Red Jade Read Free Page A

of the south mountain, nom san. An adjacent village had been located at the north river, bok hoy . The villagers got along well and had historically formed alliances. When they arrived in New York’s Chinatown, they organized a club, an association for family members and affiliates of their clans. Jack’s father had arrived with the third or fourth generation of landed Chinese, a junior member of a small group.
    As an association, the Nom San wasn’t a big deal, nothing like the Lee Association, or the merchants groups; it had only a couple of hundred members. Jack remembered the Nom San’s annual banquets at Port Arthur, a big old-world Chinese restaurant where the kids could play hide-and-seek behind the ornate carved wood panels and banquettes, the tables, and the countertops inlaid with mother of pearl. Chinatown restaurants were now all slick shiny glass and chrome, reflecting the Hong Kong influence, thought Jack. He remembered visiting the association as a child, when Pa, unable to find a babysitter, had brought him along to meetings.
    The Nom San building was a five-story walk-up with a rusty redbrick front. Twin flagpoles flew the red, white, and blue banners of both the United States and the Republic of China. Recently, they had rented out the top floor, and had moved the association’s meeting hall down to the second floor, above the Fung Wang Restaurant, so that the elders wouldn’t have to climb the five flights of stairs to attend a meeting. Outside, there was a red plastic sign, framed in a metallic gold, with shiny yellow letters spelling out the association’s name: NOM SAN BOK HOY BENEVOLENT ASSOCIATION . Jack pressed the dusty button at the wire-grated glass door. He was buzzed in immediately, and while ascending the steps, he felt as if they’d been waiting, anticipating his arrival.

6:55 AM
    At the top of the stairs, he was buzzed in again as he reached for the handle of a gray metal door. Inside was a long open room with bench seating against the side walls. They were sitting at a dark wood table at the far end: two old men he didn’t recognize, hunched over, staring into the mahogany surface over clasped hands, as if they were praying. Behind them, against the short back wall, was an old range top, a steaming pot of tea, and a slop sink setup typical of Chinatown in Pa’s day. There were racks of folding chairs and tables. A tiny bathroom in the right corner was squeezed in next to a fire-escape exit. Along both long walls, hung on coat pegs above the benches, were folded tray tables. Members had always been welcome to sit and eat their takeout, hop jaai faahn , box meals. Displayed higher up on the walls were ancestral plaques and old black-and-white portraits of the village forefathers.
    Everything looked flat and sickly under the two rows of fluorescent ceiling lights. The men were both sixtyish, balding. As Jack approached, they raised their frowning faces to him. Their baggy winter clothes and their choked-back grief made them look similar, like relatives, joined by tragedy.
    The silence was broken by the rumbling complaint of tractor trailers on the street outside, big trucks navigating the bouncing length of Canal Street, heading toward the Holland Tunnel.
    Jack pulled a stool up to the table and sat, showing the gold detective’s badge at his waist. He smelled camphor, the scent of mon gum yao , tiger balm, and bok fa yao , minty oil. The old men had resorted to herbal liniments to help fight off their looming nausea and despair.
    The more haggard of the two spoke first. “We appreciate your help,” he said. “Ah Gong here remembered your father, Sing gor .”
    The other man said, “We asked for you because a tong yen , Chinese, would be more understanding … that this is the saddest day of our lives.”
    “I respect that,” Jack answered. “Who called me?”
    “I am lo Gong,” said the second man. “My son … is the dead man. I got your telephone number from the police