City of Shadows

by M J Lee

  At the counter, a young clerk in the dark green uniform of the Post Office was stamping letters.

  ‘What is this?’

  The clerk looked surprised at the bluntness of the question. ‘It’s the Poste Restante, sir. Can’t you see the sign?’

  He pointed to a large sign at the back of the room. Danilov smiled to himself. I’m slipping, he thought. Either that or he wasn’t up to the old cloak-and-dagger stuff. Better leave it to the young ones from now on.

  ‘How can I help you?’

  The clerk was thin with a peculiarly small head beneath a large green cap. ‘A woman came in just now.’

  ‘That’s correct.’

  ‘She took some post?’

  ‘No.’

  Danilov looked confused. ‘This is the Poste Restante?’

  ‘Sir is correct.’

  The clerk was smiling at him. ‘She must have picked up some post?’

  ‘No, she didn’t.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I’m sorry, but sir must understand what a customer does in the privacy of the Post Office is a matter for the said customer and of the Chinese postal service.’ He smiled. ‘I’m sure sir understands.’

  The man was beginning to irritate him. He produced his warrant card, shoving it right under the nose of the clerk. ‘Inspector Danilov, Shanghai Municipal Police. You are obstructing me in the performance of my duties. That is a serious offence. I’m sure “sir” understands. Now, what did the woman do?’

  Immediately the man stood up straight. ‘She...she left a note,’ he stammered.

  ‘For whom?’ Danilov barked.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘The note had an address on it, didn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So, I don’t know who it was addressed to. The note was for one of our PO boxes. People can leave their letters here.’

  ‘Give me the letter.’

  The man sucked in air. ‘I don’t know if I can do that, sir.’

  ‘Do I have to remind you again of the laws regarding obstruction? How would you like to spend two years in Ward Road Jail? Not a pleasant place. Not as comfortable as working here.’ He deliberately looked up at the ornately carved ceiling of the Post Office. ‘I’m sure you wouldn’t like to spend time there.’

  ‘I’m sure I wouldn’t, sir.’

  Danilov held out his hand. The clerk reached behind him and took the letter from a pigeon hole.

  ‘Thank you. Ward Road will miss you.’ With that, he opened the letter, careful not to tear it. It had just one sentence on it.

  ‘The same place. Tomorrow at 5 pm.’

  He folded the note back into the letter and gave it back to the clerk. ‘Make sure the recipient gets this in his PO box. And do not tell anybody what happened. Ward Road may not miss you after all. Is that clear?’

  The clerk nodded his head.

  Inspector Danilov smiled. Now all he had to do was arrange for a team of policemen to stake out the Poste Restante to find out who picked the note up. He would pay the old rickshaw puller to watch it until they arrived. He was sure he could do with the money.

  Danilov knew he was close now.

  Chapter 82

  ‘We’ve made a breakthrough, Strachan.’ Danilov explained how he had followed the wife to the Post Office. ‘I’ve arranged for the box to be watched over constantly. With a bit of luck, we’ll see who picks up the note.’

  ‘Will it be our killer, sir?’

  ‘I hope so, Strachan, or at least one of his accomplices.’

  ‘What’s next, sir?’

  ‘We wait for a killer to take the note. Make sure they arrest anybody who goes near it. Anything from your side?’

  Strachan produced a sheaf of photographs from the top of the desk. ‘These are from the film we confiscated from the reporters, sir.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Nothing, sir. Most are out of focus. You’d think professionals would at least get things in focus.’

  ‘I thought so. The editors would have already chosen their best shots. We’ve seen everything they have.’

  Strachan picked up the photographs. ‘Photographers. Can’t seem to get anything right. See this one? All those heads standing in the way. He should have asked them to move.’

  Danilov stopped arranging the pens on his desk. ‘What did you just say, Strachan?’

  ‘Me, sir? Nothing. I think.’

  ‘No. You said the photographers should have asked them to move.’

  ‘I did?’ Strachan scratched his nose.

  ‘You did.’ Danilov stood up. ‘Where are the photographs of the crime scene?’

  ‘Which crime scene?’

  ‘The Lee house, Strachan. Get them. Quickly.’

  Strachan dived into the second drawer on his desk, producing a beige folder.

  Danilov snatched it from him and took out the photographs, laying them on his desk. He adjusted his anglepoise lamp so that the light shone directly onto the pictures.

  ‘I have been very slow and even more stupid, Strachan. I should have seen this much earlier.’ Danilov slapped himself on the side of the head. ‘Stupid. Distracted. Think Danilov, use your brain.’

  He gathered up the photographs and put them back in the folder. ‘Come on, Strachan.’

  ‘Where are we going, sir?’

  ‘To the Lee house, where else?’

  Chapter 83

  This was the third time they had returned to the Lee house. Each time, it always looked the same from the outside. A normal middle-class house in a new lane.

  The front door still had the seal in place, but the constable wasn’t there. No point in guarding a house that had already been ransacked.

  Danilov called Strachan forward. ‘Break it down.’

  Strachan kicked the centre of the door, once and then again. The door cracked and then splintered around the lock. Strachan gave one last kick and the door split open, one side hanging off the hinges.

  Inspector Danilov sniffed and stepped forward. The house looked the same as last time. Still a mess. The people who had trashed it had not returned for another search.

  ‘I think it was Cowan who knocked on the front door. That was why the young boy answered it. He must have shouted “Police” as he knocked.’

  Danilov walked across the courtyard, acting out the crime. ‘As the boy went back into the house, perhaps to shout for his parents, Cowan grabbed him from behind and slit his throat. The blood spurted up the wall over there. Cowan threw the body to the ground in the hallway. The mother must have seen Cowan or perhaps the boy managed to shout something before he died. She panicked and ran up the stairs. The other killer had crept up behind, entering through the kitchen window.’

  Danilov suddenly went limp as if all the bones had been removed from his body. He felt old now. And tired. ‘The rest we know. The wife was killed. The husband shot dead on the third floor. The disabled daughter slaughtered in her bed.’

  He looked back at the chaos in the house. Rubbish strewn everywhere, holes knocked into walls, cupboards emptied. ‘Yet somebody, more than one person, came back and searched the house. They were looking for something. Something that Mr Lee had hidden.’

  ‘Was that why he was killed?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so. That’s what has been so confusing about this case. Two crimes were committed here for two different reasons. The first was the murder of the family by hired killers, one of whom was Cowan. The second was the destruction of the house as people searched for something hidden. It was what you said that gave me the idea.’

  ‘Me, sir?’

  ‘See the blood splatters?’ Danilov pointed to the faint brown traces of blood that still stood out against the whiteness of the wall. ‘There is a white area where no blood landed. Just there.’

  Strachan moved closer to see where the Inspector was pointing.

  ‘I couldn’t understand why until you mentioned the photographers.’

&nb
sp; He strode back to the palm plant sitting in its pot on the patio. He leant in and examined the leaves intently. ‘I thought so. See, there are traces of blood on the leaves.’

  ‘But how, sir, if the murder was committed in the hallway?’

  ‘The police photographers moved the plant to get a better shot of the body, Strachan. It’s so obvious when you think about it. The angle of the shot was from where the plant pot should have stood. It got in the photographer’s way.’

  He knelt down and touched all around the base of the terracotta.

  Nothing.

  He grabbed the plant where the trunk joined the soil and heaved upwards. It lifted out with a jerk, revealing an inner pot in which the palm was planted. He placed the plant on the floor beside him.

  Reaching into the larger terracotta pot, he pulled out a small brown hessian sack. He blew off a few grains of soil that clung to the outside. ‘This is what our vandals have been searching for, Strachan.’

  Strachan had come closer. ‘What is it, sir?’

  Danilov was unravelling the sacking. ‘If I’m not mistaken, it’s a book.’ The wrapping came off and Danilov held a small black book with a broad red stripe down its centre and gold characters in English and Chinese: Three Friends Company. He opened it. Inside were row upon row of numbers, some with three figures and others with five or six figures.

  ‘I’ll take that.’

  Danilov looked up to see a gun staring down at him. The gun was in a hand and a man was holding it. The hand was very steady, not moving or shaking. It was a very confident hand. And behind it was a short, stocky Chinese man.

  ‘I said I’ll take that.’

  ‘You’re the man I chased across the roof,’ said Strachan.

  ‘You remembered.’

  ‘How could I forget?’

  ‘I’ll say this one more time. Give the book to me.’ The gun pointed directly at Danilov.’

  ‘This is what you were looking for?’

  The man nodded and held out his free hand. Danilov threw the book. The man caught it. The gun still stayed pointed at both of them.

  ‘It’s a valuable book to some people.’

  ‘I believe it is.’ Danilov stood up. The man took one step backwards. The gun stayed where it was. ‘My bet is that it’s a book of figures, dates, times, places.’

  ‘You could be right.’

  ‘An accountant’s book. A book of all the imports and sales of opium into Shanghai by the Three Friends Company.’

  The man smiled. The gun didn’t.

  ‘But it was more than that. It was a book that protected the owner from, shall we say, reprisals. It was the one thing that ensured he always stayed alive. Well, it was until somebody else wanted him dead.’

  ‘I didn’t kill him.’

  ‘I know. You couldn’t. That book was his protection. But when you knew he was dead, you were sent round to get it.’

  The man smiled again, saying nothing.

  It was Strachan who spoke. ‘You mean, he didn’t kill Mr’ Lee and his family?’

  ‘Oh no, Strachan. They were murdered by Cowan and another man. You see, our friend and his bosses, they couldn’t kill him. The book stopped that. He knew too much. And if that book ever fell into the hands of the police, or even one of their rivals, they knew they were finished. That’s why they have been looking for it.’

  The man spoke. ‘It was supposed to be in the house.’

  ‘So you looked for it in the house.’ Inspector Danilov smiled. ‘It’s funny, Strachan, how even intelligent people are defeated by their own assumptions. The book was known to be in the house so they searched there. But they never thought to look on the patio. You see, in their eyes it wasn’t part of the house. It was outside.’

  Strachan looked from the Inspector to the man holding the gun. ‘What happens next?’

  ‘I rather think that’s the decision of the man with the gun. In his mind, he’s debating whether to shoot us here and now. Or to take us somewhere quiet and shoot us later.’

  ‘I don’t like either option, sir.’

  ‘Neither do I, Strachan, neither do I.’

  The gunman smiled.

  ‘It looks like he’s made his decision, Strachan.’

  The gun jerked to the left, the voice spoke at the same time. ‘Move.’

  Then there was a loud bang as something metallic flew through the air and hit the wall above the plant pot. The gunman turned towards the noise. Strachan leapt forward, throwing all his weight against the man and the hand holding the gun.

  It went off.

  Acrid smoke filled the air. The gunman went down. Strachan was on top of him, hitting downwards. The man tried to get the gun free, to point it up at the detective. Strachan grabbed the hand and forced it upwards and outwards.

  The gun fired again. More acrid smoke filled the air. The gunman kicked out with his legs. Strachan, off balance, toppled over his head and sprawled on the floor. The gunman was on his feet in a flash, pointing the gun down at Strachan. He pulled the trigger.

  Strachan shielded his face. An instinctive reaction, trying to stop the bullet with his arms. Even a 7-year-old knows arms have no chance of stopping a bullet.

  The gun clicked.

  Nothing.

  No bang. No flash. No smoke.

  The gunman stared down at the gun in his hand. It was the last thing he would do. A plant pot, from the hands of Inspector Danilov, formed a perfect arc in the air and smashed into his temple just at the point where the hairline meets the ear.

  The gunman stood upright for a second, slowly turning towards Danilov, who was searching for another weapon.

  The man just toppled over like a sack of wet cement, hitting the stone floor head first.

  He didn’t move.

  Strachan scrambled to his feet. He stepped over the inert body of a man and prised the gun from his fingers. Then he looked towards the door. Miss Chong was standing there.

  ‘I’m sorry. I heard raised voices and came in. This man was pointing his gun at you. It was the only thing I had.’

  She pointed towards the dented rubbish bin lying on the patio floor. ‘I missed.’

  ‘Thank you, Miss Chong, you don’t know how grateful we are for the timing of your arrival.’

  Three constables charged through the door, their pistols drawn and ready.

  Danilov pulled out his warrant card. ‘Take him back to the station and charge him with murder.’ He took the gun from Strachan’s hands. ‘A Colt, I believe. Take it to the Ballistics Department on the fourth floor of Central. Tell him it’s a present from Inspector Danilov.’ He handed the gun to one of the constables.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Don’t let it out of your sight. It’s the only evidence that this man killed Inspector Cowan. Well, don’t just stand there, man, get a move on.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’ The constable saluted and ran out the door, carrying the gun.

  ‘Come on, Strachan, we have more work to do.’

  ‘Where to, sir?’

  ‘The Post Office. I want to check that PO box.’

  Chapter 84

  It was easy to find the old maid. A visit to Ah Yen holding a packet of letters which he pretended were for her was the key. Of course, she had wanted to take them, deliver them herself. But he had played the ‘Post Office only releases letters to the recipient’ card.

  It always worked on young girls from the country like her. The fear of ‘officials’ had been ingrained in them with their mother’s milk.

  She had been contacted by Ah Ching the day before and asked to send some clothes to an address on Kiangse Street. It was an address she was happy to give a small, humble postman.

  He went straight to the house. Time to finish the work he had started. Tie up the loose ends.

  The maid was just another loose end.

  He stood watch outside the house. It was in an old area with lots of street traffic coming and going from the market nearby.

  Two women ca
me out from the house. An old woman, she must be the owner because she locked the door with her keys, left first. With her was Ah Ching, dressed in the freshly laundered white shirt and black trousers of a maid.

  He followed them to the market. They didn’t notice him.

  They went first to the meat stall, selecting a large piece of pork and some pork bones. Afterwards to the vegetable stall. A large winter melon was popped into the maid’s bag with some radish and greens.

  They were making soup. Shame they would never drink it.

  He followed them back to the house, watching as they struggled with their heavy bags. At one point, he even considered offering to help them. It would amuse him later. However, caution took over and he decided to avoid the pleasure.

  They went inside. He stood outside smoking a cigarette, waiting until they had settled down and were in the midst of cooking.

  Then he would act.

  Chapter 85

  ‘You’re sure nobody has been near this Poste Restante box?’

  The constable standing in front of Danilov was carrying a mop and pail, dressed in blue overalls and a white T-shirt. The constable and the shirt were far too clean for such a job. He would have stuck out like a priest in a Quaker meeting house.

  ‘Let’s open it anyway.’

  A small round man from the Post Office stepped forward with a large bunch of keys. ‘It’s number 239, isn’t it?’

  ‘Where’s the man I met yesterday?’

  ‘Mr Han? He hasn’t come in this morning. Not like Mr Han. He’s normally so punctilious. Hasn’t missed a day in years.’ A wet drop hung on the end of the man’s nose. He pinched it between his fingers and used the same hand to open the door to the PO box.

  Inside, the note from Mrs Lee lay in the centre of the shiny box. Danilov reached in and unfolded it. The same note. Untouched. Unread.

  ‘Who owns this box?’

  ‘It’s registered under the name of a Mr Zhang of the Greater Good Company.’

  ‘That was the man who was shot dead on the street this morning, sir. I remember the name.’

  And then the image of Strachan unfolding a letter, the envelope placed beside the file on a desk in the detectives’ room, swam into Danilov’s mind. He remembered the detective reading the message from the cousin of the murdered girl. All about riding horses in Nanking.