Li looked at Yi speculatively. He said, ‘I think if the messenger dresses in Armani suits and silk shirts, then his boss must be worth a few kwai.’
Yi was unruffled. ‘Councilman Soong is chairman of the Houston-Hong Kong Bank,’ he said. ‘He is a ve-ery rich man. He has heard a great deal about you, Detective Li. He would very much like to meet you.’
‘Would he?’
‘He is from Canton. He began life in America as an illegal immigrant himself. He was granted amnesty by President Bush after Tiananmen. So now he is a real American.’
‘The living embodiment of the American Dream,’ Li said, his voice heavy with sarcasm. Margaret glanced at him, curious about his attitude. Then he said, ‘Okay, let’s meet with Councilman Soong.’
Yi stood up, smiling. ‘At two o’clock this afternoon, then. At Minute Maid Park.’
‘A fucking baseball stadium?’ This from Hrycyk. He could not hide his incredulity.
Yi said, ‘Councilman Soong has a private suite at the stadium which he uses for confidential meetings.’ Yi grinned. ‘And Councilman Soong says, no soft soap, please. He likes to play hardball.’ He nodded and headed toward the door.
Margaret said to Li, ‘You didn’t like him much, did you?’
Li said, ‘He’s a type. You come across them all the time in my job. Low life off the street. A hundred-dollar haircut and an Armani suit doesn’t hide that.’
Hrycyk said, to no one in particular, ‘I don’t know how he can tell. They all look the same to me.’
Mendez ignored Hrycyk and said mischievously, ‘Ah, but don’t they say that it’s clothes that maketh the man?’
Li said, ‘They also say that a leopard never changes its spots.’
Margaret laughed. ‘Never exchange proverbs with a Chinese, Felipe,’ she said. ‘You’ll never win. They’ve got more of them than the rest of the world put together.’
III
There were storm clouds gathering in the sky. Great dark, rolling accumulations of rain filled with electricity and the promise of thunder. A hot wind had sprung up from the southwest and blew the dust of nearly six rainless weeks along the edges of the highway. Convicts in scuffed white prison outfits, trustees, raked the trash at the roadside, sweating freely in the hot humid midday.
The Holliday Unit was all the more oppressive, somehow, under the black sky. Margaret sat in the car park in Mendez’s Bronco, the engine running to power the air-con. He had told her to leave it for him at her office car park. Baylor was only five minutes away in the Texas Medical Center, and he would get the shuttle bus down to pick it up when he was finished there. He went off with Li, Hrycyk and Fuller to get a ride into Houston. Now Margaret sat waiting at the prison gate for Xiao Ling. She was going to take her to the Forensic Center on Old Spanish Trail, and Li would pick her up after the meeting at Minute Maid Park to take her to Washington.
Margaret was full of trepidation. Xiao Ling’s English was limited, and she was expecting to be picked up by Li. Margaret tapped the wheel impatiently, aware of the guard watching her from the tower. She had called up to him twenty minutes ago that she was there to collect Xiao Ling. But there was still no sign of activity. Then she saw the main door of H block opening, and Deputy Warden Macleod emerged with Li’s sister, dressed as she had been yesterday in her short blue dress and white high heels. It was a bizarre contrast to the prison uniform she had worn in court, a transformation from cowed illegal immigrant back to cheap prostitute. If clothes did not make the man, she thought, then they certainly made, or unmade, the woman.
She got out of the car and walked to the outer gate to meet them. As she did, the first heavy drops of rain started to fall from the sky. Margaret felt them big and cold on her bare arms and neck.
Deputy Warden Macleod said, ‘She’s all yours, doctor.’
Xiao Ling stood looking at her, and then glanced bewildered beyond her to the car park. ‘Li Yan?’ she asked.
Margaret shook her head. She pointed at Xiao Ling, then at herself. ‘You come with me.’
Xiao Ling appeared confused. Frightened even. She shook her head. ‘No.’
The deputy warden smiled. ‘Well, I’ll leave you good folks to it,’ she said, and she locked the gate behind her, and started back along the corridor, leaving Margaret feeling very alone out there in the rain with this stranger who was her lover’s sister.
She pointed to her wrist watch and made a circling motion with her finger, hoping to indicate passing time. ‘Li Yan. Houston. Later,’ she said.
Xiao Ling looked at her blankly. Margaret was starting to lose patience, getting wet standing there as the rain got heavier. She took the girl by the wrist and started leading her toward the Bronco. But Xiao Ling resisted. ‘No,’ she said again, pulling her wrist away.
Margaret snapped, ‘Well, have it your own fucking way. You can stay here in the rain if you want, but I’m going to Houston.’ And she ran, sheltering her head with her purse, toward the Bronco. Something in her tone must have communicated more than her words — or maybe it was the rain — for when she reached the driver’s door she turned to see Xiao Ling hurrying meekly after her. And then she regretted her anger and impatience, trying to remember just how frightened and disoriented the girl must be. But always getting in Margaret’s way was an image of Xinxin, the daughter from whom Xiao Ling had simply walked away. Her own child, a child that Margaret had grown to love. Whatever else Xiao Ling might have done in her life, whatever pain and indignity she might have suffered, Margaret found it almost impossible to forgive her that.
Billboards on stalks grew like weeds along either side of the freeway, increasing in density the closer they got to Houston. Fast food joints jostled for space, shoulder to shoulder, like so many immigrants — Chinese, Mexican, Italian — fighting for custom against such well-established American citizens as McDonald’s and Cracker Barrel. A battle between burgers and Beijing duck, French fries and fajitas. Margaret and Xiao Ling drove in a silence broken only by the windshield wipers, a distinct tension between them. Traffic flow on the interstate artery carrying them into the heart of the city was slowing down in the rain, like blood thick with cholesterol. Margaret was distracted by a car tailgating her, about two feet back from her rear fender. If she had to brake suddenly she knew its driver would have no time to slow down, especially in the wet. It would certainly plough into the back of her. She saw a gap on the inside lane, flicked on her turn signal, and swung into it, leaving space for the car behind to pass. But when she checked her mirror, she saw that it had followed her and was still occupying the same space on her tail.
‘For Christ’s sake!’ she muttered, drawing a look from Xiao Ling who immediately saw her preoccupation with the rear-view mirror and turned to look at the car behind. But she had no clear view of its driver through the rain-spattered rear windshield. Margaret indicated again and pulled out to the middle lane. The car behind followed. Margaret did not even have time to form an oath before Xiao Ling screamed, a shrill exhalation of fear that was almost deafening in the confined space.
Margaret looked at her. She was sitting rigid, staring straight ahead at nothing, all colour drained from her face. Beyond her, something caught Margaret c’s eye and she jumped focus to see a green Lincoln travelling level with them in the inside lane, its driver grinning at them through his window, a mouthful of bad teeth in an unpleasant Chinese face.
‘Ma zhai,’ Xiao Ling whispered. She was clutching her seat, rigid with terror, afraid to look out of the side window.