Read Online The Trail to Buddha's Mirror by Don Winslow - Free Book Online Page B

finish off the fish.
    As they were celebrating their conquest with more cups of wine, Olivia Kendall said, “So, Neal, tell us about your work.”
    Well, Olivia, I’m a rent-a-rat who has lied his way into your house in order to threaten your friends.
    “It’s very boring, really,” he said.
    “Not at all.”
    “Well,” he said, reaching through the haze of wine, beer and food to try to recall his notes, “primarily I’m interested in the political subtext contained in Qing Dynasty paintings as an effort to subvert the ruling foreign Manchus.”
    Okay?
    “And how do you pursue this research? What are the sources?” Tom Kendall asked.
    Et tu, Tom?
    “Museums mostly,” he said. “Some books, doctoral dissertations … the usual.”
    He wondered if he sounded as stupid to them as he did to himself. Come on, Neal, end this. Just tell them that you wouldn’t know a Qing Dynasty painting if it was tattooed on your left testicle. Get it over with.
    “You have looked at the pictures at the De Young Museum?” Lan asked.
    The De Young Museum … San Francisco.
    “Oh, yes,” he answered. “Superb.”
    He looked at Pendleton and asked, “Now, what do you do?”
    A pathetic desperation effort, Neal thought.
    “I’m a biochemist,” Pendleton said.
    “Where?”
    Pendleton pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. His lips edged into a small smile as he answered, “I’m between jobs right now. So I’m abusing the hospitality of these good people.”
    “Nonsense,” Tom said quickly. “Bob is the official Kendall Household Adviser on Rose Fertilization.”
    “You’ve done a wonderful job,” Olivia said. “Now if you could just think of a way to kill the weeds …”
    “Not my line, I’m afraid. I only know how to make stuff grow.”
    “You can keep your present position for as long as you want,” said Kendall.
    “The pay isn’t so hot,” Pendleton said, “but the food is great, the beer is cold, and the company …”
    Pull the trigger, Neal. Pull it now.
    “The company is sublime,” Neal said.
    Yeah, it is, he thought as he finished off his cup of wine. You cultivate loneliness like a flower in your garden, you treat people like weeds that need to be torn away, and here is a world where people love eating together, talking together … love being with each other. A world you’ve imagined but never experienced. Until now. Until this evening. Talk about abusing the hospitality of good people….
    “Chicken with peanuts and dried red peppers,” he heard Li Lan saying, and he looked up to see her set down a steaming plate.
    “The peppers are not for eating,” she continued, “just for flavor.”
    The chicken dish stoked the dormant flames in Neal’s throat and brought tears to his eyes. Every bite was hotter and more delicious than the last and made the wine taste sweeter and cooler.
    He watched Li Lan gracefully take the half-peanuts with her chopsticks and feed them to Pendleton, and he felt simultaneously touched and jealous. Let him go, he thought. Let him go and let yourself go. You can start over. Take the rest of your money out of the bank and stay here. Apply to Berkeley. Or Stanford. Or become the Official Kendall Household Adviser on Eighteenth-Century English Literature. You must be getting drunk. Getting drunk? You are drunk. With wine, with beer, with great food, with soft lights, with … you’re drunk.
    “Oh, God, more?” he heard Olivia groan in mock despair as Li Lan brought out a plate of broccoli, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, and mushrooms in bean sauce.
    “Your show ends tomorrow?” he asked Lan as he munched on a crisp stem of brocolli.
    “Yes,” she answered sadly.
    “It was very successful,” said Olivia.
    “Then where do you go?” Neal asked.
    She didn’t answer. You could cut the tension with a chopstick, Neal thought.
    “Home,” she said quietly.
    “Hong Kong?” Neal asked.
    She looked straight at him. “Yes. Home. Hong Kong.”
    “Let’s