His cell phone rang. Caller ID showed that it was Lianping, so he picked up. After exchanging greetings, Chen asked, “What’s up?”
“I’m going to the Shaoxing Literature Festival tomorrow.”
“That’s nice-have you ever been there?”
“No, this will be my first time. It’s only one hour outside of Shanghai, and the sponsor is providing me a ‘journalist’s package.’ It includes a ticket to tour Lu Xun’s residence, meal coupons, and if I stay over, accommodations at a four-star hotel.”
“What a nice package!”
“I mentioned your name to the sponsor and they would love to invite you to come and speak. Everything would be covered, and it would also include a handsome speaker’s fee.”
“Thank you, Lianping. I might not have the time to attend the festival or to give a speech, but I’ll think about it.”
“Please do. If you decide you can come, I’ll put you in touch with the organizers. I’ll be there, you know.”
After hanging up, he thought about it. For a brief moment, he felt drawn to the city of Shaoxing, if only for the chance to take a short vacation there. Oh, a “vacation” is the draw, is it? he joked with himself-surely not the one who invited you? He tried to mock himself out of thinking about a possibly romantic vacation. Shaoxing was a city with a long cultural history, he reflected. It was known for its association with many celebrated men of letters, and particularly with Lu Xun, a modern Chinese writer whom Chen passionately admired.
With the investigation in the state it was, however, he didn’t think he could spare the time for the trip. So he started to settle back into the various files about Fang when another call came in, this time from Melong.
“I have something for you, Chief Inspector Chen. Where are you?”
“I’m on Yunnan Road.”
“Ah, you’re on the gourmet street. It’s quite close to me. How about I meet you there in ten minutes? I have something to show you.”
“That’s good. I’ll wait here for you,” he said, looking across the street at a restaurant on the corner near Ninghai Road. “I’ll be at the Four Seas Cross-Bridge Rice Noodles.”
Chen left the Internet café and walked over to the noodle restaurant. To his surprise, it wasn’t crowded. He sat down at a corner table. He had hardly finished looking through the menu when Melong stepped in with a large envelope in his hand.
“This is one of the few places around here that hasn’t really changed,” Melong said, sitting down opposite. “An excellent choice.”
But even this noodle place had changed some, the service fancier and the menu more varied than Chen remembered. The waiter put down on the table more than a dozen tiny saucers of fresh toppings, including thin-sliced pork, beef, lamb, fish, shrimp, and vegetables, before bringing over two large bowls of noodles immersed in steaming hot soup covered with a thin layer of oil. They were supposed to immerse the toppings in the soup, then wait for a minute or two before eating. They were the same cross-bridge noodles Zhou had had for his last meal.
The moment the waiter stepped away Melong pushed the envelope across the table to Chen.
It contained a bunch of pictures of Zhou and Fang in the office, the two touching and kissing each other there. One picture showed Zhou sitting on the desk with his trousers half removed, and her kneeling in front of him on the carpet, naked to her waist, her hair cascading down over her bare back. Then there were several more explicit ones showing the two of them in bed, totally naked, engaged in the entangling ecstasy of rolling cloud and rain. The pictures were of low quality, and most of them were rather blurry.
“Where did you get these?”
“You know a thing or two about my work, don’t you? These photos were found on Dang’s computer.”
“Dang’s computer-how?”
But Chen didn’t have to wait for the answer. One of the angles he’d discussed with Detective Wei was who would benefit from Zhou’s murder, an approach he had mentioned when talking with Melong. While the relationship between Zhou and Fang was not unanticipated, the source of the pictures put Dang in a new light. Figuring out why Dang had taken them was a no-brainer. They were evidence he could use against Zhou, having secretly installed a video camera in Zhou’s office.
The pictures would have been enough to bring down Zhou and for Dang, the second in command, to succeed to Zhou’s position. Dang might have simply been biding his time until the 95 Supreme Majesty scandal broke out, making it no longer necessary for him to release those photos.
Alternatively, he could have been blackmailing Zhou with these pictures.
“The other day you mentioned that people in Zhou’s office were on your radar,” Melong said. “I checked into each of them, and this is what has come up so far.”
He didn’t have to explain further. Chen nodded.
But that led Chen back to a question that had occurred to him earlier in the day.
He wasn’t interested so much in Fang’s appearance in these pictures as he was in Jiang’s panic about her sudden disappearance. A clandestine relationship between a boss and his little secretary wasn’t really surprising in China. Jiang must have known something about it before Fang disappeared: but was he now worried about these graphic photos coming to light? Was Jiang just irrationally panicky?
Or was it something else?
When Chen pulled himself back into the present moment after being so lost in thought, he realized that Melong was looking at him with a wry smile.
“What is it?”
“The noodles are now cold and taste like glue with all the soup soaked in.”
“I’m sorry. It’s my fault entirely.”
“No, it’s my fault. I should have shown you the pictures after we’d finished eating.”
“Let’s order something else.”
“No thanks. I’m not really hungry.”
“I owe you one, Melong. I’ll treat you to a better meal another day.” He added belatedly, “How is your mother?”
“She’s already in the hospital. The doctor is taking special care of her. I should go over there now. The hospital won’t admit visitors after eight.”
Watching Melong get into a taxi, Chen felt a twinge of guilt about not visiting his mother. In a somber mood, he pursued his plan to have some cooked food delivered to her. He walked over to Little Shaoxing Chicken Restaurant and settled on the Shanghai-style smoked carp and half a three-yellow chicken.
Even though it was getting late, Chen contemplated, perhaps it wasn’t too late for him to go and interview Fang’s parents.
So he walked back over to the Internet café. The attendant recognized him and led him to a computer without asking to see his ID again. He logged on and retrieved the file Jiang sent, then copied Fang’s address.
He couldn’t shake the feeling, however, that there was something else, something dancing just on the edge of his thoughts. Was it in Lianping’s call about the festival in Shaoxing, something possibly connected to the investigation, that slipped away when he was distracted by Melong’s call?
Then he got an idea.
He took a folder out of his briefcase and looked through it. It turned out to be just as he remembered.
Last year, Zhou had made two trips to Shaoxing. Born and raised there until he was seven, he left for Shanghai when his father’s job was transferred. Zhou hadn’t been back there even once until last year. The information gathered by Detective Wei was quite detailed, including all of the trips Zhou had taken in the last several years and their purpose, as well as the people, especially the local officials, he met with. But that wasn’t the case with his trips to Shaoxing. Wei had no details on them. So Zhou had gone to Shaoxing for some unrevealed personal reason.
There was a note in the folder stating that Zhou had no property under his own name in Shaoxing. Wei had done a thorough job, taking into consideration Zhou’s position and connections.
Of course, a man could suddenly be so nostalgic as to decide to visit his old home, even going there twice in one year. But that wasn’t likely, particularly not for a busy official like Zhou.