Xiao Bai - French Concession

Now Ch’i was standing on the ground by the bed, and to the right of her pelvis he could see the Mauser. She edged toward the right, and her pale ass had never looked curvier or more beautiful. Her green birthmark shivered. Strangely, he was not afraid. He wanted to reach his hand out and plunge it between her legs again. He wanted to pull her back toward him and make her cry out like a lonely seagull on the Whampoa at midnight.

When the Browning appeared to her left in front of him, he fired. He didn’t need to worry about the empty-handed man on the right, who had tossed his axe on the ground by the door, assuming that the Mauser had everything under control.

He fired straight at the Browning’s chin, shooting his chinbone off. He pushed Ch’i aside to look for the Mauser. Ch’i stumbled, but she suddenly turned toward him, spreading her arms out, as though she wanted to make her body into a wall.

The Mauser fired a single round that pierced her from the tailbone through to her belly. But her body changed the trajectory of the bullet as she turned, so that it penetrated the blanket and lodged in the wall.

Ku stretched out his right hand to break her fall, pulling the trigger with his left. One round, two, he aimed again, a third round. His targets slowly collapsed onto the ground, and for a moment there was complete silence. You could hear the wild cats in heat, and blood bubbling from wounds. Only now did he notice that his hand was pressed against Ch’i’s pubic hair. Her pubic bone, which usually felt soft, now felt sharp like a rock, making his wrists hurt. He withdrew his hand. He could feel the warmth in her body as it grew cold.

Ku was now sitting in the attic of the candle shop, smoking endlessly and plotting his revenge.

JUNE 17, YEAR 20 OF THE REPUBLIC.

3:00 P.M.

From the roof of Te-hsing Hotel, Ku scanned the mansion opposite him on Route Ratard with a pair of racecourse binoculars. He had booked the entire third floor of the hotel. Half an hour earlier, he had been busy working on the third-floor balcony disguised as a technician installing electric lights. But the roof was a better vantage point. From it he could see not just the mansion, but also its extensive grounds farther north, along Avenue Foch.

At 181 Avenue Foch was Fu-sheng Casino. It was one of the Boss’s top sources of income, and also where he made all his friends. Everyone had heard of it, but not everyone was allowed in. There was no shortage of gambling dens in the Concession. When the British banned gambling in the International Settlement, they had all picked up and moved south. But Fu-sheng was reserved for high rollers, and new gamblers had to be vouched for by existing members. Anyone who qualified was handed a thousand yuan worth of chips at the door and wouldn’t have to settle the bill until he left.

It was a three-story villa with red tiles and wide eaves, high walls and low walls. A squadron of fully armed guards posted at windows and balconies controlled every inch of the nine-acre grounds from their positions. The walls were decorated with intricate wall carvings, the perfect firing position for a shootout. Ku saw Morris Jr. standing behind a second-floor window on the corridor. He knew that that was the guardroom. The night before, he and Park had wormed their way into the building dressed as two high-rolling gamblers. Park, the former actor, was much better at coming up with disguises. The entire grounds could be seen from the guardroom. The casino guards could defend the main gate and walls from the three vertical windows facing north toward Avenue Foch, and use automatic rifles to secure the yard and back gate from the windows facing south.

Morris Jr. was about to leave the grounds. There were more than thirty bodyguards at Fu-sheng, huge sums of cash, and scores of important guests who couldn’t be touched. It was three in the afternoon, and he could afford to take off for a few hours, until the Boss himself got there in the evening. He always arrived punctually at eight and played the domino game Pai Gow for four or five hours, humming to himself as he played. Then Morris Jr. would not be able to step away even for a moment. Lin had found all this out by talking to the gardeners.

Morris Jr. was not tall, but he was as sturdy as a turret on an armored police vehicle. His nervous tic was squinting, but he wasn’t squinting right now. Although Ku had killed all three of the hit men sent to dispatch him the previous Sunday evening, that did not seem to worry the thug at all.

Morris Jr. had disappeared from view. He must be inspecting the rooms. The smaller rooms would be empty, with only a handful of guests milling about the roulette and dice tables. But Ku’s binoculars picked him out again inside the bar where guests came for a breather or a bite to eat. He was stuffing cigars into a leather pouch, bantering with the waitresses, and looking out the window. The back gate on the far side of the lawn was shut, and guards sat outside the greenhouse, dozing in the sun.

He went over to the iron gate, and disappeared behind a wall. That did not trouble Ku at all. Lin would be watching him from there. They had already spent a few days staking out this place, and they knew Morris Jr.’s routine by heart. He always cut diagonally across Avenue Foch, ignoring the cars that sped past as though he were the only man on the road. Then he would walk straight up to the counters at the Continental Car Service and hire a cab. Once he had paid, and the attendants said his cab was ready, he would saunter out, maybe light a cigarette at the door. He would turn the corner into the longtang next door, and walk toward the garage at the end of the alley.

The whole process from hiring a cab at the counter to walking into the garage would take him about three minutes. That gave Lin’s unit plenty of time to get ready. In those three minutes, they would board a car, having already hired one and claimed that they were waiting for a friend in the garage. Then they would direct the driver to make a turn at the gate, the only blind spot that could not be seen from the drivers’ waiting room. There they could hustle him off the cab with a gun to his temple, shoving him into the storage room just to the left of the exit, where they would truss him up and stuff his mouth with absorbent cotton balls.

No one in Lin’s unit knew how to drive a car, so Ku directed Park to join them for this operation. At this moment, Park was sitting in the driver’s seat, wearing his absurd knitted cap, its edge folded all the way back to the bobble, making it look like a dumpling with too much skin.

Ku ordered all his operatives to wear ordinary clothes with one really outrageous accessory. Lin, for instance, had wrapped his amber-colored glasses, nose bridge included, in white medical gauze. If there is one thing about you that stands out, people tend to focus on it and forget what your face looks like. A small trick, but it always works.

Killing Morris Jr. would rid Shanghai of a gangster known for his cruelty, but Ku also had other motives for targeting him.

As soon as Morris Jr. appeared, squinting at the car and making his way toward it, Park was to push the door open and shout over the black Czech-made car:

“Your usual opium den, sir? Hop on board, please.” Ku had wondered whether Park’s northern accent would give him away, but he decided it would have to do. Luckily Continental employed plenty of drivers from Shan-tung.

Morris had an opium habit. Although the casino provided it to guests as a courtesy, he kept his little vice a secret, especially from the Boss. He always directed the cabdrivers to take him to North Szechuen Road.