City of Dragons (8 page)

The woman paused again, choosing her words with deliberation. “For reasons which I will discuss tomorrow. Twenty dollars a day is your rate, is it not?”

“Normally, yes.”

“Until tomorrow at one, then.”

“Good-bye, Mrs. Winters.”

She didn’t realize the phone was off the hook until it made an irritated buzzing sound, and the whiny voice of a switchboard operator came on to scold her. She hung up, staring again at the bloodied bandage and poisonous powder from the herbalist. Then she reached for the trash can under her desk, looking for the morning paper. Saturday morning, before Eddie Takahashi died.

She found a
Chronicle
neatly folded, pulled it out and turned to the shipping news. On the bottom was a brief notice: “Believed to have died of a heart attack, marine engineer Lester Winters was found dead in his bed in the Pickwick Hotel on Fifth and Mission, San Francisco, on Friday. He is survived by his wife Helen Winters, of Alameda, and daughter Phyllis. Police suspect no foul play.”

The church bell tolled the half-hour. Miranda locked up the poison and marijuana cigarettes in her safe. Grimacing, she retucked the bandage inside her bra, shoved on her hat, and headed for home.

“How’s the Sling?”

“What?”

“I said, ‘How’s the drink?’ ”

The swirling gleam of the Twin Dragon’s famous circular bar was dull with excited clamor, peanuts, spilled booze, and the bad breath of the salesman on Miranda’s left, most of him and his Rob Roy spilling on Miranda. She shrugged her left shoulder hard, but he was beyond feeling anything. It was Sunday night, the last night to tie one on for China.

She leaned into Rick. He was standing in between her and the blonde determined to jiggle what she had before the market dried up.

“What happened to that goddamned reservation?”

Rick smiled, shook his head, and gestured to his ear. Spilled his own scotch-and-water when the blonde fell on him, guffawing over a thigh-slapper from the gent two stools down. Rick helped prop up the dime-store Mae West, while Miranda wiped her shoulder in disgust. So much for her Persian lamb coat.

She downed the rest of the Singapore Sling, leaving a washed-out cherry at the bottom of the martini glass, pushed it across the bar, and slid herself off the stool. He nodded, and they squeezed through the bar crowd. They emerged in a Waverly Place nearly as thick and almost as drunk.

Miranda and Rick turned right and followed a deer trail against the side of walls and doors, past the Rice Bowl benefit auction for a new electric Frigidaire, past the Chinese band, past the firecrackers, finally reaching the corner of Waverly and Clay, home to the street carnival.

A fat lady was drawing betting money on a guess-your-weight machine, the smell of popcorn, hot dogs, peanuts, and cotton candy masking the more aromatic odors of Chinatown. Miranda leaned against a slab of old brick wall, watching the wheel of fortune go around two booths down.

“What the hell are we doing here?”

Rick shook out a Lucky Strike, offered her one; she shook her head, he lit it and finally answered.

“We’ll find a place to talk. That’s not the problem—”

“It isn’t?”

“The problem is you need to relax. You had a shock yesterday, the cops are riding you, and you need to lighten up and relax. For God’s sake, Miranda—”

“You think I’m the problem? Listen, bright eyes, I agreed to meet you so we can discuss this case you want to blow wide open—remember? And if I need to relax so goddamn much, then why the hell did you bring me back to Chinatown? You said it was business—remember?”

“Shhh. Shut up.” He pulled her back toward the wall, and she angrily threw his hands off.

“You cocky Irish bast—”

His mouth was on hers, suddenly, his body pressing her against the brick. On reflex, she opened her mouth, let herself be handled, let herself be used, before jolting back to the present. Rick wasn’t using his tongue, the kiss not motivated by lust. Her hands unclenched and she held them gingerly against his back.

He whispered: “Good girl. Doyle and other cops, walking.”

He tilted his head to the left, his hat obscuring any view of her face. His mouth was on her right ear.

“Gone yet?”

“Talking at a booth.” She could feel his lips brush her hair. “What’s the perfume?”

“Vol de Nuit.”

“Not your old stuff. In New York.”

His body was warm, and she squirmed. She stopped wearing Je Reviens the same year she stopped remembering.

“Too old-fashioned. They gone?”

“Wait. Turn your head.”

She faced Clay, watching the roving bands of partygoers laughing under the neon signs.

“S’OK now.”

Miranda took a deep breath, fixed her hat, met Rick’s eyes. They crinkled at the edges, which irritated her.

“Thanks. I think. So what do you suggest now, Sir Galahad?”

He took her elbow. “Let’s go get something to eat.”

“In this mess?”

He shrugged. “We’ll find a couple of seats. Universal Café, Shanghai Low, we’ll find something.”

They threaded through the games of chance with no chance at all, pop the balloon mister, throw a dart, do it for China. Men with sweaty necks tried to arm-wrestle the Chinese acrobat and win a dollar.

End of the alley, Sacramento Street. Drunks wavered by, unhindered by cars, all traffic except human closed off until tomorrow. Rick pulled Miranda toward a tawdry black tent, propped against an association wall. The sign outside read MADAME PENGO—PAST—PRESENT—FUTURE.”

“Where the hell are you going?”

He pushed his hat up, eyed the long line of Madame Pengo’s customers, mostly women, mostly older, mouths gnawed by petty tyrannies and dimly felt loss. A petite, pretty brunette in silver sable waited too, drinking it in, electric despair, excitement of struggle. Escaping the ennui of plenty.

“Madame Pengo—I remember that name …”

“Sanders, goddamn it, we either talk or I go home.”

He shrugged, and led her to the corner. Miranda hesitated, not wanting to pass the herbalist, not wanting to see where Eddie fell. Not with the crowd, the girls in strapless dresses, hair perfumed, boyfriend tight.

Something hard brushed against her, and a little girl darted by them, ragtag blur, maybe seven, maybe eight. Blindly running. She tripped and Rick caught her. Bloody, scraped knee. Dirty dress, dirty face. Deep circles under eyes too old for childhood.

Noise from the fortune teller’s tent. A woman dressed in gaudy rags parted the waiting line of customers.

“Is she all right?”

The child backed against Rick’s legs. Miranda put a hand on her shoulder.

“You’re not her mother.”

She didn’t know why she said it and knew it to be true.

The woman’s face faded against the cheap shiny jewelry.

“Come inside. Bring Anna.”

They followed, Rick lifting the little girl into his arms. Her customers stood silent, curious, watching, a fat woman in gingham reaching out to touch Madame Pengo.

They stooped into the darkness. A table took up most of the space, covered in a stained white cloth and a cloudy crystal ball. The fortune-teller gestured to a couple of chairs. Walked to a crate behind the table, pulling out a ragged scarf and a bottle of rye. Wetted the fabric, and knelt in front of the little girl, dabbing the torn knee.

“Anna’s not a relation, exactly. I’m watching her for her mother.”

“Maybe you’re spending a little too much time in the past and the future.”

Not a flicker. “Lady, I’d be a rich woman if I had a nickel every time a child goes missing at a carnival. I’m not from Chinatown, and she knows it—figures she can run out on me. But she knows where she lives, she knows me, and I would’ve found her eventually, though I appreciate you getting her out of the street.”

Her face was strong, hardened like only the once vulnerable can be. Elegance clung to her, faded and almost invisible, lingering behind the gauzy gypsy rags and imitation jewels. A woman who’d lived well when times were good, and times hadn’t been good for a while.

Rick stared at her. The little girl remained expressionless, almost somnambulant, the energy that sent her running all gone away.

“Didn’t you make a big ruckus in New York, about fifteen years ago? It was before the Crash … you played the hotel circuit, didn’t you? Made quite a name—the Eurasian medium sensation, or something. No one could prove anything against you, but you disappeared. I guess fashions come and go, even in the crystal-ball circuit.”

Eurasian. Explained the child’s haunting beauty, explained her worn dress. Explained, most likely, where and what her mother was. One of the whores in one of the Chinatown bordellos, charging by exclusivity of service. Whites only, Chinese only, Orientals only. No such restrictions for the poorest, the most desperate.

Miranda said: “I know all the acts in this city. When did you get here?”

Madame Pengo smiled at Anna, ignoring the question. The little girl twisted out of Rick’s grip, running to hug the fortune-teller.

“You see? Anna knows me. Her mother’s a friend of mine.”

Miranda fished in her purse, pulled out a Chesterfield. “You mind if I smoke?”

The gypsy shook her head. Rick lit the cigarette with a lighter. Miranda took a long drag on the Chesterfield, looking at the older woman.

“I think I know where her mother works. Does she get enough to eat? Does she go to school?”

Madame Pengo whispered something to Anna Miranda couldn’t hear. Together they walked behind the table, the little girl standing, leaning against the woman while she sat.

“She’s taken care of, lady. Her mother puts something by, when she can. I do, too. She gets fed, more than some people. You think it’s easy? We’re Eurasian. Chinese don’t want us, whites don’t want us. We’re treated like mongrel dogs. But I’ve got enough money put by, in case—I’ve got enough money put by.”

The fortune-teller stroked the girl’s hair, and Anna pressed against her, eyes closed. Miranda thought of the other children she’d seen seven years ago in the Central Valley. The land of plenty, the land of hope, the land of racial purity. Aryans and Daughters of the American Revolution, all the rest cotton-pickers, hayseeds, stoop labor. No poor, no Okies, no coloreds, no mongrels allowed, not in agricultural towns. Not much of a new deal for them. No fucking deal at all.

Rick nudged Miranda. She squeezed the cigarette out, put the rest of it back in her purse. Madame Pengo looked up at them. Her voice was quiet.

“Thanks for helping Anna. If you sit down, I’ll give you a free reading. I think maybe you could use some advice.”

Miranda stared at her and the little girl, sat down in one of the wobbling chairs.

“What makes you say so?”

The fortune-teller studied her for a few seconds. “I know who you are. You’re in a dangerous business. Word travels fast in Chinatown.”

She was still stroking Anna’s hair. The little girl watched Rick and Miranda, eyes unfocused, clutching the older woman’s side.

Miranda said slowly: “General advice … or do you have something specific in mind?”

Madame Pengo shrugged. “Both. If you’ve got a good man, hold him.” She nodded at Rick, who took the other seat.

“He’s not my—”

“The Chinese say whoever learns without thought is lost. But whoever thinks without learning is in great danger.”

“Am I in danger?”

Madame Pengo paused, looked at the floor for a minute. “And read your Bible. It’s been a great comfort to me, lady, I can tell you. Let me see. I think Acts … Acts 27, 10 or 11, my memory isn’t what it used to be.”

No one spoke. The band music was still blaring from Stockton, the shouting and laughing outside getting louder. Madame Pengo’s head sunk further on her chest, her hands resting on the table. Anna leaned against her. Her eyes were closed.

Motionless, the woman and the little girl, statue-still, carnival Pietà. Miranda stood up. She opened her purse and took out three dollars, most of the cash she had. She left it on the table, looked over at Rick.

He nodded, dug in his pockets, contributed a five. They walked toward the tent flap.

“She will be all right.” The voice was deep, sonorous.

Miranda pivoted. No one else in the tent. The voice came from Madame Pengo. Flickering light, shadows on the thin high ceiling of the tent playing tricks, the woman’s rags gleaming like silk and velvet, cheap trinkets like Spanish gold. Little girl suddenly old, unnaturally still, face like a Madonna.

Madame Pengo opened her mouth, still motionless, and Miranda saw the words come out, foreign voice, clear and rich over the band, the shouts from the alley.

“She will be all right. There is much evil when child turns against father, but also salvation. She will be all right.”

Miranda looked up and around the tent, unnerved, trying to spot a wire. Voice was too loud. Rick stared at the fortune-teller, mouth open, as if reading to himself.

“He loves you. Unlock the box. She will be all right.”

Too loud, the voice, like cannon fire, like bombs in Madrid, church bells tolling the dead, sound pulsing through her body. Sweat trickled down Miranda’s neck, her breath short, shallow, staccato.

“Paths cross. Find the way. He is lost. Find your way. Unlock. Open. Live. She. Will. Be. All. Right.”

Miranda stumbled backward, hands pressed to her ears, face wrenched, agony. Rick was standing dumbly, staring at her. Before the gypsy could say anything else, Miranda turned and ran out of the tent.

Six