Foul Lady Fortune

Shortly before noon, the office was undergoing a hubbub of activity, various assistants wheeling in boxes from the cars parked beneath the building. While Orion cupped his mug of tea and let it brew in his hands, he wandered around to the department windows, peering down at the cars in the compound. New shipments, they said. Printings straight from the factory.

Ambassador Deoka was down there, directing the movement. As was Haidi, standing at his side. The two of them exchanged a few words before Haidi nodded and bowed, setting off toward the front gates as if she were going on a leisurely stroll. Orion glanced at his wristwatch. They were meeting in fifteen minutes. Did Deoka know? Had Deoka sent her? If Haidi had something to say, why not find a meeting room in the building? Why go so many streets away?

The Frenchwoman’s lockbox had been a bust. Orion was one of the first people to show up at the office this morning, before Janie had even finished pinning her hair up, just so he could rummage around. With the department empty, he had made a direct line for the Frenchwoman’s desk and unlocked the box, only to find nothing except letters from other expatriates reporting unruly neighbors on foreign territory. Useless.

They were rapidly exhausting their routes of investigation. If Orion were a less confident young man, perhaps he might even start worrying.

Well—he was a little worried. Just a little.

His wristwatch ticked, marking ten minutes to noon. He set his mug down on his cubicle desk, picking up his jacket from the back of his chair. When he passed the front of the department, Janie looked up and tilted her head at him curiously, but he only waved, leaving through the doors before she could ask. Once he had attended the rendezvous to see what Haidi had to say, maybe he would have a better explanation. Maybe he would have something useful for their investigation.

I have information about your wife that concerns you, Haidi had whispered to him. People like you want information, don’t they?

Orion hadn’t forgotten what Janie had tried to brush aside the previous night. Her ease when it came to taking out one of their colleagues. Her ease when it came to hiding it, tamping down the matter of murder like it was nothing.

“So?” Orion had demanded once Phoebe departed. His sister had asserted that she could walk up the driveway by herself, which left Orion and Janie standing under the streetlight at the corner of the road, Janie staring at the wrought-iron gates wrapped around the Hong mansion and Orion trying to peel her apart with his intense scrutiny.

“So…?” Janie echoed, playing daft.

“Tong Zilin,” Orion pressed. Earlier in the night, she had used the excuse of finding a better time to explain; with Phoebe departed, it was only the two of them, an empty street, and a long, long walk before they reached home. “Is it true?”

Janie tugged her bracelet, a thoughtful expression on her face. Orion was so tired that he was seconds away from keeling over and taking a nap on the sidewalk. Janie, on the other hand, seemed perfectly alert, even if she kept refusing to look directly at him, which was odd.

She started to walk. Orion followed, hovering at her side persistently as she picked up speed. It wasn’t until they were some distance away from his family home that Janie said:

“He caught on to a slip in my cover. I had to make a split-second decision between being exposed or shutting him up.”

“So you killed him.”

He saw Janie’s shoulders stiffen. Her pace sped up further. “Are you disapproving?”

“No, of course not.” Orion’s hands had been dirtied too after his years working as an agent, but it was a rare occasion. Like when they were being pursued at high speed by mysterious entities firing projectiles at their vehicle. “I only want to be kept informed.”

That earned a noise from Janie, one that Orion didn’t entirely know how to read. Some mix between acceptance and curiosity. A low hum at the base of her throat, purring outward. There was a lot about Janie Mead that Orion didn’t know how to read.

“I panicked,” Janie said plainly. “I thought it was easier to keep it to myself. That’s how Dao Feng trained me.”

“That’s how Dao Feng trained you when you ran solo.” Orion sidestepped a puddle, moving onto the road for three paces before returning to the sidewalk. He resisted the urge to take Janie’s elbow, to spin her so she was facing him and he could pry everything she hid out into the open. “We are High Tide together now, are we not? We are one combined unit now, are we not?”

Janie did stop then, as if she had read his thoughts.

“I ought to have told you,” she stated. “Yes. You’re right. It was careless and dangerous, and if you had needed to cover for me, it would have been easier if you’d known the true extent of what happened.”

Orion almost couldn’t believe what he was hearing. She sounded sincere. Was she… admitting to wrongdoing? Who was this girl and what had she done with the operative he’d been sharing a roof with for weeks?

“Good.” He wanted to push his luck. “Are you keeping any other secrets from me, Janie Mead?”

She turned to face him properly, searching his gaze under the glow of the streetlights. The night blew a sudden cold breeze between them, but Janie hardly flinched, too busy considering the matter he had put forward.

“One,” she said quietly. “But I don’t want to tell you yet.”

And like that, she surged ahead again. As if she hadn’t admitted that she might drop another bomb on him any one of these days. He didn’t know if it was better or worse that he knew now to brace for impact.

Who are you, Janie Mead?

In the present, Orion shouldered through the main doors out of Seagreen Press, winding around the activity outside. He passed Ambassador Deoka with a nod. Though Ambassador Deoka nodded back courteously, Orion felt the official’s gaze follow him all the way to the front gates.

“Count your days,” Orion muttered aloud, hailing a rickshaw. “You will not be here for long.”

If the hotel had a name, Orion was having trouble finding it when he walked in, looking around to ensure his location was correct. What sort of facility didn’t have a sign out front? The lobby inside was nice enough: a fish tank in the corner and a glass panel installed over the front desk, protecting the receptionist at her chair while she filed her nails. Still, there was no doubt that this was Chinese territory. The walls had none of the veneer that the foreign hotels had, none of the decor and shimmering gold that came as a result of money exchanged for jurisdiction.

“I’m looking for Zheng Haidi,” Orion said, approaching the desk.

The receptionist checked the logbook, already open to a page in front of her. “Room three, ground level. Hallway on your left.”

Orion’s arms were prickling. When he walked down the hallway and approached room three, he didn’t knock first; he just walked right in, taking inventory. Better to get this over and done with—if he thought too long about anything, he might mess it up.

“You’re early!” a high-pitched voice exclaimed from the settee. Haidi jumped to her feet, her hair loose at the nape of her neck.

The hotel room was arranged as any ordinary room would be. A bed, the settee, a table. Large windows, thin curtains—hmm.

“Is that a problem?” Orion asked, striding to the windows. He peered onto the street outside, holding the smile on his face. “You’re lovely in the light as always, Haidi, but I didn’t get enough sleep and I have a mild headache. You don’t mind, do you?” He tugged the curtains closed before she could answer.

From the settee, Haidi blinked rapidly, taken aback.

“Not at all,” she replied after a beat. “I trust you didn’t have too much trouble finding this place.”

Orion leaned back against the wall. He folded his arms, then crossed one ankle over the other. The curtains were pulled, so no photograph evidence of a setup. What else did he need to watch for? Wires? Microphones?

“Nothing I cannot navigate.” Subtly, Orion ran his eyes to the side, inspecting the adjoining bathroom. Nobody was hiding inside. “You said you summoned me here for something important. What’s the matter?”

Haidi took a moment to pour from the teapot on the table. Orion hadn’t wasted any time before getting to the topic, and with her face inclined down, he could not tell if Haidi was reacting with neutrality or displeasure.

“Come sit, won’t you?”

Suspicion took root in his gut. He didn’t show it—he walked to the long seat and dropped down, elbows propped on his knees in casualness.

“I made a discovery the other day,” Haidi said, “and I thought it pertinent to tell you. The last thing I’d want to see is my colleagues dragged down into terrible schemes.”

Orion laced his fingers together. If he had learned anything from so many years socializing and schmoozing around people with ulterior motives, it was how to pick up their tells. Haidi was making a concentrated effort to look directly at him. When her words slotted in one after the other, it sounded more like she was reading off a script. Like she was reciting words that had been carefully fed to her already.

This is a test, Orion thought frantically. But of what? From whom?

“That’s kind,” he said carefully. Haidi shifted closer and set a hand on his arm. He reached for the tea, nudging her off. “But you said previously it had to do with my wife. I gather there is nothing of my wife that I don’t already know.”

Haidi’s eyes flickered to her purse, which sat at the end of the settee. In his catalogue of observations, Orion filed away the knee-jerk reaction.

“Certainly,” Haidi said. “Tell me, how well do you really know her?”

Orion didn’t like this one bit. No matter how many times he emphasized the word “wife,” Haidi was not letting up, which meant this was an intentional task. Under usual circumstances, he would hardly fight a clear seduction. But this had to do with Janie. If Haidi was poking around to see where Orion stood with her, then Janie was being suspected, and Haidi was trying to determine whether Orion was to be looped in with her or considered innocent. High Tide was one unit. Orion would never be so foolish as to separate himself from her.

Only… it was true that he knew nothing about Janie. And though he didn’t know who Haidi was working for, she had to have some information to be doing this.

“I suppose I married her quite fast,” he allowed.

“Ah, of course.” Haidi leaned in, her perfume swirling under his nose. Orion almost sneezed. “I suppose you were taken by surprise, weren’t you?”

She trailed a finger along his jaw. He held back his flinch. If he lurched away with visible distaste, he would lose access to the information she had. But if she kept going, Janie was going to kill him. With her bare hands.

Orion did the only thing he could.

He faked a nosebleed.

“Oh—” One of his hands launched up to pinch his nose; the other one slipped into his pocket and opened his penknife, slicing his own index finger open. When he touched his nose, it looked as if it was running with bright red, smeared along his upper lip. “Could you grab a wet towel, please?”

Haidi jolted to her feet, her eyes wide. “Yes, of course. Hold on.”

She hurried away into the bathroom, jostling around the cabinets noisily. Orion already knew that there were no towels in there: places like these would hardly supply free amenities. When she emerged, she gave a harried, “I’ll ask the receptionist,” and slipped out.

Immediately, Orion lowered his finger from his nose, scrunching his fist tight to trap the bleeding. With his uninjured hand, he opened Haidi’s purse and peered at what was inside.

A gun—interesting. A hair ribbon. Some loose-leaf paper.

Orion shook the contents around, digging to the bottom. Something made of glass clinked as it rolled around, and he dug in to find a small vial filled with green liquid. He set it down and reached for the final object he had observed: a photograph.

“Hm…” He brought the photo closer. The subject was a Kuomintang politician standing over an outdoor podium. Orion didn’t know where exactly it was, but it looked like one of the public gardens in the settlements. He gathered that Haidi wasn’t carrying the photograph around for the politician. Far likelier was the fact that Janie stood in the background, perfectly caught in the frame. She was wearing a dark qipao, a ribbon looped around her wrist. For a second or two, Orion only observed her smile in admiration.

Then his gaze dropped to the handwritten description at the bottom.

Juewu Gardens, 1926.

“What?” he murmured aloud. Five years ago. He had been seventeen. Janie should have been even younger. So why did she look almost the same?

The rapid clatter of footsteps neared the door from outside, and Orion put the photograph where he had found it, snapping Haidi’s purse closed and scooting to where he had been on the settee. When Haidi returned with the towel, he squeezed his finger hard, letting a rivulet of blood drip down his arm and stain his sleeve.

“Here, here,” Haidi said quickly, hurrying close.

Orion took the towel from her, pressing the cold cloth to his nose. In the same motion, he stood up just as she was sitting down.

“I think it’s best if I go,” he said nasally. “I’ll see you at the office. I’m sure you can tell me anything you want there. Zàijiàn!”

Before Haidi could protest, Orion was slipping out, closing the door after himself. He took the towel away from his nose as soon as the handle clicked, wincing at the cut on his finger. What a mess. He wiped his nose as well as he could, then hurried out of the hotel, ducking his head from the receptionist.

Outside the building, he tossed the towel into the first trash pile he saw. There was still a smear of blood on his lip when he wiped, but no one paid him any mind while he walked down the road, weaving between shoe shiners and fortune card readers. The cool air was helping clear his mind, even with the noise on Shanghai’s main thoroughfare streets. With the sun beaming down at the center of the sky, the city was rumbling at the height of its daytime activity, and Orion sank right into it, holding his hand up to stop the bleeding.

He watched a fight begin near the vegetable market. He tossed a few coins at the sleeping bodies slumped outside the shops. Each step on the pavement set off another wave of thoughts roaring through his head.

By the time he had been walking long enough for a thin layer of sweat to gather down his back, his thoughts were no clearer about the past half hour’s events. All he felt in the dip of his chest was worry and bafflement. Most of the latter emotion was directed entirely toward his pretend wife and what information she could possibly be hiding from him that was hauling their cover into crisis.

Orion slipped into a public phone booth, grimacing when the dark green paint job on the door chipped off into his palm. He dusted his uninjured hand to clean it, then lifted the phone receiver and dialed.

“Hullo?”

“Do you have a moment?” Orion asked. “I need your help.”

“You’re needing my help a lot recently,” Phoebe replied over the line. She sounded very pleased. He could practically imagine how she was sitting at that moment: holding the cord of the telephone, her head hunched into her shoulders like a little gremlin catching the first scent of treasure.

“Yes, well, you did offer it yesterday.”

On the other end of the line, Phoebe had most certainly sat up straight.

“Am I stalking Liza?”

“I want you to observe her,” Orion corrected. He hesitated a moment, then said, “Janie is keeping something from me. Something big. And I’m certain that she and Liza knew each other prior to Seagreen.”

A tap came on the glass of the phone booth. Orion turned around to find an old man gesturing for him to hurry up, and he made an apologetic gesture, holding up his hand to indicate a few more minutes.

“I checked Seagreen’s records,” he went on. “Liza Ivanova lives in an apartment opposite Peach Lily Palace. Run into her accidentally, offer to help in her task. You’re the only one among us officially unaffiliated with the Nationalists, so you’ll have a better chance at playing the neutral card. Somehow, we need to uncover what Liza and Janie have on each other.”

Phoebe considered it for a moment.

“I must ask…,” she said, “why are we off investigating a Communist operative to find out about your own wife? It sounds rather complicated. Can you not ask Janie directly?”

“Ask her what secret she is keeping from me?” Orion snorted. “Because that would go well.” He shook his head. “There’s something hidden there. I know it. Can you do it?”

The old man had started tapping on the glass again. Orion gestured more forcefully, bidding patience while his sister mused on the task. It was a mystery why she was even pretending to think about it. There was no doubt that she was trembling on the other side, waiting to agree.

Phoebe cleared her throat. “You can count on me,” she declared.