Dark Rivers of the Heart

jade medallion on a gold chain.
        "I sometimes give one of these to people who seem to need it."
        Half afraid that the two men would hear his heart thundering, Spencer joined Lee at the desk and accepted the gift.
        It was two inches in diameter. Carved on one side was the head of a dragon. On the other side was an equally stylized pheasant.
        "This looks too expensive to-"
        "It's only soapstone. Pheasants and dragons, Mr. Grant. You need their power. Pheasants and dragons.
        Prosperity and long life."
        Dangling the medallion from its chain, Spencer said, "A charm?"
        "Effective," Lee said. "Did you see the Quan Yin when you came in the restaurant?"
        "Excuse me?"
        "The wooden statue, by the front door?"
        "Yes, I did. The woman with the gentle face."
        "A spirit resides in her and prevents enemies from crossing my threshold." Lee was as solemn as when he'd recounted his escape from Vietnam.
        "She is especially good at barring envious people, and envy is second only to self-pity as the most dangerous of all emotions."
        "After a life like yours, you can believe in this?"
        "We must believe in something, Mr. Grant."
        They shook hands.
        Carrying the notepaper and the medallion, Spencer followed the escort out of the room.
        In the elevator, recalling the brief exchange between the escort and the bald man when they had first entered the reception lounge, Spencer said,
        "I was scanned for weapons on the way down, wasn't I?"
        The escort seemed amused by the question but didn't answer.
        A minute later, at the front door, Spencer paused to study the Quan Yin.
        "He really thinks she works, keeps out his enemies?"
        "If he thinks so, then she must," said the escort. "Mr. Lee is a great man."
        Spencer looked at him. "You were in the boat?"
        "I was only eight. My mother was the woman who died of thirst the day before we were rescued."
        "He says he saved no one."
        "He saved us all," the escort said, and he opened the door.
        On the sidewalk in front of the restaurant, half blinded by the harsh sunlight, 'arred by the noise of the assin traffic and a jet overhead, Spencer felt as if he had awakened suddenly from a dream. Or had just plunged into one.
        During the entire time he'd been in the restaurant and the rooms beneath it, no one had looked at his scar.
        He turned and gazed through the glass door of the restaurant.
        The man whose mother had died of thirst on the South China Sea now stood among the tables again, folding white cloth napkins into fanciful, peaked shapes.
        The print lab, where David Davis and a young male assistant were waiting for Roy Miro, was one of four rooms occupied by Fingerprint Analysis.
        Image-processing computers, high-definition monitors, and more exotic pieces of equipment were provided in generous quantity.
        Davis was preparing to develop latent fingerprints on the bathroom window that had been carefully removed from the Santa Monica bungalow.
        It lay on the marble top of a lab bench-the entire frame, with the glass intact and the corroded brass piano hinge attached.
        "This one's important," Roy warned as he approached them.
        "Of course, yes, every case is important," Davis said.
        "This one's more important. And urgent."
        Roy disliked Davis, not merely because the man had an annoying name, but because he was exhaustingly enthusiastic. Tall, thin, storklike, with wiry blond hair, David Davis never merely walked anywhere but bustled, scurried, sprinted. Instead of just turning, he always seemed to spin.
        He never pointed at anything but thrust a finger at it. To Roy Miro, who avoided extremes of appearance and of public behavior, Davis was embarrassingly theatrical.
        The assistant-known to Roy only as Wertz-was a pale creature who wore his lab coat as if it were the hassock of a humble novice in a seminary.
        When he wasn't rushing off to fetch something for Davis, he orbited his boss with fidgety reverence. He made Roy sick.
        "The flashlight gave us nothing," David Davis said, flamboyantly whirling one hand to indicate a big zero. "Zero! Not even a partial.
        Crap.
        A piece of crap-that flashlight! No smooth surface on it.
        Brushed steel, ribbed steel,