Telegraph Hill (14 page)

Chapter 24

The Golden Gate Bridge ended in a spread of toll
booths. They drove through the tall pines and eucalyptus of the Presidio, past
the Palace of Fine Arts, up Lombard to Van Ness. He turned up several narrow
streets, winding circuitously up Russian Hill. At last he stopped on Filbert
Street overlooking San Francisco Bay. To his left was the Golden Gate Bridge.
To his right, Alcatraz Island jutted amid the green waters, forlornly beautiful
as its sun-bleached prison walls crumbled in the salt air.

Ray drove on. He replayed the sickening collision,
the pointblank shots. He wondered if both men were dead. He knew he should feel
something, but for now, those men were like mushrooms beneath his feet. His
body was shunting off all emotion into his survival instinct. He turned and
bore all his energy into Tania.

“We need to talk details. Now. Talk about who
you’re hiding from. If you want help, you need to tell me.”

“Who are you?” she hissed.

“I told you. Your family hired me through their
attorney.” Tania sat staring at him.

“Look, whoever that was back there, I’m obviously
not with them. So that’s a start. Other people besides me were able to track
you to Marin. Who are you hiding from?”

Tania sat curled-up and looking small. After a pause,
she looked up. “I'm not sure specifically who they were, their names. But I
think they’re triad members.”

“Which one?”

“Black Fist.”

“Why are they looking for you?”

Tania cupped her hand to her mouth and paused. “I
saw something I wasn’t supposed to see.”

“So you’re a witness. To what exactly?”

“The murder of a businessman. He was killed in a
gang dispute a few weeks back.”

Ray looked around. This section of Russian Hill
was peaceful and secluded. He decided that they would stay put for now.

“How did it happen?”

“I was in the room with him,” said Tania. “Right
before they came in and did it.” Ray watched her. She still looked dazed.

“Did it involve your job?” he said quietly. She
hesitated. “I saw the arrest in 1997.”

“Yes.” She frowned a little. “A date was arranged.
He took two of us to a hotel on Mason Street. He wanted two girls. A two-girl
fantasy. After we were done, he went outside to smoke a cigarette on the
balcony. The other girl, Cindy, went out there with him.”

“What hotel?”

“The Senator. Near Taylor.”

“OK. Go on.”

“Well, she took him out there and they had a
cigarette. It was raining a little. I sat back on the bed, getting dressed.
There was a breeze coming from the window. I remember Cindy laughing and
smoking. Outside with the man.” Tania paused, rubbed her temples, and then
resumed.

“At one point, she came in, and then locked the
door after her. I thought she was joking—I didn’t understand why she would do
that, locking the door. I could see him behind the small window in the door,
his silhouette. He was leaning over the balcony, looking down at something.”

“Who was he, what was his name?”

“Johnny Cho.” Tania brushed her hair back and
looked down at her legs. “Cindy was trying to get her stuff together but she
was nervous. There was a commotion on the fire escape. Johnny was trying to get
in. He was shaking the door but he couldn’t open it. I didn’t really understand
what was going on. There was a scuffle and then I heard gunshots. There were
men on the balcony. They were trying to get in the room. I ran down the
hallway. There was another man waiting. He had something covering his face,
like a bandanna. He shot Cindy in the back as she ran. I heard her cry out and
fall behind me. I kept running. It went crazy then. Everyone was in the
hallway. All these people running around, half-dressed. The man shot at the
ceiling, and yelled for everyone to get down, but it was total panic. The owner
came running upstairs with a gun. We ran back and forth, everyone screaming and
shouting. There was a lot of gunfire and a guy in the hallway was hit pretty
bad. The other guys escaped. Cops were all over the place a few minutes later.”

“So there was a police response.”

“Yes. A lot of people were hurt that night. The
story was all over the news. Vans and lights, reporters trying to get comments
from people.”

Ray glanced out the window. An old lady walked her
dog on the sidewalk. “What did you do next?” Ray asked.

“I left. No one had any record of me being in the
room. The place was rented by the client. He probably signed me in with
whatever name he felt like. A cop stopped me and took me to the station. And
they were watching me. Saw me get in the car.” She sighed. “In our world,
snitching is a death penalty. Even though I never said anything, they would
never believe it. Eventually I got out and headed to Moon’s house.”

“How did you know Moon?”

Tania looked straight ahead. She rubbed the back
of her left hand vigorously. “It’s complicated. Moon and I worked at a house
run by the triad.”

“A massage parlor?”

“Yes.”

“You worked with her at the parlor?”

“Yes. They ran it, kept the place secure, handled
the money.”

“Where did they find the women who worked there?”

“Everywhere.” Tania looked irritated at the
question. “Finding girls is never a problem. The girls are there for lots of
reasons. Families to feed back home. Debts. Other reasons. There is no one
reason.”

“Are some forced to work?”

She shrugged. “Not really forced.” She looked out
the window. Ray could see she did not want to answer too many questions about
her former profession.

“How did you get involved?” Ray asked.

“I was—” She trailed off. “My father was a member
of the triad. He married into another triad family. Our families were close.”

“Who did he marry?” Ray asked.

“Victoria Chang. When my father died, she turned
me out. Then she sold everything he had.”

Victoria Chang had been identified as the head of
the Boston syndicate. “Chang was your mother?”

“She’s not my real mother.” Tania looked down at
her feet. “She married my father.”

Seeing her distress, he stopped pushing in that
direction. “Anyway, you were at Moon’s house. What happened then?”

“I got to Moon’s, and we stayed up all night
talking until I fell asleep. The next morning, I looked at the paper. There was
an article about the killings. I saw the names of the victims at the hotel. One
was the client, Johnny, who hired us. He turned out to be a local boss. But the
other name was a Black Fist soldier, Lee Fong. They ran a photo—he was arrested
before, I guess. I knew him. I had seen him before at one of the houses. People
said he did protection work for the triad.”

“Why would a Black Fist soldier shoot Cindy?” Ray
asked.

“The police said the killings were related to a
turf war. But I knew that wasn’t the full story. We were witnesses to the
shooting. But I saw Cindy lock Johnny Cho outside on the balcony. So she was
part of the plan. And then she was killed. I was supposed to be next. Because
who can trust two whores who witnessed a murder? Who really cares if we turn up
dead?”

She stopped talking and looked out the window.

“And it made sense. I worked off most of my debt,
and so I was not worth much to them anymore.”

“What debt?”

She said nothing.

Ray checked outside again but no one was around.
He rolled down a window. “Where did you go after you figured all this out?”

“I stayed with Moon for a few hours. No one knew
about us, I was pretty sure. I left late that night and hid out in a club. A
few weeks passed and everything seemed like it had died down. Until yesterday.”

Ray looked at her. Parts of her story bothered
him. “Weren’t you worried about staying in the Bay Area? You’re only seventy
miles from San Francisco?”

“Of course I was worried. But this is my home.
Where else could I go?” Her forehead lined with worry. “And I was worried about
Moon,” she said. “Do you think they followed her to Marin?”

“I think so. After she pulled into the Center, I
saw a black Mercedes come up right behind her. I assume they followed her from
the city. How they managed to lock in on her I’m not sure. Maybe they followed
me to her the previous day. Although I doubt it.”

They sat for a while.

“What do we do?” she asked.

“Let’s get indoors for a while. I need to speak to
my client later today.”

Tania brushed her hair out of her eyes. “Wait.
That is something I need to ask you about. Can you tell me again how this
lawyer is involved?”

“He called me,” Ray said. “He was referred by a
mutual friend. We’d run across each other before. He told me your
family—specifically your sister—had retained him. She is worried about you.”

“My sister? I haven’t spoken with her for two
years. I was afraid they might find me through her. They used her before.”

“How?”

She looked down and said nothing.

Ray sat back and thought about his first meeting
with Lucas.

“I kept your confidences—against my better
judgment—for a short time. But remember, I owe a duty to report back to my
client. At this point, I have to at least tell him I found you. But we won’t
arrange a meeting until you decide how you want things to go. Plus, I need to
research a few things.”

She nodded.

“We need to get to some place safe.”

Ray pulled away from the curb and headed east past
whitewashed apartment buildings that lined the steep streets of Russian Hill. He
raced down Union Street, timing the lights, and darted into North Beach. He
turned left toward the Wharf, then turned up Filbert Street onto the slope of
Telegraph Hill.

Telegraph Hill had a glorious, tottering beauty
about it, defiant in the face of inevitable earthquakes. The hill commanded
views of the Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz and Angel Island. Originally called
Loma Alta, the precipitous hill had been home to roughhouse sailors and
immigrants in the 1800s. Later, artists and bohemians moved in, attracted by
spectacular views and cheap homemade wine served in North Beach restaurants.
The neighborhood had long been gentrified by professionals. They drove German
sedans, bought organic fruits, and overpaid for eight hundred square foot
condos with original molding. But the neighborhood was still flecked with
oddballs who had managed to thrive in the sharply angled neighborhood, the
local cafe owner or a Chinese family who resisted the upwardly mobile erosion.

Ray stopped at Union and Kearny. Halfway down
Kearny, he turned left into a driveway. He looked around—no one in the street,
no one tailing.

He pulled up to a Spanish Revival home with a red
stucco facade. A rotted balcony ran along the second floor. One of Ray’s oldest
friends, Antonio Flores, lived there. They had grown up together in New York.
Antonio taxed friendships. He disappeared for weeks at a time, and then showed
up at friends’ houses unannounced, past midnight. He was blunt to the point of
crudity, but Ray forgave it as an occasional antidote to California dopiness.
Antonio’s loyalty was canine, so Ray didn’t feel hesitant in knocking on his
door unexpectedly.

Ray knocked and heard a heavy braying of dogs. A
squat rawboned figure abruptly opened the door. He had Doberman-thick black hair
and a superbly scarred face, so prehistoric that it looked as if he had
murdered his way from the Gold Rush era into modern times.

“Ray! God, come on in!” Antonio motioned for them
to enter. He looked at Tania and smiled deeply, extending a hand. Ray looked at
Tania, who appeared bedraggled and almost out on her feet. He did not waste any
time.

“Antonio, I’m in a bind. She needs to disappear
for a while. We had trouble this morning in Marin.”

“You’re family Ray, you know that. Whatever you
need.”

“Tania, do you need anything? A drink?”

She nodded.

Antonio motioned them inside. He was wearing black
shorts with yellow neon trim and a black shirt with sandals.

“Can I make a call?” Ray asked.

“Phone is in the living—hell, you know where
everything is! Let me get you something to drink.”

Ray headed into the living room, where a menagerie
of stuffed animal heads—zebra, bear, lion—peered silently from the pine walls.
Rustic pine furniture and an enormous television. Ray sat down beneath a wolf's
head, and collected his thoughts. Then he dialed Lucas.

“We had trouble today. As I told you, I tried to
meet Tania last night. The meeting went well. But she’s running from a group
she was involved with. An Asian gang. A group of them surprised us in Marin
this morning. Rough going, but we got out of there.”

“How is she?” Lucas interrupted.

“She’s OK. Exhausted at this point.”

“Where is she?”

“At a friend’s.”

“Where is that?”

Ray sensed the urgency in Lucas’s voice. “Trust me
when I say she is in a safe place. I don’t want to say too much— I am sure you
understand. I can confirm it later with you.”

Lucas paused. “Yes. Yes, I understand. When can I
see her? We need to set a meeting.”

“Can you fly out?”

“I can fly out tonight, if you want. Where should
we meet?”

“I’ll email you a place in a few hours.”

“OK. Great work today, Ray.”

“I’ll be in touch with the time and place.”

Ray called and checked his messages at the office.
Nothing urgent. He hung up the phone. He walked over a floor laid with Mexican
tile to the living room. Tania sat there on a sofa, sipping a large glass of
orange juice, her hair neatly combed. Antonio looked like a freshly groomed dog
at a show, leg wiggling in suppressed excitement. Tania’s Asiatic elegance was
having its way with him. Antonio was bragging about his exploits as an amateur
panner who, each September, traveled to the Sierra Nevada Mountains to pan for
gold in the cold mountain rivers. He hid his small findings of gold throughout
the house, mixing the gold flecks with sand in empty baby food jars. His
gleanings to date amounted to no more than twenty ounces of gold, but he was in
it for the long haul. He wasn’t starving though; he owned several rental
properties in the city. He was retelling a story that he repeated at any
gathering of friends: “I told the adjuster, if you stay on my property, I will
be forced to discharge a firearm in your general direction.”