French Concession (20 page)

The Nanking commission was convinced that Ku's people were ordinary criminals, not Communists. Their methods weren't like Communist methods. And the investigators should know, not just because they were experts on the Communists, but also because a few of them used to be Communists themselves.

That was precisely how Lieutenant Sarly planned to undermine them. He was attending a meeting at the Municipal Office's Trustees House on Route Pichon in the leafy west of the French Concession. Nominally, the Trustees House was not a government building, and it had been chosen to give the session an informal setting. Consul Baudez had called this meeting in his capacity as a trustee of the Municipal Office, although he was not taking part in it. Ever since M. Brenier de Montmorant, the previous consul, had clashed with the Municipal Office over the police station, the consul had held both posts. At the time, M. Brenier had ordered the trustees dismissed, and surrounded the Municipal Office with police, causing a fracas that escalated all the way to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Paris. Three days later, the trustees were set free on payment of 100,000 francs, and the Ministry had to create a special committee to restore the government of the Concession. From then onward, the police headquarters were placed firmly under the authority of the consul, and its main officers were always trusted lieutenants of his.

“Maybe our visitors simply can't bear to think that Communists
could stoop to ordinary crime. After all, communism is just a youthful phase, isn't it?” Sarly was taunting the ex-Communists from Nanking. Colonel Bichat of the Shanghai Volunteer Corps also began to laugh—he and Commander Martin, who was also present, supported Sarly's view. Shanghailanders were growing tired of the fight between the Kuomintang and the Communists. The demonstrations and strikes were bad for business, and now shootouts in the streets verged on civil war, threatening to reduce the concessions to rubble. Perhaps there was nothing for it but to turn Shanghai into a—

Horns tooted in the yard. A car was ready for Consul Baudez's wife. Once, when he was in a good mood, Baudez had told Sarly that there were three beautiful women in the villa. His wife and daughter were two of the three, of course. The third must be the half-naked marble statue in the center of the pond, guessed Sarly, but luckily he didn't say that aloud. No, the third was the pond itself, which narrowed on both ends but widened in the middle, curving outward like a woman's hips. Consul Baudez does have conventional taste in women, thought Sarly. Did that make the camphor tree bending toward the surface of the pond a lecher? One of its branches was pointing at the woman's breasts.

“The gangs in Shanghai tipped us off that these people aren't Communists,” Mr. Tseng from Nanking insisted.

“The Green Gang is a sworn enemy of the Communists, just like you.”

“Speak for yourself!” Tseng retorted.

“Indeed. Maybe the Concession Police should take more responsibility for combating the Red Threat in Shanghai. We can't let Nanking do all the work.” Like all Corsicans, Lieutenant Sarly had a way with words. The Nanking investigators were temporarily silenced.

“Nanking overrelies on brute force to suppress dissident parties. That won't work nowadays, but your Kuomintang politicians are stuck in the past. They don't know how to govern a modern city. When the Communists in Kiangsi executed one of your men and set his head afloat on a raft on the Kan River, I heard you shot a bunch of jailed Communists in Nanking and Shanghai to retaliate.” Unlike
the other Shanghailanders, Sarly read Chinese newspapers and took a real interest in what the Chinese thought. The poetic headline had lodged itself in his mind:
Silently the waves bear him home.

“Shanghai could be a model city for China, a modern city where law and order prevail,” Sarly concluded. Only Mr. Blair, attending the meeting as a diplomatic policy observer for the British government, approved of these abstract musings. Blair listened dutifully, but his eyes looked weary and sad.

“The chaos in Shanghai is all your doing. You only want to appease the Communists so you can make money off the Chinese. Half the problem is that you restrict Nanking's freedom to maneuver in the concessions. The reason why the Communists are based in Shanghai is that you're too shortsighted to crack down on them!” a young man from the investigative commission said indignantly.

“Sun Yat-sen was right about modern China. We're not ready for democracy yet, and there has to be a period of political tutelage during which the Kuomintang governs. But one day we will have this city under control, maybe when the Greater Shanghai Plan has succeeded.” The young man sounded a little defeated.

They had strayed from the topic of the meeting. These larger questions would have to be resolved by politicians in London, Paris, or Nanking. Commander Martin said it was time they returned to the matters at hand. If Nanking's people were permitted to move freely in the concessions, they would contribute more to the intelligence exchanged among all parties, Mr. Tseng said as the spokesman for the investigative commission.

On behalf of the two foreign governing authorities in Shanghai, Lieutenant Sarly and Commander Martin negotiated with the Nanking investigators regarding the carrying of firearms, wireless frequencies, and special license plates, and permitted them to set up an operation base in the concessions. But Sarly reminded them that Nanking would have no authority whatsoever to make arrests within the territories of the concessions.

The meeting became more amicable. Whereas all the parties disagreed heartily in principle, negotiating on concrete matters helped
them to find common ground. Under the current arrangement, Nanking submitted names to the concession authorities, which would then carry out the arrests. Tseng pointed out that the delay often caused them to miss their best opportunities for interrogations. He suggested that Nanking be allowed to make arrests within the concessions, on condition that they report all names to the concession authorities retrospectively, and share the intelligence so obtained with all parties. But Lieutenant Sarly insisted that the consular jurisdiction of the concessions must be protected. He warned that if Nanking made any unilateral arrests, the French Concession Police would be compelled to view them as kidnappings.

Commander Martin broke the ensuing silence. It is true that the Nanking authorities have a home advantage in dealing with Chinese matters, he said. Perhaps we could agree to call these operations neither arrests nor kidnappings. Let us say the Nanking commission were to invite a couple of individuals to discuss something at their office, eyewitnesses agreed that the parties in question were not coerced into doing so, and the police forces of the concessions were given a reasonable explanation of the circumstances. Let us say that the results of this discussion would be made available in their entirety to the police, and within a certain time, say forty-eight hours, these individuals would be turned over to the police authorities of the respective concessions, and lawfully tried or extradited. I would have no objection to that.

Sarly insisted that all interrogations would have to be carried out in the presence of an observer appointed by the French Concession Police or the Shanghai Municipal Police. Eventually they agreed that written notice of Nanking's actions would have to be given directly to the Political Section within twenty-four hours, upon which the police would send an observer. During those twenty-four hours, the Nanking investigators would be free to discuss matters of interest with their subjects in a friendly manner.

“So who are you planning to ask out on a friendly date?” Sarly brought the discussion to a close with what he intended to be a lighthearted question.

Unlike the other Chinese, who were always too serious around Westerners, Mr. Tseng did have a sense of humor. “As we agreed, whoever they are, we will notify their parents within twenty-four hours of issuing an invitation.”

“That's enough time to get someone pregnant,” Colonel Bichat added cheerfully.

The Nanking investigators filed out of the temporary meeting room, a side room on the second floor adjoining the large living room. After these five bookish Chinese men had made their way across the balcony and down the exterior stairs onto the lawn, and their black sedan car had driven through the gate, Commander Martin cried: “Did they have to send all that many people to one meeting? Are there really too many people in China?”

Consul Baudez appeared only after the Chinese had left. His position was equivalent to that of a colonial governor, which meant he remained detached from most practical affairs. He handed Mr. Blair a memo his secretary had just written, to be passed on to the British consul. It had been drafted in accordance with Lieutenant Sarly's suggestions.

“We have reliable information that the underground organization we have been discussing is acquiring a more dangerous arsenal of weapons. We do not yet have a full picture of their movements. But this constitutes concrete evidence in favor of our hypothesis that Shanghai is turning into a battleground for the struggle between the Communists and the Kuomintang, which would affect our interests here. The French government has committed to redeploying some French troops from Hanoi to Shanghai, to address recent developments. We urge other European governments with strong interests in the concessions to do the same.” Sarly hoped chiefly to influence the romantic Mr. Blair, who acted as an observer for the Foreign Office. He was now infamous for his way with women in the Concession. Surely he could not object to doing something for the men?

“And then there's the Greater Shanghai Plan,” murmured Colonel Bichat. Many Shanghailanders felt that the plan would severely damage international interests in the concessions. In fact, Lieutenant
Sarly was well aware that Nanking's scheme chiefly hurt foreign land developers. European and now American land speculators had bought up large tracts of land to the south and west of Shanghai. These firms would buy land, wait for the prices to be driven up, sell it, and then buy more land farther south and west.

But according to the blueprint for the Greater Shanghai Plan, the heart of Shanghai was to lie in the northeast. Government buildings, a university, model elementary schools, and even a sports ground were to be built in Chapei and Chiang-wan. Roads and public facilities would bring commercial activity to a part of town that was currently a wasteland, and future residents of Shanghai would buy property there. If that happened, the land in the southwest that foreign developers had acquired for huge sums of money would be worthless, and they would lose their investment. Not only would the speculators and banks suffer losses, but the whole system of profiteering would collapse.

“There's also Tokyo—they keep sending naval and ground troops here, and they've always wanted more clout in Shanghai. The Japanese businessmen in the International Settlement have been getting aggressive, and the Municipal Police has spent the past year breaking up brawls between the Chinese and the Japanese in the streets,” Commander Martin said.

“If the Japanese are willing to help, I say the more the merrier,” said Colonel Bichat. “What's that piece of cloth they wear at the back of their necks again?”

“Ah, neck flaps—they're just afraid of having their heads chopped off,” said Martin, gesturing with a flick of his wrist. “I hear they like beheading people up there.”

“The Japanese Army got that idea from our North African troops. The Meiji emperor ordered military hats from all over the world to be brought to him, and he chose that one, despite the fact that it was designed for the desert and Japan is nowhere near one. He thought it looked most like the
kabuto
, a samurai helmet with a neck guard. Except they have two flaps instead of one—for good luck.” Sarly got his information from books.

“The Shanghainese are good people,” Colonel Bichat said. “I say letting Shanghai become a free city would be a wise decision.” But Sarly thought that was a rash thing to say, little better than the rash bets that speculators were making, snapping up farmland around Shanghai. In his view, policy had to progress incrementally, and sending more troops to Shanghai right now would be the right thing to do. The setting sun shone on the pool outside, and the water shimmered like the glistening skin of a belly dancer.

At first, Lin had no reason to be suspicious. But the class struggle had made him more vigilant. He was a quick learner, and he often learned by observing Park. For instance, he had noticed that Park always returned to the scene of even a minor operation, and talked to the shirtless errand boys who stood at the doors of the corner stores all day.

Without telling Ku, he went off to the Singapore Hotel on his own. It was only a short walk from the Rue Palikao candle store. On the way he wondered how he could strike up a conversation. Maybe he could pretend to be a wealthy man looking to set up a private gambling den, but he didn't think he looked the part.

He stood on the opposite side of Rue du Consulat, at the door of Kuan-sheng Yüan, the candy manufacturer. When someone began to climb the narrow stairs toward the hotel, he quickly crossed the road and followed them. He would feel safer if he wasn't the only person at the reception. The receptionist was standing behind the desk at the stairwell, talking to someone. He slipped past him and struck up a conversation with the steward sitting on a bench. He spoke in a low voice, winking to hint that it was sex he was after. But the Concession prohibited under-the-table prostitution, and he'd heard that this place had had a spot of trouble with the cops.

“I live in the longtang across the street,” he added unnecessarily.
He shouldn't have said that. A real john doesn't tell people where he lives.

“The police were here just last week. You scared now?”

He shook his head and shrugged, rattling the coins in his pocket.

“It was the Communists they were after.”

“I heard it was a woman.”

The steward was a young man, but he had met all kinds of people. He gave Lin a meaningful look. Then he shook his head.

“She was a single woman. They took her to the police station, with a man.” That proved his point: you can always learn something useful by returning to the scene of an incident.

He bungled his exit by simply walking away, as though asking about hookers embarrassed him. That could well have made the steward suspicious enough to mention him to the manager in a spare moment. He rushed out of the building, trying to avoid the beggars who squatted in twos and threes by the colonnade, enjoying a few moments of peace during the police's lunch break.

Leng had lied to the cell! Lin had been there when she called Ku—in fact, he had answered the phone. This has to be reported to Ku, he thought. What did it mean that Leng had been taken to North Gate Police Station? He didn't have the time to think that through. Ku would be leaving the candle store this very moment, to meet Leng and that photojournalist friend of hers, as they had arranged. That man had real connections in the Political Section. He stopped at the corner of Rue Palikao.

Lin didn't know where they were planning to meet, but he realized how serious the problem was. Leng was completely exposed: her photograph was in all the Concession newspapers, and it must have been plastered on the walls of the police station, to fix her face in the minds of all those policemen going off to their daily beat. She must have been arrested because someone recognized her, but despite knowing precisely who she was, they had released her anyway. The police weren't blind, so there must have been some reason why they would turn a blind eye.

He couldn't think straight. Ku wasn't there, Park wouldn't be there, and he always went to one of them when he had questions. His entire unit had been deployed to protect Ku, since this was one of the rare occasions when he would appear in public.

He should go to the new safe house, the apartment rented to replace the one on Rue Amiral Bayle. It was on Boulevard des Deux Républiques between Rue Buissonnet and Rue Voisin. Boulevard des Deux Républiques was the boundary between the French Concession and the Chinese-administered Old Town. The buildings facing the street were under Concession jurisdiction, because the longtang stretching from east to west opened onto Boulevard de Montigny, but the eastern windows opened onto Ming Koo Road, just across the street from the Chinese-administered area. The apartment was rented under his name, but the idea had been Ku's. Ku said that one night, when he was being frisked by Concession detectives at the gate on Ming Koo Road, he had seen the light come on in a second-floor window. It occurred to him that it could be useful to keep a bundle of rope at the window facing east in one of these apartments and let it down in an emergency, said Ku. Then an unusually wistful look had come over him.

Lin never made it to the apartment. He would later think he only got caught because he couldn't stop thinking about Leng's lie.

He had just turned the corner. Afterward he wouldn't for the life of him be able to remember which street he had been on. He did remember seeing basketfuls of peaches between those fingers—pink and flat green peaches. A pair of large callused hands had covered his eyes, digging its fingers into his sockets, making his temples hurt.

The pair of hands had reached over from behind him, and the voice also came from behind, floating toward him like a disembodied voice:

“Guess who I am? Guess who I am?” It was a high-pitched singsong voice, like someone reciting a nursery rhyme. He could hear laughter muffled by the street noises. The hands were also twisting his ears, making all those voices sound as though they were underwater.

He heard a car screech to a halt. Someone was standing in front of him, pushing him, pulling him from the side. There was a brief burst of light, and then he could see nothing. He was surrounded by people breathing heavily.

He didn't notice when they twisted his arms behind his back. He was aware of being dragged to the edge of the pavement, and he noticed the step. Then a stab of pain—a punch, he thought. He was just thinking that when he was punched again in the stomach, his knees buckled, he bent over and collapsed to the ground.

But this wasn't the ground. It was soft and bouncy, with a smell of new leather. Before he knew what was happening, the door had been closed. He knew he was in a car because the door had caught on his pant leg.

As it sped off, the hands pushed his head down into the car seat. It felt as if a thousand people were sitting on his back, and he could hardly breathe. His nose was wedged into the gap at the back of the seat, and his mouth tasted of rust, probably because his lips or gums were bleeding.

Someone put a cloth bag over his head and tied it on tightly. The rope was right at his mouth, and it felt as though the corners of his mouth were going to split open. This must be to stop him from screaming, he thought. It actually hadn't occurred to him to scream. He couldn't make a sound if he tried.

He was dragged out of the car by many pairs of hands. He couldn't see where he was and he had no concept of time; he had never been trained to handle situations like this. But he remembered Park once saying that you could count silently using a regular bodily rhythm like your heartbeat or breathing. Count how many times the car turns a corner—you can always tell, because of inertia. Pay attention to changes in the ground surface, notice whether it's sloping upward or downward, whether it's hard or soft. If you stay calm, you can feel even the gaps between the tiles beneath your feet. Without Park's training, Lin didn't have the presence of mind to start counting. All he could remember was birdsong, the sound of wind in the leaves, and the smell of car exhaust. He didn't remember
to count the number of steps they climbed, but he knew that he had been taken to an empty third-floor room, and he noticed the dank smell of slaked lime.

Now there was silence. No more breathing noises, no footsteps. He felt as though he had been abandoned, not just in an empty room, but also in an empty building. Before long, he heard someone talking in low tones through the ceiling. The voice sounded as if it was coming from a room to his left. His hearing was recovering. He could hear someone pouring water from a hot water bottle into a teacup. This couldn't be the police station, he guessed. There were no clanking sounds of metal, no handcuffs, no metal doors. Besides, the police could arrest him openly. No, these men were more likely to be from the Green Gang. At first he thought it must be because of the Singapore Hotel, but he quickly abandoned that idea. Stay calm. He remembered what Park had told him: expand your senses of hearing, touch, smell, and the entire surface of your skin, so that you absorb every bit of sound, warmth, and humidity from your surroundings.

Not long afterward, he remembered about the Singapore Hotel, and realized that he hadn't had a chance to report his discovery to Ku. The entire cell was in danger, and there was nothing he could do about it. Lin began to worry.