Year of the Dog Read online

  Year of the Dog

  Also by the author

  Chinatown Beat

  Year of the Dog

  Henry Chang

  Copyright © 2008 by

  Henry Chang

  Published by Soho Press, Inc.

  853 Broadway

  New York, NY 10003

  All rights reserved.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Chang, Henry, 1951-

  Year of the dog / by Henry Chang.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 978-1-56947-515-7

  1. New York (N.Y.). Police Dept.—Fiction. 2. Chinese—United States—

  Fiction. 3. Chinatown (New York, N.Y.)—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3603.H35728Y43 2008

  813’.6—dc22

  2008018856

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  For Mom, who crossed the oceans with quiet courage, leaving behind a war-torn nation, bound for America, to a Chinatown life of piecework, sweatshops, and family. May the Kwoon Yum, Goddess of Mercy, stand beside you always.

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  0 - Nine

  Bodega Koreano

  Face and Death

  Dog Eat Dog

  Black Car, Black Night

  Chao’s

  OTB

  On the Edge

  Night Without End

  Ninth and Midnight

  EDP Avenue B

  White Devil Medicine

  Roll By

  Pa’s Jook

  Ma’s Prayers

  AJA

  Day for Night

  Sampan Sinking

  Precious

  Friends

  Golden Star

  Dailo ’s Money

  Hovel and Home

  Pay off

  Time and Space

  Secret Society

  Watch Out

  White and Red

  Sin

  Touch

  Crime No Holiday

  Xmas Eve

  Happy Family

  Watch and Wait

  Revelations

  Deliver U$ from Evil

  On This Holy Night

  Break Down

  Ghost Face

  Fade In

  God’s General Gourd

  Betting Against Time

  Blanket Party . . .

  Above and Beyond

  Gangsta Rap

  Bitch Up and Turn

  Takeout

  Death and Desperation

  Life Is Suffering

  Space for Time

  Courage

  Afterlife

  Into the Light

  The Price of Freedom

  Dead Man Walking

  Gain , No Pain

  Fresh Money

  Legal End

  Storm

  Death Do Us Part

  Painkiller

  O-Nine

  Off - Track - Bleeding

  0 - Five

  Pieces of Death

  Personal Effects

  Projects

  Hovel

  Sampan

  Dailo’s Demise

  Dead Men Talking

  Ballistics and Foreign Sics

  Most Precious

  Intelligence

  Loot - See Lawyer

  Touch on Evil

  Wise Woman

  Wanted Person of Interest

  Mercy and Love

  White Face

  BAI SAN, Paying Respect

  Acknowledgments

  A blood-thick thanks to Andrew, my brother, the first-born son, for his patience, understanding, and PC Photoshop skills.

  A heartfelt thanks to Laura Hruska, my Soho editor, for her keen insight which undoubtedly has elevated my words.

  Deep appreciation to Dana and Debbie who continue to believe in the stories.

  Great gratitude to Sophia, Mimi, and Bobo, for maintaining the machine.

  And as always, love to all my Chinatown brothers, past and present. They inspire me every day.

  The Year of the Dog

  The Dog is the eleventh sign, next to last in the lunar cycle, the most likeable of all the animals. The Dog is fearless, charismatic, and believes in justice, loyalty, and fidelity.

  The year is characterized in the masculine Yang, by struggle, perseverance, and faith.

  0 - N i n e

  The Ninth Precinct started at the East River, and ran west to Broadway. On the north it was bounded by Fourteenth Street; on the south, Houston. Within these confines, the neighborhoods were the East Village, Loisaida, NoHo, Alphabet City, and Tompkins Square. Anarchists, artists, students, and the low-income working class all lived together, sometimes tenuously, until their breaking points made the Daily News headlines.

  The detectives who worked in the Ninth were accustomed to dealing with multicultural scenarios, the daily struggles of blacks and whites, browns and yellows. The scattered Asian presence within its boundaries consisted mostly of hole-in-the wall Chinese take-out joints, Korean delis and dry cleaners, Japanese sushi spots, and even what was probably the last Chinese hand laundry in New York. In the Village, Southeast Asians peddled T-shirts, punk-rock jewelry, and drug paraphernalia. Indians and Pakistanis ruled over the newspaper stands.

  Jack Yu had been assigned to the Ninth to cover the holidays. He leaned back from his computer desk in the detective’s area and closed his eyes. On Thanksgiving Day, the last hour of the overnight shift was the longest. His nagging fatigue was spiked with uneasy anticipation.

  Homicides in Manhattan South, or diverted from Major Case, were only a phone call away.

  He pressed his trigger finger against his temple, working tight little circles there. Computer statistics scrolled dimly inside his forehead, the blunt, logical CompStat analysis of why and how people killed each other in New York City.

  There were hundreds of murders in the five boroughs each year; closer to two thousand in the early days of crack cocaine. The records indicated that people killed because of:

  Disputes 28%

  Drugs 25%

  Domestic violence 13%

  Robbery/Burglary 12%

  Revenge 10%

  Gang related 8%

  Unknown 4%

  Entire lifetimes were reduced to an NYPD short list of cold percentages, time and location, gender and ethnicity.

  Just the facts. Leave the speculation to the beat dicks.

  The statistics indicated that women were more likely than men to murder a spouse or lover, and:

  Male killers favored firearms over all other weapons.

  Brooklyn, a.k.a. Crooklyn, had more killings citywide than any of the other five boroughs. 46%.

  Saturday was the most popular day both for killing and dying.

  Men and boys perpetrated 90% of the murders.

  The deadliest hour was between one and two AM.

  In half the cases, the killer and victim knew each other.

  In 75% of cases, the perp and the vic were of the same race.

  Homicides were concentrated in poorer neighborhoods.

  Most of the killers had criminal records.

  A third of homicides went unsolved.

  Asians, who made up 11 percent of the city’s population, accounted for 4 percent of the victims, and oddly enough, for 4 percent of the killers. The number four, in spoken Chinese, sounded like the word for to die.

  Jack knew working the Ninth Precinct, the 0-Nine, wouldn’t be like working anticrime in Brownsville, or East New York, where killings were commonplace, and cops were used to tabulating bodies on a weekly basis. The 0-Nine, according to the Compstat analysis, didn’t have a lot of homicides, but kept pace with other precincts with regards to all other types of incidences, like armed robberies, burglari
es, domestic disputes, teen violence, and drug dealing.

  He grabbed at and massaged the knotted cords in the back of his neck, taking a deep boxer’s breath through his nose.

  The 0-Nine house seemed to be a good fit for him, a welcome surprise. He wasn’t expecting any of the problems he’d had in the Fifth Precinct. He figured that his exploits there, which had earned him a gold shield, would have preceded him to the new stationhouse, earning him a small measure of respect.

  Jack got up from the desk and went toward the rear window, smoothly swinging his hips and legs down into a long bridge squat, a Shaolin-style stretch. His lower joints and ligaments popped as he straightened up, watching the frozen gray Alphabet City morning seep in through the window.

  One call came into the precinct. A junkie from the projects had been found dead of an apparent drug overdose in an Avenue D shooting gallery, but Narcotics swept it up as part of a larger operation. The dead junkie was their CI, their confidential informant.

  The remainder of the shift passed quietly, punctuated only by crackling voices from the squad radio at the duty desk out front. Nobody killed anyone in the precinct on this overnight shift, but on the Lower East Side, Jack knew, violence was only one wrong look, one bad intention away.

  Out by the duty desk, the uniforms of the day shift rolled in.

  Jack signed out as they started to muster for roll call. He was thinking of the hot chowder at Kim’s when the first frigid gust of East River wind slapped him in the face.

  Bodega Koreano

  Kim’s Produce was a mom-and-pop Korean deli on Tenth Street, a few blocks from the Ninth Precinct stationhouse. It was 9:18 AM on the Colt 45 display clock, well past his twelve-hour tour, when Jack joined the cashier’s line with his take-out container of hot clam chowder. A small television set showed the Thanksgiving Day parade. He sipped the steaming soup as he waited, watching the TV. Jack had mixed thoughts about the holiday seasons in the city. These were celebrations, but for many people the seasons were very sad times. There were two cities here—one rich, one poor, each spiritually if not physically segregated from the other.

  Jack watched the Macy’s Parade march down Central Park West, past the stately and formidable buildings whose names rolled out: Majestic, Prasada, Dakota, San Remo, the landmarks of the rich and fabulous, private balconies with front-row views. The majorettes fronting the marching bands moved briskly down through the Twentieth Precinct, toward the old Mayflower Hotel, then on past Trump International, where top-shelf guests reserved midlevel suites for holiday packages at a thousand a night, so that their children would be thrilled by the giant cartoon balloons floating past their floor-to-ceiling double-paned glass windows. The Pink Panther. The Cat in the Hat. Barney the Dinosaur. Sonic the Hedgehog, who had an appetite for lampposts along Central Park.

  Down below, at street level, two million of the hoi polloi gathered along the parade route, crowded and penned-in along the sidewalks, in the bitter cold. Tourists and middle-class families from the outer boroughs saw the floats rolling by—Big Bird and Santa Claus, and comic-book heroes floating in the sky.

  The parade moved south toward Times Square, passing through the Midtown Commands, Manhattan North and Manhattan South. It would all end, Jack knew, at the Macy’s store at Herald Square, where there would be backup from the Tenth and Thirteenth Precincts, and, of course, plenty of overtime uniforms managing the crowds, working the barricades and the subways.

  Much farther downtown, Jack knew, there were no luxurious hotel rooms, no balloons or floats. On the Lower East Side, Loisaida, the holidays found citizens of the 0-Nine at soup kitchens and food pantries, at the Bowery Mission, where the hungry, homeless families and the poor eagerly awaited a traditional hot turkey meal with all the trimmings, with the rest of the citizenry giving thanks, There but for the grace of God go I. Holy Cross, St. Mary’s, St. Mark’s Shelter: Soup kitchens scattered throughout the precinct gave them all something to be thankful for, even for one day.

  The holidays were a humbling time for them; the displays of cheery celebration, and religious and commercial spectacles were not theirs. To them it was only another year of struggle passing by.

  In Chinatown, most Chinese people didn’t celebrate a traditional Thanksgiving, but the holiday provided an excuse for them to get together and feast on a meal of seafood, pork, chicken, and baby bok choy. Lobster Cantonese instead of turkey, rice instead of mashed potatoes, with winter melon and lotus root soup. Extended families gathered around da bean lo, hot-pot casserole-style cooking.

  Jack didn’t have fond memories of the holidays. Pa had never felt he had a lot to give thanks for, and hadn’t been a big believer in Christmas either, so Jack rarely received gifts. His one big thrill had been getting something from the Fifth Precinct PAL, when he’d line up with all the other “deprived” Chinatown kids hoping for a holiday handout. He remembered one year getting trampled in the mad rush of the older kids and parents to get a free toy. Trampled for a Popeye-the-Sailorman figure. He cried, but was still happy to have the free gift. When he brought it home, Pa had derided him for getting run over for a stupid gwailo doll.

  Jack reached the cashier at the same time that his cell phone jangled and broke his reverie. He paid for his soup, and flipped open the phone.

  It was the dayshift duty sarge, telling him patrol had responded to a call and found multiple bodies, very dead, at One Astor Plaza, down from the Barnes & Noble bookstore.

  Sergeant Donahoe was in the blue-and-white downstairs at the scene.

  Manhattan South was responding to holiday road rage auto fatalities on the Westside Highway, so they were reaching out to Jack.

  “On my way,” Jack said, pocketing the phone.

  He finished the soup in a big swallow, turned up his collar, and emerged onto the frozen street. He made his way west, through the East Village, the icy wind already tearing at his face, icy needles prickling his eyes every step of the way.

  Face and Death

  One Astor Plaza was a twenty-story curved glass tower, a luxury high-rise condominium building seamlessly shoehorned into the middle of a neighborhood crossroads that spread out to include the Public Theater, the NYU and Cooper Union campuses, the East Village and NoHo. It was a doorman residence, had security in the lobby, and a concierge behind a black marble counter. A Commercial Bank branch anchored the rest of the main street floor. A two-bedroom unit cost 1.5 million dollars and the project had sold out during construction.

  The sculpted neo-modern glass building towered over the main avenues that ran north-south through Manhattan, over the major eastside subway hub, and dominated that entire commercial corner of Cooper Square.

  A big overweight man, Sergeant Donahoe, stepped out of the squad car.

  “I’ve got Wong up there,” he said.

  Police Officer Wong, Jack knew, was a rookie patrolman, a Chinese-American portable who could speak several Chinese dialects.

  “Eighteen-A,” Donahoe continued. “You got the building manager, the security guard, the grandmother, all up there. The fire lieutenant’s at the fireboard in the lobby. Talk to him first.”

  Jack sucked in a deep gulp of cold air. “What do you have?” he asked, steeling himself.

  Donahoe gave him a sad look and shook his gray-haired head.

  “It’s the whole family . . .” He paused and before he could continue, Jack had turned and was heading for the lobby.

  The fire lieutenant, another tall Irishman, explained that they’d come to the scene because a ceiling smoke detector had activated and the alarm had gone out through the fireboard.

  “When we got to the floor, there was no smoke,” he said. “But the ceiling detector was a combination type that also detected carbon monoxide.”

  “So it was the carbon monoxide that set it off?” Jack asked.

  “We took several readings,” the lieutenant said. “The CO levels were over eighty parts. And ten parts is unsafe.”

  “Eight times letha
l,” Jack noted.

  “Hell of a thing on Thanksgiving Day. Anyway, my men are done upstairs.” The lieutenant added, “We’re just resetting the fireboard now.”

  “Thanks for your help,” Jack said, grateful for the heads up as to what he was walking into.

  Jack had heard many other cops deride the firefighters as thieves, referring to how they would take money and property from fire scenes. Quite often control of a crime scene that involved a fire was contested between the two commands, cops versus firefighters. Jack never saw it; he thought the firefighters had a tough job entering burning buildings, especially in winter. Even though he knew that the FDNY was still segregated—mostly white, mostly Irish—he had to give them respect for the hazardous jobs they did.

  The elevators were fast, industrial quality steel polished into an elegant design.

  The door to 18A was open, with yellow Crime Scene tape running across it. The firefighters had cranked open all the windows and evacuated all the residents of the eighteenth floor. P.O. Wong stood by the door with the building manager who nervously jangled a set of master keys. Jack introduced himself to the manager, nodded to Wong.

  “I’ll need a statement from you,” he said to the manager. “Also, the security report, and information about the tenants.”

  The manager was in shock. His face was pallid, voice shaky. He said sadly, “Certainly. I’ll be in my office on the main floor. It’s a terrible, terrible thing.” He walked slowly to the elevator.

  Wong, who was shorter than Jack and built like a bulldog, pulled off one end of the yellow tape.

  Jack asked him, “Wong, when accidents happen, do you think it’s destiny?”

  P.O. Wong answered, “Well, this sure wasn’t an accident, but it could be destiny.” A puzzled look cross Jack’s face when he saw the Chinese grandmother seated on a folding chair just outside the apartment door.

  “We had a hard time calming her down,” Wong told him. “She only speaks Taiwanese.”