Citizen One (42 page)

“Risky, Comrade Citizen One, for a
tong zhi
who braved the Long March? Surely, as the Americans say, ‘a walk in the park’?”

“Senior Investigator, when it comes to dealing with the Politburo, there is no such thing as a ‘walk in the park’. Only a society that views its political dogma in the same way that it views its food, fast and tasteless, could spawn such a phrase. You forget, Sun Piao, I know how the Politburo thinks and reacts. It does not respond well to being placed in a position of pressure.”

Last canaries being loaded into vans. Blankets thrown over the cages, their last songs coming to an end.

“They will gather as a crowd of angry old women do. Age might have robbed them of their teeth, Senior Investigator, but you would not wish to face their gums.”

Yaobang taking from his pocket a CD-Rom and pressing it into the
tong zhi’s
hand.

“If I am correct about what I think is on here and how you intend to use it, there will be many consequences. A tidal wave of consequences.”

Pulling Piao to the side, the old
tong zhi
. A fierce whisper over the traffic’s roar.

“A tidal wave that I might not be able to protect you from, Senior Investigator. Do you understand what I say?”

A nod.

“This is where our paths diverge,
tong zhi
. You must go east. Us, we go west. Our paths home go in different directions, but not in this, yes? One other has a copy of this CD-Rom. It has already been determined how and when he should use it.”

His hand on the
tong zhi’s
in farewell.

“To trap a bird such as our Colonel Qi, a net will not be sufficient, Citizen One. What you need to do is to turn the flock that he is a part of against one of its own.”

Waiting for him for several hours, in silence in the dark.

Glass from a broken window at the rear of the house catching the moonlight in splinters. Drawers and cupboards ransacked. It would look exactly what it was meant to look like: a robbery. The owner of the house stumbling, unknowing, into panicking, violent
liu-mang
.

An arc of cold headlight through windows, casting listing shadows in the large hallway. Cut adrift as headlights died. Footfall over pavement, a key into a lock, front door in creaking swing, a hand going to a light switch, but no light. A curse in the darkness about a light bulb only replaced a week ago. The door closing, a controlled stumbling down the hallway. Within finger’s touch of the light switch to the living room, when they fell upon him. Through the leather of his coat, jacket, shirt, popping through their brief resistance, the stiletto blades. A sickening floodtide of warmth. Again, again, bruising knuckles crimson. Each plunge, a fractured breath. A quiver of lips, bubbling spit.

The victim still standing, braced by the wall, as they wiped their bloodied hands upon his shirt. Still standing but already dead, his killers made their way through the darkness of the hall and into the indifferent night.

*

Moving, a dark wedge cutting the morning’s early hours. The door, as ordered, left ajar. Moving through the communal hallway, past the Street Committee member’s door, conspicuously locked. Moving up the stairs. On the third landing a dark finger pointing.

“There.”

Silent footfall down the corridor. Outside a heavy door, two silver keys in unison, inserted into locks. Levers moving, releasing. The door opened, blackness moving through it, the door closed.

Muffled sounds, a man’s voice, a deep thud and then a groan. Feet over floorboards, a young woman, her scream cut short with the palm of a sweaty hand. For several minutes, the muffled screams continuing as they went about their work with the freshly stropped cut-throat razor. The screams weaker as blood was lost with honesty generosity. Weaker, until falling silent.

The door opening. In silence moving down the stairs, through the hallway, briefly pausing outside of the Street Committee member’s room. Two keys slipped through the gap beneath the door and silently out into a morning still not awake.

Only with the certainty of them having gone, the Street Committee member’s door unbolting from the inside. Carefully looking around. From a neat cupboard in the hallway retrieving an old mop and bucket. Scalding water and pine smelling disinfectant would be needed, and many visits to the third floor. Already with the anticipatory twinges of back pain that would surely follow such arduous labour. The third floor, why couldn’t it have been the ground floor, or even the first floor?

The
Hong-qi
that drew-up at the steps of the
fen-chu
was an official chauffeur-driven PLA Red Flag, one of a fleet of gloss-black stretched automotive perfection, that only the highest of ranking People’s Liberation Army officers had access to. The documentation that the passenger in the
Hong-qi
had borne through the cauldron of a Shanghai noon was also official. More ink-bled stamps upon it than polished boots at a May Day parade in the People’s Square. Documents of authority, identification, orders of office, standing orders. Detective Yun fastidiously checking each paper. Thirty-six all told. The power, the authority, issued in Beijing itself, by the General Secretary of the Central Secretariat, to take full command of the Shanghai Public Security Bureau.

Yun re-folded the papers precisely as they had been folded, and returned them to the hand of the new Comrade Chief Officer. A man, every inch of him, who would wish to lead from the front, as long as the ‘enemy’ was already bowed and defeated. Detective Yun stood to attention and saluted crisply.

“Welcome to Shanghai, Comrade Chief Officer Xin. Welcome to the
fen-chu
.”

The old
tong zhi
smiled and leisurely lit a cigarette, looking at Yun for several seconds before he spoke. When he did so it was as if each word had been hewn from rock, long ago quarried.

“I trust that my being a serving PLA Officer will not cause you a problem? Or my being a close comrade of Senior Colonel Qi?”

“Of course not, Comrade Chief Officer Xin. But if I may be so bold as to enquire as to why Comrade Chief Officer Zoul has lost his posting at the
fen-chu
?”

“Of course you may be so bold, Comrade Detective. But you should brace yourself for some unexpected news. Highly unfortunate news. I am afraid that your previous Comrade Chief Officer was the victim of a very violent crime in his own home. He sustained terrible injuries and, unfortunately, did not survive.”

Not waiting for Yun to respond.

“My position within the Public Security Bureau, as you have seen …”

Pointing to the large tranche of orders of authority, thrown on to the desk.

“Has the full blessing of Beijing. Zoul was a fine comrade, but now Beijing feels that a more steady hand can stop the rot that has permeated this place. It is felt that a PLA posting, however unusual this may seem, will bring some additional steel to the Shanghai Public Security Bureau. My time with you will be limited. I will stay only until my job is completed. Then I will return to the Shanghai
Kan Shou Jingbei Si Ling Bu
, where I belong. Until that happy day, Detective Yun, you will note that I am not one for ceremony. Salutes do not impress me.”

No longer smiling.

“Only results will catch my favour. And you will wish to catch my favour, will you not?”

Yun catching himself about to salute.

“Yes, Comrade Chief Officer, Sir.”

“Good. Good. Then we have established an understanding.”

His hand to the inside pocket of his expensively tailored tunic, a neat cornered envelope retrieved. Under nicotine yellow fingertips, the embossed seal of the Ministry of Security.

“Your first orders from your new Comrade Chief Officer, Detective. Also approved by our superiors in Beijing. There was some reluctance in some quarters, but as I am sure that you will agree, there is little choice in this sad case.”

Tentatively opening the envelope, Yun carefully reading and re-reading the warrant papers. By the time that he had finished, a sheen of sweat across his forehead.

Nothing escaping the PLA’s attention.

“You have a problem, Detective Yun?”

“Comrade Chief Officer, Sir, there must be a mistake.”

“A mistake, Detective? Are you insinuating that I would make such an error? That our superiors in Beijing would make a mistake of such magnitude?”

“No. No, of course not, Comrade Chief Officer, Sir. It is just that this is a very trustworthy officer. An officer of the highest repute. He could not be involved in something like this …”

“Detective Yun. I realise that discipline and standards had drifted under the late Comrade Chief Officer Zoul’s command, but I really had expected a greater professionalism from senior officers of this
fen-chu
. The evidence against this officer is indisputable. More than enough to warrant a charge of murder. I am assured that there is also reliable forensic evidence that will be made available at the trial. Fingerprints found on the murder weapon itself. A cut-throat razor.”

His voice a whisper.

“My poor, poor predecessor, Comrade Chief Officer Zoul. Better that life no longer possesses him than to witness one of his most trusted officers arrested and taken to trial for murder.”

A whisper more menacing than thunder.

“You will arrest Senior Investigator Sun Piao on the charge of murder. You will do it now, Detective Yun, without delay.”

And heaven and earth are set apart;

If you wish to see it before your own eyes,

Have no fixed thoughts either for or against it.

Early hours. Dangerous hours
…

Incorporating the noises and movements into his dream. A dream of numbers, of mindless repetitions. Only fully awake as he heard and processed the words.

“Boss, I’ve just got back from the
fen-chu
. They’re coming. They’re fucking coming for you.”

Adrenalin jab, shunting Piao out of the sleeping bag.

“Qi?”

“No, Boss. No …”

“Who?”

“PSB. Fucking PSB.”

Pulling on clothes as they walked then ran.

“I don’t know how to say this to you, Boss.”

“Say what?”

“I’m sorry, Boss. So fucking sorry.”

Following the Big Man through the heat of the bakery. Sweat already coursing from his brow.

“They’ve murdered her, Boss. Fucking murdered her.”

“Who?”

But already knowing. Her name falling on his tongue, an unlabelled sickness seeming to flood into him.

“Lan Li.”

“Sorry, Boss. So fucking sorry. Yun says your cut-throat razor was at the crime scene. That’s why they’re after you.”

Words hard to form.

“You posted a report of it being taken from my flat, after the Wizard. After …”

“It’s gone missing, Boss. There’s no report on file at the
fen-chu
.”

Piao peering through the cracked corner of the window. Rain, in grey sheets, as if the heavens had turned to ocean. As if the ancestors were pissing on them.

“I don’t know how they found her. How they fucking got to her.”

“My fault. Mine. To meet her, it was wrong. What I most feared, I brought about …
ta ma
de.”

A glint of a cap badge, then another and another.

“A stain to the soul…”

But Yaobang not listening.

“Boss. Boss. We must move. They’re almost upon us.”

“I need to talk to the Comrade Chief Officer, maybe he can …”

“Zoul’s dead, Boss, knifed. They made it look like a break-in, but Yun said that they took nothing, except his fucking life.”

Two blocks away, dull and lazy revolutions of red, blue and white light.

“The new Comrade Chief Officer at the
fen-chu
is PLA. We’re on our own.”

Glints of gold buttons in darkness. PSB. Packs of PSB.

“The pier, Boss.”

Slipping against the bakery wall, Piao, comfort in the stone floor’s chill.

Pulling at the Senior Investigator’s jacket.

“You can’t let them take you. That’s what they want. If you want to avenge her you have to fucking save yourself.”

Rising to feet, as if ensnared in a dream. Following the Big Man through the bakery. Wrenching open the back door and instantly they were on the pier, chilled, wet. Stars banished behind mile thick cloud. Beside them, the river running fast, as if downhill.

From the arse of the bakery to the neighbouring wharves, a thick mud inlet of river, like a black finger. A leap, perhaps seven feet or more.

“We’ll jump, it’s the only fucking way. And then we can …”

With both hands, Piao grabbing the Big Man by the shoulders.

“Just me, they are after me. You stay.”

“No, Boss. I’m coming too. You need me.”

“Yes, I do need you. I need you on the inside.”

“Boss?”

Separating, moving into darkness, Piao, toes over ragged edge of concrete apron. Just the sound of the river’s dark inlet and its dead smell. A fan of torchlight, a voice, feet scrabbling over mud, over filth. Counting the steps back, a run, a leap, and the Senior Investigator lost in darkness. Just the sound of a heavy fall onto other concrete. A stuttered exhalation and his uneven footfall lost in the river’s angry voice.

A minute, no more, Yaobang standing at the centre of the pier, his face to heaven. Rain, as he had never known it, falling down on him. Standing there, its cry across his mouth, his tongue. Pooling in closed eyes. A sense of freedom in its purge, but only brief.

“A serious charge can arise from protecting a murderer, Deputy Yaobang. Where is Senior Investigator Sun Piao?”

Shaking his head like a dog. Opening his eyes to the old
tong zhi
, Xin. Sodden cigarette hanging between his dark lips.

“Senior Investigator who, Comrade Chief Officer PLA?”

The Big Man smiling, as clumsy PSB officers manhandled cracked planks across the river.

*

Warehouse leading to warehouse, in tattered joinings. Glimpses, through cracked brickwork and dull windows, to the road. PSB patrol car lights. Colours so bright in the grip of pounding heart exhaustion. Running, each pace, his leg on fire. For an instant, stopping. Hand to his ankle. Cloying, warm, the blood from it as black as the river. Filling his sock, shoe, and pain, gnawing at his resolve.