A Barely Written Tale of Rip-offs, Naked Stereotypes & Scantily-Clad Cliches
It was a dark and stormy night. The kind that compel petty thieves and rapists to come roving out of their holes like rats in Mayham city. It's on nights like these that people stay home, cops stay in pubs and bereaved widows come looking for Juan Mirili in his fourth-storey office off Calicoot Avenue.
Mirili was into his fourteenth glass of tequila when the bell rang. His visitor was a woman - tall, slim and striking in her black dress (he wonders how they all manage it). Languidly, he downed his tequila and shoved the bottle into the file cabinet. The glass he wiped with his tie and stuffed into his shirt pocket.
When she lifted her veil, he recognized her instantly as the wife of Canton Street's Dai Lo, and recently widowed. The papers were brief - just another feud between two Dai Lo's that ended badly for one. The Cantonese was shot in his study by a Fukien henchman. There were two eyewitnesses, the Fukien had given himself up and the case was closed as far as the Mayham Police Department was concerned.
What, then, was Wong Ho's widow doing in his office?
"Mr Choo-an," she began, in a thick Hong Kong accent.
Mirili coughed and cleared his throat.
"I'm sorry, that's Juan."
His visitor blinked her eyes.
"One what?"
"Juan Mirili."
"Yes, I can see there is only one of you."
"What?"
"Is there two of you?
"Er, no?" Mirili looks around him.
"Then why say you are one Mirili?"
"Because I am Juan Mirili."
His visitor frowned.
"I mean, my name is Juan Mirili."
"Ah..." She nodded her head in comprehension and shook her hair (long, black and luscious, Mirili noticed) free of the veil. "Why didn't you say earlier?"
Mirili swallowed and pulled up a chair for her. It might be a long night.
"What can I do for you, Mrs Wong?"
"Ah, you know me. Good. I would like to engage your services to investigate the murder of my husband."
"Yes. An assassination, wasn't it, by the Fukien Street Dai Lo?"
Mrs Wang laughed a loud hearty cynical laugh.
"Who ever heard of a Fukien surrendering himself to the police?"
Mirili frowned. The papers had said Wong Ho's right hand man, Si Hao, had been in the study when it happened, and the gardener was standing outside the study window just then. Both claimed that the Fukien barged into the room, fired into Wong Ho's head point blank and fled. The next day, the alleged hitman appeared at MYPD (Mayham Police Department) headquarters, corroborated the eyewitness accounts and turned himself in.
It smacks too much of coincidence for it to be true. And convenient for the MYPD too, he thought.
"And you have reason to think there may be something more to your husband's murder."
At this, Mrs Wong bit her lower lip, as if thinking hard about how she should reply. Finally she said slowly and carefully, "For twenty years, Si Hao has served my husband without complaint. But I think he may have been growing restless in the past years. He's been recruiting more and more men from his district for a while now but my husband trusted him too much to suspect anything. Even now the men that guard the house are his. All our old servants have been sent away except for old Lu who was with me." She began to sob. "I don't know how long it will be before he gets rid of me too."
When she finished, Mirili felt a rush of sympathy for her and almost offered her his tie to blow her nose. But he stopped himself, remembering the Hutson widow case. Sympathy always led to other things...which were hmm...not entirely undesirable actually. He smiled at the thought.
"I'm glad I amuse you."
Mirili woke out of his reverie to find Mrs Wong staring at him in what can only be interpreted as more than mild irritation. Quickly he shook himself out of it.
"I'm sorry, I always smile when I'm thinking."
"That's a strange habit."
"Er yes, I'm a strange man."
Mirili lit his pipe and tried to appear professional.
"But isn't it true that Wong Ho has a vendetta with the Fukien Dai Lo?
"It's true but they're not stupid. They have business to do too, and the last thing they want is to have a clan war on their hands."
Mirili nodded. After an assassination like that, there'll be war on the streets. This might mean that whoever it was responsible for Wong Ho's death might actually have been looking to stir up trouble between Chinatown's two biggest clans. But this could be anyone - the Spanish gangs, the Irish gangs, the police, the business associations, or any of the other dozen or so triads in Chinatown. The problem was, where it came to a man like Wong Ho, motives were a dime a dozen.
"Just a question I hope you don't mind me asking. What do you hope to accomplish? Even if you find that your husband's right hand man had something to do with it. If Si Hao is responsible, it probably means he's got an MYPD biggie in his pocket to have arranged the cover-up. It seems to me you are in grave danger and hardly in any position to exact any kind of revenge. You should just find yourself a safe place to get away from all this."
At this, Mrs Wong's eyes widened and she glared at Mirili indignantly.
"Mr Choo-an, I will never ever run away. Not when my husband's death is still a mystery. And I hope to accomplish nothing except to know the truth. At least I'll die content and when I see my husband again in the nether world I can face him without shame."
The last word was spat at Mirili. He winced and wiped his cheek with his tie. What is it with these widows? They're so good at spitting and slapping; that Hutson widow was a pro.
After the outburst, Mrs Wong seemed to recover herself and continued in a softer tone.
"I never saw his body, you know. I was in Shanghai where they telegraphed me. He was buried by the time I returned. All I know is what Si Hao tells me and what the papers say." She began to cry again. This time Mirili offered his tie but she waved it away and sat upright suddenly.
"There's one thing I should tell you before I forget. Old Lu bumped into one of our servants yesterday. He had helped carry my husband's coffin at the burial and he joked that Si Hao must have skimped on the funeral because the coffin was very light, almost like he was carrying nothing at all. I thought that was a very strange remark because my husband was by no accounts a slim man.” She began to sob and blew her nose on his tie. “Maybe…he’s not…"
Mirili put his arm around the sobbing widow and tried to position a drier part of his tie under her nose.
“Don’t worry, mam, I’ll find out what happened to your husband.”
(This is the bad idea I was going about, guys. Inspired by 'Mr Wong, Detective' and a bad book review. Jump in and continue!)
