Jade Woman

17

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THIS is the other gentleman, Irwin. Lovejoy, my husband.” Husband? Two men, cheerfully pumping my hand. Lorna was pink in the face over introductions, saying twice over how we’d “quite accidentally” met up in the viewing session.

“So you’re the expert who knows everything, huh?” Irwin had a hotel belly and a way of speaking down to managers. Beside him, giving out assurances, Lorna had the boned look of the dieter, her skin that golden frailty of premature senescence from too many afternoons watching sunlamps.

“Not really, Irwin. Just guesswork.”

“He lies”—from Steerforth.

“Hohoho!” Irwin offered me a cigar, which I declined. George Brookers took one from his partner. In contrast he was a tall stooper with a golfer’s walk and bushy eyebrows, Mame with him tinier than ever. “That’s what you say, Lovejoy!” He mangled my hand.

“Mame’s told us how helpful you were!”

“Not really,” I said into Mame’s novice-nun smile. Her eyes betrayed the daytime agony of the poor sleeper, but she was still up to innuendo. (“Oh, but you were!”) My own expression felt false, a ghastly give-away rictus.

“Now we’d like to buy you guys lunch,” Irwin said. His Episcopalian timbre forbore refusal.

Steerforth nudged me. “Why, thank yoooou!”

“There’s a price, Jim!” Irwin winked openly at George. “We’re going to pump you about these antiques. Right, George?”

“Don’t wear them out totally!” Sweetly from Mame. “They’re going to show us around later!”

“Antiques?” Steerforth’s ignorance made him hesitate.

“Certainly,” I said, relaxing. No harm can come to poor slobs who follow orders. To Steerforth’s relief I encouraged them. “I’ll divvy the whole lot if you like.” Most of them I could do from memory anyway. “In return I want to hear everything about how you two set up your antiques business.” I meant it as a joke, but Steerforth warned me with a glance. George and Irwin went oho and laughed as the lift lofted us to the roof restaurant.

“Lovejoy wants company secrets, George!” Irwin whooped.

George was itching to tell. “Well, I met Irwin in Minneapolis. He was a furniture salesman and I ran a downtown store…”

The meal was a jovial business, George and Irwin reminiscing and pulling each other’s leg, Steerforth playing the campy innocent, me chuckling at their sallies, Lorna and Mame hugging themselves and swapping carefully timed glances.

We seemed in the sky. The restaurant was walled with glass panels so that Hong Kong’s harbor formed a panorama of toy skyscrapers and blue water drawn upon by the wakes of ships. Only too glad to be noshing, I hadn’t taken much notice. Then Lorna exclaimed, “Just look at that!” and we saw the most remarkable sight.

Junks were streaming round all the headlands, but mostly from the western approaches. They came steadily, without sails. Encased in the glass turret, we were unable to hear the engines, but the spectacle made me gape, hundreds converging on the typhoon shelters in Kowloon and closer by in Wan Chai. I asked a waiter what was up.

“Typhoon warning. Number One. Junks come to shelter.”

“A typhoon coming?” I asked Steerforth. I wasn’t sure what one was. The weather looked the same, a hot blue day. I’d seen a film about a cyclone once. The whole world was saved by one palm tree that gamely stuck it out.

“Perhaps,” he said. “They start out in the South China Sea. If we’re in the path, it hits us. If not, it goes on to Japan.”

“When?” Mame was excited.

“Actually they usually don’t arrive. Typhoon One is the first grade of warning. The higher the number, the greater the likelihood of our being hit.”

I’d have liked to hear more, fascinated by the vast fleet slowly cramming into harbor, but antiques called, so I helped to get a move on. It only took us a couple of hours to be down into the thick of the antiques. The women got bored and drifted off to the hotel shops with Steerforth. By four I was checking the last two or three items.

Interestingly, George and Irwin already had separate reports from somewhere.

“You’re pretty well informed.” I was impressed.

They laughed. “Organization. An amateur like you won’t realize, Lovejoy. But us old pros’ve got reps in every major city. It pays.” George added, “Our staff surveys every auction—Geneva, London, New York—you name it, our people’re picking over the spoils. It’s money, boy.”

Money again. I kept my face smiley, or thought I did, though George’s manner was beginning to irritate.

“Staff of sixty, Lovejoy”—from Irwin.

“Cost us enough!” boomed George. “That’s how we made Brookers Gelman the wholest antique wholesalers you ever did see! Hey, seen this crappy porcelain?”

I drew breath to explain, then gave up, too narked to play the fool anymore. I’d done my bit, as ordered by the Triad. Let him make a fool of himself. Had he looked properly, he would have noticed that lot 463 was far too translucent for porcelain. It was a simple white mug enameled with a picture of maidens with a basket between trees, lovely deep glass made in Germany about 1770, using tin oxide. A mint specimen is an utter rarity. As they moved on I touched it to feel its superb quality speak to my senses.

“Yes, rubbish,” I agreed, giving the mug a pained mental apology. Quickly I eased my smile back into place, for Lorna’s steady eyes were reflected in a chevalier mirror. That was the start of the death. The finish occurred after we were gathering in the foyer.

A series of display cases stood expensively showing off luxury wares. Naturally I crossed over to take a look, and surprised Johny Chen daydreaming out of sight behind one.

“Wotcher, Yank,” I said. “Private eye, huh?”

He grinned. “Shamus to yoh, man. Godda do—”

“Whatcha godda do?” I did the best accent I could. “Look, Johny. The auction’s six o’clock tonight. Bid on 463.” I told him a limit price.

“Sho’ can, man. Say no mo’.”

The others were audible then, so I emerged casually as if inspecting the pricey modern dross jewelers make these days. We separated, George and Irwin to meet two of their buyers flying in from London. During the meal they had agreed that we take Lorna and Mame on an island tour, though I felt I’d done enough touring to last a lifetime. I’d have rather been at the auction. We went out and hired a hotel limousine to take us.

Doesn’t sound much of a killing gambit, does it? But it was, it was.

Take every superlative. Multiply it by every exotic adjective of praise known to all lexicographers. Apply the product to every single aspect of Hong Kong. And there you have the dusk-time tour.

The Peak tramway’s slow climb shafts the clouds to set you on a mountaintip surely intended for an eastern Olympus. The giant net of lights and reflections is spread out below to make you gasp.

A car had driven to meet us, and we were taken to marvel at the famous beaches of Repulse Bay, Stanley, the astonishingly uninhabited hills of the island, the luxury shops and bars, the smaller townships so unbelievably varied.

For a couple of hours afterwards we danced in a night club, sharing a table. We watched a garish but mediocre Western-style floor show, gamboled some more. We strolled along the evening shoppers’ haven of Wan Chai and Causeway Bay, admiring the spice shops, spectacular decorations, colors, the busy nightlife.

Then it was nine o’clock, and by a fluke we found ourselves outside the Digga Dig, surprise surprise. Supper time, drinks, more laughs, talk of Hong Kong’s wondrous dynamism, all that jazz.

We had different rooms from last time. I honestly thought I’d had quite a good time, experienced a marvelous tourist’s day.

At one point quite far on in our activities she said shyly, “Lovejoy. Because I’m the, uh, y’know? Does it mean I can, well, say, y’know, whatever?”

Warily I considered this proposition from Wittgenstein. What the hell did she mean? “Er, if you like.”

She considered this lengthily. “Do I just, right out, y’know, you to, y’know? Or not?”

Christ. Were many permutations left? “Sure.” I assumed a campaign veteran’s gruffness.

She stayed until three in the morning. I’d asked what time Mame was supposed to meet her, but she only pressed a hand on my mouth and went, “Shhhh.” I also worried about Irwin. I could see him bursting in with a shotgun. Surreptitiously I checked the fire escape.

Maybe it was this worry or the loving we got up to that vexed me when she did the envelope bit. My refusals are never any good with women, so I went all reticent and simply said, “Don’t, love.”

She was dressing, me still in bed. “But it’s your… Won’t you get in trouble from the, y’know, agency? James told Mame how strict the rules are.”

“No.” I must have sounded harsher than I’d intended because her eyes filled. “No money. Understand?”

She came to me. “Oh, darling. That’s perfectly sweet. Can’t I just give it you as a present?”

See? Tell them no and they argue the hind leg off a donkey. “Just go,” I said. I could see Irwin and his sixty revenge-seeking assistant dealers gunning for me as despoiler of the honor of Brookers Gelman, Inc.

She departed smiling through her tears, really odd. Worn out, I rolled over for a quick zuzz, wishing I’d told her to have some tea sent up on the way out.

I’d just dozed off when my bad dream came true. The men burst in with the shotguns I’d been so terrified of.

Gift