China Trade (3 page)

“Well,” he said, “in the meantime, if I’m going to have to work for your brother Tim, I think you’re going to have to buy me a piece of pie.”

“Don’t pick on my brother,” I said as he waved the waitress over.

“You always do. Want some apple pie?”

“No. That’s because he’s stuffy and patronizing and has no sense of humor.”

“And because you always had to wear his hand-me-downs.”

“No, it’s because they wouldn’t let me wear his hand-me-downs. They were a club I couldn’t join, my brothers, and their club had all the fun. They played baseball while I learned to embroider.”

“You embroider beautifully.”

I glared. “And I’m a great shortstop.” He knew it was true; we’d played together in a Central Park league last summer.

Bill grinned. “Hey, calm down. You can wear my hand-me-downs any time. I have this great ripped T-shirt—”

The waitress brought his pie just in time, so I didn’t have
to sock him. She also brought two forks. The pie was warm, its trails of cinammon and nutmeg mingling with the ginger from my tea.

“I suggest we discuss this case,” I primly suggested.

“Anything you want, boss.” Bill, still grinning, moved the pie to the center of the table. “Who’s CP’s protection?”

I knew what he meant, and the answer wasn’t Pinkerton.

“I asked Nora that,” I said. “She said not to worry about it, that that had nothing to do with this.”

“How does she know that?”

“She can’t know that. I finally caught on that she didn’t want to talk about gangs in front of the
low faan. Low faan
,” I started to add, “that’s—”

“Barbarians,” Bill cut me off. “Guys who look like me. Isn’t that what your mother calls me?”

“No, she has special words for you. Anyway, I think that’s what it was. I’ll go back to talk to her later, but it doesn’t really matter. That’s Golden Dragons territory, that corner, so it’s bound to be them.”

All of Chinatown, with very few exceptions, is divided among a small number of gangs who extort protection money from the shopkeepers, guard the gambling dens, deal drugs, and run whatever rackets there are to be run on their blocks. They’re one of the worst facts of Chinatown life, but they are a fact, and I’ve never seen the point of pretending to outsiders that it doesn’t happen like that.

“Have you talked to them yet?” Bill wanted to know.

“My mother would kill you if she heard you ask that. As if any decent young woman who respected her father’s ghost would increase his sufferings in the spirit world by taking unnecessary chances, like for example speaking to a Golden Dragon.” I squared my shoulders righteously. “Not yet,” I added.

“Want me to come with you?”

“Oh, god, no. They may not talk to me, but they certainly won’t talk to you.”

“I could pretend I’m a bad guy.”

“Unless you could pretend you were a Chinese bad guy it wouldn’t help.”

“I’ll work on it.”

“I’ll be careful,” I said, hearing in his tone what he wasn’t saying. “I’m only promising that because you didn’t tell me to.”

“Oh, I know better than to do that.”

“That’s why I love you.”

“Really? You love me?”

“No, but I appreciate you.”

“Well,” he sighed, “that’s more than I deserve. Okay. Where do you want me to start?”

I wasn’t sure, so I drank some tea and thought out loud. “What happens to stolen art?” I didn’t really expect him to answer me, but he did.

“Depends who stole it. If they know what they’re doing they’ll find a fence who specializes.”

“What does he do with it?”

“He launders it through shady galleries. Usually he’ll have private customers of his own, too.”

“What if the thieves don’t know what they’re doing?”

“It’s a pain to unload if you don’t have a fence. Porcelain may be different, but in general you don’t get nearly as much for art on the black market as it’s worth—if you can find a buyer at all. There’s a provenance problem.”

“There’s a what kind of problem?”

“Provenance. Where the thing came from. Most people who collect are as interested in value as they are in beauty. Sometimes more. Having a clear provenance is like having a pedigree. Otherwise it’s harder to be sure things aren’t fake. Or stolen.”

“That’s why you have to launder them through galleries?” I sampled the crumbly topping on the pie.

“Uh-huh.” Bill ate some pie himself and went on: “The other possibility about stolen art is that it can have been stolen on commission for someone in particular.”

“ ‘Can have been’? Is that really English?”

“I’ll look it up. There’s a big lump of raisins over there.”

I directed my fork to the big lump of raisins. “How often does that happen?”

“Raisin lumps?”

“Commissioned theft.”

“I’ll bet not often. Most people who could afford to do that could probably afford to buy the stuff they want outright.”

“Except from a museum or something that refuses to sell it.”

“Could that have been a problem here?”

“They hardly got the chance. People have to know you have something and then they have to offer to buy it from you before you can refuse to sell.”

“Would they have, do you suppose?”

“Refused? I don’t know. Why?”

“I’m just wondering if someone did know they were getting this gift, and knew that that meant he’d never get his hands on any of it.”

“Mrs. Blair said she didn’t tell anyone. And CP was keeping it secret until they were ready to unveil it to the public. They were planning a big opening. You don’t like the coincidence theory? Break in to a place because it’s there, grab whatever you can get your hands on, and leave?”

“I’m not nuts about it, but I’ve seen stranger things. Here, you finish.” He slid the pie across the table to me.

“It’s not my favorite theory either, but it’s a place to start.” I licked the last of the warm, spicy apple off my fork. “Anyway, once we find them, we can ask the bad guys why they took them.”

I took a manila envelope out of my big black bag. “This is for you. It’s Dr. Browning’s descriptions of the stolen pieces, and some photographs. He hadn’t gotten to photographing them all, yet.”

Bill glanced through the list and the Xeroxed photos. “Well, you’re right, it looks like porcelain. Where do you want me to start?”

“With the slime, funny man. The specialist fences and the shady galleries.”

I gathered my things and went to pay the check.

Bill was lighting a cigarette in the late-day sun when I came out of the cafe. The air was so cold, after the cozy warmth we’d been sitting in, that the sharpness of it was like a slap in the face.

Bill’s jacket was open and he wore no hat. Another hatless guy in another open jacket jumped back onto the curb so that a four-wheel-drive vehicle—so useful in the city—wouldn’t hit him. Then he calmly ambled across the street and up the block.

“What is this, a man thing?” I asked, pulling my hat down around my ears and zipping my jacket up to my nose. “No hat is macho? That guy almost got killed probably because his brain is frozen.”

“Or the driver’s brain is fried. You want me to call you later? Where will you be?”

“Try me at home, this evening.”

“Where are you going now?”

I fished in my pocket for a subway token. “Downtown,” I said. “I’ve got to see a man about a dragon.”

T
H R E E

B
y the time I came out of the subway, back in Chinatown, it was dark. I hate that about winter. I pulled my collar up to keep the icy air off the back of my neck and headed along Pell Street.

Even in the dark and the cold Chinatown was crowded. It always is. Sometimes I get up at six on a Sunday morning just to go out onto streets I can have to myself. You can walk along
the sidewalks then, at your own pace, without tripping over a guy who’s stopped for a bogus Rolex at a storefront stand or being jostled along by a family of four in a hurry to get the fish home for dinner while it’s still flopping and gasping in the plastic bag.

The sweatshop day had just ended. Women who’d been at their sewing machines since seven were haggling with vegetable sellers who’d been at their stands since eight. The women’s high-pitched voices cut through the shrieking laughter of children and the short-tempered shouts of the merchants who were only interested in How many? and Next! In the street a car drifted by with a blasting radio, the driver drinking in the sights, oblivious to the honking behind him. A wind-up plastic bird swooped, cawing, out of a street vendor’s hand and over the heads of the crowd, nosediving into a fire hydrant across the street.

By the time I reached the shop I was headed for, I was grateful for the soothing ring of a two-note chime as I opened the door, and even more grateful for the silence that followed when I closed it.

In the shop’s dim interior dark wood cabinets, built in China a hundred years ago, glowed in the light of glass-shaded lamps. Tiny brass knobs gleamed on rows of small, square drawers that ran practically to the ceiling. The air was rich with quiet scents, ginger and ginseng, honey and lotus root. Ceramic urns of various sizes sat in corners, on counters, and on top of the low, lionfooted table where old Mr. Gao would sit and drink tea with his customers when business was slow.

The shop was an apothecary, and old Mr. Gao, at the moment, was behind the counter, pouring-golden powder from a pewter scoop onto a white square of paper while an anxious woman watched. He was a tall, slow-moving man with sharp-knuckled, bony hands. Sparse threads of still-black hair ran straight back from his forehead over an age-spotted skull.

I stood a respectful distance away and listened to the quiet murmur of Mr. Gao’s voice. His fingers, deliberate and precise, folded the paper while he spoke. His words and the movement
of his hands came to an end at exactly the same moment, and he handed his worried customer a perfectly square, flat little package. Thanking him, she grasped her purchase and bustled out.

Mr. Gao, a small, satisfied smile on his thin face, watched her until the two-note chime rang behind her and the door clicked shut; only then did he turn to me.

“Ling Wan-ju, what a delight.” He smiled. Speaking in Chinese, he used my Chinese name. Mr. Gao’s voice was soft; I couldn’t remember a time, no matter what was happening, that I’d ever heard him raise it. “Have you come for something to stop the young men from swarming around you like bees in the honeysuckle? Or are you here to bring me some New Year’s luck?”

“Neither, Grandfather.” I returned his smile. “I haven’t had much trouble with swarming bees lately. And I’m sure your continued prosperity in the New Year will have little to do with me.” Mr. Gao wasn’t really my grandfather: All my grandparents’ pictures have their places near the picture of my father at the little altar where my mother burns incense and spirit money to ease their lives in the next world. The title was one of respect.

“Well.” Mr. Gao turned, reached for one of the drawers. “To encourage the bees, I have a tincture—”

“I’m sure my mother’s already bought it, Grandfather. And I’m sure it would work, if the honeysuckle were willing.”

Mr. Gao closed the drawer and smiled at me again. “The bees cannot smell the nectar until the blossoms open. But flowers find their own time to seek the sunlight. With what can I help you, Ling Wan-ju?”

“Grandfather, I have the temerity to come here to ask for a favor.”

He nodded gravely. “I hope it is within my power to grant.”

“I have a friend,” I said carefully, “who would like to pay her respects to the
dai lo
of the Golden Dragons.”

Mr. Gao’s expression didn’t change. “Do you think,” he asked, “that that’s wise—of your friend?”

“She feels that it’s important,” I answered. “She’s trying to be wise, and also to be useful.”

“Is it more important to her to be wise, or to be useful?”

“Probably,” I said, “she’ll never be wise.”

Mr. Gao, pursing his lips, looked into the ancient shadows of his store. Beyond the clouded glass half-panel in the front door were the night streets of Chinatown. I could see shapes there, moving, blending, separating; beyond the silence I could hear muffled voices, like the dim moaning of long-forgotten ghosts.

“Wisdom comes only from experience,” Mr. Gao finally spoke. “And then only to one capable of profiting by it.” With a pencil, he stroked quick Chinese characters onto a sheet of paper, then folded it over. “The desire to be useful is a virtue, though who can tell what will come of it?” He handed the paper to me. “Tell your friend to come to this place tomorrow morning at ten. She must come alone. She will be safe.”

“Thank you, Grandfather.” I tucked the paper into my pocket. “My friend and I are in your debt.”

Mr. Gao, our business concluded, formally offered his respects to my mother and brothers, and I offered mine to his sons and his many grandchildren. The two-note chime rang behind me as I stepped from the shadows and silence of Mr. Gao’s shop into the icy scramble of Pell Street.

A cold wind was cheering on the scraps of paper that pounced on people’s ankles as I made my way up the street. I was tempted to go home, but I’d skipped karate class yesterday, and I don’t like to miss two days in a row. I subwayed up to the dojo in Tribeca and, after I’d stretched, was assigned by Sensei Chung to take the beginners through their exercises. Probably because I didn’t come yesterday, I grumped to myself. I strode up and down the rows of uneven shoulders and marshmallow
fists, practicing patience, one of the virtues I have a little trouble with. Finally it was time for black belt sparring, and I got in two good bouts, practicing virtues I’m better at.

Later, flushed and invigorated, I changed my clothes and called Bill.

“I’m in your neighborhood, at the dojo,” I told him. “You have anything new?”

“At my age? But I’ll buy you a drink.”

We met at Shorty’s, the bar Bill’s lived over for sixteen years—since the days when I was sneaking off to a corner of the schoolyard with Matt Yin. Bill was there when I got there, in a battle-scarred booth with an amber drink in front of him. I waved to Shorty behind the bar and slipped in across the table.