by M J Lee
Cartwright glanced up at the clock on the green wall of the room. Nearly five-thirty, time for his evening pick-me-up at Coco’s. ‘Anything else?’ he asked.
The interpreter spoke once again. The Giant shrugged his broad shoulders and shook his head.
‘It seems that’s it,’ said the interpreter.
‘OK, thank him for visiting the station today. You know, the usual polite rubbish you people enjoy hearing from each other.’ Cartwright started to get up when the Giant started speaking once more, this time holding his right hand out, palm upwards.
‘He says he wants five dollars,’ said the interpreter.
‘What?’
‘Five dollars. The reward that was promised.’
‘Reward?’
‘For information. The policeman told all the boat people.’
‘I know nothing ’bout any reward. Tell him to come back later. You can get your chit from Sergeant Wolfe.’ Cartwright got up and rushed out of the room. God, he needed a drink.
The interpreter tried to explain about the reward. The Giant did not look a happy man.
***
The local police had closed off the park at all the entrances, but that hadn’t stopped a crowd of sightseers from gathering around the metal railings.
Inspector Danilov drew up in the black sedan driven by Strachan. They had gone back to the station after the interview with the doctor, only to be greeted by the news of the discovery of another body.
‘Afternoon, sir, we’ve closed the gates and sealed off the park.’
‘Well done, Sergeant. Who found the body?’
The sergeant pointed at the plump, well-fed Ah Yi, sitting on a bench just inside the gates. She was shouting and crying to the police in loud Shanghainese. Her young charge sat quietly in his pram, enjoying all the activity going on around him.
‘I have to go home. I’m late. The family will be worried, his parents will sack me,’ she wailed.
‘Stra-chan, interview this woman quickly, then get her a police escort home before she wakes the dead. I’ll deal with the body.’
‘Yes, sir.’ Strachan moved quickly to the woman’s side, kneeling down next to her and touching her softly on her arm. ‘Is this your child?’ he said quietly in Shanghainese. The woman stopped crying and nodded. ‘He’s well behaved. You’ve taught him well.’ She nodded again. ‘We mustn’t get him worried though.’ Again his arm touched hers lightly.
‘No,’ she answered.
‘Just tell me what you saw and then we’ll drive you and the boy home.’ He tickled the boy under his chin. The young child responded with a large smile, his eyes vanishing into the fleshy cheeks.
In between gasps for breath, she began to talk, Strachan encouraging her with little nods of the head.
Danilov scanned the park. It was caught in that wonderful time between winter and summer, the buds beginning to show on the trees and signs of life bursting through the brown earth. It was a time he loved in Minsk, when the crocuses were pushing through the hard ground, little fingers of green with blue highlights, thrusting themselves into the world.
Over to his left, an English lawn stretched to a wooden bandstand. Its wooden stage lay empty and forlorn, just memories of hot summer nights and waltz music to keep it warm in winter.
The crowd behind him, four or five deep in some places, had gone silent, straining to hear the testimony of the Ah Yi as she talked to Strachan.
Another crowd, another public spectacle.
Danilov lifted his nose to the breeze. There it was again, the lilting scent of incense in the air. Again, he was taken back to a church in Minsk, walking down the aisle with his new bride-to-be, the chants of the monks a counterpoint to the echoes of his footsteps, a priest in ornate golden robes and white flowing beard waiting for them at the altar.
He turned around quickly and scanned the faces of the crowd behind the iron railings. Young and old, round and gaunt, short and tall, European and Chinese, they all stared at the plump Ah Yi giving her statement.
And there he was. The hawker with his cauldron of charcoal and sweet potatoes, reaching for his paddle and stirring the white embers in the base. The aroma of incense wafted through the air again.
The sergeant touched Danilov’s arm. ‘It’s this way, sir.’ He led him down a narrow path, past a magnolia tree in full blossom, round a corner and there she was.
‘Please wait here, Sergeant.’
She was lying on a park bench dressed in a light pink camisole, a vivid splash of red glistening on her chest. Her hands were neatly crossed in front of her and her eyes were open.
Blue eyes. Cornflower-blue eyes. The same as Henry Sellars. They had a peculiar lack of life in them, like glass eyes lying on a tray in an ophthalmologist’s shop.
He moved closer. He could see red lines scarring her arms and legs. Sharp, slicing cuts that contrasted with the great red gash that used to be her throat. But something seemed wrong to him. She wasn’t as posed as Henry Sellars had been.
He walked back to the sergeant. ‘Has anybody touched the body?’
The sergeant looked down. ‘I’m sorry, sir, one of the lads touched her face to see if she was dead. I’m afraid she fell over onto her side. We didn’t want to move her.’
Danilov lifted his hat and ran his fingers through his hair. Would they never learn? Well, the damage was done now. ‘Please inform Dr Fang that another body will be coming to the morgue today. If he could look at it as soon as possible…’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And ask Detective Constable Stra-chan to join me as soon as he has finished.’
‘Yes, sir.’
The sergeant marched back towards the gates. Danilov scanned the park again. A pretty place, quiet but open. There would be people here at all times of the day. Why take the risk to be seen? And why were the bodies displayed so openly? What message was the killer trying to send?
Perhaps that wasn’t the right question. ‘Ask the right questions and they will eventually lead you to the solution.’ He remembered his training from the Imperial Police Academy, Muller, the old instructor, always intoning, ‘To find the right answer, look for the right question,’ in his German accent.
He had not asked the right questions yet.
A cough announced someone was behind him. ‘What is it?’
Strachan stepped forward. ‘The woman found the body at 4.30 pm, sir. She had just come to the park with her child for a stroll before dinner. The boy ran away from her. She chased after him and thought he was talking to a woman on the bench. It was only as she got close that she realised the woman was dead.’ Strachan glanced down at the body lying on the bench. ‘Strange though, she said the woman was sitting upright. She was clear about that. She said it was just like the woman was taking a tea break on the bench.’
‘Hmmm, nobody else reported seeing her?’
‘Nobody so far. The local police cleared the park so we don’t know who was here when she was found.’
‘Ask around, will you? Perhaps they are still watching from over there.’ He pointed towards the crowd of sightseers, which had almost doubled in size now, new watchers attracted like ants to a cube of sugar. ‘Stra-chan, get statements from the local coppers who arrived on the scene. They may have noticed something.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Danilov looked down at the body once more. A strand of blonde hair hung down over her forehead, framing one of the cornflower-blue eyes. A pretty woman, he thought, vivacious.
‘Who took your life?’ he asked out loud to the corpse.
A sudden breeze whistled through the trees, blowing Danilov’s hat off his head and past the bench with its cold body. The hat rolled on, pushed by the breeze, across the lawn towards the bandstand.
Danilov stood there and watched it go.
Chapter 11
‘How was your day?’
‘Just the same. Busy. Bureaucratic. Corrupt. Nothing new. Did you see Elsie?’
Richard put down hi
s drink. He stared up at the carvings of laurel leaves, acorns and cherubs that adorned the ceiling of the Shanghai Club and decided to come straight out with it. ‘She’s gone away with another man.’
‘Impossible. I don’t believe it. She couldn’t…she wouldn’t.’
‘I’m afraid it’s true. I went to the theatre. They said she didn’t turn up for work last night. I also went to her home. Her flatmate said she had gone away.’ He paused for a moment and thought about what he was going to say. ‘It appears I wasn’t the only one.’
‘Rubbish,’ Alfred shouted loudly. Two of the other members turned and stared at them. He lowered his voice. ‘It can’t be true. Not Elsie. I don’t believe it.’
‘She left all her clothes behind. Took nothing.’
‘Elsie wouldn’t have gone without talking to you. She wasn’t that sort…’
‘And what sort was that?’ asked Richard.
Alfred had the sense to remain quiet.
‘It does seem strange, her vanishing like that.’ Richard finished his Scotch and water. ‘Not like her at all.’
‘Listen. She wouldn’t just go off. Something must have happened to her.’
‘Like what?’
‘I don’t know. A lot of kidnappings lately.’
‘But Elsie hasn’t got any money. And there’s been no ransom note.’
‘Not that sort of kidnapping. One reads about it all the time. Pretty girl. Kidnapped. Taken to some foreign mansion. Held against her will. You know the sort of stuff I’m talking about.’
‘But that’s just the stuff for the yellow press like the Daily Mail. It doesn’t really happen.’
‘There is a word for it, isn’t there? Shanghaied.’
‘I thought that was just for sailors.’
Alfred shrugged his shoulders. ‘It doesn’t feel right to me. She wouldn’t just go off.’
‘I think you’re right. If I haven’t heard from her by tomorrow morning, I’ll go to the police. They’ll know what to do.’
‘Do it. You never know what could have happened to her.’
Richard checked his watch. ‘No point in hanging round here. Can I give you a lift anywhere?’
‘Let’s go to the Lido.’
He got up and nodded to the waiter, who went behind the bar and brought Richard the chit to sign. ‘Last night, I was going to ask her to marry me and now she’s vanished.’
Alfred guided his friend out of the Long Bar to the door of the club. A doorman leant to one side, pulling open the imposing double doors. The car was already waiting with its engine running.
‘I can’t believe there was anybody else in Elsie’s life. I know there was only me.’
Richard threw his cigarette into the gutter. As he did so a copy of the North China Daily News drifted alone the road, blown by the wind. In big, bold, black letters, the headline on the cover read:
ANOTHER BODY FOUND
Beneath it, in smaller type, a subhead made it plain to all but the most stupid reader.
THE CHARACTER KILLER STRIKES
Chapter 12
Inspector Danilov and Detective Constable Strachan were sitting alone in the detectives’ room at Central Police Station. A solitary lamp burned above Danilov’s desk. A clock ticked loudly on the wall. Smoke hung in the air, its white trail caught in the light like a silk shroud.
Danilov was slouched in his chair saying nothing.
Strachan was sitting opposite him, tapping his fingers on the table.
The rest of the night shift had been called out to a stabbing on the Bund near Chu Pao Street. An American marine had taken a strong dislike to a British squaddie over a game of darts and knifed him between the ribs. .Just another quiet night in Blood Alley.
‘Another killing, sir.’ Strachan was just trying to make conversation with his boss who had spent the last half hour just sitting there, rolling his pungent cigarettes.
‘An acute observation, Stra-chan.’
‘Sorry, sir, you were lost in thought, I just thought…’
‘You just thought you would disturb me?’
‘No, sir.’
‘You will learn, Detective Stra-chan, that silence can be the most useful weapon in a policeman’s arsenal. Silence makes people feel uncomfortable. Just as you felt when you were sitting here with me.’
‘Yes, sir, I…’
Danilov held his hand out in front of his face and his finger came up to his lips. As he did so, he noticed a yellow note peeping out from under his desk blotter. He picked it up with the tips of his fingers. ‘A Lieutenant Masset called. Would like an update on the investigation? Miss Cavendish.’
She even signs it Miss Cavendish, thought Danilov. I wonder what her first name is. Something very English, I’m sure. Daphne. Dorothy. Daisy. Maybe all three.
But who had hidden the note? One of the children, Cartwright, Ford, or Tinkler. Would they never stop playing games? Their childishness was affecting his investigation. He would have to do something. ‘Masset is inquiring about our progress, Stra-chan. What shall I tell him?’
‘You could tell him there’s been another murder, sir.’
‘I’ll let him know tomorrow morning, I’m sure it’s not the news he wants to hear.’
Danilov then lapsed back into silence, staring at a brown mark on his desk. ‘It’s the same man,’ he said quietly. ‘The rope marks, the characters on the chest, the personal, close method of killing.’
‘The same man who killed Henry Sellars?’
‘No. The same man who killed Henry Sellars. And the magistrate. And the Russian prostitute. And the woman tonight.’
‘I think I understand, sir.’
‘What are the patterns?’ He looked across at Strachan. ‘What colour was the prostitute’s hair?’
Strachan reached for the files that had arrived from the French Garde Municipale that afternoon. He scanned down the form. ‘She was blonde too, sir.’
‘And the magistrate?’
He took the other file and scanned it too. ‘Châtain. I think that means chestnut, sir. Reddish-brown.’
Danilov was deflated. ‘It does, Stra-chan, your years studying French under Mademoiselle Lafarge were not wasted.’
‘Actually, I studied under a large Belgian monk called Georges who weighed 300 pounds and stank of beer. I think he brewed it himself.’
‘The Belgians make good beer. They don’t make good monks.’ Danilov thought again. ‘What about the eyes? Both our victims had a beautiful shade of cornflower blue. Most striking.’
‘The magistrate had hazel eyes, sir. “Yeux noisette” it says here. The Russian prostitute had green eyes.’
‘Stra-chan…’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘How much did you understand during our meeting with the French?’
‘Quite a lot, sir.’
‘You never let on.’
‘No, I thought it better not to reveal how much I understood. You never know when silence can come in handy.’
‘Silence is golden, Stra-chan.’
‘We have the same proverb in English, sir.’
‘I know. I was speaking English.’
‘Oh, I thought…’
‘Don’t think, Stra-chan, that’s my job. So the only link between the victims seems to be the characters carved on their chest and the rope that tied their wrists.’
‘That seems to be it, sir. But the characters have been different every time.’ Strachan checked his notebook. ‘“Vengeance” written on the magistrate. “Damnation” on the Russian prostitute. “Justice” on Henry Sellars. And “retribution” on our woman in the park. Not common characters, sir. Quite old-fashioned. The sort of language a Mandarin would use in the Imperial examinations, not your normal johnnie’s word at all. I had to look it up in the dictionary.’
‘Like Shakespeare or Chaucer?’
‘Exactly, sir, except a Chinese version.’ Strachan thought for a moment. ‘I know somebody who could help us. My mother’s eldest uncle, Chang.
He sat the Imperial examinations in 1910.’
‘Not the best time to be a Mandarin.’
‘Took him fifteen years of study and he finally passes them just as the Empire begins to crumble. Not much use for a Mandarin in a republic.’
‘How can he help?’
‘I don’t know, sir, but as you said, we’re missing something. He may be able to give us a new angle.’
‘And what about the scratches on the bottom of the lid?’
‘HATE ALL. The words of a madman, if you ask me.’
‘Luckily, I wasn’t asking you. But they are frightening words, Stra-chan. It seems our killer has no love for the human race.’
‘Do you want me to check the local asylums, sir? See if anybody has been released lately?’
Danilov became much more active, stubbing his cigarette out in the ashtray. ‘Not yet. I think there is a logic in their madness. We just haven’t seen it yet. But you can set up a meeting with your uncle. I think we have to learn more about these written characters.’ He stood up in front of his desk. ‘Did you find out anything about the church? The Children of God, I think it was called.’
‘I’ve got an address, sir. It’s across the creek in Hongkew.’
‘Meaker’s territory.’
‘Shall I tell him we’re coming, sir?’
Danilov took out his tobacco pouch and began rolling another cigarette. ‘No, don’t, he won’t want to get involved. The man’s a waste of oxygen. I worked with him once. Not a good partnership. We’ll pay it a visit tomorrow morning.’
‘I also checked the club, Paresis Hall, with the local coppers. Well known, it is. Somebody must have been paid off because it’s been going strong for a number of years. Attracts tour groups apparently. There to see the local “sights”.’
‘Hmmm, let’s visit there now. You don’t have anything else to do, do you?’
Strachan hadn’t eaten all day. A warm bowl of dumplings was waiting for him at home. As his mother always said, the one thing that was definitely Chinese about him was his stomach. ‘No, sir, nothing else to do.’