Eli was unable to explain what Joshua’s words had meant. He gently tried to coax the old man to say more, but Joshua appeared neither to hear nor to see him.
“That name… Li Jing,” the Chief said. “Have you heard it before?”
“No, never,” Eli said. “It sounds Chinese…”
He looked thoughtful.
“I know there used to be a business in the port dealing in mother-of-pearl and semi-precious gemstones from China and Southeast Asia. The firm was called Shanghai Import or something of the sort. And I think Dad had some dealings with them. Their premises were somewhere along the river over in Govan. But I haven’t heard anything of them for many, many years.”
“Do you think Li Jing could be someone who worked for that firm?” 135
Eli shrugged his shoulders.
“I haven’t any idea at all, I’m afraid.”
We thanked Eli Rombach for his help and said goodbye. The rain had stopped at last, only to be replaced by a clammy, grey mist that had settled like a lid over the city.
I was wondering what we should do next, and the Chief was clearly thinking along the same lines.
“What do you think?” he asked. “Should we see if we can locate Shanghai Import?”
I nodded. Given that we still had a lead, we should certainly follow it up.
We took the subway train under the river and got off at Govan Cross station. The street was bustling with life. Trams, lorries and horse-drawn carts fought for space on the wide road. Street cleaners attempted to clear the horse dung from the setts, while singing barkers tried to tempt the people on the pavements to buy their soaps and boot laces. At the crossroads there were several young couples dancing to the music of a solitary mouth organ and the people who’d gathered around them were clapping in time to the music.
“Everyone in Glasgow can dance,” the Chief said. “Dancing and fighting, you’ll find the champions at both in this city!” 136
We started walking east past the rows of gloomy, stone tenements. This is where the shipyard workers and their families must live, I thought. On the other side of the street there were lead foundries, wood yards, mechanical workshops and heaps of coal. The air was thick with the smoke from factory chimneys, mixed with the muddy aroma of the river and the smell of tar and red paint from the shipyards.
The Chief stopped everyone we met and asked if they’d ever heard of someone called Li Jing or of a firm called Shanghai Import. The majority of people stopped and tried to be helpful. Now and then small groups of people gathered around and engaged in loud discussions about which companies had been where. In the end, however, no one was able to say with any certainty whether Shanghai Import had ever existed in Glasgow. And no one recognized the name Li Jing.
We were approaching the three wide bridges across the River Clyde in the middle of the city. Just before we reached the first bridge, we passed a big gang of noisy young men hanging around outside a billiard hall. Some of them seemed keen on having a fight, others were doing shady deals in the dark doorway. People were making small detours to avoid them.
In the midst of this gang of thugs, there was a young woman sitting on a pile of wooden crates. She was small and thin, with a pale face and big, blue eyes. She was wearing a lined white 137cape, a wide, ruffled skirt showing under it. She reminded me of one of those china dolls seen in toyshop windows. I noticed her eyes following the Chief and me as we passed on the other side of the street.
We hadn’t walked more than twenty or so yards when we heard a light, slightly childlike, voice behind us.
“Hey you, mister! Stop where you are!”
The Chief and I turned round. There she was, the china girl.
With a serious look on her face, she pointed at me and said to the Chief, “I want your ape. It’s cute. You can give it to me.”
The Chief’s eyebrows shot up, but then he laughed and said, “I can’t do that.”
“Why not?” the girl said.
“Because the ape isn’t mine. Her name is Sally Jones and she is her own.”
The girl’s big blue eyes narrowed.
“From now on I’ll be the one to decide what the ape’s called,” she snarled between her teeth. “Tell it to come here! To me!”
“Sorry, my friend,” the Chief said, shaking his head in a good-natured way before nodding to me that we should move on.
Suddenly the girl was standing in our way. At the same time, she made a quick movement with her hand, as if shaking something out of her sleeve. The next moment there was a click as she flicked open the blade of a large cut-throat razor. 138
“Either the ape comes with me…” she said, holding the razor to the Chief’s face, “or I’ll slice off your nose and ears, old man!”
The Chief looked at her in astonishment. But then we were joined by a young man from the gang on the other side of the street.
“Cops!” he said to the girl, indicating two police constables plodding along the pavement a short distance away.
The girl swore quietly and closed her razor. Reluctantly she accompanied the young man back to the rest of the gang. Halfway across the street she turned and looked at me with her big blue eyes. I shuddered.
“Is there a problem here?” one of the constables asked when they came up to me and the Chief.
“No,” the Chief said, with a sigh of relief. “But there probably would have been if you hadn’t turned up.”
The policemen looked across at the gang on the street corner.
“They call themselves the Kingston Kings,” one of the policemen said. “One of the worst street gangs this side of the river. Avoid them if you can.”
“Will do,” the Chief said.
139After crossing the river we walked on with no particular plan in mind apart from finding somewhere to eat. After a while we came to a large market hall called Bridgegate Fish-market.
The Chief had obviously been there before. His face broke into a big grin and he said, “Let’s take a look in here. You’ll really like it.”
I wondered what was supposed to be so enjoyable about a fish market. But no sooner had we gone through the tall doorway than I understood what the Chief meant.
When you go to sea you inevitably hear a lot of swearwords and during my years at sea I’ve learnt a whole string of them. During the time the Chief and I spent wandering round the noisy crowd in the fish market I learnt at least twice that number. And pretty good swearwords they were, too!
“Scottish fish merchants are in a class of their own when it comes to swearing,” the Chief said, his voice full of admiration.
And I had no reason to disagree with him.
There was a nice little pub near the fish market. The Chief took a portion of fried haddock and I had boiled cauliflower. Afterwards we strolled back to our boarding house. My legs were aching from walking all day. 140
“Hello there!” Mrs Grimes called as we passed the door to her small office. “I’ve got something for you!”
With a struggle our landlady rose from her worn armchair and handed the Chief an envelope. It had both the Chief’s name and my name written on it.
“Who can this be from?” the Chief wondered in surprise.
“I have no idea at all, pet,” Mrs Grimes said.
“But who delivered it?”
Mrs Grimes looked a little shamefaced. “I suppose I must have dozed off a while. My old armchair is so comfortable, you know. And all of a sudden the envelope was just there on the table.”
The Chief gave an understanding smile and then slit open the envelope with his pocket knife. It contained nothing but a plain white card. After reading it, he passed it to me, a look of confusion on his face.
The text was written in an old person’s shaky hand:
Caledonian Railway departure 18.15
from Glasgow Central, Platform 14.
5 Albert Road, Gourock.
Li Jing will be expecting you.