The Chinese Maze Murders

Tenth Chapter

Judge Dee and Sergeant Hoong had some difficulty in locating Woo's dwelling place. They asked several shops behind the Temple of the War God, but no one had heard of a man called Woo Feng.

Then the judge remembered that he lived over a wine shop called "Eternal Spring". This proved to be a well known establishment, famous for the superior quality of its wines. A street urchin took them into a side alley where they saw a red cloth banner marked "Eternal Spring" fluttering in the wind.

The shop was open in front, a high counter separated it from the street. Along the walls inside a number of large earthenware wine jars were standing on wooden shelves. Red labels pasted on their side proclaimed the excellent quality of the contents.

The proprietor, a pleasant looking round-faced man stood behind the counter idly looking out in the street while picking his teeth.

The judge and Sergeant Hoong walked round the counter and sat down at the square table inside. Judge Dee ordered a small jar of good wine. As the proprietor was wiping the table Judge Dee inquired how his business was doing.

The proprietor shrugged his shoulders.

"Nothing to boast of, he replied, "but fairly steady. And, as I always say, just enough is better than too little!"

"Have you no one to help you in the shop?", the judge asked.

The proprietor turned round to ladle some pickled vegetables from a jar in the corner. He put them in the platter on the table and said:

"I could do with some help, but unfortunately there always goes a hungry mouth with two helping hands. No, I prefer to look after things myself. And what might you two gentlemen be doing in this town?"

"We are just passing through", the judge replied. "We are silk merchants from the capital."

"Well, well!", the other exclaimed, "then you must meet my lodger, a Mr. Woo Feng, who is also from the capital."

"Is this Mr. Woo a silk merchant too?", asked the sergeant.

"No", the proprietor answered, "he is a kind of painter. I don't claim to be a judge in these matters but I have heard people say that he is quite good. And I would say that he is bound to be, for he is at it from morning till night!" Walking over to the stairway he called up: "Master Woo, here are two gentlemen with the latest news from the capital!"

A voice shouted from upstairs:

"I can't leave my work just now. Let them come up!"

The wine merchant was visibly disappointed. The judge consoled him by leaving a generous tip on the table.

They climbed the wooden stairs.

The second floor consisted of one large room lighted by a row of broad lattice windows in front and at the back, pasted over with fine white paper.

A young man clad in outlandish garb was working on a picture representing the Black Judge of the Nether World. He wore a gaudy jacket and his head was covered by a high turban of coloured silk such as is worn by some barbarian tribes over the border.

JUDGE DEE IN WOO FENG'S STUDIO

The painter had spread the silk canvas out on the huge table that stood in the middle of the room. The wall space between the windows was covered entirely by a great number of finished pictures, provisionally mounted on paper scrolls. A bamboo couch stood against the back wall.

"Sit for a while on that couch, gentlemen!", the young man said without looking up from his work, "I am putting in some blue paint here and if I stop the colour will not dry evenly."

Sergeant Hoong sat down on the couch. Judge Dee remained standing and looked with interest at the young man as he was deftly handling his brush. He noticed that the picture, though expertly drawn, showed a number of unfamiliar features, especially in the treatment of the folds in the dresses and of the faces of the persons represented. Looking round at the pictures hanging on the wall the judge found that all of them showed these same foreign features.

The young man added a last stroke, then straightened himself and started washing his brush in a porcelain bowl. As he did so he gave the judge a penetrating look. Slowly moving the brush round in the bowl he said:

"So Your Honour is the new magistrate. Since evidently you are here incognito, I shall not embarrass you with the usual formalities!"

Judge Dee was quite taken back by this sudden statement.

"What makes you think that I am a magistrate?", he asked.

The young man smiled condescendingly. He left the brush in the jar. Folding his arms he leaned back against the table so that he faced Judge Dee and remarked:

"I fancy myself as a portrait painter. Now you, Sir, are the very prototype of a judge. Pray observe this Infernal Judge on this picture here! You could have sat as model for it, though I admit it is by no means a flattering portrait!"

The judge could not forbear smiling. He realized that it was no use to try to fool this clever young man. So he said:

"You are not mistaken, I am indeed Dee Jen-djieh, the new magistrate of Lan-fang, and this is my lieutenant."

Woo nodded slowly. Looking straight at the judge he said:

"Your name is well known in the capital, Sir. Now to what am I indebted for the honour of this visit? I don't think you have come to arrest me. That job you would have left to your constables."

"What", Judge Dee inquired, "makes you think that you might be arrested?"

Woo pushed his turban back.

"Sir, please forgive me for skipping all the usual polite preliminaries. Let me save your time and mine. This morning the news spread that the old General Ding had been murdered. That, by the way, is just what the hypocritical scoundrel deserved. Now that sneaking son of his has been passing the word around that I, the son of Commander Woo who is known to be the General's arch-enemy, intended to kill him. Young Ding has been snooping in this neighbourhood for more than a month, trying to worm information about me out of the proprietor of the shop here, at the same time telling all kinds of slanderous tales.

Doubtless young Ding has now accused me of having killed his father. An ordinary magistrate would have sent out his constables to arrest me immediately. But you, Sir, are known as a man of unusual perspicacity. So you thought you would first come round here yourself and see what I looked like."

Sergeant Hoong had been listening with mounting anger tot his nonchalant statement. Now he jumped up exclaiming:

"Your Honour, the insolence of this dogshead is unbearable!"

Judge Dee raised his hand. He said with a thin smile:

"Mr. Woo and I understand each other perfectly, Sergeant! I for one find him rather refreshing!"

As the sergeant sat down again the judge continued:

"You are right, my friend. Now I shall be as direct as yourself: why did you, the son of a well known military commander in the Board of Military Affairs, settle down all alone in this out-of-the-way place?"

Woo looked round at his pictures on the wall.

"Five years ago", he replied, "I passed the examination for Junior Candidate. To the disappointment of my father I then resolved to break off my studies and devote myself to painting. I worked under two famous masters in the capital but was not satisfied with their style.

Two years ago I happened to meet a monk who had come all the way from Khotan, the tributary kingdom in the far west. That man showed me his style of painting, full of life and exciting colours. I realized that our Chinese artists ought to study that style in order to renew our national art. I thought that I might become the pioneer and resolved to travel to Khotan myself."

"Personally", the judge remarked dryly, "I find our national art perfectly satisfactory and I fail to see what a barbarian foreign nation could ever teach us. But I don't pretend to be a connoisseur. Pray proceed!"

"So I wangled travelling funds from my good father", Woo went on. "He let me go in the hope that this was youthful extravagance, and that some day I would return as a sedate young official. Until two years ago the route to the western kingdoms led via Lan-fang, thus I came here. Then I found that this route had been abandoned for the northern one. Now the plains to the west of this town are inhabited only by roaming Uigur hordes, people without art or culture."

"That being so", Judge Dee interrupted him, "why did you not leave this district at once and travel north to continue your journey?"

The young man smiled.

"That, Sir, is not so easy to make you understand. You must know that I am a lazy man and much given to moods. Somehow or other I felt comfortable here and thought that I might as well stay on for a while and practise. Moreover I took a liking to this house. I am mighty fond of wine and it suits me to have my dealer right under the same roof. That man has an uncanny intuition for a good wine and his stock can compare with the best shops in the capital. So I just stayed on here."

The judge did not comment on this statement. He said:

"Now I come to my second question. Where were you last night, say from the first to the third night-watch?"

"Here!", the young man replied immediately.

"Have you witnesses who can testify to that?"

Woo sadly shook his head.

"No", he replied, "it so happened that I did not know that the General was going to be murdered last night!"

Judge Dee went to the stairway and shouted for the proprietor.

When his round face appeared at the bottom of the stairs the judge called out:

"Just to settle a friendly argument. Did you notice whether Master Woo went out last night?"

The man scratched his head, then said with a grin:

"I am sorry I can't oblige, Sir! Last night there was much coming and going here, I really could not say whether Master Woo went out or not!"

Judge Dee nodded. He stroked his beard for some time, then said:

"Candidate Ding reported that you have hired men to spy on his mansion!"

Woo burst out laughing.

"What a ridiculous lie!", he exclaimed. "I studiously ignore that faked General. I would not spend one copper for knowing what he is doing!"

"What", the judge asked, "did your father accuse General Ding of?"

Woo's face grew serious.

"That old scoundrel", he said bitterly, "sacrified the lives of one battalion of the Imperial army, eight hundred good men in all, to extricate himself from a difficult position. Every single man was hacked to pieces by the barbarians. General Ding would have been beheaded were it not for the fact that at that time there was widespread discontent among the troops. Therefore the authorities did not want the General's foul deed to become common knowledge. He was ordered to tender his resignation."

Judge Dee said nothing.

He walked along the walls and examined Woo's work. It were all pictures of Buddhist saints and deities. The goddess Kwan Yin was very well represented, sometimes single, sometimes with a group of attendant deities.

The judge turned round.

"If I may end a frank conversation with a frank statement", he remarked, "allow me to observe that I don't think that your so-called new style is an improvement. Maybe one must get accustomed to it. You might give me one of those pictures so that I can study your work at leisure."

Woo gave the judge a doubtful look. After a moment of hesitation he took down a medium-size picture showing the goddess Kwan Yin accompanied by four other deities. He spread it out on the table and picked up his seal, an intricately carved small block of white jade. It stood on a dimunitive blackwood stand. Woo pressed the seal on a vermilion seal pad and then stamped it in a corner of the picture. The impression showed a quaint, archaic form of the character Feng, his personal name. Then he rolled the picture up and presented it to the judge.

"Am I under arrest?", he asked.

"A feeling of guilt seems to weigh heavily on your mind", the judge remarked dryly. "No, you are not under arrest. But you will not leave this house until further notice. Good day, and thanks for the picture!"

Judge Dee gave a sign to Sergeant Hoong. They went down the stairway. Woo bowed his farewell. He did not bother to conduct them to the door.

As they were walking down the main street Sergeant Hoong burst out:

"That insolent yokel would talk quite differently if he was lying in the screws before Your Honour's dais!"

The judge smiled.

"Woo is an extremely clever young man", he commented, "but he has already made his first bad mistake!"

Tao Gan and Chiao Tai were waiting in the judge's private office.

They had spent the afternoon in Chien's mansion and collected evidence relating to a few cases of extortion. Tao Gan confirmed Liu Wan-fang's statement in court that Chien Mow had personally directed most affairs; his two counsellors seemed to be just hangers-on who said "Yes!" to their master whenever required.

Judge Dee drank the cup of tea that Sergeant Hoong offered him.

Then he unrolled Woo's picture and said:

"Let us now start our artistic studies! Tao Gan, hang this picture on the wall, next to Governor Yoo's landscape!"

The judge settled back in his armchair and looked for some time at the two paintings.

"These two pictures", he said at last, "contain the key-to the Governor's last will, and to the murder of General Ding!"

Sergeant Hoong, Tao Gan and Chiao Tai turned their footstools round so that they faced the paintings.

Ma Joong came in. He looked astonished at this unusual scene.

"Sit down, Ma Joong!", the judge ordered, "and join this gathering of connoisseurs!"

Tao Gan rose and stood himself with his hands on his back in front of the Governor's landscape. After a while he turned round and shook his head.

"For a moment", he said, "I thought that some inscription in very small letters might be hidden among the leaves of the trees or in the outlines of the rocks. But I cannot discover as much as one single character!"

Judge Dee pensively tugged at his whiskers.

"Last night", he spoke, "I have pondered over that landscape for several hours and early this morning I again scrutinized it inch by inch. I must confess that this painting baffles me."

Tao Gan stroked his ragged moustache. He asked:

"Could not it be, Your Honour, that a sheet of paper has been concealed at the back of the picture, between the lining?"

"I had thought of that possibility too", the judge answered, "and therefore I examined the picture against a strong light. If a sheet of paper had been pasted between the lining it should have shown."

"When I was living in Canton ", Tao Gan said, "I learned the art of mounting pictures. Shall I remove the lining entirely and investigate also the space covered by the brocade frame? At the same time I could verify whether the _wooden rollers at top and bottom of the scroll are solid; it is not unthinkable that the old Governor concealed a tightly rolled piece of paper inside."

"If thereafter you can restore the scroll again to its original form", the judge answered, "by all means try. Although I must confess that such a hiding place seems rather crude to me and unworthy of the Governor's brilliant mind. But we can not afford to pass over the slightest chance for solving this riddle.

This Buddhist picture by our friend Woo is quite another proposition. It contains a definite clue."

Sergeant Hoong asked astonished:

"How can that be, Your Honour? Woo selected that picture for you himself!"

Judge Dee smiled his thin smile.

"That is because Woo did not realize how he had betrayed himself", he answered. "Woo may have no high opinion of my artistic sense, but I saw something in his picture that he himself had overlooked."

Judge Dee sipped his tea. Then he ordered Ma Joong to call Headman Fang.

When Fang was standing in front of the desk Judge Dee looked at him gravely for a while. Then he said kindly:

"Your daughter Dark Orchid is doing well, my First Lady informs me that she is an industrious and intelligent worker."

The headman bowed deeply.

"I am rather reluctant", the judge continued, "to take your daughter from her present safe surroundings, all the more so since there is as yet no news about the fate of your eldest daughter White Orchid. On the other hand Dark Orchid is the most suitable person to gather information for me in the Ding household. With the impending funeral of the General the house will be in great confusion and they will need extra-servants. If Dark Orchid could get herself a position there as temporary maid, she could find out much inside information from the other servants. I do not wish to do anything, however, without the consent of you, her father."

"Your Honour", the headman answered quietly, "I and my family consider ourselves your slaves. Moreover my youngest daughter is an independent and enterprising girl, she would enjoy executing such an order."

Ma Joong had been shifting uneasily on his chair. Now he interrupted:

"Is that not rather a job for Tao Gan, Your Honour?" The judge shot a shrewd glance at Ma Joong. He replied: "There is no better source of information on what is going on in a household than the tittle-tattle of the maids. Instruct your daughter, Headman, to go to the Ding mansion straight away!

As to our friend Woo, I want a double watch on him. You, Ma Joong, will go there tonight as the open watcher. You should make it appear as if you try to remain unobserved but in such a way that Woo realizes that you are a man from the tribunal sent to watch him. You will give him every opportunity to leave the house unobserved. Put all your skill and experience in this job, Ma Joong. This Woo is an extraordinarily clever young fellow!

Tao Gan will be the real watcher, he should take good care to remain hidden. As soon as Woo has eluded Ma Joong, Tao Gan will follow Woo secretly and find out where he goes and what he does. If he tries to leave the city you can come out in the open and arrest him." Tao Gan looked pleased. He said: "Ma Joong and I have practised this trick of the double watch before, Your Honour! I shall now first take the Governor's painting and moisten it so that the lining can soak loose during the night. Then I shall start out with Ma Joong."

When Tao Gan and Ma Joong had taken their leave, the judge consulted with Chiao Tai and Headman Fang about the affairs of the Chien mansion.

He decided that Chien Mow's wives and concubines could be sent back to their respective families. The house servants should be released with one month salary advanced by the tribunal. Only the steward was to be detained for further questioning.

Chiao Tai reported that he was very satisfied with the discipline of the soldiers. Every morning and afternoon he took them through a strenuous military drill. He added that they stood in deadly fear of Corporal Ling.

When the headman and Chiao Tai had left, Judge Dee leaned back in his armchair.

He reflected that after all these years of working together he really knew very little about Chiao Tai. He had been Ma Joong's companion in "the green woods", but about his earlier life the judge knew nothing. Judge Dee had heard Ma Joong's entire story, and several episodes of it even twice. But Chiao Tai had always been very reticent. He seemed to take so much pleasure in his military duties in Lan-fang that Judge Dee wondered whether Chiao Tai had not been originally a career officer. He promised himself that he would try to find out in the near future.

But there were many other more pressing affairs. With a sigh the judge started to study the documents relating to Chien Mow's misdeeds that Tao Gan had placed on his desk.