Shanghai Redemption (35 page)

Jiang pulled out a pack of cigarettes. “Let me think.”

“What's he referring to with ‘your nose stuffed or not?'” Chen murmured.

“Wait a minute—” Jiang jumped up and rushed into the back room. He came back with a glass jar in his hand.

“What's that?”

“Fei's parents came from Ningbo. I don't think he's ever been to Ningbo himself, but he's crazy about Ningbo food. Particularly the stinky fermented tofu. He keeps a whole jar of it in our mini refrigerator. We got along well together in this small office, except for our constant squabbles over this jar. We both bring our lunches with us and eat them here. Once he takes out the stinky tofu, however, I have to flee the building. Except for rainy days, when I simply have to stay inside and stuff my nose with my fingers.”

“If that's the case, you can step outside and smoke a cigarette. I'll take a look at the jar in here.”

If there was really something in the jar, as long as Chen didn't tell Jiang and he didn't see it, then Jiang wouldn't be responsible for the consequences.

The moment Jiang sidled out, Chen picked up the jar. It was quite large, with seemingly nothing but fermented tofu inside. There were at least thirty small pieces immersed in the amber-colored liquid, some of them with a grayish fuzzy surface.

He wrenched open the lid with a pop, and an overwhelming smell surged out. Jiang wasn't to blame for the reaction he'd described. For people from Ningbo, however, stinky foods were considered delicacies, and fermented tofu was probably the most popular of them.

Chen stuffed his nose with a paper napkin before inserting a ballpoint pen into the jar. Sure enough, it touched something other than fermented tofu at the bottom. With two fingers, he reached gingerly into the jar and pulled out a tiny package wrapped in layers of plastic sheets.

Except for some bits of tofu that had broken off in the extraction process, the jar soon recovered its tranquility. No one would notice any difference, he thought, screwing the lid back on and wiping his fingers with the paper napkin. He put the package in his briefcase.

Then he opened the front door to find Jiang smoking outside.

“That smell is really horrible, Jiang.”

“I told you,” Jiang said, stepping back into an office still beleaguered by the smell. “You haven't found anything, have you?”

It was a question with the expected answer implied.

“No. Nothing.”

“I put my lunchbox into and take it out of the refrigerator every day. If there were something there, I would have seen it.”

“Exactly,” Chen said. Jiang must have rehearsed his words while he was outside smoking.

“But some people just want to catch the wind and shadow,” Jiang said, looking worried again.

“Don't worry too much,” Chen said, handing him a SIM card. “That's for you. I'll call you on this number exclusively. But don't try to call me. I'm constantly changing my number.”

“But what if they continue…”

“Things may change soon, possibly in a couple of days. I'll keep you posted,” Chen said, “but I think I have to leave now.”

*   *   *

Forty-five minutes later, Chen arrived at a teahouse called Tang Flavor on Hingham Road, close to the subway exit there. He had been to this teahouse before. There were nice private rooms equipped with Wi-Fi.

A waitress came over to him with a menu in her hand.

“I have an appointment with a friend,” he said readily, “but I'm a bit early. I want to sit by myself while I wait. What's the minimum charge for a two-person private room?”

“Two hundred for three hours.”

“That's fine,” he said, counting out the money. “For the moment, just a cup of tea. Nothing else. And no interruptions whatsoever.”

“You can also have our Shanghai snacks for free.”

“Don't worry about it. Just tea for now. Again, no interruptions.”

After the waitress put the tea on the table and withdrew, closing the door after her, he took out his laptop and the plastic-wrapped object from the jar.

He lit a cigarette first, frowning.

 

TWENTY-SEVEN

IN THE LATE AFTERNOON,
Chen stood up to leave the private room at the Tang Flavor teahouse.

How long he'd shut himself up in that room, bent over his laptop, the cup of tea barely touched, he had no idea.

The world is crazier than a crime novel.

What Fei kept in the stinking fermented tofu jar was a flash drive with the contents of the hotel surveillance camera from the day Daniel Martin died. The video showed the people going in and out of that particular hotel room—including Kai, the First Lady of Shanghai. She entered the room in the company of the American, intimately, hand in hand, and then, shortly after the estimated time of the American's death, left with a middle-aged Chinese man.

A lot of things clicked, connected, once Chen added the video to the e-mails, but at the same time, a lot more still didn't add up.

Kai had been involved in the death of the American. But why would she get involved in such a thing at the very moment that Lai was advancing to the top of the Party power structure? The American might have somehow become an insufferable threat, but even if he did, she didn't have to do something like that.

For the first time, Chen could start to piece together the cause of his troubles. He'd known for some time that the stakes of some case or cases were too high for certain people, as he'd told Jiang earlier. That accounted for the desperate urgency with which they'd been trying to get him out of their way. But he hadn't known which cases.

He hadn't even heard about the death of the American until after he'd been promoted out of the police department and the Special Case Squad. Now Detective Yu had been suspended while in the middle of a seemingly unrelated investigation.

Emerging from the teahouse, he turned, absentmindedly, toward the subway entrance near Hengshan Road. He'd become gradually familiar with the cobweb of subway lines after losing the use of a bureau car along with his position as chief inspector. In the city, there were more than ten lines woven together, and there were five or six more in partial operation or under construction. Ever-present traffic jams made the subway system the more reliable alternative. For Chen, there was another advantage he'd never known about before: it wouldn't be easy for someone to follow him through the labyrinth of subway lines. He made a point of standing near the train door and abruptly shoving his way out at the stop, without give any advance signs of his intentions.

That afternoon, he pushed out of the train in just such a manner and climbed up the steps to West Huaihai Road, an area that used to be part of the French concession back in the old days. It remained just as fashionable and wealthy now, a symbol of status in the current materialistic age.

Finding himself at an intersection close to White Cloud's hair salon, he toyed with idea of going in for a haircut. He took out his cell phone. There were no new messages from her in the last two days. She might have tried to make additional inquiries for him, but it would have been difficult for even a cop to have found out any more. Then he realized he hadn't even given her his new cell number. She might have tried to call but without success.

He thought, too, that they might be able to check some of the details they hadn't been able to cover in their hurried phone call that night at her apartment. He decided to give her a call first. It would be too dramatic for him to make another unannounced visit to her salon.

“Oh, it's you,” she said, picking up on the first ring. “I was thinking about calling you, too.”

So she hadn't tried to call him yet. That's good, he thought.

“Things aren't good, Chen,” she went on without waiting for him to say anything. “To put it in a nutshell, it would be advisable for you to take a short vacation, preferably abroad, as Mr. Gu suggested.”

Had she discussed this with Mr. Gu?

“It might not be that easy.”

“Don't you know some people in the consulate on Wulumuqi Road?”

“Yes, but…” he said, without finishing his sentence.

She was referring to the American consulate. He knew a cultural consul there, though he wondered whether he'd ever told her about that. But it wasn't the matter of getting a visa from the consulate: his name would already have been put on some sort of alert list at customs.

It was clear, however, that she'd learned more about his troubles and that they were far more serious than she'd initially supposed.

“You have done a lot here, Chen. It's time for you to start over somewhere else and do something for yourself. You're still dreaming of an academic career, aren't you?”

“I've thought about it,” he said, not really knowing how to respond. “But what about things here? Take you, for example: you've worked hard all these years, and now with the salon and the apartment—”

“
I've thought about it
,” she said, picking at his words irritably. “I don't like it, not at all—the salon, the apartment, and everything else that might go onto that list. Whatever you have here today can be totally wiped out tomorrow.”

“So—”

“With your command of English, I would have made it out long ago.”

He was alarmed. There was something urgent in her vague words, but she didn't elaborate. Still, there was an unambiguous difference between tonight's call and her phone call the night he stood at her Bingjiang apartment windows, overlooking the sleepless river. This time, she was still so concerned about him, and her suggestion was a realistic one. But this time, she chose not to involve herself more than necessary.

It was understandable. What could he possibly give her? Nothing except trouble, particularly in the midst of his own troubles.

There was no point in going to her hair salon. He finished up the phone call like a suddenly hollow man, murmuring polite yet meaningless words. He reminded himself that she had helped him so generously.

The evening was beginning to spread out against the sky. He walked on along Huaihai Road, passing the consulate she had just mentioned, as if in some mysterious correspondence. Then he turned onto a shady side road lined with trees. Ahead of him, he saw a new Sichuan restaurant, with several Westerners talking outside under the flashing neon sign. Heavenly Sichuan. He remembered hearing a lot about this place. On an inexplicable impulse, he stepped inside.

The restaurant, while still designed in the old Sichuan style, was pretty much Westernized in terms of its service. The proprietor must have taken into consideration the consulates located nearby, not only the American consulate but several other Western ones as well. Chen chose a corner table. At a table in the other corner, a waitress was deftly cutting and placing a portion of a squirrel-shaped fish on a dainty plate in front of each diner, all Westerners. It was quite different from the Chinese way of everyone dipping their chopsticks into the same big platter.

At the recommendation of a bespectacled waiter, Chen ordered sliced spicy pork draped like clothing on a tiny bamboo pole, pock-faced granny's spicy tofu, and a steamed live bass with ginger and scallion.

“Are you waiting for someone?”

“Maybe. She might come, but I'm not sure.”

“These will be enough for now, I think. When she comes, you can order more,” the waiter said considerately. “Anything to drink?”

Chen was thinking of hot tea when the waiter opened up the menu to the wine page.

“How about the Bordeaux? It's very appropriate and fashionable to have red wine with the Sichuan dishes.”

“Well, whatever you recommend, but I'd like a pot of green tea too.”

He wasn't surprised to see that the two Westerners across the aisle—both men—were dining with three young Chinese women. Each of them was holding a glass of red wine, laughing, and using chopsticks as if they had done so all their life.

He found himself the only solitary diner there. Few, Shanghainese or not, would go to a stylish restaurant alone. The waiter came back to the table, carrying a medium-sized live bass jumping in a hand net for his inspection. He nodded absently.

At the next table, the diners were from Russia, which gave him an idea. Just a couple of days ago, he had planned to visit Overseas Chinese Lu in Pudong but had ended up staying at White Cloud's apartment. This evening, he'd finally go to Overseas Chinese Lu's place. But first, he had to think about what he was going to do, tomorrow, with the footage from the hotel surveillance camera.

The spicy tofu was brought to the table. It was quite tasty, but after just a spoonful, he lost himself in a tangle of ideas, one after the next, in a futile attempt to find a way out. He worked through the possible scenarios so many times that thinking only exhausted him.

The next dish that came out was the thin-sliced pork. It was beautifully prepared and looked almost like a table decoration.

Before Chen could take a bite, he thought of something Peiqin had said about Kai's son studying at an Ivy League college and Daniel Martin's business of making arrangements for the children of high officials who were going abroad. Was there a connection? But it was probably such small change for those officials …

“The live fish,” the waiter said, serving a large, colorful platter with the steamed fish covered with green onion, red pepper, and golden ginger.

Was Chen just like the Watch Boss, anxious to have a last fling before the end?

The dead fish eyes seemed to be staring back at him.

Outside, it started raining. It could be difficult to get a taxi on a rainy night. Most of the customers here had come in their own cars, so they weren't worried. Not so for Chen, but then again, he wasn't anxious to leave for Pudong.

He was beginning to have second thoughts about his plan for the night. Given the present circumstances, there was no telling if visiting them would cause trouble for the Lus. Besides, Chen couldn't afford to spend the night in sentimental conversation about the old days. Overseas Chinese Lu had grown impossibly nostalgic of late. In the meantime, Chen didn't have much time left—the net was closing around him.