The trial was over in less than half an hour.
‘He’ll get about ten years hard labour,’ said Hong Qiu.
‘I didn’t hear the judge say anything that sounded like a sentence.’
Hong Qiu made no comment. When the judge stood up, everybody else followed suit. The convicted man was led away. Birgitta never managed to catch his eye.
‘Now we shall meet the judge,’ said Hong Qiu. ‘She has invited us to tea in her office. Her name is Min Ta. When she’s not working, she spends her time looking after two grandchildren.’
‘What’s her reputation?’
Hong Qiu didn’t understand the question.
‘All judges have a reputation, more or less accurate. Seldom very wide of the mark. I’m reputed to be a mild but very firm judge,’ Birgitta explained.
‘Min Ta follows the law. She’s proud of being a judge. And so she is also a true representative of our country.’
They went through the low door at the back of the dais and were received by Min Ta in her spartan and freezing cold office. A clerk served tea. They sat down. Min Ta immediately began to talk in the same shrill voice as she had used in the courtroom. When she finished, Hong Qiu translated what she had said.
‘It is a great honour to meet a colleague from Sweden. She has heard many positive comments about the Swedish legal system. Unfortunately she has another trial coming up shortly, otherwise she’d have loved to discuss the Swedish legal system with you.’
‘Please thank her for inviting me,’ said Birgitta Roslin. ‘Ask her what she thinks the sentence will be. Were you right in guessing about ten years?’
‘I never go into a courtroom without being thoroughly prepared,’ said Min Ta when she had heard the translation of the question. ‘It’s my duty to use my time and that of the other legal officers efficiently. There was no doubt in this case. The man had confessed; he’s a recidivist; there were no extenuating circumstances. I think I’ll give him between seven and ten years in prison, but I shall ponder carefully before deciding.’
That was the only question Birgitta had the possibility of asking. Then it was Min Ta who fired a whole series of questions for her to answer. Birgitta wondered in passing exactly what Hong Qiu said in her translations. Perhaps she and Min Ta were in fact conducting a conversation about something entirely different?
After twenty minutes Min Ta stood up and explained that she would have to return to the courtroom. A man came in with a camera. Min Ta stood next to Birgitta Roslin, and a photograph was taken. Hong Qiu was standing to one side, out of camera range. The two judges shook hands, and they both went into the corridor together. When Min Ta opened the door Birgitta noticed that the courtroom was now packed.
They returned to the car and drove off at high speed. When they stopped, it was not at the hotel but outside a pagoda-like tea house on an island in an artificial lake.
‘It’s cold,’ said Hong Qiu. ‘Tea warms you up.’
Hong Qiu led her to a room screened off from the rest of the tea house. Two teacups were waiting on a table, beside which stood a waitress with a teapot in her hand. Everything that happened to Birgitta today was meticulously planned. From having been just another tourist, she had been transformed into an especially important visitor to China. She still didn’t know why.
Hong Qiu suddenly started talking about the Swedish legal system. She gave the impression of being very well read. She asked questions about the murders of Olof Palme and Anna Lindh.
‘In an open society you can never guarantee a person’s safety one hundred per cent,’ said Birgitta Roslin. ‘You have to pay prices in all kinds of societies. Freedom and safety are always jostling for position.’
‘If you are really intent on murdering somebody, it can never be prevented,’ said Hong Qiu. ‘Not even an American president can be protected.’
Birgitta Roslin detected an undertone in what Hong Qiu had said, but was unable to put her finger on it.
‘We don’t often hear about Sweden,’ said Hong Qiu. ‘But just recently news has reached our papers about a horrific mass murder.’
‘I happen to know a bit about it,’ said Birgitta Roslin. ‘Even though I wasn’t involved. A suspect was arrested, but he committed suicide. Which is a scandal in itself, no matter how it happened.’
As Hong Qiu was displaying polite interest, Birgitta described what had happened in as much detail as she could. Hong Qiu listened attentively, asked no questions, but occasionally asked for something to be repeated.
‘A madman,’ said Birgitta Roslin in conclusion. ‘Who managed to take his own life. Or another madman the police haven’t succeeded in finding yet. Or something completely different, with a motive and a cold-blooded, brutal plan.’
‘What would that be?’
‘As nothing seems to have been stolen it must be a combination of hatred and revenge.’
‘What do you think?’
‘Who should they be looking for, do you mean? I don’t know. But I find it hard to accept the theory of a lone madman.’
Birgitta elaborated on what she called the Chinese lead. She started from the beginning, when she discovered she was related to some of the dead, and then the astonishing next phase involving the Chinese visitor to Hudiksvall. When she noticed that Hong Qiu really was listening intently, she found it impossible to stop. In the end she took out the photograph and showed it to Hong Qiu.
Hong Qiu nodded slowly. Just for a moment she seemed lost in her own thoughts. It suddenly occurred to Birgitta that Hong Qiu recognised the face. But that was implausible. One face in a billion?
Hong Qiu smiled, returned the photograph and asked what Birgitta intended to do for the remainder of her time in Beijing.
‘Tomorrow I hope my friend will be able to take me to see the Great Wall of China. Then we’ll be flying home the following day.’
‘I’m afraid I’m busy and won’t be able to help you.’
‘You have already done more than I could ever have asked for.’
‘In any case, I shall come to bid you farewell before you leave.’
They said goodbye outside the hotel. Birgitta Roslin watched the car with Hong Qiu leaving through the hotel gates.
Karin came back at three o’clock and, with a sigh of relief, threw most of the conference material into the wastebasket. When Birgitta suggested a trip to the Great Wall of China the following day, Karin agreed immediately. But first, she wanted to go shopping. Birgitta accompanied her from one shop to the next, to semi-official markets in side streets and dimly lit boutiques filled with all kinds of bargains, from old lamps to wooden sculptures depicting evil demons. Weighed down with parcels and packages, they hailed a taxi as dusk began to fall. Karin was feeling tired, so they ate at the hotel. Birgitta spoke to the concierge and arranged a trip to the Wall for the following day.
Karin was asleep, but Birgitta curled up in a chair and watched Chinese television with the sound turned down. She occasionally felt stabs of fear originating from the previous day’s events. But she had made up her mind once and for all to say nothing about it, not even to Karin.
The following day they drove out to the Great Wall of China. There wasn’t even a breath of wind, and the dry cold felt less intrusive. They wandered around the Wall, duly impressed, and took pictures of each other or handed the camera to a friendly local who was only too pleased to snap them.
‘So, we came here in the end,’ said Karin. ‘With a camera in our hands, not Mao’s Little Red Book.’
‘A miracle must have taken place in this country,’ said Birgitta. ‘Not brought about by gods but by people with astounding courage.’