The Stone Monkey
turned into was one of the exits from the parking lot.
“ Gan,” the Ghost spat out.
“What happened?” one of the Turks in the back asked him.
What had happened was that Chang hadn’t trusted Jimmy Mah, the Ghost realized. He’d given the tong leader a fake address. He’d probably seen an advertisement for this place. He glanced up at the big sign over their heads.
The Home Store
Your source for every house and lawn need
The Ghost considered what to do. The other immigrant, Wu, probably hadn’t been so clever. He had used Mah’s broker to get an apartment. The Ghost had the name of the broker and they could find out the location of that family quickly.
“We’ll get the Wus now,” the Ghost said. “Then we’ll find the Changs.”
Naixin.
All in good time.
• • •
Sam Chang hung up the phone.
Numb, he stood for a moment, staring at a TV show, which depicted a living room very different from the one he was now in and a content and silly family very different from his own. He glanced at Mei-Mei, who was looking at him with a querying glance. He shook his head and she dutifully returned to Po-Yee, the baby. Chang then crouched down beside his father and whispered to him, “Mah is dead.”
“Mah?”
“The loaban in Chinatown, the one who helped us. I called to ask about our papers. His girl said that he was dead.”
“The Ghost? That was who killed him?”
“Who else?”
His father asked, “Did Mah know where we are?”
“No.” Chang hadn’t trusted Mah. So he’d given the address of one of the Home Stores in the flyer he’d found at the shopping center where they’d stolen the paint and brushes.
The Changs were, in fact, not in Queens at all but in Brooklyn, a neighborhood called Owls Head, near the harbor. That this had been their destination was a secret he’d kept from everyone except his father.
The old man nodded and winced as some pain shot through him.
“Morphine?”
His father shook his head and breathed deeply for a moment. “This news about Mah—it confirms that the Ghost is looking for us.”
“Yes.” Then Chang had a troubling thought. “The Wus! The Ghost can find them. They got their apartment through Mah’s broker. I have to warn him.” He stepped toward the door.
“No,” his father said. “You can’t save a man from his own foolishness.”
“He has a family too. Children, his wife. We can’t let them die.”
Chang Jiechi thought for some moments. Finally the old man said, “All right but don’t go yourself. Use the phone. Call that woman back. Tell her to get a message to Wu, warn him.”
Chang picked up the phone and dialed. He spoke to the woman from Mah’s office again and asked her to get a message to Wu. “Tell him he must move at once. He and his family are in great danger. You will tell him that?”
“Yes, yes,” she said but she was clearly distraught and Chang had no idea if she actually would do as he’d asked.
His father closed his eyes and lay back on the couch. Chang wrapped the blanket around his feet. The old man would need to see a doctor very soon.
So many things to do, precautions to take. For a moment he was overwhelmed by the hopelessness of it all. He thought of the amulet that Dr. John Sung wore—the Monkey King. In the hold of the ship he’d let young Ronald play with the charm and had told him stories about Monkey. One of them was how the gods punished Monkey forhis effrontery by burying him under a huge mountain. This is how Sam Chang now felt—covered by a million kilos of fear and uncertainty.
But his eyes then fell on his family and the burden lessened somewhat.
William laughed at something on the television; Chang believed this was the first time that his oldest son had been free from the anger and sour spirit that he’d radiated all day. He was laughing in genuine good spirits at the frivolous show. Ronald too.
Chang then looked at his wife, completely absorbed in the child, Po-Yee. How comfortable she is with children. Chang himself didn’t have this easiness with them. He was forever weighing what he said—should he be stern about this matter, lenient about that?
Mei-Mei perched the baby on her own knees and made the child giggle as she rocked her.
In China families pray for a son to carry on the family name (traditionally, not bearing a male heir was grounds for divorce). Chang of course had been delighted when William had been born, and Ronald after him, proud that he
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