There wasn’t much about her, however, that really appealed to Huang.
“You know why I’m here, Mi. This is my colleague Chen. We want to talk to you about Liu’s murder.”
She pressed a key on a brand-new computer, which Huang didn’t remember seeing last time. She motioned them to sit down in two black chairs opposite.
“We’ve already talked about it, Officer Huang,” she said.
“I’m new to the team,” Chen cut in, “so anything you say will be of great help to me.”
“Anything specific,” Huang echoed. He noticed another difference about her desk. A silver-framed photo of Liu speaking at a national conference had disappeared, and a golden plaque stating Office Manager was in its place.
“Let’s start with what you can tell us about Liu,” Chen said.
“He was an extraordinary boss. When he first took over, the company was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy. In a large state-run enterprise like ours, with more than three thousand employees, his was not an easy job. But he managed to turn it around.”
“We learned about his work from all the media coverage. But what do you think of him as a man?”
“He was a good man-generous, intelligent, and always ready to help.”
“Now, let me ask you a different question. As someone who worked closely with him, what do you know about his family life?”
“He didn’t talk much about his family life.”
“Do you think he had a satisfactory one?”
“I don’t know,” she said, then added, “But a busy man like him should have had better care taken of him.”
“We talked to his wife,” Chen said, looking her in the eye. “She told us something.”
He paused deliberately, letting a silence eat away at her reserve like a crumbling wall in the room. Huang thought he knew what Chen was up to.
“Whatever she may have told you,” she said, without meeting his eyes, “I don’t think she was a good wife to him. Everybody here could see he wasn’t happy at home.”
“Can you give us any detailed examples?”
“It’s just something I heard. They were schoolmates in Shanghai-she from a good family in Shanghai, and he from a poor village in Jiangxi. In spite of her family’s opposition, she married down and followed him to Wuxi. She got it into her head that she should be compensated for her sacrifice, so to speak, by him waiting on her hand and foot, and obeying her in everything, big or small. She was a typical Shanghai woman.”
“But then in Wuxi he became successful.”
“Exactly. For a busy, overworked man like him-a virtuous wife would have taken good care of him at home, especially after she quit her job and became a housewife, leaving the family dependent on Liu’s income alone. But no. She frequently went back to Shanghai during the week and over the weekends too. He was often left all alone in the house. ”
“She has family in Shanghai. It’s natural that she would go back from time to time.”
“Who could tell what she was really up to in Shanghai? She used to be a high school flower, I heard, with a number of secret admirers hanging around.”
“Really!”
“And I can tell you why he sometimes stayed overnight at his home office. With all the responsibilities on his hands, he frequently worked late. But more often than not, he simply didn’t want to go back home. The home office was the only place he could really relax. But she wouldn’t leave him alone even there. One time when he was away on a business trip, she came over and turned the whole apartment upside down.”
Huang listened without interrupting. It was intriguing that Chen kept his focus on Mrs. Liu, even when interviewing Mi. It was possible that Mrs. Liu had killed him, as Huang had suggested at the crime scene, but after his initial excitement with it, it more and more seemed to him to be a theory that wasn’t supported by any evidence.
Mi’s accusations against Mrs. Liu were understandable, even though she had denied any knowledge of Liu’s family life. She knew that the cops had heard stories about her, so she was trying to downplay the relationship between her and Liu. Presenting Mrs. Liu as an irresponsible wife was designed to justify her own role in Liu’s life-if not morally, at least psychologically. But that self-justification was irrelevant to the murder investigation, with the exception that it presented a totally different version from that of Mrs. Liu.
Still, they learned some new things from the interview: for one, the frequency of Mrs. Liu’s trips to Shanghai. It wasn’t a long-distance trip, but it was nonetheless odd to so often leave her husband all alone at home.
And that led to the revelation about her having been a high school flower with many secret admirers. What could that possibly mean? If she had another man in Shanghai-which wasn’t unimaginable for a couple like the Lius, whose marriage was already on the rocks-it introduced a motive that had been so far overlooked. Mrs. Liu’s lover, whoever it might be, could have murdered for love or for money.
“Do you think Liu was planning to do something about his family problems?” Chen went on.
“What you mean?”
“Did he plan to divorce his wife?”
“No, not that I was aware of. As I’ve said, he didn’t discuss his family problems with us other than complaining a little, now and then, when he couldn’t help himself.”
Chen took out a cigarette, tapped it on the pack, and looked at Mi before asking, “Do you mind?”
“No. Go ahead. Liu smoked too.”
Chen changed the subject abruptly. “As you may have heard, Jiang is a possible suspect. Tell us what you know about him.”
“Oh, Jiang,” she said. “He called our office quite a few times. He was calling to speak with Liu, of course. What they talked about, though, I’ve no idea. I told Internal Security about all that.”
“Can you give us any more details?” Huang cut in. “Particularly, anything in connection with the night Liu was murdered.”
“Jiang called two or three days before the night Liu died, I think, but other than insisting on speaking to Liu, he didn’t say anything to me. That’s about all I know. And-” She cleared her voice before going on. “And as I told the police, Liu mentioned that morning he was going to see someone on some unpleasant business.”
“Did he say when or where?”
“No, not that I remember.”
“And who?”
“No, no names were mentioned either.” She added, “Oh, but two or three months ago, I saw Jiang arguing with Liu in his office.”
“His office here at the plant?”
“Yes, the inside office.”
“What were they arguing about?”
“They stopped talking the moment I stepped in, but I caught a word or two. It was, I think, about pollution.”
“Do you remember the date?”
“It was March, early March,” she said. “It was the day before the Women’s Day. Yes, now I recall…”
At that moment, a tall man burst into the outer office, greeting Huang in a loud voice.
“Hello, Comrade Officer Huang. What wind brings you over here again today?”
“Hello, General Manager Fu.”
“It’s only Acting General Manager for the moment. Please just call me Fu. And this is…”
“Chen, my colleague,” Huang said.
“Welcome. Come into my office.”
“Thank you, General Manager Fu,” Chen said. He then turned back to Mi. “We might come back to you if we have more questions. If you think of anything, please call us-or rather, call Sergeant Huang.”
Huang and Chen then turned and followed Fu into the inner office. Fu motioned for them to sit on two leather chairs opposite his oak desk. The wall behind the desk exhibited a striking array of framed awards, with Liu’s name on most of them, but under the glass on the desk, Huang saw several pictures of Fu.
“Is that Bund Park?” Chen asked unexpectedly, indicating a picture of Fu standing in front of the park, his hand pointing proudly to the river.
“Yes, I came from Shanghai.”