“I have always done well with tests,” she told him.
Benito didn’t know what to say to that so he said nothing. They sat together in silence, Mai-Nu still holding Benito’s arm. She released it only when a Honda Accord slowed to a stop directly in front of them. Its lights flicked off, the engine was silenced. The man who stepped out of the vehicle was the largest Asian Benito had ever seen, nearly six feet tall. His jaw was square, his eyes unblinking—a military man, Benito decided. He smiled at Mai-Nu with a stern kindliness.
“You do not have a cordial word for your uncle?” he said.
“Why are you here?” Mai-Nu asked.
“We have much to talk about.”
Benito started to rise. Mai-Nu reached for him, but Benito pulled his arm away.
“It is a private matter,” he said, and moved to his own stoop. It was only a dozen steps away; he didn’t figure to miss much.
“Did you send those assholes last night?” Mai-Nu asked.
“Mai-Nu, your language—”
“Screw my language,” she said, and took a long pull of her drink.
Pa Chou’s eyes became narrow slits. His voice was suddenly cold and hard.
“The way you drink,” he said. “The way you talk. What has become of you?”
“I am angry, Pa Chou. Do you blame me?”
Pa Chou glanced around the street. Seeing Benito pretending not to listen, he said, “Let us go inside.”
“Fine,” said Mai-Nu. She stood and went into her house. Pa Chou followed. Benito gave them a head start, then dashed into his own house. His mother asked him what he was doing and he said he was going to his room to listen to music. Once there he stared intently through Mai-Nu’s window, but could see neither her nor her uncle. Yet he could hear them. They spoke their native language. Benito did not have to understand their words to know they were angry.
He sat and listened for what seemed like a long time. Then he heard a distinct sound of skin slapping skin violently, followed by Mai-Nu falling into her living room. Pa Chou was there in an instant. He heaved her up by her arms, shook her like a doll, and slapped her again with the back of his hand. Mai-Nu shouted at him and Pa Chou hit her again. Mai-Nu fell out of sight and Pa Chou followed. There were more shouts and more slapping sounds. Finally, Pa Chou strode purposely across the living room to the front door. He shouted something at Mai-Nu over his shoulder and left the house. Mai-Nu walked slowly into her living room and collapsed to her knees, leaning against the sofa. She covered her face with her arms and wept.
Benito closed his eyes and braced himself with both hands against the bureau. Something in his stomach flipped and flopped and tried to escape through his throat, but he choked it down. A blinding rage burned at the edge of his eyelids until teardrops formed. He smashed his fist against the side of the bureau, then shook the pain out of his hand.
It was a family matter, he told himself. It had nothing to do with him.
But he could tell Cheng Song about it.
He could do that.
The headline of the St. Paul Pioneer Pressfour days later read: Killing underscores problems in growing Hmong community.
The story suggested that the murder of Pa Chou Song and the subsequent arrest of Cheng Song by St. Paul police officers was an indication of how difficult it is for many in the Hmong community to assimilate to American culture. But that is not what distressed Benito. It was the photograph of Pa Chou that the paper printed—a decidedly small man in his late forties standing next to the doorway of a Hmong restaurant.
Benito was confused. He rushed to Mai-Nu’s house and knocked on her door.
“Who is it?” she called.
“Benito Hernandez,” he answered through the screen door.
“Come in. Sit down. I will be there in a minute.”
Benito entered the house and found a seat on the rust-colored sofa. There was a law book on the coffee table. Benito glanced at the spine—Minnesota Statutes 2005.He opened it to the page held by a bookmark. A passage had been highlighted in yellow.
524.2-803 Effect of homicide on instate succession, wills, joint assets, life insurance, and beneficiary designations.
(a) A surviving spouse, heir, or devisee who feloniously and intentionally kills the decedent is not entitled to any benefits under the will… Property appointed by the will of the decedent to or for the benefit of the killer passes as if the killer had predeceased the decedent.
Benito closed the book and returned it to the table when Mai-Nu entered the room. He stood to greet her. She appeared more radiant than at any time since he had known her. Her smile seemed like a gift to the world.
Mai-Nu was tying a white silk scarf around her head. She said, “It is traditional to wear a white headband when one is in mourning.”
“Mourning for your uncle,” Benito said.
“And my brother.”
Benito was standing in front of her now, clutching the newspaper.
“Thank you for thinking of me,” Mai-Nu gestured at the paper, “but I have already read it.”
Benito showed her the photograph.
“This is your uncle?” he said.
“Yes.”
“Pa Chou Song?”
“Yes, of course.”
“It is not the man who came here that day. The man who beat you.”
“You saw him beat me?”
“I saw—”
“Did you, Benito?”
Benito glanced at the open window and back at Mai-Nu.
“I saw,” he said.
“And you told my brother?”
“I know now that you wanted me to tell Cheng what I saw.”
“Did I?”
Benito nodded.
“There is no evidence of that.”
“Evidence?”
“Did I tell you to go to my brother?”
“No.”
“Did I tell you not to speak to my brother?”
“Yes.”
“That is the evidence that the court will hear, should you go to court.”
“I don’t understand.”
Mai-Nu brushed past Benito and retrieved the law book from the coffee table. She hugged it to her breasts.
“In Laos, women are expected to submit,” she said. “Submit to their husbands, submit to their fathers, submit to their uncles. Not here. Here we are equal. Here we are protected by the law. I love America.”
“Who was the man who came here that night?”
“A friend, Benito. Like you.”
She reached out and gently stroked Benito’s cheek.
“You must go now,” she said.
A few minutes later, Benito returned to his bedroom. Dark and menacing storm clouds were rolling in from the northwest, laying siege to the sun and casting the world half in shadow. Mai-Nu’s lights were on and though it was early morning, he had a good view of her living room.
He did not see her at first, then Mai-Nu appeared. She moved to the window and looked directly at him. She smiled and blew him a kiss. And slowly lowered her shade.
IN MY EYES
by Bruce Rubenstein
North End (St. Paul)
Lloyd B. Jensen’s funeral cortege wasn’t scheduled to leave the State Capitol for an hour, but a throng of thousands already lined University Avenue for a glimpse as it passed. The November sun wasn’t doing much to warm them so they’d crowded together instinctively, three deep, all the way to the police cordon at Rice Street. It gave them a huddled-masses look appropriate to the occasion. A cynic might say that in this year of our Lord 1934, anybody who advocated the redistribution of wealth could draw a crowd, even if he was dead. As for me, I voted for him once, and I’d have done it again if the iron crab hadn’t taken him down. I wasn’t there to freeze my toes for a peek at his corpse though. I opened the door of The Criterion. It was warm inside, a few bar flies were gathered around their Manhattans, and somewhere in the murk a client was waiting.