The Silent Bride (26 page)

What Westerners had always worshiped as cause and effect passed almost unnoticed in the Chinese mind, which was ever preoccupied with chance. The immense importance of serendipity could not be underestimated in Chinese thinking, and with good reason. For the ancients, no amount of foresight or precaution could possibly protect either the state or individuals against the vagaries of disease, war, politics, and natural disasters like earthquakes, floods, and famine. Throughout time, the best shot a human had was to remain as solid as the earth, accepting all with a steadfast heart and praying for the good luck of safety and good fortune.

All her life, in the Chinese way, April had tried to avoid conflict with her parents. She didn't want them to lose face by her marrying a Mexican American. But this correct Asian passivity was highly incorrect and even considered self-destructive in Western culture. Self-destructive didn't even exist in Asian thinking, for the self was not regarded as a separate entity.

In the wee hours of Friday morning, nearing the exact midpoint between tragedy and celebration, April resorted to the
I Ching
and her Chinese heart to get a reading on her life and Tovah's case. The I
Ching,
or Book of Changes, charts the movement of all things: the sun, the moon, fire, earth, water; human activities, qualities, emotions, and good and bad actions. Though obscure to the Western mind, the
I Ching
offers to the informed questioner judgments on when to persevere, when to stand back, when to speak, and when to remain steadfastly silent. It foretells danger and success and reveals the way to act correctly in all situations, to gain wealth and inner peace.

As the rain let loose, April sat on her single bed and prepared to throw the coins—five pennies and a dime—to get the judgment of the ancient oracle as to who was Tovah's killer and what she should do about her crisis with the man she thought it would be bad luck to marry. Like a gambler at a craps table, she blew on the pennies, then threw them out. The coins fell on the flowered quilt three heads, then three tails.

Three heads represented three straight lines one on top of another: heaven. Three tails represented three broken lines beneath the three straight ones: earth. Heaven over earth was the hexagram
P'i
(standstill or stagnation). The judgment was: Heaven and earth do not unite, and all beings fail to achieve union. Further, it said, The shadowy is within, the light is without. The way of the superior was falling. The way of the inferior was rising.

April was crushed. Her dime was in the fourth position, third line from the top. That meant her personal message was: He who acts at the command of the highest remains without blame. What was willed was done.

She was mulling over what it meant when Skinny Dragon opened her door without warning. Four days she'd been away and this was her greeting.

"Ni
(you), I have food; you eat."

A wet Dim Sum ran into her room, yelping happily, and jumped on April's bed to lick her face. It was the middle of the night, but for once April was not unhappy to see her mother. Dragons had things they wanted to talk about, had trouble sleeping, wanted to be nice. And look, Skinny was smiling. She'd brought a ceremonial gift of oranges. Hastily, April gathered up the coins and her fancy Princeton edition of the
I Ching
and hid them under her pillow.

Thirty-two

F
riday morning Mike and April were working downtown in Bellaqua's office when Mike finally located someone at God's Goodness out in Minneapolis who personally knew the man they had under restraints in Bellevue. Daniel Dody came on the line just before eleven o'clock. Mike put him on speakerphone so April and Bellaqua could listen in.

"Oh, yeah, Ubu Natzuma. I remember him. Big guy, real shy." Dody's strong Midwestern voice was cheerful. "Who are you again?"

"Lieutenant Sanchez, New York City Police Department, Inspector Bellaqua, Sergeant Woo."

"Three of you, I see. How can I help you?" The voice cooled down without losing its perkiness.

"I gather you have responsibility for Mr. Natzuma."

"Well, not exactly. We did sponsor him in a school program out here, but after his orientadon, he decided to stay in New York."

"He decided to stay in New York? A real shy guy?"

"He didn't want to get caught in the middle," Dody said slowly.

"In the middle of what?" Mike asked.

"The country. A big landmass. He gets upset when he's frightened, so we didn't try to force him."

"He was upset, so you left him here?"

"Well, no, we didn't just leave him. We gave him some names and numbers, found a place for him to stay and a school for him."

"I need those names and numbers," Mike said. The notebooks were out.

"Uh, sure. I'll have to look them up, though. It may take some time. What is this all about?" Dody sounded a little less sure about those names.

"A woman was shot here in New York last week at her wedding. Mr. Natzuma may have been involved," Mike said flatly, doodling in his notebook, not glancing at April or Poppy.

"Oh, no. Not that one I read about in the paper? That Jewish girl?" The voice flattened out a little more.

"Yes, Tovah Schoenfeld. How does Mr. Natzuma feel about Jews?"

"Oh, goodness. I can't even imagine. I know he may have some primitive ideas, but I'm sure Ubu never even met a Jew."

"Tell me about him."

"I don't know where to begin. He experienced some real deprivation when he was very young. Malnutrition, abuse, just like almost everyone in his country. I don't know if you know anything about Liberia's wars, but he was in the middle of it. Landlocked and also trapped between warring factions, one of which killed his parents. He may have witnessed that." Dody ran out of steam.

"Do you have any dates on this?"

"Gee, let me think. We're pretty sure he was recruited into a militia when he was eleven or twelve, but before that he lived with a gang of boys, hiding out, for several years. His parents may have been killed when he was nine or ten. It's hard to put dates on anything. We can only piece together their histories from their own accounts. If he's eighteen now, we might be able to correlate events in his village nine years ago."

"Did you hear any accounts of an attack during a wedding? Maybe someone from his own family?"
Something he might be reliving a world away,
Mike didn't say out loud.

"Gee, I wouldn't know, but two of his brothers are with us out here. Maybe they would know."

"What about violence?"

"I don't know what you mean."

"You said he was recruited into a militia when he was eleven. I assume that doesn't mean he was a mascot."

"Ah, Lieutenant, we try to rehabilitate them; we don't ask them to relive their tragedies."

Very preachy. Mike glanced at April and Poppy. Their faces showed their dismay.

"You don't do any psychological testing before you let potential killers loose over here?"

"I don't like the sound of that. We don't take that view. Let me remind you that soldiers throughout the ages have returned to normal life when their wars were over. Our mission is to help these people do that through Jesus Christ."

"You think of Mr. Natzuma as a retired soldier then."

"A kind of solider, yes. As he was a member of a rebel militia group, we know he was a witness to the torture arid killing of dozens of civilians on many different occasions. But as a participant... ?"

"But he can shoot a gun," Mike interrupted.

"Oh, that, certainly. Is there anything else I can help you with?"

"Oh, yes, this is just the beginning. We need to pin down if he shot any of those civilians, if he witnessed, or participated in, violence at a wedding. And if he hates Jews."

Dody was silent for a while. "He's had a sad life."

"Does that translate into a man too violent to take with you to your church in Minneapolis?"

"No, no, not violent, more like a management problem."

"Why didn't you send that management problem home?"

Dody was silent for a longer time. "We don't think in terms of sending them home. Our mission is to get them out. Bring them to safety, teach them the ways of Christ, our Lord."

"Mr. Dody, will you get those names and addresses for me? We're going to be sending someone out there to talk to you and Ubu's brothers. We'll be following up on this immediately."

Mike recited the squad number and his cell phone number and said, "Thanks, we appreciate your help," before hanging up.

He tried to frown and winced as his stitches pulled.

Thirty-three

L
ouis the Sun King knew the drill. For the Hay wedding, St. Patrick's would be closed to the public for only two hours. He would not be allowed to work after the doors were closed for the night or before they were opened in the early morning. In fact, he was not allowed to work there at all. All he could do was deliver finished product. Same thing with the St. Regis. There was an event in the ballroom that night, so he couldn't get in there undl Saturday morning.

Coordinadng the two sites took master planning. Louis had to get the ten thirty-five-foot, gardenia-plugged dcus trees in place in the cathedral, the massive arrangements down at the altar, and the ribbons and baskets along the pews as soon as the cathedral doors were open Saturday morning. The trees had to be brought in by cherry pickers. The cherry pickers had to disappear, then reappear as soon as the bride and groom walked back down the aisle and out of the building. Everything related to the Hay wedding had to be out of the cathedral before two o'clock, then delivered immediately to the designated not-for-profit for the tax deduction.

What it meant was that the ten ficus trees had to be plugged with five thousand blooming gardenias. Twenty-five giant seashells filled with perfectly blooming Hawaiian Sunset cats and other tropical and marine-type fauna. Twenty-five large umbrellas decanvased, palm fronded, and set with twinkling lights. Four arrangements for the altar and the baskets and ribbons for the pews had to be constructed. All this had to be done before nine. Saturday. The umbrellas had been done before the rain started. The police had stopped bugging him, Wendy was off his case, and he was feeling better.

Louis loved the magic of the party and missed the old days when only the richest people in the world could have what anyone could have now—masses of hlies, roses, lilac, orchids, tulips, hydrangea—anything at all any time of the year. Twenty years ago only the designers had real access to the growers and shippers and suppliers. He felt his business had been destroyed by Martha Stewart do-it-yourselfism coupled with the excessive wealth of the 1990s.

These days it was tough to make events truly unique when anyone could get what he could get. Rower growers had fields all over the world. FedEx flew in every day. Bloom-a-Million on the Internet. Call 1-8OO-FLOWERS. Roses of every hue, six dollars a dozen at every corner Korean market in the city.

At one time Louis's former partner had employed forty-five people full-time. Back in the day more than a hundred people might be involved in an event for hardly more than a hundred people. All that was gone forever. Now everything was canned, nothing was new. He'd done this before. He was bemoaning his difficulties made worse by the rain when his buzzer rang and he saw that the two detectives were back.

Groaning, he buzzed them in and pushed through the crush of extra helpers he'd hired for the day. "Morning," he said. "We're a little crowded in here today."

The Chinese nailed him with a look. "Ubu didn't really come home with you in the truck last Sunday, did he, Louis?" Respectful of his shop, she stood dripping on the doormat.

"I don't know what you mean," he said.

"Yes, you do. Three of you went to Riverdale, but only two of you came back."

Louis closed his eyes, then shook his head slowly. "He didn't want to be in the back of the truck. He wanted to walk home."

"You left him there, up in Riverdale all alone, a stranger to New York? How did you expect him to walk home to Brooklyn?"