get tired from playing it so much?”

I lean to give her a kiss on the cheek. She recoils slightly until she understands it’s just the cheek. Now she’s happy again. I’m happy because I really can use her help. Her face looks American to me right now as we rush to Larry’s hotel. I see my face in the reflection of her sunglasses, and it looks Chinese. Everybody looks like everybody, I conclude sagely. It’s the wisdom that comes when things start clicking into place.