Death Money Read Online Free PDF Page B

doubt.
    “ M’hou yisee , hah?” the man said regretfully. “Sorry that my answers are no help.” Clenched in his face, clearly, was his reluctance to say anything that in any way represented the voice of the association. He didn’t want to involve the group in any outside trouble. He didn’t want to go anywhere near the dead face in the photo, but the phone numbers seemed to make him hesitate before backing off.
    The man looked at Billy for a long moment. Bee-lee boy was Bow Ying’s son, he knew, an upcoming young businessman and heir to the tofu throne, but in their little Chinatown world, Billy didn’t carry any more weight than that. It was only business after all, but bringing a cop around was an awkward surprise.
    Jack offered one of his NYPD detective’s cards. “Please call me if anything occurs to you.”
    The man nodded politely and accepted the card.
    Billy bluntly broke the ice with an unrelated question: “So you have enough tofu for Chin’s wedding banquet?”
    Frozen momentarily by the change in direction, the man answered, “I’ll call you.”
    Jack thanked him, and they left the room, leaving him in peace with his morning coffee.
    O UT ON M OTT Street it was starting to snow, with big flakes of white slowly covering the icy gray debris on the ground. Billy fired up a cigarette and took a long drag.
    “Bullshit. What a waste of time.”
    “Relax,” Billy said. “The man got uptight. Your badge, the gun, the dead man’s picture. Hey, it’s easier to just know nothing.”
    Jack knew it as Chinese truth, centuries of perfecting this type of cooperation with the authorities, where no one ever implicates himself. See no evil. Hear no evil. Speak no evil .
    “He didn’t see you as Chinese , Jacky boy,” Billy continued. “The only thing yellow about you was your badge. That stinkin’ badge, my brother, sometimes opens doors, but sometimes closes them, too.”
    They continued toward the Tofu King.
    Billy concluded, “The man doesn’t trust what might happen to his words once they leave his mouth and slide into your cop’s ear. Ya dig?”
    Jack frowned as he checked his watch. “Just let me know if you hear anything.” He left Billy at the tofu shop, made a left onto Bayard, and headed toward the Senior Citizens’ Center. The falling flakes, he knew, would drive the elderly indoors to the free hot congee breakfast provided by the center.
    He hoped the old woman, Ah Por, would be there.
    T HE SENIOR CENTER occupied the first floor, including the old cafeteria, of what used to be Public School 23.
    What was once an elementary-school lunchroom was now used to cook and serve meals to 300 elderly Chinese—hot congee in the winter, tofu dishes and melon soups in the summer, plates of rice with sides of Chinese greens, choy , and fruit.
    A cup of tea was always available for the asking.
    The temperature rose noticeably as Jack stepped into the lunchroom, a humid mass of gray heads, warming in their down-filled jackets and quilted meen ngaap vests. He could hear Chinese Wah Fow radio over the PA system, barely audible over the din of chattering voices and clashing metal from the kitchen area.
    He looked toward Ah Por’s usual spot, near the big window facing the back courtyard. It was crowded there, and he couldn’t tell for sure with all the puffy, shapeless clothes, so he moved in for a closer look.
    The sea of bodies fluidly parted for Jack, a young stranger, and rejoined in his wake. Jack could feel the looks of curiosity following him.
    He found Ah Por alone at the end of one of the bench tables near the back exit. There was an empty bowl next to her, and she was watching an old Hong Kong movie playing on one of the overhead TV monitors.
    Jack took a seat opposite her and caught her attention by touching the back of the veiny hand she’d rested on the table. “Ah Por,” he acknowledged quietly.
    She stared at him curiously, smiling, as he bowed slightly.
    “Ah doy,” she said, using