Gold Mountain Blues - Ling Zhang [175]
He did not need to walk through to Canton Alley itself—the stuff he was looking for was not on sale there. Instead, he quietly made his way past the piles of rubbish and waste paper and pushed open the back door of a shop which went by the name of the Kwong Cheong General Store. They stocked exactly the same stuff as any other shop of this type in Chinatown— fruit, vegetables, rice and condiments—and it was all laid out in exactly the same way, with the dry goods at the back and the fresh vegetables in the front. But this was the only place in Chinatown where Kam Ho could get what he needed today. And it would not be found displayed on the shelves.
He made his way in through the back of the shop, acting just like a regular customer, picking up a handful of yellow beans from a sack, holding them to his nose, sniffing and putting them back again. Then he picked a salted duck egg out of a basket and shook it to see if the yolk was runny. But this was just for the benefit of the shop’s customers. Once they had gone, he went straight up to the counter and gave the empty bottle he was carrying to the owner, together with the money he had been carrying in his pocket. The shop owner did not bother to count it. He could tell from the weight of the coins that it was the right amount. The bottle was an old sesame oil bottle; the label was dark and transparent with grease. The owner bent down, felt around behind the counter until he found what he was looking for, then filled the bottle with the stuff and gave it back to Kam Ho. That was all there was to it. No need to talk, or even to look at each other. The owner knew that the young man would be back within the week.
Kam Ho went out the way he had come in, and started on his way home. The whole trip took him an hour or so. Usually, if the children were on a break when he came to the school, he waited until a neatly dressed woman teacher, her blouse buttoned up to the neck, rang the handbell for the children to go back into class before crossing the school playing field.
But today he could not wait. Rather, it was Mrs. Henderson who could not wait. Her shoulders had pained her all night. Kam Ho’s room was at one end of the house, and Mrs. Henderson’s at the other, but Kam Ho could hear her moans as she tossed and turned. No sooner had Mrs. Henderson seen her husband off to work that morning than she sent Kam Ho to get the bottle filled.
Not with sesame oil, but with opium juice.
His brother, Kam Shan, had told him that opium soothed pain. Kam Shan happened to be visiting on a day when Mrs. Henderson had an attack of arthritis. He told him to buy opium juice in Chinatown so she could try it. The Gold Mountain government had banned opium years ago, Kam Shan said, and shut down the opium dens. Now, only the Kwong Cheong General Store sold it, but even then, only on the quiet—under the counter to known customers. He just had to mention the name Red-Eye Bat. Kam Ho stared at his brother and said nothing. Kam Shan had lived in Kamloops for years and only came to Vancouver occasionally, but he still knew the secrets of every store in Chinatown.
It was then that Mrs. Henderson started to drink opium juice. It turned out to be so effective that she would hardly let the bottle out of her sight.
As Kam Ho approached the school, he saw half a dozen children on the playing field chasing each other