Chew Luen Fah. Elaine’s father. Adeline leaned against the wall, free hand coiling the telephone cord, taking this all in. Elaine was dying from Butterfly fire, and her father—in cahoots with Three Steel for generations—was offering them a deal? “How would you know it was us?”
“I recognize Butterfly magic better than most. I lived in Bukit Ho Swee when the fires were set. Those in the presence of your rogue Butterfly were struck by fever, and I came to tell it apart. Besides,” the man said coolly, “the fever-struck see your god, don’t they?”
“Oh?” Adeline said, attempting at coy, since she had no idea what he was talking about.
“For the past two days, Mr. Chew’s daughter has been talking of Lady Butterfly. Her and her friends.”
The dead girl who’d had a fever, who’d taken the pills, the new magic. NowElaine, and Siew Min and En Yi, if Adeline had to guess. But how would Three Steel possibly have gotten their hands on Butterfly fire? And how had theMariasgotten their hands on it? “So what does he want to trade for?” she said instead.
The man paused. “Mr. Chew has recently become aware of your situation with Three Steel. He also has reason to believe Three Steel is responsible for harming his daughter, and that you may now be interested in information about their operations in exchange for his daughter’s life.”
“Three Steel will string him up if they find out.”
“Mr. Chew is very well protected,” the man said crisply. “Worry about yourself.”
She couldn’t tell how much Mr. Chew knew about Fan Ge’s ultimatum, although it was clear some rumblings had gotten to him. It was an unnervingly good deal. Almost too good, assuming Adeline even knew how to save Elaine in the first place. “How do we know this isn’t a trap?”
“I suppose you don’t. But even I know where to call, to reach you. If Three Steel wanted to find you, they would already be at your door.”
Adeline glanced over her shoulder subconsciously, almost expecting the sounds of an intrusion outside. There was only music. She pretended to take down the Chews’ address from the fixer, then hung up the phone slowly. He had asked for Tian, but Tian was nowhere to be found these days. Besides, this was personal. She hadn’t been to the Chew estate since she was a child. It called to her.
She was thinking, mostly, that she should have tried to set Elaine on fire a long time ago.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWOTHE NAME OF THE FATHER
Chinatown wasn’t a place you were supposed to find beautiful; not compared to the dark glamor of New York or the sweeping palaces and mountains of motherland China, or even the black-and-white bungalows here in Singapore with their massive gardens. Chinatown was overcrowded and worn out, exacerbated by the wave of new residents who had come during the war fleeing Malaya and Christmas Island—only, of course, to be taken over nonetheless shortly after. It was half broken down and overrun with gangs and vices. But the Butterflies had shown Adeline their favorite shops, their favorite places to eat, the walls where they’d scratched out their initials or written secret rude messages. They would gossip liberally about people: this shopkeeper, that call girl, this hairdresser, that infamous john; what their reputations were, what their scandals were, what little quirks they had you could press on.
Nassim Hill couldn’t have been more different. Adeline’s last home with her mother had been comfortable. This wasrich, and looming, sprawled behind gates and walls of foliage. This was old money—and blood money, possibly, from when spice and land and rubber were at their most untapped. Elaine had liked to bring people home to cow them. Adeline remembered being driven down this road, seven years old, and seeing castles. How could she have thought of the girl beside her as anything other than a princess?
Adeline was bigger now, but the Chews’ white bungalow was no less grand. She rang the bell at the ornate black gate and was ushered up the driveway by a maid, past the marbled tigers and toward the patio colonnades, the scent of flowers in the air. Where Chinatown churned, Adeline thought Elaine’s home would last forever. If there were secrets here, they stayed behind the gates.
“You are not Madam Butterfly,” said the old man who was waiting beyond the door.
“She sent me instead,” Adeline lied. “I know the family.” She recognized the fixer’s curt voice from the phone, but was surprised by the tattoos, stark black lines down each of his wrinkled fingers. He looked in good health for his age and was more sharply dressed than any other Needle she had met, though, in a pressed shirt and trousers. His private clients paid well if the watch was anything to go by.Rich man. Old master. Only works for the towkays. “You’re Master Gan.”
He paused. “Where did you hear that name?”
“Anggor Neo wrote to you.”
His thin lips pursed, not denying it. “Upstairs,” he said, not waiting for her to follow him. He headed up toward Elaine’s room. She remembered this path, too.
“You work for the Chews?” she continued as they walked through the vast hallways, still trying to figure out the Needle’s exact arrangement.
“I’m retained by select clients,” he corrected her, which Adeline understood to mean that he worked for families like the Chews and beyond—wealthy, with old roots and old ties, who still believed in old ways of healing.
Elaine’s bedroom had been redecorated since Adeline had last been in here. Magazine posters of Beatles and movie stars had replaced the row of dolls; a new vanity held makeup and curlers, and the sheets were plain purple instead of pink rabbits. It was on these sheets that Elaine lay, eyelids half-closed, hair wet with perspiration, all covers thrown off her. She was wearing only a singlet and shorts,and even then, she had pushed the shirt up to cool her stomach, despite the fan churning air directly at her. Adeline felt unexpectedly embarrassed seeing her so exposed.
“What happened to her?”
“Last week she attended a secret Christian event led by a man she knew as Elijah. He called himself an ex-con who had turned to Christ in prison and made it his mission to bring other young people to his God.” Master Gan remained cordially in the doorway, but otherwise continued on, businesslike. “The man’s real name is Tee Heng Juan. He was a second-in-command in Three Steel, seven or eight years ago. He was arrested and then told the police about Three Steel’s operations. Back then I believe Fan Ge killed his girlfriend and harassed his family out of the country. Last I heard he had been stabbed in prison, but it seems he survived, and Fan Ge held his grudge.” He indicated Elaine with a tilt of his head. “She says there were twenty of them at this gathering. She and the three friends who accompanied her have all come down with the same fever. Safe to presume the other sixteen did as well, and that some are probably dead by now.”
“And Tee?”
“Shot himself two days ago at his girlfriend’s grave. Which is how I came to the understanding that this was Three Steel’s retribution, not some irrational attack from you on some schoolchildren, and that Mr. Chew had made a mistake demanding Fan Ge for revenge.”
Adeline’s eyes snapped to him. “He told Fan Ge to come after us?”
Master Gan shrugged. “He would have eventually. But yes, he told Mr. Chew that you wouldn’t be a problem anymore. When Tee’s body turned up, I started thinking about some fevers I was written about, among Three Steel’s prostitutes.”
