“Kangxi Shih-k’ai was on Mom and Dad’s Most Wanted list. They were on the verge of something and they knew it; they just never had the time to pursue it. Now, I’m not saying there’s a connection to Michelle Quantrill and this Russian who wants to run China…but it’s enough to make me think there really is something there in China for us to find. It’s time, Michael. We should have gone after this years ago.”
“Time for you to ruin my reputation on the lecture circuit, you mean,” Michael said sourly.
“Come on, no one will pay attention to the lectures themselves,” said Gabriel. “You know how it goes in China—they’ll want to wine and dine us and tour us around to demonstrate their cultural diversity and goodwill. And I’ll be perfectly charming, I promise.”
Michael put a hand to his forehead and massaged the deep furrows that had appeared there. “This is sounding worse and worse,” he said. Then, as he usually did, he diplomatically tabled the topic. “Let me think about it.”
Which was all the approval Gabriel needed.
It was still startling for Mitch to see uniformed police and soldiers carrying automatic weapons in an airport, even in a foreign country.
The Customs official was unreadable: Round head, military crop, unblinking eyes, a knife scar on one side of his mouth. “Remove glasses,” he said to Mitch, speaking in fractured English.
They examined each other. The official spot-checked the entry form boxes on Criminal convictions and Contagious diseases. Mitch had the feeling she had been processed and found lacking, no doubt an impression the uniforms cultivated deliberately.
He did not stamp Mitch’s passport. “Stand in blue area, please.”
Mitch was directed to a gauntlet of interview cubicles, where a burly Chinese soldier eviscerated her carry-on bag. She was directed to strip down to her underwear and was scanned with a multiband detector. Then into a scanning booth, to insure no contraband was up her ass or down her throat. Only then did a uniformed female supervisor show up, a black Eurasian who gave Mitch the once-over with disdain. It was designed to be as humiliating and intimidating as possible.
The soldier handed a business card to the supervisor. She squinted first at it, then at Mitch. “Your work is in computers,” she said in flawlessly mellow Oxford English.
“Yes,” said Mitch, trying to find her shirt in the tangle of clothing on the table.
“You are a consultant for Zongchang, Ltd.” Nothing the humorless supervisor said was a question. It was rhetorical prodding, bald statements of facts intended to provoke a confirmation or denial.
“Yes.”
“That is a good job for a foreigner to have.”
“Yes it is.”
About an hour later, Mitch finally made it to the overburdened taxicab queue. If one arrived at the city’s more modern Pudong Airport, one had the option of taking the MagLev train the thirty kilometers or so into downtown. Mitch had flown into Hongqiao International, and as an outsider unfamiliar with the grid, was stuck with cabbing it. She knew that if the meter crested more than 200 renminbi she would have to have words with the “helpfull, clean, professional, English-spakeing Driver“—as a sign on the inside of the door informed her.
Most commercial cabs in China are compact cars with a Plexi-shield folded around the driver’s seat only, giving the pilots an odd, bottled aspect and muffling nearly everything they say.
“Is biggest of all large bridges,” the driver told her as they chugged across the modernist swath of Nanpu Bridge. “Most excellent photo opportunity!”
“We are going to downtown Shanghai, right?” said Mitch.
The driver nodded enthusiastically. “Three times! In 1997!”
It was all right. She could already see the spire of the Oriental Pearl TV Tower on the Bund.
Outside the Dongfeng Hotel, the scene was a casserole of Grand Central Station rush hour mixed with Casablanca; a huge and bustling open-air marketplace full of hucksters, eccentrics, exotics and bums. Even the poorest citizen was proud of his suit jacket; in fact, there was a thriving subindustry whereby designer labels could be sewn onto the sleeve of virtually any garment. The visible labels (usually on the left cuff) were a weird sort of status symbol, whether you were riding a bike or stepping out of a limousine. The sheer crush of human bodies was fantastic: thousands of people, hundreds of bicycles (ten abreast and moving fast on each side of Zhongshan Road), citizens hustling about in a floral rainbow of ponchos, pushcart cages of live food. Mitch saw one intrepid cyclist precariously transporting enough strapped-on TV sets to fill a 4x4.
A liveried doorman took her shoulder bag at the entrance to the Dongfeng.
The rooms at the Dongfeng featured card-access slots on the doors but still used old-fashioned keys. Mitch slumped on a double bed, trying not to let all her energy leak out, wondering where the surveillance camera might be hidden. They certainly were omnipresent in every other part of the hotel, particularly the elevators, which seemed to have two per car. She thought about this as she undressed, thought about the bored government functionary charged with watching this particular room’s feed. Probably just made his day, she thought as she pulled a black dress out of her bag and slipped it on over her head.
Downstairs, a very polite but very confused concierge tried to help her get where she needed to go.
Mitch tapped Valerie’s business card. “This? Here? Zongchang? Yes?”
The concierge seemed conflicted; apparently there was more than one destination called Zongchang. “A taxi can take you from hotel if you really wish to go,” he said, implying that perhaps she did not want to go.
“I have an appointment with Mr. Kuan-Ku Tak Cheung,” she said.
“Oh. I see.” He scribbled a square note to be handed off to the next cabbie. “This is the Zongchang you seek.”
“She’s lost her mind,” Lucy said.
Gabriel and Lucy sat in the war zone that had once been Valerie Quantrill’s apartment.
“Near as I can figure, she took all the cards,” said Lucy. “The business stuff, the photo ID, the credit cards. She left the keys so I’m guessing she wasn’t planning to come back.”
Gabriel still had a clear mental image of Valerie Quantrill’s photo ID. The sisters had looked close enough to one another for Mitch to pass the quick scrutiny she’d get at an airport counter, especially if she’d done something to make her hair match. “A last-minute ticket to Shanghai’s not cheap…but if Mitch maxed out the credit cards she could’ve swung it. And if she got a style cut or a wig…”
“She could pass for Valerie,” Lucy said. “Fly on her passport. It’s soon enough, maybe nobody knows Valerie is dead yet.”
“The people who killed Valerie know.”
“Goddamn it,” Lucy said. “Why’d she pull something like this?”
“She’s your friend. Don’t ask me.”
“Gabriel, if I’m not on a plane in four hours, I’ll have the police forces of two countries after me!”
“So get on a plane,” Gabriel said.
“Someone’s got to help Mitch,” Lucy said.
Gabriel Hunt picked up a little snow globe from the floor. Something belonging to Valerie. Little Statue of Liberty, swirling fake snow. Big heart, for NYC.
Lucy cleared her throat. “Will you do it?” she asked.
“Like I’ve ever been able to say no to you,” Gabriel said.
Chapter 4
It was the first time Mitch had worn a dress in over six years, and the last time had been at a funeral. She felt askew in her rakish feminine attire, but it was necessary if she wanted to blend.