“There was a little Jap with him,” the other man interjected. Jack glanced at him, saw the grin on his face. “Yeah,” the man continued, “they came in together. The little Jap, or Chink, whatever.” He was trying to get a rise out of Jack. “He went looking at the gun wall. I told him, ‘Don’t bother, you need to be eighteen for guns.’”
Jack played it cool. “He was short, so you thought he was a kid?”
“A Mongolian runt, right.” He grinned.
“What did he look like?” Jack grinned back.
“Who knows? They all look alike to me.” A sneer marred his face.
“He didn’t say anything?”
“Probably couldn’t speak English. He just walked away, waited outside.”
“But it was the wetback who sold it,” the counterman joined in.
Jack took a step back and said, “I need to see the documents.”
The men straightened up, indignant. “What documents?”
“The paperwork,” Jack said evenly. “The pawnee information.”
No one was grinning anymore.
“Wait a minute, man,” the biker said defiantly. “You ain’t even Seattle PD. I don’t have to show you nothing.”
He might know someone on the force, guessed Jack.
“Go ahead, call SPD,” he continued. “See if I care. I got rights. And shit, I got a business to run here. Go ahead, call ’em.”
“Sure, I could do that,” Jack said sharply. “It’d only take a few seconds.” He placed the watch back on the tray. “But after they show up as a courtesy to a cop, I’m going to spend the day going over your inventory. I’m going to tie up your books, interrupt your business, your lunch, your dinner, everything. And keep you open late, so I hope you haven’t made plans for the evening.”
The man’s face clenched into a look of hate. He took a deep breath through his nose, spread his feet like he was getting ready to fight.
“Or,” Jack offered, “you could just show me the name, the address, phone number, whatever. And my Asian ass will be out of here in two minutes.”
The smart-ass rock star wannabe went over to the gun displays and kept quiet.
After a long moment, the biker glared at the watch, mouthing the word fuck! before replacing it into the display counter. “Why can’t you people clean up your own shit,” he bitched, “instead of harassing us true Americans?” He was still spewing hate as he stepped away into a tiny office.
Jack stood in a neutral spot and waited until the biker reappeared with a sheet of entries, information from a Seattle non-driver ID, a copy of a green card. Jack jotted down the information, memorized the likeness of the Mexican seller. He imagined the shadow of short Eddie in the background.
Jack could feel the men staring daggers into his back as he left the USA shop. He remembered Alex and knew he should leave her a message. Sorry, lady. Let’s try for later tonight. Turning up his collar, he headed for 44 South Andover.
Seekers
Mona had gone daily to the Chinese employment agency, a little cutout storefront near King Street that featured a wall of paper tickets on which various types of jobs were offered. She pretended to be a job seeker, and discovered most of the ads were for busboys, dishwashers, kitchen help. A few for laborers, grist for the construction trades. Some tickets for sweatshops.
Many of the seekers were Fukienese by dialect, but she’d understood a little of whatever Mandarin she overheard. Most of the seekers were in transit to other places, Say nga touh, Seattle, being only their first destination.
She’d have a cup of nai cha tea after each visit, at the Fuzhou Garden bakery across the street, still watching the little employment agency storefront.
The third week, Mona noticed her, a Chinese woman about the same height and weight as herself. Mona knew the woman’s eyes would be brown, and the hair color didn’t really matter. Age could be altered by a mask of calculated makeup, and besides, it was often difficult to guess the age of Chinese people.
Mona struck up a conversation with the woman, and over yum cha tea at the Fuzhou Garden, discovered that she had emigrated under a guest worker program visa, and had worked as a nanny for a Chinese couple in the Queen Anne neighborhood, who had a two-year-old child and also required housekeeping duties.
After almost six months, the husband had come on to her, pressing her for sex, and the wife had wound up firing her. She had considered working for Caucasians, the gwailo, but her English wasn’t any good.
Jing Su Tong was five foot two, 118 pounds. Yat yat bot. Yat bok yat sup bot. Sure to prosper, sure to grow. Twenty-eight years old. Perfect. She had straight shoulder-length black hair, with some partial bangs across her forehead.
Mona knew she could copy the look, could forge a realistic resemblance. The height and weight, approximately. Most customs workers appeared to feel that Asians all resembled each other anyway.
Jing Su had been hoping for work as a home-care attendant in Chinatown but hadn’t seen any such jobs posted. Her savings were being depleted and she was becoming desperate; her family in China needed her monthly contributions. She was considering going to San Francisco where she had relatives.
Appearing sympathic, Mona explained that her own tourist visa had expired, and wondered if they couldn’t help each other. She offered Jing Su five thousand dollars in cash in exchange for her Social Security card, non-driver’s identification card, and employment documents. Offering her too much would arouse Jing Su’s suspicions, thought Mona, but if she offered too little, the woman would ask for more anyway. Being firm was best. Five thousand dollars would cover the woman’s efforts to find work, enable her to send some money back home, and tide her over for at least three months. After that, she could report her cards lost or stolen, and some Wah chok wui, some Chinese service center, would help her get them reissued.
By then, Mona had planned to be long gone.
Jing Su accepted Mona’s offer, of course. To her, renting her papers for three months was a godsend. Buy time, find work, family in China. “Mo mon tay,” she declared. “No problem.”
No problem, thought Mona. If only it were true.
But the new identity was a ticket out.
The way of freedom.
Back in her James Street sanctuary Mona blew the steam off the Iron Goddess tea, caressed the jade charm in her palm, ran her fingernails over the bot gwa Taoist trigrams. Bok she’d touched. North. Mountains. Mountain over Water. The Chinese word for blindness came to mind-Beware the woman who sees the gold and not the man. Nothing good will come of it.
Blindness.
Childlike naïveté.
Yet all goes well?
She paused, unsure how to interpret this. Naïveté could lead to danger, but all goes well? She took a deep sip of the Iron Goddess.
Move forward, she resolved.
The way of freedom.
She looked at the large sack of jasmine rice propped up in the corner near the rice cooker. Plenty, she’d told the old couple, don’t stand on ceremony. Just ask if you need some.
She remembered the folktale about villagers hiding a fortune inside the rice barrels. What thief would suspect a fortune hidden in plain sight? But she knew that inside the rice sack, buried near the bottom, was a mahjong case full of gold Panda coins, diamonds, and jewelry. More than a quarter million dollars’ worth.
Soon she’d have a safe deposit box and wouldn’t have to take such risks.
She knew she had to be careful selling the coins and diamonds. Dumping the whole lot at once would draw the wrong type of attention, and lessen the value as well. There was enough cash to tide her over until she could set up the bank accounts. Gradually, she’d sell some of her cache, and offer a pair of diamonds, a few coins, to test the waters. An American gold firm that employed American-born Chinese, jook sings, could be useful. Less chance of a connection to the triads.