The Mayors of New York by S. J. Rozan

Author:S. J. Rozan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pegasus Books
Published: 2023-12-05T00:00:00+00:00

15

The Shuns were a faded, frail couple. I wondered if that had always been true, or if robustness had been drained from them by the death of their daughter. Mr. Shun, in gray slacks, a striped shirt, and a blue cardigan, helped his thinner, shorter wife, in patterned blouse and shapeless skirt, to one of Lydia’s guest chairs. He himself dropped into the other like a capsized sailor who’d made it to shore with the last of his strength.

Lydia sat behind her desk and I sat to the side of it, on a chair I’d borrowed from the travel agents who were Lydia’s landladies. The bad news and the good news about this former storeroom were the same: its one window opened on the lightwell between this building and the next. That made the paper-piled place claustrophobic, but together with the lack of a nameplate on Lydia’s buzzer it also made it possible for clients to come to her without their need for help sizzling along the Chinatown grapevine. Also, as Lydia had pointed out more than once, I was in no position to comment on her office in any case, mine being the back booth of Shorty’s bar.

“Mr. and Mrs. Shun, thank you for coming,” Lydia said. “Is it all right if we speak in English, for my partner?”

Mr. Shun looked at me and nodded. I thanked him.

“What have you learn? About daughter?” He seemed unsure where to direct his question: to the elder, bigger, White man, or the younger, smaller, Chinese woman. His wife, though, had focused a blade-sharp stare at Lydia, ignoring me entirely. Mr. Shun, after a few seconds’ hesitation, followed her lead.

“I need to ask you,” Lydia said, “was she seeing anyone?”

“Seeing?”

“Going out with. Dating.”

“Dating? Boyfriend? No.” Mr. Shun shook his head emphatically. “An-An don’t dating. Have no time for boyfriend. Too much studying, plus too young. How she keep grades for scholarship, she have boyfriend? Study, practice singing. Homework, concerts. Want to do well, at school, at singing. No, don’t dating.”

Mrs. Shun waited until her husband’s oration was through. Then she said, “Yes.”

Wide-eyed, Mr. Shun snarled something at her in Chinese. She snapped back. The fight was on.

Lydia gave it a few back-and-forths before she stepped in. She spoke in calm, measured Chinese. Both Shuns fell silent and turned to her.

“Thank you,” she said. “I’d like to go back to English? Shun Taitai, you say An-An was dating a boy, and you knew about it. But you kept it a secret?”

“How I can tell him?” Mrs. Shun jutted her chin at her husband. “You hear him. Must studying! No time for dating!” She shook her head. “I young girl once. First discover boy, wonderful. An-An, same. Plus, this America. Girl don’t hide in village, wait for matchmaker to say to father, ‘Here, I find boy.’ Boy, girl, same school, all day. An-An beautiful girl.” She turned to her husband and laid a gentle hand on his. “Of course she dating.”

“You don’t tell me.” He sounded hurt.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.