It started with a complaint.
A knock on the mini-door reminiscent of a cat flap. It slid open to reveal Harry's face peering into the smoke-filled private room. "Tommy," he rasped. "One of your men's throwing a tantrum out here."
Indeed, swearing and rustling could be heard in the far corner of the pub, one voice slightly louder than the others above the usual buzz of noise.
"Can't you deal with it on your own?" John asked. The younger brother hadn't intended it to be unkind, but his naturally blunt manner meant his genuine curiosity came off as brash. Anyone other than the bartender of the Garrison - who had known the Shelbys before the war - would have found it offensive.
"It's about Chinatown." Harry's eyes flickered to Thomas, who straightened up. "Thought you'd might like to know."
"Send him in." Thomas Shelby ordered coolly.
"What's going on?" Arthur turned to him. "I thought what they did wasn't any of our business."
"True," Thomas responded. "But it pays to keep an eye on blind spots."
The door opened. Thomas recognised the man; he was a grunt they used to ransack enemy houses. Mean eyes and stubby fingers meant he was good at his job - one of menial destruction rather than any real cognitive skills.
Speaking of violence, he was sporting the trophies of it. Two black eyes, both swollen until they were almost double their original size. The rest of his face that wasn't purple was red with rage, but he still had the sense to take off his cap. "Misters," he almost snarled.
"What is it, Barmy?" Arthur asked.
"The Chinese, Mister!" Barmy exploded. He pointed at the top half of his bruised face. "They attacked me! Me! A Peaky Blinder!"
Arthur glanced at Thomas, who did not return his brother's gaze. "Are you sure?" Thomas asked.
"Aye! They nabbed me outside the whorehouse and beat me!" Barmy spat on the floor. "Cunts! It was one against twenty! I got five of them though, Mister Tommy," his eyes glistened as he remembered the glories of battle. "I broke the bones of one and ground the other to a pulp! That was before they held me down, you see, the cowards - "
"Do you know why they attacked you, Barmy?" Thomas interrupted.
Barmy shook his head. "Not a clue, but if I did anythin' to offend them I'd do it ten times over, the scheming fucks!"
"Right, thank you." Thomas said, unamused. "You may go now."
Barmy leered. "I'll go alright! I can gather up the rest of the men, Mister Tommy, and we can lay waste to those red, slanty-eyed - "
"You won't do anything of the sort."
The incredulity on Barmy's face was clear despite half of it being out of commission. He blinked. "Sorry, Mister? What do you mean?"
"There's no need to declare war. I'll send word for the Chinese to come to the Garrison and give you an apology."
"What? Just one of them? Half of them attacked me, Mister Tommy! We should be taking their heads!"
"I trust the Chinese not to break our agreements for no reason," Thomas said calmly. "Their representative will explain the situation to me, and I have no doubt they will ask for your forgiveness."
"But Mister - !" Barmy sputtered, taking a bold step forward. John stood.
"That will be all." John said sternly.
Barmy glanced from John to Arthur, and then to Thomas. The matter was decided - even a henchman with black eyes could see that.
"Aye, Misters," Barmy muttered. He stormed out of the room, disappointed at the brothers' lack of fury and action he had been expecting.
Once the door slammed shut, John returned to his seat, amused. "What was that about, do you think?"
Arthur snorted. "He just told you, shit-for-brains. The Chinese beat him up."
"I mean why he was attacked," John rolled his eyes. "I didn't think they had it in them."
"The Chinese have cutters of their own, Johnny," Arthur said, swallowing a gulp of whiskey. "Just because they haven't cut us in a while doesn't mean they can't. They certainly cut Barmy."
"Why do you think they did it, then?"
"That's what we need to find out," Thomas said grimly. "Send word to Chinatown that they're to send a representative to the Garrison tomorrow noon."
Arthur raised an eyebrow. "You want to meet them here?"
"Roughing up a Peaky Blinder isn't the same as a bullet with our names on it. This is probably just some kind of misunderstanding."
"What if it's not? What if they want war?"
"Then we'll win before they even have time to gather their troops." Thomas said, unfazed. "The Chinese are powerful, but only in their little corner of Small Heath. We're in charge beyond the red line - they won't challenge us."
And so the message was sent, carried by a young boy born with Chinese blood but on Birmingham soil. He was one of few that could speak both tongues, being part of the second generation, and it wasn't the first time the men with peaky caps had asked him to relay requests from beyond his home.
"The bad men want to see us! The bad men with razors in their hats!" He hollered upon returning to Chinatown, ducking through the red canopies into the market, into a world of spice and silk. Livestock hung from hooks, glimmering with oil. Silk clothes fluttered in the wind, clinging to wire hangers. All around was the chatter of different dialects - the sharp edge of Cantonese, the soft sounds of Mandarin, the roundness of Shanghainese. The boy weaved through the legs of the crowd, continuing to shout the Peaky Blinders' request.
Worry spread like wildfire. It lined the faces of men who butchered pigs and women who sewed suits. As the boy passed a stall, its owner shook his head as he gutted the carcass of a chicken. "I knew it. Huang Ye should have never stepped down."
"Is this about what happened at the whorehouse yesterday?" A woman asked, standing in front of the stall with her basket of eggs.
"What else would it be about?" The stall owner muttered. "She should have kept her head down and let the Blinder get on with it. That's what Huang Ye did, and that's what he would have continued to do."
The woman shrugged. "New management, new orders."
"I don't know how she won the Elders' trust. I knew from the start she'd be nothing but trouble."
"Have some faith in her. And I'll have two roosters, please."
Eventually, the boy reached his destination. At the very back of the market, near the edge of the red canopy, he came to a lavish tent of black and red cloth. Sensual red lanterns lit the inside, its gold trimmings dripping with a primal passion the boy would not understand until adolescence. His mother had said not to go near unless he was being paid, and even then not to speak to the common women there. 'Chickens', she called them, but she always looked upon them with more pity than contempt.
At any rate, he didn't need to speak to the common women. An older boy, almost an adult, emerged from the mouth of the tent. The boy was envious of him; he was important. He could speak every language in Chinatown and even those beyond, his English tinged with the same accent that poured out of the white men's mouths. The boy wanted to be him when he grew up. A couple more years, and maybe he would even take his place.
"What time?" The older boy asked.
"Noon. At their pub." He responded, sticking out his hand.
The older boy nodded. "We will be there."
A few coins were dropped into the younger boy's hand, the metal cooling his sweaty palms. The younger boy grinned a toothy smile, and headed back to relay the acquiescence to the Peaky Blinders' order.
The next morning, the brothers sat in the Garrison, waiting for the clock to strike twelve.
"When's the last time we saw Grandpa Huang?" John asked.
"Who cares?" Arthur groaned, nursing a hangover. His knuckles rubbed the sides of his temple. "As long as he brings us those fruits like he did before, I don't care. I'm starving."
"Your own fault for drinking half the bar on an empty stomach," Thomas said. He watched the minute hand of the clock above the door. It inched towards the hour hand, slowly but surely catching up with its shorter twin.
"What do you think he'll say?" John grinned. "Do you think he'll grovel?"
"Show him some respect, John," Thomas said firmly. "The man knows when to place the interests of his people over his dignity."
"Where's that food I asked for? Oi!" Arthur barked, rapping the room's wall. "How's it coming along, Harry?"
"I've had someone run off to the baker's," Harry answered, his voice slightly muffled. "Give it a few minutes."
"I'll give the baker a few scars if he doesn't hurry," Arthur grumbled.
"At ease, Arthur," Thomas said. "It won't be long now."
The minute hand was a hair away from twelve. It was odd; Huang Ye - the non-Chinese called him Grandfather Huang - was punctual. Although it wasn't often that they met with him, Thomas distinctly remembered the old man with the gray hair and triangular beard was always at least five minutes early. He would be standing with a boy, his translator, who would be holding a handwoven basket of fresh fruit for the Shelbys. It was a gesture Arthur and John had snickered at, but Thomas appreciated the sentiment.
Yet even now, no shadow darkened the Garrison's doorstep.
"Do you think they've forgotten?" John asked.
"Maybe it's war like you said, Johnny," Arthur said.
"No. The Chinese aren't stupid." Thomas said, despite his own doubts that rose with each passing second.
The clock struck twelve. A knock on the door at the exact same time.
"Come in," John called.
Instead of the wizened face of Grandfather Huang, anxious to please and eager to obey, a woman stood at the door. She reminded Thomas of a coil of wire, thin and tall but with unspeakable strength. Two golden ornaments rested upon silky, black hair that spilled onto her shoulders. She was pale, her skin the color of snow and her cheekbones so high she appeared almost gaunt. A form-fitting red dress stretched from her neck to just above toes; while it was dulled by the gloom that hung over Birmingham, it was untouched by the city's grime. She unabashedly held Thomas's gaze, her eyes darker than the makeup that lined it.
"Who the fuck are you?" Arthur asked, stunned. "Where's Grandfather Huang?"
"Grandfather Huang has retired," only now did Thomas notice the boy next to her. It was the same one who used to accompany Chinatown's previous spokesman. Gangly and awkward yet intelligent enough to be in the business, he was not quite a boy but not quite a man. "Miss Hu now speaks for the Chinese."
"Is that code for 'he's dead'?" John stood up. "Did you kill him?"
A flash of movement - two burly figures immediately emerged from the side, forming a protective wall between the Peaky Blinders and the woman.
"Watch it!" Arthur barked, jumping to his feet.
"Easy!" Thomas bellowed. His attention on the woman turned to that of the muscular men who blocked the way. With a look at the two heavyset brows, he made another curious realisation; the woman's bodyguards were identical. Dark eyes continued to peer at the three brothers in between the twins' shoulders. Thomas directed his next words to the boy. "Tell them to get a drink at the bar. On the house."
The boy translated Thomas's instructions. One of the men gave a quick, sharp reply. Thomas didn't have to understand Chinese to know he had refused.
He was about to insist that it was an order rather than an invitation when the woman spoke from behind her bodyguards. Her voice reminded Thomas of a hot blade slowly slicing through melting iron. It wasn't pleasant - the quiet danger in her tone made him uncomfortably alert - but it wasn't shrill either.
At her words, the bodyguards gave John and Arthur identical dirty looks. Finally, they parted, turning to take seats behind the bar and revealing the woman once more.
"Pricks," Arthur grumbled. He sat down nonetheless, as did John.
Now that the danger was momentarily past, Thomas looked back at the woman. "Miss Hu, is it?"
Miss Hu nodded. The expression on her face was cold and intelligent. Her piercing stare made Thomas wonder whether she could understand him even without the boy's help.
"Why were we not made aware of this arrangement?" Thomas asked.
Miss Hu responded in her native tongue. The boy spoke for her: "Grandfather Huang didn't say anything about a notification of change being part of the agreement terms. And no, we did not kill him. He is well."
"It's common courtesy."
"Terms are terms, but we apologise if we shocked you; it was not our intention to catch you unawares."
Cordial yet stubborn, Thomas noted. Grandfather Huang would have taken the blame profusely and probably suggest perks for the Peaky Blinders in Chinatown to make up for the mistake. This was certainly a change. Regardless, it was not necessarily an unwelcome one just yet. "Apology accepted," he said earnestly. "Now, to business: one of ours was attacked outside the whorehouse yesterday. He claims he was given two black eyes without reason. Is this true?"
"It is a half-truth. Your man was attacked, but he provided plenty of reason to do so."
"Enlighten me."
"He hit one of the working women in the pleasure parlor. We gave him matching injuries."
A moment of silence. Then Arthur snorted derisively. "You attacked a Peaky Blinder because he hit a whore?"
Miss Hu's eyes narrowed. Thomas was in as much disbelief as his brothers, but he was also intent on hearing what she had to say.
"Whores get hit every day," John said incredulously. "You risked starting a war with us for one?"
"The working woman is one of us. We are protecting our people. That is well within the terms of the agreement," the boy said, looking down at the floorboards. He was not used to the tension in the room that had been non-existent under Grandfather Huang, and when voices began to raise, he was quick to fold. "We only gave him the same injuries he had inflicted upon her."
"He said he was attacked by twenty men."
"Not twenty, only two."
"Which two?"
"Huang Yu and Huang Sun."
Miss Hu raised a slender finger to point at the twins, who now had a glass of beer each. As they sipped on their drinks, Thomas caught the eye of the one on the right (it didn't make much difference; he couldn't tell them apart), and understood the unwavering loyalty they held towards the woman in red. He could see it in the way they poised themselves towards her, ready to eliminate any potential threat - they had an almost religious faith, and if Miss Hu said to beat a man with the strength of twenty, they would oblige with no hesitation. Combined with Barmy's penchant for exaggeration and the twins supporting the potential misguided notion that one Chinese man looked like another, it wasn't impossible for him to think that two assailants had become ten times that number.
The front door of the pub swung open. A loud voice came from beyond the doorway to the Garrison's private room. "You two!"
Furious roars, shattered glass and astonished yelps. The screech of chairs being shoved across the floor and the shouting of shocked men. Thomas hurtled out of the room, his brothers on his heels.
"Enough!"
His ringing voice stopped the chaos just before it could erupt. Barmy was panting heavily, leaning on the edge of the bar counter while blood spilled from the top of his head. Pieces of a broken beer glass surrounded him, shards still rocking back and forth from the impact of hitting the ground only seconds before. The twins stood in front of him, one with a glass held high to echo what the other had already done. Other men in the Garrison had also jumped to their feet, chairs laying sideways, forgotten and lopsided, with their hands on their own glasses and ready to fight the foreigners who had attacked one of their own.
"What are you?" Thomas demanded, feeling Miss Hu's eyes on the back of his neck as he talked to Barmy and the twin bodyguards. "School children fighting?"
"These are the men, Mister Tommy!" Barmy roared. "These are the men who attacked me!"
"I know that, Barmy," Thomas said, slightly calmer now that the remaining pub-goers were less primed for a brawl. "We were only just settling it like civilized people."
"Civilised? He broke a glass over my head!"
The twin on the right snarled something short and low. "Huang Sun says the man tried to punch them when he came into the pub."
"That was because them two punched me!" Barmy pointed again at his black eyes, which were not fading as quickly as he had hoped.
"So it was only the two of them then, Barmy?"
"Aye, what - ?"
"You said there were twenty of them," John pointed out.
The red of anger that flushed Barmy's cheeks became one of embarrassment. "Oh. I may have...been mistaken, Misters."
"I can forgive the dramatics," Thomas said, grimly satisfied that he was proved correct once again.
Miss Hu spoke from behind. Thomas spared her a glance. In contrast to her previous cool demeanor, now she was sneering at Barmy, lips curled into a line of disdain. The boy translated:
"Did you hit the whore?"
"I - " Barmy hesitated. He was unlucky enough to catch Thomas's eye, the crystal blue of which compelled him to speak the truth or bear even worse consequences. "I did, yes."
"Two black eyes?" The boy asked.
"Aye," Barmy said reluctantly. "But I didn't mean to, Misters; just got a bit carried away. Besides, she's only a whore."
Miss Hu scoffed. Curses were universal, and from her biting tone, Thomas didn't need a translation to understand she wanted to skin Barmy alive. She turned to Thomas. While her words weren't as serrated as those directed at the clueless, scowling grunt, they still contained enough controlled fury to make Thomas pay attention.
"Our business is done. We did not break the agreement. He is no longer welcome in Chinatown, and if he steps foot beyond the boundary again, we will do more than blacken his eyes." The boy said, his own voice wavering with a nervousness Miss Hu evidently did not feel.
She gave a sharp command with a flick of her tongue. With a sweeping glance at the three Shelby brothers, the tail of her red dress followed her out of the pub door, her bodyguards trailing as close as her shadow.
"Wait!" Barmy was about to run after them when Thomas put a forceful hand on his shoulder.
"Don't," Thomas warned. "That's an order."
Barmy huffed, but he did step away. He looked round at the gawking men and flushed once more. "What?" He snapped. "What are you all looking at? And someone get me a tissue, will you? I'm bleeding all over the fuckin' floor!"
"Sorry," a meek squeak came from beside him.
Thomas had almost forgotten about the boy's presence. The boy was about to turn and stumble back to Chinatown when Thomas spoke:
"Hold your hand out."
The boy froze. He did as was asked, and Thomas could feel his fear of not knowing whether he was about to have his fingers cut off or receive a handshake.
Thomas did neither. Instead, he put a ten-pound note in his hand. "For your services," he said, noting the way the boy's eyes lit up in awe. "For now and the future. Watch your step."
The boy stuffed the note in his jacket pocket. He looked up at Thomas, who could see the scales in the boy's head working to figure out whether he should say what was on his mind.
"Spit it out," Thomas urged.
"Hu means 'tiger'," the boy said. "We call her the Tigress."
Before Thomas could speak, the boy fled.