“How long do you think I can work as an anchorwoman, Chen?”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s a star-making age. As a woman, how long can I remain attractive to the public? I have to be realistic. Several people have been coveting my position at the TV station, and you should see them-younger, and much prettier too. In the entertainment industry, new young faces come along every year. Xie Donghong at CCTV, you know, is only in her midtwenties, and with an MBA degree from an American university.”
“But you have so many loyal fans who watch you every night. I’m one of them.”
“Come on, Chen. A man may blossom in his forties, but a woman goes downhill in her thirties. I’m thirty-seven. It is a fact I have to acknowledge,” she said, gazing into the wine, as if in search of her own reflection. The early summer evening spread peacefully outside the window, while autumn waves rippled in her eyes. “But you are different, a rising star in the political world.”
It reminded him of two lines of a poem-As always, a general is like a beauty, / there’s no seeing a white hair. In China ’s new cadre policy, age became a crucial criterion. He was lucky, but he had better seize the moment too.
“The car, the apartment, and the new boarding school for my son, all these I have to pay for,” she went on. “Do you think my state company salary is enough? I have to earn money for the future of my son, if not for myself.”
There was real worry in her voice. Spoiled by her success, she might not be able to envision the life of an ordinary woman. It wasn’t something she had planned, but it wasn’t something she could help, he understood.
“I know what you mean. I have to do translation to make up for my bureau salary.”
“Besides, I have to keep myself busy. Because of my working schedule at the TV station, and my son studying away at school, I am all alone when I come back,” she said, taking a sip of the wine. “One or two solitary evenings may not be too bad, but-”
“You are multitalented,” he said, in an effort to change the topic. “You have so many fans of your show. Now you have so many clients for your PR company.”
“It’s nothing but connections,” she said. “You can do it too. In fact, you can help me a lot.”
Was she going to include him as one of her connections? If so, she would talk more freely.
“Well, you never know,” he said.
“Heaven and Earth of Connections. That’s the name of another PR company, my biggest rival in the city. The company owner is the son of an ex-politburo member. All he needs to do is to make phone calls to important people, ‘Hi, Uncle, my father asks about you,’ or ‘Oh, Aunt, I’ve just talked to my father about you,’ and he then slips in a few words for his clients. These ‘uncles’ and ‘aunts’ are in powerful positions, capable of making decisions. So he charges for the calls-”
Abruptly Chen felt something moving in his pants pocket-throbbing. His cell phone began vibrating instead of ringing. He must have accidentally pressed a button. As he took it out, the caller hung up. He was clumsy with the new gadgets and he fumbled with it a bit, unsure how to restore the ringing function.
She took the phone from his hand, pushed a few buttons, and it rang with a pleasant tune he had never heard before.
“Thank you so much.” He refrained from asking how she’d done it. To her, he must have appeared awkward enough.
The lovers’ table d’hôte started to arrive. First, the cold dishes. One was salted cucumber skin in green rolls, crisp and clear. Another presented red shiny dates steamed with sticky rice stuffed inside. Not only sweet, it was also sensual in its color suggestion, the soft white rice inside the scarlet date skin. It took enormous imagination to invent this small wonder-like something from The Dream of the Red Chamber.
“Scarlet and white, as in a classical Chinese love poem,” An said. “People call the dish ‘your soft heart.’”
She seemed to be at home. Possibly a regular customer in the company of Jiang, or of some high-ranking officials. After the limelight, after the wine, she must have found it hard to turn back to those old days. A company of hers would ensure the luxurious lifestyle she enjoyed. There was perhaps nothing wrong with it in this materialistic time, he admitted.
She drank a little, set the glass on the table, and held a scarlet date between her red lips, her white teeth glistening in an amorous way. There was a subtle, mature voluptuousness about her. She must have sensed his glance, her eyes mirroring the response in his imagination.
According to one of his favorite poets, what might have been points to infinite possibilities. Years earlier, this could have been a most wonderful night, with two of them sitting together there, wrapped in a cocoon of intimacy, ready to burst into unknown realities. But time flies. People change. It was an evening for police investigation. He could not help it. The way he could not help being Chief Inspector Chen.
Another knock on the door. The waitress sent in more dishes. It turned out to be a feast of delicious nostalgia, in tune with the latest trend of the city. He was particularly impressed with the Old Subei Chicken Soup, which smelled rich and pleasant with a subtle flavor of wistfulness. Its very name sounded like a call for a bygone era. Another call was the Granny Pork in the small urn with the shining homely color of brown soy sauce. As in a granny’s traditional home cooking style, the pork had been fried and then steamed for such a long time that it melted on their tongues.
An recommended the pigeon of the house, its skin fried to a golden brown, a crisp crust covering the tender meat. She started tearing the bird with her slender fingers. “The wing is the best part, its muscle juicy out of constant movement,” she said, placing a pigeon wing onto his plate.
“I have to tell you something, An,” he said abruptly and apologetically, putting down the glass as he moved on to explain the real purpose of the evening.
“It is an official investigation under the Central Party Discipline Committee. I need your cooperation,” he concluded. “Our friendship is very important to me, but for a cop, work has to come first. That’s what I am, whether I like it or not.”
“I thought,” she said slowly, “that you wanted to see me for old time’s sake.”
“It’s for old time’s sake, An, that I wanted to meet you here, first.”
That was both true and not true. Or, like the much-quoted couplet in The Dream of the Red Chamber: When the true is false, the false is true. / Where there is nothing, there is everything. An official investigation in the name of the Party Discipline Committee could have a disastrous impact on her business. No one would have engaged any service from such a PR company. As well as a disastrous effect on her reputation. There would be no way for her-an embodiment of political correctness-to appear on TV again.
“How could you have listened to those people?” she said, her face flushing in indignation.
“I would not have listened, but then I received something.” He produced the large envelope that contained the pictures.
Her face blanched at the sight of the photographs. He watched her closely. An was an experienced anchorwoman, her feelings always deftly hidden behind a professional mask, but she failed to conceal her immediate reaction. The hand that held her glass began to quiver. She put her wrist on the table to steady it.
He sat back, crossed his knees, and selected a cigarette from his case with deliberation.
“That’s what an old friend is for,” she said between her teeth. Putting her spoon into the fish soup, leaving it there, and digging a cigarette from her crumpled pack, she was trying to pull herself together, but not successfully. She was doing anything to keep herself from looking up at him.