“Can I help you with anything else?” she asked.
“No, this is fine. This is a lot. We’ll nail him with this.”
She nodded.
“I have to get down to the print lab, see if they got anything off that flashlight or bathroom window.”
“Yes, of course,” she said awkwardly.
He indulged in one last look at her
After he had stepped out of her office, closed the door behind him, and crossed two-thirds of the long computer lab, he looked back, half hoping that she would be staring wistfully after him. Instead, she was sitting at her desk again, holding a compact in one hand, examining her mouth in that small mirror.
China Dream was a West Hollywood restaurant in a quaint three-story brick building, in an area of trendy shops. Spencer parked a block away, left Rocky in the truck again, and walked back.
The air was pleasantly warm. The breeze was refreshing. It was one of those days when the struggles of life seemed worth waging.
The restaurant was not yet open for lunch. Nevertheless, the door was unlocked, and he went inside.
The China Dream indulged in none of the decor common to many Chinese restaurants: no dragons or foo dogs, no brass ideograms on the walls. It was starkly modern, pearl gray and black, with white linen on the thirty to forty tables. The only Chinese art object was a life-size, carved-wood statue of a gentle-faced, robed woman holding what appeared to be an inverted bottle or a gourd; it was standing just inside the door.
Two Asian men in their twenties were arranging flatware and wineglasses. A third man, Asian but a decade older than his coworkers, was rapidly folding white cloth napkins into fanciful, peaked shapes. His hands were as dexterous as those of a magician. All three men wore black shoes, black slacks, white shirts, and black ties.
Smiling, the oldest approached Spencer. “Sorry, sir. We don’t open for lunch until eleven-thirty.”
He had a mellow voice and only a faint accent.
“I’m here to see Louis Lee, if I may,” Spencer said.
“Do you have an appointment, sir?”
“No, I’m afraid not.”
“Can you please tell me what you wish to discuss with him?”
“A tenant who lives in one of his rental properties.”
The man nodded. “May I assume this would be Ms. Valerie Keene?”
The soft voice, smile, and unfailing politeness combined to project an image of humility, which was like a veil that made it more difficult to see, until now, that the napkin folder was also quite intelligent and observant.
“Yes,” Spencer said. “My name’s Spencer Grant. I’m a…I’m a friend of Valerie’s. I’m worried about her.”
From a pocket of his trousers, the man withdrew an object about the size — but less than the thickness — of a deck of cards. It was hinged at one end; unfolded, it proved to be the smallest cellular telephone that Spencer had ever seen.
Aware of Spencer’s interest, the man said, “Made in Korea.”
“Very James Bond.”
“Mr. Lee has just begun to import them.”
“I thought he was a restaurateur.”
“Yes, sir. But he is many things.” The napkin folder pushed a single button, waited while the seven-digit programmed number was transmitted, and then surprised Spencer again by speaking in neither English nor Chinese, but in French, to the person on the other end.
Collapsing the phone and tucking it into his pocket, the napkin folder said, “Mr. Lee will see you, sir. This way, please.”
Spencer followed him among the tables, to the right rear corner of the front room, through a swinging door with a round window in the center, into clouds of appetizing aromas: garlic, onions, ginger, hot peanut oil, mushroom soup, roasting duck, almond essence.
The immense and spotlessly clean kitchen was filled with ovens, cooktops, griddles, huge woks, deep fryers, warming tables, sinks, chopping blocks. Sparkling white ceramic tile and stainless steel dominated. At least a dozen chefs and cooks and assistants, dressed in white from head to foot, were busy at a variety of culinary tasks.
The operation was as organized and precise as the mechanism in an elaborate Swiss clock with twirling ballerina dolls, marching toy soldiers, prancing wooden horses. Reliably tick-tick-ticking along.
Spencer trailed his escort through another swinging door, into a corridor, past storage rooms and staff rest rooms, to an elevator. He expected to go up. In silence, they went down one floor. When the doors opened, the escort motioned for Spencer to exit first.
The basement was not dank and dreary. They were in a mahogany-paneled lounge with handsome teak chairs upholstered in teal fabric.
The receptionist at the teak and polished-steel desk was a man: Asian, totally bald, six feet tall, with broad shoulders and a thick neck. He was typing furiously at a computer keyboard. When he turned from the keyboard and smiled, his gray suit jacket stretched tautly across a concealed handgun in a shoulder holster.
He said, “Good morning,” and Spencer replied in kind.
“Can we go in?” asked the napkin folder.
The bald man nodded. “Everything’s fine.”
As the escort led Spencer to an inner door, an electrically operated deadbolt clacked open, triggered by the receptionist.
Behind them, the bald man began to type again. His fingers raced across the keys. If he could use a gun as well as he could type, he would be a deadly adversary.
Beyond the lounge, they followed a white corridor with a gray vinyl-tile floor. It served windowless offices on both sides. Most of the doors were open, and Spencer saw men and women — many but not all of them Asian — working at desks, filing cabinets, and computers just like office workers in the real world.
The door at the end of the hall led into Louis Lee’s office, which was another surprise. Travertine floor. A beautiful Persian carpet: mostly grays, lavender, and greens. Tapestry-covered walls. Early-nineteenth-century French furniture, with elaborate marquetry and ormolu. Leather-bound books in cases with glass doors. The large room was warmly but not brightly lighted by Tiffany floor and table lamps, some with stained-glass and some with blown-glass shades, and Spencer was sure that none was a reproduction.
“Mr. Lee, this is Mr. Grant,” said the escort.
The man who came out from behind the ornate desk was five feet seven, slender, in his fifties. His thick jet- black hair had begun to turn gray at the temples. He wore black wingtips, dark blue trousers with suspenders, a white shirt, a bow tie with small red polka dots against a blue background, and horn-rimmed glasses.
“Welcome, Mr. Grant.” He had a musical accent as European as it was Chinese. His hand was small, but his grip was firm.
“Thank you for seeing me,” Spencer said, feeling as disoriented as he might have felt if he had followed Alice’s white rabbit into this windowless, Tiffany-illumined hole.
Lee’s eyes were anthracite black. They fixed Spencer with a stare that penetrated him almost as effectively as a scalpel.
The escort and erstwhile napkin folder stood to one side of the door, his hands clasped behind him. He had not grown, but he now seemed as much of a bodyguard as the huge, bald receptionist.
Louis Lee invited Spencer to one of a pair of armchairs that faced each other across a low table. A nearby Tiffany floor lamp cast blue, green, and scarlet light.
Lee took the chair opposite Spencer and sat very erect. With his spectacles, bow tie, and suspenders, and with the backdrop of books, he might have been a professor of literature in the study of his home, near the campus of Yale or another Ivy League university.
His manner was reserved but friendly. “So you are a friend of Ms. Keene’s? Perhaps you went to high school together? College?”
“No, sir. I haven’t known her that long. I met her where she works. I’m a recent…friend. But I do care about her and…well, I’m concerned that something’s happened to her.”
“What do you think might have happened to her?”
