Lin Ming approached the grounds by the Rue Lafayette gate. “Who goes?” came the gruff voice of Iron Arms, one of the guards.
“Your mother’s crack,” Lin shot back genially. “I just came from her place.”
“My mother’s? Someone as puny as you would get lost in there. Ma gan,” Iron sniffed, sesame stalk, a nod to the long skinny frame Lin had in common with his father, Du Yuesheng.
Lin took the remark placidly. He knew he looked startlingly like Du; no one who saw the two of them together ever doubted their relationship.
“Pass,” Iron Arms said, gruff but indulgent, and Lin vanished into the dark path that led under bare-branched trees to the rear of the dog track. The air was cold, and he was well inside the walls, but still he could smell Shanghai-rotting waste, temple incense, diesel oil, perfume, flowers. He may have had no real home, owing to the fact that he had no clan behind him, but the smell of Shanghai was his anchor, festering, sweetly fecund, always drawing him back. He crossed the dog-track arena, an oblong bowl above which banks of louvered windows rose to a high, steel-trussed ceiling. Rimming the track were the tiered observation stands, finished with iron rails and matching light posts in old gas lamp style, every row jammed with gamblers talking and jostling.
The shot popped, the fake rabbit screeched off, and the dogs bounded after it. The noise of the crowd rose to a long roar, deafening, a wall of prayer and hope that fell away as fast as it started when the finish was crossed and the dogs fell back, slavering. The winners’ numbers were called off in a string of languages.
In the next building a long hallway led to the back of the ballroom stages. He had two bands at the Canidrome, the Teddy Weatherford Orchestra, which played from seven thirty to two in the large ballroom, and what remained of Buck Clayton’s Harlem Gentlemen after Clayton himself had been let go as a result of a brawl. In the matter of his dismissal, Lin’s hands had been tied, though fortunately the man had been able to find other work in the city to start earning his fare home. When it came to the rest of the Harlem Gentlemen, Lin simply waited a decent amount of time and hired them back, and they played the tea dances in the afternoon and early evening. Tonight, since he was here to see his father, he skirted the ballrooms and went directly upstairs.
He found Du behind a polished desk, chatting with H. H. Kung, who lounged in an armchair opposite him. Kung was the Minister of Finance, the Governor of the Central Bank of China, and an indecently rich man. For the moment, while Chiang Kai-shek was being held prisoner in the north, he was also the acting head of the Chinese government.
“Young Lin,” he said warmly, and grasped Lin’s hands, temporarily parking his cigar in his mouth to do so.
“Pleasure to see you,” Lin said. They understood each other well. Dr. Kung had studied at Oberlin and Yale, Lin Ming at boarding school; both were at home with the English language and the West-ocean mind.
Next he turned to his father, sitting straight and gaunt in his Chinese gown, skull clean-shaven as always. “Teacher,” he said politely. Du had founded a conservative school for Chinese boys, and he liked to be addressed this way.
Du accepted his obeisance without remark, and turned directly to the news Kung had brought. “The Generalissimo’s wife, and her brother T. V. Soong, will fly to Xi’an tomorrow with a large amount of money to purchase Chiang Kai-shek’s release. They will get him out.”
“Your in-laws,” Lin said to Kung respectfully, since he knew the man was married to the eldest Soong sister, Ai-ling. “I hope they are safe.”
“Oh, they’re safe enough,” said Kung. “The problem is getting old Chiang to listen to the demands of his kidnappers. He has to give up on beating the Communists now, and fight Japan.”
Du did not conceal his shock. “Give up fighting the Communists?”
“For now,” said Kung, puffing on his cigar.
“But I shall continue to execute them.”
Kung smiled, because Du Yuesheng would execute whomever he chose, and there was nothing anyone could do about it. “As you will,” he said amiably. “But your attentions are needed against our Japanese invaders, old friend. This is another reason I came to see you tonight-to tell you that a new, high-ranking officer has arrived from Japan. An Admiral.”
Lin strained forward with interest-an Admiral would automatically, at this moment, be the top-ranking Japanese officer in Shanghai.
“Morioka is his name,” said Kung.
“Our new Viceroy,” Du said sarcastically. “Yes, I know.”
“You do?” said Kung, drawing and relighting. “Regrettably, I have heard nothing personal about him yet.”
“Wait a moment.” Du knocked three times on the side of the desk, and one of his many secretaries came in, a senior Cantonese named Pok. “Sir,” he said to Du respectfully, and then again to Kung, “Sir.” Lin Ming he ignored. His fluent Shanghainese was stretched by the drawling tones of his home dialect as he spoke. “One of my men has an informant who works in the officers’ section of the new Japanese Naval Headquarters.”
Kung drew his brows together in thought. “The old Gong Da Textile Mill they took over and reinforced, that one?”
“Yes. The new Admiral has his apartments there. Here is what your servant has learned: Morioka goes out at night and drinks, but is never drunk. He is married, but his wife and children did not accompany him, nor does he have their pictures.”
“There will be something he cares for,” Du insisted.
Kung nodded. “His weak spot.”
“Yes, Teacher,” said Pok. “You are correct. There is indeed a thing he loves-music. His quarters are filled with gramophone records.”
“Really.” Du’s cold, serpentine gaze lit with interest, flicked to Lin, and then back to Pok. “What kind of music?”
“Jazz,” said Pok.
“You don’t say,” Kung said in English, sending a twinkle toward Lin Ming, not yet seeing how the news was strangling him with terror. “And for you, Teacher,” Kung went on, back in Chinese, “What a bolt of luck! You don’t have to do a thing. He’ll come to you.”
Lin stood in the center, feeling everything around him crashing. He did not ask for much, just to bring music from over the sea, to shepherd his musicians, to be with his favorite girl, Zhuli. He did not expect to be free; he understood that his father, and the Green Gang, controlled his life, and might even end up choosing the time and manner of his death. He also accepted the fact that he personally was powerless to stop Japan. But his musicians, his flock that he’d brought from America and nurtured here in Shanghai’s endless night-they should be left alone.
Pok backed out, with Du’s thanks. Du always treated his secretaries well.
“Lucky. As for you, do not worry so much,” Kung said to Lin. “There is no reason why they should sacrifice the plum tree for the peach tree.”
Kung’s kindly joke in turning the phrase around-in the old saying, the plum tree did get sacrificed-failed to allay Lin’s fear. Meanwhile, Du Yuesheng nodded approvingly, for ancient military strategy was the kind of traditional tidbit he loved.
Lin stood motionless. “Please,” he heard himself say, small and squeaky.
“What?” Du looked over sharply.
“There are so many jazz men in Shanghai, others could serve as bait-”
But his father held up a silencing hand. “It is not up to us. It is he who will decide. No one can resist Shanghai for long, including Morioka. He will be like a bird hovering over a field of flowers. Sooner or later he will light, and then we will have him.” He looked hard at Lin. “Wherever he comes to rest.”
Lin ducked his head, burning with hatred-for his father, for Japan, and for himself most of all-because he knew that no matter what order he received, even if-when-it put one of his own in danger, he would have to obey it.