The First Excellence: Fa-Ling's Map (19 page)

Yong-qi looked at his watch. It was 10:30 am. He’d had less than half an hour of sleep. The flight to Shanghai would take several hours, and on top of that he had to factor in travel time to the domestic airport. He would sleep on the plane.

“
I will do my best to come today. Give me your number,” he said. “I’ll call you when I’m sure of the time.”

Shopei gave him Randy’s cell phone number. In truth, Yong-qi could easily have found it out. He had a good friend at the Ministry of Security. On the other hand, the real Wu Tang would have asked for the number. If he was going to capitalise on the only lead he had, he would have to remain in character.

The moment the call was disconnected, Yong-qi dialled his friend at the Ministry of State Security. Susi Song picked up on the first ring. They had dated once upon a time, but she ended up marrying some government bigwig who landed her a job in the Secret Service. Susi still enjoyed hearing from Yong-qi, which worked out well for him, since she had access to a wealth of information he couldn’t get anywhere else.

“
Hello, Susi, how’s life?” he said.

“
About as much fun as a chilled dildo,” she said. Susi was not known for her couth. More often than not, Yong-qi was shocked at the language that came out of her pretty mouth.

“
I need a favour,” he said.

“
That’s my boy,” she laughed. “Cutting right to the chase.”

“
Sorry,” he said. “I’m under the gun right now.”

“
As always. What can I do for you?”

“
I’m calling from a cell phone. Can you see the number on your screen?”

“
Big as Buddha,” she said.

“
Good. Can you find out for me who this number is registered to? Also, I need to get a list of the incoming calls for the past two weeks.”

“
I can tell you right now who it’s registered to. It’s a throw-away.” Susi meant that the phone was an over-the-counter gadget with no registration on the number. Its owner paid for user time by purchasing phone cards.

“
What about the incoming calls?”

“
That’ll take a couple of hours to dig up,” Susi said. “Where can I reach you?”

“
I’ll be on this number when you have the info.”

“
All right. I’ll get back to you this afternoon. Tell me, Qi, where have you been hiding lately?”

Yong-qi laughed. Susi was married, but that didn’t stop her from flirting shamelessly with him, and for all he knew with any other man who caught her eye.

“
Somewhere,” he answered, “where that husband of yours will never find me.”

“
Coward,” she said.

“
On the contrary,” he countered, “I am brave.”

Susi laughed out loud at the joke. Yong-qi’s name meant ‘brave one’. He was no coward, but on the other hand, he hardly fit her idea of a brave warrior with his neatly pressed suits and shaved boyish face. Still, she remembered the scent of his expensive cologne, which he purchased on the black market. She sighed.

“
You are brave,” she said. “My shining knight — one day you’ll save me from this castle.”

“
I think you like your towers and turrets,” he said, pleased to hold his own in the on-going contest of innuendo he and Susi shared.

Yong-qi’s next call was to his partner. Cheng growled like a bear waking from hibernation.

“
What is it?” he said. “You having trouble sleeping? You need to get laid, my friend. Why call me? You’re not my type.”

“
Give me a break, Minsheng. I’ve got some news about our Chen Sui Ming.”

“
Not on the phone. Give me half an hour. I’ll meet you downstairs.”

“
There’s no need to disturb yourself,” Wang said. “I can come up to your apartment.”

“
My mother is sleeping,” Cheng said. “I’ll come down.”

At 11:00 Wang pulled up outside of Cheng’s building. The big man was already waiting on a bench. His clothes were rumpled as if he had slept in them and he smelled no better than when Wang had dropped him off earlier that morning.

Wang filled Cheng in on his meeting with the girl, Li Fa-ling, and her report of seeing what must have been a Ministry of Security ‘cleanup’ man in room 607. Then he brought his partner up to speed on the call he had received about the victim’s wife.

“
So, our flamer’s name was Wu Tang,” Cheng said. “I wonder what he was doing in a five-star hotel in Nanning?”

“
His wife is in Shanghai. She may know what happened to her husband. I want to question her before she dies.”

“
It might be a trap,” Cheng said. “If the husband has been on the run since the wife’s arrest, the Ministry may be trying to round him up as well.”

“
The State has so many enemies,” Wang said. “Soon we will have to build more prisons to house them all.”

“
Luckily many of the prisoners seem to be suffering from ill-health. They don’t take up space for long.”

“
Institutional life is hard on people,” Wang agreed. “Perhaps it’s the food.”

Cheng smiled. Both men were well aware of how lawbreakers were treated in the People’s Republic of China. A prisoner, especially a ‘prisoner of conscience’ as defined by Amnesty International, did not have a high expectation of personal longevity.

Amnesty International had made a number of attempts to gain access to the country’s infamous penal system. Every effort had been rebuffed. A.I.’s reports, which were posted on its Website, were largely based on anecdotal evidence received from hundreds of people who risked their lives to come forward with their stories.

The International watchdog for human rights did its best to spread the word of its findings within China. Unfortunately the Republic’s obstructive Golden Shield Program, referred to by the population as the Great Firewall of China, blocked access to Internet information surrounding ‘sensitive’ issues, allowing citizens to view only those sites that did not threaten the government’s power.

With so many people rising up in protest and posting
blogs
and
chats
that were critical of the government, ‘Big Mama’ had her hands full. Sensitive sites were remaining available to the public for longer periods of time before they could be identified and removed. This meant some information, albeit sporadic and sketchy, was slowly beginning to percolate among the on-line population. The students, who had the widest access to Internet use, were becoming restless once again in their desire for political change.

Cheng bit his lip. He had no concerns for his own well being. It wasn’t that he didn’t value his life — on the contrary, Cheng had created a niche for himself that he found to be quite comfortable — but he firmly believed in his own ability to stand strong against any opposition that might come his way. Call it arrogance if you will, but Cheng was a man used to putting one foot in front of the other without backing down from confrontation.

He was, however, worried about Ma-ma. Cheng had inherited his iron will from her. His mother was a simple woman with a loving heart, but her mind was a fortress that would not be altered by the changing tide of public opinion. She had seen governments fall and great concepts flow in and out of favour. She would continue to follow her own path, wherever it might lead.

In the end, Cheng could not protect her from herself. He could only do his best to make her proud of him.

“
We are off to Shanghai,” he said, checking his wallet to make sure he was carrying sufficient Yuan for the trip.

“
It’s been awhile,” Yong-qi said. “I look forward to seeing the great city.”

Jiu Kaiyu nodded at Ng-zhi across the crowded office. They were in the habit of going out for coffee together in the morning. Once in awhile their new rookie, Yi, would tag along. Kaiyu waited until Yi had disappeared to the washroom before giving Ng-zhi the signal.

Neither man was comfortable talking in front of Yi.

They avoided their usual coffee shop, opting instead to walk the extra block to a bubble tea joint full of young people. Carrying coffee, Ng-zhi shouldered his way to a corner booth. Jiu Kaiyu followed.

“
Anything on the girl?” Ng-zhi asked. He studied his sculpted fingernails nonchalantly, as if he was asking about the weather.

“
Her name is Tan Shopei. She is Dahui’s older sister.” Jiu looked like he wanted to spit.

“
I didn’t guess it either,” Ng-zhi said.

“
She works for a shoe factory. I think she’s the company accountant.” Jiu slid a paper to Ng-zhi with the name and address of the company Shopei worked for. “I’ll get a list of employees,” he said. “Let’s find out who her friends are. Maybe she’s staying with one of them.”

“
Do you want to talk to her?” Ng-zhi asked. He didn’t really care how this went down. He only needed to know Jiu’s wishes.

“
Not really,” Jiu said. “Try to find out whether she talked to anyone. Then help her to disappear. It’s Chan we want. As an American he’s going to be harder to deal with. I’m thinking he probably smuggled some cocaine into the country. He looks like the type.”

“
That should keep him out of our hair for awhile.” Ng-zhi smiled. “Nothing like a little prison time to teach a man to mind his own business.” He and Jiu had access to a ready supply of narcotics. Record keeping at the lockup was notoriously sloppy. If they could find Randy Chan, setting him up for arrest would be easy.

“
Be gentle with him,” Jiu said. “I want him in one piece when we turn him over to Ho. And let’s find out who he’s communicating with overseas.”

“
You have a phone number for me?”

“
Yeah. I pulled it off Tan Dahui’s hard drive. It’s Chan’s cell number.”

“
Great,” Ng-zhi said. “I’ll plug it into the system. As soon as it gets a hit we can track him down.”

Yi was irritated when the men returned to the office.

“
Why didn’t you tell me you were going for coffee?” he said.

Jiu Kaiyu ignored Yi, walking past him to his cubicle. As his senior, he did not feel obligated to explain his actions, regardless of the young man’s influential family connections.

“
We looked for you,” Ng-zhi lied, not bothering to meet Yi’s eyes. “I needed some fresh air.”

“
You won’t find it in Shanghai,” Yi said. Still peevish, he sat at his desk and resumed his critical task of researching the best on-line poker sites.

Jiu Kaiyu did not bother to glance at Ng-zhi across the room. Each man could read the other’s thoughts without the need for eye contact. After all, they had a secret they shared with no one. Jiu Kaiyu and Ng-zhi were brothers — half brothers, that is, who shared the same father and were raised together by Jiu’s mother. Ng-zhi’s mother had never married, a fact that made her life in Shanghai extremely difficult. After she died, Ng-zhi continued to use her family name out of respect. He spent a short time in the home of an aunt and uncle who beat him regularly, until one day Jiu’s father owned up to his responsibility and convinced his angry wife to give Ng-zhi a home.

To her credit, or perhaps to her discredit, Jiu’s mother did not discriminate against her husband’s bastard, treating him to the same hostile indifference she showed to her own son. Love was not in her to give to either Jiu or Ng-zhi, but she did provide them with the basic necessities — food, clothes and discipline. She made sure they were educated. When their father died she remarried quickly and seldom allowed herself to be inconvenienced by the presence of either boy.

Ng-zhi married a peasant woman who reminded him of his own mother, a large smiling woman who admired him greatly. Jiu Kaiyu never married, preferring the attention of prostitutes and finding even their company unbearable once the act was complete. In his view most men, his brother excepted, were worms who allowed their inner strength to be tapped by women. All women, he thought, were like his mother at the core, calculating and manipulative, and utterly incapable of affection.

Still, they were a necessary evil.

Jiu Kaiyu possessed an uncanny ability to read the desires and uncertainties of others coupled with a complete inability to care about them. He was intelligent enough to recognise in himself the makings of a sociopath. It was fortunate for Jiu that his position with the Ministry of Security gave him the opportunity to use his special skills in a legitimate manner. He did not enjoy killing, but he could kill or order the death of others without remorse.

His victims were ‘enemies of the state’, criminals and cultists, so his lack of empathy toward them could pass as an appropriate response.

Ng-zhi alone was Jiu’s equal — his shipmate on the stormy sea of life. Ng-zhi never argued with his brother, a fact that Jiu took to be evidence of his intelligence. From the time they were small boys, Ng-zhi had always held Jiu Kaiyu in the highest regard. This fact made it easy for him to defer to Jiu’s professional leadership. He had grown up indebted to Jiu and his father for saving him from the unbearable oppression of his aunt and uncle. As children, Jiu Kaiyu was the wizard and Ng-zhi was the enforcer. This relationship never changed with the passing years.

Both men despised Ho Lon-shi’s useless nephew, Yi.

Still sulking, Yi pounded his keyboard in protest. Before long, though, he was once again engrossed in one of his favourite gambling sites. This left Ng-zhi free to run a discreet search on Randy Chan’s cell phone number. He plugged in the data and left the search to run, minimising the window to avoid discovery. While it ran, he pretended to busy himself with filing some case documents.