by Mike McKay
***
By one o'clock I feel like an icicle. In Houston, the summer nights can be quite chilly, and not even counting all the moisture from the irrigation ditches. But worst of all are the goddamn mosquitoes. They sleep all day, and come out at night. The next time I will follow the example of Greg Lestrade and wear my gun with my trousers.
“How long, do you reckon?” I whisper to Kate.
“God knows,” She whispers back, “I am afraid I've screwed-up with my version.”
We took our observation point at half past ten. My Police bike was chained in the China-Four (Kate was riding on the back, as usual). And from the Patch-Four we proceeded on-foot on the dirt paths between the endless veggie beds, fish ponds, and rice paddies. More precisely, I was on-foot. Kate was on her skate. In order not to make noise, she left her wooden blocks at home and wrapped her hands in old rags.
“What if he went through the other side?” I ask.
“I don't think he's bold enough to drag the dead body through the Patch common grounds.”
“Well. Let's do this. I sneak down the path and check. What if Lee is already at home?”
“And what do you do if he's at home?”
“I'll come back and we decide what to do next.”
“Sounds like a plan! Do you remember the shack?”
“I remember. After the communal latrines, there will be a storage shed. From the shed – the seventh shack on the left.”
“Excellent.”
It's a near-full moon, so the risk of stepping into some shit or destroying the veggie beds is null. Unfortunately, the narrow winding gap between the shacks, – something they call a footpath in these parts of the Slum – is pitch black. Good that Kate counted the shacks yesterday. I return from my scout mission almost running.
“Kate! Lee's house has a light inside. He is at home.”
“This means, Watson, your Sherlock Holmes is no damn good. Let's go see Mister Lee. Get your back ready, detective.”
We have done it many times. I squat down and pick the skate. Kate wraps her arm around my shoulders. Three minutes later, I offload her at the Chen's shack stair.
“Scratch the door. Just be quiet, or we wake up the whole Patch,” Kate whispers into my ear.
I approach the opposite door, “Mister Lee? Open up, Police.”
“It's not locked, come in,” the voice from behind the door is without a hint of surprise or fear. It turns out that our prey has been expecting us. Impatient, Kate crawls across the dirt path.
A dim LED bulb barely illuminates a foot-tall tilted desk. Mister Lee sits on the tatami floor with brush in his fingers. An intricate hieroglyph is half-finished. This part our Sherlock Holmes has guessed correctly: he is an experienced calligrapher, no questions. Unfortunately, Kate's other guesses are not as good. For starters, there is no dead body in the shack.
“Welcome, Deputy Kim. Good evening, Missis Bowen,” Lee smiles to us, “You come to get my confession, do you?”
“How do you know my name?” Kate asks.
“Oh, everybody knows you! You're a local star. Even at the 'Fill the scavengers ask once in a while: is it true in the GRS you have a legless Police girl on a skateboard?”
“And why do you think we come for your confession?”
“Strange question. Why would the Police knock on your door at half past one in the night?” As if nothing has happened, he finishes his hieroglyph with two precise brush strokes.
“I know you didn't kill anybody, Mister Lee,” Kate says, “If you are guilty, the only thing you can be charged with – is the obstruction of justice.”
“No need to make it complicated, Missis Bowen. I confess. I killed my neighbor, Mister Chen Te-Sheng. Do you want it in writing? I will sign it at once. After the sunrise, I will show you how I hid the body.”
“You hid the body in the irrigation ditch. Under a snag, yesterday – at midnight,” Kate pronounces suddenly.
“I suspected someone had seen it!” With a sigh, the host starts drying his brush, “Why did you need this body search comedy this morning? Admit, Deputy, our widow Lim didn't sleep once again, spying on the neighbors, did she?”
“Mister Lee, I know Chen Te-Sheng is alive,” Kate says.
“I don't want to disappoint you, Missis Bowen, but you're wrong. I stabbed Chen Te-Sheng with a screw-driver and I dumped the body. Victor must be released at once. The boy doesn't know anything.”
“You still don't believe me, Mister Lee?”
“Why are you frowning?”
“It's irrelevant.”
“Oh, how I did not see it earlier? You have phantom pain, do you?”
“Yes, I have it sometimes. How did you guess?”
“Your left hand is in the air. As if you are touching the missing knee. Looking at your uniform, you are a recent vet. Traumatic amputations frequently result in phantom pain.”
“Are you – a doctor?”
“I was. A psychiatrist. But I haven't practiced, at least in any official capacity, for years and years. In America, it's not easy to convert the psychiatrist's foreign diploma. I didn't do it before the Meltdown, and now – nobody cares. Have you discussed a pain management plan with your doctors?”
“There was a short session. Just before they dumped me in the port. I was told to meditate and smoke marijuana.”
“Not a bad plan. Have your smoke immediately. And I'll make you my special tea.”
Kate pulls her box and start rolling her To-Ma-Gochi, while Mister Lee pulls out a lacquer tray with a tea set and a thermos. “Stop guarding the doorway, Deputy,” he turns to me. “Please kindly take a seat. You don't mind sitting on tatami, do you? I have no chairs, don't like them.”
“Thank you,” I leave sandals at the top of the stairs and close the door.
Soon later, we sit with cups in our hands, and the room is full with strange smell: the medicinal herb tea blend plus another medicinal herb from the Kate's smoke. Surreal. The Police came to a suspect for a roll of Grass and a cup of tea.
“Nice tea, Mister Lee,” Kate closes her eyes and exhales smoke through the nose.
“Chinese medicine. I will write you a prescription. How is your pain? Better?”
“There's none. Let's talk about Mister Chen. Why do you stick your head in the noose for a murder you don't commit?”
“What makes you so sure I am innocent?”
“OK, fine. Let's have it this way. I tell the entire story as I see it, and if something is wrong – you may correct me.”
“Ah! Playing Sherlock Holmes?”
I give Kate a nod. How has Lee guessed about Sherlock?
“If you wish, we can call it playing Sherlock Holmes,” Kate agrees, “So the story goes like this. Yesterday, in the late afternoon, Mister Chen Te-Sheng ran into your shack. Where was he wounded, exactly?”
“In his left forearm. But the wound was superficial. As soon as I bandaged it, the blood stopped. I had to sacrifice a pillowcase.”
“I thought so. The wound kept you busy. After you had bandaged the wound, you looked out of the shack, just in-time to see Victor Chen running away with the screwdriver in his hand. Chen-senior begged you to hide the dead body so to save his son from a murder charge. First you didn't agree, but then you saw the body and changed your mind. The killed was dressed exactly as Chen Te-Sheng, and was of the same build and height. From fifty yards away – a perfect double.”
“Correction. Chen Te-Sheng and I have been close friends for nearly two years. I believed him unconditionally and decided to help him no matter what. But about the double you're right. When I saw how the dead man looked like, I believed my neighbor even more.”
“You and Chen moved the body into this shack. You began to write a Chinese scroll to warn Victor not to talk to the Police. Then the first policeman came. Deputy Tan, on his bike. You thought: too late! But Tan looked around, found no dead body,
and left. You hung the completed scroll in the Chen's shack. Why did you wash the drops of blood at the floor?”
“It was Chen's blood, but the screwdriver was covered with the blood of the other man.”
“Brilliant! You even thought about the blood types!”
“You have amazing abilities, Missis Bowen. I take it back. You are not playing Sherlock Holmes. You are the Sherlock Holmes, just a different incarnation. How did you know where I hid the body?”
“Because you volunteered for the search party. To be honest, I thought the body was still in your shack, and you were looking for the place to hide the body tonight. But when I saw that the body was gone, I immediately knew you hid it yesterday. This automatically changes your motive for joining the search. You wanted to be in the group to place yourself at the right spot, above the dead body: it was in the irrigation ditch, under the snag. Next, you waited until Deputy Investigator Woxman was near-by, and screamed that the body was found. You calculated his reaction quite well. I didn't know you were a psychiatrist, but since you told me… everything matches perfectly! A psychiatrist is a psychologist too! Woxman was sinking in the mud, you were showing him the snag, and the kids were laughing. No wonder, the investigator didn't want to check the ditch a little deeper.”
“Most of all I was afraid of Deputy Kim,” Lee smiled, “After I saw the local deputy in shorts and barefoot, I realized the ditch was not a very good place to hide a body. Fortunately, you and Deputy Woxman had some quarrel even before we started on the ditches. I was so lucky: the deputies didn't want to break the fragile peace! Woxman did not ask Kim to double-check my ditch, and Kim was reluctant to show initiative. You got it spot-on, Missis Bowen. Just one thing I can't understand. How did you know I dumped the body exactly at midnight?”
Indeed, how did our Sherlock-Holmes-on-wheels guess about the midnight? It seems I have to do the dishes all week long.
“It was a bluff,” Kate chuckles, “An unjustified spark of intuition.”
“This once again convinces me I am facing the great detective,” Mr. Lee made a short bow, “And because you know everything about this affair…”
“Not everything,” Kate interrupts Lee, “Could you tell us what kind of super-duper nuclear-space-strategic bomb your neighbor was inventing? If he told you about it, of course.”
“He told me all-right,” Lee sighs, “But it wasn't a bomb.”
“And what was it?” I ask.
“Does name Martin Fleischmann tell you anything at all?”
“N-no,” Kate says, “Who is it?”
“And Vincenzo Rossi?”
“Also no idea,” I say.
“In 1989, British chemist Martin Fleischmann discovered that by passing an electric current through a solution one can create a thermonuclear reaction. He claimed a new phenomenon: a Low-Temperature Nuclear Fusion. Or Cold Fusion, as some people preferred to call it.”
“And can you really make these reactions? The Cold Fusion?” Kate asks.
“It turned out Fleischmann's design did not work. As we psychiatrists call it, Martin Fleischmann was clearly our patient, but unfortunately only in a hind-sight. Before he went after his Cold Fusion idée fixe, Fleischmann was an expert in the field of classical electrochemistry and held a professorship. A classic case of an overvalued idea disorder was superimposed on an individual with top-notch education and strong scientific authority. By that time, Fleischmann was over sixty, his health deteriorating with Parkinson's and Diabetes. The old man was so desperate to give his discovery to the humankind! He made no secrets and published it all in his scientific papers. Other labs tried to repeat the experiments, with no success.”
“And the Cold Fusion idea was killed?”
“If so! Fleischmann worked on his Cold Fusion until his death in 2012. He had generous research grants. The US Navy gave money, and the Italian INFN. Fleischmann even got himself an apprentice genius: Vincenzo Rossi, an Italian engineer. Based on the Fleischmann research, Rossi made a machine called D-CAT. I believe the press release was dated 2011.”
“That's why I didn't hear these names,” Kate says, “In 2011, I was just one-year-old! I didn't care about the machines. Even a Barbie doll was way over my level.”
“What did this machine do?” I ask.
“The machine was top secret. Rossi said it converted nickel into copper. At the same time, on one kilogram of nickel the machine could produce ten kilowatts of electricity for ten thousand hours.”
“Ten kilowatts of electricity? But this is…” I see how Kate moves her lips calculating something in the head, “Shit! Your solar-charged light bulb here – about two watts. Ten kilowatts – it's five thousand such light bulbs! Each house in our Slum can have a light!”
“Ten kilowatts is not as much as you may think, dear Missis Bowen. In the modern slums we don't have enough electricity. But before the Meltdown the electricity was way more accessible. For instance, to boil a kettle, you need one and a half or two kilowatts. Do you remember electric kettles?”
“The electric kettles? Yes, I remember them quite well! I was… six years old. Or maybe seven, not sure. We still used an electric kettle. But then they cut our electricity for no-payments, and since we boiled water whatever way we could.”
“But if Rossi invented this wonderful machine, why there was the Meltdown first place?” I ask.
“In 2015, Vincenzo Rossi disappeared.”
“Disappeared?”
“Yeah. The rumors were he was assassinated. The oil companies didn't want people to have cheap energy.”
“And Rossi's invention? The machine?” Kate asks.
“Everything disappeared. Someone stole all the papers and all the computers, smashed the laboratory instruments, and sat the place on fire.”
“What a shame,” I say, “If Rossi was alive, the Slum kids wouldn't collect cow dung now. But what did this Rossi have in common with our Chen Te-Sheng?”
“Pretty much everything. Twenty years ago, Chen was the Chief Scientist at Rossi's research lab.”
“So you're saying someone is trying to kill Mister Chen?” I exclaim, “No, wait, that's stupid. Who would want to kill him? The oil companies are all bankrupt, and the oil is controlled by the Senate commission. Besides, Kate guessed right about the double. They didn't want to kill Chen! They're after Rossi's invention! Right?”
“Right. They are after the D-CAT.”
“But of course! If somebody has such a machine…” I ruffle my hair, “Damn! Damn! With such a machine… Wow! The Meltdown will be over! Ten kilowatts! Surely, one can make more than one machine! One machine for each Patch. No, I'm talking nonsense again! No freaking Patches! We don't need slums anymore! Everybody can have a big house. And in every house there will be this energy machine…”
“In the house you can have water taps,” Kate smiles, “Just open the tap – and get as much water as you want: a bucket, or a barrel. No, not barrel! You can fill a bathtub! Can you imagine, Wile E. Coyote: a bathtub full of hot water?”
“You know, Road Runner, we can quit the Police! We will buy a car! No, not just a car. We buy a camper! A Winnebago with a king-size bed! There are still some in the slums. Of course, they don't run now, but we can fix it. Put a couple of electric motors in, and make it run on electricity. We can go anyplace we want. California! We are the Navy sailors! We both have served in the Atlantic, now must look at the Pacific too.”
Mr. Lee looks at us with a sad smile. He turns to his desk and picks the finished scroll. From a silk-clad box, he pulls a huge inkan [2]. After rubbing the surface over porcelain ink pad, he exhales and presses the stamp in the lower right corner of the scroll. The print is dark-red and sharp, like dried blood droplets.
“Done,” He says, “Do you want me to translate?”
“Yes?”
“As any Chinese saying, this can have multiple English translations. I li
ke this: ‘Apparent is not always real.’”
“Which means?”
“Which means there is no secret. Rossi's machine – it's nothing more than a clever investment scheme.”
“A what?” In my mind, my huge double-bed Winnebago sill whines with its powerful electric motors, rushing towards the Pacific coast.
“An investment scheme. Martin Fleischmann was our patient. Psychiatric. But Vincenzo Rossi was totally sane. More normal than yours truly, for sure. His laboratory, patents, production plant, and everything else – it was a clever way of squeezing money out of brave but uneducated investors.”
“Are you absolutely certain?”
“Absolutely. I know this first-hand from my friend, Chen Te-Sheng. He told me so, and I remember it word-to-word: ‘Just once, I've betrayed science for money, and I've paid with my life, many times over’.”
“Betrayed science?”
“Yes. Who could blame him? It was 2008, in the midst of the Global Financial Crisis. Chen was a recent immigrant, with his Ph.D. in high-energy physics, his wife out of work, and his three-years-old son. Because of the crisis, all the research grants had been discontinued. The Universities had no interest for yet another Taiwanese physicist. Vincenzo Rossi came at the right time! All Chen had to do was to carry the power output measurements and turn a blind eye on some, let's call them, – scientific shortcuts! Chen decided to do work for Rossi, just to make some easy money and get the family through the GFC. He understood the risks, of course: the scientist's reputation is such a fragile thing. But he decided to take his chances.”
“And what happened next?” Kate asks.
“Chen wanted to work for just one year, but ended up with seven full years. His salary was too good! Four times an Assistant Professor can make teaching students in a Uni. Then, towards the end of 2015, Rossi had disappeared with all the investors' funds. A very smart move: he did it just before the Meltdown, and his trail went cold rather quickly. The former Chief Scientist ended up in plain view, and the hunt for Chen had begun.”
“Who was hunting? Intelligence agencies? Spooks?”
“Some intelligence agencies participated too. But how to say it… indirectly. You see, after the Meltdown, a lot of former spies went freelancing for the private companies. There were many takers: Israelis, Italians, the Mainland Chinese, Russians, British. Even our dear CIA participated, but not on behalf of the American Government, they already worked for some Middle-East money bags. Chen's laboratory technician was kidnapped in 2017. No doubt the boy was tortured, but could not tell anything useful. The technician was a diligent idiot with no IQ to speak of. Chen and Rossi hired such on purpose, so the boy knew nothing about physics or chemistry. The following year, Chen's wife died in a car crash. A very strange death, as you may imagine! In 2018, the highways were mostly empty, only the rich had money for gasoline.”
“Chen could just come clear and tell everyone the machine had never worked.” Kate says.
“As if he didn't try!” Lee sigh, “Nobody believed him! Well, that's not true: he managed to convince the Israelis and the Russians. But the rest just assumed Chen was hiding the real discovery – to cash it up at some later date.”
“But why?”
“Remember what I told you? D-CAT is not a scientific discovery. It's not a scientific phenomenon at all. It's an investment opportunity. A money-making scheme.”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you know what the shale oil is?”
“Of course,” I nod, “These wells are all over Texas. People build slums at the well pads. They collect the remaining gas and use it for cooking and such.”
“Do you know, back in 2010 the shale gas and shale oil were called the best investment opportunity of the XXI Century?”
“I've heard something like this. But it's garbage. Why would I pay my money to live in a gas-slum? They have rotten water and die of cancer or kidney failure. Frankly, our Slum is way better. As the matter of fact, even the Landfill obamavilles are way better.”
“Huh! You are the new generation. The through-Meltdown! You are smart. But back in 2010 the USA was not as logical. An oil company would tell people: give us one thousand dollars, and we give you some paper in exchange. Five years later, you can sell this paper for two thousand dollars. No interest, no dividends, nothing. Just pure value appreciation. To make the entire enterprise running, the oil company would get twenty barrels of diesel fuel and a drilling rig, go out and drill a well. Then, they would take another eighty barrels of diesel, and many tones of water and sand – and frac! And the well would produce. From each well you would recover, on average, one hundred and fifty barrels of gas condensate, which you could convert back to one hundred barrels of diesel fuel. And you could start the process all over again. The natural gas comes as a by-product and is sold for the marginal profit.”
“It's like a water-lifting wheel! You step, and step, and step, but stay in one place.”
“Exactly! And as the water wheel is for lifting water, the shale oil scheme is for lifting money. Out of the investor's wallets into the oil company executive's pocket. Well, the executive spreads some of his income, to, let say, his Chief Geologist. A guy with а Ph.D., who looks very cool, nods, and tells the public how much shale oil is still around.”
“So, for Rossi with his D-CAT,” Kate says, “Mister Chen was such a cool-looking Ph.D.?”
“Absolutely. Martin Fleischmann was a cool-looking Ph.D. too. But as Fleischmann was getting older, Rossi wanted a replacement. By the way, Rossi is not alone. There were literally thousands of these investment schemes. Vacuum energy. Biodiesel. Ethanol. Wind turbines.” He points to the dim LED bulb at his desk, “This one is the perfect example. The photovoltaic bubble.”
“What's wrong with the solar panels? I know they work!”
“They do. You spend up-front, let say, one kilowatt-hour of energy, in form of coal, oil and gas, to dig the copper ore, make the silicon and so on. Finally, all this energy is spent, and you get yourself a little photovoltaic system: one solar panel, one deep-cycle battery, an LED bulb or two, and the wires. This system will last you for about twenty years. If your place is as sunny as Houston, this system will produce two kilowatt-hours of energy though its life-span.”
“So I use one kilowatt-hour up-front, and the system gives me back two kilowatt-hours, but slowly?”
“Bravo, Missis Bowen! Being compared to the D-CAT, which doesn't work at all, or the shale oil, which works only marginally, the solar power system is a pretty good deal! But not good enough! Spending one kilowatt-hour of oil and gas for two kilowatt-hours of electricity only makes sense if you have a lot of oil and gas in the ground. Do you know America hardly makes the civilian-use solar panels anymore? Whatever is presently installed will die in about ten years – and there will be no replacement. The solar power will be only in the Army.”
“Listen to you, in ten or twenty years we will have nothing but cow dung,” I feel upset my camper trip to California has ended so quickly.
“You can burn wood and straw. The coal will be with us too, at least for some while. But, in short, yes.”
“When you say it, it looks so simple!” Kate says, “How come nobody understands it?”
“For most people it's so much easier to live a dream. You two, for example. Two tough through-Meltdown kids! You have seen horrors I personally prefer not even think of,” with his fingers he taps the tatami in front of Kate, indicating her missing legs. “Fifteen minutes ago, you learned about this wonderful energy-from-nothing D-CAT thingy, and you started making plans for the shiny future. In less than thirty seconds, you had our dirty slums converted into civilized suburbs, fixed the plumbing to fill your hot bath, and even built yourself an electric Winnebago.”
Kate runs her fingers on the tatami mat as if touching her missing leg. Lee shakes his head, “Did I trigger the pain? Sorry. I
didn't mean…”
“No, no. I am a tough girl. You can't trigger my pain, even if you whack me with a softball bat. But the Winnebago was such a nice dream.”
“So you must understand. Imagine somebody not as tough and smart, who has lived in the civilized world for forty goddamn years and have dreamed of abundant energy for the last fourteen? How do you convince him the energy doesn't come out of nothing?”
“So you believe somebody is still hunting for this non-existent Rossi's secret?”
“Chen thought this time it was the Mainland Chinese. But could be the ex-CIA too. Since 2018, he and Victor were moving every year or even more often. Chen is not his original surname, by the way. He has changed it two times.”
“Chen lived in the GRS for almost two years.”
“Yes. He had hopes all the chasers finally gave up. But still, he had no illusions and carried his gut-driver with him at all time. It just turned out he must run again…”
Kate nods. “I think you're a tough through-Meltdown too, Mister Lee. You were willing to give your life to save Victor.”
Lee smiles and bows, “Thanks. I am not a hero, not as much as you think. But the Meltdown taught me two main rules. The first is…”
“The First Rule? Like, the Slum Rules? Everybody must give once a day?”
“You can put it that way too. The proper first Meltdown rule translation is like this: if the strong care only for themselves, nobody will survive. In wider sense, we're to protect our neighbors. At all cost.”
“Don't you find it's a bit excessive? Going to gallows to protect your neighbor?”
“Not to the gallows. Only to your Station slammer – for few days. Here comes the second Meltdown rule: always have a Plan-B! Chen Te-Sheng and I, we decided our Plan-B, no problems.”
Kate shows her thumbs-up. “Can I guess?”
“Sure. Can't deny our Sherlock Holmes a pleasure of guessing.”
“In case the Police discovers the body, you're ready give a written statement: you have killed your neighbor, Chen Te-Sheng. After Victor is released, you will stall the Police long enough, so Victor can pack up and leave. Meanwhile, Chen Te-Sheng would visit a Police Department in some other city and identify himself.”
“Absolutely right. We agreed in four days he will report his wallet stolen, and show his driver license, which, by pure chance, has not been in his wallet, that's all. The incident will be recorded. Later in the court, I would just withdraw my statement. My neighbor killed a stranger. He threatened me, so I hid both the murderer and the body in my shack till the midnight. The body in the ditch is positively not Chen Te-Sheng, so my written statement is garbage anyhow. That is because I am still afraid the villain, Chen Te-Sheng, – may return.”
“All they can pin on you is the obstruction of justice, and hardly even that. Undeniably, you have assisted the murderer, but you have not been a part in the premeditated murder. Or even an accessory to murder – nobody can prove the prior knowledge. Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant!”
“Exactly. And hence our Sherlock Holmes got it right… Back to our business! I have two ways of writing things up. The first is my doctors' shorthand, but for the statement it will not do. The second way, as you may imagine, is perfect in every detail, but quite slow. Are you OK to wait, or prefer to write the statement for me? If you take care of my justice-obstructing statement, I can use the time and scribble for you my special tea recipe…”
