A Loyal Character Dancer - [Chief Inspector Chen Cao 02]

by Qiu Xiaolong

  “Oh, poor Comrade Chief Inspector Chen.”

  Their main course arrived. The food was excellent, the wine mellow, and his companion charming, Chen’s hangover almost vanished. The afternoon sunlight streamed through the window. A Russian folk song entitled “The Red Berry Blossom” played in the background.

  For a moment, he reflected that his assignment for the day was not that bad. He took another sip. Fragments of lines came to his mind.

  The sunlight burning gold,

  We cannot collect the day

  From the ancient garden

  Into an album of old,

  Let’s pick our play.

  Or time will not pardon —

  He was momentarily confused. These were not exactly his lines. Was he still drunk? Li Bai claimed that he wrote best when intoxicated. Chen had never experienced this.

  “What are you thinking about?” she said, carving into her fish.

  “Some lines. Not mine. Not all of them.”

  “Come on, you’re a well-known poet. The librarian in the Shanghai Library knows about you. How about reciting one of your poems?”

  “Well—” He felt tempted. Party Secretary Li had told him to keep her entertained. “Last year, I wrote a poem about Daifu, a modern Chinese poet. Remember the two lines on my folding fan?”

  “About whipping the horse and the beauty alike, right?” she said with a smile.

  “In the early forties, Daifu was caught in a tabloid typhoon over his divorce. He left for a Philippine island, where he started a new life, living anonymously. Like someone in your witness protection program. He changed his name, grew a big beard, opened a rice shop, and bought an ‘untouched’ native girl, about thirty years younger, who did not speak a single word of Chinese.”

  “Gauguin did something like that,” she said. “Sorry, please continue.”

  “It was during the war against Japan. The poet was involved in resistance activities. Allegedly he was killed by the Japanese. A myth has since evolved. Critics claim that he did everything— the girl, the rice shop, and his beard—as a cover for his anti-Japanese activities. My poem was a reaction to those claims. The first stanza is about the background. I’m skipping it. The second and third stanzas are about the poet’s life as a rice merchant in the company of the native girl.

  “A gigantic ledger opened him / in the morning, figures / moved him up and down / along a mahogany abacus / all day, until the curfew / closed him in her bare arms, / in a peaceful sack of darkness: / time was a handful of rice streaming out / through his fingers. A chewed betel nut / stuck on the counter. He quit / holding himself like a balloon / forsaken against a horizon blazing / with cigarette butts.

  “One midnight he awoke with the leaves / shivering, inexplicably, at the window. / She grasped at the mosquito net / in her sleep. A gold fish jumped out, / dancing furiously on the ground. / Wordless, a young woman’s capacity / for feeling jealousy and / the incorrigibly plural correspondence / of the world illuminated him. / It must have been another man, dead / long before, who had said: / ”The limits of his poetry / are the limits of his possibility.”

  “Is that all?” She gazed at him over the rim of her glass.

  “No, there’s one more stanza, but I cannot remember all the lines. It tells that years later, critics came like pilgrims to that native woman who, in her sixties, could bring nothing back, except the memory of Daifu making love to her.”

  “It’s so sad,” she said, twisting in her slender fingers the stem of the glass. “And so unfair to her.”

  “Unfair to feminist critics?”

  “No, not just that. It’s way too cynical. Not that I do not like your poem, I do.” She continued after taking another small sip. “Let me ask you a different question. When you wrote the poem, what kind of a mood were you in?”

  “I cannot remember. It was such a long time ago.”

  “A lousy mood, I bet. Things were going wrong. Messages did not get through. Disillusionment hit home. And you became cynical—” She added, “Sorry if I’m intruding.”

  “No, it’s okay,” he said, taken aback. “You’re right in a general sense. According to our Tang dynasty poet Du Fu, people do not write well when they are happy. If you are content with life, you simply want to enjoy it.”

  “Antiromantic cynicism can be a disguise for the poet’s personal disappointment. The poem reveals another side of you.”

  “Well—” He was at a loss. “You’re entitled to your reading. Inspector Rohn. In deconstruction, every reading can be a misreading.”

  Their talk was interrupted by a phone call from his deputy, Qian.

  “Where are you, Chief Inspector Chen?”

  “Moscow Suburb,” Chen said. “Party Secretary Li wants me to entertain our American guest. What do you have to report?”

  “Nothing particular. I’m in the bureau today. Detective Yu may call in at any time, and I’m still making phone calls to hotels. If anything comes up, you can reach me here.”

  “So you’re working on Sunday, too. Good for you, Qian. Goodbye.”

  Chen felt slightly disturbed, however. It was possible that Qian had intended to show how hard working he was, especially after the Qingpu incident. But why did he want to know where Chen was? Perhaps he should not have disclosed his whereabouts.

  Anna came to offer desserts from a cart.

  “Thank you.” Chen said. “Leave it here. We’ll choose for ourselves.”

  “Another linguistic question,” Catherine said, selecting chocolate mousse.

  “Yes?”

  “Lu calls Anna and other waitresses his little sisters. Why?”

  “They’re younger, but there is another reason. We used to call Russians our ‘elder brothers,’ believing they were more advanced and we were only in the early stage of Communism. Now Russia is viewed as poorer than China. Young Russian girls come here, seeking jobs in our restaurants and nightclubs, just as Chinese go to the United States. Lu is so proud of this.”

  She dug her spoon into her mousse. “I need to ask you a favor—as your American girlfriend—as your buddy imagines.”

  “Whatever I can do, Inspector Rohn.” He was conscious of a subtle change in her. Her tone lacked the edge of the previous day.

  “I have heard of a ‘knockoff’ street in Shanghai. I would like to ask you to accompany me there.”

  “A knockoff street?”

  “Huating Road, that’s the name of it. People sell all kinds of fake brands there. Like Louis Vuitton, Gucci, or Rolex.”

  “Huating Road—I have never been there myself.”

  “I can go myself, with a Shanghai map in hand. Only the peddlers will charge me a much higher price. I don’t think my Chinese is good enough for bargaining.”

  “Your Chinese is more than adequate.” Chen put down his wineglass. This was not an activity the authorities would recommend. Such a street market reflected no credit on China. If she chose to tell someone, it could be an embarrassment to the city government. But she would be able to do so even if he did not go with her. “Is it a good idea to go there, Inspector Rohn?” he said.

  “Why do you ask?”

  “You can buy such things at home. Why spend your time looking for fakes here?”

  “You know how much a Gucci shoulder bag costs?” She put hers on the table. “Mine is an off brand. Don’t think all Americans are millionaires.”

  “No, I don’t,” Chen said.

  “One of Wen’s classmates, Bai—I think that’s his name— sells fake stuff. No one knows where he is. So we can ask about him. These knockoff peddlers must have a network.”

  “We don’t have to go there to find him.” He did not think interviewing one more classmate of Wen’s could make much difference. “We deserve a break today.”

  “There’s also a possibility that we will spot an imitation Valentino. The victim in the park wore that brand of pajama, didn’t he?”

  “Yes,” he said, admitting to himself that she had a
tenacious memory for detail. He had mentioned the pajama brand to her only once in passing. “As a chief inspector, I should not go there, but you are my responsibility. Party Secretary Li repeated this to me this morning. So, I’m your tour guide.”

  When they were ready to leave, Overseas Chinese Lu made another red-faced effort to decline Chen’s payment.

  “Tell you what,” Chen said, “next time I’ll come in alone, order the most expensive dish in the house, and let you be the host. Okay?”

  “Sure. Don’t let me wait too long.” Lu accompanied them to the door, holding a camera.

  “Thank you so much, Mr. Lu,” she said.

  “Call me Overseas Chinese Lu,” he said to Catherine, bending to kiss her hand courteously, in a gesture appropriate to an overseas Chinese in the movies. “We’re privileged to have a beautiful American guest like you. Come again. Next time, Ruru and I will prepare something special for you.”

  Several customers leaving the restaurant looked at them curiously. Lu stopped a young man with a crew cut and a light green cell phone in his hand.

  “Please take a picture of the three of us. I’ll frame it. The most distinguished guests of Moscow Suburb.”

  * * * *

  Chapter 24

  I

  t took them less than ten minutes by subway to reach Huating Road. Chief Inspector Chen was surprised at the crowd at the street market. There were also a number of foreigners, with small calculators, bargaining or gesticulating with their fingers. They had probably read the same tourist guide book as Catherine Rohn.

  “You see, your Chinese is more than enough,” he said.

  “I was afraid I would be the only foreign devil here,” she said.

  The narrow street was lined on both sides with booths, kiosks, stands, barrows, and stores. Some specialized in a particular product line, like purses and shoulder bags, T-shirts, or jeans; some displayed an eclectic mixture. Armies of small vendors had created a marketplace out of a former residential area in the last few years. This had been happening throughout the city. A lot of stores were makeshift extensions, or conversions, of the original residences. Some peddlers did business on tables under awnings and umbrellas with brand logos, or simply on the pavements, giving the street the appearance of a fair.

  They asked about Bai, the peddler, but no one volunteered information. It was not surprising. There might be more than one knockoff market. She did not seem too disappointed. Nor did they find Valentino pajamas there. Old Hunter’s information had been reliable.

  She stopped at a booth to examine a leather purse. She slung it over her shoulder and appeared satisfied, but instead of bargaining for it, she left it saying, “Let me comparison shop at a few other stores first.”

  Entering a tiny shop, they saw various familiar-looking, inexpensive products on shelves at the entrance, most of them bearing “made in China” labels. The goods were the same as those in state-run stores. Further inside, however, appeared all sorts of copies of high-style goods. The owner, a broad-shouldered woman in her late forties, greeted them with a grin.

  Catherine took his arm, whispering, “For the benefit of the owner, so she won’t take me for an American sucker.”

  While the gesture made sense, it made him oddly pleased. She started to browse just like other customers with an intensity he had not expected.

  Another store displayed traditional Chinese costumes. The street, frequented by foreign tourists equally interested in exotic Oriental products, was home to a couple of specialized boutiques. She lit upon a scarlet silk robe embroidered with a golden dragon. As she stroked the smooth material, the owner of the store, a gray-haired woman wearing a pair of gray-rimmed glasses, said affably, “You can try it on here, American lady.”

  “How?” Catherine looked around. There was no fitting room.

  “It’s easy,” the owner said, pointing at a piece of cloth folded back and hooked on the wall. “Pull it out, hook it onto the other wall, and it is a fitting room curtain. You can put on the robe behind it.”

  “Ingenious,” Chen said. What stretched out across the corner of the room was, however, not exactly a curtain. The material was too thin, too short. It was more like a fashionable apron.

  Beneath the curtain, he saw Catherine’s dress falling in a heap at her feet. Looking up, he caught a glimpse of her white shoulders before she wrapped herself in the scarlet robe.

  “Take your time, Catherine. I’ll smoke a cigarette outside.”

  As he lit a cigarette outside the store, he saw a young man in front of another store across the street dialing a cell phone and casting a long glance in their direction. A Chinese onlooker would be intrigued by the sight of an American woman changing her clothes behind the makeshift curtain. Chen did not feel comfortable in his temporary role, standing there like a bodyguard, a “flower protector” in classical Chinese literature.

  Something else was bothering him, too. He was not sure what. He dropped the cigarette before he finished, stamping it out under his heel, and went back into the store. She pulled aside the curtain and emerged holding the robe wrapped in a plastic bag.

  “I bought it.”

  “The American lady speaks Chinese so well,” the owner said with an obliging smile. “I’m giving her the price for a regular Chinese client.”

  They resumed their shopping, bargaining, comparing, making small purchases here and there. As they squeezed their way through the market, it started to rain. They hurried into a garagelike store, where a young salesgirl was perched on a high chair behind the counter. Probably in her early twenties, she was cute in a clean-cut way, and she wore a black DKNY top that showed her belly button, and a pair of shorts with a Tommy Hilfiger logo on the hip. She dangled her Prada slippers and smoked a brown More cigarette. She stood up to meet them, a collective image of contemporary fashion.

  “Welcome to our store, Big Brother.”

  It was a strange greeting, he thought. The young salesgirl appeared to focus her attention on him.

  “It’s raining,” he said. “So we’ll look around.”

  “Take your time, Big Brother. Your girlfriend deserves the best.”

  “Yes, she does,” he said.

  “Thank you,” Catherine said in Chinese.

  The salesgirl introduced herself. “My name is Huang Ying. It means Oriole in Chinese.”

  “What a lovely name!”

  “Our products are no low-quality fakes. The companies themselves sell to us through an unofficial channel.”

  “How?” Catherine asked, taking up a black handbag bearing the label of an exclusive Italian designer.

  “Well, most of them have joint ventures in Hong Kong or Taiwan. This handbag, for example. They ordered two thousand. The Taiwan factory produced three thousand. The same quality, needless to say. And we get one thousand directly from the factory. For less than twenty dollars.”

  “It’s genuine,” Catherine said, after taking a closer look.

  Chen could not see anything special about it—except for the price tag. It seemed enormously expensive to him. Handing the bag back to her, he noticed a row of colorful fashionable clothes hanging on a stainless-steel rack in a corner. The price tags seemed staggering.

  There was also a length of scarlet velvet—a fitting room curtain partially hiding a cushioned stool by the back door. This store was of better quality—at least in that respect. When people changed, they would feel more secure.

  “Take a look at this watch. Oriole took out a display case. “The company is not well known for its watch line. So why bother? It’s because they are manufactured in Taiwan, and sold here.”

  “Hasn’t the government tried to close this market?” Catherine said to him.

  “The market patrollers come here from time to time, but things can be worked out,” Oriole said glibly. “Say he takes away ten T-shirts and says, ‘I’ve confiscated five of your T-shirts, right?’ And you say, ‘Five, that’s correct.’ So instead of hauling you in, he turns
in five, pockets five, and lets you off.”

  “Nothing else has been done here?” Chief Inspector Chen felt embarrassed.

  “Occasionally the cops come by. They raided Bald Zhang’s at the end of the street last month, and sentenced him to two years. It can be dangerous.”

  “If it’s so dangerous, why do you still do it?”

  “What choice do I have?” Oriole said bitterly. “My parents worked all their lives at Shanghai Number 6 Textile Mill. Laid off last year. Broken iron rice bowls. No benefit of the socialist system anymore. I have to support the family.”