Chinaman’s Chance

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The pretender to the Emperor’s throne was a fat thirty-seven-year-old Chinaman called Artie Wu who always jogged along Malibu Beach right after dawn even in summer, when dawn came round as early as 4:42. It was while jogging along the beach just east of the Paradise Cove pier that he tripped over a dead pelican, fell, and met the man with six greyhounds. It was the sixteenth of June, a Thursday.

Artie Wu and the man had often seen each other before. In fact, nearly every morning for the past two months, except on weekends, they had passed each other, Artie Wu in his blue sweat suit, the man in shirt and slacks, both of them barefoot. At first they had merely nodded, but later they spoke, although it never went much further than “Morning” or “Nice day.”

The greyhounds, all brindle colored, traveled in a tight, disciplined pack at the man’s heels. But sometimes, at the man’s silent hand signal, a kind of choppy, almost brutal gesture, they would leap forward and race one another to the pier, streaking along at sixty miles per hour, or however fast greyhounds run. After they reached the pier they would stop, turn, and trot back to the man, their mouths open, their long pink tongues licking their muzzles, as they seemed to laugh and josh each other about what fun the race had been.

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