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Tea with the Black Dragon

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He needed his good hand, which had been supporting his wounded left arm. He forced his left hand into his jeans pocket.

Mr. Long knew a bit about metals. He believed he could force the aluminum frame of the door, even if the lock was too strong. Yet he stopped with his fingers wrapped around the door-pull, remembering his error at Rasmussen’s house.

He investigated the other door. It smelled of garbage. This lock could not be forced, and though the idea of dismantling it appealed to Long’s curiosity, he had neither tools nor time.

He turned the doorknob tentatively and the door opened. A wad of ancient gum was blocking the bolt hole.

He found himself in a reeking chamber full of trash. He picked up a black plastic bag—one that upon inspection seemed less noisome than the rest—and proceeded through the inside door.

Threve’s apartment number was 10-10. Long took the elevator; he could not have climbed the stairs. It was empty, and when the box stopped, he cradled the soft package against his chest and stepped into the hall.

“Stop!” cried the voice of a woman. “Hold it!” She wore nurse’s whites. The “it” she referred to was the elevator. Mayland Long squeezed his burden higher, obscuring his face, and propped the door with his foot.

She had red hair. She smiled. “Thanks,” she continued in more conventional tones. “Sorry ’bout the noise. I forget other people sleep nights.” The doors closed and the kindly face vanished into the depths.

“Do they?” whispered Mr. Long to the empty hall.

Threve’s apartment was at the end of the hall. Beside the door Long dropped the small bag of trash; its function was fulfilled.

Speed was essential now, not stealth. Mayland Long meant to see Mr. Threve and to be seen by him. In heat of rage or chilly wet night, he would get answers from the hoodlum.

The door jamb of 10-10 snapped with a single explosive crack. He stepped in and pulled the door closed behind him.

The apartment was empty. He crept from the front room to the bedroom. He kicked open the door to the miniscule bathroom. Nothing. Finally he entered the kitchen, put his mouth beneath the tap and drank. He was a long time at it.

Now what? Should he wait for the unpleasant Mr. Threve to return? He could not wait long, for it was after midnight, and there was the matter of the letter to be accomplished…

He busied himself as productively as he could, searching through Threve’s belongings. Prying into the private affairs of others had always been one of Mr. Long’s deepest interests, and now it served to distract his mind from his body’s calamity.

Under the telephone in the bedroom he found an address book, old, spine-broken and filled with scraps of paper. He carried it out to the front room and began sifting through it, while listening for sounds from the elevator.

The oldest entries, judging by the fading of the ink, were of places in Detroit. Other cities were represented, notably Austin, Texas and Baton Rouge. Evidently, Mr. Threve was a traveler, and had only recently arrived in California. That was a help, for it reduced the number of relevant entries.

He sat upon a boxy white sofa beneath the large window of the living room. He read by the light of the full moon.

He placed his finger upon a promising scrap of paper, then started at a glimpse of movement at the far end of the room.

He stood up and walked toward a figure which walked toward him. It was a shadowy man dressed in shapeless clothes, one hand stuck insolently in a pocket.

The entire wall of the room was covered with mirror panels. The image jumped and danced at the intersections of the squares. He stood respectfully in front of the image, as though he were waiting for it to speak to him, as though the faceless, sullen figure knew something he did not. His right hand folded the address in two and stuffed it away. The image then appeared with both hands in pockets, or possibly chained behind its back. It stood with its head down; a prisoner awaiting sentence. This sad figure was no one he knew.

Outside the broken door his odorous camouflage was waiting. He picked up the garbage bag and headed for the elevator. He knew his appearance would not stand up to much scrutiny; the rusty stains on his gray sweatshirt covered half its surface. The shirt was stiff and stuck to his back. He could smell the drying blood.

He was very warm, and with warmth came the desire for sleep. This desire was mitigated by the distant white dazzle of the moon. He heard the pounding again, but it seemed too slow to be his heartbeat. It was too much like the sea.

The engine turned over and the fan blasted hot air against his face. He turned it off.

He’d been driving all day and night, it seemed. He would need gas soon. He was losing his taste for driving.

The address in his pocket was not far: just across the line into Sunnyvale. He drove down the empty El Camino, straight at the moon.

The building was nothing more than a concrete shed, surrounded by gravel. The immediate area was zoned for industry, and was desolate by night. The words Rasmussen Mas were painted in orange letters across the front wall, but it appeared the place had passed beyond that particular incarnation. Mallow and dock grew among the stones of the parking lot, and the shriveled heads of chickweed made a desolate border beneath the wall. It seemed to be one of Rasmussen’s earlier miscalculations—if in truth his bankruptcies had been accidental.

No cars were to be seen. The two doors of the building were green steel. There were no windows.

No noise leaked out, even when he put his ear to the metal. He sighed and leaned against the door, summoning what remained of his strength.

There were tracks in the gravel, from a vehicle which had driven right up to the door and backed away again. No telling how long the tracks had been there.

The factory was a fortress, but Mr. Long was not overawed by fortresses. He closed his eyes, seized the knob, and pulled.

The knob came out in his hand, trailing its tarnished entrails. The sliding bolt fell into the round hole the knob had left, and the door creaked open; the deadbolt had not been set.

He stepped into a wide empty room, lit only by the light emanating from a gaping refrigerator. The room held one wooden table, gouged and solder stained, a filthy white folding chair and a litter of magazines. Approaching closer he found in one corner more magazines that had been arranged into three piles, one pile four inches high and the other two consisting of one Playboy and one Dr. Dobb’s each, with the computer journal on top. These three piles made a triangle eighteen inches on a side. Next to this formation was the sad carcass of a tape recorder, smashed. Within it he could see a small white cassette tape. Mayland Long would have given much to know what was on that tape. He put it in his pocket.

Prowling the perimeter of the room, he came to the open refrigerator. He felt within it.

The shelves were still cold. His breath drew in in a long hiss.

Continuing his investigation, he found the bathroom by the back door. He entered and turned on the light. The bottom of the sink was damp.

On the bathroom wall, amid graffiti in English and Spanish, someone had drawn a large red circle. It began and ended at the top. It was a fat, open, hearty circle, drawn in fresh lipstick. In Zen Buddhist tradition it meant nothing. Literally nothing—zero, Mu, the Void. To Mr. Long it meant quite a lot.

He staggered into the yard, scattering gravel. He leaned his back against the door of the car. Trying to untangle his keys from the cassette tape, he dropped both on the roadway. He stooped for them, and found himself on hands and knees on the concrete, overcome by the knowledge of failure. He cried out, a thin, wordless, wail.

Too late… Too slow… Too late…

Breathing raggedly, he found the keys, the tape. He climbed to his feet and stood motionless for sixty seconds.

He got in the car.

The knocking continued. Fred crawled out of bed, dazed. The clock said 2:45.

This was a real bitch.

He slept in his b.v.d.‘s, and wearing nothing else he stood by the door.

“Whozat?” he croaked, his voice breaking in the middle of the compound word.

“Frisch? Fred. It’s Mayland Long. I hope you remember me.”

Had Frisch forgotten the name, he could not have forgotten the voice. He wrestled with the lock and flung the door open. Long stepped in.

“Forgive me. I am aware of the hour. I have come because I need your help, Fred. Both the Macnamara women are in terrible danger, and I know no one else to whom I can go.”

Frisch blinked and stared. “You’re white as a sheet,” was all he found to say. “Sit down.”

“Am I?” whispered Mr. Long, obeying. “How odd. I thought there was nothing white about me.” Suddenly he started up again. “I will ruin your upholstery.”

“Too late for that,” mumbled Frisch. “Years too late.” He squatted on the floor next to Long, taking the blood stiffened fabric in his hands.

“What in hell happened to you?”

The wounded man gently pulled the shirt out of Frisch’s grip. “I’ve been shot in the shoulder. Please don’t.”

Frisch sat back on his haunches. “You gotta go to the hospital, man. I’ll drive you.”

“No. I don’t have the time. Martha Macnamara has been kidnapped by men who intend to kill her. I must forge a letter on a RasTech text processor—an 8080—and hand it to Elizabeth before tomorrow morning.”