Authors: Rhys Bowen
“I thought you were on kitchen duty this morning, Teddy,” she said. “Don’t tell me you’ve already finished?”
Teddy flushed and got to his feet. “Well, no, but the girls seemed to have it all under control so I thought—well, dash it all, Hermione, a fellow isn’t exactly cut out for peeling potatoes.”
“This fellow had better learn if he’s going to stay here,” the girl said. “Go on. Off with you. We need privacy. And don’t take the paper with you.”
She shook her head, smiling as he left. “That one’s not going to last long. It’s too much of a shock for some of them who have been pampered all their lives. Sarah was one of our best, unfortunately. It’s too bad we’re losing her. Do sit down, Miss…?”
“Murphy. Molly Murphy,” I said. “I’ve come to you with a strange request. I’m looking for a missing Chinese girl. I wondered if you’ve ever come across one at the house?”
“Actually we have a girl here at the moment,” she said. “Frankly we’re not sure what to do with her next.”
“You do? How long has she been with you?”
“Only a few days.”
“Then this sounds like the girl I am looking for. Could I possibly see her?”
“May I ask why?” Her face took on a guarded look again.
“I’ve been asked to find her by her family.”
“Her family?” The expression changed to one of incredulity. “Her family is looking for her? We had no idea she had a family. They usually don’t. Well, that can only be good, can’t it? We were wondering what would become of her. She’s not at all well, you see. I should warn you that we think it’s possible she has tuberculosis—consumption, you know. So she could be infectious, but I’ll bring you to her if you want to take that risk.”
“Yes, I do.” My heart was thumping with excitement. She wasn’t well. Was that the reason she ran away?
Hermione led me up well-worn linoleum stairs, one flight and then two. The third flight was plain wood, narrow, and steep. “It’s quite a climb,” she said, “but awfully good for the figure, all this running up and down.”
As we came onto the landing a door opened and another young woman came out, this one wearing a large white apron and a white cap over her hair.
“How is the patient, Marigold?”
“A little better. She’s eating well, but she still has that terrible cough.”
“She has a visitor, and maybe some good news,” Hermione said, and ushered me into the room.
The frail Chinese girl lay propped on her pillows looking like a porcelain doll. The girl in my photograph had looked healthy and robust. This one looked as if she was wasting away, but she sat up as we came into the room.
“Hello,” I said, smiling at her. “Do you speak English?”
“Little bit,” she said. She was eyeing me warily.
“Are you Bo Kei?” I asked.
She frowned as if she didn’t understand.
“Bo Kei? You came from China as a bride?”
She nodded, her eyes still darting as if she might be considering flight.
“Bride of Mr. Lee Sing Tai?”
Her expression changed. “Lee Sing Tai?” She spat out the words in staccato fashion; then she actually raised herself up and spat onto the floor.
“Annie, that’s not nice,” Hermione said. “No spitting. Not hygienic.”
The girl lay back again as if exhausted.
From her outburst it was clear that she wouldn’t be too keen on going back.
“He is looking for you,” I said.
“No! Why he look for me? Not want me no more,” she said, turning her gaze away. “Send me away. No son.”
“Send you away? He sent you away?”
She nodded. “No give him son. No use, he say.”
“I don’t understand. You came from China a month ago, is that correct?” I asked her. “One month?”
Hermione touched my arm. “What’s this about coming from China as a bride? We took Annie in when she was thrown out of a local brothel. Usually they turn them out with a very different sort of disease, but in this case they were worried she had consumption and would pass it to clients.”
“A brothel?” I asked, completely confused now. “Then she’s not the girl I’m looking for. And why do you call her Annie?”
“That’s the name she gave us.”
I sat on the bed beside her. “Annie? How long have you been in America?”
She wouldn’t meet my gaze. “Five year,” she said.
Something that had been said passed through my mind—something about Lee Sing Tai bringing in another bride before this, and then sending her back to China because she didn’t produce a son.
“Did you come here as the bride of Lee Sing Tai?” I asked. “Did he have you brought here?”
She nodded, her face expressionless as if she was made of stone.
“And you didn’t give him the son he wanted, so he sent you to a brothel?”
She nodded again. I looked up and met Hermione’s concerned eyes.
“Annie, listen,” I went on. “He’s brought in another girl from China, but she has run away.”
“She smart girl,” Annie said. “He bad man. Bad man.”
“I’m trying to find her,” I said. “Do you have any idea where she might have gone?”
“Maybe she come place like this.”
I looked up at Hermione again. “Are there other settlement houses around here? Other places where a girl might seek refuge?”
“There’s the Henry Street Settlement and the University Settlement on Eldridge, but they are farther away from Chinatown and I don’t know how she would have come across them,” Hermione said. “There are a couple of Christian women’s hostels, but I don’t know if they’d take in a destitute Chinese girl.”
“You’re right,” I said. “I stayed in one near the Battery myself when I first arrived in New York. They were extremely strict—and devout.”
Hermione smiled. “That’s why we make a point of being completely open and impartial. No hint of religion here, only humanitarianism.”
Annie touched my hand. “This girl—she come from same nuns like me?”
Nuns! Why hadn’t I considered that the missionaries might be nuns?
“Yes,” I said. “I believe she came from the nuns.”
Annie gave the ghost of a tired smile. “We call them white ghost ladies. They dress all white, like ghost.”
I stood up. “Is there a convent of any kind around here?”
Hermione shrugged. “I don’t know of a convent. I’ve seen nuns in the streets occasionally, so they may be attached to local churches.”
I took a business card out of my purse. “I’m going on the hunt again, but if the girl should turn up here, please keep her and send someone to find me.” I gave Annie a reassuring smile. “Nice meeting you, Annie. You’re in good hands now. You’ll get well soon.”
“Okay, miss,” she said flatly.
We started the long descent, our footsteps echoing on the bare boards of the stairs.
“She won’t get well, you know,” Hermione said when we were safely out of earshot. “Frankly we’re in a pickle here. We don’t know what to do with her. We shouldn’t really keep her or she might infect the other women who come here, but there’s nowhere to send her.” She paused, sighing. “Poor little thing. So she came over here as a bride, did she?”
“It appears so. And she didn’t give him a son, so he got rid of her.”
“Sent her to work in a brothel. That’s disgusting.”
“From what I’ve learned of this Chinese gentleman, his people look upon women as objects to be traded and disposed of.”
“Horrible.” Hermione shuddered. “I wish you luck. I hope you find this girl before her lord and master does.”
“So do I,” I said. “Please give my best to Sarah when you see her.”
And so I left the settlement house with my head in turmoil. From what I had now learned from Annie, did I really want to find Bo Kei? And if I found her, how could I possibly deliver her back into the hands of Lee Sing Tai?
Eleven
I visited the other settlement houses but, as I suspected, they hadn’t seen my Chinese bride. So I began to look for Catholic churches and more specifically, for nuns. It was midafternoon and I was growing rather hot and weary. But I was now filled with a sense of urgency that I must find the girl before anyone else did.
I began to wish I had been a better Catholic. If I’d made a point of going to mass in New York, I’d have known where to find the churches here in the Lower East Side. But I’d too many sins to confess now to make me want to go back to church—and my few encounters with judgmental priests hadn’t convinced me otherwise. So I wandered aimlessly around, trying first the Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Mulberry. Here I moved warily again, as we were close to police headquarters. But nobody at St. Patrick’s had seen a Chinese girl.
“They don’t ever leave Chinatown,” a young priest told me. “Not if they know what’s good for them. And as for girls—well, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Chinese woman out in public.”
I wasn’t sure where to go next until an idea came to me. I had help on the spot, so to speak. So I made my way to Cherry Street, where Seamus and his children were now living with his sister Nuala and her brood. I can tell you that climbing the five flights to that tenement brought back painful memories of my arrival in New York. How far I’d come since then. Now I was safe and secure and about to be married to a wonderful man. I found renewed energy to bound up the last few of those stairs.
It was Nuala herself who opened the door. She looked me up and down, hands on hips. “Well, would you look what’s turned up on our doorstep again,” she said.
“That’s a nice welcome, if ever I heard one, Nuala,” I said. “I’m glad to see you looking well.”
“So has your fancy man thrown you out?”
I laughed. “On the contrary. I’m about to be married. To a police captain.”
Nuala looked back into the dark room beyond. “You hear that, boys!” she yelled. “You’d better mind yourselves when Miss High-and-Mighty is around these days, ’cos anything you say will be reported back to the police.”
Several suspicious faces peered out of the darkness. I couldn’t see much of them, but I didn’t like what I saw. Nuala’s boys were now looking like the typical Irish louts.
“I won’t trouble you long, but I’ve a job for young Shamey, and your boys too, if they’d like to help.”
Shamey was called to the door. I wasn’t invited inside. When Bridie heard it was me, she rushed to me and flung her arms around me again. Shamey came with more of a swagger, to impress the cousins, I suspected.
I told him what I wanted. “All the churches in the area, where there might be nuns living. Your aunt Nuala probably knows where they are. Ask if any of them has taken in a Chinese girl. If they have, come and find me immediately.”
“Are you paying him for doing this?” one of Nuala’s boys demanded, pushing past Shamey to face me. He was now almost as tall as me, with a voice that hovered between boy and man.
“You too, if you’d like to help.”
“How much?”
“Are you out of your mind?” His older brother grabbed him by his shirtfront and thrust him aside. “She’s obviously helping the police. Didn’t you hear what she said? Monk’d kill you.”
“So you’ve joined Monk Eastman’s gang now, have you?” I asked.
“Junior Eastman.” The boy stuck his chest out proudly. “Monk says I’m real useful to him.”
“Then I think I’ll leave the nuns to Shamey,” I said. “You’ll do your best for me, won’t you, boy?”
Shamey nodded, but with a half glance back at his cousins to see their reaction. “Come and report to me as soon as you hear anything. You remember where I live, don’t you? And at the moment I’m across the street with the two ladies. You can leave a message with them if I’m not there.” I ruffled Bridie’s hair. “I’ll see you soon then. And you’ll come to my wedding. I need a flower girl. We’ll make you a pretty dress.”
As I bent to hug her she whispered in my ear, “Let me come with you now. I don’t like it here. Those boys, they’re bad. They drink and they fight.”
“Darling, I can’t take you right now,” I said softly, “because I’m sleeping in someone else’s house. But I promise you I’ll take care of you and we’ll find a grand place for you. You just need to stick it out for a few more days—be brave for me—all right?”
She nodded. But after I left, I had terrible second thoughts. Was she actually safe there? I thought about asking Sid and Gus if I could bring her to share my room, but then I resolved to take her with me when I returned to Daniel’s mother’s house.
I started back in the direction of Chinatown. Churches. Where would a Chinese newcomer go, looking for nuns? Then, of course, I remembered the blank brick wall that was the face of the Church of the Transfiguration on Mott itself. It had never crossed my mind that she might be there, still in the neighborhood. Surely she wouldn’t have stayed so close, within easy reach of Mr. Lee, would she? But she might have gone there for help. Perhaps she had found nuns there who had spirited her away to their convent. It was worth a try, anyway. I went back to Mott, which had become quite lively at this time of day. There were men going into restaurants, returning home with bags of provisions, standing together talking, sitting drinking tea. A few half-Irish children kicked a ball around, but there was not a woman in sight. I tried the heavy oak door of the church and it opened to my touch, leading me into a different world. The quiet peace and muted light through the stained glass windows was in contrast to the gaudy colors and loud, staccato speech outside. I stood, breathing in the tranquility, trying to collect my thoughts, and as usual wondering what on earth I was doing getting involved again in something so complicated. A piece of stolen jewelry was one thing, but now I had no idea how I should proceed if I found the girl. I was being paid to carry out a commission. Was it up to me to make a judgment on the moral validity of my assignment? Maybe that’s why I wasn’t a good detective like Daniel, who had learned to prevent himself from becoming personally involved in his cases.
The church was silent and empty apart from an old Italian woman, dressed all in black, praying at a statue of St. Anthony. I went up to her and asked where I might find the priest. She pointed at the confessional where a red light was on. I went and sat beside it, waiting patiently, and eventually he came out.
“Were you still waiting for confession?” he asked, in a voice that still betrayed a hint of the Irish.