The Golden Mountain Murders (21 page)

Then Charles spun around and faced Fong. His eyes were suddenly bright, vibrant, as if he’d just run a race.
“Ni hao,”
he chirped.

Fong smiled and replied in Mandarin – if you speak the Common Tongue then I’m a chili pepper in a whore’s armpit.

Charles smiled. Fong found himself liking the smile. “You got me. All the Mandarin I know is how to say hello.” He then repeated,
“Ni hao.”

Fong resisted correcting Charles’s use of tones in the word. His childish approach to the word reminded Fong of student actors on the Shanghai theatre academy campus who loved to approach Westerners with loud salutations of the only English phrase they knew:
“Well, Come too Chey Na!”

“Your class was very interesting,” Fong said. “You are very skilled. My name is Zhong Fong,” Fong said in his textbook-perfect English.

Charles turned to the students who were still dis-mantling the video equipment, “That’s enough, thanks. I’ll do the rest.”

“You going to join us for a drink?” asked the older black actor.

“Do I ever join you for a drink?” Charles asked.

“No, you don’t.”

“Right. But thanks for asking. One of these days I’ll surprise you all and show up.”

“We’ll try to hide our astonishment.”

“Just find the truth, breathe in the truth and say the stupid words.”

“Good-night” and “Great class!” were offered by the actors and gratefully accepted by Charles. And then the actors were gone. Charles closed the main door behind them and opened the blinds on the south side of the studio. A full moon sat low in the night sky. Charles stared at it, doing what Fong’s actress wife, Fu Tsong, used to call “breathing it in.”

Fong allowed himself to breathe in Charles watching the low-slung moon. He sensed something almost ancient in this young man. Finally he asked, “Is there not madness in watching the moon?”

“No, there’s no madness there, Mr. Zhong,” Charles said without turning back to face Fong. “There is truth in the moon’s movement.”

“Truth in the moon? How can that be when the moon constantly changes?”

“The moon changes because it is about time – no, it is time itself. Trying to find truth between human beings without understanding time is folly.”

“Is it truth between human beings that I saw you teach this evening?”

“No art is about the clever rearranging of the truth. It is by its nature a kid of deception.”

“Then teaching acting is teaching lying.”

“No. I never said that, although there are far too many liars who claim to be acting teachers.”

“I’d like to talk to you about truth.”

Charles finally turned to face Fong. The moon hung between the two. “I assumed we’d meet again. Once is a chance meeting. Twice is an odd coincidence that assumes the arrival of the third meeting.”

“But this is only our second meeting,” Fong said.

“Wrong. Third.” Before Fong could respond Charles added, “Be that as it may,
ni hao.”

This time Fong corrected Charles’s inflection. Charles accepted the correction and, much to Fong’s surprise, repeated the complicated up and down tonal pattern – so foreign to English speakers – perfectly. Then he surprised Fong again. “You sit behind your eyes, Mr. Zhong.”

Fong remembered conversations with his actress wife about the positions that actors “wear their eyes” – and how to change the position. He parted his lips and touched the tip of his left index finger to the end of his tongue. He tasted the bacterial mix on his skin. It moved him forward from behind his eyes. Then, as his eyes softened, he dropped down to his mouth.

Charles noted the movement of Fong’s self from behind his eyes eventually into his mouth and nodded. “Who taught you that trick?”

“My wife.”

“She’s an actress.”

“Was an actress,” Fong said.

Charles got it. Implication and all. Fong’s wife had been an actress. Fong’s wife had died. Fong adored his deceased wife. Those facts were obvious to Charles. What wasn’t clear was, “Who taught her?”

Fong hesitated.

Then Charles smiled, “Poor Geoff.” It was a statement of fact not a question.

Fong nodded. Then he surprised Charles, “And you taught Geoff, didn’t you?” Again it was a statement not a question.

It was Charles’s turn to nod. “He was older than me by almost fifteen years but he wanted to learn what I had to teach.” He sighed deeply. “It’s rare that an older man is willing to learn from a younger one. Geoff was a rare talent and in his own way modest.”

Fong didn’t know what to say to that.

Momentarily time stretched between the two men as the full moon outside the window perfectly framed the two and held the moment in time’s viscous suspension – neither man took a breath – then the moment passed – breath and time resumed – the moon no longer centred the two men.

“Three meetings?” Fong prompted.

“Third meeting now. Second meeting in my rehearsal room at the Vancouver Theatre Centre watching twelve angry egotists. First meeting at the skateboard park.”

“You were there?” Fong said cautiously.

“I go to watch and I saw you see.”

“See what?”

“Don’t lie. I’m quite good at knowing when someone is lying.” Fong didn’t respond. “When Stanislavski, the great Russian acting teacher, lost his faith in what he was doing – which, being a Russian, happened to him a lot – he would always go to the beaches of the Black Sea and watch children play. Watch them put their heads up into the pure river of a child’s truth.” Charles kicked the hardwood floor with a dirty shoe. “The Black Sea is pretty far from here, Mr. Zhong – skateboard parks have a tendency to be closer. There’s a kind of truth there. I make my living by perceiving truth. By sticking my head up into the pure flow of the jet stream and hoping it doesn’t drag me back too far in time.”

“Excuse me?”

“That’s not important, Mr. Zhong. What is important is that just like me, you saw the truth in what those kids were doing – and, Mr. Zhong, I saw you see it. The powerful believe that they understand the truth and that everyone beneath them is influenced by the gyrations, fluctuations and even subtle movements of their truth. But they are wrong. Completely wrong. There are other pure rivers of truth. One of them was being played out before your eyes in the skateboard park.

“Remember the girl skateboarder? She brought something different by accessing the only commonly known pure stream: sex. It’s the one that pornographers have been building ladders to, then elevators and finally high-speed modems. I don’t care about the morality of what they do, only that they debase something that can be pure. They make it common, banal. The greatest threat the West poses to the rest of the world is its relentless pursuit of ways to bottle that ‘jet stream’ and sell it.”

“But no one can commodify the ethereal,” Fong said.

“Perhaps, but the effort to do so is the greatest sin of the West.”

“And does the East have a greatest sin?”

“For sure.”

“And that sin is?”

“The East demands obedience to gain freedom. They refuse to see that talent is needed to make the leap to the truth. And there is no talent without freedom.”

“That’s a touch elitist, don’t you think?” Fong countered.

“Perhaps, Inspector Zhong, but there are real obligations imposed on people of talent – you know that yourself.”

“I don’t follow.”

“Sure you do. Don’t lie, Inspector Zhong.”

Fong ignored the comment. “What kind of obligation does talent demand?”

“To share. Talents are to be shared. Ever hear of the parable of the talents?”

“Is that a TV game show?”

Charles laughed. Fong found the sound pleasant if disturbingly older than the sound ought to be. “If it’s possible to be the opposite of a TV game show, the parable of the talents is. The parable tells us not to hide talents, in the case of the parable, beneath a bushel – because talents are to be shared.”

“Do you share your talent, Mr. Roeg?”

“I teach, Inspector Zhong. It wasn’t what I intended to do but it was where some of my talents led me.”

Fong nodded.

“And you share your talents, too, Inspector Zhong.”

Fong thought of Captain Chen and Lily and the dozens of young officers that he’d taken under his wing – but he said nothing, although he did smile.

And Charles Roeg smiled back. “No doubt merchants are already hard at work trying to bottle what the skateboarders have – but it’s hard – skateboarding requires the one thing the West is not good at – dedication. But only with dedication can you reach up into the jet stream and fly with God.” Charles took a breath and then began to coil camera wire. “Let’s leave it at that.”

Fong looked at Charles in amazement. As if the younger man had read his mind.

“You are a dangerous man, Mr. Roeg.”

“No more so than you, Mr. Zhong.”

Fong turned to the window and looked at the moon. “Can you really tell when a person lies, Mr. Roeg?”

“Charles – you can call me Charles.”

“Thank you, Charles.” Fong struggled to get the “rl” sound in Charles to work for him and was only partially successful. “Can you tell when a person is lying?”

After a beat, Charles said, “Yes, but when I agree to do so, I get paid handsomely. But I’m careful when I use that talent. Besides it’s not why I’m out here in Vancouver.”

“You are here to direct that silly play with the lawyers?”

“That’s a favour I do. Something I return to the community that has been very good to me. I’m actually out here because I have a new girlfriend – she’s a features writer for the
Vancouver Sun
– the West’s national newspaper.”

“I see,” said Fong. “So have I been lying, Mr. Roeg?”

“You are inclined to lie, Mr. Zhong. Sins of omission are not strictly speaking lies. But you have committed many sins of omission. Who sent you to me? Don’t lie . . . I’ll know if you do, and if you do, I won’t play my magic trick for you.”

“Robert Cowens.”

“The Toronto lawyer? How’s his health?” Fong shrugged. “Sorry to hear that.”

Fong nodded. “Mr. Cowens says you have reviewed final interviews with executives for high positions and offered your opinion as to whether they are truthfully answering the questions they are asked.”

Fong watched the younger man get defensive, “Yeah, I’ve done that before.”

“So there is a person who . . .”

“. . . who you need me to tell you if he is a liar or not. Right?”

Fong felt ridiculous but that was exactly what he wanted – and after a bit of hemming and hawing said as much.

The restaurant that Robert Cowens sat in was terribly expensive and Allen Barton, of Henderson, Millet, Cavender and Barton, Attorneys at Law, was late. He arrived and ordered a single malt scotch before he even sat. Quickly he launched into the details of business dealings with the Chiang family who controlled the blood trade out of China.

Robert expertly guided the conversation to the silent partner.

Fong and Charles sat listening to the conversation from a small speaker in the back of Charles’s girlfriend’s beat-up Corolla. Fong was about to speak but Charles held up a hand. The conversation between the two lawyers continued for another ten minutes, then Charles reached over and turned off the speaker. “I’ve heard enough.”

“So?”

“You want my opinion as to whether Mr. Barton was lying, is that right?”

“Yes, if you would.”

Charles laughed, “I don’t do this for just anyone.”

“Poor people in Anhui Province are dying from AIDS brought about by the money that a silent partner supplies. These are desperately poor people who cannot protect themselves. You are not doing this for me. You are doing this for them.” Fong took a moment to compose himself. “So is this lawyer lying?”

“About not knowing who the silent partner is?”

“Yes, about that!”

“No, Inspector Zhong, he’s telling the truth about that. About other things he’s lying: his belief that Robert is representing a syndicate of money from the East, his pleasure in seeing Robert again, his upcoming meeting – fuck, even his love of single malt scotch is a lie. But not knowing the silent partner – that’s the truth.” He looked at Fong’s face. “Sorry. I assume it’s not what you wanted to hear?”

But Fong wasn’t listening. He was running towards the restaurant.

Fong charged into the restaurant the moment the lawyer left. Robert was momentarily stunned at his arrival. “Do you believe him?” Fong shouted.

“Sit down, Fong. This is what is known in this part of the world as a fancy restaurant and they don’t think kindly of either shouting or standing.”

Fong grabbed a chair, pulled it out and sat. “I’m sitting.”

“Good.” Robert pushed his plate away. “What did Charles say?”

“Never mind about that. I want to know what you think. You were sitting across from him, so was this man telling you the truth or not?”

“I think he was.”

“Telling the truth?”

“You know that’s what I meant. Yes, Fong, I think Mr. Allen Barton was telling me the truth when he claimed that he didn’t know who the silent partner was.”

“So he doesn’t know who the money is behind the Chiang operation in Anhui Province?”

“Are you asking me or just pissed off that we did all this work for nothing?”

“Asking you.”

“So, yes, that’s what I believe. That Barton doesn’t know who supplies the money for the blood-trading operation.” Robert shook his head. “What did Charles say?”

“He agrees with you that this lawyer wasn’t lying.”

“Now what?” asked Robert.

Fong stood and looked at the table. Two untouched pastries sat on a plate. Pointing to them he asked, “You don’t like sweets, Robert?”

“No. They upset my stomach.” He reached in his pocket and then swallowed two pills each about the size of a pencil stub.

Fong looked at Robert, awaiting an explanation for the pills. When it became clear that Robert wasn’t going to supply one, Fong turned to go. Over his shoulder he heard Robert say, “Where to now?”

Fong turned, about to say something about speaking loudly in fancy restaurants when he saw Robert smiling broadly. As he approached Fong, he said – loudly – “I always hated pretentious places like this. Why do lawyers always want to take meetings in these beer joints?” Fong smiled. Robert turned to a matronly woman with a shocked look on her face and the tiniest dab of horseradish mixed with roast beef juice on her pointy chin and said, “Enjoy your dinner, Agatha.”