The Hua Shan Hospital Murders

by David Rotenberg

  The meeting room smelled of pungent cigarette smoke. Fong instinctively reached for his pack of Kents. But they weren’t there. He hadn’t smoked since he’d killed the assassin Loa Wei Fen in the construction pit in the Pudong. Fong cleared his throat and tossed two newspapers onto the large oval table. Instantly he was flooded with a memory of another time. Another newspaper he’d tossed on this very table. That newspaper’s headline had screamed: Dim Sum Killer at Large. Of course that had been over five years ago. Back when he still smoked Kents.

  Lily’s voice cracked his reverie with her slightly lisped English, “Talk time, short stuff.”

  That reminded Fong of yet another time – another table – another investigation. He smiled at his wife, then asked in English, “How’s our little girl?”

  “Mother mine with. Miss you, though,” Lily replied in English.

  Fong wanted to reply, “No. She misses you, Lily,” but didn’t when he saw a darkness cross the new CSU guy’s face. This was a multiple murder investigation, not a family gathering. Fong straightened his jacket, reminded himself that he had to lead all of them, not just Lily. As if he could ever really lead Lily! He turned to Wu Fan-zi, his fireman, and said in Mandarin, “You’re up.”

  The block-like man looked haggard as he shuffled his papers. He opened his mouth then decided something or other and closed it. He smiled for no discernible reason, then said, “I’ve had to ask for help on this one. With Fong’s permission I sent my preliminary results to Hong Kong and they’ve responded with an initial critique. But they don’t want to work at a distance from the investigation.”

  “What does that mean?” asked Lily drily.

  Fong sighed, then said, “They want one of their people on the investigation team.”

  “Well, they can’t have it,” snapped Lily.

  Despite the People’s Republic of China’s takeover of Hong Kong, most of the officers around the table had been raised on a steady diet of hatred for the old English Protectorate.

  “They can’t insist on being a part of this investigation, can they, Fong?” Lily asked.

  “They can and I’ve already arranged for them to send over their man.”

  Turning away from Lily’s angry face, he returned to Wu Fan-zi, “What’ve you got so far?”

  Wu Fan-zi went through the complex mathematics of the blast. They all listened carefully. Finally Wu Fan-zi stopped reciting numbers and said simply, “It was a very strong, very controlled bomb – unlike anything we’ve seen here. It’s sophisticated in both its components and its execution. Only its detonation was simple. Then,” he said, “there’s this.” He took out a plastic evidence bag and emptied out three short metal threads on the table. “Phosphorus threads,” he said. “They were around the table – in a circle. Obviously those that ignited we don’t have, although we were able to spot several that had only partially burned. The pattern is clear. A circle around the operating table.” He pushed his chair away from the table and looked at Fong. “Phosphorus makes no sense. It couldn’t be part of the bomb but it must have been scattered by the bomber. The threads are small enough that I doubt anyone working in the operating room would have noticed them.”

  “So, is there a question here, Wu Fan-zi?” asked Fong.

  “Why would he bother, Fong? Phosphorus converts energy into light so quickly that it hardly gives off any heat at all. There’s almost no force released because all the energy is immediately converted into high intensity light.”

  “So the phosphorus has nothing to do with the bomb?” Fong asked.

  “Not as far as I can tell,” replied Wu Fan-zi.

  Fong thought, “Maybe nothing to do with the bomb but definitely something to do with the bomber,” but all he chose to say was, “Okay. Let’s leave the phosphorus for now. Could the bomb have been purchased here?” asked Fong.

  Wu Fan-zi thought about that then nodded. “Yeah, it could if you have the money and the contacts. It’s rare that a white man could be so well connected in the Middle Kingdom. Shit, even if Silas Darfun were alive today he’d have a tough time getting his hands on that stuff.”

  The others gave short chortles, not real laughs.

  “What we do know is that the bomb isn’t homegrown. We’ve got a pretty tight lid on all that. Government stockpiles are cross-checked constantly and it’s almost impossible to get the kind of materials necessary to make that kind of bomb here. Just try buying a large amount of bicarbonate of soda and watch what happens. The Internet sites are all monitored and all hits are traced. Hey-ka-ka-ka-kaboom.com seems to be the biggest but there’s seldom anything they get by us. The site has, in fact, been extremely cooperative – don’t ask me why. Besides, even if you ordered something from the Internet it still has to be delivered and we have that covered too. So that leaves us with an importer. My guess is the bomb came across the Russian frontier. But I doubt if it was Russian. They were never very clever with explosives. They always left that to the Czechs.”

  “And the Bosnians,” added the CSU guy.

  “True,” Wu Fan-zi responded.

  “But it would still be so much easier to find this explosive in the West – and the note was in English, wasn’t it?” asked the CSU guy.

  Fong ignored the question but asked one of his own: “Would it be hard to smuggle the bomb through airport security, Wu Fan-zi?”

  “Yeah.” Wu Fan-zi wasn’t about to supply any more information on that topic but his terse answer bespoke inside knowledge.

  “Hard or impossible?” Fong prodded.

  “Impossible, Fong.”

  The CSU guy looked away as Wu Fan-zi continued, “And the detonator, the timing device, the metal cage – all that couldn’t be smuggled in either. So it would all have to be obtained locally.”

  “So the bomber’s entire kit would have to be bought here?”

  “Yep,” said Wu Fan-zi, “maybe not homegrown but definitely home bought.”

  Fong turned to one of the detectives, “Start with the cage the baby was–”

  “Not a baby, Fong.” Lily’s voice was icy cold. In English she continued, “Xiao Ming is baby. This not.”

  Fong quickly translated to the men around the table. He saw clearly that they were not interested in the difference that Lily was pointing out. Lily saw their resistance and slammed her hand, palm down, on the table and then said loudly in English, “Important, this!”

  Fong both understood and didn’t understand what Lily was so upset about but now was not the time to explore it further. He looked past his wife and pointed to the young detective at her side. “Start with the cage. Someone made that thing. I want to know who.”

  The young man nodded. Fong handed him a photograph of the cage, sans fetus, and a piece of paper. “Here are the specs.” He turned to Wu Fan-zi. “What’s that metal called again?”

  “Titanium,” said the fireman.

  “Is that why it didn’t shatter – being made of this titanium metal?” asked the young detective.

  “That and its position beneath the base of the steel surgical table,” said Wu Fan-zi, then added, “and of course there was the planch.”

  “The what?”

  “The planch. This is all that’s left of it,” Wu Fanzi said, putting a badly dented very thick piece of metal plate on the table. “Some explosives can be given directionality by shaping the material. But it’s a crude method and not totally reliable. The placement of the planch adds to the accuracy. The planch forces the energy of the explosion up and out.”

  “Away from the thing in the cage,” said Lily.

  “Away from the message in the cage,” Fong corrected her none too gently.

  There was another silence, then Fong barked at the young detective, “Go!” The man quickly headed toward the door. Before he got there Fong added, “I want an update on my desk by noon tomorrow.” The man stopped, went to protest, then thought better of it as he noted the grim set of Fong’s face.

  He left, slamming the door hard
er than was absolutely necessary to close it.

  “Another happy camper,” Lily said in English.

  Fong’s textbook English couldn’t decipher the meaning of the phrase. Why was Lily inferring that the detective could be hitched to the back of an automobile or for that matter that the man was happy?

  Fong put aside these questions and turned to the CSU guy. He nodded his head. The man began his report, “All the people in the operating room left identifiable remains. The doctor, the technicians, the–”

  “Who did the hair belong to?” Fong demanded.

  The CSU guy checked his notes. “The head nurse.”

  “And the pool of blood?”

  “Hers as well but I don’t–”

  Fong cut him off again, “Nothing else from the head nurse? No bones? No body parts? No teeth?” Fong was speaking fast, clearly angry.

  “None,” said the CSU guy slowly.

  “But there were bones and body parts, teeth, and clothing from all the others?”

  “Yes, we found–”

  “Find her,” Fong shouted.

  Instantly there was chaos in the room. Cries of protest and anger over the apparent disrespect for the dead. Fong allowed the anger to crest, then as it began to fall he said simply, “She’s not dead. You three, find her.” He was pointing to a group of detectives. “Here,” he said tossing the hospital administrator’s data sheet onto the table. “Use this to start.” Then he turned to the window. As one of the detectives took the sheet the other two quickly compared notes with the new CSU man. Then the three detectives headed out. They made no effort to hide the fact that they were happy to leave the room. Once the detectives were gone, Fong turned back to the CSU guy.

  Lily had never seen Fong so angry. His words came out as little more than a hiss, “Leave your notes. You’re off the case.”

  The man glared at Fong then left the room quickly. Lily turned to Fong but before she could ask her question he spoke to those remaining in the room, “There was no way to miss the fact that the hair and blood must have been planted there. He didn’t want to know. He thought the people in that abortion surgery got what they deserved.”

  After a moment of silence one of the remaining detectives said, “Abortion is still a complicated subject.”

  Fong felt himself enveloped in dizziness, a world spinning. Fu Tsong, his first wife, dead in his arms, their unborn child on her belly. A yawning pit beneath them. Oh yes, Fong knew that abortion is a complicated subject. He knew that.

  He caught Lily’s sidelong look. No. He would not share the death of his first wife with her. “Forensics,” he snapped.

  Lily took the note that had been left behind. It had been carefully dusted then resealed in the evidence bag: THIS BLASPHEMY MUST STOP.

  Fong translated the messages for the men around the table.

  “What is blasphemy?”

  “I’ll explain later. Tell us what you found on the note, Lily.”

  “The paper is pretty standard issue bond paper. Made here. Probably in the new factory across the river in the Pudong. But there’s nothing to follow up there. The note is clean of fingerprints except for a thumb and forefinger of the guy at hospital reception. The lack of other fingerprints is rare since paper is such a good medium for prints. The ink is from a cheap disposable pen much like Fong uses. The words – are the words.” She shrugged. “I know it’s not much but it’s all I’ve got on that.”

  She pushed forward the titanium cage. “The cage was fabricated recently and with a high level of skill. Titanium is hard to work with and the welding joints can be complicated because they need such high heat. The bars are almost exactly symmetrical and the base is nearly a perfect circle. No prints. No fabric or hair traces. Not much to go on really but I’ll get a copy of this to the investigating detective.” She reached for the two newspapers on the table. “Both papers have stringers in Shanghai but there are no credits given for either the stories or the pictures. As well, there is no way of telling if the picture is of the actual cage that we found. Personally I doubt it.”

  “How could the papers get the pictures, Lily?”

  “They could have been dropped off with the stringers but we’ve checked. They both deny it. Both also deny they wrote the story. They claim the story and picture arrived at their head office in America by e-mail before the bomb went off. When the stringers confirmed the facts of the blast, their papers ran the story. There is no traceable e-mail traffic from the Middle Kingdom to these newspapers so we have to assume the e-mail came from somewhere else. This bomber could have an accomplice or he could have set his computer in America to send e-mails on a certain day to certain papers.”

  “Can e-mail do that?”

  “If you have the right software it’s no problem.”

  “How about these stringers?”

  “What about them?”

  “You believe these guys – these stringers – Lily?”

  “I do. They’re both old China hands. They both have good reason to want to stay here and therefore play by the rules.”

  “And the reason they want to stay here, Lily?”

  “One is married to a Chinese girl, the other has a weakness for Chinese women.”

  “Ah.”

  “Ah, indeed, Fong.” Lily smiled at her own cleverness.

  “Is that all, Lily?” Fong prompted her in English.

  She shot him a hard look. “Not all, Fong, and it know you!” she retorted angrily in her version of English. Her hands trembled as she opened a small transparent folder. She put on a pair of reading glasses. She didn’t look up as she read the Mandarin characters. Her voice was soft – distant – so un-Lily-like.

  “The fetus was of a seven-month-old male. Two pounds three ounces. Han Chinese. It seems to have been partially mummified. Perhaps by the blast. No matching DNA markers with known suspects or other victims. No way to tell how long ago it died–” She stopped, realizing the implication of what she had just said. If it had died it must at one time have been alive. She shook her head. Fong was frightened she might break into tears. She didn’t. “The fetus was wrapped in a flame-retardant metal sheathing with an asbestos lining – industrial strength, easy enough to find at any construction site. The lining, that is. The metal was titanium.” She turned the page and continued to read. It took five more minutes for her to complete her report – all very dry, very accurate – pretty much useless and she knew it. She closed the folder and reached for her tea. When she brought the steaming liquid to her lips her glasses misted over. It hid the tears in her eyes.

  Fong allowed a moment of silence, then said, “Find out what the hospital does with discarded fetuses.” No one moved. No one wanted that assignment.

  “They flush them or throw them in the garbage,” said Lily, her voice thickening. “I checked this morning assuming that none of the men around this table would mind if I did this part of the investigation.”

  “Thanks, Lily,” he said in English.

  “Hey, please aim do I.”

  “Right,” Fong thought but said nothing to her. He turned away from her. “You,” he said pointing to the nearest cop, “find the route between the People’s Twenty-Second Hospital and the nearest incinerator. It may even be in the hospital. Now.”

  “Fine,” said the cop getting to his feet. He strode to the door and pushed it open. A muffled “ouch” came from the other side. A stubby rat of a man poked his head around the door and smiled when he saw Fong. Then he saw Lily and he positively beamed.

  Lake Ching’s Captain Chen had come to the big city.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  THAT NIGHT

  Lily and Fong took Chen out for dinner that night in the Old City. Even as they walked toward the restaurant Fong wondered if Chen was going to get along in Shanghai. He was such a rube! He kept bobbing around to take in the sights. It made him bump into person after person – a definite no-no on Shanghai’s constantly packed streets.

  Chen apologized profusel
y in his country accent to each and every person with whom he collided. But Shanghanese are not good at accepting apologies from their country cousins and many retorted with intensely unkind descriptions of the poor man. Fortunately for Captain Chen, most of the slanders were spat out in such furiously fast and extremely idiomatic Shanghanese that it was hard for him to understand. Lily and Fong shouted back at Chen’s assailants until Chen stopped them. “Even the cat may look at the king,” he quoted.

  Fong was pretty sure this expression referred to the rights of the lowly to view their superiors, and in the realms of beauty Chen was far from being king.

  As they passed by the Jade Buddha Temple, Chen stopped. “Can I go in?”

  Fong had never been inside the popular tourist attraction that was supposed to be the “home” of the city god. “Sure,” he said.

  Inside the temple, the city seemed to slip away amid the quiet and the wafting smell of incense. Chen paid for six long sticks, knelt on the low rest in front of one of the large statues, then set the incense alight. As he bowed his head he rubbed the sticks slowly between his palms.

  Fong and Lily stood to one side. Fong looked around. Tourists with camcorders were everywhere. For a moment it occurred to Fong that it was wrong to take pictures in places like this, then he cast the thought aside. Why not, it was just a building set aside to honour superstition. He glanced back at Chen. The young man swayed slightly while he recited his prayers. As he did, it seemed to Fong that a remarkable transformation took place – the overriding clunkiness of Captain Chen gave way to an undeniable elegance. Something about the rhythm of the man’s silent recitation lent him a kind of grace.

  Fong stepped outside. The whole “thing” of the place made him feel uncomfortable. The term left out came to him but he dismissed it. For the first time in a very long time he intensely craved a cigarette.

  Chen came out shortly, with Lily at his side. Both were smiling. Fong led the way through the dank realities of the Old City. They entered a restaurant and Chen marvelled at the choices available on the menu.