bartender.”
“All right. It’s simple. Remember those security tapes I told you about? The ones taken in the hallway? I heard they were altered. New times put on. Who knows when that Russian girl was there? That’s not all that was fixed, I bet.”
“I think I know how to get something more on the tapes. But that still leaves a problem. Either he brought out a bleeding suitcase or he didn’t. What difference does the time make?”
“Maybe it wasn’t him that came out.”
I thought about it. “Back up a second. Has anyone seen him in the meantime?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Would you know?”
“I know people who would know.”
“Has anyone heard from him?”
“Messages, I’m told. I haven’t seen them. I haven’t asked to see them. I prefer not to see them.”
“Phone messages?”
“No.”
“So they’re written, these days maybe e-mail or whatever else they use. Birdsongs, I don’t know. Anyone could be sending them in his name. In other words, he could be missing.”
“Yes.”
“OK, so he could be dead.”
“Didn’t I imply that?”
“New problem: Who wanted him dead?”
“We call that ‘motive.’ ”
“The old rectification of names. Call it by its right name and it gets you most of the way you want to go. I call it someone-wanted-to-make-sure-he-was-out-of-the-way. I have my suspicions why they would want him on the sidelines. But dead?”
“Not just dead. Parked in a Louis Vuitton. I double-checked. They took out the hanger to make space.”
“Kim’s people, maybe. Pang’s people. That bastard Zhao. All of them could have done it. Personally, I think it was Zhao. Something this sick, it’s right up his alley.”
“Maybe. Each of them had reasons to get rid of him. Each of them had reasons to keep him around.”
“We call that motive.”
2
“Everyone was supposed to believe that no one had a reason to kill him, that anyone who thought about it needed him alive. But late at night, when everything was quiet and the branches were brushing against the windows in the wind, it occurred to someone that if he was around, there was always a chance he might turn out to be brilliant. What then? What if instead of chaos they ended up with stability? Maybe even recovery? What if he turned out to be charismatic? Even ‘capable’ could be a problem. They couldn’t risk the chance that a thirty-three-year-old might know what he was doing, might rally his forces and tell them to get out of his country.”
“So, she killed him, and they killed her.” Kang was sitting across from me in the restaurant on the second floor, except we had missed breakfast and so were picking at our lunch. “I needed him alive. Without him, we don’t have anyone to hold the flag.”
Kang had appeared that morning. There was a knock on my door at 10:00 A.M. and there he was.
“May I come in, Inspector?”
“Well, cut off my legs and call me Shorty.”
Kang gave me a puzzled look.
“I saw it in a movie a long time ago. I think it indicates surprise in the American West. Come in, absolutely. It says in the hotel rules I’m allowed to have visitors until ten P.M. Here, let me take your bag.”
Kang had a small nylon carry-on over his shoulder. “No, I’ll keep it with me.” He stepped inside and gave the room a careful once-over. “Nice place,” he said. “You think we can get some tea?”
I went to the desk and retrieved the room service menu. “It says here we can. All I have to do is dial six.” I dialed 6. “Yes, a pleasant good morning to you… Yes, I slept well… Yes, you can do something for me as a matter of fact. I would like two pots of tea.” I paused. “I see… Yes, it is after nine thirty. All right, two pots of coffee. Maybe some toast with strawberry jam as well?… Aha. I see. All right, blueberry will do fine. Thank you.” I hung up. “Ten minutes, they said. Meanwhile, make yourself comfortable. Take a shower if you want. Don’t mind the TV; they promised me the picture only goes one way.”
The coffee showed up; the toast did not. I was a little concerned about talking in the room, but Kang said not to worry.
“Not to step where I’m not wanted,” I said, “but how did you get in the country? I would have thought some sort of lookout had been issued for you.”
“They don’t even know for sure if I am still alive, Inspector. They have a collection of faded photographs and out-of-date descriptions. I could be anybody’s grandfather. I’ll bet my documerits are better than yours. It was time to come back. I’ll be out of your hair and set up in another part of town by the end of the day. Then we shall see what we shall see.”
After a little more Delphic volleyball like this, by 11:30 we were both hungry. “Let’s try the restaurant. I hear the soup is good.”
3
“Maybe he’s not dead; maybe we’re still speculating,” I said, though I only said it to make Kang feel better. It didn’t make me feel any better. The armrest on my chair was loose. Fancy restaurant, gold- trimmed mirrors, gold-trimmed tables, and the damned gold-trimmed chairs were falling apart. The table wobbled, too; it was the sort of wobble that would only get worse if they didn’t tighten the screws. I reached underneath to see if I could turn the ones on my side with the end of my spoon.
“No, I’m not speculating. I know Macau, Inspector. I used to do my banking there. It was hard not to bump into someone who would dispose of a body for the right fee. When the economy was bad, you could even get a rate for more than one body. He’s gone; I’m sure of it. But I need to know what happened. That’s the only way I can figure out where the solid ground is, and where the swamp. If we know who did it, and how, it may put us in a better position for the next move. Greta thinks you have a theory.”
“Greta. You know, if you mix up the Roman letters for her name you get ‘great.’ How is Greta, by the way?”
“Busy.” Another couple of words would have been polite, but he wasn’t handing them out. “Now, tell me your theory. Don’t worry with the political gloss. We’ll treat this like a police matter.”
“Nice try,” I said. “But you know as well as I do that these strands wrap around each other. I can’t separate the political from the criminal even in normal times-on this one, it is completely impossible.”
“What a relief, Inspector. For once, I thought, you might actually do exactly as I asked, and that would mean we had both become boring old men. All right, we’ll throw everything into the pot and see what we get.”
