So I tried to make it up. But I couldn’t. Now. Now.” She turned to Mr. Chen. “I know you were going to pay a million dollars for the Shanghai Moon, and I’m sorry that money’s been confiscated, but you’ll get it back. I was supposed to get half of that, and I really need it. Please.”
That “please” wasn’t a request; it was an order for the old man to go fetch her money. No one moved, though. Alice frowned. To distract her, I said, “And the Shanghai Moon was at the root of everything. Your father had been offered it, to save Kai-rong.”
Mr. Chen blanched. “What? What are you saying?”
I raised my hand gently, telling him to stay calm. “But he never got it, did he?” I asked Alice.
“He told my mother about it.” She smiled a bitter smile. “It was going to make us rich. Rich! He was arrested on his way to meet Rosalie.”
“How do you know that? You were a child.”
“Oh, my mother repeated it, over and over, every day in Chapei Camp. How my father’s greed sent us there. And how the Germans could have gotten us out but they didn’t. Germans! I hated them. They left us to rot in that horrible place, left my mother to die.”
“Holocaust asset recovery,” Bill said. “That’s why you do it. To get back at the Germans.”
Expressionless, she looked at him. “My mother had a silver dressing-table set, with grapevines on it. A mirror, combs, and brushes. A magnifying glass, and a delicate thing for stretching the fingers of kid gloves before you put them on. When she got sick, I had to ask the camp commander to take them in exchange for medicine. Ask him! Then she died. Over the next few years we traded everything away. When the camp was liberated, I had nothing of hers.”
“But the camp was run by the Japanese,” I said.
“We didn’t have to be there! The Germans could have saved us!” Alice’s shrillness made Mr. Chen jump. Mr. Zhang put a hand on his arm. Alice went on more calmly, “It was their fault. And Rosalie’s and Mei-lin’s, for tempting my weak, greedy father.”
“But what was the point of getting Joel and me involved?” Where the hell was Mary? “Why not just sell the jewelry after you and Wong Pan stole it?”
At the mention of Joel she lost a little starch. “It wasn’t worth enough. Joan needs much more money than that. Mr. Chen and Mr. Zhang had to believe Wong Pan had the Shanghai Moon and was desperate to sell it before I caught up with him. So they wouldn’t ask why it wasn’t offered on the open market.”
“You knew who they were?” Mary? Girlfriend? Any time now.
“Of course. But they had to believe I didn’t. That Wong Pan was ahead of me. I thought it was a clever plan, but I’m a plodding lawyer, not a strategist. Joel called that morning to ask why I’d inquired about a detective before I’d even left Zurich. I put him off with a promise to come in and talk about it. Then I called Wong Pan. Just to say we had to hurry. I didn’t know he’d already made a deal with the White Eagles, already gotten a gun from them, already killed that Shanghai policeman. Lydia, I’m so sorry.”
“I knew it. I knew you didn’t mean to have anything to do with killing Joel.” I tried to sound as if I’d had faith in her all along. “Alice, put the gun down. This can all be worked out.”
“No. I’m going to jail, I don’t doubt it. And I should. So many bad things were my fault. But I’ve got to take care of my sister first.”
“I’m very sorry.” Mr. Zhang spoke up, and he really did sound sorry. “But my cousin and I don’t have the money you’re asking for.”
“You were going to pay a million dollars for the Shanghai Moon. I’ve looked into your history of chasing it. That was part of my research for my plan. Like asking about a detective.” She shook her head sadly.
“Yes. And earlier today we had it, and could have given it to you. Now it’s gone. Even the police don’t know where.”
“Someone stole it, Alice,” I said. “Before the noodle shop.”
“What are you talking about? Who?”
“We don’t know. So you see—”
She shook her head. “No. No.”
“Yes. I—”
“No!” In rising panic, she said, “There must be more! Anyone willing to spend that much, there