The techs bagged the bodies for the morgue wagon as Nicoll interrupted Jack’s discovery.
“Congratulations, by the way,” he said. “I heard you got your shorty, Eddie Ng.”
“Patrol did a great job,” Jack answered evenly.
“So you did good up here, Jack.” Nicoll smiled under his mustache. “Killing two bad guys, taking a cold-blooded murderer home. Not bad for a few days in Seattle, huh?”
“Yeah,” Jack agreed reluctantly, flashing back on the dead men’s faces.
“And if anything new develops here, I’ll update you.”
“Thanks.” Jack forced a smile. “I’d appreciate that.” He felt the shock of the day slowly seeping into him.
“If there’s a woman, we’ll find her. And if anyone calls looking for a fake hand …”
Jack nodded, watching them load the body bags. Nicoll got into his unmarked car and followed the meat wagon to pick up the paperwork. Out by the access ramp the cops were hauling away the two remaining goons, and the terminal was quiet again.
Jack went back to the end of the pier and stood there looking out over the water for any signs from the Harbor Patrol or the Coast Guard. The harbor cops had responded to a boating accident off West Seattle, and Jack finally spotted them coming around the point. The Coast Guard had come through Puget Sound, a twenty-five-minute trip. Neither service had reported any sightings over the police band.
Jack waited on the pier until the last of the light, still hoping something would float up. In his mind, he reviewed the two times that he’d seen the missing woman, Mona. Once on a San Francisco rooftop, and now, on a Seattle pier. Based on the running glimpses he’d had, he couldn’t say for certain that it was the same woman. Same general height and weight, sure, but between the short hair and the long hair, the sunglasses, and makeup or lack of it, he couldn’t swear to it.
She’d eluded him again. Floating not only in the wind this time, but out to sea as well. He thought of the broken jade bangle in the prosthetic hand’s grasp. How did it figure? Sooner or later, he knew, Mona was going to surface again.
He returned to his motel room, so exhausted that he didn’t need the little vodka bottles from the minibar to help him crash.
On the Waterfront
Daylight found Jack back at the pier, watching the rain dapple the dark surface of the bay. The terminal area was busy with delivery trucks, tour buses queuing up, ferries docking, and smaller craft making ready to cast off.
He imagined the smell of coffee and croissants flavoring the salt sea air.
They never saw a body surface.
A Coast Guard cutter sliced across the rippling water, its wake white and choppy. Several times, Jack saw things floating: a waterlogged piece of luggage, an oil drum cloaked with barnacles and seaweed, a dead seagull drifting on a black garbage bag.
Nothing.
The icy water beneath the pier was maybe twenty feet deep, he thought, plenty deep enough to drown in, especially if someone was unconscious, or in shock, when they fell in.
Still, the divers hadn’t found anything.
He was there an hour before Nicoll approached him, a cardboard cup of Seattle joe in his hand.
“I tried calling your cell,” Nicoll said.
“My battery died,” Jack explained.
“You know Harbor Patrol’s on top of it, right?” Nicoll asked pointedly, firing up a cigarette.
“I know that.”
“And you know your being out here won’t make anything float up faster, yes?”
“I know that, too.” The Coast Guard was checking flow charts, analyzing the currents, tides, the drag of big ships. The harbor cops had advised him that the riptides were fast, strong, and deep, twenty-five feet in some spots. The tides could suck a body down, swirl it around for days before giving it up. Bodies had been known to float up way south or north along coastal Seattle, and as far out as Alki Point.
Still, Jack felt the same way as he had that night beside Lucky’s bedside, that somehow his presence at the scene might spark an idea, a memory, provide some clarity. He remembered that Ah Por’s clues had been yuh, rain, and seui, water. Water over water, she’d concluded. Now he saw the connections: The attack had occurred in the rain, in a city known for rain. Mona had disappeared, possibly into the water, and water over water could mean the riptides.
He made a mental note to visit Ah Por when he got back to New York.
“So here’s the update on the tong war,” Nicoll announced with a grin. “The two we arrested were illegals. We’re transferring them to INS for deportation. The two dead hatchetmen”-he finished his cigarette and flicked it into the bay-“came up from San Francisco. Motor Vehicles is still checking on the car and the minivan. And the license numbers your pretty lady friend copied down. The big man has a long sheet from Oakland, for gambling, and bootleg cigarettes. The Jap knife’s got his prints on it. The other kung-fu fighter, was a little different. He freelances, somehow, for law firms, and he has a New York driver’s ID. That’s your neck of the woods, isn’t it?”
“I think he’s a player, but I’m not sure in what game yet,” Jack added. How was he going to explain to ADA Bang Sing?
“A boat turned up abandoned near Harbor Island,” Nicoll continued. “There were a few drops of blood and a Vicodin pill on it but nothing else. We’ll see if there’s a blood match with the hand, and we’re canvassing the island for any witnesses.”
“They were triads, dodging a Red Notice,” Jack offered. “You’ll get a call from INTERPOL.”
“Yeah, okay. Plus we got this prosthetic hand. Bionic, real neat. Fingernails, knuckles, and creases even. Last made by a British company ten to fifteen years ago.”
“And a piece of red jade,” Jack added quietly. “Part of a broken bangle.”
“What is that? Some kind of voodoo?”
“It’s a Chinese thing,” Jack said. “I’m not sure you’d understand.”
“Well then, don’t worry about it, Jack.” Nicoll smiled. “Remember …”
“I know, I know,” Jack responded wearily. “It’s Chinatown.”
Nicoll laughed, and Jack walked him back to his car.
“Look,” Jack apologized, “I know I dumped on you during a red ball, but-”
“Hey, Yu, you came to my turf,” Nicoll interrupted. “Dropped two bodies on my desk, and I closed it the next day. That’s kudos for me, so don’t sweat it, okay?”
“Thanks,” Jack answered, watching Nicoll get in his unmarked Ford and drive away.
He’d figured them wrong, Jack realized. The Seattle cops had expressed racism in their tone and content, but they had been up front with it, unlike in New York where they’d play you with a smile and a wink before stabbing you in the back. He’d never condone racism but knew in the end that actions spoke louder than words.
Nicoll was a cop’s cop above all, and Jack respected him for that. At game time, it was diligent police work by the Patrol Division that had brought about Eddie’s collar at Julio’s Place. And the SPD’s arrival at the terminal pier had definitely interrupted the abduction.
They were professionals, after all, working the job.
Jack felt grateful as a Harbor Patrol boat cruised by. He left the pier, walking south through the mist. Gradually, he found the place by the bus stop, the El Amigo, where he ordered up a six-pack of cerveza and assorted dishes, and thanked Carlos and Jorge for their assistance. He gave them his detective’s card and offered help if they ever needed it.