Hungry Ghost (39 page)

The shops too were a rag-bag of ancient and modern: a herbalist with shelves full of glass bottles of mysterious green and brown plants and roots, sacks of dried mushrooms and deer antlers in display cases, a coffin maker with his wares stacked from floor to ceiling, an electrician’s store with portable colour televisions and boxes of Japanese cameras, a noodle shop with five cluttered circular tables where Dugan sometimes bought beef noodles when he tired of gweilo fast food, a shop selling nothing but cosmetics. Some of the blocks were twenty years old or more, less than ten storeys high with flats above the shops and entrances blocked with ornate metal grilles, but gradually they were coming down and being replaced with glass and marble towers two or three times taller as the developers moved away from the Central office area in search of big profits.

The pavements were as busy as the roads, and there too could be seen a cosmopolitan mix: gnarled old housewives making their way home with pink plastic bags containing enough food for a day, businessmen with sharp suits and thin ties, the occasional poser walking along talking into a hand-held phone, shouting to make himself heard over the roar of the traffic and the blaring horns, schoolchildren with crisp white shirts and white socks, rucksacks full of books distorting their frail shoulders, mothers with babies on their backs.

Dugan walked slowly, partly because the crowds were so thick but also because he didn’t want to arrive for an interview with Special Branch sweating like a pig. Occasionally he had to move off the pavement and into the road and he took care to avoid stepping in the piles of ash and rotting fruit left over from night-time ghost appeasing.

Chief Inspector Leigh looked to be a kindly man; greying hair, soft green eyes and folds of loose skin that gave him the appearance of a tired, but loyal, bloodhound. He seemed ill at ease in his light blue suit as if it had been the only thing hanging in his wardrobe when he got out of bed this morning. He smiled benignly when Dugan walked into his office and took him completely by surprise by offering to shake his hand.

‘I’ve always been a fan of yours,’ said Leigh. His voice had the lilt of a Welshman’s and made Dugan think of congregations singing in frost-covered stone churches.

‘I’m sorry?’ said Dugan, flustered.

‘You played a blinder during the last Sevens. That last try you scored, sheer magic. I remember telling my wife; Glynnis, I said, that boy could play for Wales.’

‘I’m afraid not, sir,’ said Dugan. ‘I’m not Welsh.’

Leigh looked hurt but it was too late for Dugan to add the word ‘unfortunately’ without appearing to take the piss.

‘Never mind, never mind. Please sit down.’

He waved Dugan to one of the two comfortable seats facing the desk. Leigh’s office was much the same as Dugan’s, albeit a bit larger. In one corner was a large metal safe, and on it was a brass bowl containing a bushy green plant with bulbous leaves. Leigh’s desk was as cluttered as Dugan’s though he merited a small table lamp. Dugan could see the back of a silver picture frame and guessed it contained a picture of Glynnis Leigh and probably a couple of children, too. Leigh was no doubt a devoted husband and family man, and a pillar of the church. God knows what he was doing in Special Branch. It must be a soul-destroying job, trying to stop Communist infiltration in a place which was gearing up to be handed over to Red China. Talk about a job with no prospects. Special Branch was due to be disbanded before the Communists took over and all their files gutted or destroyed. Most of the Chinese members had been promised British citizenship, unlike most of the other six million inhabitants, because even the British Government accepted that such men would not last long under the new regime.

Special Branch had other tasks, sure, they monitored CIA activity and any other intelligence agencies that tried to operate in Hong Kong, and they kept tabs on the local members of the Kuomintang, the hardline anti-Communist party that controlled Taiwan; but their main purpose was to identify Communists in Hong Kong and for that they had a network of contacts and informers throughout the colony, whose lives would also become dispensable after handover. That was one of the reasons there were so few Chinese in Special Branch, and none in top positions. The job was too sensitive to be trusted to locals.

‘So,’ said Leigh, steepling his fingers and leaning back in his chair. ‘Tell me about this girl.’ It felt for all the world like he was Dugan’s father asking about his latest girlfriend.

‘What is it you want to know, sir?’

Leigh smiled and his eyes wrinkled. He was obviously a man used to smiling. Dugan could imagine him on Christmas morning, helping grandchildren to unwrap their presents and basting the turkey while his wife looked after the vegetables. ‘How long have you known her?’

‘A few days, just a few days,’ said Dugan.

‘What was her name?’

‘Was?’

He smiled again. ‘A slip of the tongue, son. Of course, I mean
is
. What is her name?’

‘Petal.’

‘Her Chinese name?’

‘I don’t know. I only knew her as Petal.’

‘You never asked for her surname?’

‘It never came up.’

‘She knew your name, though?’

‘Sure.’

‘Both names?’

‘Both names,’ agreed Dugan.

‘Well, at least one of you knew what was going on,’ said Leigh, and he laughed. ‘Seriously Pat, how well did you know her?’

Dugan noticed the slick way the older man had dropped in his first name, trying to make it a chat between rugby fans rather than an interrogation.

‘We were friends.’

‘Do you know where she worked?’

‘Bank of China. I called her there a couple of times.’

‘And you got through to her?’

‘Once or twice, yes.’

‘You went to see her in hospital?’

‘Yes.’

‘What did she tell you?’

‘She said she’d been attacked by a gweilo.’

‘Did she tell you who her friends were?’

‘Friends?’

‘The two corpses in the room.’

Dugan shook his head. ‘No sir, no, she didn’t.’

‘What else did you talk about?’

‘That was about it, sir. She seemed pretty much out of it, she was badly hurt and she didn’t make much sense.’

‘She wasn’t delirious?’

‘No, but she seemed confused. I don’t think she was sure what had happened.’ Dugan could feel himself gradually enveloping the truth in layers of lies, building protective walls around the secret that Petal had given him, that she had trusted him with.

Leigh leant forward and put his arms on the desk. He adjusted his cuffs and studied Dugan.

‘We have a problem here, Pat. This girl was in the company of two men, one of whom has already been identified as an agent of the Chinese intelligence service who we have tentatively linked to at least three assassinations in Taiwan. A syringe was found in the hotel room containing a drug that would have given an elephant a heart attack and her fingerprints were on it. She was taken out of the hospital, badly hurt as you pointed out, by a group of spooks from Xinhua, the so-called New China News Agency. Now while the rest of the world fondly imagines that the New China News Agency does nothing but put out press releases on the latest grain harvest, you and I know better, Pat. You and I know that they are Peking’s official, and unofficial, representatives in Hong Kong. And we know that out of their offices in Happy Valley walk some of the meanest sons of bitches from China. And it is starting to look as if your friend is one of them.’

Leigh paused, looking Dugan straight in the eye as if his gaze could pierce the layers of lies. Dugan could feel his hands start to shake and he put them on his knees to try to steady them.

‘So, what exactly did your friend tell you, Pat?’

‘Like I said, sir, nothing.’

Leigh reached over and picked up a file from the left-hand side of his desk. He opened it and casually flicked through it.

‘This is your file, Pat. It’s not a bad record you’ve got. If it wasn’t for your brother-in-law there’s no doubt you’d have made chief inspector by now.’ He put the file back on the desk. ‘If there’s one thing worse than having a triad leader as a brother-in-law, it’s not being honest with your superiors, Pat. I would hate to see a career like yours come under any more pressure.’

‘It’s not as if I’m going anywhere now, is it?’ asked Dugan, feeling the resentment grow inside, burning like a flame. He tried to stay calm, knowing that Leigh was just trying to rile him, trying to get him to open up.

‘Believe me, it can get a lot worse. A lot worse. Now, what exactly did this Petal tell you?’

The senior officer was smiling still, but it seemed to Dugan that the green eyes hardened and that the kindly lines on the face were a mask. This man was not a friend, not to be trusted, and probably wasn’t even a rugby fan. The rugby would be in Dugan’s file. Dugan owed this man nothing. Fuck it, he owed the police nothing. They had killed his career, now they wanted his help. Dugan knew for sure then that his loyalty was with Petal. He would protect her and help her. He would lie to this man, he would lie all he could and he would enjoy doing it.

Dugan grinned sheepishly and rubbed his hand over his bald spot. ‘It’s a bit embarrassing, actually, sir.’

Leigh raised his eyebrows. ‘What do you mean?’

‘She wanted money.’

‘Money?’

‘For her hospital bills. She said she didn’t think she had enough.’

‘And why would she ask you for money, Pat?’

Dugan fell silent, and tried his best to look guilty and embarrassed.

‘Why?’ pressed Leigh.

‘I’d given her money before, sir. She wasn’t what you’d call a regular girlfriend.’

‘She was a hooker?’

Dugan kept his eyes looking at the floor. ‘Yes, sir. I met her at one of the bars the guys go to. I picked her up. At first I didn’t realize she was on the game, it was only afterwards that she asked for money.’

‘But you said she worked at the Bank of China?’

‘That’s what I told everyone, sir. I didn’t want to admit that I’d had to pay for it. The guys would never have let me forget it.’

‘And that’s why you never knew her full name,’ said Leigh.

‘Yes sir,’ said Dugan. ‘That’s why I can’t understand why you think she’s working with Chinese agents. She wasn’t the brightest of girls, sir. A great body, but not a lot between her ears.’

Leigh nodded. ‘I see,’ he mused. ‘I see.’

Dugan looked Leigh straight in the eyes, trying to keep his gaze even and his breathing steady. He kept his hands firmly on his knees, fingers rock-solid, trying to keep all the tension down below the level of the desk, out of sight.

Eventually Leigh seemed to reach a decision. ‘OK, Pat, that’s all for the moment. Let’s call it a day. I’ll give you a call if we need anything more from you.’

He didn’t offer to shake hands when they parted, but stayed put in his seat and watched Dugan leave and close the door behind him. Leigh drummed the fingers of his right hand on Dugan’s file.

‘Senior Inspector Patrick Dugan, I don’t believe a fucking word you told me,’ he said quietly.

Thomas Ng was standing outside the house, looking at the harbour below when he heard the phone ring and then stop as Master Cheng answered it. Cheng had arranged for a large desk to be brought down from one of the bedrooms upstairs and placed in the main lounge. On it he had put the old-fashioned black Bakelite phone and a stack of typing paper, a series of large scale maps of Hong Kong and a couple of felt-tipped pens. Now he sat in a chair taken from the set around the circular table answering the phone which had been ringing non-stop since first light. The maps had come from a property developer who owed the triad a favour, several favours to be exact, and included every single structure in the territory. As each tower block, hotel or house was visited and the doormen questioned the searchers rang back to inform Master Cheng. Cheng noted down the building, the names of the men who had visited it, and the time, which he took from a gold pocket watch he kept by the side of the phone. Sitting by his side was a young Red Pole who had formerly worked in a large estate agents and was helping the old man identify the properties.

The search had started early in the morning, and had been going on for almost eight hours, and Cheng had insisted on answering every call himself, pausing only to drink cups of chrysanthemum tea, and once he ate a small bowl of plain white rice. Ng would insist that he rest soon. This was only the first wave; every building was to be visited three times to speak to all the doormen who usually worked eight-hour shifts. There was no point in just speaking to the men on the morning shift when the gweilo might have been seen late at night. A half-hearted search was worse than no search at all.

He heard footsteps behind him and then Cheng was at his shoulder, face grave.

‘They have found him?’ said Ng.

‘They have found your brother. He is dead, Kin-ming.’

Ng had expected as much but the news still hit him hard. He tightened his hands into fists and slammed them against his thighs, cursing in English. Cheng put his hand on his shoulder.

‘Where?’ asked Ng.

‘Hebe Haven,’ said Cheng. ‘He had been chained to the anchor of one of the yachts there.’

‘He drowned?’

‘Yes. And his wrist had been cut. It seems as if your brother tried to escape in the only way he could. He tried to cut off his own hand.’

‘Oh no,’ muttered Ng. ‘No, no, no. Who found him?’

‘The owner of the yacht, about half an hour ago. In a way it was fortunate, not many take their boats out during the week. At least we know that he is dead.’

Ng nodded. ‘Fortunate is a strange term to use, but I know what you mean, Master Cheng. Can we keep this a secret?’

‘I am afraid not, the police are there now. Our men at Sai Kung say they have stopped checking the boats, for a while at least. There are police everywhere and it would not be wise for our men to attract attention to themselves. I told them to withdraw, they can continue again tomorrow.’