Year of the Dragon (13 page)

“I’m not an immigration officer, Mr. Quong. I don’t have any right to ask to see your green card. What’s he saying, Lom?”

“He says the Nam Soongs regularized him the next day. He went by tong headquarters and his green card was ready and they gave it to him.”

Powers took the card, studied it briefly, and handed it back.

“Counterfeit?” asked Lom.

“I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“I guess he’s a very naive fellow.”

“He’s a schoolteacher. He came halfway around the world to get here, more than twelve thousand miles. He trotted nearly all the way. His green card is none of our business, do you understand me, Lom?”

Quong, still grinning, had been peering from one face to the other. “Green card good,” he said. “Velly good. Cost much money.”

“Where do you work, Mr. Quong?” asked Powers.

“Velly good job, Righteous Worthy,” said Quong, “velly good job.”

He worked in a clothing factory on Pell Street. His job consisted of snipping off the loose ends of threads from finished trousers. He was paid five cents per pair of trousers snipped clean, and was allowed to work twelve hours a day, he reported proudly, thereby being granted the opportunity to earn much money and pay off his note. At first he tried to pay it off by gambling.

He could not gamble anymore, he said, and explained why. One night he had begun to win at the fan-tan table in a gambling den on Mott Street. His run went on and on. The money piled up. He won enough to pay off the tong, and have money left over, and with this realization he came to his senses and pushed back from the table.

Here Quong paused, gave a rueful grin, and shook his head sadly.

As a big winner, he was entitled to a limousine home. It was explained to him that the owners always provided limousines for big winners, like himself, because they were pleased at his good fortune and wished to contribute further to his happiness.

With thousands of dollars in his pockets Quong climbed into the limousine, and told the Chinese driver to take him to Times Square. He had never been in a limousine before, nor to Times Square either. The car rolled along. He sat back on the plump cushions, and closed his eyes and contemplated his rosy future.

The door was yanked open. The car had stopped and two Chinese youths had him by the arms. They yanked him out at gunpoint and robbed him of every cent. They did not rob the driver, Quong noticed. The driver stood by watching, and once the robbery was over he got back into the limousine and drove off, leaving Quong on the sidewalk with his pockets hanging out.

“That’s armed robbery,” said Powers. “Did you report that to the police?”

“Is nobody’s fault, Captain. I velly foolish man. I learn good lesson. I no gamble anymore.” He had seen one of the boys later on Mott Street and was told he belonged to the Flying Dragons, who were very dangerous boys. “I learn a good lesson,” he said again, and laughed.

“You said you had a problem with your son,” Powers prompted, after a moment.

“Is not worthy of your notice, Righteous Worthy,” protested Quong.

“Try me.”

Quong’s son had joined the Flying Dragons, he said. The Dragons were gangsters. The boy wore new clothes. He was being led into a life of crime - had perhaps already committed crimes.

“And he’s only fifteen years old,” said the former schoolteacher, and he turned away blinking.

His wife worked in the kitchen of a restaurant on Mulberry Street, he said. She prepared vegetables for the chef and cleaned up afterwards, working from eleven in the morning until the restaurant closed at about midnight. So neither of them had had time to watch the boy. Recently Quong had punished his son. He had administered the beating, he said, by which the boy would remember his guilt.

“What did he say?” asked Powers.

“The Chinese rarely resort to physical discipline,” Lom said. “He took a stick to the kid, and hasn’t seen him since.”

Quong paused. His manner brightened and he brought out a photo of his son for Powers to admire.

“Note how his ears are set close to the head,” said Quong proudly. “And the lobes are long. These are signs of high intelligence.”

Powers studied the photo. Was this the same boy he had watched being recruited in the school yard? He could not be sure. He handed the photo back.

“My son understands which are the four valuable things,” said Quong hopefully.

“The four valuable things?” said Powers.

“Ink, ink slab, brush and paper, Captain,” said Lom.

“I see.”

Powers began to speak gently, and Quong to nod his head up and down as if he understood. Whether he did or not Powers did not know. There was no law against a boy, any boy, associating with other boys, even if the others might in fact belong to the Flying Dragons, Powers said. However, the law did state that boys were obliged to attend school to age sixteen, and this could be enforced, though not by the police. Truant officers enforced the truancy laws. Powers would alert the truancy office. Also, he would take every possible action under the law against the Chinatown youth gangs, because to drive them out of Chinatown was his first priority.

Somewhere in the course of this speech Powers saw he had lost Mr. Quong, who had pleaded for help, and instead was receiving words. Quong rose to his feet and, smiling and bowing, he began to back his way out of the room.

“Thank you, Righteous Worthy, for time and attention. Thank you velly much,” Quong said, and was gone.

For Lom, the interview had gone well. “These Chinese gentlemen are so graceful, aren’t they, Captain?” he commented.

Powers said nothing.

“I’ve prepared a memo for you, Captain,” said Lom, and he not only handed it over but also stepped to Powers’ side to point out details in his sketches of the ten important elders. “I think you and I should go call on them, one by one.

Powers said, “I wish we could do something for Mr. Quong. I wish we could give him back his son.”

Lom agreed. “If the kid is running with the Dragons, it’s bad news. Those guys’ll blow you out of your socks. Shall I begin setting up our appointments?”

Powers folded the memo and gave it back. “Sure, set them up,” he said.

AT THAT moment, young Quong was about to be formally inducted into the Flying Dragons. Together with Nikki Han and six other boys he trooped down the stairs into a Chinatown cellar. Two of the boys carried Chinese lanterns and Nikki Han carried four steel tent pegs about two feet long, some lengths of rope and a small sledgehammer. In the darkness under the tenement they lit the lanterns, which cast eerie shadows upon the walls. They were under a Chinese grocery. Young Quong, peering up, could see seeds and leaves that hung from the rafters, drying. He was wearing his new clothes and grinning, happy among his new friends. His hair was growing out. In a few weeks it would be long enough to tease into the bouffant style of the other boys.

He no longer felt alone.

Nikki Han tapped one of the tent pegs an inch into the floor. Pacing his distance carefully, he tapped in each of the other three pegs similarly, so as to form a square. Nikki Han then handed the sledgehammer to Quong saying, “Drive each of those pegs in halfway.”

The dirt floor was trodden solid, and Quong had to swing the hammer hard. By the time all four stakes were planted, the fifteen-year-old was breathing hard, though still grinning. He felt himself a working member of the gang, and appreciated by the others, and he did not know about the ritual he was about to undergo. He handed the hammer back to Han.

Upon a command from Han, the other youths leaped upon Quong, tore off all his clothes, and threw him down naked onto the floor. Since he did not comprehend, he struggled, but he could not move. Hands held him spread-eagled. Other hands lashed his wrists and ankles to the four stakes. He was terrified. His ass squirmed uncontrollably on the dirt, and his head lashed back and forth. His frantic eyes sought an explanation, but none came. The lanterns were placed at his head and between his feet, and the other boys backed off into the darkness, and stripped to the waist, though he could not see this. Nor could he see them take out knives. For a time there was no sound, no movement. Quong’s terror mounted.

From out of the darkness came first a maniacal scream, then a butcher knife - the lantern light flashed off the blade - and then the Chinese youth attached to it. The lantern light danced on his flesh and on his weapon, and he lunged for Quong’s face, and drove the knife into the dirt beside his left ear.

Quong screamed.

In rapid succession other gang members, torsos glistening, flew screaming out of the darkness and planted knives and cleavers around the perimeter of the naked figure. Quong screamed louder than they. His sphincter muscles let go. Now as he twisted and squirmed he only soiled himself further. He began to babble, and his eyeballs rolled almost out of his head.

Nikki Han strode forth into the light. “Enough. Untie him.”

Quong, quivering, got to his feet. He was handed a newspaper, with which he cleaned himself up as best as he could. Sweat ran down his breastbone, the muscles in his face twitched, and he was weeping uncontrollably. His clothes were handed him and he got dressed. “Give him the initiation ritual,” ordered Nikki Han.

Quong was handed a paper written in Chinese and ordered to his knees. The boys crowded around him. One held a lantern high so that he could read. “As long as I live I am a member of the Flying Dragon Tong,” he read in a trembling voice. “Even if I die, I am still a member. If I betray the tong, Heaven and Earth will destroy me. I will obey all the rules of the tong. If I don’t I will die under the condition of being shot. The secret of the tong must be kept or I will die under a thousand knives.”

The oath continued. “If one is found to be a traitor, the punishment is death. We are all brothers of each other. If a brother is in trouble or danger we must respond, or die under a thousand knives. The tong leader is the adviser of all events. If anyone tries to get rid of or kill him the punishment is death.”

Having completed the oath, Quong was allowed to stand up. His head moved among the drying seeds and leaves, and the other boys stepped forward grinning, and began pummeling him on the back. His tears dried and he began to smile. They were all talking at once in Cantonese. Quong was now a sworn member of the Flying Dragons. He beamed with pride. His terror had been worth it. He was truly one of them now.

Nikki Han handed Quong a short-barreled .32-caliber revolver which he brandished this way and that, as if it were a toy pistol, which it was not. Like a small boy he pointed it at the far wall. “Tock! Tock!” he cried, which was the noise a Chinese child makes when playing at gunfire. “Tock! Tock!”

Nearly bursting with happiness and pride, Quong thrust the revolver into his belt under his shirt and all the boys trooped up the stairs out of the cellar and stepped into the sunlight on Mott Street.

LATE IN the afternoon Lom entered Captain Powers’ office. Powers, in uniform behind his desk, looked up.

“Well, Captain,” Lom said, “I’ve been able to set up the first of those appointments for us.”

Powers, peering over his half-glasses, studied Lom. “I won’t need you to come along, Lom.”

“Excuse me, Captain.”

Powers had thought the matter out. “I think it’s better if I go by myself.”

“But Captain-” Powers did not know these elders, Lom told him, nor understand the Chinatown power-structure, nor speak Chinese. Lom would be invaluable to him, as he had been invaluable to the dozen precinct commanders before him.

Powers shook his head, cutting him off. “I’ve made my decision on the matter, Lom.” Another trap avoided, Powers reflected.

“But Captain,” protested Lom, “what about my prestige?”

“Perhaps my prestige,” murmured Powers, “ought to come first, do you think?”

When Lom made no reply, Powers said: “You know what I wish you’d do for me, Lom? I wish you’d find Quong’s kid and have a talk with him. Maybe you can do some good. After that, go see Quong. Make him understand that his police department is doing everything for him that it can. Now hand me over your list, if you will.”

“Yes sir,” mumbled Lom, and he laid it down on Powers’ desk and went out.

WILBUR D. LURTSEMA, producer of the Seven O’clock World News Report, was a big man with a big paunch, who tended to bull his way through life belly foremost. He came bulling out of the men’s room now, fingers still working at his half-zipped fly, and bumped smack into Carol Cone. His hands were wrongly placed to ward her off. As a result she caromed off him into the wall, and nearly went down.

Her eyes caromed too - from his face to his hands at his crotch. His fingers let go immediately, the job half done, and rose to straighten his tie. Lurtsema, embarrassed, was therefore irritated - an effect this woman had on him all too often. He longed for the good old days when journalism meant newspapers, and was a male profession. He thought grimly: a man can’t even piss privately anymore.

“Willie,” she said. “Just the man I wanted to see.”

The other on-camera people called him Will, or Mr. Lurtsema. He hated Willie. He was fifty-five years old. No one had called him Willie since college - and even then only his pals - until this woman. Who was not a pal.

She said, “I need to see you and I run into you. What a coincidence.”

It was no coincidence, he believed. More likely she had lurked in the hall outside the can waiting for him to come out, something no male reporter would have dared. Appointments were supposed to go through his secretary. Everybody went through his secretary. But not her. He was one of the most important producers in television, but to her he was just another man to be manipulated, he believed. Her method when dealing with men was to catch them off balance, with their fly open if possible, and then to keep them that way until she got what she wanted. It was an outrage. She was an outrage.

He thought he could feel a draft, and he considered zipping himself shut right in front of her, blatantly, and screw women’s sensibilities. But he belonged to an older school - as a boy he had been taught, among other concepts, gallantry. A man was not allowed to zip up in front of a lady. The next best thing was to hike his pants higher on his hips as a means of pulling the open edges together and he did this. He also turned sideways so that whatever there was to see would not be staring her in the eye.

“What do you want?”

“Let’s go into your office.”

In the office he would have to listen to another of her far-fetched ideas. The daily news conference was the place ideas were supposed to be tried out, give twenty other people a chance to shoot them down, but not her. In the news conferences she never opened her mouth. She much preferred waylaying him outside the can. One on one. A sexual confrontation of some kind.

Lurtsema had been managing editor of the old
Herald Tribune
fifteen years earlier, before it folded. He had the same job here, different title. In the newspaper business the news came first, then the editors. The reporters, despite their bylines, were largely anonymous and did what they were told. But in television the reporters were referred to as talent, same as rock singers. They and their goddam Q factors had far more clout than editors - who were called producers - and got far more money. The Q factor was the recognition quotient of a reporter’s face as determined by secret polls of viewers. The networks paid heavily for the results of these Q polls. Carol Cone had an extremely high Q factor. She was a star. Lurtsema could not have fired her if he wanted to. On the other hand, she could probably get him fired, if she chose to make a stand on it.

He peered off down the corridor, a long, airless tube. It was like staring the length of the inside of a submarine. At the far end, where the torpedo tubes would be, was the set for the Seven O’clock News, an airless place also, where each day’s grim events were collected and fired out into the world, destined, like a spread of torpedoes, to traumatize whatever they struck.

“You can give me five minutes, Willie, can’t you?”

She was, he saw, blinking her eyes at him. It was not a come-on to him personally, but rather part of a technique she used. He had seen her use it often enough - a technique that tapped the deep, sexual core of a man, any man. She –it - made men respond to her as father to daughter, as a man to his woman. She made men want to accord her any boon in their power. Her technique was as subtle as the perfume she wore, for perfume was also part of her arsenal. Or perhaps it was not subtle at all. Like perfume, she evoked responses over which men had little control. By pretending to an intimacy that did not exist, by seeming to make promises she had no intention of fulfilling, she made all males aware of her sexually - whether producers, sources, competing reporters, anyone. She made men want to step back and let her through the door first, and they did this and were always surprised when she never even turned around to say thank you. Her technique, to Lurtsema, was a lie, and she was a cheat.

She was two other things Lurtsema did not comprehend: a so-called journalist who had never worked a day on a newspaper, and what had become known as a sexually aggressive woman. Formerly she would have been known as a bitch in heat, Lurtsema reflected. She had bedded a lot of guys. Or he supposed she had bedded them. She had as many dates as a college girl, different guys every few weeks, and a college girl she was not, so how else did all those dates end?

You tell me, Lurtsema thought.

“Willie, your office is that way.”

He strode toward it. He was trying to keep ahead of her so he could finish unobserved with his fly. But she kept up, prattling non-stop. He increased speed. It didn’t help. He strode in past his secretary, practically running. He dropped into the chair behind his desk and bellied up tight into the kneehole and glared at her.

“Here’s my idea,” said Carol. She sat down and got comfortable. “The Chinatown problem.”

“What Chinatown problem?”

Carol outlined it: “Gangs, gambling dens, tongs, the Golden Palace massacre-”

“What happened to your other idea, police mismanagement?”

“This one is better.”

“It’s a local story. It has no national impact.”

“Every Chinatown in the country is the same.”

“We don’t know that.”

He studied her. She must be forty, he thought, but made up she looked thirty, and she posed as twenty. Granted she looked terrific on TV, but mostly because the picture that went out over the air was not nearly as sharp as real life. The picture lied, though not to her, apparently. She looked at herself in the monitor every night and believed what she saw there. The old movie stars had believed what they saw too, he supposed. But they had seen themselves only once or twice a year. This woman saw herself every night. She believed what the screen told her, that she was still as delicious as a girl. To her, TV and real life were the same.

Her Chinatown idea was worthless. It was like a statue she had constructed in her own image. He was demolishing it and he was pleased. He would take a hammer to it. It would lie in shards at her feet.

“You have to admit that the Golden Palace massacre is national,” she said doggedly.

“If the cops ever break the case, sure. So far they got nothing. They haven’t even found the getaway car, for chrissake. And apart from the massacre nobody gives a damn about Chinatown.”

“It’s a big story,” persisted Carol.

But her eyes had dropped to her hands, Lurtsema noted. She had a habit, when reading the news on camera, of dropping her eyes like that. Then she would raise them, reading directly into the lens, looking suddenly extremely vulnerable, like a woman who was about to exchange a confidence, about to confess something. It was an incredibly effective trick, or at least so the ratings seemed to prove. The public responded to her in a big way, according to the numbers. To Lurtsema her trick seemed transparent. That it produced results out of all proportion to its cunning infuriated him. The only other thing he would grant her was that she read the teleprompter well; she never flubbed words. He would not grant her that Chinatown was worth a story.

“Well,” she said, “let’s get somebody in here from the police department to give us a Chinatown backgrounder. It’s worth that much at least. It’s worth a backgrounder.”

“Get who in here?”

“The guy who commands the Chinatown precinct, what’s his name-”

“He’s not involved in the massacre investigation. Probably doesn’t even know what progress they’ve made, if any.

Carol stood up. “Say you’ll think about it.”

Lurtsema shrugged. “Sure.” He had no intention of thinking about it or her.

Carol went out. Without batting her eyes at him, or wiggling her ass. Lurtsema considered this a victory, and he was chortling as he got up from his desk and began pacing the room.

His secretary came in. “Yes, Margaret,” he said.

Margaret, a twenty-two-year-old blonde, was about to speak when her gaze was caught by something that was not as it should be.

“Mr. Lurtsema,” she said cryptically, and pointed with her eyes.

“Goddamn it,” cried Lurtsema, furious with Carol Cone, furious with himself. Turning to the wall, he yanked the thing shut once and for all.

Back in her own office, Carol stared out the window, and thought about Powers, a news source she wanted to see again. Potential news sources were regularly invited to Lurtsema’s office for cocktails after the News had been taped. The sources were then grilled by producers and reporters for background information. Would Lurtsema invite Powers to a backgrounder? Maybe not immediately, Carol decided. But she was confident that eventually she could make any man do almost anything she wished.