by Ed Lin
“You remind me of a young man who thought he had no other option than being another stupid gang kid.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know about Paul. He lives with you now and he’s going to go to Columbia and everything. But you can only help one kid at a time, right?”
“That’s right.”
“So tell me what I’m supposed to do. I can’t just fade into the background. I can’t move in with relatives in California.”
I looked at the midget. He was leaning against the front display case, his jaw set hard. We both knew the answer to the problem.
“Drew,” I said, “you can’t work here anymore.”
“No!”
“Don’t even cross Bowery after school unless you have friends with you.”
“I need this job.”
“You’re a smart kid, you’ll find something else. There’s a lot of opportunity right now for a hard worker like you. Maybe you could work at school or work at a place within Confucius Plaza.”
He was quiet because he knew I was right.
“Look, when you go to college, you’re going to have the last laugh because these gang kids are going to be in jail, or in the hospital, or maybe dead.”
“Take it from Robert,” said the midget. “He was in a gang as a kid and he saw what a lousy life it was. Look at him now.”
“I’m not so sure I’m a good example,” I said.
“Yeah, you’re sort of like the dented can in the supermarket, but you’re all I’ve got right now to show the kid,” said the midget. We chuckled a little bit. “Seriously, Drew, it seems like you don’t have a lot of options right now, but if you play it smart, you’ll see that you really can do anything.”
Drew said, “They might come back at me.”
“They might,” I said.
“I was thinking about the guy from China who was killed: Mr. Chen.”
“Why were you thinking about him?”
“He was probably ambushed like I was.”
“I’m not so sure about that.”
“I’m pretty certain about one thing, though.”
“What?”
“If he had a gun, he’d still be alive or at least have a better chance of being alive.”
“No, he wouldn’t. He’d still be dead and there would be one more unlicensed firearm in the hands of criminals. Where would you get a gun from, anyway?”
“I heard about a guy who sells weapons.”
“Who is this guy?”
“He works in this after-school program.”
“Who?!”
“I don’t want to tell you!”
“You want another black eye, wise ass?”
“Robert!” said the midget. “Enough!”
I threw open the door to the BDC After-School Program. The alarm went off again. I couldn’t hear anything but I saw Lincoln at the far side of the room, looking over something on a conference table.
I didn’t see Sunny Chu, who pushed a flat hand against my gut. For a middle-aged woman, she was tough. I pushed against her and Sunny began to shake from the effort of holding me back. Lincoln managed to cut the alarm.
As soon as it was quiet, Sunny asked me, “What do you mean by busting in here?”
“Oh, excuse me,” I said. “I was just going to test the constitutional limits on free speech and the use of excessive force on Lincoln.”
“What did I do?” asked Lincoln.
“Don’t listen to him,” Sunny told him. Then to me she said, “Get out! I’m filing a complaint about you!”
“You enjoy working that much with someone who sells guns to kids?”
“He sells what?”
“You heard me. Your cute little thing over there peddles firearms to children. You probably stash them in the apartment mailboxes up and down the street.”
“This is a big misunderstanding,” said Lincoln.
“What am I not understanding?”
“I tell the kids I sell weapons. When they come see me, I give them this.” He reached inside his pocket.
“Slowly,” I warned him. He pulled out a red plastic box and held it out to me. I didn’t reach for it, so he turned it over. It was Mao’s little red book. In English.
“Knowledge is a weapon,” Lincoln said triumphantly.
“You’re giving this to kids?” I asked. All I needed to read was the opening page.
WORKERS OF ALL COUNTRIES, UNITE!
“How the hell is this supposed to prepare our youth for today’s job marketplace?” I asked.
“Once they are armed with the words of the Great Helmsman, nobody can stand in their way.”
“Not even Mr. Chen, right?”
“Of course. He kind of got what he deserved. A traitor of the Revolution.”
“Then why are you sitting in this crappy office with your crappy quasi-governmental job? Aren’t you a fully indoctrinated Maoist? You haven’t done shit with your life.”
“I’m working on it.”
“I know you’re working on it. That’s why I’m going to sic some people on your ass. You won’t know what hit you.”
“When our time comes, Robert, you’ll be one of the first to know. You and all the running dogs of capitalism.”
He actually made me laugh. “I’m a running dog of capitalism? I’m in a union, jackass. You’re a manager. You’re the big boss man.”
“No, I’m not!”
“Of course you are. You work with kids because you like to boss them around and tell them what to think.”
He yanked back his book. “You don’t get to have one of these.”
“Too bad you can’t read Chinese,” I said. “The book really loses a lot in translation.”
Vandyne and I were sitting in a plain sedan across the street from Lincoln’s apartment. I pulled the tab off a can of Coke. The fizzing sound of the soda broke the silence between us.
“You’re kind of quiet tonight,” Vandyne said.
“My goddamn back,” I said. “I pulled something that night in the gambling parlor.”
“Don’t ever tell anybody you were there. It will be your ass.”
“You’re the only one I told.”
“Good.”
“Vandyne, I was just thinking. Right now, we’re doing the same thing to Lincoln that those Manhattan South guys are doing to Lonnie. Sitting tight, waiting for them to do something to let us build a case against them.”
“There’s a difference, though. Lonnie is innocent.”
“Of course she is. As much as Lincoln is dirty. But I can’t help but think that, maybe, he didn’t murder Mr. Chen.”
“That’s not your job! Leave that for the Justice Department to weigh in with their reasonable doubt.”
I played with the soda tab a little bit in my right hand and patted the roof of the car with my left. “Is this it, man? I mean, is this really what being a detective is like? Being trapped all night in this coffin?”
“You have to suffer for your art, don’t you know that, Chow?”
“I’m no artist.” I turned to Vandyne. “But you are. I mean you could be one. You’re a guitar player and you’re really good!”
“Thank you for the compliment, but I’m just an all-right guy.”
I punched him in the arm. “C’mon! I’ve heard you play, man!”
“In all honesty, I don’t practice enough. The other cats who play for a living, they would eat me alive. You have to play every day, or else you just backslide. Just like what you said about learning to read Chinese.”
“That’s true. You skip a day and everything starts going gray. But wouldn’t you rather be playing guitar than doing this?”
“It’s too late to do anything else, partner! When they put a gun in my hand, it ruined me for almost anything else. I guess, except for being on the other side of the law.” He pointed his hand like a gun and said, “Pow! Pow! Pow!” as he picked off imaginary targets in the street.
I laughed. “I know what you mean. I’m not going to teach kids h
ow to sing or become, you know, a productive member of society.”
“So now you’re a part of the freaky fringe protecting decent folk from the sickos and crazies.”
I played with the soda tab some more. “They should draft people to go through bullshit like this.”
“Naw,” said Vandyne. “I like being here, spending time with you.” He sniffed. “Guess I’m not good enough company for you.”
“I never said that.” I flipped the tab onto the floor mat.
“Hey,” chided Vandyne. “You’re littering! You know, other people have to use this car. We’re not the only ones.”
“You polluted the air and the whole insides of the car,” I said.
“Yeah, but at least I put the cigarette out in the ashtray. I didn’t throw it on the floor.”
“Just wait until Jimmy Carter takes office. He’ll put an end to your smoking with his new clean-air laws. Oh, wait, you don’t want him to win.”
“He could win. Actually, after that stupidity of President Ford with Vernon Jordan, I can’t back him anymore.”
In some ads placed in black publications, Gerald Ford was pictured standing next to Jordan, the head of the National Urban League, and other black leaders. Jordan had demanded that the ad be removed, as it seemed like he was endorsing Ford when in reality he was backing Carter. The White House at first denied planting the ads, but later admitted it and put an end to them.
Vandyne said, “The second I saw that ad, with that opportunist Jesse Jackson in it, I knew it couldn’t be genuine.”
“That’s the guy from Operation PUSH, right?”
“How do you know about PUSH? It’s based in Chicago.”
“Then why is he in New York all the time?”
“Exactly. Jackson does good things, but he’s in it partly for the publicity.”
A light went off in Lincoln’s apartment. Even though neither of us had been looking directly at the window, we immediately shut up and focused on the building door, waiting for someone to come downstairs and pop out of it.
Lincoln came out, shivering in a surplus field coat.
“That motherfucker,” I said.
“Dressing like he was in Nam,” said Vandyne.
When Lincoln was farther down the block, Vandyne started up the engine and we rolled slowly toward him. Lincoln didn’t go far. Soon, he was back in his favorite restaurant, sitting at a table with his pals.
“This is too much excitement for me for one night,” I said. “I think I’d rather see an empty street than watch people sitting around.”
“They have to break it up sooner or later, though,” said Vandyne. “When they leave, we can split up and follow the top guys.”
“Hope that happens soon.”
“They’re all guys. How long can they sit around and talk?” Vandyne eased back his seat. “You’ll see.”
Two hours later, after both of us each had used our own empty Thermos bottle, Lincoln and his friends were still at it. One guy would write something on a piece of paper and pass it around, leading to a round of arguing. Then the guy would cross out what he’d written with exaggerated annoyance and write something else. That led to more arguing.
“This is like watching the drafting committee of the Declaration of Independence,” I said.
“Then they should charge people to watch them and take advantage of the bicentennial year,” said Vandyne.
“These guys are Commies. They wouldn’t go for touristy stuff.”
“Just make them live up to ‘All men are created equal.’ Then I don’t have any problem with it.” He paused. “Now that I think about it, that phrase does have a Communist ring to it.”
“We may all start in the same place, but we all take different roads. Some people get handed the maps where everything is marked out and labeled.” Hearing no reaction, I turned to face Vandyne directly. “You know, the map is already marked where all the good and bad stuff is, so you know where to go and what to avoid.”
Vandyne turned to me. “I’m hungry,” he said quietly.
“Me, too. What should we do?”
“We’ve got to tough this one out. I didn’t think this would last long, but here we are.”
“You never hear about cops going hungry. Usually it’s the other extreme.”
“Oh, you don’t need to tell me. It’s not like you and me need it. We’re in the best shape in the whole squad.”
“You see the one with the mean face?” I asked.
“Yeah, with the wrinkled forehead.”
“I’ve seen him at the livery-cab office, but I know him from somewhere else, too. I couldn’t find him in our, uh, vacation photo albums.” I hunched my shoulders and leaned forward to get a better look. I saw someone pull on a jacket. “Looks like it’s breaking up.”
In silence we watched the five men exit the restaurant. The mean-faced guy was a beacon with his orange knit cap on. He went in the opposite direction of Lincoln, who for some reason was headed away from home.
“Mean Face,” said Vandyne, and pointed to himself. I nodded.
When they were all far away enough, Vandyne and I exited the car and closed our door with clicks quiet enough to have come from ballpoint pens.
I walked north as Vandyne headed west.
Lincoln walked quickly, sometimes hopping on his heels. When he reached a dark spot on the sidewalk between two dim streetlights he stopped and turned to the wall.
Should’ve gone back at the restaurant, pal, I thought. I could write you up now for public urination, but I want to save you. I want to see you swing for killing Mr. Chen.
He zipped himself up and kept going. His breath in the air looked like an empty thought bubble over his head.
I followed him as he stepped off the sidewalk onto the street.
I was searching my right pants pocket for a stick of gum when I felt someone tap me on the shoulder. I glanced back quickly and saw Teresa.
“You like watching guys pee?” she asked in bad Cantonese. I guess that’s not fair to say because Cantonese, slangy by nature, disregards formal rules of grammar the same way that pedestrians ignore crossing lights in New York.
“It’s my job too,” I said. We didn’t stop walking but we kept our voices low. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m following Lincoln. I think he’s seeing someone else. Why are you following him?”
“Who says I am?”
“You want me to call out to him?”
“No!”
“You think he killed that Chinese official, don’t you?”
“I didn’t say that.”
Lincoln turned a corner and Teresa and I both picked up the pace so we wouldn’t lose him.
“He couldn’t have killed Mr. Chen,” she insisted.
“Where was he that night?”
“Honestly, I don’t know. He could have been with someone else.”
“Who?”
“I’m trying to find out now!”
“Then how do you know he isn’t a murderer?”
“He doesn’t have the guts. He only knows how to boss women around. Lincoln talks about socialism and equality, but he’s a chauvinist. If he met the real Communists, they’d execute him with a firing squad of girls!”
“Let’s keep it down, huh?” We watched Lincoln enter an apartment building on Canal Street.
“I guess that’s what those two extra keys are for,” said Teresa with a sigh.
I stopped and fished again for my gum.
“Why are you stopping?” she asked.
“I have to wait for him to come out,” I said, putting the gum into my mouth. I rolled the wrapping paper between my fingers before tossing it into the street.
“I’ll be damned if I’m stopping here!” She marched off to the building. I followed. I might not find a killer, but at the very least I could prevent a domestic assault.
Teresa was stronger than I thought. She ran up the building’s front steps like she was storming a castle. When she
reached the door she quickly pressed every apartment button in order two times through before someone got annoyed enough to buzz her in.
She held the door for me. “Are you coming?” she asked.
“I am,” I said. “You’re not carrying, are you? I don’t want this to get messy.”
“Carrying?”
“A weapon.”
“No!”
Just on the remote chance that this was some kind of setup, I made sure always to keep Teresa in front of me.
The foyer was a typical Chinatown example, meaning that it probably didn’t meet fire-safety codes.
The ceramic-tile floor was mostly pulverized, as if people worked out with free weights here and dropped them at the end of each set. Paint was peeling off the wallpaper that was peeling off the tin-sheet wall that was peeling off. At some point a chandelier had been hanging from the ceiling, but now only three curled wires were left, looking like the fingers of a dead witch.
“Where did he go?” Teresa asked as she looked up the stairs.
“You sound like a cop,” I said.
That got to her. She took the stairs two steps at a time. The first door had a baby crying behind it. The second door was slightly open to create a breeze to help ventilate the apartment as someone cooked. Sounds of a news broadcast in Cantonese from the KMT-biased radio station came from the third door. The volume was turned up high, so it must have been elderly people listening.
“Try the next floor,” I suggested. Again, I let Teresa take the lead. The heels of her cheap black shoes thundered in the stairwell. I felt a little bad for Lincoln.
The first door on this floor sounded like people were playing a game of air hockey. Someone was operating a sewing machine behind the second door. Soft jazz came out of the third door.
Teresa turned to me with a questioning expression on her face.
“There’s only one thing soft jazz is good for,” I said.
She moved to the third door and the doorknob turned in her hand. Teresa swung open the door. The music was coming from the bedroom. We tripped over some shoes in the hallway and we could hear people laughing.
Teresa yanked open the bedroom door. A wave of smoke came out and the smell brought me back to Nam. It was pot.
The lights were down low but we could make out four guys all circled around an impressive bong shaped like a standing Buddha.
