by Andy Oakes
Zoul calling over another masseur.
“Colonel, lie on the marble. Let the masseur relieve you of the strains of the day.”
“Too far Zoul. You go too far. I will not have a blind man touch me. Get away from me.”
An aside designed only for the Comrade Chief Officer to hear.
“Don’t get above yourself, Zoul. We are not comrades-in-arms. We are not old friends. You serve a purpose, nothing more.”
A shrill alarm sounding out from a heavy watch on his wrist. Without even looking down, switching it off. Re-setting it for two hours later. Smiling at Piao.
“You will want to know why I am here? Why I have arranged this, this meeting of minds.”
“I will not disappoint again, Comrade Qi. But I might surprise you. I know why you wish me here.”
“You do, do you? Then tell me, Senior Investigator. Tell me.”
“The higher the cadre, Comrade Tai Zi, the further down for you and your sponsor, your father, to tumble. You wish to bribe. If that does not achieve the result that you seek, you wish to threaten. My surprise was only that you should be allowed to present your menu at the invitation of my Comrade Chief Officer.”
“I take objection …”
A sharp knife cutting Zoul’s words, as if they were fat, from a slice of pork.
“I was able to ‘persuade’ your Comrade Chief Officer that this was the best way forward. But down to business, Senior Investigator? Time, as they say, is yuan.”
Hands clasped in a manicured steeple of gold rings.
“You are an irritant, Senior Investigator. Nothing more. But I have, as they say, bigger pork bellies to carve than you. Business that I need to conduct that has the full blessing of the People’s Liberation Army. To put it bluntly, what I do raises much needed funds to increase the potency of an army that is massively underfunded by our government. I am serving a great national interest. Sometimes in this process irritants may need to be soothed. Bumps on the road to where I need to get to, smoothed out.”
“Young women, bumps in the road? Two of my Comrade Officers, bumps in the road, Comrade Tai Zi?”
Sitting up, the Senior Investigator, his head swimming. The masseur’s fingers leaving him. Now just another blind man, not knowing what to do with redundant hands.
“You talk of these human lives as if they were inconsequential. Mere inconveniences. I doubt that their parents, lovers, children, would agree, Comrade Tai Zi.”
“You fail to understand how important my work is.”
“More important than these lives, Colonel?”
Silence.
“No, Colonel Qi, you fail to understand how important these lives are.”
Silence.
“And you, Colonel Tai Zi, a Muslim. I thought that being a Muslim would bring purity to a life? An understanding of life’s value? The Koran has much to say on the worth of life. ‘All is from God’, Sura 4:80.”
“I am not a Muslim.”
“A Muslim who rips young women up, as if they were old copies of the People’s Daily. ‘Judgement is with God only’, Sura 6:57.”
“I am not a Muslim.”
“A Muslim who uses and trades in prostitutes. Who heads a pack of hounds that perpetrate the most depraved sexual acts. ‘Be good to parents, and to the kindred, and to orphans, and to the poor, and to a neighbour, whether kinsman or newcomer, and to a fellow traveller, and to the wayfarer, and to the slaves whom your right hand holds; verily God loves not the proud, the vain boaster’, Sura 4:40.”
“I do not use whores, and I am not a Muslim.”
“Three denials of your prophet, Comrade Tai Zi. Are there no lessons for you to learn from earlier prophets and their followers?”
The princeling’s smell of violence covered in a worn veneer of Cologne. Of anger suppressed by education and upbringing.
“ ‘We will inflict on them the torture of Hell’s fire. Each time their skin will be torched, burnt totally, we will replace it with a new one, to make them taste still more the torture’. You know these words, yes, Comrade PLA? You used them as you walked from the fen-chu’s interview room. Sura 4:56.”
Silence.
“Your silence is another denial of your prophet, Comrade PLA. It intrigues me that should you deny being a Muslim, although I realise that it is not the religion of your father, the Senior Colonel?”
Silence.
“Our Muslim comrades are not under persecution within the People’s Republic, unlike other religions. So why deny a truth? What is the secret that is at the heart of this, Comrade PLA?”
Closer. Eyes locked together.
“I cannot walk away from this, PLA. Not this. Too many things I have walked away from in my life. And my soul is holed by those acts. As a Muslim, you would understand. But I will not walk away from this, or from you, Comrade PLA.”
Qi’s breath smelling of peppermint and putrid meat.
“Not even with 500,000 yuan in your pocket, Senior Investigator? Or perhaps you have no need for money, Comrade PSB?”
“No, Comrade Tai Zi, even though money thinks that I am dead I cannot walk away with your yuan in my pocket. Not when I have seen the faces of those who you have murdered and those who mourn them.”
“Such a waste, Piao. You have nothing in your hands but, but …”
Manicured fingers raking the air.
“Mist.”
“It is your turn to disappoint me, Comrade Colonel. And my turn to surprise you once more.”
Lying once more on the marble. Its coldness shocking him. The masseur’s fingers back to his skin.
“I have much more than you think. The ligature tightens, Comrade Colonel. Can you not feel it?”
Qi, pulling loose the heavy gold necklace.
“No, Piao.”
Eyes meeting through the mist.
“You have nothing. Nothing.”
Cao-mu jie-bing. “The dead cat turned.”
“Mao Zedong. August 20th, 1933. Southern Kiangsi.”
The Comrade Colonel, like a boxer rolling with the punch.
“Perhaps even I underestimated you, Senior Investigator. There is nothing more dangerous than an honest man.”
Getting to his feet and standing over Piao. A fierce whisper across his cheek.
“You know that you, and those whom you protect, will not survive, Senior Investigator? You have become irritants. You have become bumps on a road that I must go down.”
“A threat of murder to an officer in the service of the People’s Republic of China. An employee of the Ministry of Security. A serious charge, Comrade PLA. I am sure that my Comrade Chief Officer who is a witness to that threat will agree?”
Zoul desperately looking to Qi for a sign.
“He is correct, Comrade Colonel, such a threat is, is …”
“Is what, Zoul, dangerous, unwise, undiplomatic.”
Laughing, the tai zi, but it stitched in place with raw anger.
“You are not dealing with a common tu-fei, Senior Investigator. Murder, Senior Investigator? I have not talked of murder. I am a Colonel in the PLA. No, Piao, not murder. You have become too high profile for such a blunt instrument.”
Zoul stuttering.
“C-Comrade Qi, please. Please. So many witnesses. Such a scene, it is not necessary. Perhaps you should modify your language.”
The tai zi’s hand to the sweaty flab of his shoulder, pulling the Comrade Chief Officer from the marble plinth.
“Quiet Zoul. It was not your time to speak.”
Laughing as his vice-like grip increased.
“No, Piao, not murder. There are many ways to skin a cat …”
*
The Big Man, China Brand embraced between his lips, was sitting in the Shanghai Sedan on the Yi Shan Road. As a stepping stone in a river of bright water, streams of Forever Bicycles smoothing their way around the Sedan’s dented bumpers.
“So how was it mixing with the fucking rich and powerful, Boss?”
The soun
d of a cigarette lighter. Of a long, lingering inhalation of cheap smoke.
“What about the massage, Boss? I’ve heard that those blind masseurs have magic in their fingertips.”
Just the sound of bells. So many bright, tinkling bells. Yaobang studying Piao’s face before starting the car, sounding the horn in warning to the cyclists as he pulled further out into the Yi Shan Road, moving north.
“That fucking bad Boss?”
Flicking his cigarette butt out of the quarter window.
“Then let’s hope that the Wizard has had a better day than you.”
*
Home. Flat 402, the December 10th 1949 apartment block.
A door’s creak and open. Electric light, as yellow as sixty-a-day-nicotine fingers, spilling into the hallway.
“Comrade Piao, I really must complain. The stranger in your flat, really. The noises that he has been making. And the comings and goings. I have to notify you that I will be writing a letter to the Party. Your attendance at the small group’s meetings has been pitiful. You really must …”
Piao turning, facing the Street Committee Chairwoman.
“I am sorry, Comrade, I do not understand what you mean. Noises?”
“You know exactly what I mean, Comrade Piao. Noises like I have never heard before. As if a pig was being castrated in your living room.”
Eyes catching eyes, a message passed between them. Immediately turning, Piao, the Big Man, moving silently up the staircase. Hands to the inside of their jackets, fingertips to diamond-cut steel. Silhouette pistols moving ahead of them. Senses alive, seeking a shift in the unlabelled nuances that marked this place as home. Nothing in the deeply cornered folds of blackness, nearing the landing … nothing.
Behind them, the Comrade Street Committee Chairwoman following, her voice rising, reverberating.
“How dare you walk away from me, Comrade. This is official business, Party business. Have some respect.”
Piao spinning around, the Street Committee Chairwoman’s eyes widening. Hands moving to her baby-bird face. Her toothless mouth, a tunnel of screaming words.
“A gun. A gun.”
For an instance, Piao also glancing down at the pistol. Always shocking him to see his hand wrapped around its steel. A doubt, but then swiftly moving back up the steps that he had retreated from. The Big Man passing him, moving toward the Street Committee Chairwoman. His hand, dinner-plate huge, clamping around her mouth.
The alarm now sounded. Each step, knowing that they would know. And only the one entrance into his flat. Rimless rounds’ sightlines already chosen? A headshot? Shot to mid-chest?
Piao, two steps at a time now. A violent charge. Deep guttural yell in his throat. Slamming the half-open door into the wall. A splinter of wood, a yelp of metal hinges twisting. Expecting the bullet’s burn, but nothing. Almost on his knees, crouched, ball-like, except for the stretched extension of double arms, meeting, pointing with rude anodised finger. His whole body at one with his gun. Unmoving. Senses reaching out for the signals that danger emanates. Nothing. Slowly, with effort, his posture relaxing, adrenalin’s tide receding. Moving down the short hallway. Slowly rounding the door. The Wizard, static, facing the computer, his back to the door, a half-full bottle of Southern Comfort within reach.
Moving further into the room. And then it was upon him, like the heat of a dog’s breath before its teeth puncture your skin. One smell, besides that of hot wiring and hot plastic that a new computer possesses. Only one smell, as clearly defined as your own signature on your own cheque, a monsoon of blood. The Senior Investigator holstering his pistol.
Slowly moving around the side of the Wizard. Eyes alive to all. Each spent angle, horror, in fanning degrees. Horror at the gradations and depths that the colour red can possess. From the Wizard’s mouth, down his chin, neck and chest, pooling in his lap … blood. From his lap, down his legs, into his shoes, onto the carpet. So much blood, it would have to be a large wound to cause such a tide. Piao’s eyes searching, but finding nothing obvious. Reaching for Rentang’s wrist, no perceptible pulse.
“Yaobang, here. Quick.”
Footfalls in the hallway. The Street Committee Chairwoman’s face married to the palm of his hand. As the Big Man breached the living-room door his hand falling from the old woman’s face. Piao answering the question unasked.
“I think he’s dead. I cannot find a pulse. An ambulance, call one immediately.”
Blood spattered over the telephone. The Big Man using a loose sheet of paper to pick up the handset, so as not to leave his own fingerprints. Not noticing as the Street Committee Chairwoman ran for the stairs, both hands to her face in witness to a silent scream. Not noticing unconsciousness chasing her down with faster feet, her legs folding as if they were deck chairs. Not hearing her body meet the floor in a violent embrace.
The Senior Investigator’s attention drawn to a tumbler, deeply filled, near the far right corner of the computer monitor. The tumbler, its red contents almost overflowing. Southern Comfort, tainted to the hue of tinned tomatoes. Piao, with reluctance, knowing already what he would find, taking a pair of tweezers from his inside pocket, forcing them wide open. Fishing. Something solid in liquid. Bobbed squirms, away from the tweezers pinch, but steel snaring its quarry. Through the liquid, a deeper red moving through red. Slowly, carefully, withdrawing a tongue, root and branch. The Wizard’s tongue.
“Fuck.”
Piao moving around the desk. Just below the Wizard’s shoulder blade, a deep ruddy bruise soaking through the otherwise pristine cotton. A tidy comrade the PLA. The knife that had been used, wiped clean on the victim’s own clothing in a final abuse.
*
The Number 1 Hospital …
A drip. A blip. And his eyes open. Two commas on a blank sheet of white paper. Focusing on Piao, a gurgling deep at the back of Rentang’s throat, expanding into a pattern, rough and phlegmy. Falling chaotically into a coughing fit. His whole body, the bed, rattling with its fury.
The Senior Investigator, adrenalin fighting two days without sleep, yanking the string of the buzzer to summon a stout-legged nurse. A hand, Rentang’s, reaching out to his, loosely pulling it down toward the side cupboard. A clip-board. A pen. A chart of biroed peaks and troughs. The cough easing to a gagging, guttural Morse of breaths. Their eyes fixed on each others’. An understanding passed. Folding the Wizard’s hand around the biro, turning the chart sheet and holding it up to meet the tip of Rentang’s pen. And wondering how many curses, mute and in biro, would balance the ripping out of a tongue and the stealing away of a voice? Painfully slow and precise. Looking away as the words formed. Seeing a flush of red move down plastic tubing. Florid poppy fields of spittle, blood flecked, in full bloom across the bedding.
Only looking at the paper once the pen had halted its trace. Once the arm had fallen back to the aertex ocean and Rentang was at the very centre of the doctor and nurse’s universe.
Two words.
FILE TWENTY
*
“How is he, Boss?”
A look.
“That fucking bad, eh?”
Scrubbing as he talked. The carpet foaming a candy-floss pink.
“And the Street Committee Chairwoman?”
The Senior Investigator moving to the computer. A screen saver flowing with oscillating hoops and colours. As he took the mouse, their hues across his knuckles.
“A broken jaw.”
A laugh from the Big Man.
“I suppose it will be some time before she can speak. There’s always a silver lining, Boss.”
Pink rubber gloves across the glass. Gagging, the Big Man, as he carefully picked up the tumbler of Southern Comfort.
“I’ll never fucking drink this shit again, Boss.”
The toilet flushing.
“Scene of crimes, been and gone, Boss. Thirty minutes, that was all. Didn’t even look at the computer. Either they’ve got hot dates, or they don’t want to know.”
A tap runnin
g.
“What I don’t understand is why Qi’s thugs didn’t smash the fucking computer.”
“Maybe they were having so much fun that they forgot.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
Watching the Senior Investigator’s fingers on the keyboard.
“Thought you didn’t know how to use a computer, Boss?”
“I don’t. But I am good at watching.”
In a blink, the screen saver’s oscillations swept aside to be replaced by pages of numbers. Shaking his head, the Big Man, as he squeezed the cloth into the bucket.
“Rentang?”
“Yes. The Wizard.”
The computer, where he had left it. Strings of data crashing like a waterfall as Piao scrolled. Pages in frantic dashes. Stopping, then scrolling slowly back. A page, two pages. Slowly, a file title moving into mid-frame. Bold indented.
FILE TWENTY
“It is from Qi’s computer. The Wizard had hacked into it.”
On the right-hand side of the screen, a fine misting of specks. The Wizard’s blood. A few hours ago a man’s tongue had been cut out as he sat on this seat looking at this screen. Every word plucked from his mouth forever. File Twenty. Its significance unknown. But important it must be for a man gagged in blood and sutures, to summon the energy to write words that he could no longer speak. To write ‘File Twenty’ instead of, ‘fuck off’. To write ‘File Twenty’ instead of, ‘see how you have ruined me’. Yes, File Twenty must be important.
Lines. Columns. Banded characters. Numbers. Code labelled. Code edged. Not a code to conceal – Qi confident that nobody would ever see this file. But a code of convenience. A shorthand to save space, to save typing and time. Patterns emerging the more that Piao looked at it. A record, an accounts’ book, a diary and an inventory. Monies out and monies in. Cream scooped from the top. At various accounting intersections the same characters coming into play. A code? A company? A nickname? A name? And yuan, trailing so many noughts behind it, like a locomotive pulling carriages. Yuan, by the hundreds of thousands, by the millions, sent by courier, the same day of the month, the same time of day. Sent to Citizen One.
“Who, or what the fuck is Citizen One?”
Pointing to figures, running totals.
