More recently, Ah Por’s readings provided accurate if oblique clues for Jack, helping in his investigations. He found her in the back of the lunchroom, in a sea of old heads, listening to the Chung Wah Chinese Broadcasting’s radio program that was being played over the PA system.
“Ah Por,” Jack said, just loud enough to catch her ear, to make her glance up at him, a glint of recognition in her old eyes. He didn’t see any of her tools of divination but he knew she also applied “face reading” to everyday items, using them to channel with an eerie clairvoyant’s touch.
“Ah Por,” Jack repeated, handing her the photo of May Lon Fong and the expired driver’s license of Harry Gong. He pressed a folded five-dollar bill into her rheumatic hand, smiled, and bowed his head.
Ah Por ran a thumb over the smiling face of the woman in the photograph, over the karaoke microphone she held. She repeated the moves over the man’s face on the driver’s license. She pocketed the money and closed her eyes.
Jack remembered that she spoke softly, and leaned in closer.
“She is a snake.”
Huh? thought Jack.
“And he is a pig,” she added, her eyes snapping open. Dementia? considered Jack.
“They are incompatible. Better is the Snake with an Ox, or a Rooster.”
Jack realized she was referring to the animals in the Chinese zodiac.
“She is Fire, and he is Water,” Ah Por continued. “Worlds apart.” She paused, and shook her head. “He is still in love with her. But she is full with bitterness.”
Ah Por handed Jack back the photo and license.
“Their union can come to no good end.”
“Thank you,” Jack said, handing her the two posters from the open case files, slipping another five into her hand. She pocketed the money and held the Wanted posters apart, one in each hand. She swept her fingers across each of the faces, slowly rolling her head.
Jack leaned closer.
Lifting up the poster of Eddie Ng, Ah Por said, “Yuh,” meaning rain, followed by, “Lo mok,” Cantonese slang for Negro.
Jack noted Ah Por’s responses, although he continued to puzzle over their meaning.
From the second poster, the magazine photo likeness of Mona, Ah Por said yuh again. Is she confused? wondered Jack. She gave him a faraway look, adding, “Seui,” water.
“Water over water,” she concluded, handing him back the posters.
Jack thanked her again, wondering if it was all mystical mumbo-jumbo meant to torment him, another Chinatown curse.
Ah Por cackled, turned, and walked away, patting her money pocket, her signal to Jack that the session was over. He watched her disappear into the crowd of ancient folks milling about, their voices blending together amidst the sounds of Chinese radio.
The smell of congee had made him think of the Wong Sing Restaurant, where Harry Gong had worked. Jack decided to go along Columbus Park. He passed the string of Chinese funeral parlors that lined the street opposite the playgrounds and ballfields of the park side: the Chao Funeral House, the Wah Fook Parlor, the Sun Wing Parlor, the Wing Ching Parlor. Jack saw the large white tickets prominently posted on the glass doors of the parlor’s entrances; each ticket bore a Chinese ink-brushed name, each black on white ticket representing a deceased person.
There were eight tickets at the Wah Fook. Eight also at the Sun Wing. The Chao had posted six, and the Wing Ching, five. The funeral drivers would work double shifts this week.
Twenty-seven bodies leaving Mulberry Street, heading toward everlasting peace.
January and February were the cruelest months, Jack thought, with the deadly flu season and the subzero cold picking off the elderly and the infirm. At least two dozen deaths a week during these winter months. And they’d be receiving two more bodies quick enough, Jack knew, as soon as the Medical Examiner was done with May Lon Fong and Harry Gong.
Jack cut left to Mosco Street, then left again to Pell, and saw the place he sought a short distance up the street. The Wong Sing Restaurant featured home-style Cantonese dishes, with a side wall of quickie takeout: ningjouh, or haang gaai, “food walking” containers of chopped chicken, duck, or roast pork over rice, topped with a fried egg. Two countermen worked a range top where soup noodles cooked, and plated the various combinations.
There were eight small tables that could be arranged together. No tablecloths. Three waiters loitered around a shelf station filled with glasses and pots of tea. It was early enough for Jack to be their first customer, but this was a late breakfast for him. He ordered pei don jook, thousand-year-egg congee, with a yow jow gwai, fried cruller, that made for a hot, slurpy, and filling meal.
One of the waiters brought him a steaming glass of brown tea.
Jack drafted notes for the reports that he knew Captain Marino would ask for, then he observed the waiters between spoonfuls of jook. He thought about Harry Gong and his days as a waiter here.
Typically, Chinatown waiters worked a ten- to twelve-hour day, five, sometimes six days a week. The bulk of their take-home pay consisted of tips, which everyone underreported. The Wong Sing was a small restaurant, and no one here was making enormous tips like the waiters in the large banquet-style restaurants. The full-time waiters could take off an hour or two between the lunch and dinner shifts, between 3:30 and 5:30 PM. Those who lived close enough could do their errands, spend time with their families, or make a quick run to OTB. The part-time waiters covered the full shift and helped the kitchen staff prepare vegetables during the dead hours.
The Wong Sing waiters laughed among themselves at an inside joke, and Jack understood their camaraderie. They’d spend more time here with their coworkers, their “brothers,” than they did with their loved ones. Family life had to suffer.
Jack imagined Harry Gong going home to an unhappy wife after twelve hours of waiting tables. He also imagined an exasperated May Lon, after an exhausting day caring for two children, facing a dead-tired lo gung, husband, who was deaf to her frustrations.
Jack knew that the demands of work and of parenting often broke families apart. None of the negative kharma he felt reflected well on relationships, fortifying Jack’s cynicism.
Collecting his notes, Jack remembered that he needed to see Chinese newspaper editor Vincent Chin, and finished his congee.
He left an extra dollar tip on the way out.
The United National was located on White Street, hidden behind the Tombs, a city detention facility, and the rundown building of the Men’s Mission. Vincent Chin managed the operation from its renovated storefront inside a converted warehouse building.
The newspaper had a staff of twenty: pressmen, reporters, and editors. They used freelance photographers and downloaded free graphics. The copy was typeset by layout men who inserted the tiny metal Chinese characters into the press forms by hand.
The United National had been Pa’s favorite, his hometown newspaper. Its editor had assisted Jack on previous cases in Chinatown by divulging hearsay details, loose street talk, and calls from anonymous tipsters: details that were inadmissible in court, unverifiable, and unprintable in the paper.
Vincent was sipping from a steamy take-out cup of nai cha tea when Jack walked into his little office. Jack proceeded to provide Vincent with the particulars of the May Lon Fong and Harry Gong murder-suicide case, sticking to the facts, leaving out the speculation.
Jack was happy to lay out the straight scoop for Vincent, knowing he would write the true story, and that the other Chinese dailies would have to follow suit if they wanted timely coverage. When Jack finished, he said, “But you know the deal. Don’t print it until the department okays it. You could probably add it late to tomorrow’s issue.”