The Chinese Puzzle

by John Creasey

  Would they risk being identified? Would murder worry them, or would they kill him as deliberately and slowly as they had already drawn him under water?

  If he hesitated for too long, that would be suspicious; if he simply denied being a “friend of Mannering” they might disbelieve him. What had Li Chen said? “Between the Devil and the Deep Sea.”

  Mannering was staring at the nearer man, still not decided, when a thudding sound came not far away, followed by a crash as of breaking wood, and another thud. The two men sprang to their feet and swung towards the door, as the crashing and the thudding continued.

  Someone was trying to break down the bedroom door.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Once A Policeman …

  Mannering could not move because his wrists and ankles were tied; the best he could do was keep his head above water. The strain on his neck made even that difficult, if he had to stay in this position for too long, it would be impossible. He was completely at the mercy of these two men. They could turn him round, push his face under water until he drowned; or they could use a knife; or they could bludgeon him about the head. He saw a bludgeon in one man’s hands, knobbed, murderous-looking. It was the one who had raided Li Chen’s.

  The thudding and the banging continued, the floor shook and the walls reverberated. It lasted only a matter of seconds and yet to Mannering it seemed like hours. What would they do? His mind was split between the glory of hope and the dread of death. Then the man with the bludgeon jumped forward, out of the room, talking in that clacking voice, like a Donald Duck. Mannering had no idea what he was saying but they were both out of the bathroom, they were leaving him unhurt. He craned his neck even more; there was a streak of pain from the back of his head halfway down his spine, but it did not prevent him from watching.

  The first man flung up a window; the second climbed through it, nimble as a goat, and the other followed. That wall was sheer. The only hope they had was to climb from window sill to window sill, and if they slipped it would be the end. He saw a pair of legs dangling, and realised that they were going upwards, to the roof.

  The legs disappeared.

  Another, louder, crash was followed by a short, groaning kind of quiet; then footsteps sounded, of men running into the bedroom. An Englishman called out: “The window!” After a flurry of footsteps, he and two Chinese policemen appeared at the window, and one of the Chinese began to climb out. Other footsteps followed, and a man glanced into the bathroom. On that instant the strain at Mannering’s neck became too great, and he sank down. Water surged over his mouth and nose, he gulped, and began to choke. He struggled convulsively for a moment, but stopped when hands touched him firmly, and a man said sharply: “Stop jumping about!” He lay still as the speaker gradually raised him up, so that not only his head but his shoulders were above water. There was so much water in his eyes that he could not see clearly, and the water in his ears made it impossible to distinguish the voice, but he was raised gently out of the water, right out of the bath, then carried into the bedroom and put down at full length on a bed.

  The danger was past, and he could breathe freely again.

  He felt the cords at his wrists part. Pins and needles began to prickle through his hands and forearms, but not enough to harass him much. The cords at his ankles were cut next. Someone dried his head and face with a towel, and his vision as well as his hearing cleared enough for him to recognise the face and voice of the English detective from Police Headquarters who looked so like William Bristow.

  “There’s no reason at all why you shouldn’t know what happened, Mr. Mason,” said the detective. “We didn’t believe your story, particularly the explanation of your chance visit to the Li Chens’ shop. A lot of peculiar things have happened to the Li Chens lately, and a number of American citizens have been trying to get their goods out of his store, where they don’t think they’re safe. We think you went there to try to remove your own goods, or on behalf of someone else in the United States. We’re very interested in Li Chen’s business, and we don’t like armed robbery or violence anywhere on the Colony. So we had you watched. When you came up to your room we felt that you were safe enough, but in fact the two assailants came in by the staff entrance, overpowered the floor and room boys and tied them up, leaving them in a service room. They were traced by another boy who came looking for them, and the alarm was raised. I think you can consider yourself lucky.”

  “The luckiest,” Mannering said, fervently. “Just one thing, Captain—”

  “Chief Inspector Lovelace.”

  “Just one thing, Chief Inspector. I don’t know a way of telling you how grateful I am.”

  Lovelace grinned. In fact he was not only bigger but better looking than Bristow, and his eyes crinkled attractively at the corners.

  “That’s what Charles Li Chen felt about you, according to his statement. It’s becoming quite a chain of gratitude. I’m glad I could help, but I was just being a policeman. There’s one thing you can do to say ‘thanks’ and show that you mean it.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Tell me the truth about your presence in Hong Kong.” Mannering looked at Lovelace levelly, but did not answer at once. He was now sitting in an armchair, with a lightweight dressing-gown over pyjamas. He was pleasantly warm, and but for the burning sensation at his wrists and ankles and soreness at his mouth and nose, he felt well enough. He had seen himself in the mirror. His upper and lower lips, almost to the nose and chin, were puffy and spotted with globules of blood where the plaster had been pulled away so roughly, but there were no other outward evidences of the ordeal. As far as he could judge he was still more like James C. Mason, in appearance, than John Mannering. Lovelace did not seem to doubt that he was an American, which was the best possible tribute to his accent.

  Lovelace shrugged. “Well, I can’t make you tell me, but you’d be wise for your own sake as well as Li Chen’s. Think it over, will you?”

  “Sure,” said Mannering. “Don’t get sore, Chief Inspector, I’ve good reasons for keeping my own counsel. I’ve a message of introduction to Commissioner Brabazon, and I’ll present that today and talk to him. I imagine he will want me to talk to you immediately after that.”

  “You couldn’t be the F.B.I., could you?”

  “No,” said Mannering, “I couldn’t.” He smiled. “But I could be a man who needs a fire-arm.”

  Lovelace laughed. Judging from his manner, nothing was likely to disturb his composure, and there was something most attractive about his easy yet laconic manner. He stood up from the foot of the bed on which the little turquoise Buddha still squatted, undisturbed, as men approached along the passage. A policeman on duty outside the door admitted them, and two Chinese police officers came in. Studying their faces, Mannering marvelled at the difference between them and the contrast between them and the two attackers. It was almost incredible that he had thought it hard to tell Chinese individuals apart.

  “Did you get them?” Lovelace asked.

  “No, sir. They escaped very quickly down a ventilator shaft into Middle Street, and then Peking Road swallowed them up. But we have many fingerprints.”

  “Not much use until we’ve nobbled them,” remarked Lovelace. “Well, it can’t be helped. Do you think you could give us a clear description, Mr. Mason? Not just that they were yellow-faced, slit-eyed, and had distended nostrils?”

  Mannering chuckled; he liked this man.

  “One of them was as faceless as that but the real villain wasn’t, Chief Inspector. Now let me see what I can recall. His right eye was slightly higher than his left and looked slightly smaller, as if it was deformed at birth or else as the result of an operation in childhood. I didn’t notice any scar. He had a small mouth, and one corner of his upper lip – the left-hand corner – was ridged, as if he’d once been burned there and the burn had not properly healed. He had a longer face than most of the Chinese I’ve seen, and his cheek-bones were not so prominent as most of them.” He was
aware of the policemen as well as Lovelace staring at him in surprise; at least he had managed to shake the detective’s nonchalance. When he had finished, Lovelace turned to his men.

  “You heard that. Go and get the description circulated at once.” As the men turned away, he looked back at Mannering with a smile, and said: “Not F.B.I.?”

  “No, sir,” Mannering said firmly. “Not now, not any time. Now you can tell me something. Will this get into the newspapers or on the air?”

  “In a very nebulous way,” Lovelace said. “An apartment at the Peninsular was entered and the occupant robbed. Is that all you want?”

  “It’s certainly everything.”

  “When do you want to see Sir Hugh?”

  “Who did you say?”

  “Sir Hugh Brabazon.”

  “Now I understand you, the Police Commissioner,” said Mannering. He should have remembered that Brabazon had been knighted in the last Honours List, but ignorance would probably make him seem even more convincingly American. “What would be a good time? What time do you have right now?” He looked across at his wrist-watch, on the dressing-table.

  “Just after seven,” said Lovelace. “You couldn’t have chosen a worse night.”

  “Why not?”

  “The American Consul-General is giving a reception on board the aircraft-carrier in the harbour,” Lovelace told him. “As he and Sir Hugh are close friends, Sir Hugh will stay throughout the evening. But as an American citizen you will be welcome to the reception, and I shall be on duty there. If you need any help in presenting that message of introduction, call on me.” He gave that rather lazy and attractive smile, and took a small linen bag from his pocket; a manilla envelope was tied to it. “Not that I think you’ll need anything but this. Here’s your permit to carry a gun, and here’s your gun back. We decided that anyone who had taken a chance by helping Li Chen would need something to protect himself with, and it appears we were right.”

  He turned towards the door, leaving the package on the bed where he had been sitting. Mannering allowed him to reach the door, and then called: “Lovelace.”

  Lovelace half turned. “Yes?”

  “How serious is the threat to the Li Chens and their shop?”

  “It is very serious.”

  “Can’t you put a guard on their premises day and night?”

  “We already have a guard,” Lovelace told him. “Two men were watching there this afternoon, but they made the mistake of rushing after the man who threw a hand-grenade case at the window, and the real attack came from two men who were on foot. If you want to know more about the situation, talk to Sir Hugh.” He nodded, and went out; and this time Mannering did not call him back.

  Instead, Mannering leaned back in the chair, staring at the ceiling, and the top of the window against which a red neon sign was flashing. It was dark outside but for the artificial light; night had dropped very quickly. There were the usual noises of traffic, an occasional hoot from a ship at sea, once a shrill train whistle, but he was only half aware of these things. He was warm, snug, and alive; and that was something to be deeply grateful for. He did not know whether the men would have killed him, and he would never know. It was worth assuming that anything else which happened here would be acutely dangerous. The police were highly competent – that was a good thing to know – and yet there remained this danger to the Li Chens, which the police seemed so powerless to prevent. The whole situation was puzzling, even bewildering; and the best chance of learning more about it lay in Sir Hugh Brabazon.

  Mannering wondered if he would pass at the American Consulate as an American; that would be the ultimate test.

  He got up, cautiously. His shoulders ached, and there was a red-hot pain at the back of his neck where it had been pressed forward by the bath. He massaged it gently and gingerly, inspecting his puffy lips as he did so. He washed them as gently as he could and rubbed in a vanishing-cream-based salve; when he had finished he looked better. He went to his hanging travel robe in the wardrobe; it was empty, but all of his clothes were hanging, one of the room boys had been busy. His suitcase had been unpacked, too.

  His heart began to beat faster with a new kind of anxiety. In that case there had been his make-up box, everything he needed to make-up and to cleanse his face and reassume his real identity. He picked the black moroccan-leather case up. It should be locked. He tried the catch, and it opened easily; it had been cleverly and neatly forced. He stood very still as he looked down at it, and then lifted out the top tray, which had most of the paints; underneath was another section containing gum, hair, false eyelashes, cheek pads, even rubber sheaths to work over his teeth to alter their shape and colour. In this compartment he kept his British passport as John Mannering, and his letters of credit.

  The letters of credit were gone; so had the passport.

  Did that mean that Lovelace had searched and found it? Or had the two assailants taken it before they had come to question him? If they had, then they knew his true identity.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The Reception

  No doubt it was partly delayed shock from the attack, and partly it was the fault of understanding just how dangerous this made his own predicament. Whatever the reason, Mannering felt a wave of weakness which ran through his body from his knees to his head. He sat down heavily in the nearest chair, with the make-up case in his hands. A tube of flesh-coloured grease-paint, loosened when he had moved the top tray, slipped and fell. He did not attempt to pick it up. After a few minutes he realised that he needed a drink, above everything else; something to stimulate him. He looked pale and felt very shaky as he pressed the service bell. Wraith-like, the room boy appeared. Mannering saw that his right eye was swollen, and his lip cut; yet the man had not said a word of complaint and had behaved as if nothing had happened.

  “You require something, sir?”

  “A whisky and soda, in a hurry,” Mannering said.

  “One glass, sir, or a bottle of whisky and some bottles of soda water?”

  “I’ll have the bottles. Haig.”

  “Very good, sir.” He bowed his way backwards to the door and went out; the door closed with a snap. Mannering, rather better now that he was on his feet again, went to the window and looked out.

  He would not have believed it possible that any sight could draw the tension and the weakness out of him, thrusting him into a mood of complete oblivion except the scene before his eyes. Yet the scene which confronted him did exactly that. There was a myriad of lights of every conceivable colour, sharp and clear against the dark water and the dark-blue starlit sky. Every shade, every hue, every contrast stretched out in front of him, and as far as the eyes could see. There were not only the lights in the tall buildings across the water on Hong Kong Island, and the lights in the houses and on the streets of the peak; there were the moving lights on the water, some like giant fireflies, some like moving beacons: lights from the ferries, the junks, the sampans, the warships in the harbour, some of them gaily dressed, in festive mood. He had not seen ships illuminated by coloured lights and floodlights since the victory celebrations after the war. It was not only the beauty of the colouring, it was the speed of the movement everywhere, and most of the moving lights seemed to converge on the largest of the warships, the Chesapeake, a carrier of the United States Navy. It looked sombre and grey against the brightness and the beauty of the afternoon scene. He was still watching this, not quite believing it was real, when there was a tap at the door. He turned round. “Come in.”

  The room boy was already halfway in, with a tray, ice, Scotch whisky, soda water, and two glasses. Why two? The boy deposited the tray on a table near a luxurious armchair, stood back, and bowed.

  “Everything all right, sir?”

  “Yes, fine, thanks. What do they call you?” Mannering asked.

  “I beg pardon?”

  “What’s your name?”

  “My name, sir, is Wang Lu.”

  “Did they hurt you much this a
fternoon?”

  “Not very much, sir, only a little. Not so much as they hurt you. I wish to say I am very sorry I allowed it to happen, sir. I was not careful. I hope you will accept my apology, please.” He looked both anxious and pathetic as he spoke.

  “Wang, you don’t have to apologise to me,” Mannering said. “I brought it on your head and I’m very sorry about it. Wouldn’t you like some time off, so as to take it easy?”

  “No, sir, I am perfectly all right, thank you. Is there anything more?”

  “Not a thing,” said Mannering, but as Wang began a dignified kind of shuffle back, he changed his mind. “Oh, yes, there is. Do you happen to know where the American Consul’s reception is being held tonight?”

  “Of course, sir. Reception is on board big American ship, aircraft-carrier Chesapeake. You are to go, sir?”

  “Yes.”

  “I will put out your clothes—”

  “It’s all right,” Mannering said. “I’ll do it.”

  “Please sit down and have drink, sir, and I will put out your clothes. It is all right not to have dinner suit, many air travellers do not have one these days.” Wang Lu sounded as if he disapproved of that. “I clean shoes,” he announced after spreading out the suit, a clean shirt, a bow tie, and two handkerchiefs. “Reception go on to midnight, there is no hurry.”

  He went out.

  Mannering felt the whisky gradually warming and comforting his body, but it made the back of his head throb even more than before, and he began to wonder whether it had been wise to drink. His headache was very bad indeed when he was dressed except for his shoes. He took three aspirins – Lorna always made sure that he had some in his case – but they did not greatly help. He began to feel impatient for his shoes; Wang Lu was taking a long time.

  Five minutes passed, and Mannering began to worry in case something else had gone wrong, but it had not. Wang Lu came back with the shoes shining like polished ebony; he placed them on the floor at Mannering’s feet, stood back, and said: “I arrange hotel taxi, sir. The launches for the reception leave from special pier near Star Ferry. Taxi take you straight to the pier. Please, you do not forget your passport, it is very important at receptions.”