The Black Dragon (15 page)

Lo looks up, pushing the thick mop of hair out of his eyes.

“They take time sometimes, Ricard. You know that.”

“And the missing boat?”

“All in hand. No problem.”

One of the other men is throwing things from Zamora's case. He stands up, a big grin on his face now, holding a bag of white powder in his gloved hands.

“Aha,” says Lo, feigning surprise. “Well, nothing is ever what it seems, is it, Ricard?”

The Interpol man frowns again as Lo takes the bag of suspicious-looking powder from his inspector. “Looks like our short friend has been doing a bit of smuggling . . . We'll throw more firepower at finding them. Got plenty to press charges now.”

Ricard inclines his head and looks at Lo. He doesn't smile back.

From where the laundry bin sits in the service basement of the Pearl, Danny can see five other large baskets, filled to the brim, standing ready to be collected.

“Let's make ourselves comfortable,” he says. “Maybe we can get a lift out of here.”

Every now and then a soft whisper in the chute grows to a hiss, and another sheet or towel comes tumbling down onto them. It would be comical—if Laura wasn't in the hands of the gangsters, and threatened with the loss of digits or worse. If he and Zamora hadn't just run for their lives, dodging bullets on a seedy rooftop. If Mum and Dad were still alive . . .

His head still aches a bit from the bump in the chute and his thoughts are jumping from one to the next. He thinks of Laura and her predicament, which makes him think of Detective Tan and Ricard's dark assessment of the detective's fate. And that makes him think of the harbor and fish, which leads to the aquarium exploding in the Golden Bat, and that—the fish tank—brings him back again to the Water Torture Escape. And his parents and the Mysterium. Always now his thoughts are coming back to the Mysterium.

It's pulling me back
, he thinks.
Like gravity
.

The deck of cards is in his hands, and he's working them like worry beads. Zamora looks at them snapping through his long fingers.

“Hey, Mister Danny. You were going to show me the jumping man.”

“Now?”

“We've got time, no?”

Danny smiles in spite of everything. He shuffles the cards, working the king to where he wants it, preparing the force, the actions relaxing him. Feels easier than it did at school. He remembers Dad doing the very same trick, sitting on the trailer's steps, one summer's evening long ago on the outskirts of Rome. First time he saw it. Some of the Aerialisques were watching and the evening breeze was ruffling the black ostrich feathers on their costumes. Someone playing flamenco guitar in the distance—and Dad's hands looked so calm, so easy as he joked with everyone. That was the life . . .

“Pick a card, Major.”

The trick goes like clockwork, the king taking a decent jump, tumbling like a “flyer” on the trapeze, and Zamora applauds silently.

“Good stuff, Mister Danny.”

There are footsteps approaching. Voices in the corridor.

Quickly Zamora pulls the lid shut and they burrow down into the sheets.

They hear some of the other bins being wheeled across the concrete floor, and then suddenly their own basket lurches, and they're on the move themselves—spun around, shoved out through flapping plastic doors, back into the humidity and heat of the afternoon, bumped up a ramp. Sunlight chinks through the basket onto their faces.

“OK.
Vamos!
” Zamora mutters as the laundry men heave the basket onto the lift at the back of their waiting truck.

“But where to?” Danny says, tucking the cards away.

Zamora smiles, his face mysterious in the striated light, expression hard to read. “No straight roads in this world, Danny. Just labyrinths.”

The Happy Laundry truck reverses out of the loading bay. Its smiling sun logo flashing yellow as it emerges from the back of the Pearl.

Unnoticed, it slips from the service road and merges with the mangle of traffic on Connaught Road.

It's reflected in Sing Sing's sunglasses as she sits impassively in a café across the street, mobile clamped to her ear, talking urgently in Cantonese.

It passes—without raising any attention—a squad car, where Detective Lo sits pensively, chain smoking, running a hand through his shaggy hair.

It glides effortlessly past three men waiting in a side street on their motorbikes, black-tinted visors pulled down over their faces. One of them takes off his helmet and shakes out his long slick ponytail, his back still smarting from the retribution cuts he has received from the triad. In his eyes, the desire for vengeance.

Standing on the pavement, Ricard watches the laundry truck gliding past and tells himself that he too is doing the right thing. That it can all work out just fine. That the sun will smile on them all.

The van turns a corner and disappears from sight.

19

HOW TO GET A TRIM WHEN KIDNAPPED

Laura comes slowly to something like consciousness.

Her head hurts like crazy and she has no clue where she is. The room's dark and her vision is swimming uncertainly. Her mouth is dry and she has the nagging sensation that she might have been sick.

Must have drugged me
, she thinks.

She remembers the gym, writing with lipstick on the wall. Frantic moments when she realized it might be her only chance. As long as someone finds that message there might be hope. Maybe even Danny?

Come off it. He's a clever lad, but still only twelve. One day he'll be as resourceful as his dad, I should think. Not yet.

Should have told Danny before. Should have written the message differently. Made it clear about White Suit.
But then there was only a second—and no more—to scrawl on the wall and flip the chart back. Major Zee's quite handy when the chips are down, though. Wouldn't be the first time he's stepped up to the plate.
What's wrong with the floor . . . ?

She gets to her feet and lurches sideways. Surely not that groggy? Now she feels the remnants of the gaffer tape on her wrists, the sore patches around her mouth.
Must have trussed me like a chicken and taped my big mouth shut. Oh boy.

She staggers again in the semi-darkness. The floor's falling and rising, falling and rising. And from somewhere below comes the throb of a big diesel engine.

A door opens, a bare bulb in the corridor beyond silhouetting a man as thin as a stick, advancing into the cabin. He's got a pistol and is waving it at Laura. All spiky angles.

“Lie down. You lie down!”

“OK. I'm lying down.”

Another figure, as fat as the other is skinny. He crouches over her now waving a large pair of scissors in her face. They don't look at all clean. And the man carries an overpowering smell of fish with him that makes her gag.

“Your hair,” he says. “Need hair now. Not move.”

“OK. You're the boss. Just a little off the length, please.”

“Shut up!” Fatty shouts, and clunks the scissors rapidly together twice. “Or I cut something else.”

What a mess
, Laura thinks.
Still, if I get out of it I'm going to have quite a story. Front-page stuff.

The thought gives her a tiny lift. She shuts her eyes as the scissors start snapping away close to her ear, thinking of the great copy this will make. It helps to think of something else, and to distract herself she experiments with opening sentences.

“Hey! Watch it, lardboy. That was nearly my ear.”

20

HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR LUCK

The Happy Laundry truck heads for home.

It's pitch black in the basket in the shuttered back of the van, but it's a relief, Danny thinks, not to have to make decisions for a few minutes. He closes his eyes and settles back amidst the sheets and towels, thinking about Ricard again.

Could the man be OK? The look on his face was one that has become very familiar of late. It said,
I know a bit more than you do, Danny
. Everyone seems to know more than he does: Laura, Zamora, Sing Sing . . .

And now Ricard. As Zamora said, Laura's message on the wall could be read either way: Watch out for White Suit. Trust White Suit.

How to know who to trust?

He remembers Dad doing the “safety” on the escapes.
Always do your own checks, old son—you may trust everyone around you, but you only know the thing's ready if you've done it yourself.

So what went wrong in the water torture cell? And at some point, surely, you have to trust someone other than yourself. So start from a firm base and work up from there.
I trust Zamora
. Stupid even for a moment to think there's a problem there.

He looks in Zamora's direction. In the darkness it seems easier to ask certain questions.

“Major Zee?”

“Yes,
amigo
.”

“Who did you trust—when we were in the Mysterium?”

“Everyone. Well, nearly everyone. A couple of the temporary roustabouts gave me a bad vibe, if you know what I mean. Couple of the Khaos Klowns too. Rosa agreed with me about them.”

“No. I mean when you were doing the cannonball. Or the Wall of Death. Who did you trust to set the equipment?”

“Well, I let the riggers do most of it,” Zamora says, considering. “But I always checked things at the last moment. That way I could only blame myself if something went wrong. Like the popcorn accident. Oversight on my part. It's a matter of responsibility.”

Danny thinks about this for a moment. Makes his decision.

“I'll take the responsibility if we're wrong.”

“Shared responsibility, Mister Danny. Tell you what, though, the other person I didn't like—” The major's about to say more, but the truck slams over a speed bump, knocking the words from his mouth. They're dropping down a ramp. Danny feels his stomach rise—as if they're on a roller-coaster drop—and then the brakes are bringing them to a squealing stop.

“Last stop,” Zamora says brightly. “Let's hop out before someone puts us on a boil wash!”

They're out of their basket and waiting when the shutter at the back of the van comes flying up. A sleepy laundry worker looks bemused at the sight that greets him. To say the least.

“What are you doing in truck?”

“What do we owe you,
señor
?” The major beams and hops down. “And where are we?”

They're standing in a basement loading bay. Other Happy Laundry vans are pulled up to the raised concrete walkway at the back. The heat and noise are oppressive.

“Kowloon,” the man says. “Shantung Street.”

“
Muchas gracias
,” Zamora says, patting the man heartily on the back. He turns to Danny, his smile fading.

“We're back across the harbor again then. What now? We could try Kwan again. See if he can come and drive us around. Cheung Chau maybe?”

Danny nods. “OK. But first I think we should see what Inspector Ricard has to say.”

“I'll borrow the phone here,” Zamora says, bustling off toward the laundry office.