Flower Net

by Lisa See

  Hulan chose her next words carefully. “We are at a cusp in China. Deng Xiaoping, our paramount leader, is old. No one knows what will happen when he dies. Our government believes that the country will go on as before. After all, Deng has already picked his successor. But we must be prepared for other eventualities.”

  “Such as?”

  “Some say his death could bring back the warlords. Some say China could disintegrate in much the same way that Russia has. Others predict that a new leader will come from the provinces. But there is yet another possibility. As I have already pointed out, the triads have found their greatest strength in times of political unrest. We understand that you are worried about the influx of triad members to Los Angeles after Hong Kong rejoins China. But we are worried that upon Deng’s death, the triads will grab that opportunity to solidify their positions in China. They are rich, they are many, and their guanxi are undeniable.”

  “Now that we’re finally being frank, Inspector, why haven’t you discussed these issues with me before?” David asked.

  “Because, unlike you, I don’t believe that the triads are involved in these murders. Look at the facts. All three murders took place in China. We have nothing to connect those deaths to triad activity in the U.S. except that Guang Henglai was found on board the Peony.”

  “And the money.”

  “Perhaps the money. Can you tie the money back to the Rising Phoenix?”

  David looked at his charts, then surveyed the faces in the room. “That’s what we’re going to try to do, because I think that even if the killer isn’t in the States, the reason is.” He considered, then said, “You have told us a lot about the history of the triads, but maybe we should take a minute or two to look at their activities in the U.S. today.”

  He went to the chart that outlined the family tree of the Rising Phoenix. At the top where the “dragon head” should be was an empty space. From the dragon head, a line led down, then split into three others leading to boxes representing the top lieutenants. Of these, only the names for Spencer Lee and Yingyee Lee were known. From here, the lines branched again and again, with about half of the names filled in. There were no photographs in the top half of the pyramid. Those at the base were mug shots taken of the few gang members who’d been arrested over the years. The next chart outlined the triad’s legitimate and illegitimate businesses, which ranged from tea shops and bean-curd factories to floating gambling clubs and prostitution rings.

  “You know all this?” Peter asked. When David said yes, the young agent asked, “And you don’t arrest them?”

  Jack Campbell grunted. “We can’t get authorization for wiretaps on Spencer Lee or the others unless we can provide the court with hard evidence that these men are involved in criminal activities, and we can’t get that evidence unless we get the wiretaps.”

  Peter looked at Campbell in disbelief. “You know what they’re doing is illegal but you can’t do anything about it?”

  “It’s the American way,” Campbell said and heaved a shrug.

  Peter leaned over and asked Hulan a question in Chinese, which she answered. The Caucasians in the room looked to her for an explanation. “He’s wondering why you Americans keep moving your shoulders like that,” she said. “In China, we don’t shrug. I was just explaining what you were doing and what it meant.”

  Campbell shrugged theatrically. Peter nodded and laughed. He liked this man.

  “So, does anyone have any suggestions for what we should do next?” David asked the group.

  After a moment of silence, Hulan said, “In China what I would do is cast a flower net.” She looked to Peter for agreement before continuing. “This method of fishing goes back many centuries. The flower net is a round, hand-woven net with weights on the edges. The fisherman throws it out into the air, where it opens like a flower, settles on the surface of the water, sinks to the dark depths, and traps everything within its circumference.” She turned to David. “We’ll do as you say. We’ll follow the money, but we’ll also look at everything that comes in contact with our net.”

  They spent the next couple of hours brainstorming. Peter suggested that they go back and interview everyone that David and the FBI had ever suspected of being involved with the Rising Phoenix. Hulan wanted to go to Chinatown to restaurants, herbal shops, grocery stores, sweatshops. “Let’s talk to real people—common people,” she said. “It’s a small community. Maybe someone will have heard something. I think they will talk to one of their countrymen before they would ever talk to you.”

  David preferred a more direct approach. He wanted to go to the handful of banks where the financial transactions had taken place and to investigate other businesses that fell under the auspices of the China Land and Economics Corporation. “It can’t be a coincidence that Guang Mingyun owns the Chinese Overseas Bank, that his son laundered—for want of a better word—money in that bank, and that he was found dead on a boat used by the Rising Phoenix to transport illegal immigrants.”

  They would also have to find time to interview Guang Mingyun’s relatives and business associates, especially those who had come in contact with Henglai. “I don’t want to forget Billy Watson,” Hulan added to the growing to-do list. “Let’s go to the university and see what we can find out.”

  Noel Gardner, with his accounting background and Peter Sun’s assistance, worked at one of the computer terminals, inputting data from the bankbooks found in Guang Henglai’s apartment with those found in Cao Hua’s, then comparing the financial transactions with the exit and entry stamps in their respective passports. Sometimes the two men had traveled on the same day, often separately. Either way, deposits and withdrawals had been made either just before or just after a trip. Beyond this, Gardner and Peter determined that certain deposits had leaped from bank to bank, probably as a way of hiding the trail.

  By the end of Gardner and Sun’s session, they had pieced together a pattern. Guang and Cao had traveled to Los Angeles on the first and third Tuesdays of every month. Cao Hua had continued with this itinerary even after Henglai’s death. The first Tuesday of February was two days away. Would someone take Cao’s place? And for what purpose? Campbell called an old friend who worked for U.S. Customs at LAX and arranged for the group to be down there when the earliest flight from China came in.

  For the first time since he got on the helicopter to fly out to the Peony, David felt that the investigation was going forward in a way he could understand. Peter was surprisingly receptive to Campbell’s and Gardner’s ideas. In fact, these three men from two very different cultures had found common ground in law enforcement. As they laughed and kidded one another about the relative superiority of weapons and techniques, David regretted that Campbell and Gardner hadn’t been able to come with him to China. It might have broken the ice sooner.

  But then he thought that maybe it just came down to home-court advantage. David was in his own country. He was surrounded by his charts and support staff. He understood how things worked in Los Angeles. From here on out, he would act, not react. He would pursue, not be pursued. He would push, not be pushed. He would watch, not be watched. He would apply the pressure that his title provided him, bringing all the power of the U.S. Attorney’s Office to bear on those who lied to him. To use Hulan’s words, he would cast a flower net and trap anyone or anything that lay within its reach.

  At two in the afternoon, dizzy with excitement and fatigue, everyone piled back into the van and drove the few blocks to the Biltmore Hotel. David walked the Chinese agents up to the front desk. While Hulan filled out registration forms, Peter gaped at the lobby’s elegance—the huge bouquets of fresh-cut flowers, the lush carpets that lay resplendent beneath their feet, the sweeping double staircase, the ceilings with their hand-stenciled designs. David reminded everyone to be ready in two hours. They would just have time to take a quick nap and clean up before they met again for the first of Campbell’s excursions.

  Campbell then drove David, who felt focused and very mu
ch awake, up Beachwood Canyon to his home. He changed into his running clothes and jogged around the Lake Hollywood Reservoir. Then he showered, slipped on khakis, a clean shirt, and a cashmere sweater, and drove down to the Biltmore to join the others.

  As Campbell navigated the van out west to the beach, Peter fiddled with his camera and talked animatedly to Gardner. David and Hulan sat in the last seat. She, too, had changed clothes. She wore a peach silk skirt cut on the bias and an embroidered blouse of creamy silk. Just as on the plane, David felt breathless being so close to her.

  In Venice, Campbell turned down a side street and pulled to a stop in front of 72 Market Street, a restaurant one block from the ocean. He handed the keys to the parking attendant, saying, “We’re going for a walk before the sun goes down. We’ll be back for dinner.”

  As they stood together on the sidewalk, David saw just how “foreign” Peter looked in his polyester plaid business suit and knit sweater vest. David suddenly worried that they would lose Peter, but Campbell was already on top of it. “Investigator Sun, this is very important. You stick with us. Okay? If you get lost, remember where we left the car. Come back here. You understand?”

  “Dong, dong.” Peter nodded enthusiastically, reverting to Mandarin.

  “Don’t wander off,” Campbell repeated. “Very important.”

  “Dong, dong.”

  “He understands, Mr. Campbell,” Hulan said.

  “Okay, then, let’s do it.”

  They got to the strand and turned left. The air felt balmy after the wintry cold of China. They had come to the beach at the perfect time of day. Most of the weekend crowds had gone home, but the walkway was still alive with rappers, bums, girls in thong bikinis on roller skates, teenage boys hotdogging on their bikes. Open-air stands offered T-shirts, sunglasses, shoes, suitcases, and gauzy dresses for sale.

  As they walked—the FBI agents pressing ahead with Peter—Hulan reached out and took David’s hand. He couldn’t believe it; they were in public. He looked at her and wondered again how in just a few hours she could have transformed so much. She was still beautiful and her hair still hung in tendrils around her face, but she looked so relaxed, so different from the cautious Hulan of Beijing.

  At the old Venice Pavilion, the landscape widened and the pedestrian traffic increased. David led them out past the crowds so they could watch the sun set behind the shimmering horizon. As they headed back to the restaurant, Peter ducked into a kiosk that sold shoes and came back out with two pairs. “Genuine leather,” he said, incredulous. “Cheaper than Beijing!” Then he picked up a pair of sunglasses and Hulan bought a flowing floral dress. After that, they stopped at every stall to check the prices and variety of T-shirts. Hulan bought a set of three for $10, but Peter surprised them all by bargaining with a woman who spoke mostly Spanish and coming away with three T-shirts for $7.50.

  They got back to the restaurant in time for their reservation. “We have a protocol department,” Campbell said, “and they’ve been doing research on your customs.” Peter became serious but instantly changed as Campbell addressed the waiter. “We need liquor for toasts. Bring us a bottle of scotch, a bucket of ice, and some glasses. I’ll take it from there.”

  With considerable panache, Campbell filled the glasses, passed them out, then held up his own. “I believe the word is ganbei.”

  “Ganbei!”

  “Ganbei!”

  “Bottoms up!”

  For the second round, Campbell added ice, but with their jet lag and their empty stomachs, the liquor did much to loosen whatever inhibitions were left in the group.

  Hulan translated the difficult words on the menu and tried to decipher for her compatriot the ingredients in ahi with papaya and chili salsa and in fresh ravioli filled with mascarpone. Peter prudently ordered the duck “done in the Cantonese style,” which turned out to be a quarter of the bird still in one piece. He looked at it in confusion, then grunted happily as a platter draped with a huge steak—thick, aromatic, and also in one very large piece—was set before Jack Campbell. Peter waited until Hulan picked up her knife and fork and began sawing her meal into bite-size pieces before attempting to attack his with the barbaric utensils.

  By the time they returned to the hotel—David thought it was a miracle that Campbell hadn’t been pulled over for driving under the influence—everyone was sated with food and drink. At the Biltmore, David, Hulan, and Peter got out. Peter yawned, waved, and disappeared through the Biltmore’s double doors with his purchases in hand. Hulan followed right behind him.

  David waited in the cool night air. When his car came around, he gave the valet a ten, put the ticket stub back in his pocket, and entered the hotel. At Hulan’s door, he knocked gently. She opened it and drew him in. Feverishly they fumbled at buttons and zippers, stripping each other of silk and cotton, gabardine and cashmere. Hulan’s flesh was hot beneath his fingers. Her lips sought his. The smell of her came back to him as from a distant dream. They had not been together this way for twelve years, yet David’s hands and lips seemed to remember just how to increase Hulan’s ecstasy. Gradually their frantic gropings dissolved into a languorous rhythm. The rest of the night was sweeter and wilder than he ever could have imagined. But as keenly as David felt the primitive pain of passion and the exquisite thrill of release, there was a part of him that held back. He loved Hulan, but he knew he needed to be wary of her.

  12

  FEBRUARY 3

  Chinatown

  Did you sleep well, Inspector Liu?” Peter Sun asked Hulan as she slid into a chair beside him in the coffee shop the next morning.

  “Yes, very well, thank you,” she said, keeping her voice steady.

  “All night I am wondering if your sleep is gentle or if you are dreaming of traveling to Kaifeng,” Peter continued soberly. “But I think, Liu Hulan is a sensible person. She is not porcelain with scars.”

  Hulan couldn’t help but blush at his innuendoes. The city of Kaifeng sounded like kai feng, which meant “unseal,” and was often used as a way to describe the wedding night. His porcelain metaphor was a time-honored way of describing loose women.

  Peter puffed out his cheeks like a blowfish, then let his air out in a whoosh, laughing heartily.

  “You!” Hulan warned, finally catching his teasing tone.

  “We are away, Inspector.” Peter shrugged, imitating his new American friends. “I am here to watch you and I will. But you have done nothing that I wouldn’t do if I had the chance. Only one problem. No chance for me, hey? You see them bringing their females around me? No, just that woman attorney with the big smiling teeth. She is as appetizing as a wooden chicken! I would rather die than do the house thing with her!”

  “True, but the only way to catch a tiger is by visiting the cave,” Hulan advised, laughing. “Investigator Sun, I did not know you were so…”

  “What? We are away. If we return home, we have no problems. If you forget who you are and where you belong, that is a different matter.” Peter took a sip of tea. “Inspector Liu, here is what I think. We are in America. We have some fun, then we go home. But I think the old philosophers said it best. It is difficult for a snake to go back to hell once it has tasted heaven. I say, while we’re in heaven, we should gorge ourselves.”

  “You are a corrupt man, Investigator.”

  “I guess I am,” he said, and giggled.

  They met in the lobby at nine sharp, then split into three groups. David and Hulan would go to Chinatown in the morning, USC after lunch, and call on the Guangs’ relatives in the late afternoon. Gardner and Peter would also go to Chinatown to visit the banks, hoping to glean as much information as possible from an industry that was at least partially in the business of secrecy. Campbell would head east to Monterey Park with the list of alleged members of the Rising Phoenix. Maybe he’d get lucky.

  Before setting out, the Chinese agents asked if they could be provided with weapons. “Absolutely not” was Jack Campbell’s prompt response.

 
; “We don’t know what or who we’re dealing with,” said Hulan. “You can’t leave us exposed without any recourse.”

  “You won’t be alone for a minute. That I can promise you,” said Campbell. “If you need protection, the FBI will provide it. But you’re not getting any weapons!” So that was that. The teams left the hotel not on the best of terms and went their separate ways.

  David had been to Chinatown many times, but he’d never had the kind of access that being with Hulan brought. They walked along Broadway, then looped over to Hill Street. The old buildings with their upturned eaves, neon lights, and gaudily painted gates hadn’t changed since the 1930s. The old-timers still had their curio and antique shops. But in the last decade, Hong Kong money had made an impact on the enclave in the form of shopping centers and strip malls that were occupied by bustling restaurants, electronics stores, and import/export enterprises. The biggest change, from Hulan’s point of view, was demographic. There were far fewer Cantonese in Chinatown than she remembered. Today she saw Cambodians, Vietnamese, Burmese, and Thais. She also recognized a variety of Chinese dialects—Fujianese and Shanghainese mostly—sprinkled in with the Cantonese and Mandarin.

  David and Hulan focused on Chinese-run shops, many of which were festooned in red and gold New Year’s decorations. They wandered in and out of grocery stores redolent of ginger and fermented bean curd, butcher shops with roast ducks hanging in the windows, herbal emporiums filled with strange remedies. At some of these, Hulan would buy a tin of Danish sugar cookies, a pack of cigarettes, a box of candy. Occasionally, they would detour up a set of stairs, where Hulan would talk to the residents of a crowded apartment or boldly enter a sweatshop to converse with the workers. They stopped in small cafés and talked with busboys and waiters. Hulan even led the way back into cramped kitchens to chat with dishwashers and chefs. Sometimes, to get people to talk more freely, Hulan would give away one of her purchases.