Chapter Fifteen
“Lioness Team, Lois speaking. How can I help you?”
“This is Billy Jiang. Someone wants to kill me. I think only your team can help me. You have such a reputation.” The voice sounded a little quivering.
“Did this someone call you or write to you?”
“He or she, I can't tell, the voice's disguised, called twice during the past week. And I received a letter today.” He seemed a bit more composed.
“What did the person say on the phone?”
“The first time, the person said, 'Write your will if you don't have one.' The second time, it was 'Buy a coffin for yourself'.”
“And what did the letter say?”
“The letter didn't say anything. Only a picture in it.”
“Can you describe the picture for me?”
“It's a tombstone with my name on it.”
“Do you have any idea who wants you dead?”
“No.”
“Did you make any enemies in your life?”
“Never.”
“Do you have any business rivals who want you dead?”
“None that I can think of.”
“What do you want me to do for you?”
“Can you come to my office to have a talk in person and see how you can protect me or suggest what I should do?” The request was reasonable.
Although she was busy with three cases on hand right now, this sounded like a life and death problem, and she could not refuse. She jotted down the address and promised to arrive in twenty minutes. It was on
When she pulled into the parking lot, she saw a wooden board erected in front of the building, bearing these words: “Office Space Available.” with a phone number under them. The first thought that struck her was how empty this building was, because assassination would be much easier in a comparatively empty building. She parked her car in the nearest available space. When she entered the building, she was all ears and eyes. It was a three-story building. The first floor space seemed occupied. She took the stairs instead of the elevator. It was safer. In the second floor space, only part of it saw activities. But the third floor space was almost empty, except the suite with the number she came for. She pushed open the double doors, no one in the outer office. Had some assassin already achieved his goal? Was this Billy Jiang already dead somewhere in the suite? She pushed the door hard, all the way to the wall lest someone was hiding behind the door. It was okay. No one was behind the door. She saw another door on the left side. She walked there, glancing all around. At her knock on the door, a man inside said, “Come in, please!” Lois opened the door all the way to the wall. A man was sitting behind a big oak desk at the other end of the room. He didn't stand up when Lois neared the desk. He asked Lois to sit in an armchair in front of the desk and introduced himself as Billy Jiang. Lois went directly into business and asked more questions. His reply mostly consisted of “No.” Then he took a piece of paper out of a side desk drawer, which was supposed to be the threatening letter. He handed it to Lois. She took it and at a glimpse, decided it was a computer printout. At that moment, she caught some movement behind her out of the corners of her eyes. Two men were approaching her from behind, one a little to the right, the other a little to the left. They wanted to grip both her arms simultaneously. But Lois was quicker than they were. She shook her head and whipped her long, shiny black braid at the face of the man at her right. It hit the man on the face and eyes. He fell on the floor, groaning, with his hands on his own face. The man at her left jerked his right arm and a small knife with a blue color on its blade sprang out from his sleeve and cut Lois's left forearm, two inches above the wrist. Though the wound was short and only skin-deep, the blood that oozed out became blue. If Lois had maneuvered her chi under the skin of her arm, the knife couldn't have cut her. The chi would have protected it. But Lois hadn't been prepared for the attack. She knew it was a poisonous knife and swiftly hit some of her own xues right above the wound on the forearm with the forefinger of her right hand to prevent the poison from going up into her heart. Before the man could deal another blow with the knife, Lois struck his Stop-Motion Xue. He became a human statue in a striking posture. The man who called himself Billy Jiang opened the middle desk drawer and took out a pistol, but before he had time to pull the trigger, Lois threw a pencil that was on the desk near his hand. The sharp end of the pencil penetrated into the flesh of his hand and he dropped the pistol in pain. Lois dashed out of the suite, down the stairs, then out of the building. She got into her car and drove it with one hand.
When she got home, the part of her forearm below the wound down to her fingers and thumb looked blue. She quickly took some pills from a cabinet in the den and swallowed them and sat down on the carpeted floor in a cross-legged posture. She maneuvered her chi to the wounded area, trying to force out the poison through her fingertips. At that time, her mother came back, having picked Alida up from her school. Perceiving the situation, Mrs. Lin sat behind Lois in the same pose, putting both her hands on Lois's back, infusing her chi into Lois for reinforcement. Alida was worried, too, and called Mr. Lin at the video store. Hearing the bad news, Mr. Lin left immediately, leaving the store in the sole care of Mike.
Parking his car at the curb, Mr. Lin ran into the house to the den. Mrs. Lin told him that Lois already took some antidote pills, but they were not the right alexipharmic for that kind of poison. It could assuage some poisonous effects, but couldn't undo it entirely. Mr. Lin told Alida to get a basin and put it before Lois. Then he told Lois to hold her poisoned hand over the basin. He took a needle from a box in the cabinet and pricked every finger and the thumb, letting out the poisoned blood. The skin on her lower arm and hand didn’t look as blue now, but still bluish.
“The poison has invaded the muscle. It will be very hard to get rid of now. Your grandfather said that there are only two ways to deal with this kind of poison. One is to cut off the lower forearm. If we can't heal it, the poison will eventually go up and then your life's in danger. The other is to find a Snow-Lotus flower, which can totally heal the poisoned organ. Only the Snow-Lotus flower is very difficult to find. It grows only among the
The phone rang in the living room. Alida picked it up. “Will you hold on, please?” she talked into the mouthpiece. She pushed the hold button and rested the receiver on the end table by the sofa.
“Auntie Louise, can you answer the phone?”
Mrs. Lin had stopped and stood aside, worried to death since her hu*****and came back and took over. Now she hurried to the living room and picked up the phone, pushing on the hold button again. It was Mrs. Chang, Lois's Dry Mother. She called from time to time, inquiring about Lois, how she's faring, inviting her to her house whenever she had time….
“How's Lois? I hope she's busy right now,” said Mrs. Chang on the line.
“She's not good, been poisoned on the arm, though her life is not in immediate danger,” Mrs. Lin replied, sounding a little weepy.
“What's the matter? Oh, never mind, we'll come right over.” She hung up.
Alida was doing her homework in the family room. Suddenly, she thought she must call her other two cousins and let them know about Lois's wound. Tricia and Sally hurried home, but they could do nothing for Lois. They could only say some soothing words to their mother.
Fifteen minutes later, there was a buzz at the door. Sally opened it. Mr. and Mrs. Chang rushed in, looking really concerned. “She's in the den,” Louise told them without any formality of greeting. They hurried to the den, but halted in the doorway, seeing Lois was maneuvering her chi to her left arm to hinder the remaining poison from going up. Mr. Lin sat behind her with both hands on her back. Mr. and Mrs. Chang knew that they could not be disturbed at such a critical time; so they receded to the living room, talking with Mrs. Lin.
“We were so worried that Richie wanted to reach here as fast as possible. He drove so fast and even ran the red lights twice all the way down. Lucky he was not caught by the police. What can we do now?” Mrs. Chang was eager to do something, anything for Lois and asked no one in particular.
“I'll go to replace Mr. Lin for a while,” Mr. Chang said and went into the den. Mr. Lin stood up and let Mr. Chang take his place. After one hour, both he and Lois came out of the den. The bluish color on Lois's lower arm and hand was barely discernible. Her chi had suppressed the remaining poison, but it was still there. It meant if Lois used her chi to fight, the suppression would be abated and the poison would move up again. Therefore, Lois mustn't use her chi till she was healed.
“I will go back to
“It will be like seeking a needle in a haystack. Your efforts will end in nothing, Mr. Chang,” Mr. Lin said to him. “If there was hope, I would go there myself.”
“You know I learned kungfu in
“Who attacked you?” asked Mr. Chang. Lois told them what happened, from the phone call that she received to the escape she made from the building. “Now I recall that the guy who used the poisoned knife to cut me was one of the seven people that we had fought with in
“So they are all together.” Tricia analyzed the situation. “The stout guy was among the seven people with whom we had a fight in
“I never heard of the Black Panther. It must be a secret organization,” said Mr. Chang. “But I think David came to learn kungfu from me with a certain special purpose.”
“Do you have any idea what his purpose was, Master Chang?” asked Sally.
“No idea.” He could not say that they might want to use him as a cover. However, he guessed now that the Black Panther had killed Charles. But why? Personal hostility? Or business rivalry? That was out of the question. Charles was not a businessman. He was roused out of his reverie by what Lois was saying. “If Mr. Hsu is my only suspect, it indicates that his Hunter Corps is really the Black Panther. Hunter Corps is the official name and Black Panther is the secret name.”
“I'll find out,” Sally said. “You can go to
***
“Hi, Sam, this is Tricia. I've something new to tell you, but Lois is wounded.”
“Is she in the hospital?” Sam asked, sounding concerned.
“No, she's at home.”
“So, I hope the wound is minor.” His voice relaxed in relief.
“No, it's very bad,” stated Tricia truthfully.
“Then, why don't you send her to the hospital?” he asked in perplexity.
“You don't understand.”
“Okay. I'll come to see her and to hear your news.” A click came from the other end.
When Sam arrived, Lois had finished her self-treatment and was in the living room, talking with Mr. and Mrs. Chang. The door was open. Sam just pulled the screen door and got himself inside. No introduction was needed since Sam knew everyone in the room. The three girls went with Sam to the dining room and sat at the table. Lois told him about the phony customer and the attack. Then to save Lois's energy, Tricia took over the conversation and explained to Sam why the wound was very bad and why she needn't be sent to the hospital. Sam sighed at his own ignorance about such things and knew that he could not be of any assistance here. Lois gave Sam the address of the building where she was ambushed. Sam asked why Lois didn't call him with the situation earlier so that he might catch the thugs, but he was enlightened with the knowledge that it was more urgent to treat the wound immediately at that time. So he left at once, sending some patrol cars there.
Half an hour later, Sam called from his cell phone, saying that no one was found in the suite, no clue left. He went to the management office and people there said that the whole third floor space was for rent and no one should have occupied that suite unless they sneaked in without notifying the management.
