Lair of Dreams

Page 34

“Very well. What’s your price?”
“Ten dollars,” Ling blurted.
Without a word, Henry removed a crisp ten from his wallet and put it on the table. Ling tried not to let her surprise show. This dream walker was the first person not to haggle over the price. But it wasn’t her job to tell him that. Whoever this lost friend of his was, he must be very important.
“I’ll need something of yours,” she said, pocketing his money quickly. “To find you in the dream.”
Henry passed Ling his hat. “Will this do?”
Ling nodded. “What time tonight?”
“It’ll have to be late. I play for the Rooftop Revue above the Follies at midnight.”
Ling had seen the advertisements for the Rooftop Revue in the newspaper. The girls didn’t wear much.
“I’m hoping to get my songs some attention,” Henry said sheepishly. “I’m a composer, you see.”
“Do I know any of your songs?” Ling asked.
“‘You’re My Turtle Dove, Coo-E-Coo’? ‘September Moon’?”
Ling shook her head. “Never heard of them.”
Henry felt vaguely insulted. “It’s a tough business.”
“Maybe it isn’t the business. Maybe your songs aren’t that good.”
Henry left money for the bill as he rose from the table. “I should be home by three,” he said coolly. “Do we have a deal?”
“Three o’clock is fine.”
“I suppose we’re in business, then.” He stuck out his hand for a shake.
Ling didn’t take his hand. She looked him straight in the eyes. “It’s very brave of you to come down here. Most people are afraid of catching the sleeping sickness.”
“I’m not most people,” he said, his hand still out.
Ling gave it a quick shake. This time, there was no spark.
“I’ll see you in my dreams, Ling Chan.”
“I hope your songs aren’t as corny as your jokes,” she answered.
Henry headed back into the cold city thinking that Ling Chan was possibly the bluntest person he had ever met. But she was going to help him find Louis. It was the first hopeful break he’d had. That hope buoyed Henry’s mood as he passed down Chinatown’s narrow, winding streets. Above his head, laundry danced from lines stretched between tenement windows like pennants decorating Yankee Stadium, where, come spring, Babe Ruth hoped to swing his way into the record books. He reached the wide sidewalks and winter-stripped trees of Columbus Park, where a man ranted from the steps of the park’s steeple-roofed pavilion.
“The Chinaman comes in with Chinese habits—his gambling and his Tong Wars and the opium pipe. He’s a secretive sort of fellow. He can’t ever be an American. And now he’s given us his sickness. I say we should keep America safe for Americans. Send him back to China. Send him back on the next ship.”
“Bigot,” Henry muttered, and moved on. As he walked through the park, he felt a sudden chill for no reason he could name—a strange feeling of dread.
“You all right, son?” a man in a tweed suit asked. He looked like a judge or a minister.
“Yeah. I mean, yes. Fine, thanks,” Henry answered, but the chill remained.
“Here. Have one of these,” the man said, shoving a leaflet into Henry’s hands: KEEP AMERICA WHITE AND YOU KEEP AMERICA SAFE. THE KNIGHTS OF THE KU KLUX KLAN NEED YOU!
Henry tossed the leaflet in the rubbish can without reading it and wiped his hands on his coat.
On the platform of the City Hall subway station, Henry waited for the train, trying to shake off the odd dread that had come over him in Columbus Park. He thought about all the things he wanted to say to Louis when he saw him again. A young man stumbled down the steps. His suit was rumpled, and he smelled of booze. He muttered to himself as if answering private voices, drawing concerned glances from the other people waiting.
“Where’s the damned train?” the man swore. “I need the train!”
“It’ll be here soon,” a businessman chided. “Settle down, there.”
People moved back, keeping a safe distance from the young man as he stalked the platform. “It was so beautiful there. I need to go back. I can’t find it. I can’t find it!”
Henry flicked a glance down the tunnel and was relieved to see the distant train light moving closer. The troubled man swayed dangerously close to the platform’s edge.
“Watch out!” Henry darted forward and yanked him back just as the train screeched into the station.