The Runner (The China Thrillers 5)

by Peter May

  The boy appeared embarrassed. ‘You take rest. Not far now.’

  Suddenly, and quite unexpectedly, a tear in the clouds released a flood of silver light from a full moon, and the Forbidden City lit up all around them, eerie in its deserted silence, a bizarre, secret and empty place at the heart of one of the world’s most populous capitals. The falling snow was swept away on an equally sudden breath of wind, leaving the air clear and still for just a moment before it resumed its steady descent. Their footprints in the square below were an alarming betrayal of their passing there. An engraved notice on a stand beside the copper pot where Margaret leaned revealed that there were three hundred and eight of them in the palace grounds. They had been used to hold water in case of fire. During the winter, fires had been lit under them to keep the water from freezing. No doubt increasing the risk of fire, was the absurd thought that flitted through Margaret’s mind.

  She looked ahead, through the next gate, and saw yet another hall, on yet another terrace, and regretted her decision to go with the boy. But she had come too far to turn back now.

  ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Let’s go. But not so fast.’

  The boy nodded, and they set off again, at a more sedate pace. From the terrace of the Qianqing Palace, Margaret could see beyond the walls of the Forbidden City to the lights of Beijing. People were going about their normal lives out there. People in shops and homes and restaurants, people in cars and buses and on bikes. Normal people who saw only the high grey walls of the Forbidden City as they passed and had no idea that there were people in there. People in hiding, people in distress. People in danger.

  A sign with an arrow pointed beyond a tall bronze bird and a giant tortoise to the Hall of Ceramics, and Lili’s brother took Margaret’s arm as they carefully negotiated the steps down into an ancient alleyway, and through a gate into a courtyard. They passed the red shuttered windows of a tourist shop advertising souvenirs, and the carving of names on chopsticks. Ceramic roofs dipped and soared above the high walls of narrow streets, rows of pillars cast shadows in covered galleries.

  Chu Xiu, the Palace of Gathering Excellence, was built around a quiet courtyard with tall conifers in each corner casting shadows in the moonlight across the snow-covered pavings. Margaret’s legs were turning to jelly as she dragged herself into the enclosure. She had suffered several cramps now, and her apprehension was starting to turn to fear. ‘I can’t go any further,’ she gasped.

  ‘Lili here,’ her brother said. ‘No go any further.’ And he took her gently by the arm and guided her across the courtyard, past statues of dragons and peacocks, and up steps to the terrace of the long, low pavilion where the concubine and Empress Dowager Cixi had once lived, and given birth to an emperor.

  He whispered loudly in the darkness, and after a moment, Margaret heard a whispered response from inside the pavilion. There were several more exchanges before the door creaked open a crack, and Margaret saw Lili’s frightened face caught in the moonlight, her birthmark like a shadow across her left cheek. She motioned quickly for Margaret to come in. ‘I wait out here,’ her brother said. And Margaret brushed past him, still out of breath, and squeezed into the ancient imperial dwelling.

  Inside, pillars and painted beams, ceramic tiles, an ornamental throne, were brushed in shadow. The only light came from a tiny oil lamp which cast flickering illumination upon a very small circle of Lili’s things. A sleeping bag, a pillow, a sports hold all spilling clothes from its gaping top. There were some books, a cardboard box with cans of fruit and empty noodle cartons, a canvas chair, and a small paraffin heater which made no impression on the bone-jarring cold of this utterly inhospitable place.

  Margaret took Lili’s hands in hers. They were colder than the corpses that passed through her autopsy room. Margaret said, ‘You’ve been living here?’

  Lili nodded. ‘Hiding.’

  ‘In God’s name why? What from?’

  ‘They kill me if they find me,’ she babbled. ‘I know when I hear about Sui that I am next. I’ve been so scared for weeks. Everyone dying. And they did it to me, too. I know I am going to die.’ Sobs were breaking her voice into almost indecipherable pieces.

  ‘Woah,’ Margaret said. ‘Slow down. If I’m going to understand, you must start at the beginning.’ She steered her towards the seat and drew the paraffin heater close, and then draped the sleeping bag around the girl’s shoulders to try to stop her shivering.

  ‘I want to tell you before,’ she said. ‘But it too dangerous.’

  Their voices seemed tiny, lost in the rafters of this dark place, whispering among the ghosts of history, the imperial concubines who had once known it as home.

  ‘From the beginning,’ Margaret encouraged her gently.

  Lili took a deep, trembling breath. ‘They came the first time maybe six, seven months ago.’

  ‘Who are “they”?’

  ‘I don’t know. Men. Men in suits, men with cars and money. They take me to fancy restaurant and say they can make me big winner. And I make big money.’ She looked at Margaret, with a pleading in her eyes for understanding. ‘But I no wanna make big money. Only be good as my sister.’ And her eyes dipped towards the floor. ‘But, she sick. Can’t run no more. Medical costs ve-err expensive.’ She looked at Margaret, appealing her innocence. ‘I no greedy girl, lady I only say yes for my sister. So I can pay for her. Everything.’

  Margaret crouched down beside her and squeezed her arm. ‘I believe you, Lili. I’m on your side.’

  ‘I say no drug. They say no drug. Minor – physical – adjustment. That is what they say.’ She had trouble saying it herself in English. ‘Minor – physical – adjustment. That is all.’ She clutched Margaret’s hand. ‘They tell me it is safe. There are others. And they tell me some names. I know them, because they are big names. All winning. They tell me I can be big name, too. I am good, but I can be better.’

  ‘Who were the other names?’

  ‘Xing Da. He big hero of me. And Sui Mingshan. They say there are others, but they no tell me. But I know in time. Because from little winners they are all become big winners. Again, and again. So I know, or I can guess.’

  ‘When you agreed to these … minor physical adjustments, what happened then?’

  Lili shook her head miserably. ‘I don’t know, lady. They take some blood from me, and then a week later, maybe ten days, they come and take me to apartment downtown. They put me in a room and I sit and wait for lo-ong time. Then man come in. Foreign man.’

  ‘White hair? Beard?’

  Lili looked at Margaret with astonishment, and then perhaps a little fear. ‘How you know this?’

  ‘He’s been hurting athletes all his life. He’s a bad man, Lili. We’re going to get him.’ Margaret paused. ‘What did he do to you?’

  Lili shrugged. ‘He give me jab.’ She patted the top of her left arm. ‘That’s all.’

  ‘An injection?’

  Lili nodded. ‘Then he say someone else explain, and he leave.’

  ‘Explain what?’

  ‘How it work.’ She corrected herself. ‘How I make it work.’

  They heard a dull thud from out in the courtyard, and they both froze in the tiny circle of light that marked the boundary of their world. It sounded to Margaret like snow falling from a roof, but she couldn’t be sure. She leaned over and extinguished the oil lamp, and they were plunged into total darkness. Lili clutched her arm.

  ‘What is it?’ she whispered.

  ‘Shhh.’ Margaret had put her finger to her lips before she realised the futility of the gesture. Lili could not see her in the dark. They waited for several minutes, listening intently. But there was no further sound. Slowly, Margaret eased herself up into a standing position. One of her knees cracked and it sounded absurdly loud in the absolute still. The black which had smothered her eyes like a mask had turned to grey, and she realised that from somewhere there was a little moonlight seeping into the pavilion. Pillars and statues began to take the faintest shape in
the deepest gloom, and she made her way carefully to the door. Lili followed, a tiny cold hand clutching at her coat in case she lost her. Margaret eased the door open a crack and peered out into the dazzling moonlight. Finally, the snow had stopped. The courtyard was empty. She saw the footprints she and Lili’s brother had left in the snow, tracking across the courtyard to the pavilion, and then stopping where they had stepped up on to the veranda. And then his footsteps again when Margaret had gone inside, and he had wandered back down into the square. They headed off towards the south-west corner, and into the deep shadow cast by the long, low building that bounded the south side.

  ‘Can you see Solo,’ Lili whispered.

  ‘Solo?’ Margaret glanced at her, confused.

  ‘My brother. Is his nickname.’

  ‘No, he’s not there. But I can see his footsteps heading across the courtyard. He must be sheltering in the gallery over there. I can’t see him, though.’

  ‘I’m scared,’ Lili whispered.

  ‘Me, too,’ Margaret said. ‘Let’s go find him.’ And as the words left her mouth, darkness fell across the courtyard as the sky closed up above them and shut out the moon. ‘Shit!’ she muttered. ‘Get the lamp, Lili.’

  Lili scuttled across the flagstones to retrieve the oil lamp. ‘I light it?’

  ‘It would help if we could see where we were going. We’ll find your brother and go straight to the police.’

  ‘No police!’ Lili said, alarmed.

  ‘Section Chief Li will not let anyone harm you. You have my promise on that,’ Margaret whispered. But she saw the doubt in Lili’s face as the girl lit the lamp and they both blinked in its sudden brightness. And then a sharp cramp made Margaret gasp.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Lili said urgently.

  Margaret put a hand to her belly and found herself breathing rapidly. ‘Nothing.’ she said quickly. And she took the lamp. ‘Come on, let’s go.’ She forced herself to straighten up and pull the door wider so that they could slip out on to the terrace.

  The lamp did not cast its light very far across the courtyard, and its brightness made everything else beyond its range seem even darker. Lili held Margaret’s arm with both hands, and they made their way across the snow, following the footprints which led towards the far side. Suddenly Margaret stopped, and fear touched her like cold hands on hot skin. Two more sets of footprints converged on Solo’s, coming from the left. They must have come up behind him, soundless as ghosts in the snow. There had been a scuffle. Margaret felt Lili’s grip tighten on her arm, and she swung around to her right, and by the light of the lamp they saw Solo lying in the snow, face up, a wide grin across his throat where it had been cut from ear to ear. He was covered in blood which had gouted in great loops across the snow, deep vivid red against the white, as his heart had pumped desperately to compensate for the sudden fall in pressure, only to hasten the blood loss from his severed jugular. Death had been swift and silent.

  Lili screamed then, a shrill, feral scream that split the night air, and the shadows of men came at them out of the darkness. Margaret saw a face, pale and tense, caught for a fleeting moment in the light of the lamp as she swung it hard at the leading figure. It appeared to explode against him, oil igniting as it splashed over him through broken glass. In a matter of seconds his whole upper body was alight, his hair, his face. He howled in agony, spiralling away across the courtyard.

  By the light of the flames engulfing him, Margaret saw two other men, frozen for a moment in horror as they saw their friend on fire. All thoughts of the women vanished as they dived towards him then, knocking him over to roll him in the snow, desperately trying to extinguish the flames and stop his screams. Margaret grabbed Lili’s hand. ‘Run!’ she hissed, and the two women set off in fear and panic, sprinting across the flagstones in the long gallery and out into the snow of a narrow street that ran north and south. Margaret’s instinct was to head back for the Donghua gate where Solo had led her into the Forbidden City only half an hour before. She pulled on Lili’s arm and they turned south and ran, slithering down the street, alleyways leading off to their right at regular intervals into obscured courtyards. The sky to the south was orange, low clouds reflecting the floodlights in Tiananmen Square. The roofs of palaces and pavilions curled their dark shapes in silhouette against it.

  Behind them, they heard the voices of men shouting, and Margaret knew she could never outrun them, even if Lili could. The cramps in her stomach were coming frequently, and were sharply painful. She put a protecting arm around the swelling of her child and feared the worst.

  Lili was the stronger of them now, half pulling her up the steps towards the vast open space that lay before the Qianqing Gate. They ran across the terrace, hemmed in by shadowy figures which, as confusion cleared, Margaret realised were the marble pillars of the balustrade that marked its boundary. The voices of their pursuers sounded very close behind them.

  Margaret stopped, almost doubled up in pain. ‘I can’t go on,’ she gasped. ‘I just can’t.’

  ‘We hide,’ Lili whispered urgently. ‘Quick.’ And she pulled Margaret into the shadow of the gate.

  ‘Where? There’s nowhere to hide.’

  ‘In pot,’ Lili said. And Margaret saw that a huge copper pot flanked each side of the entrance to the gate, the reservoirs once used to guard against fire. She allowed herself to be dragged towards the fence around the nearer of the pots, and with a great effort she clambered over it. Lili helped her up over the lip of the pot, enormous strength in such small hands, and she dropped down into its echoing darkness to crouch in the snow that was gathered in the bottom of it. She heard the patter of Lili’s feet as she scuttled across the terrace to the other side. And then silence. Except for her breathing, which was hard and fast and painful, and deafening in this confined space.

  For a long time she heard nothing. The voices that had pursued them were no longer calling in the dark. And then she remembered their footprints, almost at the same time as a shadow loomed over the lip of the pot above her and grabbing hands reached in. She heard Lili scream from across the terrace.

  II

  Li rode up in the elevator to the eleventh floor. He was cold and miserable and frustrated. No one seemed to know where Fleischer was. It was possible he had already left the country. And the response to their appeal for information on Dai Lili had been poor. People were still afraid of the police in China, and did not want to get involved.

  He had no idea whether or not his letter of resignation had made it on to the desk of Commissioner Hu Yisheng, but as yet there had been no response. Not that it mattered now, anyway. However the situation was concluded, its resolution would not be a happy one. All he wanted was to lie with Margaret, sharing their warmth and their child and whatever happiness they could muster. But he knew that, too, was impossible, with her mother a constant presence in her apartment, and his father a black hole in his.

  He stepped out on to the landing and took a deep breath, preparing to put a face on things for Margaret’s mother. He had to stop himself from using his key, and knocked instead. After a moment, the door flew open and Li found himself confronted by Mrs. Campbell.

  ‘What kind of hour do you call this?’ she said sharply, and then realising that Li was alone, looked up and down the hallway in surprise. ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Margaret?’

  ‘Well, who else would I be talking about?’

  ‘She’s not here?’ Li asked, perplexed.

  ‘Would I be asking you if she was?’ Mrs. Campbell snapped.

  Mei Yuan appeared behind her. ‘You’d better come in, Li Yan. We’ve been waiting for her for more than two hours.’

  Mrs. Campbell reluctantly stepped aside to let Li into the apartment. He said, ‘She had an antenatal class tonight.’ He looked at his watch. ‘She should have been back ages ago.’

  ‘What have we just been telling you?’ Mrs. Campbell said impatiently.

  Li pushed into the sitting room and snatched the phone an
d dialled the switchboard at Section One. When the operator answered he said, ‘It’s Section Chief Li. Give me Detective Sun’s home number.’ He scribbled it on a notepad, hung up and then dialled again. After a few moments a girl’s voice answered. ‘Wen?’ he said.

  ‘Who is this?’ Wen asked cautiously.

  ‘It’s Chief Li.’ He paused. ‘Wen, was Margaret at the antenatal class tonight?’

  ‘Margaret? No,’ Wen said. ‘I was there on my own.’

  Li frowned. ‘On your own?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Sun Xi was with you.’

  ‘No.’

  Li was surprised. ‘But he asked me if he could have the time off to go with you today.’ To his dismay Wen began sobbing softly at the other end of the phone. ‘Wen? Are you alright?’ And when she didn’t answer, ‘What’s wrong?’

  Her voice was quivering when she said, ‘I can’t talk about it. I don’t want to talk about it.’ And he heard her crying aloud in the moment before she hung up.

  ‘Well?’ Margaret’s mother had been watching him critically from the doorway.

  ‘She didn’t go to her antenatal class.’ He was alarmed and puzzled by Wen’s reaction, and more than a little afraid now for Margaret. ‘She didn’t leave a note or anything?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Mei Yuan said. ‘Just her wedding outfit spread out on the bed, as if she had laid it out ready to wear.’

  Li pushed silently past the two women and up the hall to the bedroom. The sight of the qipao, the little silk slippers she had bought, and the brightly embroidered smock, all laid out on the bed with the red headscarf, tied a knot tightly in his stomach, and he felt panic rising in his chest, although he could not have said exactly why. ‘I’m going down to talk to the security guard on the gate,’ he said.

  And as he hurried out on to the landing he heard Mrs. Campbell call after him in a shrill voice, ‘You’ve lost her, haven’t you? You’ve lost my daughter!’