The Risk Agent

by Ridley Pearson

  “This is acceptable,” she said in Shanghainese.

  “The first forty-eight hours are critical in a kidnapping. No need to tell you that.”

  “No.”

  He glanced at his TAG Heuer knock-off out of habit. “We’re well past that already. Sarge…Dulwich to you…is convinced Danny’s presence is a game changer.”

  “Yes.”

  “That they’ll kill him, maybe both of them, because he’s American.”

  “Not if we kill them first,” she said.

  He hesitated. It didn’t sound right coming from her mouth.

  “Agreed,” he said.

  “And as to logistics. How we move, when we move. I will handle.”

  He opened his mouth to challenge that when she said:

  “This is my city, Mr. Knox. Do not forget it.”

  6

  7:00 P.M.

  SHANGHAI

  Allan Marquardt waited behind his desk for the People’s Armed Police officer to say something. Instead, the man seemed to be trying to make a point by looking out at the Xuan Tower as the work there continued through the night, illuminated by massive floodlights. The scaffolding crawled with ants-though Marquardt knew it was far fewer ants than the day before, a troubling development.

  This meeting had been arranged abruptly, interrupting Marquardt’s Saturday evening at the Shanghai Grand Theater. No great loss. He still had calls to place to headquarters in Boston and an engineering firm in San Francisco. It promised to be a long night.

  But one did not turn down a meeting requested by the People’s Armed Police. He thought of them as the Gestapo of China. Marquardt was well familiar with the term “Iron Hand,” and now, looking at this man, understood it more fully. Inspector Shen Deshi was bigger than most Chinese by half, his face unreadable, eyes distant, like a man incapable of feeling. Marquardt had no intention of putting The Berthold Group on his bad side; he had trouble enough.

  Having been coached by Brian Primer over the phone on his way here, Marquardt braced himself for mention of the kidnapping, to show no reaction, to deny it, reminded the police wanted such a situation no more than The Berthold Group. If not provoked, the officer would more than likely skirt the issue, giving Marquardt openings but not pressing him to take them. Failure to address the crime would be held against him at a later date, but appreciated in the near term. The complexities of the interwoven social and professional etiquette involving the Chinese required him to rethink his replies. The vaguer, the better.

  “Any problems lately?” asked the inspector.

  There it was, teed up. Marquardt needed to show respect while demonstrating his understanding of proper etiquette. Speaking adequate, though American-accented, Mandarin, he said, “Shi shang wu nan shi, zhi pa you xin ren.” A Chinese proverb that literally translated: “You must persevere to accomplish seemingly impossible tasks.”

  “Yi ke lao shu shi huai le yi guo zhou,” Shen Deshi tested him.

  “Again, please? Slowly.”

  The inspector repeated his proverb. Marquardt managed to translate it, though searched for the true meaning. The Chinese language had many nuances.

  The man spoke passable English. “One mouse dropping ruins the whole pot of rice porridge.”

  “Thankfully, no mice around here,” Marquardt said.

  “Mice are everywhere.”

  “We guard against them.”

  “Have you? I am aware that there is some kind of documentary being filmed about your construction project.”

  Marquardt felt his tension release by a degree. Had he assumed incorrectly the inspector knew about the kidnapping?

  “Ah, yes. It’s a piece for our National Public Television in the States.”

  “You must enjoy dogs biting at your feet.”

  “We can tolerate it. We’re used to it, actually. A free press is something you learn to tolerate.”

  “In China, we have no tolerance for unauthorized investigation.”

  Marquardt said nothing. He found it an interesting choice of words.

  “Any problem with the film crew?”

  “To be honest, I have little to nothing to do with them. You would need to speak with our Director of Communication.”

  “I am speaking to you.”

  Prick. “My dealings with the film crew have been positive. Nice enough people. We screened the first episode, but I haven’t seen anything since. Why do you ask?”

  “Visas for foreign press are quite specific,” the inspector said. “This crew has approval to make film of Xuan Tower as well as your offices.” He hit the arms of the armchair. “Nowhere but this.”

  “If they’ve overstepped their bounds, I wouldn’t know. If you want to deport them, be my guest.” Marquardt tried to calculate where all this was leading. It was a Saturday night. An inspector with the People’s Armed Police was in his office. All this because of a visa violation? It didn’t add up. “We are only the subject of the film. This crew does not work for us. Has no affiliation with us. Is there something I should know?”

  “I believe you must be aware two of the cameramen have connections with World Life.”

  “The environmental group? Certainly not.”

  “Extremists. Militants,” Shen Deshi said. “If they do not work for you, then I trust that I can expect your cooperation in this matter.”

  “I-ah…first, Detective-”

  “Inspector.”

  “It must be understood that neither I nor anyone in this company has any knowledge of, nor control over, the visa status or operations of this freelance film crew.” Marquardt was tempted to call in their chief counsel.

  “I must account for each member of the film crew,” Shen Deshi said.

  “With all respect, sir, as I was saying-”

  “And it must be now. Tonight.”

  Marquardt felt his temper flare. “Listen here. Tonight is”-out of the question, he thought-“unlikely,” he said. “Our Director of Communication will be in by ten o’clock Monday morning.”

  “This is unacceptable,” the inspector said.

  “I repeat: The Berthold Group has no professional affiliation or business relationship with the filmmakers beyond an agreement to grant them access to our offices and construction site.”

  “You will please make contact with your communication direction tonight,” Shen Deshi said, misspeaking. Marquardt wasn’t about to correct him. “I wish to speak with the entire crew at once. Please,” he added as an afterthought.

  Prick on a stick! Barely able to control himself, Marquardt eked out, “Monday morning at ten o’clock.”

  Shen Deshi drew himself out of the chair heavily. He reached into his pocket, withdrew a leather wallet, and carefully passed his business card to Marquardt, both hands extended. Marquardt returned his card in similar fashion.

  “If you are able to help me in this matter,” Inspector Shen Deshi said gravely, “your present situation will continue to be overlooked. At least for the time being.”

  Marquardt swallowed dryly. Your present situation. The kidnapping.

  “We believe one of the cameramen is unaccounted for,” Shen Deshi said.

  A member of the American press had gone missing? Was this man hinting at his knowledge of the kidnapping, or could there have been another-a second-abduction? A journalist?

  Given what he now knew, Marquardt realized the man was on orders from the highest level of his government. The Chinese would want to get in front of the event before they lost face in the international community. Their unforgiving stance on foreign journalists was well documented. Not a pretty track record.

  Christ, there must be heads rolling. Marquardt’s next thought was whether he could leverage this to his advantage.

  His hand felt small in the other man’s as they said their goodbyes. But it was the determined, hardened look in his visitor’s eyes that stayed with Marquardt.

  This man will stop at nothing.

  SUNDAY

  Septembe
r 26

  5 days until the ransom

  7

  7:30 P.M.

  ZHABEI DISTRICT

  SHANGHAI

  “The realtor will meet us in thirty minutes,” Grace said, returning her iPhone to her purse.

  “I love Shanghai,” Knox said. “You make a call, on Sunday afternoon, no less, and you get a showing two hours later. Entrepreneurship at its best. In the U.S., we’ve become too complacent, too expectant of the good life. Here, everyone still earns it.” His one accomplishment of the day had been walking the crime scene: the backstreet warren from where Danner and Lu Hao had been abducted. Lu Hao had ridden into an ambush, though why he’d turned into the narrow-lane neighborhood in the first place remained unexplained.

  “You heard me, yes? Thirty minutes?”

  “Yep. You look appropriately slutty, I must say. I, on the other hand, could use a quick makeover.”

  Watch your mouth, John Knox.”

  “I mean it as a compliment. It’s part of the plan, right?”

  Grace was looking past him, across the street. “I spot two possible policemen,” she said.

  “The one working the trinket cart and the big guy inside the restaurant over there.”

  “Yes.”

  “I make the one with the cart as PSB. You?”

  “Certainly police of some kind. Yes. We have many such bureaus and ministries here in China.”

  “The other, I’m not so sure about.”

  “Private security, I think,” she said. “Would other foreign companies have an interest in Lu Hao? Of course they would.”

  “So maybe that’s it.”

  “I do not know,” she said, still sounding stiff. He was considering nicknaming her “Rosetta Stone.” “The realtor said she would meet us out front.”

  “You should hang all over me. You know? Like we’re shopping for a place to…you know. To carry out our torrid affair.”

  “Not a problem,” she said.

  “Seriously? Is it that easy for you?” He couldn’t imagine this woman acting sexy or slutty. He couldn’t wait.

  “Think of it this way: when I am not serious, I will let you know.”

  Together they found a shop and Knox bought some dress pants and a pressed shirt. He changed and added his worn clothes to hers in the bag she carried.

  “One thing I’m confused about,” he said, studying himself in the shop’s full-length mirror. “After all that education, why join the army instead of returning here and making serious money? And then, why Hong Kong?”

  “It is complicated,” she said.

  “We make the complication. It doesn’t make us.”

  “You may be good at whatever it is you do, Mr. Knox. But you are not much of a philosopher.”

  He narrowed his eyes.

  “Have I offended you?” she asked.

  “You would have to work harder than that,” he said.

  “Lu Hao has made much trouble for his family. Bad financial dealings. I extended the offer of employment to him in hope of assisting his situation-his family’s situation. The Berthold Group was paying him extremely well. Now, he is in trouble-”

  “Which reflects badly on you,” Knox said.

  She said nothing for several strides. “As I said: it is complicated.”

  Minutes later, they were on the sidewalk in front of Lu’s apartment building.

  A young, energetic Chinese woman approached them. She was in her mid-twenties, displaying unbridled enthusiasm and a lot of leg beneath a miniskirt. They introduced themselves. She two-handed them both her business card: SPACE-REAL ESTATE FOR TOMORROW.

  The apartment building’s lobby was clean and brightly lit.

  “All latest qualities,” the agent said, her English clipped and, at times, broken. “The high-speed Internet, the telephone and the highly technical security. Every residence have hot water and warming and colding of the environment.”

  They rode as a group to the fifth floor in the building’s only elevator. The name of the vacant apartment being offered was labeled in Mandarin beside the door: “Five Fawns.”

  Knox crossed the small living room and looked out the window to inspect the view. First he saw the man in the restaurant window; then, a complication: the trinket cart was heading toward the apartment building.

  Wondering if they’d been made, Knox considered aborting. Instead, he hoped to speed things up and get out of here.

  Grace surprised him with a squeal from the bedroom. “Lover!” she called out. “You must come here this instant!”

  Knox entered the apartment’s bedroom, a space barely wide enough for the double bed. Grace was bouncing on her knees on the mattress like a five-year-old.

  “So soft! You must try this!” she said, patting the mattress.

  Knox waited for the agent’s attention to return to Grace and he subtly tapped his watch. Grace’s head went up and down as she bounced: she’d caught his cue.

  “What do you think?” she asked. “You like it?”

  “It’s the view I’m concerned about, my little rose. We talked about this street being too noisy. Too busy.”

  Grace threw herself back onto the bed, drew her knees up into her chest and hummed her satisfaction. “Always so practical,” she said to Knox as she sat up. “Very well. You,” Grace said to the agent, “will please negotiate on our behalf. Street noise is too much. Requires fifteen percent deduction.”

  The real estate woman said, “I am quite certain price is firm.”

  Grace laughed derisively. There wasn’t a firm price in all of China. “Must I remind you: you represent both the landlord and our interests.”

  “Yes,” the agent said. “Of course.”

  Grace patted the mattress again. Knox did not sit.

  “The landlord is to install a mirror on the ceiling,” Grace said. “Bedroom lights must be on dimmers.” She reached over and took Knox by the hand. “Come on, Lover! Please, you must try.”

  Knox shot her a look.

  The agent pulled out a small notebook and took notes.

  “Flat-panel television,” Grace said, “one hundred centimeters. Reading lamps on both sides of the bed. No compact fluorescent. Makes your skin look yellow. Disgusting.”

  The agent continued writing.

  “Not that there is to be much reading,” Grace said, mooning at Knox. “Hmm?”

  Knox grinned. “Oh, you,” he said, pushing her shoulder so hard she fell back onto the mattress.

  “Ah! You want to play?”

  “Later,” Knox said in a suggestive tone.

  Grace faced the agent. “Landlord is to pay utility, of course,” she said. “Lover will pay for television cable channels.”

  Knox took Grace’s hand as she reached over for him.

  Grace glanced down at the floor demurely. “You will excuse my demands, cousin,” she said in Shanghainese, “but this man, and his opinion of me…my time with him, all very important.”

  “Of course.”

  Knox played it as if not understanding a word.

  “Now I will leave you two,” Grace said, “to review the mechanicals, and discuss numbers. Yes?” Grace asked rhetorically. “Yes.”

  “Don’t be long,” Knox pressed.

  “Cannot bear to be without you!” Grace said, popping up off the bed. She swished past the agent.

  “Your phone,” Knox said, making a point of handing her both the purse and bag containing their clothes. “I’ll text you when it’s time to leave.”

  The agent waved Knox toward the kitchen. “I believe you must be most impressed with features of the kitchen dining.”

  “Not really, cousin,” Grace called back on her way out the door. “It is not like we will be doing much cooking.”

  Minutes later, Grace arrived to the door marked “Seven Swans,” having passed “Seven Lakes” and “Seven Gorges” on her way from the elevator. She drew in a deep breath, and knocked. Seven was a neutral number, but she took it as an ominous sign. />
  She was greeted by a gangly young man in his early twenties. His T-shirt showed grease stains, his right index finger a smoker’s smudge.

  “Where is he?” Grace asked angrily in Shanghainese.

  She barged past the surprised young man, quickly taking in the three other boys reclining in front of a flat-panel television. Take-out wrappers, pizza boxes and Red Bull cans littered the low coffee table.

  “Tell me where he is!” she shouted, not liking the look of Lu’s living room. Clearly it served as a dormitory, housing the other men as well. The space was crowded with bamboo mats, pillows, blankets and IKEA furniture. Singling out Lu Hao’s belongings from the mess would be next to impossible without a great deal of time, not to mention privacy. She continued on to a closed door and threw it open.

  “Hiding in here?” she called out.

  Better. This room was neater. A single futon occupied the corner, alongside which were a low bedside table and a crane lamp. An IKEA desk, part of a matched set with the dressers in the living room. A smaller flat-panel television, with a game box, a DVD player and a cable box. Lu Hao’s room, she thought.

  A bamboo rod hung from wires screwed into the ceiling, holding laundered pants, shirts and two sport coats on plastic hangers. She pulled open the armoire to find it stacked with suitcases and packaging for all the electronics.

  A digital picture frame on the desk stopped her. A photo of Lu Jian came and went in the frame’s slide show, confirming her suspicion. Her chest cramped. Lu Jian looked somewhat older than she remembered him, but even more handsome, if that were possible. The same warm eyes. For a moment she couldn’t breathe.

  She sensed a presence behind her. Without turning, she asked, “Where is he?”

  “We haven’t seen him for a couple of days,” a roommate informed her.

  She wheeled and moved toward him. “Another girl?”

  “How should I know? He’s a big boy. He doesn’t need me looking after him. Maybe you should check his family home. It’s-”

  “Chongming Island. Yes, I know. Do you think I do not know Lu Hao? You child.”