The Interior (14 page)

“For what?”

“For Sun. Landing him as a client is a coup. I know I owe that to you.”

“But I didn’t do anything.”

“He isn’t a friend or some part of the Red Prince network?”

“I’ve never met him. I’ve seen him, of course. He was at Deng’s funeral. He’s a powerful man, David. Very important.”

“So how did he…”

“As Sun said himself, your reputation precedes you. Besides, Miss Quo has impeccable connections.”

David thought for a moment, then asked, “All that pro-democracy, pro-capitalism talk, isn’t that dangerous?”

“A year ago, even three months ago I would have said yes. But Deng is dead. Look at who runs the country now. President Jiang Zemin is trying to recast the U.S. as China’s friend, not its enemy. As mayor of Shanghai, Zhu Rongzi brought that city back to world prominence. Now that he’s premier, he hopes to do the same for the whole country. I don’t know much about Sun, except that he’s trying to do for his entire province what Zhu did for Shanghai. It doesn’t take a mathematician to add this up. Today Sun is one of one hundred and seventy-five people on the Central Committee. People say he’s vying to become one of the seventeen members of the Politburo. From there maybe he’ll go onto the five-man Standing Committee. Then again, maybe he can bypass those steps entirely and go straight to the top. In ten, twenty years, he could have it all.”

“You like him.”

Hulan shrugged. “Again, I don’t know him personally, but I like what he says. He’ll be a great client for you.”

“I don’t know,” David said. When Hulan looked at him quizzically, he continued, “I don’t know much about the way things work here. I don’t understand the politics. I go out on the streets and see capitalism. I come home and you tell me about communist party rule. I have trouble meshing those two ideas.”

“But you don’t have to. Listen to what he said: He wants your help in working with foreigners, because the rituals are different. He said it; you just didn’t hear it. In a Chinese deal the negotiations are intricate: will tea be offered, will you accept it, who will sit at what part of the table, who enters the room first. Effusive compliments are exchanged but never accepted. You can never say what you want or what you’ll concede. The ‘final’ contract is never the last version. On the eve of signing or just before a big banquet, there are always ‘a few last matters to attend to.’ Negotiations can go on for months, sometimes years. This is true in business and personal relationships, but it’s absolutely contrary to the American way. When you tell me Sun wants you to help him cut through all that, I like him even more.”

“But he’s a politician, Hulan.”

“He’s not just any politician. He’s a forward thinker. If he needs help, I think you should give it to him. That’s what you do best—help people who are on the side of right.”

David didn’t like the idea of getting involved in politics, but if Hulan thought Sun was a good guy, then what could David do but help him, because as Hulan said, this was what he did best. He tried to explain the heart of it to Hulan.

“I guess it doesn’t matter to me if a client is big or not. Like today with those people who were manufacturing clothes out of pigskin. I enjoyed talking to them. It pleased me that with a couple of phone calls I could fix their problem or at least make some headway. But a politician is different. I’m not convinced about how complex his deals are. I worry about integrity. I worry about what I won’t understand. I worry about what Sun’s real problems are and why he wasn’t forthright about them. Because he must have them or else he wouldn’t come to me. Still, as a lawyer I can look at his problems and steer him in the right direction, but…” He drew the word out as he thought back. “I remember once seeing a painting of a shipwreck. There was a lighthouse and the beam reflected over the water, but that still hadn’t prevented the ship from hitting the rocks. That’s how I see what I do, Hulan. There’s the sense that you can orient to the light in the darkness and even know the waters, but if a surprise current comes up or a fog descends, then suddenly logic and experience might not be enough to stop disaster from occurring.”

On Wednesday they were awakened as usual by the
yang ge
troupe. This time David said he wanted to go out and see it. They dressed and a few minutes later stepped out into the alleyway. Standing at David’s side, Hulan saw the dancers in a new way. How sweet they were in their colorful costumes. How dear to see these old people like Madame Zhang and Madame Ri with their smiling faces and delicate movements. Even the music that had sounded so loud and inharmonic to her ears now sounded festive and gay. And at her side was David. He was dressed casually in khakis, a button-down shirt open at the neck, and loafers. His body was loose and relaxed as he leaned lackadaisically with one shoulder against the wall of the Liu family compound. Hulan edged closer to him, and he draped his arm easily over her shoulder. She felt cautiously happy.

Still, David was a foreigner and Hulan’s neighbors had been aware of his presence since the night he had arrived in the
hutong
. So, when Neighborhood Committee Director Zhang came knocking at the door an hour after the troupe dispersed, Hulan was ready for her. She escorted Madame Zhang out to the garden, where David was on the phone speaking to Miles Stout about Governor Sun and explaining all the conflict issues. David looked up, said into the phone, “Miles, I have to go, but if you get a waiver from Tartan, fax it to me as soon as possible. I’d like to represent Sun if we can.” Then he hung up, stood, and took Madame Zhang’s knobby hand in his for a light handshake.

Madame Zhang took an appreciatively noisy sip of chrysanthemum tea, then said in Chinese, “The foreigner has come again. I see he has been here for five days already.”

“Yes, auntie,” Hulan agreed.

“I suspect that he has plans to stay longer.”

“I hope so,” Hulan said.

“You have not come to me for a marriage permit.”

Hulan glanced over to David, who was trying to look interested, but was totally unaware of the meaning of the conversation. “There is no plan for marriage.”

“This man is the father of your baby,” Madame Zhang stated.

“You know that to be true.”

Madame Zhang grunted. She shifted her frame in her chair to stare at David directly. She leaned forward and said to him as if in confidence, “One drop of piss can ruin the well for everyone. The people of our neighborhood would not like to see this happen. Our citizens are good people. We don’t want trouble with the higher-ups.”

David smiled and asked Hulan what the Neighborhood Committee director had said.

“On behalf of all our neighbors, she welcomes you to the
hutong
. She says that America is an inspiring country, and she looks forward to many interesting conversations with you in the future.”

“
Xie-xie
,” David said to the older woman. Then he addressed Hulan, “Please tell Madame Zhang that I’m very happy to call this place my home.”

Hulan translated this as “Attorney Stark says that he is happy to visit China again, and he will do his best to obey all rules of the neighborhood and the country.”

Madame Zhang snorted, then roughly cleared her throat. “Well then,” she said again to David. “I expect to have a request for a marriage certificate very soon, as it is not a custom in our country for this certificate to come
after
the one for a baby.”

Again Hulan translated: “Our Committee director says that when good things come, they come in a pair. She is gladdened that you have come and that we are together.”

David reached over and took the startled older woman’s hand. “I will do everything I can to make Hulan happy.”

Madame Zhang pulled her scrabbly hand out of the foreigner’s grasp and hastily stood. “We make allowances for you, Liu Hulan, but please remember to be careful.” Then she bowed to David and hurriedly left the compound muttering to herself about the curious ways of
wai guo ren
.

Hulan might have been able to camouflage Madame Zhang’s disapproval, but she had a far more difficult time when she and David met Vice Minister Zai later at a restaurant for dim sum. Vice Minister Zai spoke English. He was a shrewd man and a survivor of many political upheavals. Once the assortment of little dishes and miniature steamers were set on the table, he said to Hulan, “Your mother was well enough to speak with me on the phone yesterday.”

These words hit Hulan deeply. She hadn’t forgotten Jinli—she’d spoken to her mother’s nurse every day since they’d gone to Beidaihe—but she’d selfishly guarded her happiness and her privacy with David.

“I think the sea air agrees with Mama,” Hulan said. “I’m happy she’s where she can enjoy the cool ocean breezes.”

“She was away from you for many years…”

“I know this, uncle.”

Hulan always used the honorific when she wanted to imply a closer relationship. In truth, theirs was much closer than even uncle and niece. With her own father there had always been layer upon layer of hidden meaning, but with Zai, Hulan knew that his hidden meanings—even when they preyed upon her filial duties and underlying guilt—were always in her best interests.

“Then she will be returning to Beijing soon?”

“After David and I return from the countryside.”

David put down his chopsticks and smiled. “I didn’t know you were coming with me.”

“I asked Miss Quo to buy tickets for both of us.”

“She didn’t tell me,” David said.

“You didn’t ask.”

In the excitement of the last few days, David and Hulan hadn’t talked about her visit to the countryside, nor had she seen Vice Minister Zai to tell him about it. Now Hulan quickly recounted her trip and what she’d seen—the mysterious floor plans and other records Suchee had shown her, the incongruity of the death scene, the bizarre encounter she’d had in the village café, the official visit to the factory during which she’d seen little, and finally her decision that the only way to know what was going on there was to get inside.

“There’s something strange about that place,” she said. “Otherwise they would have let me see the whole facility.”

“But whatever is happening there surely has nothing to do with the suicide of your daughter’s friend,” Zai said.

“Not to mention that Knight is important to me right now,” David added. “The sale’s my main reason for being in Beijing.”

“I thought I was your reason for being here,” Hulan said.

“You know what I mean, Hulan.”

Vice Minister Zai held up his hands to silence the two of them. “There’s no need to disagree, because Hulan has no reason to go out to the countryside at all.” He turned to Hulan. “You have a job here in the city. I gave you a few personal days off to visit your friend, which you did. Now, although you have returned to the capital, you have not come back to work.”

“David needs my help getting settled in.”

“He has Miss Quo for that.” Zai paused, then said, “When I was a boy, we had a saying about women. Never come out the front gate, or walk across the second gate. Do you know what that means? In a compound like your family’s, women not only didn’t go out into the street, but most were not expected to go into the far courtyards. But you were not born in feudal times, Hulan. You don’t need to stay at home to be considered a good woman.”

Hulan blushed and looked down at her plate.

“I will put this another way,” Zai continued. “If you were anyone else, you would have already been reprimanded.”

David looked at Hulan, confused. “What’s he talking about?”

“Hulan dismissed,” Zai explained, “and you expelled from the country.”

“I’ve done nothing wrong,” David said.

“Foreigners are not allowed to have affairs with Chinese citizens,” Hulan said softly.

“We’re not having an affair,” David corrected.

Hulan shrugged. “You call it one thing. The government calls it another.”

Zai spoke to Hulan in Mandarin: “I protected your father for many years, Hulan. I don’t regret that. But you make a mistake if you think my actions aren’t being monitored. As for you, I want to remind you of the newspapers. You have money, but that can’t always protect you. Again, I refer to what happened to your father.”

“Excuse me,” David interrupted. “Please speak in English.”

But no one translated the last exchange for him.

“I need to get into that factory,” Hulan repeated, switching back to English for David’s benefit.

“And what of the baby, Hulan?” Zai asked. “If you can’t be concerned for yourself, shouldn’t you be concerned for its safety?”

With these words the past few weeks rippled through Hulan’s mind—the boring cases, the light workload, the protectiveness of Investigator Lo. Zai must have known about the pregnancy all along.

Hulan tried a different tack. “A minute ago you were chiding me for being old-fashioned. Now you’re telling me I can’t do something because I’m pregnant.”

“These are two different things,” he said. “Am I not right, David?”

As an American, David was having trouble with this conversation. It was too personal to be having with his girlfriend’s boss. Besides, what Zai said went to deep questions about the roles of men and women, of fathers and mothers, to which David wasn’t sure he knew the answers. But David was a lawyer and knew how to move a conversation in another direction if he had to.

“If you’re so worried about corruption,” David said to Hulan, “you don’t need to go out to the countryside to find it. In a few days here in Beijing I’ve seen several instances of corruption involving foreigners: those office buildings, the fees for hooking up phones, what you told me about the salaries for translators—”

“Everything you’ve seen is perfectly legal,” Hulan interrupted impatiently. “Foreigners have more money than the Chinese people. They should pay more.”

“A hundred grand for a secretary?”

“Could your secretary in Los Angeles set you up with new clients? Could she introduce you to the most important people in the city? How do you think you got your new legal matters so quickly?”