When Wang Jun finally caught up to Fong, the younger man was standing alone on the lip overlooking the construction pit. Sixty feet beneath him was the newly poured cement foundation of a huge building. Even as Wang Jun looked over the edge, the bodies of Fu Tsong and her baby were swallowed by the grayish muck. The sash of Fu Tsong’s bathrobe floated incongruously on the surface-gently in motion as if catching life from the rain itself.
He stared at Fong.
Fong stood very still for a long time. The rain increased. The thunder roared its approval. Fong seemed to take it all in. For a moment his eyes brightened, then the light behind them dimmed. As they did he shouted to the sky. “You win! You win! I have delivered her to you. Take her. Take her for my sins!” Then he tilted back his head and spat well out into the pit.
Wang Jun rubbed his eyes, chasing away the image. As far as Wang Jun knew that was the last time that Fong had ventured into the Pudong. But it was all one now. It was late. They’d find Fong tomorrow. They most certainly would.
Fong awoke from his nightmare covered in sweat. The dream had ended the way it always did. Him alone. Them gone. A truth. But not the complete truth. Not yet.
Breathing heavily he looked out at the city. In the Shanghai dawn the smog clings quilt-thick to the buildings. Roads, still passable, await the coming assault of day. For a breath the bamboo-coated construction sites let out a sigh of relief between shifts-restful, but only for a moment. For the tumult would begin again, as it must, if Shanghai was to continue its assault upon the sky. And, just for a moment, Fong thought, To have been an ant in its midst, a moment of its time, the slightest ripple in its stream has been an honour. Then he spat and faced the reality of a dangerous dawn after a terrifying night.
DAY NINE
The Portman, like every other major hotel in Shanghai, had extensive security in its lobby. Discreet but extensive. Also like most Shanghai hotels, at the Portman you could sit in the lobby if you ordered a drink or a cup of coffee. It was too early for a drink so Amanda ordered coffee. She was not surprised that the cup of bitter coffee cost more than the entire lunch she and the two policemen had eaten at the Old Shanghai Restaurant on the day of their dead man’s walk.
She sipped the rancid stuff as she watched the human traffic in the lobby. After fifteen minutes she knew that this would get her nowhere. There were too many elevators to watch and besides even if she saw the man in the picture how would she find his room number?
She finished her coffee and went over to the concierge’s desk. A young man with pimples, reasonable English, and a well-cut suit stepped forward to help her. She asked for a city map and was given a small piece of paper that was almost decipherable. She looked at it closely and put on a puzzled expression. “Is there a problem?” the young man asked her. Amanda bit her lower lip. Why do men like that?
“Well, there is, actually.”
“May I help?”
“I hope so.” She pulled out the picture of Loa Wei Fen from her purse and put it on the table. “Do you know this man?”
The young concierge nodded.
“He’s staying here?” Once again he nodded. Then, with seemingly uncontrollable excitement, Amanda bit her knuckles. “Bobby Tol is staying here? Really?”
“Who?”
“Bobby Tol, the Okinawan singer, here in this hotel?” The young concierge looked at the picture again and said, “I guess he is.” It was clear that he didn’t know who Bobby Tol was but it was also clear that he was more than a little taken with Amanda.
“Would you do something for me?” Amanda said and marked the effect of her words on the young man.
He replied weakly, “What?”
“Take some flowers up to his room for me. I don’t want to invade his privacy but I’m such a fan. Would you take care of delivering them?” He nodded eagerly. If he were a dog his tongue would have been on the pavement.
“You’re great, thanks. I’ll be right back with the flowers.” With that she touched his hand gently. He spluttered and reddened and looked ready to drop to the ground and kiss her feet.
• • •
There was a florist in the arcade on the west side of the hotel. She bought an enormous basket of flowers and winced when she saw the price. Oh well, the better to follow you by, she thought. She carried the flower basket back into the Portman lobby, smiling back at all the questioning looks.
By the time she brought the flowers to the concierge, he had regained his composure. He took the basket and asked if she wanted to send a card as well. She declined and after thanking him profusely retreated to the far end of the lobby. The concierge called over a uniformed bellhop and gave him the flowers and a room number.
It was not difficult for Amanda to follow the enormous basket of flowers to room 2714.
Li Xiao was in a fury. The object of that fury was Wang Jun. The two men sat alone in the big conference room.
“It was a mistake,” yelled Wang Jun.
“All our men just happened to take a break at the same time? Is that what you are trying to tell me? That the three men detailed to stake out Zhong Fong’s apartment just happened all to be called away. I’m supposed to believe this?”
“Talk to Commissioner Hu if you have a problem,” snapped back Wang Jun.
“You’re telling me you didn’t do this, Wang Jun?”
“I’m telling you this isn’t any normal investigation in case you haven’t figured that out yet.”
“We have new testimony from the Canadian director, whatever his name is, and so we reopened the investigation. Right?”
“Sure, if you have to believe that, believe that. But just for the record, I wouldn’t get carried away by the idea that you are in charge of this investigation. Everything here is going through his Hu-ness. He may look stupid, but he’s cleverer than you and me put together.”
“If that’s so, why did our cops miss Fong yesterday?”
“Because his Hu-ness had another surprise waiting for Fong.”
“What?!”
“Even you can’t be that young, Li Xiao. Fong’s a dead man. One way or the other, he’s a dead man.”
“I thought he was your friend, Wang Jun.”
“Funny how that works, isn’t it?”
Fong was Wang Jun’s friend. His only real friend. But things being what they were, Wang Jun would go to the wall to catch his friend and put him behind bars in a prison from which he would never emerge. The New China was growing and Wang Jun wanted to live his last days riding the shoulders of the giant rather than ground beneath its heels.
Amanda almost screamed when Fong slid up beside her on the busy street corner.
“You have the room number?”
“Don’t do that! You’ll scare the panties off a poor girl.”
“Do you?”
“2714.”
“Good, let’s go.”
“Where? To the Portman?”
“Where else?”
“Is he there?”
“Would we be going there if he was there?”
“Well, then where the hell is he?”
“Looking for me.”
“Oh,” she said and began to pick up her pace to keep up with him. It occurred to her that if Loa Wei Fen was looking for Fong, then he might in fact be following them now. It made her laugh.
“What’s funny?”
“All of this is. Yet it isn’t, is it? I used to know but now I’m not so sure.”
Fong smiled. “Welcome to China.”
“What exactly do you mean by that?”
“If you have to ask the question you wouldn’t understand the answer,” he replied.
But Fong was wrong. Amanda asked her question out of a sense of etiquette rather than out of any real need to know. The paradoxical nature of it all was not lost on her. Far from it. What she didn’t know, though, was that as Shanghai worked its awakening magic on her, it also brought her to the attention of the true centres of power in this ancient land.