Chinese Whispers (The China Thrillers 6)

by Peter May

  ‘That’s not Li Jon’s.’

  Li looked up and saw Margaret, still clutching their son, looking down at him. ‘What isn’t?’

  ‘That panda.’

  Li looked at the panda. He was not familiar with all of Li Jon’s toys and would not have known that it was not his. It seemed new, as if it had just come out of its wrapping. He turned it over, and there was a folded sheet of paper pinned to its back. He froze, initial uneasiness turning now to real fear. He held out a hand towards Wu. ‘Gloves.’

  Wu handed him a pair of latex gloves. Li laid the panda in the buggy and snapped them on, then removed the pin from the note. Carefully he unfolded it, and felt shock, like an electric jolt, when he saw the now familiar characters in red ink.

  Chief,

  A little gift for baby.

  Happy hunting,

  Jack

  He heard the trilling of a cellphone and looked up to see faces pressed all around. Eager faces full of wonder and curiosity. There was an odd silence at the heart of the crowd fighting for a view of this bizarre piece of street theatre. He heard Wu’s voice speaking on the phone, and then stood up and shouted at the crowd to move back. A ripple went through them like a wave, as the nearest of them recoiled from his anger. He shouted again, and another ripple created more space. He took his wife and baby in his arms and held them tightly, still clutching the note.

  ‘Chief … Chief …’ Wu’s voice was insistent. ‘Chief you gotta go. They want you at headquarters downtown. Commander Hu’s office.’ Commander Hu Yisheng was the Divisional Head of the Criminal Investigation Department of the Beijing Municipal Police. Li’s immediate boss.

  Li asked for an evidence bag and dropped the note into it and gave it to Wu. He turned to Margaret and said quietly, ‘Go straight home. Take a taxi. Stay there. Don’t answer the door to anyone but me.’

  She stared at him, fear and confusion in her eyes. ‘Li Yan, I’ve got to pick up my passport from the visa office.’

  ‘Get it another day.’

  ‘No, they said today. They’ve been real bastards about it. I don’t feel secure without it.’

  He sighed. ‘Well, keep the taxi waiting outside, then go straight back to the apartment.’

  ‘When will I see you?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ll be in touch.’ And he turned and pushed off through the crowd, and she could see from the way he moved that he was rigid with tension. Li Jon gurgled in her ear and she squeezed him even more tightly, something close to panic rising inside her, forcing an intake of breath interrupted by sobs, like the wheels of a bicycle running over rutted snow.

  VI

  CID headquarters was housed in the new grey marble building sandwiched between the old redbrick HQ and the police museum. High, arched windows flanked a romanesque entrance between ornamental pillars. The frontage was still shaded by the dusty trees that lined each side of Jiaominxiang Lane.

  Li drove past armed guards into the compound at the rear of police headquarters and stepped out into the midmorning sunshine. His mood was bleak as he mounted the steps to the lobby and climbed up to the top floor.

  Commander Hu’s new office was dominated by one of those arched windows on the building’s facade. It rose from floor to ceiling, divided into Georgian oblongs, and gave on to a view, through the trees, of the Supreme Court – still clad in green construction netting. His mahogany desk was inlaid with green leather, and he sat behind it resplendent in his black uniform with its silver badges and buttons, and the number 000023 above the flap of his left breast pocket – which made him twenty-third in the Ministry pecking order. He was not a tall man, but he had an imposing presence, a full head of grey-streaked hair swept back from an unlined forehead and a handsome face for a man of his years. He did not invite Li to sit, gazing at him instead, from behind his desk, with the look of a man disappointed by the failures of his only son. He shook his head sadly. ‘I am glad that Yifu did not live to see this day.’

  Li felt a sinking feeling in his stomach.

  ‘I don’t know what’s going on Li, but someone up there doesn’t like you very much, and you’ve been giving them all the ammunition they need to shoot you down. I only regret that it has fallen to me to be the one who pulls the trigger.’

  ‘Commander …’

  Hu raised a hand to stop him. ‘I don’t want to hear it, Section Chief. I really don’t.’ He opened a drawer in his desk and reached in to pull out the previous day’s copy of the Beijing Youth Daily. He dropped it on the desktop, with the headline facing Li. ‘The journalist who wrote this has provided a statement implicating you in the leaking of the story.’

  Li felt the first pricklings of anger. ‘It’s a lie.’

  Hu regarded him thoughtfully for a long time. ‘Actually, I’m inclined to believe you. But that doesn’t alter the fact that it’s your word against his.’

  ‘And you would take the word of a journalist over that of a senior police officer?’

  Hu sighed deeply. ‘If that was all it was …’ He opened a folder on his desk. ‘I have copies here of an official complaint registered by a serving police officer in the Beijing East district. In it he claims that you assaulted him in the course of his duties.’

  Li frowned, wondering what Hu was talking about. And then he remembered the pushy community cop at the antiques market at Panjiayuan who had dealt so insensitively with the mother of Sunday’s ripper victim. You’re lucky I don’t break your neck, Li had told him, and he had a sudden recollection of the officer’s hat rolling away across the cobbles. ‘That officer was interfering directly with a murder investigation and got physical with one of my detectives.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘Detective Wu.’

  ‘Well, we’ll talk to Wu in due course, no doubt. Meantime we have several sworn statements from witnesses at Panjiayuan that you physically assaulted the complaining officer, knocking off his hat and threatening him in full public view.’ Hu breathed stertorously through his nose. ‘Is it true, Li?’

  Li sighed. ‘He was out of line, Commander.’

  ‘No, Section Chief. You were out of line. If this community cop was overreaching his authority or behaving badly, then there are proper channels for dealing with that. But to assault a fellow police officer in full public view does nothing but bring disrepute on Public Security, and undermine the authority of police officers in the eyes of the masses.’ He shut the folder and reached out a hand. ‘I’ll require your Public Security identity card.’

  Li’s heart was pounding. ‘What for?’

  ‘You’re being suspended, Li, until such time as an inquiry into your conduct is held by an investigating group of senior officers.’ He paused. ‘Your ID.’

  Li made no move to give it to him. He said, ‘Commander, we’re in the middle of a serial murder investigation. Someone out there is killing young women. And he’s going to do it again if we don’t stop him.’

  ‘You’re not a one-man band, Li, even if you think you are. You have a perfectly capable deputy in the section who can take over.’

  ‘You’re being used, Commander. You said it yourself. Someone up there doesn’t like me. Have you wondered why?’

  ‘I don’t want to hear it.’

  ‘Because he’s a murderer, that’s why. And he knows if he doesn’t get me out of the way I’m going to expose him.’

  Commander Hu looked at him with something close to pity in his eyes. ‘Now you’re just being ridiculous,’ he said. ‘Give me your ID!’ His raised voice heralded the end of his patience.

  Li stood for a moment, furious, frustrated. Helpless. Then he reached into his pocket for the well-worn maroon wallet that held his identity card and dropped it on the commander’s desk. He turned without a word and walked out of the office.

  * * *

  Li paced slowly back and forth across the compound for a long time, thinking furiously. He had no doubt that the misappropriation of his son, albeit temporarily, had been a warning. He was be
ing threatened and outmanoeuvred at every turn. Either Commissioner Zhu had confided in more than just the Director General of the Political Department, or … the thought coagulated in Li’s head like an embolism … or the killer was Zhu himself. Or the Director General. He held his hands out and saw that they were shaking. The guard on the gate was looking curiously in his direction, and he quickly thrust them back into his coat pockets. He had no idea what he was going to do. Where he was going to go. He was no longer Section Chief Li Yan. He was a disgraced officer awaiting internal investigation. How quickly the hero had become the villain. He glanced towards the guards at the gate again and knew that once he went out he would not be able to re-enter without his ID. There didn’t seem anything else for it but to confront the dragon in his lair.

  He let anger fuel his determination as he crossed the compound to the main building and rode up in the elevator to the fifth floor. He strode with long, decisive steps, down the hush of the carpeted corridor which led to the Commissioner’s inner sanctum. The armed policewoman with her gun pressed against her cheek stared sternly at him from the poster on the wall of the reception room. Commissioner Zhu’s formidable secretary guarded the entrance to his lair. She was a dominating presence.

  ‘I need to see the Commissioner,’ he said.

  ‘He’s busy.’ Her response was intended to be a full stop on their conversation. It was clear she did not expect a reply.

  ‘I’ll wait.’

  She glared at him. ‘You will not. Your section secretary will require to make an appointment.’

  It was obvious to Li that she knew perfectly well that he had been suspended and no longer had access to his section.

  Li took a step towards the Commissioner’s door. ‘Is he in there?’

  She rose to her feet in order to put her full weight behind her threat. ‘If you go in there,’ she said, ‘I shall have you arrested.’

  He glared back at her, but knew that it was pointless to do anything other than accept that he was beaten. He could do nothing if he gave them the slightest excuse to put him under lock and key. He turned away in disgust, and his eyes fell on something in the trash that stopped him in his tracks. Amidst the screwed up sheets of paper and cellophane wrappings in the bin lay the dark red and gold of an empty pack of Russian cheroots. Icy fingers wrapped themselves around his heart. He looked at her again. ‘You shouldn’t smoke,’ he said to her. ‘It’s bad for your health.’

  She looked at him as if he were insane. ‘I don’t,’ she said.

  He nodded. ‘I didn’t think so.’

  Chapter Ten

  I

  The visa office was even busier than it had been on Monday, and Margaret had to stand in the back of a long line at the visa issuing desk of the foreign section. She had left the buggy in the taxi, and held Li Jon in her arms. There was no way she was letting him go anywhere out of touching distance. He was fast asleep, his head resting on her shoulder, the rest of him a dead weight in arms that were beginning to ache.

  She glanced along the desk and saw the frosty-faced visa cop with the bad complexion. Miss Chicken Feet. She didn’t look any better today. She looked up and caught Margaret’s eye. It was a moment before she recognised her, but when she did, a slow, humourless smile crept across her face and sent a chill of apprehension arrowing through Margaret’s very soul.

  Margaret looked quickly away and found thoughts that she did not want to entertain for a second flooding her mind. She moved slowly, inexorably, towards the head of the queue with a growing sense of dread. What if there was a problem? What if they wouldn’t give her back her passport? There were others behind her now, and she heard American voices chatting about some business success which had led to the need for an extension. ‘It’s alright, Beijing,’ she heard someone say. ‘If you got money. Ten years ago you couldn’t get a thing. Now there’s nothing you can get Stateside you can’t get here. Another ten years and everyone’ll be speaking English.’

  The person ahead of her slipped their passport in their bag and moved away. Margaret found herself at the head of the queue. Her mouth was dry, and her hand shook a little as she pushed her receipt across the counter at the issuing officer. He took it without looking at her and punched information into his computer. Then he looked up curiously at the woman and baby standing in front of him. ‘One moment, please.’ He turned and disappeared through a doorway, leaving Margaret to stand for what seemed like an eternity, with Li Jon growing heavier by the second. This was turning into a nightmare. She glanced down the desk and saw that Miss Chicken Feet was watching her. The issuing officer returned to his seat, and to her relief pushed her passport across the counter at her. ‘Visa denied,’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You give incorrect address. Misleading to police. Present visa expire Saturday. You must make arrangement to leave country before then.’

  * * *

  The taxi ride back to the apartment passed in a blur of unreality. The city rose up above her, towering over her on all sides, traffic squeezing in from every direction to choke her taxi’s progress south on the Third Ring Road. She felt mocked, betrayed, robbed. It seemed inconceivable to her that within three days she would have to leave, possibly never to return. This was her home. It was where she had made her life, conceived and given birth to her child. It was where the man she loved had his home, where he worked. It was his country. How could they forbid her to share it with him? She only thanked God that she’d had the foresight to register Li Jon with the American Embassy to obtain his Consular Report of Birth Abroad. If the worst came to the worst, and she really did have to leave, she would at least be able to take him with her.

  But somewhere, deep down, she couldn’t believe it would come to that. Li wouldn’t let it. He must be able to do something. He was a senior officer of Public Security, he must have some kind of influence he could bring to bear. It just didn’t seem possible that she would actually have to go.

  By the time her taxi was turning into Zhengyi Road, she had persuaded herself that it would all get sorted out. Li would find some way to fix things. But still, she looked at the street she knew so well with different eyes, for somewhere behind them there lurked still the fear that the life that was so familiar to her now would soon be taken away. It left her feeling empty and sick, and she fought to hold on to the optimism she had been trying so hard to build on the ride home.

  The taxi dropped her at the roadside outside the ministry compound, and she wheeled Li Jon in his buggy past the armed guard, towards the pink and white apartment block that she had come to regard as home – for better or worse. There was a black and white police patrol car parked outside the main entrance. It was not unusual to see police vehicles within the compound, but as she approached it she saw two uniformed officers sitting inside, and Margaret began to feel distinctly apprehensive.

  She walked past as if it wasn’t there, keeping her eyes fixed ahead of her, and turned into the path leading to the main door of the block. She heard car doors opening behind her and then slamming shut. A voice called, ‘Mizz Cambo.’ She was almost at the steps, and wanted just to run up them and disappear inside, shutting the door behind her, closing out the world. She just knew that this was something she didn’t want to hear. She stopped and turned.

  ‘Yes?’

  The two officers approached her, faces impassive, unsmiling. ‘Mizz Magret Cambo?’

  ‘I just said I was, didn’t I?’

  ‘You come with us.’ The officer put out a hand and fingers like steel closed around her upper arm.

  Margaret pulled herself free indignantly. ‘What for?’

  ‘You undah arrest, lady. Fail to give change of address to PSB.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be ridiculous!’ Margaret’s words made her feel braver than she felt. ‘Do you know who the father of my child is?’

  ‘Formah Section Chief Li Yan.’

  ‘Former …’ Margaret’s voice tailed away, and she felt her world falling in around her
.

  ‘Chief Li disgraced officah. He put cult of personality above duty to country.’ It sounded like a mantra that had been put out in a memo. ‘You come with us.’ And he took her arm again. This time she did not resist. There seemed no point. Powerful currents had her in their grip and were sweeping her away on an uncertain tide. This must be what drowning felt like, she thought. As you were dragged down through the water you knew there was no way back, and you released the breath you had been so desperately holding, succumbing to the water that rushed to replace it in your lungs, slipping into the state of unconsciousness that cradled you before death.

  II

  Li had spent most of the last hour just driving aimlessly through the city, letting the traffic flow carry him where it would. He had driven a couple of times around Tiananmen Square, then turned north up Nanchang Street, flanked on one side by the Forbidden City and Zhongnanhai on the other. Trees on either sidewalk grew across it to intermesh and create a tunnel shading it from the late season sunshine. People were going about their everyday lives, cycling to and from work, shopping, walking, chatting idly on corners or on benches, playing chess, flying kites. It seemed wrong, somehow, that their world kept turning as it always did, while his had turned to dust under his feet. His inertia, his inability to decide his next move, was building a frustration in him that was threatening to explode. He beeped his horn fiercely at a cyclist who turned out of the Xihuamen intersection and Li accelerated past him into Beichang Street. There was nowhere else for him to go but Section One. Even if he was impotent to do anything, to be in any way pro-active, Qian and Wu were not. They were still actively involved in both the Ripper case and the Lynn Pan murder. They could still make a difference. He had to talk to them.

  Another fifteen minutes found him on Dongzhimen, heading east, past all the red lanterns hanging from the trees, past street vendors steaming huge trays of dumplings in preparation for the lunch trade that was already starting to gather pace. Men and women in suits streamed out of office blocks and shops and into restaurants, wrapped in warm coats against the cold of the wind, wearing sunglasses to protect them from the blinding autumn sun. Li saw Mei Yuan on her corner as he turned into Hepinglidong Street. He remembered her wet face and red eyes and her distress while Li Jon was still missing. In their own distress, both he and Margaret had not fully appreciated the hell that Mei Yuan must have gone through, believing it all to be her fault. He could see that her eyes were still swollen and red as she served a queue of customers. She did not see him as he turned north, and then west into Beixinqiao Santiao to park in the street outside section headquarters.