“Turn the damned machine off!” a passenger shouted out to the driver. “Mao’s dead and rotting in his grave. Go and play those red songs in the cemetery.”
“Don’t drag Mao into this, you pathetic loser,” another passenger snapped back, glaring over his shoulder. “Don’t forget the movie Hibiscus Village!”
“What about it?”
“The Cultural Revolution will come again.”
“Come on. Those were nothing but the ravings of a lunatic at the end of that movie. You must have lost your mind too.”
“Let’s not fight. It’s Secretary Lai’s order that we play these red songs on the bus,” the driver declared.
Was another Cultural Revolution on the horizon? Chen contemplated that idea. The revival of the old revolutionary red songs was a campaign that originated under Lai, the First Secretary of the Shanghai Party Committee. A relative newcomer to the city, Lai had lost no time leaving his mark through a series of political moves, made possible by his background as a princeling-a child of a high Party member-and the fast-changing political weather. He was regarded by many as a leading figure of the left in China. It was increasingly said that Shanghai was just a stepping stone for Lai in his inevitable rise to the very top of the Party power structure.
What Lai did appealed to some of the people frustrated with the problems of modern China, because it harkened back to the days of Mao. But Chen didn’t think it could work. China was still changing dramatically, despite these old red songs.
A gray-haired passenger was nodding in front, as if lost in the familiar tune. He had perhaps heard the song many times in his youth, and what the words meant hardly mattered any more.
Of course, the man in front might be napping instead, his head merely bobbing along with the bumpy ride. Still, several others in the bus seemed to be humming along, one of them even tapping his foot on the floor. At least they didn’t appear to be bothered by the song.
Another argument was just beginning to rise up as the bus jerked to an unexpected stop.
“What a lousy ride!” An old man cursed. “The bag of my old bones is being shaken loose.”
“If you want to enjoy a comfortable, luxurious ride,” the driver shouted back, “take the high-speed train.”
“It’s easy for you to talk. How can a retiree possibly afford the train?” the old man wailed. “Alas, why do poor people like us have to suffer like this? If he were alive today, Chairman Mao would never let it happen.”
“Your brain must be totally addled, old fool. Mao had a special train just for himself, with pretty waitresses dancing attendance on him, and, from what I hear, dancing under him, too. Use your imagination! I saw a documentary that said that one of the train girls became his personal secretary, and later became a powerful politburo member.”
“Let Mao lie in peace,” another passenger said, from across the aisle.
“Under Chairman Mao, you wouldn’t have been allowed to sweep graves during Qingming. It was forbidden as a superstitious practice.”
Chen nodded along to the arguments flying back and forth, but he didn’t get in the middle of it. It was then that his phone rang again. It was Detective Yu Guangming, his longtime partner at the bureau. At the same time Chen’s departure had been announced, Yu had been named the head of the Special Case Squad. Chen trusted Yu, so it was a relief that Yu had succeeded him, but he tried not to put too much stock in the choice. Yu’s promotion might just be another part of the reassuring show.
“Chief-”
“I’m sitting on a cemetery bus. You can hear the background noise-and the red song-can’t you? It’s no place to talk.” He added, “And I’m not ‘Chief.’ Not anymore.”
“But I need to discuss the cases we took over just before yesterday’s announcement.”
“No, you’re the squad leader now, Yu. You don’t need to discuss anything with me.”
“Some of the cases are ones you’d already started reviewing, and your opinion may be invaluable to the squad.”
He thought he knew why Yu had called him. A demonstration of solidarity. But that was the very reason he didn’t want Yu to go on. The phone call might be tapped.
“I’ll be back from Suzhou soon, Yu,” he said. “I’ll call you.”
Detective Yu had a point, though. His sudden change in job duties could have something to do with one of the cases recently assigned to the Special Case Squad. The squad’s cases were deemed “special” mostly because there were politically sensitive. What Chen was supposed to do with those cases was provide damage control for the Party. The problem was that he took the cases, and his role as chief inspector, too seriously. Now, he was in trouble.
But he failed to see how his current trouble was in any way related to the squad’s current caseload, particularly the case he’d been handed the day before. It was about a dead tiger-a publicly disgraced official or businessman who wouldn’t be able to fight back-and it was assigned to Chen’s squad as a formality, because of its high-profile nature. Chen hadn’t done anything with it and wasn’t planning to. He left the case file unread on the bureau’s computer.
He did have some other files stored on his laptop. Without going back into the bureau, he could review them again. For the time being, however, he wasn’t going to contact Detective Yu.
The bus ground to another abrupt stop. The driver caught sight of several people walking along the road with their cemetery offerings. He pulled over, let them on, and charged them ten yuan each. It was his own bus, and it made sense for him to make money any way possible.
The bus started up again and then swerved onto a newly built highway. Chen didn’t remember having ever seen that highway before, but the high-rises along both sides looked strangely similar. They were all almost identical, like gray concrete matchboxes precariously piled up.
The bus took another turn, rolling down narrow roads with old, ramshackle farmhouses lining both sides. Occasionally, though, there were newly constructed villas, just like those in the suburbs of Shanghai.
“Gaofeng Cemetery!” came an announcement on the bus’s loudspeaker.
The cemetery bus pulled slowly into the parking lot.
TWO
“THE BUS BACK TO Shanghai will arrive around 12:30,” the driver announced. “After that, there may be another one, but it’s difficult to say when it will arrive. So please don’t miss the one at 12:30.”
Chen looked at his watch. It was about nine thirty. Three hours. No need for him to hurry.
Following the crowd, he headed toward the cemetery entrance. Even though it was after Qingming, the number of visitors was considerable.
Chen hadn’t been to the cemetery in several years, and it, like everywhere else in Suzhou, had changed. The sign at the entrance appeared to have been recently repainted, and a new arch stood over the entrance, redolent with the grandeur of a gate to an ancient palace. It added a majestic touch to the scene, standing against the verdant hills stretching to the horizon. To the left, he saw a pair of imitation bronze burners inside a red pavilion, with a sign in large characters instructing people to burn their netherworld money in the designated burners. That was surely another “improvement with time”-a political catchphrase in the People’s Daily. In the past, visitors would burn “money” in front of the graves, which had the potential risk of setting off wildfires.
Chen carried no offering with him. At the sight of others headed toward the burners, clasping enormous red envelopes or brown paper bags, he felt another twinge of guilt.
Several guards stood by the gate, serious and motionless as ancient statues. It was possible they were there to prevent people from sneaking netherworld money into the grave sites. But Chen doubted it. More likely they were there merely to add to the pompous appearance of the cemetery in this materialistic age.