The Golden Mountain Murders (9 page)

Robert thought of Evan. A bear of a man – roaming the darkness of his house, once their house – but now, his alone.

J
oan Shui wasn’t happy. The preliminary report from the fire scene that unfurled from the fax machine in her Hong Kong condo struck her as cursory at best. But she hesitated to make a fuss. She was new to the Shanghai police force and all her years on the Hong Kong constabulary as a chief arson inspector meant squat to the Shanghanese. If anything, those years counted against her. Years of steady propaganda had instilled a deep loathing for Hong Kong in the Shanghanese, despite the fact that Shanghai was actively trying to out “Hong Kong” Hong Kong in every conceivable way. As well, her sponsor and lover Zhong Fong was off in the West at a counterterrorism conference. “That’s why I’m hesitating to respond to this bullshit fax,” she thought, then cast aside the thought.

She reread the faxed report. Claptrap about a kitchen fire that got out of control. She was in Hong Kong finalizing the sale of her condo when she’d gotten the first call. The men in charge of the investigation were none too happy when she told them to fax their report to her. They were none too keen on taking orders of any sort from a woman, especially a woman who they thought of as a Westerner. She’d done her best to hold her temper when she spoke to them on the phone.

“It was what?”

“A simple kitchen fire. You know these people, they have kitchens now and they don’t know how to use them properly.”

Joan knew that since the last “great leap forward” the entire population of Shanghai had basically eaten from communal kitchens – they had little choice because most Shanghanese had to melt down their kitchen utensils to meet the Beijing Government’s ludicrous demands for steel that they were supposed to produce in backyard blast furnaces. So it was possible that finally having a kitchen could pose issues. But it didn’t sound right.

“All three are dead?” she asked.

“Mom, pop and kid,” the cop said.

His cell phone crackled for a few seconds – unusual in China where cell phone communication was first rate. Without the advent of cell-phone technology China could never have had the extraordinary economic growth of the past decade. There was no way to wire 1.3 billion people. But with cell phones there was obviously no need for telephone poles and trillions of kilometres of wires. Besides, cell phones were made in Chinese prisons and therefore were cheap. In fact, because cell phones came into China when they did, China never went through the early woes of cell-phone technology. In New York or London or Rome, cell phones regularly cacked out. Not in China. So the crackling sound on the man’s cell phone raised alarm bells in her head.

“All dead. How?”

“Fire.”

She took a breath and told herself to keep her cool. “From burning or suffocation or body injury?”

“I don’t know.”

“Find that out for me. Then notify Lily that after I take a look, three bodies will be coming her way and we need cause of death on each. What about time?”

“Well, the neighbour heard the boom around two in the morning.”

An odd time to be using the kitchen, Joan thought. “How many rooms were in the apartment?”

“Three.” The man’s voice was flat, angry.

Naturally, she thought. He probably lived in half a room with another family on the other side of sheets strung on clotheslines to divide the place, so three rooms would strike him as offensive. “Were they rich?”

“Recently from HK.” This time his voice wasn’t flat. The anger was open. “Oh, yeah, he worked for the department.”

“What?”

“He had one of those English names . . .”

Joan held the phone away from her ear. Kenneth Lo – it could only have been Kenneth Lo and his wife and daughter. She looked out at the twinkle of lights across the bay in Macau. “They seemed to say: Kenneth is gone – an omen. Stay away from Shanghai!”

“Three rooms, you said?”

“Yeah.”

“Bedroom, kitchen and what?”

“Sort of an office, I guess. A desk, a couch that pulls out into a bed, a TV and dinner table and lounge chair and lots of electronic stuff, paintings, kids’ toys – stuff. What kind of room would you call that?”

A room where you shoved together what you used to have in four or five rooms, she thought. Kenneth had moved his family from their six-room apartment in Hong Kong’s fancy Causeway Bay district to three rooms in Shanghai’s upscale, but modest, embassy district.

“Was the desk destroyed?”

“Yep.”

“And his computers?”

“Melted junk.”

“Inform Captain Chen that after I take a look the computer equipment will be brought over to him.” She wondered briefly how well Chen knew Kenneth Lo. Probably pretty well. She needed Chen’s expertise; he was the only other technical expert in Special Investigations. “Tape the scene. Clear out the apartments on both sides and above and below. This is a homicide scene.”

“What . . .”

“Just do it. And no one but no one is to touch anything until I get there. Is that clear?”

She hung up and called her lawyer. It was late but he agreed to meet her and they quickly settled the final arrangements for the sale of her condo. At first light she was at the airport, and by the end of rush hour she was heading towards the fire scene – towards Shanghai, towards a life with Fong. For a moment she recalled her first trip to Shanghai – six days dressed as a peasant working as a Dalong Fada courier and a troubling night when she slept with a peasant’s animals and awoke unable to catch her breath. But that was behind her, she hoped.

Joan stood very still looking at the scorched little girl with the plastic doll melted to her tiny chest. The smell of barbecued human flesh still lingered in the room but she knew it was not as overpowering now as it would have been the day before when the fire ate this place. Now the smell lurked in the charred drywall, hid in the carpets, hung from the ceiling tiles. Just a fire scene she told herself. Just like so many she’d seen before.

It was only when she went to take out her notebook that she realized she was crying.

She checked to make sure that the gas outlets were turned off and that all the electrical appliances were unhooked. She wasn’t surprised to see that the food in the small refrigerator had been cleaned out. “Cop’s privilege,” she thought. What did surprise her were three sweet confections called Hostess Cup Cakes that for some reason had been left. They had been torn from their wrappers and the centre squiggle of white icing removed. Aside from some rotting tofu, they were the sole occupants of the icebox. The refrigerator itself was dented but unharmed. It was clearly not in the line of the blast.

Once she was sure that the place wasn’t going to blow up a second time – something not unheard of in arson circles – she photographed the site in a practised manner. Slow, exact, meticulous. Then she began to go through drawers – and she came across another shock – there were baby clothes.

“Oh, Kenneth, you didn’t.” But she knew he must have. No one keeps baby clothes without a baby. She recalled that Kenneth had taken six months to arrive in Shanghai claiming that he had business to complete in Xian – or somewhere. What she remembered was how angry Fong had been when Kenneth finally sauntered into Fong’s office, six-plus months late for work.

She slammed the dresser drawer with the baby clothes shut and spun around. Where? She wanted to scream. They had only found the one child. Kenneth and his wife must have had a second child and hid it for fear of retribution for breaking the second child policy.

“Oh, Kenneth, once a cheat, always a cheat,” she mumbled and then turned slowly, with real trepidation, to examine the walls of the room. Joan touched the wall and felt the heat still in it. She forced herself to make the palm of her hand move slowly along the wall about three feet above the baseboards. She circumnavigated the kitchen and the bedroom but found nothing.

Then she took a deep breath and entered the room with the desk and the couch. She slowly pulled the burnt furniture away from the wallpapered wall. The design was badly scorched but it was a complex pattern of light vertical and horizontal lines on a dark field, with what seemed to be black dots wherever a vertical intersected a horizontal line.

Joan ran her hand over one of the “dots.” It wasn’t a dot – it was a hole. Every dot was a hole! An air hole!

For a moment she wanted to run. To get far away from here. But she didn’t. Instead she got down on her hands and knees and examined the baseboards. It was hard to tell – there had been so much damage from the fire. She stood and placed her hand flat against the wallpaper and slowly began to walk.

Halfway across the second wall, which backed onto the bedroom, she felt a ridge. Right on a vertical line. She traced the line down to the floor and up about four feet, then horizontally for about three feet, then down to the floor. She tried to pry her fingers into the ridge but it wouldn’t budge.

She stood back and looked at the rectangle she’d traced. The design on the wallpaper looked the same as the rest of the paper in the room. But then she noticed smudge marks in the very centre of the rectangle. She put her hand on the smudge marks and pushed.

She heard a latch give before anything moved. Then the rectangle slid out on straight wheel casters. For a split second Joan wanted to laugh – a safe.

Then her breath caught in her throat.

And the smell of charred human flesh assaulted her.

A tiny, once ornate, metal crib bent from the heat.

A synthetic blanket melted to a tiny body.

It had been a long time since she’d vomited at a crime scene but she was on her knees retching before she took another breath – and she stayed there for a long, long moment before she got to her feet and staggered to the door.

“I
t’s beautiful,” Fong said as Robert guided their rental car towards Vancouver from the international airport.

“Rumour has it that we are under the visitor’s umbrella. Once you rent a place, the umbrella is removed and the rain starts – and never stops.”

Fong turned in his seat to face Robert. “That’s an awful thing to say.”

“Yeah, I guess,” Robert replied.

“Why don’t you like Vancouver, Robert? The air seems clean. There are mountains and the ocean and sunshine and space – look at all the space.”

“If you like space, you’d love Saskatchewan,” Robert mumbled with a distinctly nasty edge in his voice.

“I don’t understand, Robert.”

“Fine, Fong. Vancouver’s paradise,” Robert said as he switched lanes to avoid the cars waiting to make left-hand turns off Granville Street.

“You don’t like paradise, Robert?”

“It’s just one of those things, Fong – let it be – fine. I don’t like paradise.”

Fong considered replying then thought better of it and turned his attention to the road. Large singlefamily homes sat on both sides of the four-lane street. Some were hunched behind dense hedges; others were obscured by tall slender trees planted unnaturally close together. There were extravagant homes like this in the new outer reaches of Shanghai, although these houses were of an older vintage. Straight ahead, on the other side of what Fong assumed was the city centre, were snow-covered mountains. But here in the city the temperature was moderate and the sun was shining – and many pretty women in spring dresses strolled the sidewalks – paradise of a sort, surely.

“Where are you going to start, Robert?”

Robert allowed a car to pass him then changed lanes. “I have two contacts in Vancouver. One is actually from Toronto but he happens to be here now, but he’s a loose cannon, a really odd kind of guy. I know how to find him here but I haven’t gotten in touch. My other contact I called from Calgary. He’s an old teacher of mine who can introduce me to people who can perhaps introduce me to people. If this blood business is really big stuff then someone will know someone who will know someone – I hope.”

Something occurred to Fong and he hissed, “
Tian na.”

“Sorry, but my Mandarin’s a bit rusty.”

“Tian na,
it means ‘golly.’”

“I doubt it means golly – nothing has meant golly since the fifties.” He waited for a response; none was forthcoming. “Golly what, Fong?”

“I don’t know why, but it never crossed my mind. But is it even illegal to import blood into Canada?”

“I’m happy to tell you that for the first time in this little venture I’m a step ahead of you. I used my Ontario law licence and logged into the law library in Calgary. It’s debatable, Fong. Raw blood is most probably illegal, but treated blood products, like those coming on that ship, are probably not illegal to import. Sorry.”

“Not illegal?” Fong shook his head.

“Probably not illegal,” Robert corrected him.

“Cao ni ma de, cao ni, feng zi, bian tai, chu sheng, nao zi you mao bing!”

“I assume those are charming home-grown cuss phrases of some sort. But I wouldn’t throw in the towel just yet. This is Canada, after all, and the province we’re in is called British Columbia – accent on the British. And with the British, shame works. Britain was shamed out of India. Can you imagine the French being shamed out of their colonial holdings – or the Germans or the Dutch or the fucking Belgians? But the British were shamed out of the crown jewel of all colonies, India. And there is enough vestigial British guilt here that, even though it may be legal, those who profit from the importation of Chinese blood could be ‘outed.’ Vancouver’s a social place, Fong – pariah status doesn’t get the missus an invite to the good parties.”

“So you think . . .”

“Embarrassment could work, Fong. In Montana or Texas or Alberta – no – but here, it’s worth a shot . . . as long as you have a good hook.”

“Hook?”

“The newspapers and television will need a personal angle on the blood story to get them interested. Articles in the press are a good beginning in shaming people.”

“So I would need something personal about the blood importer?”

“Better if it’s something about a blood victim. Something personal. Name and shame the money man with the name and story of the victim. Then we’ve got a chance.”

“That sounds straightforward.”

“Straightforward and difficult.”

“Find the money man; find a victim’s story and get it published.”

“That sounds easy to you?”

“No. But even the longest journey begins with a single step.”

“Yeah, Fong, and life is what happens while you’re busy making other plans.”

“Who said that?”

“The same guy who said even the longest journey begins with a single step – John Lennon.”

“Really? John Lennon quoted Chairman Mao.” Fong smiled. “I never would have guessed.”

Robert slid a CD out of its jewel case and into the player on the dashboard. He hit play and the whiskysoaked tones of Tom Waits filled the car. “Is he trying to sing?” Fong asked.

“He’s singing, Fong.”

“Is he in pain?”

“Most probably. This song is ‘Kentucky Avenue.’ Open your ears and you’ll learn something.”

And Fong did – and he did. On the other side of the scratchy voice were lyrics in stark contradiction to the melody. The song told the story of a boy breaking into a hospital to see his quadriplegic friend in the middle of the night and the friend’s request to be wheeled on his gurney bed out into the hall and launched through the plate-glass window – “slide down the drain pipe all the way to New Orleans in the fall.”

Robert sang the final lyrics with Mr. Waits then hit the repeat button and “Kentucky Avenue’s” agony once again filled the car.

“And this is a popular song?” Fong asked.

“It is with me. It didn’t used to be, but it’s a fave of mine now. I heard it maybe twice in the last three decades but it stayed with me. So when I saw it in the Toronto airport I couldn’t resist. You know Fong, despite the fact I haven’t heard it for years, I know every word of this – every word. Isn’t that odd?”

Fong was going to reply that it didn’t strike him as odd that at certain moments of our lives pieces of art fall into place – begin to make sense – but before he could speak, a cop swung his motorcycle out in front of them, its siren blaring, and signalled them to pull over to the curb. The smile changed on Fong’s face – still a smile, but different. “Were you speeding, Robert?”

“Not unless everyone else on this street was.”

“Is it common in your country to be detained by a police officer for no reason. It seems somewhat dictatorial. Now, where exactly are your human rights in a situation like this?”

“Are you done being a smart ass, Fong?”

“No, I’m actually enjoying this.”

“Don’t. If the cops in this town know about our little mission then everything, but everything, will get complicated.”

It turned out that the rental car had a broken taillight. The police officer, a young man with mirrored sunglasses, kept looking across Robert to Fong – as if he were checking something – perhaps a likeness.

Fong looked too. He looked at the two small holes on the breast pocket of the officer’s shirt – holes that were left after the man had removed his name tag.

“Is there anything else, Officer?” Robert asked as he put his driver’s licence back into his wallet.

“No. But I need you to get that light looked after.”

“I’ll call the rental company right away and give them holy hell.”

This was clearly intended as a joke on Robert’s part, but the young cop didn’t take it that way. The police officer lifted his sunglasses to reveal the lightest pair of blue eyes that Fong had ever seen. “There is nothing holy in hell, sir.”

Fong saw the vein on Robert’s forehead suddenly pulse. He leaned across Robert seemingly to speak to the police officer but in fact to watch the blue-eyed cop’s right hand that rested casually on the rental car’s side-view mirror. “No offence was intended, Officer,” Fong said.

“Is that so?” The officer’s voice was frosty.

“It is, Officer.”

“And what is your name, sir?”

Fong was tempted to ask the officer for his badge number but after looking more closely into the hatred in those watery blue eyes thought better of it. “Zhong Fong.”

“And are you a Canadian citizen, sir?”

“No. I am here . . .”

“. . . you have no right to question him about that,” Robert said. “You have no just cause. He has done nothing wrong. I was driving. I rented the car with the broken taillight, not him. Customs and Immigration Canada both cleared his entrance to our country. He does not have to answer your questions or present any form of identification to you, Officer.”

“You’re a lawyer, Mr. Cowens?” He emphasized the “cow” part of the name.

“Yes, but that has nothing . . .”

Before Robert could complete his statement the officer flipped down his sunglasses, returned to his motorcycle and zoomed away. Fong was not sorry to be done with those watery blue eyes, but he was surprised to see how rattled Robert was. At first Fong assumed that Robert was angry because the police officer planted a tiny metallic bug behind the driver’s side outside mirror of the rental car, then he realized that Robert had not noticed. Fong wasn’t upset by this, in fact he thought of it as a potential weapon – a way to lead the trackers rather than be followed by them.

“Can I . . .”

“Drive? No. You don’t have a driver’s licence, Fong, and even if you did, I didn’t put you on the rental agreement. So even if I wanted you to drive, which I don’t – you can’t.”

“I don’t want to drive, Robert.”

“Good.”

“Ah . . .” Fong said, although he wasn’t exactly sure what he was “ahing” about.

“Where to, Fong?”

“Let me out here. Go to your hotel and arrange to meet your contact – the good one. While you’re at it, at least get in touch with the oddball. Who knows when we might need his oddness. Let’s at least gather together the weapons we have. Contact me tomorrow and we’ll compare notes. We have at least forty-eight hours before anything really happens.”

“Why’s that?”

“The blood shipment isn’t due to arrive in port for at least two more days.” He didn’t bother mentioning the other “little surprises” he’d put in place in Shanghai before he left.

“And what are you going to do til then, Fong?”

“Understand Vancouver.”

“How do you plan to understand Vancouver in two days, Fong?”

“By walking and talking and following my instincts. Places have essences, Robert, that are not that difficult to sense when you are an outsider. Foreigners can often tell me things about Shanghai that I didn’t know, despite the fact that I’ve lived there my whole life. Outsider’s eyes are not tainted by preconception.”

“Fair enough. How do I get hold of you?”

“You have my cell-phone number.”

“It’s a Chinese local number, Fong.”

“You can afford the long-distance charges, Robert. Go to your hotel, meet your old teacher and see who he can introduce you to who might introduce you to someone who might introduce you to someone, etc., etc.”

“Very funny, Fong. Where will you be?”

“It’s better that you don’t know that, Robert. Call me to tell me where to meet. We’ll have dinner together tomorrow.”

Fong got out of the car and Robert pulled away from the curb. Fong noted the broken taillight. The splay lines of the glass suggested it had been hit with a hammer. Hardly an accident. So they were ready for them even before they landed in Vancouver. Fine. He was ready too.

He put his hand up to hail the cab coming up the road and got in. “Where to, boss?” asked the cabbie – who just happened to be the angry young man who had been with his father and grandfather in Fong’s hotel room in Calgary.

“It’s your town – you pick.”

“Are your people in place?” Fong asked.

“The timeline you gave me was tight but, yes, we managed it,” replied the young man as he swung the cab out into traffic.

“And your father doesn’t know?”

The man didn’t answer.

“Stop the cab and let me out,” Fong demanded.

The young man continued to drive. He swung the cab west and headed parallel to the city centre which could now be clearly seen out of the right side of the cab. Finally the young man spoke, “No, my father doesn’t know, Inspector. But are you sure about him?”

“I’m sorry but, yes, I’m sure that your father is at least peripherally involved in this. He sits on the board of an investment company that has heavy stock positions in the International Exchange Institute’s holding company.” It had taken Kenneth Lo a long time to explain this idea to him. “Now answer my question.”

“Yes. I mean my father doesn’t know. He thinks we are out gathering information to bring to the Chinese government for them to use as leverage to get the Canadian government to apologize.”

Fong studied the young man’s face in the rearview mirror. Finally he said, “Why are you doing this. . . I’m sorry, but I don’t know your given name?”