A Case of Two Cities

2

CHIEF INSPECTOR CHEN PL ANNED to stay at home the following morning, reading the material about Xing. The initial part had been delivered to him in five bulging folders the previous night. There was also a special one-page document, a statement on the letterhead of the Party Discipline Committee.

“Comrade Chen Cao, of the Shanghai Police Bureau, is hereby authorized by the Party Discipline Committee to take whatever action necessary for the investigation. Full cooperation with his work is expected at all government levels in the Party’s interest.”

There was not only a red seal of the committee imprinted underneath the statement but also the signature of Comrade Zhao. It was not just a gesture, it could serve like the imperial sword in ancient history: execute before reporting to the emperor.

He started studying the file on Xing. Secret surveillance of Xing must have been going on for a long time. Some of the reports were quite detailed, covering the length of several months. Chen had to get a general picture before making a move.

He took only one short break. Around nine-thirty, he went out to a hawking street-corner peddler and bought a small bag of fried buns with minced pork and shrimp stuffing. The hot buns tasted delicious, and he devoured them one by one over the dossier. As he was picking up the last bun, he got a call from Detective Yu.

“You’re not coming to the bureau today, boss?”

“No. What’s up?”

“You have a special assignment, I guess?”

“Yes. Did Party Secretary Li tell you anything?”

“No. How about meeting you at your place around noon?”

“Great. Come for lunch.”

“Don’t worry about lunch.” Yu added, “Go on with your work. See you soon.”

Yu didn’t explain the occasion for his visit. The timing concerned the chief inspector. He wasn’t supposed to talk about his new work with any of his colleagues. But for Yu, his longtime partner and friend, also the one in practical charge of the special case squad, he had to make an exception.

So the last bun was left there untouched, stuck to the paper, cold, greasy, flaccid, and dispirited. It was almost like his changed mood, as he went on reading the file about Xing.

In the early eighties, Xing had served as the Party Secretary of Huayuan County, Fujian Province. It was then a backward agricultural area consisting of four or five poor People’s Communes. For the year-long labor, farmers there made less than a hundred yuan. Xing got caught up in the early waves of the economic reform, setting up several commune factories. Those nonstate business entities enjoyed tax breaks as well as other competitive edges in the new market. Their success soon changed the local economic landscape. Xing became a national model Party cadre in “leading the people on the way to wealth and prosperity.” Instead of accepting promotions, he insisted on working as the number-one boss in the county.

As the reform gained further momentum, those companies became private-his companies. His business rocketed up, reaching out into large cities. Like many other upstarts, Xing could not help showing off. If “it is glorious to get rich,” as Comrade Deng Xiaoping said, few appeared more magnificent than Xing. He paraded through Fuzhou in a bulletproof Red Flag allegedly manufactured for Chairman Mao. For his family, he built mansions after the fashion of the Grand View Garden. In a visit to his elementary school, he handed a bunch of hundred-yuan bills to a poor old janitor, like a modern-day Robin Hood. Eventually, his excesses caught the attention of some people in Beijing.

Suspicious things were noticed about his business practice. Because of the market competition, a number of his companies suffered serious losses instead of making profits, but he launched into one new grandiose project after another and went on squandering as if there were gold mountains and silver mines in his backyard. The Beijing authorities had been cautious at first. Xing being a much-touted model Party cadre of the reform, no one wanted to “damage a whole pot of soup with one drop of rat dung.” A special investigation team was sent to Fujian, and the initial discoveries were shocking. Xing had made his real money through smuggling. It was a gigantic operation that covered an incredible range of goods, including automobiles, oils, petrochemical products, liquors, drugs, and weapons. The operation was run by an elaborate network involving his Party connections at all government levels, from the very top in Beijing to the local cops and customs, with the direct or indirect complicity of hundreds of officials. According to one source, the smuggling operation racked up a billion dollars in revenues-an amount equivalent to the province’s annual gross domestic product. No one had taken advantage of the labyrinthine system in a more skillful and more surprisingly simple way-corruption upon corruption.

In order to “get the green light all the way,” he bribed all necessary officials. A Party cadre himself, he knew what worked. A “red envelope” of Chinese yuan or American dollars. If an envelope was returned, he increased the amount until it was finally accepted. With connections secured all over the country, he converted a fifteen-story building in Fujian into a pleasure palace for cadres from everywhere. The mansion was called Red Tower, where the Party officials lost themselves in the woods of the sexiest bodies and emerged as the most loyal allies of Xing in China ’s economic reform.

As more and more irrefutable evidence was gathered, the Beijing authorities became furious. They gave the order to arrest Xing-as a part of the new national anticorruption campaign. But Xing must have been warned at the last minute, for he sneaked out of the country like a rice-paddy eel.

Newspaper reports about Xing began to emerge early in the year, making him the national symbol of the mounting corruption, providing sensational details about fat cats cavorting with young women in the hot tubs of the Red Tower, and speculating about bribery and protection schemes at the highest rungs of the political ladder. But there was something not covered in the media: Xing’s application for political asylum from the U.S., claiming to be the victim of a power struggle, and his threat to reveal the criminal activities of high-ranking Party officials if he was deported. The Beijing authorities were worried that these stories might cost the people’s faith in the Party.

But what could Chief Inspector Chen do about it?

While Xing’s business had reached into a number of cities, he did not have a company or office in Shanghai. All the chief inspector had gotten was a list of Xing’s contacts here. Chen could spend months checking through the names on the list-without getting anywhere.

But Chen understood why Xing’s case could be so politically significant. China ’s economic reform had ignited a powerful engine for financial growth, but it had also opened up a Pandora’s box of greed and corruption. Given the opportunity, some Party officials pillaged and plundered like pirates, so the reform itself was seriously endangered.

Tapping on the file, he realized Detective Yu would be arriving soon. He stood up and began to straighten some old newspapers and books. Yu had been making an effort to quit smoking, so Chen put away the ashtray. The desk was small, and it served as a tea table in the event of a visitor. The efficiency-like room would have looked overcrowded with both a desk and a table.

As expected, Yu came over around twelve. A tall man with a rugged face, he carried several lunch boxes as well as disposable chopsticks and spoons in a plastic bag, which was a surprise to Chen.

“Peiqin’s idea,” Yu said. “She insisted on my going to Old Geng’s place first. Free lunch.”

“Delicious idea.”

Yu’s wife, Peiqin, worked in a state-run restaurant, but she had a sideline job as an accountant at a private restaurant, enjoying a good extra income, plus free food from the restaurant owner, Old Geng. The private restaurant was expanding, and the sideline job had become practically a full-time one. Old Geng talked about having her as a partner, for he knew what a capable woman she was.

“Still quite hot,” Yu went on, opening the boxes. “The crisp skin roast piglet and smoked carp head. Old Geng’s specials.”

Chen took out a bottle of yellow rice wine. “You have something to ask me, Yu,” he said, crunching the crispy pork skin in his mouth.

“It’s an anticorruption case under the Party Discipline Committee, right?” Yu said, not really as a question. “Someone high up wants you to do the job.”

“Not exactly,” Chen said. “Most of the investigation is in Fujian. Xing runs a large corruption empire from there.”

“That bastard!” Yu banged the desk with his fist. “You know what? His Red Tower has become a tourist attraction, in spite of its exorbitant admission fee. People pour in, trying to see the place where those rotten officials luxuriated themselves in ‘the woods of naked bodies, in the pools of mellow wines.’ The local government has to close the building again.”

“Indeed, it’s such a notorious case that the day the news first hit the press,” Chen recalled, “the People’s Daily sold out.”

“With Xing in the United States,” Yu said, taking a sip at the wine, “it may be easy for the Beijing government to blame corruption on Western influences-the result of opening the door and ‘letting in the flies.’”

“That’s way too simplistic,” Chen said. “How have you learned all that so fast?”

“This kind of news people learn in no time. Tell me more about what they want you to do.”

Chen recapitulated what he had learned from Comrade Zhao and from the file this morning. At the end of his summary, he pushed over the list of Xing’s contacts in Shanghai. Yu looked at the list without responding immediately.

“Why can’t they have Xing sent back?” Yu said. “Once he’s back, he has to spill. All his connections. No need for you to do anything.”

“ China is embarking on international cooperation in the legal field, signing extradition treaties with several countries. Some convicts have been returned to China. But Xing is seeking political asylum there by claiming to be a victim of a Party power struggle.”

“It’s a brazen lie. The Americans really buy it?”

“Xing must have planned it for a long time. His family moved to the States several months before his flight, taking much of the evidence with them. That made the investigation really difficult. The evidence we have may not even be admissible in a foreign court, and our demands for extradition can be overruled on technical grounds.”

“It’s a tough job, boss. Most of the people on the list have high positions, or high connections. Not like ordinary canvassing, a cop knocking on one door after another, without worrying about the consequences. These are the doors of the most powerful, capable of getting you into trouble. They may not be able to wreak their anger against the committee, but it will be a different story for that particular knocker.”

“I know. Beijing could have sent someone to Shanghai,” Chen said, “someone who does not have to work here afterward.”

“And all your knocking will make no difference. It’s not a matter of your having the guts. Those officials won’t talk to you, not without undeniable evidence, of which you have none.”

“It may sound like I’m quoting the People’s Daily, but corruption is a cancer of today’s society. We have to do something about it.”

“Well, the recent prosecution and execution of several senior officials may give you the impression that the CCP leadership is committed to this. With all the media operating under government control, however, self-policing may never be practical. It won’t work for a ruling party accountable to no one,” Yu said thoughtfully. “People say that anticorruption campaigns make a lot of thunder these days, and at first, quite a bit of rain too. Then still some thunder, but less rain. After a while, you won’t hear or see anything at all.”

Chen was surprised by Yu’s eloquence. Yu must have given serious thought to the issue. Earlier, much-propagandized campaigns had given people reason to suspect that most of the officials, especially those at the top, would manage to wriggle off the hook.

“It’s like a proverb, Yu. I haven’t seen you for a couple of days, and you talk like another man.”

“You’re a high-profile chief inspector,” Yu said, not responding to Chen’s comment. “It may only be another sign of the Party’s determination.”

“No, I don’t think so. The Party authorities are quite determined in this. For one thing, they have allowed reports about the case to be published in official newspapers. As Comrade Zhao said, corruption could develop ‘to such a serious extent that it will threaten the government.’ “

“Come on. At most, the discipline committee functions like a watchdog. The ultimate decision will be made in the interests of the Party. Whatever investigation is done, it’s still nothing but a show.”

“For me, it’s not a show, as you know.”

“And that’s why it can be so dangerous,” Yu said. “Have you heard the premier’s statement about one hundred coffins?”

“Yes, everybody has heard it.” The premier made it as a gesture of his determination. Knowing that it is impossible to do so, he still tried to do so because it’s what he should do. That was a Confucian statement Chen had learned from his late father. The premier had played an important role, Chen had heard, in pushing for this investigation.

“Even those on the top know it’s an impossible job,” Yu said.

Yu must have his reason to be so worried, Chen suspected. The pork skin no longer tasted crisp, but smoked carp head still made a palatable dish for the wine. He put a large piece of the fish cheek meat on top of Yu’s rice.

“We have done difficult and dangerous cases together before, Detective Yu, and you have never encouraged me to quit. What do you know?”

“There is one thing I have to tell you,” Yu said. “Hua Ting, a veteran cop in Fuzhou, died in a most mysterious way a couple of days ago- within a week after he had taken over the Xing case, a mission similar to yours.”

“Any foul play suspected?”

“As foul as you could imagine. His naked body was found in a prostitute’s room. An overdose of Chinese Viagra-according to the whore’s statement. Stories with such sordid details run like wildfire in tabloid newspapers there. My father, Old Hunter, does not believe it. He knew Hua for years. A family man, and an honest cop, Hua would have never done anything like that.”

“That’s the worst ending possible for a cop. His name tarnished, and he will never rest in peace.”

“Old Hunter discussed it with me and he wanted me to talk to you. You know what? He calls those crooked officials ‘red rats,’ with the barn of the Chinese society under their control.”

“That’s a superb metaphor.” But Chen did not want to push on. He refused to see the system as a barn run by and for red rats. “It reminds me of a fable written by Liu Zhongyuan, a Tang dynasty poet, about such a rat-ravaged barn. For a short period of time, people gave it up, so the rats relieved it was a world of their own. Then one man broke in, and all the rats, so fattened that they could hardly run, were killed in no time.”

“It’s a fable, Chief.”

“Old Hunter and you want me to think more carefully about accepting the job, I understand,” Chen said. “But I really have no choice.”

“Yes, Chief Inspector Chen?”

“You may well call me impossibly bookish or romantic, but when someone like Comrade Zhao says he considers me one of the few Beijing can trust in a difficult situation-as an emperor’s special envoy-what can I say? As Confucius said, ‘If people treat me as the man of the state, I have to live up to the expectation.’”

“I have not read the book.”

“But I will be careful. You may be right about it being possibly a show, and there’s no point in jumping headlong into the muddy river.”

“I didn’t think I could change your mind,” Yu said somberly, “but I had to tell you all that. Having said so, I am still your partner. If you want to work on the case, you have to count me in.”

“Thanks. I know I can always count on you,” Chen said. “But at this stage, it would be better for you to stay in the background.”

“How are you going to proceed?”

“I haven’t decided yet. I’ll talk to the people on the list, I think.”

“It’s like touching the tiger’s tail,” Yu said, draining his cup.

And the tiger could bite.