I decide not to mention this new idea Sidney has to give away his entire fortune. “But he’s a billionaire,” I say. “It’s not like the museum will take up all his money.”
“True. But Tiantian can’t see things that way. He’s always been terrible at sharing.”
She smiles. This time I think I’m finally seeing her real smile, and it’s cold.
“Now Tiantian will never get what he wants,” she says.
It hits me all at once that if anyone inherits Sidney’s empire, it’s going to be Meimei.
I don’t know what to do with the gun. I don’t want to carry it; I don’t want to touch it anymore. But I can’t just leave it lying around or tossed in the dirt. It’s a weapon. It killed someone.
I killed someone.
You had to do it, I tell myself.
The gun is also evidence.
So I take it with me as we walk up the path that leads to the gardens at the back of Sidney’s fake French palace, carrying it cradled in both my hands.
When we get to the house, Sidney is waiting for us on the terrace. “Fashengle shenme shi?” What happened?
“Marsh tried to kill her,” Meimei says. “He might have killed me, too.”
“But… why?”
“He works for Tiantian as well as Gugu.” Funny thing, now I hear emotion in her voice. A ragged edge of anger.
Sidney starts to say something, I don’t know what. Some form of denial, I’m guessing. But he doesn’t get there. He stops himself, covers his face with his hands for a moment. “Duibuqi, Meimei. Qing raoshu wo ba.” Please forgive me.
Maybe he’s thinking about how he could have lost her.
He turns to me and just shakes his head. “I am very sorry, Ellie. This should not have happened.”
Things go down the way Meimei said they would.
The police come. Meimei puts on a little show for them. It’s pitch-perfect: she’s not quite hysterical, just slightly breathless, and shaken. “I still can’t believe it,” she says more than once. “He was completely crazy!”
As Meimei suggested, I tell them pretty much what happened, with a few key additions and omissions. They don’t speak much English, so I tell them in a mix of English and Chinese, with Meimei filling in some of the Chinese details. They don’t separate us to keep us from getting our stories straight. They don’t even try. They ask me to write out an account of what happened and why, and I do that.
I went for a walk. Ran into Marsh. He said something to me about the dead girl. How he needed someone to blame. I was able to get away, distract him with the paint gun. That’s when Meimei showed up, to go target shooting.
“I gave her the gun, because she was a soldier,” Meimei tells the police. “I knew she could shoot better than I.”
One of the policeman nods. “Americans all have guns anyway,” he says to his partner. “Of course they know how to shoot.”
I still have to wonder if Meimei set Marsh up. Pretended to make some kind of deal with him. Kill her to save yourself. Kill her and you can fix things for me, too.
I don’t think she wanted me dead. But maybe she wanted to use me to kill.
Guess I’ll never know, because it’s not like I’m going to ask.
Here’s how I get out of Xingfu Cun.
John shows up.
It’s been a few hours, late afternoon, the sun heading for the hills on the left end of the vineyard. The PSB is still here, more of them now, technicians or people pretending to be them who convoy down the hill to the paintball course, carrying cameras and evidence bags. A little while ago, I watched one of them bag the revolver I used. Now I’m standing out at the back of the garden watching them. Same spot I was in when Marsh found me. I’m finding it hard to believe that there’s actually a CSI: Xingfu Cun, but I could be wrong.
Nobody’s told me that I can’t leave yet, but then I haven’t asked.
“Ellie.”
I turn, and there’s John, dressed in his usual snug black T-shirt and black jeans.
“Hi,” I say. “Thanks for coming.”
He doesn’t say anything. Neither do I.
“I talk to the police here,” John finally says. “They say you cooperate well with them.”
“I gave them a statement.”
“I think it’s okay if we leave now.” John slips his hands into his front jeans pockets. “If you want.”
“Yeah. I want to leave.”
Before I leave, I figure I’d better have one last word with Sidney.
I find him sitting behind his massive carved desk in the wood-paneled room lined with bookcases, the room with the giant stuffed deer head. Maybe it actually is his office, and not just for show. Vicky Huang is there, too, sitting on the couch with her ever-present iPad, taking notes.
Sidney rises when I come in. Gestures at one of the leather club chairs.
I shake my head. “I’m going now,” I say.
I’m a little curious to see if he tries to stop me.
“I am making certain arrangements,” Sidney says. “I do my best so Yang Junmin won’t bother you or your family.”
“Thanks.”
He shakes his head and waves his hands in that little brusque gesture that won’t allow any discussion. “I cannot do business with him anymore.”
“And Tiantian?”
Now Sidney sits back down. “He has made his choice,” he says curtly. “He is not my child.”
In spite of everything that’s happened, in spite of feeling mostly numb, I still have this weird corner of sympathy for him. “Meimei’s really smart,” I say. “She could help you run things. And Gugu…”
What can I say about Gugu?
I think about how he was yesterday on the set, how focused and… well, sober he was. I think about the night he went to the gallery, because he wanted to learn about art, even if he was too drunk to appreciate it.
“He’s okay,” I say. “He’s interested in art. I think he’d like to work with you. If you’ll listen to him sometimes.”
Sidney doesn’t say anything. He stares down at his desk, face dark.
I steal a glance at Vicky, who sits there utterly still. It’s funny how a person as pushy as she is can turn into a piece of furniture when she needs to.
“If you’re still planning on the museum,” I say.
Now Sidney looks up. “Of course. Even more.” He spreads his hands. “This will all belong to the people.”
I think about the mansion, the art, the vineyards and private jet, a mostly empty “village,” all that money, and I wonder what the people are going to do with it all.
I don’t know where John got the car, a slightly beat-up black VW Santana. I don’t think it could be his: not enough time from when I called this morning for him to drive down from Beijing to Anhui.
We drive a few hours to Hefei, the capital of Anhui Province, not saying much on the ride.
“What you tell the police,” John says after a while. “Is that true?”
“Pretty much. Except Marsh didn’t kill Wang Junyi. Dao Ming did.”
He draws in a startled breath. “Dao Ming?”
“Yeah, after Tiantian beat Junyi half to death.”
Another long silence.
“You shoot him?” he finally asks.
“Yeah. He had a gun. He said he was going to kill me, like I told the police.” I look down at my hands, clasped loosely in my lap, and I can still feel the weight of the revolver there, if I let myself.
“Why did you go alone, Ellie? Why didn’t you wait for me? I might have-”
“Yeah, well, you might not have,” I snap back. “You might have brought Yang Junmin’s army down on us.”
Anyhow, I don’t want to think about a different way it might have gone. One where I didn’t kill anybody.
Chapter Twenty Eight
★
We get to Hefei. John leaves the Santana at a curb somewhere in the city. I don’t know where. I’ve never been here before. It’s another big city that looks like it grew too fast, with constant jackhammers and construction trucks and cranes, half-completed high-rises covered with green netting, giant earthmovers and huge pipes and gaping holes in the ground. Then we take a taxi to the train station, the usual clusterfuck of cars, taxis, buses, and people swarming in and around a space that isn’t big enough to hold them all. I’m still too nervous to fly. I’ll give Sidney some time to do whatever it is he’s going to do with Yang Junmin before I get on a plane.