A Loyal Character Dancer - [Chief Inspector Chen Cao 02]

by Qiu Xiaolong

  “What does the phrase folk east of the river mean?” Catherine asked, as she put her cosmetics into a small bag.

  “It means the people at home who have high hopes for you. Lord Chu was defeated in a battle around 200 B.C. and declared that he was unable to face his folk east of the river. So by the Wu River, he committed suicide.”

  “I’ve seen a tape of a Beijing Opera called Farewell to His Imperial Concubine. It is about the proud Lord of Chu, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, that’s him.” Chen was not in the mood to talk more.

  He was increasingly uneasy about this trip back to Fujian. Wen had appeared so determined, yet every delay increased her risk.

  He excused himself and went to smoke a cigarette. There were people at one end of the corridor, holding plastic basins filled with clothes. They were carrying their laundry to the public laundry room the hotel manager had shown him—a long concrete groove with a number of faucets. There was no such thing as a washing machine around here. He walked to a window at the other end. Next to it was a door opening to a flight of steps, which led to a small concrete platform, a part of the flat roof. There a young woman was busy hanging her wet clothes on the clothesline. Wearing a slip with thin straps, bare legged and bare of foot, she looked like a gymnast ready to perform. A young man emerged from behind the clothes and embraced her in spite of the beads of water glistening on her shoulders. A couple on their honeymoon trip, Chen guessed, his eyes squinting from the cigarette smoke.

  Most of the people here were not affluent and had to endure the inconveniences of a cheap hotel, but they were contented.

  He wondered whether he had done the right thing for Wen.

  Was Wen going to have a good life with Feng in that faraway country? She knew the answer. That’s why she had chosen to stay in Suzhou. With the best years of her life already wasted in the Cultural Revolution and its aftermath, Wen was trying to hang on to the last remnant of her dreams by staying here with Liu.

  What had he done? A cop was not paid to be compassionate.

  Some unexpected lines came to him as he stared out of the window...

  “What are you thinking about?” Inspector Rohn came to his side by the window.

  “Nothing.” He was upset. But for their interference, Wen might have stayed on with Liu, though he knew it was not fair to blame Inspector Rohn. “We have done our job.”

  “We’ve done our job,” she repeated. “To be exact, you have done it. A wonderful job, I have to say.”

  “A wonderful job indeed.” He ground out the cigarette on the windowsill.

  “What did you say to Liu in his study?” she asked, touching his hand lightly. She must have sensed the change in his mood. “It couldn’t have been easy for you to bring him around.”

  “There are so many perspectives from which we can look at one and the same thing. I merely provided another perspective for him.”

  “A political perspective?”

  “No, Inspector Rohn. Not everything is political here.” He noticed the young couple staring at them from the roof. From their perspective, what would they think of the two of them, a Chinese man and an American woman standing by the window? He changed the subject. “Oh, sorry about turning down the dinner invitation. It would have been a sumptuous dinner, I imagine. Loads of toasts to friendship between China and the United States. I was not in the mood.”

  “You made the right choice. Now we have a chance to take a walk in a Suzhou garden.”

  “You want to go to a garden?”

  “I have not visited a single one yet,” she said. “If we have to wait, let us wait in a garden.”

  “Good idea. Let me make one more phone call.”

  “Fine, I’ll take a few pictures of the hotel out front.”

  He dialed Gu’s number. Now that they were about to leave Suzhou, it should be safe for him to make a call to Gu in Shanghai.

  “Where are you, Chief Inspector Chen?” Gu sounded genuinely anxious. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”

  “I’m on my way to another city, Gu. Is there anything you want to tell me?”

  “Some people are after you. You have to take care.”

  “Who are those people?” Chen said.

  “An international organization.”

  “Tell me about them.”

  “Their base is Hong Kong. I have not yet found out everything. It’s not convenient for me to talk at the moment, Chief Inspector Chen. Let’s discuss it when you come back, okay?”

  “Okay.” At least it was not Internal Security.

  Catherine was waiting for him in front of the hotel. She wanted to take a picture of him standing by the burnished bronze lion, his hand on its back. It did not feel like bronze. He examined it more closely, and found it was made of plastic, covered with gold paint.

  * * * *

  Chapter 32

  C

  hen was still in a dark mood, which soon proved to be infectious. Catherine was also subdued as they entered the Qing-style landscape of the Yi Garden.

  There was something on his mind, she knew. A number of unanswered questions were on hers, too. Nevertheless, they had found Wen.

  She did not want to raise those questions for the moment. And she felt uncomfortable for a different reason as she walked beside him in the garden. In the past few days, Chen had played the role of the cop in charge, always having something to say— about modernism, Confucianism, or communism. That afternoon, however, their roles had become reversed. She had taken the initiative. She wondered whether he resented her.

  The garden was quiet. There were hardly any other visitors. Their footsteps made the only sound.

  “Such a beautiful garden,” she said, “but it’s almost deserted.”

  “It’s the time of the day.”

  Dusk was beginning to envelop the garden path; the sun hung above the tilted eaves of the ancient stone pavilion like a stamp. They strolled through a gourd-shaped stone gate to a bamboo bridge where they saw several golden carp swimming in the clear, tranquil water.

  “Your heart’s not in sightseeing, Chief Inspector Chen.”

  “No. I’m enjoying every minute of it—in your company.”

  “You don’t have to say that.”

  “You’re not a fish,” he said. “How do you know what a fish feels?”

  They came to another small bridge, across which they saw a teahouse with vermilion posts, and with a large black Chinese character for “Tea” embroidered on a yellow silk pennant streaming in the breeze. There was an arrangement of strange-shaped rocks in front of the teahouse.

  “Shall we go there?” she suggested.

  The teahouse might have served as an official reception hall in the original architect’s design, spacious, elegant, yet gloomy. The light filtered through the stained-glass windows. High on the wall was a horizontal board inscribed with Chinese characters: Return of Spring. By a lacquer screen in the corner, an old woman standing at a glass counter gave them a bamboo-covered thermos bottle, two cups with green tea leaves, a box of dried tofu braised in soy sauce, and a box of greenish cakes. “If you need more water, you can refill the bottle here.”

  There were no other customers. Nor any service after they seated themselves at a mahogany table. The old woman disappeared behind the screen.

  The tea was excellent. Perhaps because of the tea leaves, perhaps because of the water, or perhaps because of the peaceful atmosphere. The dried tofu, rich in a spicy brown sauce, also tasted good, but the green cake was more palatable, sweet with an unusual flavor she had never tasted before.

  “This is a wonderful dinner for me,” she said, a tiny tea leaf between her lips.

  “For me too,” he said, adding water into her cup. “In the Chinese way of drinking tea, the first cup is not supposed to be the best. Its taste comes out in a natural way in the second or the third cup. That’s why the teahouse gives you the thermos bottle, so you can enjoy the tea at your leisure while you view the garden.”<
br />
  “Yes, the view is fantastic.”

  “The Hui Emperor of the Song dynasty liked oddly shaped rocks. He ordered a national rock search—Huashigang—but he was captured by the Jin invaders before the chosen rocks were transported to the capital. Some of them are said to have been left in Suzhou,” Chen said. “Look at this one. It is called Heaven’s Gate.”

  “Really! I don’t see the resemblance.” Its name seemed a misnomer to her. The rock was shaped more like a spring bamboo shoot, angular, and sharp-pointed. It was in no way suggestive of a magnificent gate to the heavens.

  “You have to see it from the right perspective,” he said. “It may resemble a lot of things—a cone swaying in the wind, or an old man fishing in the snow, or a dog barking at the moon, or a deserted woman waiting for her lover’s return. It all depends on your perspective.”

  “Yes, it all depends on your point of view,” she said, failing to see any of those resemblances. She was pleased that he had recovered enough to play the guide again, though at the same time irritated by her enforced return to the role of tourist.

  The sight of the rocks also served as a reminder of reality. Despite all her Chinese studies, a American marshal would never see things exactly the same way as her Chinese partner. That was a sobering realization. “I have some questions for you, Chief Inspector Chen.”

  “Go ahead, Inspector Rohn.”

  “Since you phoned the Suzhou Police Bureau from Liu’s place, why not call in the local cops to do the job? They could have forced Liu to cooperate.”

  “They could, but I did not like that idea. Liu was not holding her against her will,” Chen said. “Besides, I had a number of unanswered questions. So I wanted to talk to them first.”

  “Have you got your answers?”

  “Some,” Chen said, piercing a cube of tofu with a toothpick. “I was also worried about Liu’s possible reaction. He’s such a romantic. According to Bertrand Russell, romantic passion reaches its height when lovers are fighting against the whole world.”

  “You have made a study of it, Chief Inspector Chen. What if you had failed to persuade them?”

  “As a police officer, I would have to make an objective report to the bureau.”

  “Then the bureau would make them cooperate, right?”

  “Yes, so you see, my effort is just pathetic, isn’t it?”

  “Well, you succeeded in convincing them. She’s willing to leave,” she said. “Now for the relationship between Liu and Wen. Can you tell me more about it? It’s still hazy to me. You may have given your word to Liu—promised confidentiality perhaps. Tell me what you can.”

  She was sipping at her tea as he began, but soon she was so absorbed that the tea turned cold in the cup. He included what he considered to be the important details. In addition, he added things from Yu’s interview tapes, which focused more on the miseries Wen had suffered with Feng.

  Catherine had gathered some of the information but now the various pieces were forming a whole. At the end of his account, she gazed into her cup for several minutes. When she raised her head again, the hall appeared to be even more gloomy. She saw why he had been so depressed.

  “One more question, Chief Inspector Chen,” she said. “About the connection between the Fujian police and the Flying Axes—is that true?”

  “It’s very probable. I had to tell her that,” Chen said evasively. “I might be able to shield her for a week or two, but more than that, I doubt. She has no choice but to go to the United States.”

  “You should have discussed this with me earlier.”

  “It’s not pleasant, you know, for a Chinese cop to admit this.”

  She grasped his hand.

  The moment of silence was broken by the sound of the old woman cracking water melon seeds behind the screen.

  “Let’s go outside,” Chen said.

  They stepped out, carrying their tea and cakes. Walking across the bridge, they entered the pavilion with the yellow glazed tile roof and vermilion posts. The posts were set into a surrounding bench with a flat marble top and lattice railings. They placed the thermos bottle on the ground and sat with the cups and cakes between them. Small birds chirped in the grotto behind them.

  “The Suzhou garden landscape was designed,” he said, “to inspire people to feel poetic.”

  She did not feel so, though she relished the moment. Someday in the future, she knew she would look back on this early evening in Suzhou as special. Leaning sideways against the post, she went through a sudden shift of mood, as if they had undergone another role reversal. Chen was almost his usual self again. And she was becoming sentimental.

  What were Wen and Liu doing at this moment?

  “Soon Liu and Wen are going to part,” she said wistfully.

  “Liu may go to the United States someday—”

  “No, he will never be able to find her.” She shook her head. “That’s the way our program works.”

  “Wen may come back—for a visit—” he cut himself short. “No, that would be too risky for her.”

  “It’s out of the question.”

  “It’s difficult to meet, and to part, too. / The east wind languid, the flowers fallen,” he murmured, “Sorry, I’m quoting poetry again.”

  “What’s wrong with that, Chief Inspector Chen?”

  “It’s sentimental.”

  “So you have turned into a hermit crab retreating into a rationalist shell.”

  Instantaneously she knew she had gone too far. Why had she burst out with this? Was it because she was upset with the outcome of the investigation, because neither he nor she could possibly do anything that would really help Wen? Or was it because of a subconscious parallel rising to the surface of her mind? Soon she, too, would be leaving China.

  He made no response.

  She bent over to rub her aching ankle.

  “Finish the last piece,” he said, handing the cake to her.

  “It’s a strange name, Bamboo Leaf Green Cake,” she said, studying the box.

  “Bamboo leaves may have been used in the cake. Bamboo used to be a very important part of traditional Chinese culture. There must be a bamboo grove in a Chinese garden landscape, and a bamboo shoot dish in a Chinese banquet.”

  “Interesting,” she said. “Even Chinese gangsters use the word bamboo in the name of their organizations.”

  “What are you referring to, Inspector Rohn?”

  “Remember the fax I got at the hotel last Sunday? It contained some background information about international triads involved in human smuggling. One of them is called Green Bamboo.”

  “Do you have the fax with you?”

  “No, I left it at the Peace Hotel.

  “But you’re sure?”

  “Yes, I remember the name,” she said.

  She changed her position. Turning toward him, she reclined against the post. He removed the cups. She slipped off her shoes and put her feet on the bench, her knees doubled against her chin, her bare soles resting on the cold marble bench top.

  “Your ankle has not completely recovered,” he said. “The bench top is too cold.”

  And she felt her feet being placed in his lap, the arch of her sole cradled in his hand, which warmed it before rubbing her ankle.

  “Thank you,” she said, her toes curling against his fingers involuntarily.

  “Let me recite a poem for you, Inspector Rohn. It came in fragments to me during the last few days.”

  “Your own poem?”

  “Not really. More like an imitation of MacNeice’s The Sunlight on the Garden.’ It is a poem about people being grateful for the time they share, even though the moment is fleeting.”

  He started to speak, his hand on her ankle.

  “The sunlight burning gold, / we cannot collect the day / from the ancient garden / into an album of old. / Let’s pick our play, / or time will not pardon.”

  “The sunlight on the garden,” she said.

  “Actually, the central image
of the first stanza came to me in Moscow Suburb.

  “Then after I got Liu’s poem about the loyal character dance, especially after we met Wen and Liu, some more lines appeared,” he explained. “When all is told, / we cannot tell / the question from the answer. / Which is to hold / us under a spell, / the dance or the dancer?”

  “The dance and the dancer, I understand,” she said, nodding, “For Liu, it’s Wen that turned the loyal character dance into a miracle.”