Dragon's Eye (41 page)

“Three packs, and you call that friendship?”

“It is when you hear what fucking shit he has dredged up …”

Yaobang pulled the paper from the Senior Investigator’s fingers and turned it over. More grease. More mustard and ketchup. More numbers.

“… twenty minutes after Zhiyuan called his old buddy Chunqiao, the comrade made a call of his own at 3:50am, a call that lasted for eight minutes …”

Piao could see the number. Another tong zhi. Another Politburo member … a prefix ‘39’.

“… do you recognise the number, Boss?”

The Senior Investigator studied it, knowing that he should.

“No, but you thought that I might?”

“Only if marriage is for life, I guess, Boss …”

He bit on the hot dog, bread and paper on his tongue, both tasting the same.

“… it’s your wife’s number. Minister Kang Zhu’s residence in Beijing.”

The world seemed to jolt. Silence pressing onto his inner ears, and in its wings the sound of rain. Across Piao’s face. Across the paintwork of the Red Flag. And his last glimpse of her. An arm, a hand heavy in gold rings, slipping around her shoulders. Her face slowly turning away. Jolted once more, Yaobang’s words pulling him back.

“Eleven minutes later at 4:01am a call was made from Kang Zhu’s residence to this number …”

The Big Man stabbed at the paper.

“… it’s a Zhejiang code, a Hangzhou number …”

Piao already knowing what was coming, bracing himself for the wave.

“… Taihu Lake. A zhau-dai-suo registered to the Minister, Kang Zhu. Ring any fucking bells Boss?”

Remembering the smell of the smoke from the burning bodies.

“Liping.”

No more than a breath from Piao, Yaobang nodding. The Senior Investigator finished his beer. As warm as dishwater and with the taste of dishwater.

“Chunqiao. Kang Zhu. Liping. Join the dots and see what fucking picture they make …”

The Big Man licked his fingers clean of grease. Lips shiny.

“… the murder of Comrade Zhiyuan. So does my telephone operator get his three packs of China Brand, eh Boss?”

“Has he got any more information for us, calls from the zhau-dai-suo?”

“More. Isn’t this enough? Any calls out of the zhau-dai-suo would have been beyond the operator’s area. I haven’t got old friends who are operators in every fucking province.”

Piao looked deeply into the empty beer glass; streams of foam, slower than clouds in a summer sky, falling back down the glass.

“No, not three packs. Four. He did well.”

He clinked his beer bottle against the Big Man’s.

“Done, Boss. What the fuck would we do without the back-door?”

“Be four packs of China Brand better off?”

Yaobang examined his nails.

“What is it with Liping, Boss? Shit, he’s the Chief. The law.”

The carousel was slowing to a standstill. Piao moved forward, small arms reaching out for him. Arms that needed him.

“Liping uses the law as a dog uses a lamppost, for support, not illumination.”

The Big Man nodded; he didn’t understand what it meant, but it sounded about right.

*

Wet kisses. Warm arms. Piao bit his lip … saying good-bye and not daring to promise to meet for the New Year. Ice creams, parades, cuddles, tears … better not to let them down. To make promises to children and then break them, is to mortgage your soul.

*

He was running late. Darkness bruising the rooftops. The lights from the fair ripping at the advancing night. Walking at a pace.

“The reception, you got hold of a guest list?”

The Big Man running beside him.

“There was one in the duty office for security checks, Boss.”

“And?”

They were on the corner of Weihai Lu and Chengdu Lu, Piao looking for his loaned car. Yaobang for the next food stop.

“The name you gave me, it was high up on the list Boss. A very favoured foreigner …”

His attention drawn by the noodle shop, a handful of doors down on Chengdu; the next hour of his evening planned. Already deciding what to order. Baozi dumplings, rice noodles, steamed buns, Sanpijiu draught beer.

“… to be favoured must be comforting, eh Boss?”

“I wouldn’t know. Who invited him?”

Yaobang was already crossing Weihai Lu. The road frantic. Thunder on wheels. Shouting at the top of his voice. Piao hardly able to hear him.

“Liping. Liping invited him. You’d better hurry Boss. You’re fucking late.”

*

Red Flags. Red Banners. A dog pissing up against a wall.

The reception that he hadn’t been invited to was held in the Shanghai Conservatory Arts & Crafts Institute … an austere and unsmiling building just off of Huaihai Lu. Pigeon shit and dressed stone. Its toes paddling in the gutters that flowed from Fumin market, just a block away.

Guests were arriving. Red Flags, pennants unfurled. Flood-lights across gloss black paintwork and flaming chrome. Security, a hand resting inside their jackets. Chauffeurs running around bonnets to open doors. Piao pulled at his collar, the dress uniform that he had hurriedly changed into, a series of snags, tugs, and rubs. Joining the queue of jocular, cement chinned Russians and gnarled Politburo Members. At the front of the line, American voices. Behind them a brace of Italians … the men preening themselves, the women as moody as rain clouds in July. The private jets from Beijing’s Capital Airport were busy tonight. Piao had walked, leaving him with the legacy of a thirst that was big enough to drown in.

The anomaly of being suspended from duty, a murder suspect, yet dressed to the hilt, a back-door invitation to the customary pre-New Year reception … encouraging him to light another cigarette. For no apparent reason, his eyes were drawn to the road. Through the exhaust smoke and its sting, a figure briskly walking toward the Institute from Fuxingxi Lu. Elegant as a pin. Rounding the traffic, cutting the search of headlights, Charles Haven. Already unbuttoning the black cashmere coat, pulling off soft leather gloves. A hand brushing through the steel wire of his hair. Moving past the open doors of the Red Flag limousines. A nod to the plainclothed Security Officers. The line of queuing guests ignored. A smell of expensive cologne and toothpaste as he walked by, almost brushing against Piao’s shoulder. At the main door, Liping, skin weather-tanned, as brown as the mahogany of the heavy double doors, beckoning the Englishman through. Greeting him with a double-handed shake of the hands. Shepherding him inside, arm across his shoulder. A smart throng … languages, perfumes, cleavages, all vying for ascendancy. The doors swinging closed. A sudden stab of pain in Piao’s stomach; he hadn’t eaten since the morning. It took the Senior Investigator another twenty minutes of queuing before he could walk through the same doors.

*

Hazel hen, ‘flying dragon’ … served with mushrooms,
hericium erinaceus
, from the walnut forests. Duck smoked over tea leaves and camphor wood. Smoked yellow river carp. Frogs legs with grains of Huajiao spice, orange rind and spring onions. Rice flower birds preserved in spiced honey. Ravioli stuffed with crab-spawn, steam cooked and served in quinlong … bamboo boxes. Long tables. Starched white linen. Silver serving dishes. The banquet placed onto white bone china. Sauces of sunflower, damask, saffron … racing into each other. A line of waiters in dress white. Sleepy faced, shoes scuffed … eyeing the food hungrily. Serving with a controlled animosity.

Piao settled for carp, smoked in Suzhou. It had come a long way, the least that he could do was to eat it; his appetite left behind at the back of the queue to get into the reception. And all of the time watching the Englishman, glimpses of him between the stroll of guests. Haven not eating, just drinking still mineral water. Sips, lips hardly wet. Close enough, at times, to hear the odd word of his conversations with high cadre and Politburo members. His Mandarin, perfect … spoken with the distinct accent of the Shanghai-bred, but with an edge of elegance that could never be emulated by the Shanghai-bred. The Senior Investigator placed his empty plate on the buffet table, orange pepper sauce on his fingers. Sucking them clean. Drinking the remainder of his Dynasty white wine, its taste soured. Changing to a glass of the red. It was no different; as tart as limes and bad news. Moving through a glut of French diplomats. Cologne and garlic. The path to the Englishman clear. Haven alone in the desert of the centre of the hall. Piao, hearing the heels of his boots against the solid oak flooring. Hearing himself talk, and hating it …

“To be invited to such a reception, you must have friends in high places?”

There was a gap of a few seconds before Haven turned. Every movement smooth, as if rehearsed.

“Senior Investigator. The detective who burns his fingers. You are in good health, I hope?”

Piao raised his hands.

“Burns heal.”

The Englishman didn’t look at them, his attention focussed over Piao’s shoulder as he looked for the next person to talk to.

“Some burns do not. I thought that you had been suspended, Senior Investigator?”

Piao moved closer, the Englishman, a complex recipe of smells. Foreign cologne, dry-cleaning fluid, peppermint breath. But beneath it all, the odour of the animal ready for its feed. A keynote, faint but high pitched … Civet.

“You seem to know a great deal about me, Mr Haven?”

“A reputation for brilliance and now for self-destruction, and a stubbornness to succeed well at both. Who could resist knowing about you, Senior Investigator?”

Piao wished that he had a drink, not for the alcohol, just for the glass … something to keep his hands busy. A mask for nerves; his fingers already giving him away. He buried them deep into his pockets.

“And I thought that I was investigating you, Mr Haven.”

“Me, Senior Investigator. Why would you want to investigate me?”

Smiling, but darts in his eyes, like a distant arrowhead of crows worrying at the horizon.

“Because you murdered Bobby Hayes. Also Ye Yang, Heywood and Qingde. In our country that is enough reason to want to investigate somebody. Do you not think so? Tell me, Mr Haven, do you have a cigarette that I could kindly have?”

The Englishman reached into his inside pocket. A gold pack, hard and neat cornered. Tobacco as sweet as brown sugar.

“And a light please?”

The lighter was already in his hand, manicured fingers across the gold block. A dull click. The electricity arcing. Gas ignited. The flame spiking blue, building to pale yellow.

“Thank you, English cigarettes are very good. Very sweet, like yellow wine. And your lighter, it is very beautiful. I have always wanted such a lighter as this.”

Taking back the lighter, his eyes meeting Piao’s for the first time. Ice on ice.

“Do you often accuse people of four murders in such a novel fashion?”

“No. I have never investigated a man who has committed four murders before.”

“And, of course, you can prove your accusations, Investigator; witnesses, forensics, evidence. Remember evidence?”

“No. Officially I cannot even prove that you are here in our country, that you have ever been in our country. Officially you are not standing here now. We have less on our files about you than I can dredge up on Deng Xiaoping with the push of a single button. I just have a feeling about you.”

The Englishman brought the mineral water to his lips, teeth magnified through the bottom of the glass.

“I didn’t think so. You are a dreamer, Investigator Piao. You should know that ‘feelings’ do not hold up well in courts of law.”

“Of course you are right, Mr Haven, but it will come, evidence is like that, it builds like bamboo scaffolding, very slowly. And murderers, they are like monkeys, the higher they escape up a tree, the more that they show of their arses.”

Haven closed the narrow gap between them; his words warm on Piao’s cheek. But chilling. So calmly said … so well wrapped.

“But I am not a monkey, Senior Investigator. Monkeys do not swap New Year gifts with Senior Politburo members. Perhaps you should be scared.”

An invitation … but everything in Piao’s stare rejecting it.

“ I will wait, Mr Haven. I am very good at waiting. Wait and let the evidence show itself. Play the games that we PSB are good at. You will wish to leave our country, but you will find delays that cannot be explained. Ticket reservations will be cancelled from computer screens. Your credit cards will be rejected for no apparent reason. Stolen articles or illegal substances will be found in your hotel room, in your suitcase.”

The Englishman turned to walk away, but before he did, whispering words through clenched teeth. Words precisely hewn from ice.

“You have no idea what you are getting into, Senior Investigator, a simple policeman like you. Get out before this swallows you whole.”

Haven twisted leisurely through the perfumed throng of guests. The silky swerve of the lizard. Within seconds he was lost to Piao’s view in a press of Armani and overzealous braid.

One last glance as Piao made his way from the reception hall, their eyes meeting in a brief snap, as bitter as frostbite. Haven turning, continuing his conversation with a Mao suited clutch of Politburo members. Laughing. Glasses clinking.

Piao walked home, watching every shadow. The Englishman’s words, a constantly repeating hiccup in his mind.

Get out before this swallows you whole.

*

Five calls, cut off in tears. Angry words. Slammed receivers. The anxiety of each conversation spilt across Piao’s table in an ashtray full of cigarette butts and a sentry of empty Tsingtao bottles. He called the number again, knowing it by heart. Asking for the room number. The line connecting, ringing, picked up. Her voice … already knowing who was calling.

“I don’t need this, not again, Sun. Not again. I don’t want to argue anymore. I don’t want to cry.”

Piao closed his eyes, sucking in a breath and pushing the urgency, the panic down. Reaching for each word, polishing them. Listening to Barbara’s breath as he spoke and trying to gauge her emotions by the rhythm of her exhalations against the mouthpiece. Seconds of silence … and in it, the echo of his last word. And faint, ever so faint in the background of the call … a glass being filled, a cigarette withdrawn from a pack and being lit. The dull click of a lighter.