Master of Rain

by Tom Bradby

  Field watched the uniformed officers around him writing the number down in their books.

  “We’ve also got a kidnapping this morning. Bubbling Well Road, next to the Italian consulate. Young boy, about eleven, dark hair. Father’s quite high up in Fraser’s. Chinese, obviously. Not sure why they’ve reported it. I’m sure they’ll pay up in the end. No message in the paper yet, but probably the Green Gang again. There’s a picture of the boy pinned to the back wall there, so take a look at it on the way out. Now . . . there was a Russian girl murdered yesterday in the Happy Times block on Foochow Road.” Captain Smith was smiling as he said this and there was a jeer from the men. Sorenson whistled at the back. “I give you Detective Caprisi.”

  Caprisi got up and walked to the front as the men continued to cheer and whistle. He wasn’t smiling when he turned and faced them.

  “The Russian girl’s name,” Caprisi said, having waited for them to stop, “was Lena Orlov. She was tied up, stabbed almost twenty times. There does not appear to have been a sexual assault.”

  “He couldn’t get the handcuffs undone,” Sorenson said. There was a guffaw of laughter.

  Caprisi ignored it. “Has anyone ever heard of anything similar . . . not murder, but violence against Russian girls . . .”

  “I’ve got a thousand,” Sorenson said. “A thousand cases.”

  “I’ve got two,” someone else added, and there was another guffaw of laughter.

  “The flats belong to Lu,” Caprisi said, his mood souring further. “So do the women in it. The doorman was taken away and executed yesterday, and everyone else in the neighborhood claims not to have seen a thing.”

  Field noticed that Maretsky had come in and was leaning against the back wall, also scowling. Field assumed he’d heard the laughter.

  “Chen and I are dealing with any direct leads,” Caprisi went on. “Along with Richard Field from S.1. But we want to hear about anyone who could give us a sense of this falling into a pattern.”

  “I’ll raise you two thousand,” Sorenson said. “Two thousand Russian tarts being slapped about . . . two thousand cases . . . no, three thousand . . .” There was more laughter, and Field watched Maretsky turn and walk out, his face a picture of disgust.

  “Try not to be an Ohio boy all your life, Sorenson,” Caprisi said easily as he thrust his hands in his pockets and walked back from the lectern.

  “That’s it,” Smith said. Chairs and desks scraped across the floor as everyone got to their feet and began talking. Sorenson stood and picked up his jacket and helmet. He hadn’t shaved this morning, his short hair and bullet head making him look like a convict. “You’ve never used handcuffs?” he asked Caprisi.

  “Sure, Caprisi was fucking her,” Prokopieff said, standing up next to Sorenson. “Little Russian girl, little bit of pain . . .”

  “You should keep a hold of the keys, old man,” Sorenson taunted.

  “I was fucking her, too, of course,” Prokopieff went on. “She danced at the Majestic, right? The spoiled little princess screamed.”

  Caprisi stood still, his head tilted to one side, staring at the floor. Prokopieff took a step closer, towering over the American. He was a huge man, with the body of a wrestler, short, spiky hair, and a bulbous nose above big lips.

  “Back off, Prokopieff,” Field said quietly.

  The Russian turned to stare at him. “Ah, the new boy.” Everyone was looking at Field now. “You couldn’t even find your dick in a storm, or maybe . . . I see now . . . Good for you, Caprisi, just like Slugger, just like old—”

  Caprisi launched himself into Prokopieff’s stomach, so that the Russian was caught off guard and spun back over a desk, smashing into the officers who’d gathered behind him. Field took a step forward, saw Sorenson turn, and watched the punch coming. He ducked easily and struck him with a powerful left on the side of the jaw, so that he fell onto Prokopieff.

  “Enough!” Granger shoved the men aside and yanked Sorenson roughly to his feet. “You should know fucking better. All of you. Get up, Prokopieff.” He waited as the Russian got up and dusted himself down, glowering at both of them. Field wondered if Granger would discipline them, but he said simply, “As if there isn’t enough trouble out there.” He turned and pushed Caprisi out of the door, glancing at Field and indicating that he should follow. The two of them walked past the desk sergeant and climbed the stairs beside the lift, not stopping until they had almost reached Crime on the third floor.

  Caprisi bent over, as if trying to catch his breath. “Give me a minute, would you?” he asked. “In fact, make that an hour.”

  “Sure.”

  The American straightened and looked out of the small, slitted window at the smoke drifting across the rooftops. “I’ll be in here if you need me.”

  Field took out his cigarettes and offered Caprisi one, but the American shook his head. “What did Prokopieff mean?” Field asked. “About Slugger.”

  “Forget it, Field.”

  “Sure.” He took a pace back. “I’ll . . . I’ll meet you in an hour.” Field turned away and began to climb the stairs.

  “Dick.”

  Field stopped.

  “Where did you learn to punch like that?”

  “My father taught me.”

  “Thanks.”

  “It’s hard,” Field said, “not knowing . . .”

  “You don’t understand, do you?”

  “Understand what?”

  Caprisi shook his head, bemused. “You really don’t know?”

  “Know what?”

  “We’ll get there, Field.” Caprisi raised his hand and walked away. He was smiling.

  Nine

  Field didn’t want to go into the Special Branch offices to face Prokopieff’s hostility and Granger’s wrath, so he went on up to the sixth floor. It was dark up here. The door at the end of the corridor was blue, with paint peeling around a small pane of frosted glass. Field knocked once and then entered without bothering to wait for an answer. He dropped his cigarette and felt the heat as he stubbed it out under the sole of his shoe.

  Maretsky was seated at his desk. He was reading the newspaper with his back to the door, his feet not touching the ground.

  “I thought I might find you here,” Field said. Maretsky did not reply, turning back to his newspaper.

  It was a tiny room, the desk occupying most of it. Field had to step to the left and shut the door before he had anywhere to stand. There was a bookcase behind him, full of newspapers, and the wall opposite was covered with yellowing clippings in fading newsprint pinned to a corkboard. Every one of them referred to Lu Huang.

  “There was a fight after you left,” Field said.

  “Sorenson is an animal.” Maretsky did not raise his eyes from the newspaper. Field leaned back, crossing his legs. The article in the center of the corkboard opposite had a picture of a smiling Lu underneath the headline “Another Generous Donation to Sisters of Mercy Orphanage.”

  Maretsky swung around, looking at Field over the top of his glasses. He followed Field’s gaze to the clippings on the wall. “Sometimes he prefers them younger.”

  Field stared at him.

  “Eleven or twelve.”

  “From that orphanage?”

  Maretsky shrugged. “From wherever takes his fancy and whoever is willing to be bought, which means most people in this city.”

  “The donations are for procuring . . .”

  “Oh, I don’t know the specifics of individual donations, but it’s a nice irony, don’t you think?”

  Field shook his head slowly. “No.”

  “I usually deal with visitors in the registry.”

  “I know.”

  “Then do me the courtesy of calling when you wish to see me.”

  “I need to keep out of the office until tempers cool.”

  “Well, this is not a rest room.”

  “Who was Slugger?”

  Maretsky frowned. “Slugger?”

  “Prokopieff taunted
Caprisi by referring to a Slugger . . .”

  “Slugger Davis. Alan Davis. A detective from London. Caprisi’s partner until the end of last year.”

  “What happened to him?”

  Maretsky turned back to the newspaper. “Ask Caprisi.”

  “He won’t say.”

  “Then I won’t, either.”

  “I think I should know if I’m working with him.”

  “You think you are.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Maretsky frowned. “What do you want, Field?”

  “Can I smoke in here?”

  “No you can’t.”

  Field crossed his arms. “Why did you walk out of the briefing?”

  “Don’t you have work to do?”

  “You know I’m on the Orlov case.”

  “The Orlove case,” Maretsky said, raising his eyebrows. “I see. When is it a case, not an incident, I wonder?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “A little Russian princess. A whore. Bit of a playful end. Why would anyone care about that?” He looked at Field, his piggy eyes burning with angry intensity. “You care about it, Field, why is that?”

  “She was murdered.”

  “She was a Russian prostitute.”

  “So it doesn’t matter?”

  Maretsky hesitated. “Is that a philosophical question or a practical one?”

  “It’s just about doing a job . . .”

  “Oh, is it? Of course. How foolish of me.” He turned back to his desk. “We work within our limitations here, Mr. Field, and if you haven’t learned that, you soon will.”

  “You mean you do.”

  “I mean I do, yes. I can see you’re not a member of the club, but a bright young man . . .” He smiled. “It won’t last, so I wouldn’t worry about it.”

  Field tried not to betray his confusion. “Tell me about this case, Maretsky.”

  “You’re the detective.”

  “So Lu can do whatever he likes?”

  Maretsky faced him again. “Please, I have work to do.”

  “Tell me about him.”

  “You really don’t understand, do you?”

  “Don’t patronize me.”

  “Don’t patronize you?” Maretsky sighed deeply. “All right, I’m sorry, I’m just not used to idealism.” He breathed out again. “Or perhaps I should say ignorance. You seem to be . . . energetic, but what will happen if you pursue this case with any vigor is that you will make a certain amount of headway and then you won’t get any further. If you get somewhere close to the truth, it will become very dangerous for you. As to evidence, forget it. Witnesses will be too frightened to speak, and will be eliminated if they are foolish enough to do so.” He rolled his eyes. “This is Lu’s girl. He killed her himself, or gave her to someone else for the purpose—it doesn’t much matter.”

  “But we can still establish the truth, can’t we? Or do you consider that naive, too? We can still determine whether the murder was carried out by Lu himself, and if not, who it is he is protecting and why.”

  Maretsky didn’t answer.

  “Will he do it again?”

  “Probably.”

  “Has he done it before?”

  Maretsky hesitated. “Possibly. I can’t be sure. We have no record of anything like . . . specifically like this, and the French say they have none . . . but . . .”

  Field could tell that, despite himself, Maretsky was interested. “But what?”

  He shrugged. “There is a confidence to it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Maretsky was silent. “It’s a developed fantasy,” he said.

  “You mean he’s done similar things before?”

  “I mean there is a history leading up to this. You would have a pattern of violence against women. To begin with, beating, sexually abusing . . . the abuse becomes steadily more violent. Then, one day, it gets out of hand and he actually kills a girl. He enjoys it. So now he goes about achieving the same satisfaction with greater confidence. He knows what he wants. The kind of attire he likes, tied up, under control.”

  “So there might be a pattern?”

  “There is a pattern. One might be able to find it.”

  “And now it will accelerate?”

  “I would say he has done this before. It will certainly continue now, and it might accelerate.”

  “Other girls in Lu’s possession?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “So we do nothing?”

  Maretsky shrugged.

  “So you won’t help me?”

  “I wish you good luck.”

  “Tell me about Lu.”

  “What about him?”

  “He’s your private obsession.” Field looked at the clippings on the wall.

  “Only in an academic sense.”

  “Then tell me about him in an academic way. Whatever has happened, he is at the center of it.”

  Maretsky closed his newspaper. He took off his glasses and placed them carefully on the desk. “There are many files,” he said quietly.

  “And most of them are not in the system.”

  Maretsky stared at his hands for a long time.

  “Lu is restless. In ten years he has accrued to himself absolute power. You won’t believe me, of course, won’t accept the true nature of the word ‘absolute,’ or the influence I ascribe to him. Only those who know the city completely do. But it is true nevertheless. However, his power is never enough. Never. There is always someone not quite under control . . . something that is irritating, like a fly.”

  Field wiped away the sweat that had gathered on his forehead. “Money? In the French Concession, I mean. He’s bribing people. Is that it?”

  Maretsky smiled. “In the French Concession. Oh yes. Don’t they say every man has his price?” He straightened. “It’s true, of course. Every man does have his price.”

  “So he buys people.”

  “You misunderstand me. Every man has his price, but that does not mean every man can be bought.”

  “Try to be less obtuse.”

  “You’re an intelligent man, Mr. Field.” He nodded. “I can appreciate that, though perhaps not why you ended up here. I don’t doubt you are flushed with idealism and an optimistic and perhaps even opportunistic sense of the possible.”

  “So it’s not always about money? He finds other ways of controlling people. Blackmail?”

  “It is not always money. He likes the feeling of absolute control and has developed a taste for more, shall we say, persuasive measures. He is a gangster, a nobody from nowhere who had terrible bad luck as a child in a country where bad luck usually means destitution and death. He survived. With a cunning and ruthlessness and skill we can only imagine, he has dragged himself up through the underbelly of this city to a position he could never have dreamed would ever be his. He has power and money beyond the imagination of most Chinese, let alone those who began life in such desperate circumstances. His position is an obsession. He will leave nothing to chance and do anything to protect it. He has systematically set out to buy everyone and everything in this city so that he can never go back to the world he has fought so hard to get away from. The fear of a return to poverty keeps him awake at night, still. In this city it is the survival of the fittest, and believe me, he has done everything in his power to ensure no one can touch him. He is unassailable. If he is behind these murders, then you cannot win and you may as well not try.”

  “So what other measures does he use?”

  Maretsky frowned, as if frustrated that his message was not getting through. “Ask Caprisi to tell you about Slugger, Field.” Maretsky shook his head. “But why do you, a bright ambitious young man with the right social connections—or so I have heard—why do you care about a poor Russian princess who fell by the wayside?”

  Field straightened. He felt his face reddening.