The Dog by Jack Livings Page A

herself. “You understand this kid is connected?” the fat man said.
    â€œLike I care. He walked a tab. And he insulted me.”
    â€œBesmirched your good name, did he?”
    â€œYou were there,” she said. “You heard what he said.”
    â€œFor the record,” he said.
    â€œA whore. He said I was a whore.”
    â€œImagine.”
    She crossed her arms and gave the fat man the evil eye.
    This went on for a while, the fat man extracting his pound of flesh, Anwher attempting invisibility, the old woman needling them both. The barber watched dumbly from the side. Eventually the fat man got bored.
    â€œI’m sure he’ll gladly pay a fine plus what he owes you,” he said to the barber’s mother. “Justice done?”
    â€œHe steals from me. He threatens me. He calls me a whore in the open market, and you let him go free?”
    â€œI’m sure you’ve been called worse,” the fat man said. “Don’t push your luck.” He waved at the door. “Take him back to his cell and get this citizen her money.”
    *   *   *
    The fat man had been promoted hastily in the wake of the corruption sweep. His ascension to the rank of commanding officer was the result of good timing and the luck enjoyed by those who kept their mouths shut and carried out orders. But his men made farting noises when he walked by, and some still called him Fatty Bo to his face. This bothered him.
    He had his orders from the new regime and had been waiting for an excuse to move against the old gangster. One could never be too careful. Things had to look right. He’d told the old woman what to do: make your claim, file a report, allow the process to take hold.
    Of course, these civilians don’t take orders. She’d crashed into the station like it was 1967, invoking revolutionary slogans and a bunch of stuff she’d heard on the radio. “Seek truth from facts,” she kept yelling. Before he knew it, the entire station was peering around doors and over the tops of their reports to see what was going to happen next. His men didn’t bother to hide their snickering faces. “They’re taking over,” she screamed. “Threatening old women!”
    He had bellowed at the corporal to escort the old woman to a room where they could question the prisoner. The man took his time leading her away, and Fatty Bo had to yell at him again. The corporal’s hangdog face hardly registered the abuse, which the other men found hilarious. And the son—there he was, trying to put enough distance between himself and his own mother to signal that their simultaneous arrival had been a coincidence. Fatty Bo motioned him over.
    â€œShe’s really got a wire up her ass,” Fatty Bo said.
    â€œIt’s the heat,” replied the barber. Fatty Bo waited, but that was all the son had to say on the matter. Why she wanted the Uyghur strung up was a mystery, but it sure wasn’t because the Uyghur had called her a whore. She wanted this kid out the back door in a body bag. So be it. Embarrassing, yes, to be subject to a crazy old woman’s whims, but good luck all the same. Fatty Bo was self-sufficient enough to summon some intellectual appreciation for the situation. It was a blessing, was what it was. Bastards wouldn’t call him Fatty Bo after he burned Uyghurville to the ground.
    *   *   *
    Omar went to the PSB station alone, having left the payoff with one of his toughs stationed down the street.
    Every cop in the place jammed into booking to eyeball him. It took two hours to fill out the forms because his Chinese was far from perfect and one of the cops dumped tea on the papers just as he was finishing. This was part of the process and Omar dutifully requested new forms, for which he was charged a yuan and a half. Hunched over like a schoolboy, he began again, pausing occasionally to brush their cigarette ash from