The Red Pavilion

by Robert Van Gulik

  ‘Your two aquatic friends let themselves be carried away by their resentment against Wen, the rival of their boss Feng. They evidently want to cause trouble for the curio-dealer I met him tonight, he is indeed a nasty old man. I wouldn’t put it beyond him to scheme against Feng and try to replace him as warden of Paradise Island. But murder is quite a different proposition! And why should Wen want to murder the Academician, the very man whose help he was enlisting for ousting Feng? No, my friend, your two informants were contradicting themselves. And let’s not get mixed up in these local bickerings.’ He thought for a while, pensively pulling at his moustache. Then he resumed: ‘What Feng’s two men told you about the Academician’s activities during his stay here nicely completes the picture. I met the woman he killed himself for. Met her twice, worse luck!’

  After he had related the conversation on the veranda of the Red Pavilion, he added: (

  “The Academician may have been an able and learned scholar, but he can’t have been a good judge of women. Although the Queen Flower is indeed a striking beauty, at heart she is a callous, fickle creature. Fortunately she attended only the second half of the dinner. The food was excellent, I must say, and I had an interesting conversation with Tao Pan-te, and with a young poet called Kia Yu-po.’

  ‘That is the unlucky fellow who lost all his money at the tables!’ Ma Joong remarked. And in one sitting, too!’

  Judge Dee raised his eyebrows.

  ‘That’s odd! Feng told me that Kia will soon marry his only daughter!’

  ‘Well, that’s one way for a man to get his lost money back!’ Ma Joong said with a grin.

  Their palankeen was set down in front of the Hostel of Eternal Bliss. Ma Joong picked a candle up at the counter, then they crossed the courtyard and walked through the garden to the dark corridor leading to the Red Pavilion.

  Judge Dee opened the carved door of the antechamber. Suddenly he stood stock-still. Pointing at the ray of light that came from under the door of the Red Room on the left, he said in a low voice:

  ‘That’s strange! I distinctly remember that I doused the candles before leaving.’ He stooped, then added: ‘And the key I left in the lock has gone.’

  Ma Joong pressed his ear to the door. ‘Can’t hear anything! Shall I knock?’

  ‘Let’s first have a look through the window.’ They quickly went through the sitting-room out on to the veranda, and tiptoed to the barred window. Ma Joong uttered an oath.

  On the red carpet, in front of the bedstead, lay a naked woman. She was flat on her back, legs and arms stretched out, her head turned away from them.

  ‘Is she dead?’ Ma Joong asked in a whisper. ‘Her breast doesn’t move.’ The judge pressed his face to the iron bars. ‘Look, the key is in the lock!’

  ‘That makes it the third suicide in this accursed room!’ Ma Joong exclaimed worriedly.

  ‘I am not so sure it’s suicide,’ Judge Dee muttered. ‘I think I see a blue bruise on the side of her neck. Go to the office and tell the manager to fetch Feng Dai, at once! Don’t say anything about our discovery, though.’

  When Ma Joong had rushed off, the judge peered inside again. The red curtains of the bedstead were drawn open, exactly as when he had left. But next to the pillow he saw a folded-up white garment. More woman’s clothes were piled up on the nearest chair, also neatly folded. A pair of diminutive silk shoes were standing in front of the bedstead.

  ‘The poor, conceited wench!’ he said softly. ‘She was very sure of herself! And now she is dead.’

  He turned away from the window and sat down by the balustrade. Sounds of singing and laughter came drifting over from the house in the park, the party there was still in full swing. Only a few hours ago she had been standing there at the balustrade, flaunting her voluptuous body. She had been a vain and pretentious woman, yet one shouldn’t judge her too harshly, he thought. The fault lay not with her alone. The exaggerated veneration for physical beauty, the cult of carnal love, and the hectic hankering after gold that prevail in such an amusement resort must spoil a woman, giving her a distorted view of all values. The queen of the island’s flowers had been rather a pathetic person, after all.

  He was roused from his musings by the arrival of Feng Dai. He came out on the veranda accompanied by Ma Joong, the manager, and two sturdy men.

  ‘What happened, sir?’ Feng asked excitedly. Judge Dee pointed at the barred window. Feng and the manager stepped up to it. They shrank back with a gasp. The judge rose.

  ‘Tell your men to break the door open!’ he ordered the warden.

  In the antechamber Feng’s two henchmen threw themselves against the door. When it didn’t budge, Ma Joong joined their efforts. The wood round the lock splintered away and the door swung open.

  ‘Stay where you are!’ Judge Dee ordered. He stepped over the threshold and from there studied the prone figure. He couldn’t see any wound or traces of blood on Autumn Moon’s smooth white body. But she must have died in a terrible manner for he saw now that her face was horribly distorted, the glazed eyes were bulging from their sockets.

  He went into the room and squatted down by the side of the dead woman. He placed his hand under her left breast. The body was still warm, the heart must have ceased beating not so long ago. He closed the eye-lids, then examined her throat. On either side were blue bruises. Someone must have throttled her, but there were no marks of fingernails. He went over the perfect body. There were no other signs of violence, only a few long, thin scratches on her forearms. They looked quite recent, and he was certain those hadn’t been there when he saw her practically naked on the veranda. He turned the corpse over, but the shapely back showed no marks of any kind. Finally, he scrutinized her hands. The long, carefully tended fingernails were intact. Under them he found only bits of fluff from the red carpet.

  He rose and surveyed the room. There were no signs of a struggle. He motioned the others to come inside, and said to Feng Dai:

  ‘It’s clear what brought her here, after our dinner. Apparently she had expected to pass the night with me in order to start a liaison. She had been under the mistaken impression that Magistrate Lo would buy her out, and when she found she had been wrong, she decided that I might do as well. “While she was waiting for me here, something happened. For the time being we’ll call it accidental death, for as far as I can see nobody could have entered this room. Tell your men to remove the body to your office, for the autopsy. Tomorrow morning I shall deal with this case at the court session. Summon Wen Yuan, Tao Pan-te and Kia Yu-po to appear there too.’

  When Feng had left, Judge Dee asked the manager: ‘Did you or anyone else see her enter the hostel?’

  ‘No, Your Honour. But there’s a short-cut from her pavilion on the plot next to ours, leading to the veranda here.’

  The judge went to the bedstead and looked up at the canopy. It was higher than usual. He tapped the wooden panels of the back wall, but found no hollow sound. He turned to the manager, who couldn’t keep his eyes off the white corpse, and snapped:

  ‘Don’t stand there and goggle! Speak up, is there any secret peephole or other queer device in this bedstead?’

  ‘Certainly not, sir!’ He looked again at the dead woman, then stammered: ‘First the Academician, now the Queen Flower, I … I can’t understand what…’

  ‘Neither can I!’ the judge cut him short. ‘What is on the other side of this room?’

  ‘Nothing, Your Honour! That’s to say, there’s no other room. Only the outer wall, and our side garden.’

  ‘Did queer things ever happen in this room before? Speak the truth!’

  ‘Never, Your Excellency!’ the manager wailed. ‘I have been in charge here more than fifteen years, hundreds of guests have stayed here and I never heard any complaints. I don’t know how …’

  ‘Fetch me your register!’

  The manager scurried away. Feng’s men came in with a stretcher. They rolled the dead woman in a blanket and carried her away.

 
In the meantime the judge had searched the sleeves of the violet robe. He found nothing but the usual brocade folder with comb and tooth-pick, a package of Autumn Moon’s visiting cards, and two handkerchiefs. Then the manager returned with a ledger under his arm. ‘Put it on the table!’ Judge Dee barked at him.

  Left alone with Ma Joong, the judge went over to the table and sat down with a tired sigh.

  His tall lieutenant took the tea-pot from its basket and poured out a cup for the judge. Pointing at the red smear on the rim of the other cup, he remarked casually:

  ‘She had a cup of tea before she died. And alone, for the second cup I just filled was quite dry.’

  The judge set the full cup down abruptly.

  ‘Pour this tea back into the pot,’ he said curtly. ‘Tell the manager to get you a sick cat or dog, and let it drink it.’

  After Ma Joong had gone, Judge Dee pulled the ledger towards him and began to leaf through it.

  Sooner than he had expected Ma Joong came back. He shook his head.

  ‘The tea was all right, sir.’

  “That’s bad! I thought that someone had perhaps accompanied her here, and put poison in the tea before he left her. And that she had drunk it after she had locked herself in. That was the only rational explanation of her death.’

  He leaned back in his chair, disconsolately tugging at his beard.

  ‘But what about the bruises on her throat, Your Honour?’

  ‘Those were only superficial, and there were no nail marks on the skin, just blue spots. They might have been caused by some poison unknown to me, but certainly not by someone trying to throttle her.’

  Ma Joong worriedly shook his large head. He asked uneasily:

  ‘What could have happened to her, sir?’

  ‘We have those long thin scratches on her arms. Of undetermined origin, just like those found on the arms of the Academician. His death and that of his mistress, both in this same Red Room, must be connected in some way or other. Strange affair! I don’t like it at all, Ma Joong.’ He thought for a while, caressing his sidewhiskers. Then he sat up straight and resumed: ‘While you were away I carefully studied the entries here in this ledger. In the past two months about thirty people have been staying in the Red Pavilion for shorter or longer periods. Now most of the entries have in the margin a woman’s name, and an additional sum of money, marked down in red ink. Do you know what that means?’

  ‘That’s simple! It means that those guests slept here with a professional girl. The amount marked indicates the commission those women had to pay to the hostel’s management.’

  ‘I see. Well, the Academician slept here on his first night, the 19th that is, with a girl called Peony. On the two following nights with Jade Flower, and on those of the 22nd and ‘23rd with a woman called Carnation. He died on the night of the 25th.’

  ‘That one wasted night got him!’ Ma Joong said with a bleak smile.

  The judge hadn’t heard the remark. He went on pensively:

  ‘Curious that Autumn Moon’s name doesn’t appear here.’

  ‘There’s always the afternoon! Some men take their tea in a rather elaborate fashion!’

  Judge Dee closed the ledger. He let his gaze wander about the room. Then he got up and walked over to the window. After he had felt the thick iron bars and checked the solid wooden frame, he remarked:

  ‘There’s nothing wrong with this window, no human being could have entered the room through it. And we can rule out any other hocus-pocus with this window too, for she was lying more than ten feet away from it; she fell backwards facing the door, not the window. Her head was turned slightly to the left, towards the bedstead.’ He shook his head dejectedly and resumed : ‘You had better go now and have a good night’s rest, Ma Joong. I want you to go to the landing stage tomorrow morning at dawn. Try to locate the captain of Feng Dai’s junk, and let him tell you all about the collision of the two boats. Make also discreet inquiries about the meeting of the Academician and the curio-dealer that, according to your two pumpkin-raising friends, took place there. I’ll examine that bedstead again, then go to sleep too. Tomorrow we’ll have a busy day.’

  ‘You aren’t going to sleep here in this room, sir’ Ma Joong asked, aghast.

  ‘Of course I will!’ the judge said peevishly. ‘That’ll give me a chance to verify whether there’s really something wrong here. You can go now and find yourself a lodging. Good night!’

  Ma Joong thought a moment of protesting, but when he saw Judge Dee’s determined expression he realized that it would be useless. He bowed and took his leave.

  The judge stood himself in front of the bedstead, his hands clasped behind his back. He saw that the thin silk cover of the bedmat showed some creases. Feeling them with his forefinger, he found they were slightly damp. He stooped and smelled the pillow. There was the musk scent he had noticed in the courtesan’s hair when she was sitting next to him during the dinner.

  It was easy to reconstruct the first phase. She had entered the Red Pavilion by the veranda, probably after a brief visit to her own pavilion. She might have intended to wait for him in the sitting-room, but when she found that the key was left in the lock of the Red Room, she thought the meeting could be more effectively staged inside there. She had a cup of tea, then she took off her upper robe, folded it and laid it on the chair. After she had stripped naked, she placed her undergarment on the bedstead, next to the pillow. Sitting on the edge of the bed, she took off her shoes and put them neatly on the floor. Finally she laid herself down, waiting till she would hear him knock. She must have lain there for quite some time, her perspiring back had creased the silk cover. He couldn’t even guess at what happened next. Something must have occurred that made her leave the bed, and very calmly. For if she had jumped off in a hurry, the pillow and the cover would have been disturbed. As soon as she was standing in front of the bedstead, a terrible thing happened. He suddenly shivered when he recalled the expression of utter horror on the woman’s contorted face.

  He pushed the pillow aside and drew the silk cover away. Underneath was nothing but the bedmat of closely woven, soft reed, and under it solid wooden boards. He went to the table and took the candle. He found that, by standing on the bed, he could just reach the canopy. He tapped it with his knuckles but heard no hollow sound. Again he tapped the back wall of the bedstead, scowling at the set of small erotic pictures framed among the panelling. Then he pushed his cap back and pulled a hairpin from his top-knot. He pried with it among the grooves among the panels, without finding any deep fissure indicating a secret opening.

  With a sigh the judge stepped down to the floor. It was completely incomprehensible. Smoothing down his long beard, he again studied the bedstead. An uneasy feeling took hold of him. Both the Academician and the Queen Flower had been marked by thin, long scratches. It was a very old building, was it possible that some queer animal housed there? He remembered strange stories he had read about large …

  He quickly put the candle back on the table, and carefully shook out the bedcurtains. Then he knelt on the floor and peered under the bed. There was nothing, not even dust or cobwebs. Finally he lifted up a corner of the thick red rug. The tiled floor underneath was entirely free from dust. Evidently the room had been thoroughly swept after the Academician’s death.

  ‘Perhaps some queer beast came in from outside, through the barred window,’ he muttered. He went to the sitting-room, took his long sword from the couch where Ma Joong had deposited it, and stepped out on the veranda. He prodded with the sword among the overhanging clusters of wistaria, then shook the mass of leaves vigorously. Clouds of blue blossoms came drifting down, but that was all.

  Judge Dee went back to the Red Room. He pushed the door shut, and drew the centre table up against it. Then he loosened the sash round his waist and took off his upper robe. Having folded it up he put it on the floor, in front of the dressing-table. He quickly verified that the two candles would last through what was left of the night, then placed
his cap on the table. He stretched himself out on the floor, his head on his folded robe, his right hand on the hilt of the drawn sword by his side. He was a light sleeper, he knew that the slightest noise would wake him.

  Chapter 6

  AFTER MA JOONG had said goodnight to the judge, he went to the hall of the hostel, where half a dozen waiters stood huddled together, discussing the tragedy in hushed voices. He grabbed an intelligent looking youngster by his arm and told him to show him the kitchen entrance.

  The boy took him outside in the street and to a bamboo door in the fence to the left of the gatehouse. When they had gone inside there was on the right the blind outer wall of the hostel compound, on the left a neglected garden. From the door farther along in the wall came the sound of clattering platters and running water.

  “That’s the entrance of our kitchen,’ the waiter said. ‘We had a very late dinner, over in the right wing.’

  ‘Walk on!’ Ma Joong ordered.

  Near the corner of the compound they found their progress barred by a dense, low shrubbery, overhung with clusters of wistaria. Ma Joong parted the branches, and saw a flight of narrow wooden steps, leading up to the left end of the veranda of the Red Pavilion. Below the steps was a path, overgrown with weeds.

  ‘That leads to the back entrance of the Queen Flower’s pavilion,’ the waiter remarked, looking over Ma Joong’s shoulder. ‘That’s where she receives her favourite admirers. It’s a cosy place, beautifully furnished.’

  Ma Joong grunted. With some difficulty he struggled through the dense shrubbery till he reached a thinner patch in front of the veranda. He could hear Judge Dee moving about in the Red Room. Turning round to the waiter, who was following close behind him, he laid his finger on his lips, then quickly searched the bushes. As an experienced woodsman he hardly made any sound. When he had verified that no one was hiding there, he moved on till he came out on a broad road.

  ‘This is the main road of the park,’ the youngster explained. ‘If we keep to the right, we come out on the street again, on the other side of our hostel.’