The Lacquer Screen

XII

This time Judge Dee entered the tribunal by the main gate. He gave his red card, reading 'Shen Mo, Commission Agent', to one of the guards, together with a small tip, and asked him to have it brought to Counsellor Pan. Soon a clerk came and led him past the chancery to Pan Yoo-te's office.

Pan pushed a pile of official documents aside and bade Judge Dee sit down opposite him. He poured a cup of tea from the large pot on his desk, then began, with a harried look on his face:

'You'll have no doubt heard the terrible news, Mr Shen! The magistrate is nearly distracted with grief. I am really worried about him. This morning he suddenly had the banker Leng Chien arrested, you know. And Leng is one of our prominent citizens. The whole town is talking about it! I do hope that the magistrate didn't make a mistake . . . Everything goes wrong today! There couldn't be an autopsy, as our coroner had left town without even informing us! And the man is always so punctilious! ' He suddenly remem­bered his manners and asked quickly: 'I trust you had a pleasant day, Mr Shen? Did you visit the Temple of the City God? It was rather hot this afternoon, I fear, but I hope ...'

'I did visit a very curious place,' the judge cut him short, 'in the second street to the left of the west gate.'

He closely watched Pan's face, but it was completely blank.

'The second street?' Pan repeated. 'Oh, now I know! You've made a slight mistake. It's the third street you mean, of course! Yes, that old Buddhist chapel there is quite unusual; it's very old, you know. It was founded three hundred years ago by an Indian priest who . . .'

Judge Dee let him tell the entire story without interrupting him. He thought that, if it had been Pan who had spied on the couple, he certainly was a consummate actor. When Pan had concluded his historical dissertation, the judge said:

'I mustn't take too much of your time. Mrs Teng's murder is keeping you very busy, of course. Is there any clue to the murderer yet?'

'Not that I know of,' Pan replied. 'But then the magis­trate may know more. He keeps the investigation entirely in his own hands, quite understandably, of course, seeing that the victim was his own wife! A tragedy, a terrible tragedy, Mr Shen!'

'It will be very sad news for all their friends,' Judge Dee remarked. 'Since Mrs Teng was a poetess, I assume that she belonged to some literary ladies' circle here?'

'I can see,' Pan said with a smile, 'that you don't know the Tengs very well! They went out very little, you know. The magistrate took part in all official functions, of course, but apart from that he kept very much to himself; he doesn't have any particular friend among the gentry here. He takes the view that a magistrate ought to be completely impartial and have no local attachments. And Mrs Teng hardly went out at all. She only used to spend a few days regularly with her widowed sister. The husband was a wealthy landowner; he died young, when he was thirty-five and she just thirty. He left her that splendid country house outside the north gate. The air there did Mrs Teng a lot of good. The maids said she always looked so cheerful and well when she came back from there. And she needed it this time too, for the last couple of weeks she had been in bad health and looked very pale and sad. . . . And now she is dead!'

After a suitable pause Judge Dee decided he would try another direct attack. He said casually:

'Today I happened to see in a shop a painting by one of the local artists, called Leng Te. They said he knew Mrs Teng well.'

Old Pan looked astonished for a moment. But then he said:

'I didn't know that, but it's very likely, now I come to think of it. The painter was a distant relative of the dead landowner, he also visited the country house of Mrs Teng's elder sister frequently. Yes, he must have met Mrs Teng there, of course. A pity he died so young, for he was a gifted artist. His pictures of birds and flowers were excellent. He specialized in lotus flowers, in quite an original style, too.'

The judge thought that this was getting him nowhere at all. He had learned where the lovers could have met, but he hadn't come one step nearer to the main issue, the identity of the mysterious third person involved. And the madame's description seemed to point directly at Pan: tall but thin, the air of authority, the limp ... He decided to make a last attempt. Leaning forward, he said in a low, confidential voice:

'Yesterday you told me much about the historical sites of this city, Mr Pan. Now those are very interesting for day­time. But after dark the thoughts of a lonely traveller naturally turn to, ah . . . more recent art, more tangible beauty, one might say. Doubtless there are a few places here where charming damsels . . .'

'I have neither the inclination nor the leisure for frivolous entertainment,' Pan interrupted him stiffly. 'Hence I am unable to give you any information on that particular sub­ject.' Then, remembering that, after all, this vulgar fellow had come with an introduction from the Prefect, he added with a forced smile: 'I married rather young, you see, and I have two wives, eight sons and four daughters.'

Judge Dee reflected ruefully that this truly impressive record definitely disposed of the possibility that old Pan was a pervert. The mysterious visitor had to be another person, as yet unknown. Perhaps Mrs Teng's writings would supply a clue. He emptied his teacup, then resumed:

'Although as a simple merchant I don't claim to under­stand much of literature, I always read the magistrate's poetry with great admiration. I never saw, however, an edition of his wife's collected poems. Could you tell me where I could find one?'

Pan pursed his lips.

'That's difficult!' he replied. 'Mrs Teng was a woman of a most sensitive disposition, and of extreme modesty. The magistrate told me that he had often tried to persuade her to have her work published, but she always resolutely re­fused, so that he had to give up in despair.'

'That's a pity,' Judge Dee said, 'I would have liked to read her poetry, to enable me to say a few sympathetic things to the magistrate about it, when I go to offer him my con­dolences.'

'Well,' Pan said, 'perhaps I can help you. Last week Mrs Teng sent me a copy-book containing her poems, written out by herself. She added a note asking me to verify whether there were mistakes in some references to the historical sites of Wei-ping. I'll have to return the manuscript to the magistrate soon, but if you want, you can have a look at it now.'

'Excellent!' Judge Dee exclaimed. 'I'll just sit down with it over by the window there, so that you can get on with your work!'

Pan opened a drawer and took out a bulky volume bound in plain blue paper. The judge went over to the armchair in front of the window.

First he quickly leafed through the volume. It was written in the same neat hand as the second couplet of the poem he had seen in the house of assignation, with only some minor differences. These could, of course, be explained by the fact that the copy-book had been written out carefully in the quiet library, while the couplet was jotted down during a secret rendezvous.

Then he began to read the poems, from the beginning. Soon he found himself completely captivated by this truly magnificent poetry. Judge Dee took the narrow Confucianist view that the only poetry worthy of the name served either an ethical or didactic purpose. In his youth he himself had written a long poem on the importance of agriculture. He had little interest in verses that were just lyrical effusions or that recorded only fleeting moods. But he had to admit that Mrs Teng's masterful command of the language and her original imagery lent her poetry a compelling beauty. She had the gift of the adjective; as a rule she used only one to define a mood or scene, but that one word summed up all the essential features. Some of the striking similes he remembered having encountered in the magistrate's published poetry also, evidently the pair had worked together very closely.

He put the volume in his lap and sat there staring at nothing, pensively caressing his side-whiskers. Pan shot him an astonished look but the judge did not notice it. He asked himself how it could be possible that a great poetess, a re­fined, sensitive woman, happily married to a husband with whom she shared the same interests, could ever become an adulteress. That a woman whose delicate sentiments were so convincingly recorded in her poetry, could ever stoop to the sordidness of secret meetings in a bawdy house — the smirking madame, the sly tips — it seemed utterly incredible. A sudden, passionate affair with a rough-and-ready youngster, violent and brief — such a thing might not be wholly impossible. Women were strange creatures. But the young painter had been the same type of man as her own husband, with the same interests. He angrily tugged at his moustache. It didn't fit at all.

Suddenly he remembered the slight differences in the hand­writing. Could it be that the woman who secretly met the painter was not Mrs Teng, but her elder sister, the young widow? She had worn Mrs Teng's earrings and bracelets, but sisters often lend each other their trinkets. The painter had been a distant relative, so the young widow had had even more opportunities for meeting him than had Mrs Teng. Moreover, there were two other sisters. He asked Pan:

'Tell me, are Mrs Teng's other sisters also living in the country house outside the north gate?'

'As far as I know,' Pan replied, 'there's only one sister there, Mr Shen, and that is the landowner's widow.'

The judge returned the volume to him. 'Excellent poetry!' he commented. He now felt sure that the young widow had been Leng Te's paramour. Of course her handwriting would resemble closely that of Mrs Teng. When they were still young girls they would have been taught by the same private tutor. Probably the elder sister had planned to marry the painter as soon as the years of mourning prescribed by the rites had passed. Their secret meetings were of course utterly wrong, but that was no concern of his. Neither was he interested in the depraved taste of the mysterious man who had spied on the couple. He had been wrong. He rose with a sigh and asked Pan to announce him to the magistrate.

When Judge Dee was seated with Magistrate Teng at the table in his library, he said:

'Tomorrow we'll leave here for the prefectural city, Teng. I did my best, but I have failed to discover the slightest in­dication that my theory about an intruder being implicated in the death of your wife was correct. You were right, it would indeed have been too much of a coincidence. I am sorry, Teng. Tonight I shall try to evolve a plausible explana­tion for Mrs Teng's body having been found in the marsh, and I shall take full responsibility for the delay in reporting the tragedy to the Prefect.'

Teng nodded gravely. He said:

'I deeply appreciate all you have done for me, Dee! It is I who must apologize for the trouble I put you to, and that on your holiday! Your presence in itself is a great comfort to me. Your sympathetic understanding and readiness to help are things I shan't easily forget, Dee.'

The judge was touched. Teng would have been fully justi­fied in showering reproaches on him, for he had tampered with evidence and retarded a murder investigation. More­over, he had given Teng idle hopes. It flashed through his mind that he was glad indeed he had sent the coroner away with a faked message. In this hot weather decomposition would have so far advanced by now that a detailed autopsy would be impossible. Thus Teng would fortunately never know what he had done before killing his wife. Judge Dee still thought it very strange, but one really knew very little about the vagaries of a sick mind. He said:

'I hope you'll give me a chance to try to make myself use­ful in another respect, Teng. Namely, in the case of Ko Chih-yuan's demise. I expect that you'll say you are sick and tired of my theories, but the fact is that I happened to stumble on some rather interesting ramifications of that case. The banker Leng Chien is involved in it. He confessed to me that he had been swindling Ko for large amounts. That is why I sent you the message asking you to have him arrested. I just heard that you complied with my request at once. I am really quite embarrassed by your confidence in my slender abilities, Teng! But I trust that in this case at least I shan't disappoint you!'

The magistrate passed his hand over his eyes with a weary gesture.

'That's true!' he said, 'I had quite forgotten about that case!'

'Today you won't feel like going into that further, I sup­pose. You would really do me a favour if you would allow me to conduct an investigation, together with your coun­sellor.'

'By all means!' Teng replied. 'You are perfectly right in thinking that I couldn't give that complicated case the attention it deserves. I can't think of anything but our inter­view with the Prefect tomorrow. You are really very thought­ful, Dee!'

The judge felt embarrassed. Outwardly Teng might seem a cold man, but his reserve concealed a warm nature. He had been a fool to assume that his wife had been deceiving him. He said:

'Thank you, Teng! I would propose that you tell Pan my real identity, so that I can go over the official records of the case with him.'

The magistrate clapped his hands. When the old steward appeared he told him to summon Pan Yoo-te.

The old counsellor was taken aback when he learned Judge Dee's identity. He immediately started upon a long apology for his casual attitude towards him. But Judge Dee cut him short, and asked Teng to excuse them.

When the still confused Pan was leading him to his private office, the judge noticed that it had grown dark outside. He said to Pan:

'I think that both of us are entitled to a bit of fresh air! I would be pleased if you would join me for dinner in a restaurant, and order some local specialities for me.'

Pan protested that he couldn't possibly accept that honour; but the judge insisted, adding that to the outer world he was, after all, still Mr Shen, the commission agent. At last the old counsellor agreed. They left the tribunal together.