The First Excellence: Fa-Ling's Map Read online

  Once Tang was settled in Canada and free to express himself openly, religion might become a less prominent factor in his life. He might gain some perspective. It was possible he would fall in love and marry again, maybe even have children of his own.

  In the enormous cocoon of love and optimism that Ting-lo shared with Adrian, all things seemed possible.

  Best of all, little Anna would have an uncle. How could that be a bad thing?

  SEVENTEEN

  In the fourth floor room next to Ting-Lo and Adrian Harlan, Eloise Golluck listened to her husband Joseph snoring. Normally it wouldn’t keep her awake, but it was the middle of the afternoon in Canada. Although she’d slept for less than three hours, she was fully alert.

  She glanced at the bedside clock. Three-thirty. The hotel restaurant wouldn’t open for breakfast till six-thirty. What was she going to do with herself for three hours?

  She got up quietly and lifted her bag onto the dressing table, turning the lamp on low.

  From inside the bag Eloise removed a large package. The group’s documents were to be safeguarded by one person who would make sure each couple had the necessary paperwork on hand when officials requested it. Eloise was that person.

  She slid the forms from the package and spread them on the table, mentally performing a roll call to ensure nothing was missing.

  She compared them to each other, checking that each question had been completed correctly. Then she returned them to the package and tucked them back into her bag.

  Next she counted the cash Joseph had been carrying. . Each couple was responsible for safeguarding their own cash. The required donation for the orphanage was $3,500. US per child in clean, crisp bills. Eloise had made a special appointment with her bank manager to procure the bills, emphasising they must be in excellent condition. Chinese officials had been known to reject bills that were torn, dirty or rumpled.

  The operation took all of ten minutes. Eloise still had three hours to kill before she could wander downstairs to the restaurant.

  Sighing, she lifted a book from her bag and tried to read.

  **

  The line up at the airport was long. Junior Agent Ho Lon-Yi fidgeted, playing the scene over in his mind. It was unfair. On the one hand, his uncle insisted he needed to show initiative, but when it came down to brass tacks, the only thing the old bastard really wanted was control.

  If he’d listened … but there was no point beating himself up. His plan should have worked, far better than his uncle’s would have. These Falun Gong fools were always torching themselves to make a statement, as if the government gave a pig’s tail what happened to one more flaming Fong. Most likely the local cops would put it down to ‘suicide by inferno’ and leave it at that.

  If he had followed Uncle Lon-shi’s advice, Tang could just as easily have died anyway, and there would have been no hope of passing it off as suicide. His uncle was partial to using water torture to get answers. The interrogator would place a plastic bag over the suspect’s face and force his head under a water faucet. It was known as ‘dry drowning’, and it was effective.

  The problem was it was also messy, and in a one-on-one situation, there was no guarantee the suspect could be overpowered. Some of these religious nuts could get pretty feisty, especially if they were scared. Yi had once seen a man so wired up on nirvana it took five guys to bring him in. Once they had him in custody, it took four of them to help him hang himself in honour of his Master Li Hongzhi. Three of the four had bruises on their faces for weeks afterwards.

  No matter what the old man said, that wasn’t Yi’s idea of a good time.

  EIGHTEEN

  The hotel bar was closed, but Cheng knew a place where he and Wang could order a shot of excellent Russian vodka at four in the morning.

  Wang Yong-qi hesitated at the door, peering into the darkness. He might have known when he suggested a drink that his partner would drag him to a place like this. His nose twitched.

  Cheng smiled at his discomfort and led the way to a table in the middle of the room.

  “You wanted a drink,” Cheng said.

  Wang Yong-qi followed him, resisting the urge to wipe the chair and look under the table.

  “What do you think of our Chen Sui Ming?” Wang said, labelling the suicide victim with the Cantonese equivalent of ‘John Doe’.

  “I think,” Cheng said, waving at a young girl who was far too pretty to be working in such a dump, “if our dear Ming had made the acquaintance of his next door neighbour, he might still be alive. At least she would give him a reason to face another day.”

  Cheng laughed at his own joke, until his laughter degenerated into a phlegmy coughing fit. He suffered from chronic respiratory problems, which were exacerbated by the summer’s humidity and pollution. He grabbed a paper napkin from a dispenser on the table.

  “She seems to have brightened up your day, Minsheng,” Wang said. He seldom used Cheng’s given name, which meant ‘voice of the people’. He knew Cheng was embarrassed by its grandeur, preferring his family name, which meant ‘sincerity’.

  “Oh, yes, don’t worry.” Cheng laughed again. “There are no thoughts of suicide here.”

  Wang hoped Cheng would not break into another choking spell, but he only chuckled and waved one more time at the waitress, holding up two fingers to indicate he wanted two of ‘the usual’. The girl smiled at Cheng with the warmth reserved for a regular customer.

  “However,” said Wang Yong-qi, “here is the question… did our Ming really suffer from thoughts of suicide?”

  Cheng’s face darkened. “If it appears to be a suicide,” he said, “then who are we to think differently?”

  “We are detectives,” Wang said.

  “Lately I wonder — are we detectives, or are we spin masters? Is it our job to learn the truth, or to invent it?” Cheng turned his eyes to Yong-qi, looking for an answer to a question that was bound to frustrate both of them.

  Wang thanked the waitress and peered into his vodka, marvelling that a joint like this could serve such crystal clear liquor. He touched the glass, enjoying its chilled surface. Yong-qi did not care much for vodka, but he always drank it when he was with Cheng. Cheng considered beer to be a peasant drink, a connection to his roots he would rather not acknowledge.

  Wang Yong-qi, who was raised in Shanghai as the son of well-to-do intellectuals, had no concerns over being mistaken for a farmer. When he wanted beer, he drank it without reservation. Just the same, he was sensitive to his friend’s quirky preferences. Cheng’s eccentricities, like the way he daintily savoured the expensive vodka, holding the frosty glass in a hand that had not been washed that day, were rooted in unfathomable depths of psychological quicksand.

  Despite his talent for understanding human motivation, Wang had long since given up trying to define what drove his partner. On the one hand, Cheng despised all signs of weakness and fussiness. On the other, it was critical to his self-image that people understand he was rough ‘by choice’, and his education and natural intelligence gave him a licence to scorn his betters.

  Wang knew this was true. Cheng’s mind was superior to those possessed by many men of higher rank. Still, the telltale signs that have always separated the poorer classes from the wealthy existed in spades between Cheng and Wang, and both men were painfully aware of those differences. Wang, who held Cheng in the deepest of admiration, was disposed to allow the big man whatever pretences he felt comfortable with.

  “We are what we are,” Wang Yong-qi said, “and we know what we must do. In the end, we understand the truth may need to be tamed, so it doesn’t run wild and bite us in the ass.”

  “Ever the diplomat, my friend.” Cheng nodded. “So, we are agreed that our Chen Sui Ming did not take his own life. We are agreed that a person or persons unknown are responsible for his murder. What now? If we record this as a case of foul play, the shit will hit the fan. Fat will not rest until we recant our theory.”

  Fat was the department chief, a ti
n pot dictator who ruled his department like a tyrant, but who knew how to toady up and turn on the oil when it suited his purpose. His artful fawning and scraping in front of visiting government officials was a phenomenon to be marvelled at.

  “What I am suggesting,” Yong-qi said, encouraged by Cheng’s willingness to consider the options, “is that we turn our reports in as we usually do. Fat won’t read beyond the first couple of sections anyway. We say ‘Apparent’ Suicide. That’s the key: Apparent. That will give us a justification later should we wish to formally re-open the case.”

  “On what grounds could we later re-open it?”

  “I’m getting to that. We should insert our true observations, but not in a prominent manner. We do not want Fat to question our findings. In my report I will mention vaguely the chair was used to break the window, as evidenced by the glass piece, and it was later returned to its proper spot. I will also note the other physical evidence of the candle being blown out and laid neatly on the bed. I will not comment on the fact these things are inconsistent with a suicide.”

  “What about the witness?” Cheng asked. “The Kader woman heard male voices arguing.”

  “I will leave it to you to insert the witness statement into your report,” Wang said. “After all, it is the critical piece of evidence. No offence, but your writing is terrible. Fat will be less likely to read through your report than mine. You will need to keep your comments vague, so they will not be noticed. Mrs. Kader is in China to adopt a child. She will not be anxious to talk further to police. Hopefully by the time anyone realises her statement conflicts with the official findings, she will have returned to Canada.”

  “She’s an odd one, Mrs. Kader.”

  “Do you think she was lying?” Wang asked.

  “Yes, but not to us.”

  “I agree. She was telling the truth about what she heard. She was genuinely frightened by the situation. I don’t envy that husband of hers.”

  “Can we drag our feet on the reports?” Cheng asked.

  “Not for long — a day or two at most. Fat will be looking to close the case.”

  “We let him close the case, but we continue to investigate. What if we are caught?”

  “Then,” Wang said, “we refer back to our original reports. We say that, after discussing it further between ourselves, we began to notice discrepancies. There were details on your report I overlooked, and vice-versa. We simply wanted to find out if there are grounds to re-open the file.”

  “OK,” Cheng agreed. “Suppose we uncover proof of foul play?”

  “It depends on what the proof is. Naturally if we discover that President Hu Jintao’s favourite nephew set the poor bugger on fire, then we will not call the press. On the other hand, if we learn some local vigilantes decided to ‘flame the Fong’, let’s nail their carcasses to the wall.”

  “As long as the “vigilantes” aren’t employed by the Ministry of State Security,” Cheng said.

  “We’ll have to play it by ear.”

  The two men worked on their vodka in silence, each contemplating the many hazards associated with an excess of truth in a society that thrived on secrecy.

  A sound of breaking glass caught Yong-qi’s attention. He turned lazily in time to see the pretty waitress back away from one of the tables with a red face. Two drunken roosters crowed with laughter. One began to pick up the broken glass, while the other rested his hand on the girl’s back.

  Cheng leapt to his feet, his forbidden M 77B pistol in his hand.

  “What’s happening?” Wang said, jumping up to help his partner.

  Wang’s surprise concerned the expression of cold rage he saw on Cheng’s face. He supposed his partner possessed a normal range of emotions including anger, but he had never seen evidence of it.

  In the years they had been together as a team he had come to respect Cheng’s steady professionalism. Cheng would do what was necessary to get the job done, without hesitation, but his actions were never motivated by anger. He preferred to rely on logic.

  Now a look of utter fury sat like a mask on the large man’s countenance. He strode across the room, Wang following nervously with his less impressive Type 77 pistol drawn and ready.

  “On your knees!” Cheng shouted, waving his gun at the young men. One of them dropped to the floor instantly. The other pulled his hand away from the waitress’s back as if she were on fire. “You, too. Get on the floor, beside your buddy.”

  Wang stood helplessly beside Cheng, confused by his actions.

  “What’s going on,” he repeated quietly.

  “Lulu,” Cheng said to the girl, “are these punks bothering you?”

  “No,” the frightened girl whispered. “Please, Uncle Minsheng… I don’t want any trouble.”

  “What did this one say to you?” Cheng demanded.

  “He only asked for a drink.”

  “Does he have a tongue? Must he ask for a drink with his hands? You,” he said, pointing at the man who had touched Lulu, “show me your tongue.”

  The man, who was really more of a boy, stuck out his tongue. Cheng grabbed it with his left hand and pulled it firmly, pretending to inspect its quality. Wang shuddered at the thought of that dirty hand on the poor man’s tongue.

  “This looks like a perfectly good tongue to me.” He nodded at Yong-qi happily. “In the future,” he said to the young man loudly, “please use this tongue to ask for your drinks. Your hands should be kept on the table at all times. You never know when an angry uncle who is also a cop will pull out a huge mother of a gun and blow your hand clean off your wrist.”

  “Cheng,” Yong-qi began, but his partner was already waving his arms like a benevolent Buddha, telling the men to get up off the floor and seeming unaware of the fact his right hand still held the barbaric weapon.

  The 77B was considered by the government to be too heavy and ungainly, and far too deadly for use by the general police force. The official propaganda insisted it was sold only for export. The manufacturer denied it was available for purchase within China.

  “There, there,” Cheng said, “everything is all right now. We just had a little misunderstanding, didn’t we, Lulu? Now you run along and get these fellows a drink, and I’m sure they will have a generous tip for you when they leave.” He spoke loudly, his face changing from anger to camaraderie quickly and completely.

  “Everyone, go back to your drinks. In fact, Lulu, bring new drinks for everyone. There is no trouble here. These gentlemen are intelligent. They understand now what will happen to them if my little Lulu should ever feel she has been violated.”

  He motioned for the men to sit down and they complied. Then he pulled two more chairs to their table and waited politely for Wang to sit before joining the group.

  “No hard feelings, Gentlemen,” he said. “This round is on me.” He tucked the gun into the pocket of his seedy grey jacket and smiled.

  Wang Yong-qi could hardly talk, so shocked was he by his friend’s bizarre behaviour. Once they were back in the early morning darkness of the Nanning streets, he had to speak up.

  “What the hell was that all about?” he said.

  “Are you referring to my little Peking Opera?” Cheng said. “What do you think? Was I convincing as the deranged uncle? Did I make my point?”

  “Loud and clear, my friend, to everyone in the place. Don’t you think, though, it was a bit overdone?”

  “Not at all, Yong-qi. Every bit of theatre has a purpose. Those two boys, they are nothing. They are harmless. I think one of them pissed his pants, he was so scared. However, my friend, they weren’t the only men with ears in that room.”

  “So you were delivering a more general message?”

  “Indeed. Several mornings ago, little Lulu came home crying to her mother. It seemed her nasty bug of a manager was making inappropriate suggestions to her. She had a similar problem at her last position, and she was worried about losing this job. It is the curse of being young and beautiful, I’m afraid.”
>
  Wang smiled. Cheng spoke as if he truly understood the curse of beauty.

  “My sister is a widow,” Cheng continued. “She does not always see things clearly the way a father would. She came to me for advice. I offered to confront the cockroach directly. Lulu was frantic. She was deeply embarrassed by the whole situation, and felt her boss would take revenge if he lost face in public.”

  “You waited for a chance to make your presence known without having to confront him directly,” Wang said.

  “Precisely. Those jackasses were in the right place at the wrong time. If they hadn’t acted up, I would have gone for them anyway. It was convenient.”

  “I hope you wouldn’t have shot them,” Yong-qi joked.

  “One never knows,” Cheng said, his face deadly serious, “what a crazy uncle with a gun might do.”

  NINETEEN

  Jiu Kaiyu slumped over the keyboard in his darkened office at the Ministry of State Security in Shanghai. To save on energy costs, the building’s lights were turned off from eight p.m. till seven o’clock in the morning. Because he often kept strange hours, Jiu had placed a floor lamp in the corner of his tiny cubicle. By its light and by the glow from the computer monitor he was able to see well enough to make his way around.

  Embarrassment kept him from heading back to the station the previous afternoon when he and his men were finished at the airport. Jiu had not wanted to face his boss, Chief Ho Lon-shi. He knew Ho would make a big production over his disgrace. Ho’s nephew Yi would feed into the tirade with innuendo concerning what he would have done differently in Jiu’s place.

  Jiu was not up to dealing with the recriminations. He sent Yi home early — an offer Yi was far too lazy to question — then headed back to the Tan apartment with Ng-zhi. Free from Yi’s prying eyes, the two men turned the apartment inside out, taking care to leave behind no evidence of having done so. Jiu immediately discovered the girl’s bed in the laundry room. He shook his head at his own stupidity for having overlooked something so obvious. Under Ho’s direction, the entire division was becoming shoddy, and Jiu realised he was no exception.