Tuan turned to face the captain. “The problem, Captain McCreedy, is that you have delivered only part of the opium I paid you for,” he said, his voice dangerously level. His façade of geniality was gone, and I saw the flat, cold eyes of a killer.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” McCreedy said, mustering outrage. Behind him, I saw some of his men try to slip out the door, only to be blocked by what seemed to be a growing number of Chinese workers.
“I believe you know quite well what I mean,” Tuan replied. “My taster tells me the blocks in the last ten crates appear to be date paste. Perhaps a match in color, but not what I have paid you quite generously to deliver.”
“It must have gotten switched in the port when we loaded,” McCreedy said, growing red in the face. “I can’t keep my eye on every box all the time.”
“Perhaps not, but in this case, a little more caution would have been prudent.”
As Tuan spoke, the workers had moved forward until they now formed a ring around McCreedy and his men, forcing the sailors away from the wall. McCreedy was well outnumbered.
“Maybe the boxes were mislabeled,” McCreedy said, bargaining now that his escape was cut off.
“I highly doubt that.”
“I can fix this. Let me go back to my ship. The right boxes –”
A cold smile touched the corners of Tuan’s lips. “Yes, Captain. I suspect that if you were to return to your ship, you would find ten crates of Turkish opium. But I do not think the boxes were mislabeled. I believe you intended to cheat me.”
“No. Of course not. Why would you even think –”
“I’m afraid my mind is quite made up on the matter,” Tuan replied. He gestured, and the workers who stood behind McCreedy’s sailors lunged forward, then reared back, tightening garrotes around the men’s throats and lifting them off their feet as the metal wires dug into their necks and their bodies bucked and kicked.
“To hell with you,” McCreedy said, pulling his Colt Paterson revolver from his belt. He managed to get off one shot before Tuan’s workers tackled him. The bullet caught the old lady full in the chest, knocking her backward onto the floor.
McCreedy was a fighter. He had four shots left, and dropped as many of Tuan’s workers in their tracks. When the others closed in on him, he used the pistol grip as a bludgeon, snatching up a crowbar to keep
his attackers at bay. The numbers were against him. Even he must have known how it would end. He backed up, hemmed in on all sides by Tuan’s workers, until he was against the desk. Tuan slipped between two of the workers to approach McCreedy, and now the old man carried a long knife with a carved bone handle.
“I make it a point to be clear about shipping terms,” Tuan said. “The contract clearly states ‘no returns or exchanges’.” He gave a predator’s smile. “So sorry. Our business is at an end.”
Two things happened at once. Tuan lunged forward with the knife, driving it between McCreedy’s ribs, and McCreedy snatched the Foo dog sculpture from the desk with his right hand and brought it down with a sickening thud on Tuan’s skull.
A cry went up from the workers who surged forward. Somehow, they had all managed to draw knives, and as McCreedy sank to the floor, the workers swarmed over him, their knives rising and falling as he screamed. Blood covered the floor. It pooled beneath the old woman’s body, and under Tuan’s head where the heavy sculpture had laid open his scalp and crushed his skull. Rivers of blood were running from where McCreedy lay, and the Foo dog’s base diverted it into eddies as the blood just kept flowing…
A crash made my heart thud, and the world swirled around me as I lost my bearings. Another crash, and a spray of sharp splinters peppered my skin. The vision had lost its hold on me, but I was adrift, reeling. The third crash yanked me firmly back to the present.
As usual, I woke up screaming.
This time, I came back to myself on my own. I opened my eyes and saw Anthony standing over the broken remains of the Foo dog sculpture, a fireplace poker raised to strike again. Shards of the statue were scattered across the room, and fell from my skin and clothing.
Teag was throwing handfuls of salt, herbs, and charcoal onto the broken antique. Both men wore grim expressions, as if they had just gone to battle. If I hadn’t had such a rotten headache, the sight of them rushing to my rescue would have warmed my heart.
“It’s okay,” I managed. “I think the dog’s dead.”
Chapter Nine
“WHAT DID I miss while I was ‘out’?” I asked. By now, I was sitting in one of the fireside chairs as Teag swept up the remains of the Foo dog and placed them in a garbage bag. I had already given them a complete recounting of the vision.
“It was quite a show,” Anthony said, in a tone that made me wonder if he would ever consent to help out again. “When you first went into your trance, we just waited and watched. Teag got the things ready from his kit, and told me to grab the poker, just in case.”
“And?”
“Then all hell broke loose. We saw ghostly images moving in the mirror. A shadow man appeared on the wall and started to make his way toward us. I could hear wailing coming from the front hall, and a woman’s scream from the dining room. There were heavy footsteps coming up the hall, even though Rebecca had locked herself in her room. It was like all the ghosts that were linked to the haunted objects hit full strength at once,” he said.
“So even with the salt we scattered, the energy in the Foo dog could still summon up all that bad mojo,” I mused.
“Apparently so,” Teag replied.
“And that’s when Teag and I decided it was time to do something.”
“I threw salt at the shadow man, and it made him back off,” Teag said. “Then I poured a salt circle around the three of us so that nothing could sneak up while we were dealing with the statue. Anthony and I worked together so that I poured the crushed herbs and charcoal over the sculpture to weaken it, and then Anthony started whacking away with the poker.”
“I have to admit, that was rather satisfying in an afraid-for-your-life sort of way,” Anthony admitted sheepishly.
“As soon as the statue broke, the other phenomena stopped,” Teag added. “Poof. No wailing, no shadow men, no ghosts in the mirror. End of story.”
“That was a little more excitement than I expected,” I said, taking a deep breath. “If the Foo dog had been owned by a Chinese drug lord and was present for multiple murders, then it explains why it had acquired so much negative energy. But we still don’t know what activated it, or how it got the power to bring the other pieces to life.”
“We can work on that later,” Teag said. “But first, we should go make sure Rebecca is all right. She’s probably hiding under her bed.”
I nodded, and mustered the energy to get to my feet. “I’ll check,” I said, and headed up the steps to the third floor. I was alert for any remnants of ghostly energy, but felt nothing.
I knocked at the door at the top of the steps. “Rebecca? Are you okay? It’s safe to come out now.”