Soul of the Fire (14 page)

No one spoke. Vogel noisily sipped his tea. Judson and Hannah Oglesby stared at the man in confusion. Kolsang stared at his notepad. A narrow grin rose on Zhu's face.

“What kind of factory was it?” Shan asked.

Choi made an exasperated clucking sound.

Tenzin began to look over his shoulder, then seemed to reconsider. He brought his hands back up and locked them together. “One of those chemical factories with big smokestacks.”

“If you were trying to hide your wife's body, why burn it by the roadside?” Shan pressed.

Choi raised a palm toward Shan. “Our rules don't provide for examination of witnesses,” she interrupted.

“Then a question for you, Madam Chairman,” Shan said. “What becomes of Comrade Tenzin?”

“He is to be commended for coming forward with the truth. No more than a few months' administrative detention for mutilation of a corpse.”

Lin touched Tenzin's shoulder and beckoned him to follow her out the door. As the prisoner stood, Shan noticed inflamed blotches on the man's neck and shuddered. They were the marks from the bite of an electric cattle prod.

Choi dropped the file into the stack for mental breakdowns.

As if on cue, Vogel looked up. “So now we see,” the German said, gazing pointedly at Shan. “When we have direct testimony, it corroborates the file.”

Shan watched Tenzin move down the corridor, flanked by two uniformed knobs. He stumbled and the knobs seized his arms, dragging him out of sight.

Shan stared forlornly at the file in front of him. He would never sign a report filled with half truths and coerced witness testimony. But when he refused, he and Lokesh both would pay a terrible price. Could that be all Tan intended, for him to derail the Commission by refusing to endorse its findings? There had to be more, some invisible war between Tan and those behind the Commission.

He became aware of another group entering the room, of chairs being pushed back. He would ask questions of this witness no matter what Choi said. This time he would not— Suddenly he realized everyone in the room was standing. In the middle of the new arrivals, a face from the newspapers regarded Shan with amusement. Deputy Secretary Pao had come to visit his Commission. Shan obediently stood.

“An unexpected honor, Comrade Deputy Secretary!” Choi exclaimed. “We are deeply grateful that—”

Pao cut her off with an upraised hand and lowered himself into Choi's chair, gesturing for the others to sit. Four uniformed knobs took up stations by the door. The man called the Emperor of Tibet appeared surprisingly robust, his chiseled features highlighted by a well-practiced smile.

“It is the motherland who is deeply grateful, for the dedication and diligence demonstrated by this Commission.” Pao nodded at each Commissioner in turn, speaking their names. When he came to Shan, his careful smile widened. His eyes were two black gems. “It truly takes a special talent and dedication for one to rise up out of the mud, as it were, to so adeptly serve the motherland. We salute you, Comrade Shan, and know you share our commitment to ending these terrible deaths.”

Shan bowed his head deferentially. “It is a unique and somber responsibility.”

“For a man of unique talents,” Pao replied. He fixed Shan with another stare, this one intense and scrutinizing, then made a gesture that swept in all those at the table. “Time is short and our work is weighty. Having direct witnesses will simplify your task, however. When I return next week, I look forward to reviewing your draft recommendations.”

The announcement clearly did not surprise Madam Choi, who was beaming.

“Sometimes I wonder,” Judson suddenly said.

Choi's face turned to ice. Pao slowly turned toward the American. “Wonder what, Mr. Judson?”

“Is China punishing Tibetans so severely because they complain so, or are Tibetans complaining because China punishes them so severely?” Judson looked at the shocked faces turned his way and shrugged. “We are all so dedicated to finding the root cause of this tragic epidemic, as you said in your first speech in Lhasa.”

For a moment Pao's face was empty, then his smile returned. “China is proud of her behavioral reform institutions, which strive so hard to address that dilemma.” He gestured out the window to the prison complex above. “Longtou, for example, has won innumerable awards for its innovative programs. I only wish I had time to take you on a personal tour so you could witness the good work for yourself. You would be most impressed.”

Miss Lin appeared, leading an attendant carrying a cardboard carton.

“I nearly forgot. We have jackets,” Pao announced, never dropping his practiced smile, and motioned to Lin, who began distributing plastic-wrapped jackets bearing the Commission's logo.

“One hundred eighty-nine cases,” Shan declared as Pao rose to leave.

Choi's eyes went wide. Pao looked back at Shan. “You too have something to add, comrade?”

“At last count, we had one hundred eighty-nine cases to review and barely a hundred have been presented to the Commission. We owe each case adequate time for consideration. The addition of witnesses adds a whole new dimension.”

Pao cast a peeved glance at Tuan. “I am sure Madam Choi and Herr Vogel will find a way.”

“But where cases are found to involve criminal conduct, surely there are legal standards to be analyzed as well.”

Pao clenched his jaw, then collected himself as if for public oratory, taking a deep breath and switching on the smile again. “Our legal standards, much as our policies on assimilation, all serve a higher political order. And share the same goals. Just this morning, I shared with Major Sung how Religious Affairs noted an upswing in Tibetan visitors at a small temple near the Lhasa airport. The Ministry of Transportation had discovered imbalances in inventories of aviation fuel. Public Security reported the hiring of two new Tibetans on ground crews who were photographed attending the temple. Arrests were made, and a hole in our security was filled. That is the kind of synergy that will drive the Commission to an efficient conclusion.” Pao extended his hands and twisted his palms upward. It was the benediction Party officials liked to give when closing ceremonies. He nodded to Choi, shook Vogel's hand, and departed in a cloud of uniforms.

Miss Lin intercepted Shan in the hall when the afternoon session adjourned. “This way,” was all she said, and Shan dutifully followed her into the Commission offices. They passed the conference room, where samples of parchment were still laid out, and went on to the door of a corner office, where a uniformed knob stood guard. The soldier opened the door, then stood at attention as Shan entered.

Major Sung turned from the window where he stood. “The Deputy Secretary almost had Tuan's head today. You manipulate us into visiting that immolation site. You don't show up for scheduled Commission sessions. You slip away toward Lhasa for unaccounted hours. As a watcher, he is all but blind.”

“It is rare that I get to visit the provincial capital. Only an hour away, and so many tempting sights to see. Someone said former Administrator Deng went there for his family emergency. I was wondering if someone should check on him.”

Sung gave Shan a withering glance. “Leave it alone. None of your concern.”

“It's difficult, Major. Old habits, you know. I was trained by senior investigators in Beijing to speculate about scenarios as a way of smoking out the truth. Like the scenario that Xie was murdered. And the one that Deng may have been killed to hide evidence of that murder.”

Sung's countenance flared with color.

“You saw him burning, Major. You then restrained any further investigation. There was a struggle when he died. He spilled blood, which means there is physical evidence that he was acting against his will. When the truth comes out, it will reflect poorly on you.”

“When the truth comes out, the world will know it was another crime by the
purbas.
”

“So you admit he was murdered. And if you insist it was the
purbas,
then you acknowledge it was to avenge Xie. You therefore admit there were two murders.”

Sung's brittle expression returned. “When you are on Pao's Commission, you work only on Commission work. Nothing else. What you are engaged in, comrade, is a slow form of suicide.”

When Shan offered no reply, Sung nodded as if deciding he had made his point, then sat at his desk and pushed a folder toward Shan. The major spoke slowly, in an oddly contemplative voice. “Events move quickly, comrade. It would be unfortunate if our valuable work were frustrated because you misunderstood certain facts. I accept that your instincts as an inspector may still haunt you. Surely we can speak candidly. One professional to another.”

Shan lowered himself into the chair opposite Sung. On the desk in front of the major were two enlarged photographs. One was of an attractive young Tibetan woman of perhaps twenty, the kind of formal photograph used for travel documents. Beside it was a grainy photo taken from a distance with a cell phone or security camera of a tall woman in a robe. It could have been the same woman, years older. On the first photo, someone had written across the top the word
University.
On the second, there was a note that stated
Small lotus tattoo, left temple
and a name. Dawa.

Shan looked back up at Sung, realizing the real question wasn't whether the major understood Deng had been murdered, it was why he was not sweeping Yamdrok and the surrounding countryside for the
purbas
he suspected.

“The reason we could accept rehabilitated criminals onto the Commission is that they are supposed to know exactly how much they have to lose. But you lie to us.”

Shan cocked his head, not understanding.

“You lie to us, to yourself, to the world. You are not actually rehabilitated.”

Shan looked up at the prison on the hill. “My greatest struggle has been trying to understand what that means.”

Sung gave a weary shrug. “We can crush you. We can take you away, and you can spend the rest of your life in a black hole without even knowing where you are. If you derail this Commission, Pao will no doubt insist upon it.” He gestured for Shan to open the file. “I would prefer another approach, to demonstrate to you why your activities are so counterproductive. It's all there. The filthy secrets we don't tell the foreigners. Beijing likes its summaries to be as short as possible. Only a dozen people in Tibet have seen this. My way of giving you one last chance. You may not take the folder out of this room. If you ever admit to reading it, I will say you stole it. Stole state secrets. A capital crime.”

Shan's distrusting gaze lingered a long moment on Sung before he picked up the sheet of paper. The evidence was compiled in short paragraphs, in bullet format. The first bullet explained that all immolations prior to eighteen months earlier had used kerosene, gasoline, or lamp oil as the accelerant. Half of all since used a form of aviation fuel, and nearly all those within a hundred miles of Lhasa used the fuel, which was not commonly available in Tibet.

Analysis of witness statements from the incidents revealed that at twenty of the most recent incidents, the same three women had been seen—one very tall with a small tattoo of a lotus on her left temple, a young nun with a girlish face who sometimes wore the clothes of a herder, and a third older woman with a missing index finger on her left hand. At each of these locations, the partially burned flags of the Dalai Lama clique had been recovered.

Next came a statement that in the same period, small paper manifestos written in Tibetan began appearing near the bodies. More than half of all incidents within a hundred miles of Lhasa were accompanied by such papers, and all of those at which the women had been seen. None of them had the same wording, but they were written on the same distinctive paper, a coarse, parchmentlike material used in certain Tibetan prayer books.

Shan dropped the paper onto the desk. “Manifestos? I thought they were poems.”

“What it doesn't say is that we have now identified the source of the paper for those prayer books.”

“
Peches.
They are called
peches.
”

“Whatever. Forensic analysis revealed that the paper had little grey yak hairs mixed in it. Religious Affairs has visited every monastery printing house within two hundred miles. The paper is produced only at a run-down monastery called Shetok, no more than an hour's drive north of here. This woman Dawa grew up near there. She has been on a list of suspected purbas for years.” Sung reached across and retrieved the folder. “We are confronted by a conspiracy by the damned
purbas,
comrade. If Deng was marked for murder—”

“If?” Shan interrupted. “Meaning you at least admit you can't account for him?”

Sung ignored him. “If he were marked for murder, it obviously would have been by the
purbas.
Their conspiracy involves at least forty deaths, probably many more. A conspiracy against the motherland. Some might call it war, except the fools are just killing themselves.”

The words twisted in Shan's gut. This was the only way Tibetans could fight a war. “Attending suicides is not an act of murder.”

“Don't be a fool. Murder. Abetting murder. Manslaughter. Treason. Playing with matches. I don't care what the legal scholars want to call it. When they are caught, we'll just call it a bullet in the head.”

*   *   *

The crow watched Longtou Prison like a sentinel, its head turning with the back-and-forth movement of the guards on the wall. It had joined Shan not long after he lowered himself onto a rock a quarter mile from the prison. Even at such a distance, Shan knew he risked being intercepted, but nonetheless he dropped into the shadow of an outcropping. He wanted to be close enough to see figures at the gates, to smell the ever-present prison stench, to hear familiar commands barked over loudspeakers. It made him feel closer to Lokesh.