“That’s so true,” X said in a subdued voice. “Consequently, people of our age are inclined to feel more and more nostalgic for the past. That’s also why people like these old stories so much. Not to mention that it was also a popular leitmotif in classic Chinese literature.”

  “A popular leitmotif?”

  “About girls from green houses falling in love with gallant heroes and brilliant scholars. These stories live in the Chinese collective unconscious, you might say. Like the legend of Red Sleeves from the Tang dynasty.”

  “What do you mean by ‘green houses’?” Zhang said.

  “Brothels or other infamous places. Another well-known example is Li Wa. Also from the Tang dynasty, she was a beautiful courtesan, just like Little Phoenix Fairy in social status, though Li Wa’s tale had a much happier ending.”

  “Whatever you say. I don’t really see the story’s relevance to today’s society.”

  “Nor do I,” X answered. “But why bother? It’s nothing but an old story for us to enjoy during the last ever evening talk.”

  The question-and-answer period was fairly short, Chen noted. It lasted only about five or six minutes.

  But it took quite a long while for him to listen closely to the full recording of the tragic romance X had told at the last evening talk in Red Dust Lane, and then listen to it once again.

  As Chen had suspected, all of Yan’s accusations had been nothing but the product of her evil imagination.

  X had talked cautiously in the lane over all these years, and particularly so during that “last evening talk.” It would not have made any sense for him to drop his guard all of a sudden.

  He had not said anything politically sensitive or subversive while narrating the romantic affair between General Cai and Little Phoenix Fairy, nor had he done so in the question-and-answer session that followed. He definitely had not said anything that Yan had accused him of in her report to the Party boss in the district’s office—not at all.

  It was probably not because X did not have the courage to do so in his narration. But for such a small audience, it would not be worthwhile for him to take the risk. Nor would he have wanted to expose those elderly people in the lane to any political troubles.

  Paradoxically as it might have appeared, to some extent, X seemed to have told the story more like a reader-response critic. He’d left it up to the audience to come up with their own personal responses and interpretations.

  In other words, X had left no opportunity whatsoever for someone to misinterpret his words—unless they were committing unthinking, faceless “banal evils,” like Yan.

  “What are you thinking about, Director Chen?”

  He saw Jin emerging from the kitchen, moving toward him with a hot platter in her hands.

  “I have just finished listening to the recording. Once again, it reminds me of a poem by W.B. Yeats. ‘The Second Coming.’ Sit with me here, Jin.” He patted the green sofa, signaling for her to sit beside him.

  Jin moved over to his side. Kicking off her slippers, she sat on the sofa with her bare feet under her as he started to recite the poem for her:

  Turning and turning in the widening gyre

  The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

  Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

  Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

  The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

  The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

  The best lack all conviction, while the worst

  Are full of passionate intensity.

  Surely some revelation is at hand;

  Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

  The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out

  When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi

  Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert

  A shape with lion body and the head of a man,

  A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,

  Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it

  Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.

  The darkness drops again; but now I know

  That twenty centuries of stony sleep

  Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,

  And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

  Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

  “Another modernist poem?” Jin asked, looking up at him in surprise.

  “It strikes me as if Yeats had written the poem for today’s China. What a horrible picture of the wasteland! Especially the ending of the poem. Yeats said he composed the last two lines with the then-emerging Fascists in mind:

  And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

  Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”

  “Take a short break, my poetic boss. Have a piece of the brown-sugared sticky rice cake first. It’s hot, just out of the wok. I’ve heard brown-sugared sticky rice cakes taste best when you bite into them steaming hot.”

  Taking a small bite out of the golden-fried rice cake, he exclaimed, “That’s the taste, and the texture, I remember from my childhood. You are simply marvelous, Jin!”

  “I only bought them for you and heated them up.”

  “I still remember vividly that I came back home from Beijing Foreign Language University one year on the eve of Chinese New Year. For the celebration and the Gala TV program, my mother made brown-sugared sticky rice cakes. This is the very same taste and texture. For some reason, she never made them again.”

  “It’s because these special sticky rice cakes have disappeared from the market, I think. Too low a profit margin, I bet. But I’m glad you like them.”

  “I like them so much,” Chen said, taking another bite of the cake, and added apologetically, “but you may have to run another errand for me, I’m afraid.”

  “Whatever you want me to do, Director Chen. Tell me.”

  “Make a copy of the recording and deliver it to Mei as soon as possible. Tell her to give it to someone above her—someone in a position to help her out regarding X’s case.

  “It’s the evidence she needs that the report submitted by Yan, the head of the Red Dust Neighborhood, was nothing but an out-and-out lie. X said nothing politically sensitive or subversive during the last evening talk. Not at all. Nothing that would warrant his sudden disappearance.”

  “Yes, that’s important! I’ll go to see her right now,” she said, jumping up off the sofa. Her feet were still bare, her red-painted toenails shining like rose petals in the afternoon light.

  Before she headed to the door, she turned to feed another piece of sticky brown-sugar rice cake into Chen’s mouth with a toothpick.

  At the door, she pulled on her shoes, looked over her shoulder, and said with a giggle, “But don’t overeat. You have such a sweet tooth. Your blood sugar level is borderline!”

  She scampered out, still acting like a young college student who’d just been assigned to his office.

  Jin’s mission was of vital importance, but Chen knew that he, too, had something urgent at hand.

  He took his seat at the desk and started writing an email to Hou Guohua, who had worked with him on a serial murder case during the Covid pandemic. At that time, Hou was Deputy Chief of Staff of the Shanghai Government.

  Nowadays, the word “deputy” had been taken away from Hou’s official title in the city government.

  During the course of the serial murder investigation in the Covid days, Hou had struck Chen as something of a “sophisticated egoist,” but one not totally without a moral compass. In other words, for all his politically correct posturing and bluster, Chen suspected that he knew better in his heart. And Hou had cooperated with Chen the best he possibly could during the investigation, his attitude full of respect for Chen.

  After the official pleasantries at the start of the email, Chen came straight to the point:

  I’m still on convalescent leave. I don’t know how long it may last, but I know I cannot simply stay idle at home. I thought I’d better do something, even while I’m on sick leave. So I have just done some preliminary research related to my office responsibilities.

  As far as I can see, one of thorniest issues our judicial reform office is dealing with at the moment concerns the fairness of the relocation compensation given to residents for urban redevelopment. I have often read about the issue. In the past, the compensation amount was determined by the developers concerned. If they obtained the correct official documents, whether by hook or by crook, those developers could then do whatever they wanted, riding roughshod over the original residents, leading to a lot of instability for the neighborhoods involved.

  Our Party government has recently introduced a number of new policies. Instead of the compensation sums being determined by the developers, they are now determined by the government—with a lot of the calculations behind the sums now more transparent. Still, things are changing so fast all around us. With the housing market suddenly plunged into crisis, the current compensation estimates appear not to be enough for some people. Remember Red Dust Lane—the lane where we carried out our investigation during the Covid pandemic? Because of its excellent location in the center of the city, the remaining lane residents believe they should be paid far more in compensation, and that remaining in their homes is the best way to keep the value of their properties high. They refuse to move. So, as you can tell, this problem is causing political instability.

  That’s why I am writing this email to you. With so many social disturbances nowadays, the problem deserves our serious attention. Can you look into it?

  It was an email written with an official tone, seemingly appropriate for a responsible Party cadre like Chen. Hou knew Chen was familiar with the lane, so it made sense for Chen himself to do this kind of research there, and to send such a message to him. The former Chief Inspector Chen knew for sure, however, that Hou was too busy to actually look into it as he was requesting.

  Chen’s real purpose in sending the email, however, was to prevent people in government from growing too suspicious of him—and of Jin—regarding their recent activities in the lane.

  About three hours later, Chen received a text message marked urgent from Jin: Mei received the file safely, and listened to it. She said that she was so grateful to you for all your help, and that she was going to contact someone high up in government about it immediately.

  But almost at the same time, another piece of news came out of the blue, totally galvanizing Chen.

  It was said that Four-eyed Zhang had fallen from the dark, steep staircase in Red Dust Lane and hit his head hard against the concrete landing. He was rushed to Renji Hospital, lying flat on a grocery tricycle.

  Chen rushed over to the hospital in a hurry.

  Zhang was lying in a deep coma in the ward there. Motionless, stiff, rigid. Chen bent over him, hardly able to feel Zhang’s cold, weak breath. He made no response at all to what Chen was saying, gesturing to him.

  An elderly doctor surnamed Wang came in, introduced himself, rubbed his hands, and said with a frown, “The situation is grave. The patient’s prognosis does not appear to be optimistic. Not at all. I believe it will be a matter of a day or two before he passes away. Even in the best-case scenario, he may never wake up from his coma. Considering his age, this would only give him a couple of weeks to live. With the hospital full of patients, we cannot continue treating someone like Zhang who has no hope of recovery.”

  “I understand, but Zhang is very important to me. Can you manage for just a bit longer?”

  “And any medical expenses have to be paid in advance,” Doctor Wang went on. “It’s the rule of our hospital, you know. There are no exceptions. So you are one of his relatives, right?”

  “Whatever medical expenses are not covered by his insurance, Doctor Wang, I’ll be responsible for them, relative or not.” Chen handed the doctor his business card printed with his official titles. “I’ll pay a hundred thousand yuan in advance. If it’s not enough, let me know. You don’t have to worry about it.”

  Chen knew only too well that all the hospitals in socialist China required payment in advance, or the patient would be driven out without receiving treatment.

  Doctor Wang studied Chen’s business card in silence before he said, “I think I have read about you before. You don’t have to worry about things here, Director Chen. We’ll look after Zhang until the end.”

  But another possibility suddenly occurred to Chen.

  Could foul play have been involved in Zhang’s sudden fall, tumbling down the steep staircase?

  If so, why?

  And who could have been the criminal aiming at a harmless old man like Zhang?

  A name jumped into his mind.

  Yan, the head of the Red Dust Lane neighborhood committee.

  A number of possible scenarios came crowding into his mind. Zhang’s accident could have been exactly as it appeared—an accident. The former Chief Inspector Chen could not rule out the possibility, however, that Zhang had been pushed down the dark staircase because of his involvement with Chen’s investigation.

  To Chen, it remained a plausible scenario that Yan, the head of the Red Dust Neighborhood Committee, had detected something suspicious taking place between Chen and Zhang. Those neighborhood committee officials could turn out to be like mobile surveillance cameras.

  Or human surveillance cameras, always on the go.

  In fact, Yan had implied as much in the report to her district Party boss. She had tried to pull out the fire from the bottom of the earthen oven, so to speak.

  It was possible that she was capable of committing murder—or attempting to do so—in order to prevent the discovery of her evil maneuvering, conspiring, plotting in the dark. After all, under the authoritarian CCP system, she could have moved much farther than committing acts of “banal evil.”

  “By the way,” Chen said to Doctor Wang, who was still standing beside him, “have you noticed any other wounds on Zhang’s body, Doctor Wang?”

  “What do you mean, Director Chen?”

  “It’s common for people of his age to fall, I know. But could it be possible that Zhang was pushed down the stairs? Alternatively, that somebody at the top of the stairs hit him hard from behind? I have been a chief inspector, so I can’t help considering the accident from that perspective. It’s in my nature to be suspicious.”

  “I see, Chief Inspector Chen. I haven’t examined the patient myself, but I give you my word—I will definitely double-check for you.”

  Dusk was gathering, and a black raven was cawing shrilly outside the hospital window.

  Something once said by a Han dynasty Confucian scholar flashed through Chen’s mind.

  “I did not kill you, but you died because of me.”

  He felt so responsible. There was still a possibility that Zhang might survive, and eventually recover, but he knew he was hoping against hope.

  And he was reaching the conclusion that this was another case that called for a serious criminal investigation on the part of the former Chief Inspector Chen.

  DAY 6

  “Mooring by the Maple Bridge at Night”

  Zhang Ji (active around 750)

  The moon setting, the crow cawing,

  the frost spreading out against the sky,

  the maple trees standing on the bank,

  the fisherman’s light moving

  across the river, who is there,

  worried even in sleep?

  By the Cold Mountain Temple

  outside of Gusu City,

  a sampan comes

  as the midnight bells ring.

  “Others’ Interpretation”

  Chen Cao

  Where do we live?

  In others’ interpretation—

  like a frame, where we find ourselves

  positioned against a walnut tree whispering

  in the wind, a butterfly soaring

  into the black eye of the sun.

  So you and I, too, have

  to frame ourselves, in the proper light

  and perspective, to be recognized

  as meaningful, as a woodpecker

  proves its existential value

  in the echoes of a dead trunk.

  Still, I am holding out to you

  the bouquet of words that may blossom

  in your smile, and then

  fade, like a sea star disappearing

  on a motel window sill, leaving

  water stains to others’ interpretation.

  Chen did not get up early the next morning. It had been a night full of broken dreams and fragmented thoughts, particularly of the disturbing image of a butterfly losing itself in darksome flowers, time and time again, just like the butterfly flitting in and out of that sentimental poem of Li Shangyin’s.

  What could the image of the butterfly signify—losing itself in the midst of darksome flowers?

  Was it about Zhang? His ominous foreboding about Zhang, lying in a deep coma at the hospital, had weighed heavily on his chest overnight.

  And the former chief inspector still had no idea how to start the brand-new “investigation.” Not at all.

  Confronting Yan in the open might not work for him. Not just because his hands were tied.

  It was also fairly common for an old man like Zhang to fall down a dark staircase by accident. In the final analysis, Chen was still in no position to rule out this possibility. He had to wait until he was told about the results of Doctor Wang’s “double-checking” …

  Would he have to tap Molong for help again, no matter how unwilling he found himself to do so? Chen decided to shelve this thought for the moment. Perhaps there was no hurry for him to do that.

  Coincidentally, a text message marked “extremely urgent” from Mei derailed his train of thought.

  “Xiaohui is being released from secret detention this morning! I am so happy for him. I’m going to pick him up right now. The car is waiting for me. I don’t know how I can thank you enough. You have literally saved both of us.”

  Mei did not have to say any more. She had pulled out all the stops through her high-level connections.