The girl froze, her jaw slack with fear.

The elevator reached Eight, one of his hands cupped over her mouth, the other feeling for the switchblade in his pocket. At Fifteen, he took her into the stairwell, her eyes big, wet now, too afraid to cry. She was half-dragged, half-carried, up the stairs, her whimpering unheard over the echoing thunder of his footsteps, the feeble screams of grandma far below now.

On the roof landing he showed the knife but spoke calmly in a dialect of Chinese she barely understood.

Um sai pa, he said, eyes freezing her, don't be afraid. She nodded her answer at the point of the blade. Good, he murmured in English, tugging down her underpants. Seven, maybe eight years old, his eyes swallowed her. He put his fingers on her, like ice. Good, this country America, as he unbuckled his belt…

Bones

Jack nosed the Fury into Evergreen Hills cemetery, parked it behind a line of mausoleums, and went to the plot in the Chinese section.

The empty cemetery looked pastoral as a brief patch of sun spread over the clipped grass, throwing long shadows across the rows of tombstones. It was cooler now as Jack kicked away the twigs of the dying season, gravesweeping beneath his father's tombstone. He planted a bouquet of flowers, produced his flask and toasted mao-tai to Father and earth. Sorry, Pa, he thought.

He lit sticks of incense, took another slug from the flask, then poured out a small stream making a wet circle in the dirt. When his thoughts tumbled into speech, sorry was all he could say, not for anything in particular, but for the general torment of unfulfilled dreams.

"Sorry," he repeated, bowed three times, planted the incense, and touched his fingers to the graceful cuts in the gray stone.

Sorry you never struck it rich.

Sorry I never struck it rich.

He moved the tin bucket over and torched various packages of death money for gambling in the house of the dead.

Sorry no big house in the South of China.

Sorry no farm with fish, and rice paddies.

Sorry no bones to return to Kwangtungprovince.

He fed the shopping bag of gold-colored paper taels into the fiery heap in the bucket. He stirred the flames with a branch, produced three packs of firecrackers.

Sorry we never had a car.

Sorry I didn't become a doctor or lawyer.

He tossed the fireworks into the flames, stepped back as the staccato explosions rocked the silent cemetery.

Sony about moving out on you.

He tilted the flask and took another long hard hit. Sorry, sorry, sorry.

Big Uncle

As was his custom on Saturday mornings, Wah Yee Tom left the office of the Hip Ching Labor and Benevolent Association, met Colo Clink, the enforcer, and went down the block to the joy Luck dim sum parlor where he held court for one hour at the large round table by the back wall.

During this hour, Wah Yee Tom dispensed charitable favors to members of the Association and their families, and mediated problems that arose within the ranks.

Wah Yee Tom, a.k.a. Uncle Four, was advisor for life to the Hip Ching tong, the number two tong in America, a bi-coastal organization with thousands of members, a multi-million-dollar bankroll, and an aging conservative leadership. The tong was the American offspring of the international Triads, Chinese secret societies whose roots reached back to warlords and dynasties preceding China's birth as a nation. The numerous Triads had supporters and agents in every Chinese community in the world.

A waiter brought Uncle Four's usual pot of guk bo cha, poured two cups and withdrew. Golo escorted some people into the restaurant and seated them by the takeout counter in the front. Then he went back to the round table, sat, and the two men sipped tea together before Uncle Four spoke.

"What do we have?" he asked quietly.

"A widow," Golo answered. "Needs money."

Uncle Four's eyes shifted to the disparate group at the front as Golo continued. "A member with a complaint, and a young guy who came off the ship that crashed the other night."

"Put him last," said Uncle Four.

The first matter at hand was a request for help from an elderly widow whose husband had been a longtime member before his death. The wrinkled old woman with gnarled hands had been beaten and her apartment had been ransacked by a gang of Puerto Rican beat girls during a push-in robbery in the housing projects. She was terrified and wanted to return to China to die but had no money, the say loy sung neu, nasty Latina girls, having taken everything.

Uncle Four spoke quietly to Golo, who rose and escorted the old woman to the door. He gave her a handful of hundred-dollar bills from a wad in his pocket, whispered in her ear, and patted her reassuringly across the shoulder. She nodded her head, almost kowtowing, before leaving the restaurant.

Golo returned to the table.

"She agrees," he said, "to provide us with the address and the keys to her apartment, along with the canceled rent checks and telephone bills of the year previous."

Uncle Four nodded, sipping thoughtfully from his cup of tea, thinking that he would instruct Golo to dispatch several Dragons to take over the apartment. It would become an additional stash- or safe-house, and the gang could distribute their Number Three bah fun, heroin, from there, to the low lifes and the animals.

The second person to entreat Uncle Four's help was pale for a Chinese; there was a sickly, pasty tone to his face. He wore a cheap jacket and tie over jeans and his black shoes were scuffed, slanted along the heels with wear. He wrung his hands and looked about nervously.

Golo brought him to the table, where he respectfully introduced himself as a new member who owned a small takeout counter down near Essex Street, at the edge of East Broadway. He'd paid his dues and posted the Hip Ching membership placard, but was still being shaken down by three rival crews, one of them being Dragons-a crew of young guns.

They'd threatened him and taken fifty dollars from his register.

Uncle Four knew the territory, a no-man's land picked over by rival gangs, the Fuk Chings, the Tong On. It was half a mile away from Pell and Division Streets, the heart of Dragon turf.

It was more difficult to manage the fringes of the empire, he thought, things were more desperate out there on the edge, the Fukienese refusing to respect truce and territory.

He gave the man a hundred dollars and assured him the problem would be gau dim, taken care of.

The man thanked him profusely and never took his eyes off Golo until he was out of the restaurant. Colo checked his watch, signaled the next young man over.

He was a skinny Fukienese with a scared look, and Golo conversed with him in Mandarin, calmed him, gave him a cigarette. He talked and Colo translated.

"His name is Li Jon. He walked off the highway, found a payphone. He called the number they gave him in China. When they called back, he gave them the words on the street signs. Half an hour later a black car picked him up and dropped him in Chinatown. He's been walking around town since."

Uncle Four blew the steam gently around the rim of the thick porcelain cup. "What about the ones who drowned?" lie asked the Fukienese.

The man took a breath. His eyes went distant.

"It was the ocean, the darkness. We're not used to it, you see." He shivered, continuing, "We're from the South of China, the water is always warm. When we dropped in, the water was so icy my muscles were in shock. I stroked and kicked but went nowhere. I was afraid my bones would freeze and snap and I'd sink and drown. People were screaming. Less than a hundred yards to land, I could see it. It was hard to breathe. My hands were chopping at the waves. I thought my heart would explode. I started to swallow saltwater."