“I need no enticing,” I told him, and the deal was struck.
So, Mama, soon I’ll be what the British call an “old China hand.” I’m looking forward to my education, but more than that, to another half hour with someone in whose presence I can forget that I’m afraid.
Stay well, Mama, and come soon!
Your Rosalie
As I slipped the printout onto my bedside table, I could almost feel the salt wind. I wondered what kind of tea Rosalie and Chen Kai-rong had been drinking: Osmanthus flower? Chrysanthemum? And did the Italian liner stock these teas for the Chinese passengers, or had Chen Kai-rong brought his own tea aboard? Maybe he’d found a favorite shop in Europe where he bought his Chinese tea, and now he was taking it home.
I fell asleep and dreamed of oceans.
3
“You slept well,” said my mother: a declaration, not a question.
She’s a restless sleeper herself. It was entirely possible she’d seen light under my door at 2:00 A.M. and was ostentatiously pretending she hadn’t. Rather than get into that, I poured myself tea and called my best and oldest friend, Mary.
“ Lydia! Are you back?”
“Almost completely. You have time for lunch today?”
“I’m on the eight to four, but I’ll make time. My vic won’t be any deader after lunch.”
“You have a homicide?” I was surprised. Mary Kee is a Fifth Precinct detective. She does, or, as she says, undoes, extortion, robbery, and assault, but the precincts usually hand off homicides to the NYPD’s specialized squads.
“Not exactly. An Asian John Doe in a Times Square hotel. Bad teeth, no money, no papers, so they think he might be an illegal. Midtown Homicide asked for someone from down here to help ID him. My captain doesn’t like it, but he couldn’t say no.”
“Why doesn’t he like it?”
“He thinks the special-squad guys are divas. Especially Midtown Homicide. They don’t play well with others.”