When Red is Black

by Qiu Xiaolong

  But there was no need to act in a reckless hurry, nor to take any unnecessary risk. The manuscript had been finished years earlier, and it still retained its power. First-class literature does not suffer with the lapse of time. It should not matter too much if the manuscript were to lie unpublished for a few years more.

  Internal Security was still on the alert. They had inquired about how the chief inspector and his partner had come to find the manuscript, and he had simply said that it had taken Detective Yu’s hard work to trace Bao and obtain his confession, and that they had at once marched Bao over to the police bureau with the manuscript. The press conference was scheduled for the next day. They could not afford to delay any longer.

  He had not mentioned that he had had the manuscript in his hands for about two hours, and been busy copying every page of it at a street-corner copy shop, before he returned with it to Bao’s room. His story was plausible, but Internal Security had never really gotten along with him, and he had to be very careful.

  Besides, the way things were changing in China, in five or ten years, publication of Yang’s novel might not be totally unimaginable-

  “Chief Inspector Chen.” The young nurse approached him again in the lobby.

  “Oh yes, how is she?”

  “She is doing all right, still asleep.” she said. “But when she is out of the hospital, you have to pay more attention to her choice of food.”

  “I will,” he said.

  “Her cholesterol level is still too high. The expensive delicacies on the nightstand may not be good for her.”

  “I understand,” he said. “Some of my friends are incorrigible.”

  “She must be proud of a successful son like you with all those important buddies.”

  “Well, you’d really need to ask her that.”

  As he walked toward his mother’s room, he was surprised at the sight of White Cloud making a call at the pay phone. Her back was toward him, but she was wearing the same white, large-collared wool sweater as on the first day she had reported to his apartment. She must have come to visit his mother again.

  She had a cell phone, he remembered, but it was not surprising that she should use a pay phone, considering what her cell phone bill at the end of the month might amount to. He, too, had used the pay phone in the lobby.

  Was it possible that Gu had given her a cell phone only for her assignment? And now that the job was finished, he had taken it back? In any case, it was none of his business.

  She seemed to be engrossed in a long conversation. He was about to step away when he heard his title mentioned. He snapped to attention, and took a few steps to the side until he was out of sight behind a white pillar.

  “Oh, that chief inspector… What a prig… impossible… so self-important.”

  There was no justifying his decision to go on eavesdropping. But he remained fixed by the pillar, hardly able to convince himself that he was lurking there for the purpose of finding out more about Gu.

  “Those Big Bucks at least know what to do with a woman…Not so goddamned bookish, so busy keeping his official neck untouched. He will never take a risk for something he wants.”

  From the position in which he stood, he could not quite make out every word she spoke. He could tell himself that she was probably talking about somebody else, but he knew it was not so.

  “He loves only himself…”

  Was she so aggravated by his “political correctness” or “Confucian morals?”

  Perhaps he was too bookish to figure this out. Perhaps she was so modern or postmodern that in her company, he was hopelessly old-fashioned. Hence the inevitable conflict. Perhaps he did not understand her at all.

  In a Zen episode he had read long ago, a good lesson came with a blow. When you are knocked out of your usual self, things may be seen from a totally different perspective.

  Or perhaps it was nothing but business. In business, every gesture was possible, for a possible reason. Hers would have been made for his approval, and more importantly, for Gu’s approval. It was not every day that she could have landed such a job. Now that their business was finished, she was making her objective comments.

  Yet these objective comments hurt.

  I am a cloud in the sky, casting a reflection, / by chance, in the heart of your wave. Don’t be too amazed, / or too thrilled, / in an instant I’ll be gone without a trace.

  Those were lines from another poem by Xu Zhimo, also with a central image of a cloud. The poem would read far more naturally in her voice. She was not meant for him. Still, he should be grateful to her, whether their relationship had been all-business or not. In those hectic days, her help really had made a difference. He wished the best for her now that everything was over.

  He decided not to go back to his mother’s room. White Cloud would be there too. It was time for him to return to the routine bureau work which he had become accustomed to, the way a snail becomes used to its shell.

  No more little secretary, nothing. He was truly like the blank page he had thought of in his mother’s company a short while earlier.

  ***

  Afterward, on the way to the Shanghai Police Bureau, he dropped in at a travel agency, where he booked his mother a trip to Suzhou and Hangzhou with a tour group. She had not had a vacation for years-not since the early sixties, when she had taken him to Suzhou on a one-day trip. He had been a Young Pioneer, in his pre-school days, and his mother, wearing a red silk cheongsam, had been very young as they stood together in the Xuanmiao Temple. A trip might help her to recover, he thought. A pity that he would not be able to accompany her. There was no possibility of his taking another vacation, not after he received a phone call from the Central Party Discipline Committee in Beijing urging him to be prepared for larger responsibilities. He decided not to discuss that with his mother.

  “What a good son you are,” the travel agent said.

  Perhaps it was not too bad being Chief Inspector Chen.

  And he also decided that instead of waiting for a distant future opportunity, he would start trying to do something now about the manuscript Yang had left. Chief Inspector Chen was prepared to take a risk for something he really wanted.

  Chapter 24

  Yu was pleased with the conclusion of Yin Lige’s case. He was sitting in the courtyard while Peiqin was preparing a special dinner in the common kitchen area “in celebration of the successful conclusion of the case,” she told him.

  Qinqin was overwhelmed by the need to study for an important test next week. “Extremely important,” Peiqin had declared. So the only table in the room was reserved for Qinqin until dinner time.

  Incoming phone calls would not help Qinqin to concentrate. Nor did Yu want to smoke like a chimney with Qinqin studying hard in the same room. As a result, Yu had to remain in the courtyard, although it was chilly for this time of the year. Seated on a bamboo stool, with a pot of hot tea, a cordless phone, and a notepad resting on a slightly shaky chair in front of him, he looked almost like a lane peddler. He was going to write the report concluding the Yin case. It was his case, after all.

  It was true that Chief Inspector Chen, while on vacation, had played a crucial part in the breakthrough but Yu believed that he had performed well as officer in sole charge. Police work could sometimes be like a blind cat jumping on a dead rat, dependent on a lot of luck. Still, the cat had to be there, capable of jumping energetically at the right moment. Whatever others might think, Chen and he had moved beyond the stage of splitting hairs over who should get the credit for each contribution to the solution of a case.

  It was also true that Peiqin had helped a great deal. Chief Inspector Chen had praised her perception when she had shared her insight into the textual problems of Death of a Chinese Professor, which proved to be a crucial lead.

  Even Old Liang had contributed in his way, pushing and pressing his theories, by the ironic causalities of misplaced yin and yang, a phrase Yu had recently learned from Chen.

  As Party Secre
tary Li had declared, “The homicide case would have remained unsolved but for Detective Yu’s hard work.” What the Party boss did not admit was that but for Yu’s hard work, the case would have been “solved” by the arrest and conviction for murder of an innocent man. Li would not say a single word about this at the press conference, of course, and he had taken pains to arrange for Yu to take a break at home while the conference was being held. As Chief Inspector Chen was still on vacation, it made sense for the senior Party cadre to talk about the significance of their work to the media. Yu readily agreed.

  It was still a moment of triumph for him, Yu thought; a moment of redemption as well, in spite of his pathetically low pay, of his bottom-level rank, and of the fiasco that had taken his promised new apartment from him. What’s more, it was a moment that might reinspire him to hang on to his position as a policeman.

  The telephone calls kept coming as he sat in the courtyard. He had no more time to think about himself. There was still plenty to do to wrap up the murder investigation.

  Whatever defense Bao might drum up, it was all over for him. Not only the city government, but the central government too, had expressed concern over the tragic death of Comrade Yin Lige. The murderer had to be punished. That was a foregone conclusion.

  It remained for Yu to notify Hong, the poor mother who still had all her hopes vested in Bao. It would not be a pleasant job, and he was not in any hurry to do it.

  The remaining loose end to the investigation was the manuscript Bao had stolen, even though it was Yang’s rather than Yin’s. It had at once been seized by Internal Security. To his puzzlement, Chief Inspector Chen had made no protest. Later he would have to discuss this with Chen, Yu decided.

  Then, in accordance with the terms of Yin’s will, whatever was left of Yin and Yang’s money would go toward a scholarship for college students writing in English. It would not amount to a great deal, and it was not police business, but Yu had volunteered to help with this arrangement. To his surprise, Party Secretary Li had not objected.

  The neighborhood committee was so pleased with the special commendation from the city government that they honored Yu by asking him to make a speech at the entrance to Treasure Garden Lane.

  Lei, the food stall proprietor, telephoned to express his thanks to Yu for his investigative work. “I thank you from the bottom of my heart, Comrade Detective Yu. Finally, Yin may rest in peace. She must be in heaven, I know, looking down at this lane and at my business at the lane entrance, with a smile.

  “And you know what? My lunch business is growing. So I am going to give it a formal name: ‘Yin & Yang.’ That will be my way of commemorating that remarkable woman, and it may also bring in more business. A magazine has already contacted me for the story of how she helped me at the lowest ebb of my fortunes. She’s the guiren-important person-in my fate.”

  “We can never understand the workings of fate,” Yu said, “but the restaurant’s new name is catchy and should even attract customers who know nothing about the story behind it.”

  “Exactly. Yin & Yang. And it goes without saying, Detective Yu, whenever you come to the lane, lunch is on me-on the Yin & Yang Restaurant.”

  It had been much tougher, on the other hand, to deal with the two men who were in custody, Cai and Wan.

  Cai should have been released days earlier, the day Wan turned himself in. Old Liang had objected, insisting that there was still something suspicious about Cai, for he had never provided an alibi for the night of February 6 or for the morning of February 7.

  Finally, Yu had to put his foot down. “If Cai was detained as a suspect, he must be released now that the case is closed. I’m in charge, and that’s my decision.”

  Grumbling, Old Liang realized that he had no choice but to let Cai out.

  But for Wan, the situation seemed far more complicated. To begin with, no one could understand why Wan had come forward. He did not utter a single word when he was informed of Bao’s arrest. He sat with his chin on his chest, like a statue, offering no explanation as to why he had confessed to a crime he had not committed.

  According to one neighborhood committee member, Wan must be assumed to be more or less demented-Alzheimer’s disease or something like it must have been behind his confession. Another suggested that Wan had sought the limelight he had long missed. According to a third, Wan must have imagined himself to be the last soldier of the Cultural Revolution. And, finally, according to neighborhood hearsay, Wan was secretly in love, and he confessed in order to impress his undisclosed lover. Or a combination of various factors might have motivated him. For, as Chen had pointed out, Wan was like a fish out of water in present-day China, a factor that must have influenced his thought processes.

  Old Liang was furious with Wan. The residence cop insisted that some charge should be pressed against him. “He should be sent to prison for at least three or four years. Wan deserves it. Deliberate false testimony! This ex-Mao Zedong Thought Propaganda Worker Team Member is crazy. He must believe he can do whatever he likes and get away with it, like in the days of the Cultural Revolution He’s simply lost in his spring-and-autumn dream! Our society is a legal society now.”

  It was Party Secretary Li, however, who decided against prosecuting Wan. “Enough is enough. We have had so many stories about the Cultural Revolution. There is no point bringing Wan into troubled water, too. People have to move on. Let the old man alone.”

  Politically, it was not a good idea to harp on the disastrous aftermath of the Cultural Revolution, or even to remind people of it. This was the very card Chen had played, though Li did not say this in so many words. Anyway, Wan’s case was not to be interpreted politically, so Yu did not have to say anything. Outraged as Old Liang might be, Party Secretary Li had the last word regarding Wan’s fate.

  Still, the unsolved mystery of Wan’s confession kept intruding itself into Yu’s thoughts.

  Stubbing out his cigarette, Yu got up and carried his phone into the kitchen area.

  Peiqin was busy cooking, moving about in a maze of pots and pans. There was hardly enough space for the two of them.

  She was genuinely pleased with the outcome of the investigation and with the part she had played. “So everything is finished,” she said, turning to him with a bright smile, her hands still stuffing tofu with ground pork.

  “There is still a lot to do to wrap it all up.”

  “Imagine I-imagine both of us-having done something for Yang,” she said. “Yin was his only comfort in his last days. Now her murderer has been caught. In heaven, if there is a heaven, Yang must be pleased.”

  “Yes, the conclusion…” Yu found it hard to complete his sentence-that his grandnephew killed the woman he loved.

  “Can you take out his poetry collection for me? It is in the second drawer of the chest.”

  “Of course. But why?”

  “I think I have just gained a new understanding of Yang’s poetry while I was busy cooking,” she said. “Sorry, my hands are not clean. But when you bring the book here, I have something to tell you that is related to the case.”

  Yu came back with the poetry book in his hand.

  “Please find the poem titled ‘A Cat of the Cultural Revolution,’” she said. “Can you read it to me?”

  He started reading in a low voice, still totally mystified. At times, Peiqin could be too wrapped up in books, just like Chief Inspector Chen. Fortunately, she did not have too many idols like Yang. And there was no one else in the kitchen area just then.

  My fantasy came true / with the Cultural Revolution / of being a cat, jumping / through the attic window, stalking / on the dark roof, staring / down into the rooms now peopled / with the strangers wearing / the armbands of “Red Guards.” / They had told me “Go away, / bastard, you hear!” I heard, / only too glad to come / to the roof, where I found, / for the first time, that starlight / could shine so long in solitude, / and that Mother had changed / beside the Red Guards, her neck / bent by a blackboard like / a zoolo
gical label. I couldn’t tell / the words written on it, but I knew / she’s in no position to stop / my leaping into the dark night.

  Morning brought me down / brandishing a slate, Mother sprang back / at the sight, as if the slate too / were designed for her swollen neck. / I couldn’t help shouting / in a voice I had learned overnight, / “Go, and fetch a bowl of rice / for me, you hear!” Away she / scampered. A mouse scuttled / in the debris of a night’s “cultural revolution.” And / I decided, not being human enough / to be a Red Guard, to be / felinely ferocious. Back / from a visit to the dentist / one day, I caught her squealing, “No, / your teeth are sharp.” “Alas, / she was born under the star of the mouse,” a blind / fortune-teller said, sighing / by her deathbed. “It was / predestined, according / to the Chinese horoscope.” / I ran out wild. There were / nine lives to lose, and I jumped / into the jungle.

  I see a paw-print / on this white paper.

  “Yes, it’s about the Cultural Revolution,” Yu said, after reading the long poem aloud.

  “Now that I have learned more about his life,” Peiqin said, “I’m sure the narrator must have been based on Hong, the child of a ‘black’ family. Her family was persecuted by the Red Guards. Those kids suffered terrible discrimination. They were regarded as ‘politically untrustworthy,’ with no future in socialist China. Some of them could not help seeing themselves as less than human because they could never become Red Guards.”

  “Yes, that’s why she denounced her parents, I was told.”

  “I can really relate, because I had a similar experience and harbored secret resentment against my parents,” she said in a trembling voice before she controlled herself. “What a poem! It represents the dehumanization of the Cultural Revolution from a child’s perspective.”

  “Yes, the Cultural Revolution caused many tragedies. Even today, there are people who have not been able to move out of its shadow, including Hong, and perhaps Bao too.”