along in the total blackness. He could not see his feet. He did not know how high the ceiling was above him. The heat bounced off the walls. It ran down his face; it stuck his shirt to his back. He ran his finger along the wall and touched something wet and sticky. He smelt blood. He smelt panic. Mann stopped. His heart raced, the blood pumped in his ears as he strained to listen.
Nina was crying.
‘Nina…’ Shrimp could barely speak. ‘I can help you, Nina. I will do anything for you. Please, don’t do this to us.’
Mann moved along the corridor in the dark. He didn’t want to alert anyone to his presence. He felt his way in the darkness. His shirt stuck to his wounds, stinging now from the sweat in them. But he didn’t notice. He had one purpose left for his body, one more thing he asked it to do. His fingers tingled with adrenalin as he gripped Delilah tightly in his hand and called out.
The candle flickered a ghostly sheen up the white tiles and over the faces of the dolls.
Nina sat on top of Shrimp and felt along his ribcage.
She picked up the scalpel and cut along the bottom of his rib.
‘All right, Nina.’ Shrimp struggled to talk through the pain. ‘You kill me now but understand one thing, Nina…’ Nina cut him again twice more. She lifted the section of skin and exposed his ribs ‘…I will love you forever.’
He couldn’t talk any more. Nina picked up the skewer. The pain shook his body and he gave one deep cry; all the pain and all the love found a harmony in the last few seconds of his life. Nina slashed through the artery in her left wrist. There was a pause and then blood shot out and covered the wall behind and extinguished the candle and, in pitch darkness, Nina pressed the point of the skewer into Shrimp’s heart.
‘Shrimp?’ Mann’s heart pounded in his ears as he waited for an answer. There was none. He felt along in the pitch darkness. He came to the second door and he turned the handle, pushed, and stepped into the room. In the darkness he called out again. From the far end of the room he thought he heard what sounded like Shrimp’s voice. Mann inched forwards. At the far end of the room he felt a curtain beneath his fingers and behind it the solid feel of a door. He felt for a handle and turned it.
The door opened and the heat from the room stuck in Mann’s lungs along with the smell of atomized blood as thick as a cloud. He heard the sound of dripping. His fingers tingled with adrenalin as he gripped Delilah tightly in his hand. He took another step and his foot touched something on the floor. He shone his light into the room. Hundreds of pairs of eyes stared back at him. In the middle of the room were bodies. Nina slumped forward, naked, her long hair hiding whoever was underneath. Mann knelt down beside them. Mann saw Sheng, what was left of him. He pushed Nina over. She rolled to one side on top of Sheng.
Mann’s heart broke when he saw Shrimp. His chest was opened. His ribs showing. He was covered in blood. He wasn’t moving and a skewer was deeply imbedded in his heart. Nina’s weight had driven it in. Mann looked closely; there was the faintest sign of movement; the heart was still beating. Shrimp was hanging on.
‘I’m here, Shrimp. Stay with me. Hold on. You’re going to be all right.’
Mann turned and shouted out for Daniel Lu. He looked back at Shrimp. The heart was barely beating now, growing fainter every beat. He knew he shouldn’t remove the skewer but it’s all he wanted to do. It was killing Shrimp and he couldn’t stop it.
‘Shrimp, stay with me. For fuck sake listen to me and stay alive.’
He looked around for something to pack inside the chest cavity to try and stem the bleeding that was filling the cavity with blood. The nearest thing he could find was Shrimp’s shirt. He grabbed it, pulled it to him and gently folded it around the knife. He cursed his useless hand. He needed more. He reached for Shrimp’s jacket, to tear out the silk lining. He turned back. The heart had stopped beating. Mann tried to tear more of the lining free. Something hard in the pocket stopped him. In the inside pocket he found a syringe pouch. He tore the pouch open with his teeth and bit off the top of the packet. He pulled off the cap and then he plunged the epinephrine syringe straight into Shrimp’s heart.
Chapter 117
Mann ran at the dummy and let fly his shuriken. Six gleaming stars spun through the air, and missed.
‘Fuck. I’m going to have to practise. It’s not so easy when you’ve only got four and a half fingers and you can’t feel three of them.’
Mia, Daniel Lu and Shrimp were standing on the rooftop with him at sunrise. They scattered Ng’s ashes to the morning breeze. Tom Sheng’s body was buried in a family plot. Mia hadn’t been allowed to attend the funeral; she was just the mistress.
‘What are we going to do with the monkey?’ asked Mia. ‘It’s not meant to live on ice cream and takeaways. Ng liked things to be what they were meant to be.’
The mention of Ng’s name sat heavily in the air.
‘You two are going to have to take some time off. Shrimp, we have to count ourselves lucky you’re still here.’ Mia smiled at Shrimp.
He nodded his head but he didn’t smile or answer. Mann looked at him and he understood that this would change Shrimp forever. The pink flush of dawn was on his pale face. He would carry with him scars on his heart that would cut deeper than any knife could.
‘We can’t get to Victoria Chan now,’ said Mia.
‘She’ll be back. She’ll be wanting to take over as the Dragon Head of the Wo Shing Shing,’ Mann answered. He went to stand by the edge. He looked out at the morning blossom-coloured sky.
‘What about your father’s affairs? What about the Mansions?’ asked Daniel.
‘I am giving it to the people who deserve it. I am turning it over to the people who live there. They can own a part of it. They can also be responsible for it. They will have their own community police inside it, made up of all the nationalities. They can meet regularly, sort out differences. The refurb can go ahead but just floor by floor. Michelle will have a restaurant. PJ can have a secure tenancy with the Delhi Grill. I am giving everything else away. It might take me a while but I intend to do it somehow. It will never bring me happiness. Then I am taking Shrimp away somewhere to heal his soul and mine.’
Mann could hear the black-eared eagle kite calling. It flew near the edge now. It watched them as it always did.
When they’d all left him, Mann stayed on the roof. He took out his phone.
‘Alfie? Tell Jake I’m coming. Tell him his brother wants to see him. Tell him I miss him.’
He stood on the parapet. Mann looked back at the horizon. He looked down on the eagle, the blush of the first rays of sun touching its back. He looked out on the Hong Kong he loved. He picked up the last handful of Ng’s ashes and let them seep through his fist like powder. They flew off in a swirl.
‘Goodbye, my friend. See you on the other side. The way is not in the sky. The way is in your heart.’
Chapter 118
Across town in the Mansions, Lilly was serving customers and helping her mother out with the stall. The Mansions had a new calm about them. Without their figurehead or their Red Poles the Outcasts had collapsed. The kids wandered the streets in search of a new gang.
A young backpacker couple from England stopped by Michelle’s stall to buy dinner. It was their first time in Asia. They were on a gap year. They were young and excited and it was lovely to see. Michelle gave them an extra helping. They took it to the Mansion steps on Nathan Road to eat it. It was their first taste of Filipino food. Crackling pork with fried rice. As he used his fingers to pick up the pieces of meat, the lad paused and smiled and showed his girlfriend.
‘Look at this on my crackling. It must be a pig brand. How funny. Look what it says… MUM.’
Back at the stall Michelle looked at Lilly.
‘We’ll have to get pork from somewhere else now that Nina’s gone.’
