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31_days2006-02-09 04:44 pm
incandescens) wrote in 31_days2006-02-09 04:44 pm
[February 9th] [original noir] this always happens
Title: this always happens
Date/Theme: February 9th / mad in the teahouse
Series: Original noir
Character/Pairing: a private detective and his client
Rating: G
We had gone out for tea. Gouen objected to my alcohol, and I objected to no drinks at all, which made things simple. I left a note on my secretary's desk. At least I didn't have to tell her to get the door repaired this time.
It was a little place that knew Gouen, which meant they didn't want to know me. Bad enough being a foreigner, but I wasn't even a rich foreigner. Nothing like being poor in Shanghai. This is the city where they sold sin to the highest bidder and then stiffed him on the deal. But for the moment I was Lung Gouen's guest, and that meant I was welcome.
The rain was still sheeting down outside. They took our coats to hang them up to dry, and put our umbrellas in the stand. It was one of those elephant-foot ones, heavy enough to beat someone to death with.
We were shown to a table with a nice view of the rain outside. Gouen gave a nod to the people whose tables we passed, and I did the same. I got politely ignored by the grandfathers who were discussing poetry, and a wave from the Big Eight Mob boys who were sitting right next to us. Luckily I was on fairly good terms with their gang. I'd never had to show them any disrespect, and they'd never had to make any requests of me that I'd have had to turn down. It made for a quiet life.
I let Gouen order the tea.
"So," I said, as the teahouse got back to its normal buzz of conversation, "tell me about it."
Gouen steepled his long fingers. "It's something of a story," he said vaguely. "You know about the Opium Wars, of course."
I nodded. It might have been 80 years ago, but you couldn't escape them; not in this city, not anywhere on the coast of China. "Had the school version. Had the real version, too." I'd grown up as an orphan in Shanghai, been sent to an ex-pat orphanage where they'd had us sitting in rows and chanting our facts and dates. Then I'd got out on the streets and heard the rest of it. "It goes back that far?"
"Farther than that." Gouen paused at the arrival of the tea and utensils, and took over the preparation while I stared out at the rain again. The drops hit the pond outside and slithered over the leaves of the plants round it, tracking down the window and slapping against the stone path.
"You're paying for my time," I said when I had his attention again. "What do you want to tell me?"
He placed my cup of tea in front of me, then took a sip from his own. "What do you think of this blend?"
I tried it. "Good," I decided. "Was that what you were hiring me for?"
Gouen put down his cup. "Eighty years ago, during the Opium Wars, there was a man who thought that the English were going to lose."
"He was the odd man out, then." I remembered what I'd heard of that day. Even the dogs had been quiet and had slunk around without howling.
Gouen gave that a nod. "So he assumed that in the absence of legal opium and the re-imposition of proper law, opium would become much more valuable."
I had to agree. "True. Anyone who'd been holding a stock at that point would have made his weight in silver."
"More than that," Gouen said. He tapped a nail against the side of the teapot. "Of course, the problem was how to bring it in and where to keep it. The blockades didn't make life easy."
I could see where this was going. And hells, if the stuff was still in Shanghai, even today it'd be a very tidy sum indeed. "So -- you want me to find it?"
Gouen nodded. "The man was called the White Serpent. His son has -- shall we say -- been acting oddly recently, and then dropped out of sight after making certain connections. If his father succeeded, and if the son knows where it is . . ."
He trailed off, leaving me to finish the train of thought. Dumping a load of cheap opium on the market would make the seller very, very rich, and make everyone else involved in the traffic very, very unhappy. "I need names and places, Lung Gouen. And if you want me to manage this quietly, I'm going to need to know who else is involved."
A crash and a yell came from the teahouse lobby. I couldn't see it, but I knew the sound of someone being put face first through a table. There was a background of noise to it that I didn't like.
"Or we could take this somewhere else," I suggested.
"And leave this tea?" Gouen blinked at me. "Unthinkable."
The Big Eight Mob boys were already looking towards the entrance. They had better manners than to go grabbing for guns, but the youngest of them was already shoving his chair back and getting some room for maneuvering.
Half a dozen men came crowding through the doorway. They were low-level thugs; short coats, cheap fabric, trousers, still wearing their caps. The one in the lead looked round the restaurant till he caught sight of the table where Gouen and I were drinking, and pointed right at us.
I hate going out for tea with lawyers. This always happens.
(Continued from http://community.livejournal.com/31_days/405515.html.)
Date/Theme: February 9th / mad in the teahouse
Series: Original noir
Character/Pairing: a private detective and his client
Rating: G
We had gone out for tea. Gouen objected to my alcohol, and I objected to no drinks at all, which made things simple. I left a note on my secretary's desk. At least I didn't have to tell her to get the door repaired this time.
It was a little place that knew Gouen, which meant they didn't want to know me. Bad enough being a foreigner, but I wasn't even a rich foreigner. Nothing like being poor in Shanghai. This is the city where they sold sin to the highest bidder and then stiffed him on the deal. But for the moment I was Lung Gouen's guest, and that meant I was welcome.
The rain was still sheeting down outside. They took our coats to hang them up to dry, and put our umbrellas in the stand. It was one of those elephant-foot ones, heavy enough to beat someone to death with.
We were shown to a table with a nice view of the rain outside. Gouen gave a nod to the people whose tables we passed, and I did the same. I got politely ignored by the grandfathers who were discussing poetry, and a wave from the Big Eight Mob boys who were sitting right next to us. Luckily I was on fairly good terms with their gang. I'd never had to show them any disrespect, and they'd never had to make any requests of me that I'd have had to turn down. It made for a quiet life.
I let Gouen order the tea.
"So," I said, as the teahouse got back to its normal buzz of conversation, "tell me about it."
Gouen steepled his long fingers. "It's something of a story," he said vaguely. "You know about the Opium Wars, of course."
I nodded. It might have been 80 years ago, but you couldn't escape them; not in this city, not anywhere on the coast of China. "Had the school version. Had the real version, too." I'd grown up as an orphan in Shanghai, been sent to an ex-pat orphanage where they'd had us sitting in rows and chanting our facts and dates. Then I'd got out on the streets and heard the rest of it. "It goes back that far?"
"Farther than that." Gouen paused at the arrival of the tea and utensils, and took over the preparation while I stared out at the rain again. The drops hit the pond outside and slithered over the leaves of the plants round it, tracking down the window and slapping against the stone path.
"You're paying for my time," I said when I had his attention again. "What do you want to tell me?"
He placed my cup of tea in front of me, then took a sip from his own. "What do you think of this blend?"
I tried it. "Good," I decided. "Was that what you were hiring me for?"
Gouen put down his cup. "Eighty years ago, during the Opium Wars, there was a man who thought that the English were going to lose."
"He was the odd man out, then." I remembered what I'd heard of that day. Even the dogs had been quiet and had slunk around without howling.
Gouen gave that a nod. "So he assumed that in the absence of legal opium and the re-imposition of proper law, opium would become much more valuable."
I had to agree. "True. Anyone who'd been holding a stock at that point would have made his weight in silver."
"More than that," Gouen said. He tapped a nail against the side of the teapot. "Of course, the problem was how to bring it in and where to keep it. The blockades didn't make life easy."
I could see where this was going. And hells, if the stuff was still in Shanghai, even today it'd be a very tidy sum indeed. "So -- you want me to find it?"
Gouen nodded. "The man was called the White Serpent. His son has -- shall we say -- been acting oddly recently, and then dropped out of sight after making certain connections. If his father succeeded, and if the son knows where it is . . ."
He trailed off, leaving me to finish the train of thought. Dumping a load of cheap opium on the market would make the seller very, very rich, and make everyone else involved in the traffic very, very unhappy. "I need names and places, Lung Gouen. And if you want me to manage this quietly, I'm going to need to know who else is involved."
A crash and a yell came from the teahouse lobby. I couldn't see it, but I knew the sound of someone being put face first through a table. There was a background of noise to it that I didn't like.
"Or we could take this somewhere else," I suggested.
"And leave this tea?" Gouen blinked at me. "Unthinkable."
The Big Eight Mob boys were already looking towards the entrance. They had better manners than to go grabbing for guns, but the youngest of them was already shoving his chair back and getting some room for maneuvering.
Half a dozen men came crowding through the doorway. They were low-level thugs; short coats, cheap fabric, trousers, still wearing their caps. The one in the lead looked round the restaurant till he caught sight of the table where Gouen and I were drinking, and pointed right at us.
I hate going out for tea with lawyers. This always happens.
(Continued from http://community.livejournal.com/31_days/405515.html.)