Whispering Shadows (24 page)

“Why did Tang threaten him?”

Instead of replying she simply shook her head.

“Does Tang have anything to do with the murder?”

“I don't know. You'll find that out. Or maybe not. I said I would answer two questions and I've done that. Go now. Please!”

“Can't I help you?”

“I wish you could.”

“Perhaps I can—”

“No,” she interrupted him. “You can't do anything for me now except leave me alone.” She turned away and walked toward the door.

Paul followed her. He had no doubt that she knew more than she was prepared to say, but it was also clear that he would not find out more from her right now. He had to call Zhang as soon as he had left Diamond Villas and ask him to come over. With his experience he would have more success; he would get her to talk.

Anyi opened the door. “Don't worry about me,” she said in parting, looking him in the face as she said this.

Had he ever seen a face as lonely and despairing as this one?

XXI

Is there a life without lies? A life not permeated by falsehoods? Zhang was not thinking of the small untruths that make everyday life easier. Nor of the made-up excuses for arriving late or the tales concocted to cover up forgetting a birthday or another act of carelessness. He was thinking about a big secret that he, and perhaps everyone, carried around. What was it for other people? The misappropriation of inheritance funds? An illegitimate child whom the wife knew nothing about? The forbidden love for a close relative? The betrayal of a friend or a business partner? He wondered if Mei lived with a big secret. Was she perhaps secretly in love with another man? Had she had an affair that Zhang knew nothing about? He could not imagine so, but could a person ever be certain? Wasn't every life based in some way on a lie, a fiction, a pretense? Could a person conceal it until his deathbed, or did it force its way out of its hiding place at some point? What will Mei and, later, his son say; how will Paul react, when they find out what he had kept silent about for over thirty years? Zhang wondered. Will they see everything that he has done and said in another light? Will they turn away or will they be able to forgive?

Sitting on the express ferry from Hong Kong to Shenzhen, he wondered if he had a choice in the matter. He probably had no choice back then, back when hysteria had ruled the whole country and the sixteen-year-old Zhang had longed for respect and recognition; he had wanted to belong too badly. Aside from that, he had not
met anyone in his life so far who had dared to question Mao Zedong and his commands, the pervasive power of the Communist Party and the official propaganda, or who had even prompted Zhang to at least think about it. He had been a blind man who had believed he could see.

But the Cultural Revolution lasted for ten years. By 1976 he had choices, like everyone who had been part of the madness. From then on, every day had been a choice, every day Zhang had decided anew to stay silent instead of telling the truth and asking for forgiveness. He bore the responsibility for that, and, if he were honest with himself, he could not pin the blame for his silence on society or on any political party, political chief, or great chairman. He had learned that from Buddha. We are the masters of our actions, we create our own Karma. It is
our
life. This late revelation, a revolutionary one for a Chinese person of his age, had been a liberation, but like every liberation, it brought uncertainty and many new questions with it.

Zhang was so tortured by his thoughts that he felt nauseous, and he had to go up on deck.

As the ferry zoomed toward the harbor at high speed, the warm air ruffled his hair, and the water, whipped up by the many vessels, looked like a bathtub in which children were splashing around. The waves slapped against the side of the ferry in quick succession, and some of them raised the ship high up in the air, only to let it dip again immediately. The constant up and down motion only made Zhang feel more sick. He leaned against the railing and tried to meditate, but retched loudly twice instead, feeling his stomach in revolt as the fried noodles and wonton soup he had eaten not long before rose like a wave and burst out of him. Part of it landed in the water and the wind spread the other part on his pants and shoes in equal proportion. Stomach acid burned in his throat and he wished he could crawl off somewhere to hide and find protection from what was awaiting him in Shenzhen.

He shuddered at the thought. Interrogating Anyi.

She was hiding something and was frightened of Tang, Paul had
said.

Zhang thought about his own past with Tang. One lie always led to another, and the second to a third until a web of untruths, attitudes, distortions, false assertions, and excuses was created. Was it ever possible for it to stop at one lie?

He was not sure. He knew only that
he
would no longer be running away, that his lie had caught up with him, just as one day the lies would catch up with Tang and with the whole country.

———

Zhang was one of the last to disembark. When he saw the border guards, the sight of a uniform made him nervous again for the first time in years. Were they already looking for him? Would they take him off to some side room on a pretext, take his police ID from him, and get in touch with the homicide division?

Nonsense! Luo thought he was at home on the couch resting his damaged knee. Since yesterday, Zhang had not done anything that would arouse suspicion. But now he was about to cross a line and after that there would be no turning back, he knew that.

Until now he had simply withdrawn from the system. Despite several invitations he had not joined the Communist Party again and was not on any committees or commissions. That was possible in the China of today without being immediately branded a counterrevolutionary. His colleagues did not understand him; they found him eccentric but harmless. Now, he was setting himself against the system, acting in opposition for the first time in his life, and that was dangerous, just as it had been before. It was only a matter of time, of hours or a few days at most, before his investigating encroached on the interests of other people, influential people who would know how to defend themselves. Apart from Paul, Zhang was on his own.

The young border official guessed nothing of these thoughts. He glanced at the passport, the Hong Kong visa, and the computer, and waved Zhang through.

He took a taxi from the ferry terminal to a café near Diamond Villas, where Paul was waiting for him.

“You look a mess! Were you sick?” Paul blurted out when he saw his friend.

“The crossing was rough. I was a little seasick. It's not so bad,” Zhang replied. “I'll just go to the restroom and clean my shoes and trousers.”

They found the best taxi they could—a shiny new black VW Passat with tinted windows—and traveled the short distance to Diamond Villas. They passed the security guard, who greeted them with a snappy military salute, and got the car to drop them off in front of Sapphire.

“I may ask you to leave after a while,” Zhang said as they walked through the parking lot.

“What do you plan to do?” Paul asked in astonishment. “Do you want to intimidate her?”

“No, but I have to see if she begins to trust me. If I succeed in making her do that, it may be better for the two of us to be on our own for a while.”

Paul nodded.

They stood in front of the iron grille gate that separated the garage from the elevator and looked at each other without exchanging a word. Zhang gave his friend a sign, and Paul pressed the button for the penthouse.

They waited and buzzed again, but there was no response.

“Maybe she's asleep? She was pretty exhausted when I left,” Paul said.

Zhang pressed his lips together as he thought, passing both his hands through his hair. “I hope nothing's happened to her. She told you more than can be good for her. We have to get into the apartment.”

They went back to the security guard at the entrance and asked for the building manager.

The building manager lived in the basement of Sapphire; he
sized up the two strangers with a skeptical look. Of course he had a key, but he could only open the door to an apartment if he had specific instructions from management to do so in an emergency or if the owner of the apartment was present. Even Zhang's police ID did not impress him at first. Only when he read the words “homicide division” did he start, fetch the key, and take them up to the top floor.

After ringing the bell and getting no reply again, the building manager opened the door. Zhang gestured with his head to indicate that they wanted to be left alone now. The building manager reluctantly took the elevator back down to the basement.

“Anyi?” Paul called out hesitantly.

No reply.

“Anyi,” he repeated in a louder voice.

Silence.

Zhang was the first to enter the apartment carefully. The curtains in the living room were closed and it took a moment for their eyes to get used to the half darkness. They listened and flinched. Both of them had the feeling that they had heard a sound from the bedroom.

“Hello, is anyone home?” Zhang called out. His voice sounded more hesitant than a police detective's ought to, he thought.

No reply.

They looked around the living room. The glass of water Paul had drunk from was still on the table, as were the plastic flowers. Next to them lay a pile of magazines.

“Anyi,” Paul said again, loudly. But he no longer expected a reply.

Zhang shook his head and began walking toward the bedroom. The door was slightly ajar. He stopped, held his breath, and pricked his ears to try to make out if someone was breathing quietly in the room before he slowly pushed the door open.

The bed was covered with shoes, tops, underwear, dresses, and skirts, and the closet doors were open. On one side were piles of men's clothes; the shelves on the other side were almost empty.

Paul had followed Zhang in. “She's gone,” he whispered, as if to himself.

“And not to run errands,” the detective said. “This looks like she's run away.”

They searched the flat but did not find anything suspicious.

“What do we do now?” Paul asked.

“No idea,” Zhang replied, letting himself flop onto the couch with exhaustion. “Hey, Paul, what exactly does ‘I am so sorry' in English mean?”

“Please excuse me. Or, my mistake, pardon. Forgive me. Why are you asking?”

“Richard Owen stammered those words when he was identifying the body of his dead son. Could that have some meaning?”

Paul thought for a moment. “I don't think so.”

Zhang leaned back, crossed his arms behind his head, and stared at the ceiling. After a while he asked, “What do you think about meeting Elizabeth Owen again?”

Paul paced up and down in the living room. Finally he said, “I'd be happy to, but I'm afraid she won't be able to help us any further. Remember how little she knew when I rang her yesterday.”

“That's true. But now at least we have two names, maybe we can do something with them. Apart from that, I want to know what the father and the son had their big fight about. She should at least be able to tell us that.”

———

Elizabeth Owen picked up the phone on the second ring, as if she had been waiting for his call. She was in the hotel resting, and her husband was at the US consulate seeing to the paperwork. She was happy to speak with Paul at any time. They agreed to meet two hours later in the bar of the InterContinental.

———

On the way back to Hong Kong, Paul told Zhang again about his
conversation with Anyi, this time in detail.

Zhang's cell phone rang while Paul was talking. He looked on the display screen and got a shock. It was Luo, the head of the homicide division.

“Zhang, how are you?”

“Thank you for calling, but I'm afraid I'm not well yet. Rather the opposite, in fact.”

“Where are you? It's so noisy in the background. I hope that's not the brothel beneath you making such a racket.”

“No, I'm on the ferry to Hong Kong,” Zhang replied, so nervous he was unable to think of an excuse.

“What are you going there for?” Luo asked, astonished, in a tone of voice that did not sound at all sympathetic.

“I-I'm on my way to see a specialist. My knee is quite swollen and is terribly painful. My friend Paul has booked me a last-minute appointment with an orthopedic specialist.”

Luo said nothing for a few seconds, as though he was trying to decide if this was another thing to be suspicious about. “I'm only calling to tell you that the trial of Owen's murderer has been brought forward. The Americans pushed for it. It's taking place the day after tomorrow. Since we have a confession, it won't take longer than a day. I thought you'd like to know about it.”

“Of course.”

“Maybe you can tell the parents about it through your friend. We're informing them via official communication channels, but that takes a bit of time.”

“I'll do that.”

What did his boss want from him? Did he suspect him of not sticking to the official line? Or did he really only mean to ask him to tell the Owens about the trial?

“It will be a relief for the parents, won't it?”

“Of course, Luo, of course.” His boss was suddenly talkative,
which Zhang found odd. He wondered how they had gotten the factory worker to put his signature to a made-up confession. What had they threatened him with? The arrest of his wife, and his child ending up in an orphanage? The arrest of his relations in Sichuan or their expulsion from the village? They had probably promised him at the same time that he would be spared the death sentence, and that his family would be given a generous allowance during his time in prison. That would be an attractive offer for the poor fellow; if he had even the least experience with the police and the courts, he would know that there was no alternative for him.

“Most bereaved people in these situations only consider the case closed when the murderer has not only been found, but been judged and sentenced by a court, yes?”