“Our bathrooms have no windows.”

“There’s the kitchen fire escape.”

“The fire escape faces a busy street.”

“They might come at night.”

“Old Chow Lun would see them.”

“He might not be there.”

“Have you ever seen him when he is not there?”

How could I see him if he’s not there? I tried to calm down and discuss things rationally. But this was my mother. “It won’t be for long, Ma.”

“How long?”

“I don’t know.”

“Then how do you know it will not be long?”

“Just until I find out what they wanted and whether they got it.”

“How will you do that?”

“I don’t know.”

“And what do you think it might have been, this thing they wanted?”

“I don’t know.”

“I see. You do not know who they are, what they wanted, whether they found it, or how to learn these things.”

“No. But-”

“But you know you want your mother to go back to Flushing, for a length of time you also do not know.”

“Ma! Ma, please! I just don’t want to have to worry about you.”

“Oh.” She peered at me. “This is not something you want me to do for myself? It is something you want me to do for you?”

“That’s not what I meant! I-”

The Bonanza theme cut me off, which was probably just as well. “Hi,” I said, watching my mother turn and walk out of the room. “Where have you been?”

“Legwork,” came Bill’s rational, though worried, voice. “You okay? Where are you?”

“I’m down the rabbit hole. Otherwise I’m fine.”

“What does that mean?”

“I’m trying to talk my mother into going out to Queens for a few days. Those guys who broke into my office, I don’t know what they were after. In case they didn’t find it and think it might be here, I want her out.”

“But she won’t go?”

“What do you think?”

“Maybe you should tell her I agree with her. I don’t think she should go.”

“You don’t?”

“Sure I do. I’m using reverse psychology.”

“Forget it. We tried that when we were kids. There’s no kind of psychology that works on my mother.”

“Tell me about the break-in.”

I did, leaving out the Duke of Hell.

“The White Eagles?” Bill asked. “How do you suppose they’re involved?”

“I don’t know. They run protection rackets on some of the jewelers, but that doesn’t get me very far.”

“Like your pal Mr. Chen?”

“I don’t know.”

“Could they have thought you had the Shanghai Moon?”

“And just dropped it in my in-box? Even White Eagles can’t be that dumb. Well, they could, but I don’t think so. If I could get over there and go through the mess, I might figure it out, but I don’t want to leave my mother alone if-” I stopped in midsentence.

“Lydia? You still there? What’s up?”

“I have to go. I’ll call you back.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. It’s fine. But I’ll call you back.”

I lowered the phone and gaped. My mother stood before me, traveling hat on, suitcase in hand.

When I finally called Bill back, from my brother’s place in Flushing, I told him to meet me at my office in an hour and a half. “And bring your boy detective kit.”

“Why?”

“Because my mother’s a genius.”

He didn’t respond to that, as well he shouldn’t. And admittedly it’s not something I say often. On the way to Queens, though, she’d outdone herself.

Not that she’d meant to be helpful. She’d meant to keep complaining. “Send your mother all the way to Flushing again,” she’d grumbled. “When she has not been back in her own home for one week yet.” That was at the station, after we’d stopped at a tea shop for red bean buns. Ted’s kids love them, and though you can get them at a bakery two blocks from their house, my mother swears no one in Flushing, with the exception of Ling-an when she’s not too busy, can cook. We also picked up cream puffs, almond cookies, and chocolate tarts with green frosting that looked like something Bill might eat. Which I didn’t mention.

Once we were on the subway, bakery boxes in pink plastic bags, my mother had another thought. “Chin Ling Wan-ju! If you are in the apartment alone when the gang boys come, who will keep you safe?” She stood, ready to turn and go back.

To tell the truth, I was surprised this hadn’t come up sooner. I was ready. “Sit down, Ma. I’m going to get alarms for the door and the kitchen window. And I’ll keep the window locked. But I really don’t think anyone will come while I’m there. I was mostly worried that they’d wait until I went out and break in while you were there.”

“Why will they not come while you are there?”

Because I have a gun. No, Lydia, don’t say that. “They waited until my office was empty. They seem to not want to run into me.”

She narrowed her eyes, but for a while after that she sat silent. Then, in a mutter that grew steadily louder, she picked up her earlier theme. The first words I made out were “… valued our elders.” I guessed what was coming. “Children today, no respect,” she told no one in particular. “Make their parents leave home, go far away.”

“Ma, I-”

“Your cousin Danny.” She gave me a dirty look, like every bad thing Danny had ever done was my fault. “Sent his mother all the way to China.”

“She wanted to see her home village. Danny paid for the trip. He’s very generous.”

“He should have gone with her, not make her go alone.”

“She’s not alone. She’s on a tour.”

“With strangers.”

“And her sister and two of her best friends!”

“And strangers. Instead of their own children. And your cousin Clifford. A very unfilial son. Made his mother go to New Jersey.”

“Clifford Kwan? Armpit? He sent his mother to New Jersey?”

She frowned at me. “No wonder he is bad. People call him disgusting names.”

“He’s proud of that name.”

“Does that make it not disgusting?”

“What do you mean, he sent his mother to New Jersey?”

“The son caused the mother so much heartache, the mother moved away.”

“Oh. So he didn’t send her away. She moved to the suburbs.”

“He made her go away by breaking her heart.”

“Ma, Clifford’s been rotten from the day he was born. I’m surprised Kwan Shan didn’t kick him out of the house years ago.”

She rolled her eyes. Once again I’d failed to understand something basic. “It would be better if you could choose your relatives. Get ones you want, throw away bad ones. But you can’t. The child you get is the child you have to keep.” Her narrowed eyes told me that, by the way, I should consider myself lucky this was true. As if to emphasize her point, she added, “It was when Kwan Shan left Chinatown that her son became involved with gang boys.”

I wasn’t having any. “I thought you said his bad behavior made her move away.”

“Now she will not come back. She is ashamed to show her face.”

“She’s probably just happy in her nice new apartment. With a garden. Near her grandchildren.”

“What mother could be happy when her youngest son is a White Eagle?”

“Ma-what?”

“I said-”

“I know what you said. Armpit’s a White Eagle? Since when?”

“Auntie Ro, at the pharmacy, told me. Her brother-in-law, who makes tattoos, drew a white eagle on Clifford three days ago. Auntie Ro says that means he is accepted as one of them.”

It sure did. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Oh, have you been home for me to tell you? I’m sorry, Ling Wan-ju, I must not have noticed.”

When I got to my office, I found Bill shooting the breeze with the Golden Adventure ladies. They all but batted their eyes when he said good-bye. Well, good. Anything to keep them thinking I was a worthwhile subtenant.

“How did you talk your mother into going?” he asked as we went down the hall.

“Believe me, I didn’t. I told her I didn’t want to have to worry about her. She said, ‘Oh, this is for you, not for me?’ and I thought she was mad. Next thing I knew she was looking for her MetroCard.”