Pump Six and Other Stories(4)

"Mei me'er." He used Beijing slang. No way. He started the game. His soldier squatted on the plains, with snowy peaks rising before him. He started forward, pushing across short grasses to a hut made of the skin of earlier Chinese soldiers. Wang Jun watched and said, "Don't go in the hut."

"I know."

"I'll take fifty."

Three-Fingers snorted. His soldier spied horsemen approaching and moved so that the hut hid him from their view. "I'll give you twenty."

Wang Jun said, "Maybe BeanBean will give me more."

"I'll give you thirty, go see if BeanBean will give you that." His soldier waited until the horsemen clustered. He launched a rocket into their center. The game machine rumbled as the rocket exploded.

"You have thirty now?"

Three-Fingers turned away from his game and his soldier perished quickly as bioengineered yakmen boiled out of the hut. He ignored the screams of his soldier as he counted out the cash to Wang Jun. Wang Jun left Three-Fingers to his games and celebrated the sale by finding an unused piece of bridge near the Bing Jiang. He settled down to nap under it through the sweltering afternoon heat.

He woke in the evening and he was hungry. He felt the heaviness of coins in his pocket and thought on the possibilities of his wealth. Among the coins, his fingers touched the unfamiliar shape of the datacube. He took it out and turned it in his hands. He had nearly forgotten the origin of his money. Holding the datacube, he was reminded of the Tibetan and the Hunanese and his mission. He considered seeking out the Tibetan and returning it to him, but deep inside he held a suspicion that he would not find the man selling tiger bones tonight. His stomach rumbled. He dropped the datacube back into his pocket and jingled the coins it resided with. Tonight he had money in his pockets. He would eat well.

"How much for mapo dofu?"

The cook looked at him from where he stood, swirling a soup in his broad wok, and listening to it sizzle.

"Too expensive for you, Little Wang. Go and find somewhere else to beg. I don't want you bothering my customers."

"Shushu, I have money." Wang Jun showed him the coins. "And I want to eat."

The cook laughed. "Xiao Wang is rich! Well then, Little Wang, tell me what you care for."

"Mapo dofu, yu xiang pork, two liang of rice and Wu Xing beer." His order tumbled out in a rush.

"Little Wang has a big stomach! Where will you fit all that food, I wonder?" When Wang Jun glared at him he said, "Go, sit, you'll have your feast."

Wang Jun went and sat at a low table and watched as the fire roared and the cook threw chilies into the wok to fry. He wiped at his mouth to keep from drooling as the smell of the food came to his nose. The cook's wife opened a bottle of Five Star for him, and he watched as she poured the beer into a wet glass. The day's heat was dissipating. Rain began to spatter the street restaurant's burlap roof. Wang Jun drank from his beer and watched the other diners, taking in the food they ate and the company they kept. These were people he might have previously harassed for their money. But not tonight. Tonight he was a king. Rich, with money in his pocket.

His thoughts were broken by the arrival of a foreigner. A broad man with long white hair pulled back in a horse's tail. His skin was pale and he wore white gloves. He stepped under the sheltering burlap and cast alien blue eyes across the diners. The Chinese at their tables stared back. When his eyes settled on Wang Jun's bent form, he smiled. He went to squat on a stool across from Wang Jun and said, in accented Mandarin, "You are Little Wang. You have something for me."

Wang Jun stared at the man and then, feeling cocky with the attention of the other Chinese said, "Ke neng." Maybe.

The foreigner frowned, then leaned across the table. The cook's wife came, interrupting, and set down Wang Jun's mapo dofu, followed quickly by the pork. She went and scooped out a steaming bowl of rice broader than Wang Jun's hand, and set it before him. Wang Jun picked up chopsticks and began shoveling the food into his mouth, all the while watching the foreigner. His eyes watered at the spiciness of the dofu and his mouth tingled with the familiar numbing of ground peppercorns.

The wife asked if the foreigner would eat with him, and Wang Jun eyed the foreigner. He felt the money in his pocket, while his mouth flamed on. He looked at the size of the foreigner and assented reluctantly, feeling his wealth now inadequate. They spoke in Chengdu hua, the dialect of the city, so that the foreigner did not understand what they said. The man watched as the wife scooped another bowl of rice and set it in front of him with a pair of chopsticks. He looked down at the white mountain of rice in his bowl and then looked up at Wang Jun. He shook his head, and said, "You have something for me. Give it to me now."

Wang Jun was stung by the foreigner's disregard of the offered food. Because he was unhappy he said, "Why should I give it to you?"

The pale white man frowned and his blue eyes were cold and angry. "Did not the Tibetan tell you to give me something?" He held out a white-gloved hand.

Wang Jun shrugged. "You didn't come to the bridge. Why should I give it to you now?"

"Do you have it?"

Wang Jun became guarded. "No."

"Where is it?"

"I threw it away."

The man reached across the small table and grasped Wang Jun's ragged collar. He pulled him close. "Give it to me now. You are very small, I can take it or you can give it to me. Little Wang, you cannot win tonight. Do not test me."