The Interior

18

WHEN HULAN GOT HOME, DAVID WAS SITTING AT THE kitchen table with several three-by-five cards spread out in two rows before him. As she approached, he put a finger on a card and slowly slid it across the table and up into the top row. Then he repeated the process; only this time he moved a card down from the top row to the bottom row. He didn't look up, not even when she put her hands on his shoulders and began to massage his tense muscles.

"I learned a lot from Miles," he said. "None of it good."

She stopped massaging and sat down next to him. "Tell me," she said, and he did.

With each piece of information he pointed at a matching card. "I've been looking at these since I got back, trying to figure out what happened when. Randall Craig said he knew about conditions at the factory; Henry Knight says they're a complete fabrication; you tell me they may not even be prosecutable in China. Miles practically admitted that he knew that the Knights' disclosures were false; Henry says that they're accurate. When Miaoshan died, she had in her possession documents that suggest that Sun may have accepted bribes; he gave me something that might be related. Then there's Pearl Jenner. She too is a walking contradiction. She knows some things but seems totally ignorant of others. The pieces have to fit together, but I still don't see how."

"Maybe you should try a different approach." Hulan picked up the stack of cards and wrote on a few new ones. When she was done, she laid them out in two columns, leaving an area in the middle empty. On the left were the various crimes; on the right were the names of people that were suspicious. Then she went back to her scribbling.

A moment later she looked back at the two columns and began setting down the new cards. "I am looking for a match, but I also don't think we can separate crimes and criminals from jurisdiction, because I think they're interrelated."

Once her three columns were completed, Hulan surveyed her handiwork.

Miaoshan (murder) China -

Keith Baxter (murder) U.S. -

Xiao Yang (murder) China Aaron Rodgers

Paying bribes China/U.S. Knight International

Accepting bribes China Sun Gan

Illegal working

conditions at Knight – Knight

Illegal filing U.S. Tartan/Knight

of papers to FTC amp; SEC (Phillips, MacKenzie amp; Stout)

Hulan realized how desperate David was when he didn't automatically strike Sun Gan off the chart and that he'd let down his guard enough to let drop that Miaoshan's papers and Sun's papers were similar.

"Why are you so sure about Aaron Rodgers?" David asked. "He was really shaken up when Xiao Yang died."

"He was the last person to see her alive, and everyone else was in the meeting with you," Hulan answered. "I'd also like to put Aaron down for Miaoshan's murder. He was having an affair with her. Maybe she made one too many demands on him. The fact that she had the papers would have meant nothing to him, which explains why he didn't take them." Hulan put a finger on the last card and asked, "What do you think Miles meant when he was talking about Keith? Do you think Keith had found what we've found and told Miles?"

"Miles made it sound that way, but I'm not sure."

"Tell me again what he said about you and Keith."

"Which part?"

"About when Keith died…"

"Miles said that I went out to dinner and 'a guy' gets killed in front of me, that he died in my arms in public," he said.

"Right, and that people would think you'd suffered from post-traumatic stress and had made up all this stuff," she said, motioning to the cards.

"He made it sound like the firm had done me a big favor, like hiring back some brain-injured person as a way of doing the right thing."

"But actually he wanted you back in the fold, where he could control you in case you decided to pursue Keith's death while in the U.S. Attorney's Office."

"I think so."

"So, do you think that the others in the firm know what Miles is up to?"

"I can't imagine it. They're good people."

"Then let me put it this way: How much money will the firm make from the deal?"

"About a million, but a lot of that goes toward overhead…"

"I know it's not much in a law firm," she agreed, dismissing the idea. Then, "I want to know if Miles is the only one behind Keith's murder or if they're all in on it."

David looked back down at the chart, then, keeping his voice light, said, "I don't see that as an alternative here." He peered over at Hulan and asked, "You're not serious?" When she didn't respond, he said, "I worked at the firm for years. You and I met there, for Christ's sake. Was there anything that ever made you think that they were engaged in criminal activities?"

Hulan shrugged. "Times change. Maybe they got greedy."

"But murder! Come on! I don't think Phil or Ralph or Marjorie would go out and kill one of their own partners."

"What about Miles?"

"He's an asshole. But a murderer? The man lives in Brentwood. He's got a couple of kids. He's well respected." Seeing Hulan's smirk, David stopped. He had to smile himself. "All right, so that matches the description of another Brentwood resident, but really! Miles is purely white-collar. I don't see him getting blood on his hands."

"And the other stuff?" she asked, pointing at the card that corresponded to the filing of the paperwork to the FTC. "Could the others be involved in the fraud?"

When David shook his head no, Hulan picked up that card, crossed out Phillips, MacKenzie amp; Stout, and wrote in its place David, Miles, and Keith.

"That makes me feel so much better!" David said.

A strand of Hulan's hair came loose and fell across her cheek. David smoothed it behind her ear.

"You haven't told me what you found out," he said.

She quickly summarized her morning's activities and showed him the travel records. At the end she said, "So like you I'm looking at contradictions. Sun had contact with Americans and yet wasn't punished for that during the Cultural Revolution. Or I should say that his punishment was mild. Kneeling in glass, a few struggle meetings, are nothing. I would have expected ten years of reform through labor."

"Maybe he was lucky…"

"His file also says that he hasn't accepted bribes, but we have circumstantial evidence that he has, which is why his name's on the chart," she said, pointing at the card. "But does someone's essential nature change?"

"Everyone says that Sun is good. His power is based on the premise that he's honest."

"Power may be the key word. Power corrupts, and my government is by definition corrupt," Hulan admitted.

"You said it, not me. But, yes, China does have a little problem now and then with corruption."

"Is that what happened to Miles?" Hulan asked.

"Power, money, for him I think they're synonymous."

"And Henry Knight and Randall Craig?"

"My country was built by corporate and industrial bandits. We glorify people who've pulled themselves up by their boot straps by any means possible."

They sat silent for a few minutes, then Hulan asked, "What are you going to do now?"

"I'm going to go for a run, take a shower, put on a suit, and go to the banquet."

"What about Miles?"

"What about him? He said I could quit. I won't." David hesitated, then repeated himself, this time with more conviction. "We're going to that banquet. We're going to put smiles on our faces, act charming, and hope one of the players slips. When and if one does, I want to see it."

"Then I suppose I'd better figure out what I'm going to wear." She stood and smiled. This was the closest she'd felt to him since they'd looked at Miaoshan's papers together, for he was finally speaking to her as a trusted lover again rather than an inspector. She smoothed her hands over her slightly swelling belly. "I hope I have something that fits."

It was an intimate thing to say, and as David grabbed her hand, brought her close, and looked into her eyes, she thought he might respond in kind. But he had something else on his mind. "Did you tell me everything?"

She felt the professional wall come back down between them. She met his gaze squarely. "Did you?"

"Yes," he said, though he'd left out the way Miles had implied much more clearly than Hulan surmised that he might have had something to do with Keith's death. But David couldn't bring himself to believe it. David knew Miles, played tennis with him, was his law partner. The idea that Miles was a murderer was inconceivable. But if on some chance it was true, then David would have to deal with it in his own way. He couldn't allow Miles to become a victim of the Chinese legal system.

"I told you everything too," Hulan said, though she'd withheld the names of Sun's banks in China and abroad. That information would be useless to David. In America he'd need a court order to gain access to Sun's accounts. But David was in China, and besides, he would never use a court order against his own client. To Hulan, however, Sun was nothing but a suspect. If she had to, she'd use, to quote David, any means possible to bring Sun to justice, even if that ultimately meant betraying David's trust, because… Because it was in her nature to put duty first- whether on the Red Soil Farm or here in Beijing-before matters of her own heart. She couldn't allow herself to forget that again.

The silence lingered between them, then David said, "That's good. We don't want any secrets between us."

Hulan pulled away. "I'd better get ready."

The Beijing Hotel was the oldest of the grand hotels in the city. It sat at the end of Wangfujing Street where it intersected with Chang An, the imperial boulevard of Eternal Peace. The Beijing was a venerable dowager that had seen it all. Today she was comprised of three wings, each representing a different incarnation. The oldest dated back to the days when she was the Hotel de Pekin, a French-owned establishment originally designed to appeal to decadent and cosmopolitan foreign guests. The west wing had been built in the fifties for the more severe requirements of Soviet visitors. The newest wing, the " Distinguished Guests Building," attempted to serve the needs of today's most demanding guests-foreign and Chinese. Although not as popular with Americans as some of the new hotels that had sprung up around the city, the Beijing's location-within walking distance of Tiananmen Square, the huge governmental edifices that bordered it, and the ancient Forbidden City-made it a preferred venue for business meetings and banquets for officials and dignitaries.

The banquet was scheduled to start at six. Although Tartan and Knight were American companies, Chinese custom would prevail since Governor Sun and a few low-level ministry officials would be in attendance. This meant that the banquet would start promptly at six and end precisely at eight. However, this was not the only event taking place at the Beijing Hotel on this particular evening, as Hulan and David discovered when Investigator Lo attempted to drop them off. Several limousines and Town Cars clogged the entrance, depositing parties of young people, men in business suits, and entire families. As Lo edged forward in the line, he suggested that these people might be here for wedding banquets. This assessment was verified as they reached the entrance and saw a couple of men with video cameras capturing the arrivals for wedding tapes.

David and Hulan edged past the video crews, who jostled to get shots of everyone entering the building. Once inside, they looked around the bustling lobby until they found Miss Quo, who'd been invited as part of the permanent staff of the Beijing office of Phillips, MacKenzie amp; Stout.

Unlike the typical law firm underling who adhered to modestly priced, conservative styles, she was dressed this evening in an elegant black slip dress bought off a couture runway in Paris. Yet it was Miss Quo who gushed over Hulan's outfit-a summer dress made from silk the color of a ripe persimmon. Over this Hulan wore a handmade short-sleeve jacket woven from the thinnest strands of rice straw. These clothes, like so many of Hulan's, had come from her mother's trunks and dated back many decades to a period in China when wealth meant time and luxury, refinement and grace, no matter what the temperature.

David and the two women walked up the sweeping staircase to the second-floor banquet rooms. Knight had followed Chinese tradition by booking two connected rooms-one for sitting, one for eating. Outside the door, Henry was speaking intensely to his son. As David and Hulan approached, they heard Doug's reply.

"Dad, I've said it a hundred times today," he said impatiently. "If you want to cancel the sale entirely, fine. We fix everything and move forward, but…" When he noticed that the others had arrived, his voice changed. "David, good to see you. You have a nice flight up?"

Henry stared from his son to David and back again. Just as he was about to say something, Miles poked his head through the door and said, "I wondered where you two had gone. Oh, and here's David and Hulan." Miles gave Hulan a hug and kiss, then said, "It's been a long time. You're more beautiful today than when I last saw you. No wonder David's turned his world upside down to get back to you."

During this exchange David watched as Doug took his father's elbow and led him back into the room, but not before Henry looked back over his shoulder at David, a worried look on his face. Then David's attention was drawn back to Miles, who was shaking his hand, smiling warmly, and saying sotto voce, "I knew you'd come around."

Together they entered the sitting room, which was lined with thirty overstuffed easy chairs upholstered in heavy gray wool with tatted antimacassars on the arms and headrests from which a vague smell of mothballs wafted. On the walls were a series of landscape scrolls, each showing a different season.

Whereas in the U.S. the cocktail hour was designed for casual mingling, this portion of a Chinese banquet was carefully scripted, with the bigwigs on the north and south walls communicating across the expanse of the room in formulaic sentences. As a result, where people sat was carefully strategized according to rank and importance.

As if nothing had happened, Randall Craig rose from his chair, greeted David warmly, shook hands with Hulan and Miss Quo, and began introducing them to those already seated. Governor Sun, as the highest-ranking official, sat in the middle chair against the northern wall. To his left sat Henry Knight, while on his right was Assistant Secretary Amy Gao. Flanking out from them and lining the walls to Sun's right and left were officials from several government entities. By the time these introductions were done, Miss Quo had taken a chair far from the middle along one of the side walls, thus showing her very low rank.

Somewhere above the middle of the west wall, Randall began to introduce David and Hulan to Nixon Chen, who was representing one of the government agencies.

"No introduction necessary, Mr. Craig," Nixon said, jumping up and pumping David's hand. "We are old, old friends! I have known Liu Hulan my entire life, and David from my years in America." In answer to Randall's unasked question, Nixon rattled on. "Like Liu Hulan I was sent to America to study. She was there for many more years than I, but for some of those years we were in the same place."

"Phillips, MacKenzie had an innovative program," David explained to Randall. "Almost as soon as Nixon-President Nixon-opened China, the firm started hiring one or two Chinese law students who were studying in the States each year as summer clerks or even as associates. As you can see, the program had long-term benefits. People like Nixon here returned to China and have risen to positions of power."

"Not anymore," Nixon said with feigned indignation. "Now that you've come, you'll put the rest of us Chinese attorneys out of business."

"I doubt that."

"Really? Look what's happened to my business for Tartan. You don't know this, Mr. Craig, but I've done a lot of work for your company. Until now Miles always sent me your China matters, but no longer. Now he has a 'big gun' in Attorney Stark."

"Don't believe everything you hear," David warned Randall. "Attorney Chen is one of the highest-paid lawyers in all of China." Then to Nixon he added, "I recall you said that you bill like New York lawyers."

Nixon patted his ample waist. " Beijing is the third most expensive city in the world. I have to take care of myself and my hundred employees. We want to live the high life! Given that, I should bill even more than I do."

Randall Craig seemed to lose interest in the small talk and edged back to his chair, which stood directly across the room from Sun. This south wall was home to the Tartan entourage. Since Doug Knight would be staying with Tartan after the sale, he too was on this wall, seated to Randall's left. To Randall's right was Miles Stout. David caught his eye. The senior partner gave a subtle nod to the two chairs next to him. Hulan and David crossed the room and sat down. They had been placed on a wall of equal importance to Sun and firmly in the Tartan camp.

It was going to be a long night.

At six-thirty exactly, the party began moving to the other room. Governor Sun sidled up to David and, slowing his pace so that the others would pass them, asked in a low voice, "Have you had a chance to look at the papers I sent over?"

"Yes," David answered stiffly. As much as he tried to believe in his client's innocence, he was becoming increasingly convinced of his guilt.

"We need to talk-"

"I tried to see you yesterday. I was told you were unavailable."

A frown creased Sun's face, then instantly smoothed away. "I'm sorry if it was an inconvenience. Tomorrow I will come to your office at ten. Is that okay?" But Sun didn't wait for a response. Instead he raised his voice and said affably, "David, tonight you are in for a treat. The Beijing Hotel always provides a fine banquet." He gestured with his arm into the dining room, and David entered.

The room had been set up with three tables of ten place settings apiece. Name cards marked each seat, so that decorum would be maintained. David and Hulan were seated at the head table with Governor Sun, Randall Craig, Miles Stout, Doug and Henry Knight, one of Randall's minions, and a vice minister from COSCO, the largest shipper of merchandise out of China. Nixon Chen had also made the cut.

Unlike Chinese restaurants in other parts of the world where the food was served family-style in the middle of the table, banquets in China were presented course by course on individual plates. The first dish offered three cold selections-shredded jellyfish, cold steamed chicken, and a few thin slices of barbecued pork. Accompanying this was a glass of mao tai, a fiery and fierce liquor. Almost immediately the sense of conviviality rose in the room.

Within minutes, David could understand why Nixon Chen had been placed at this table. Nixon was jovial and irreverent. He led the toasts. He yammered on in flowery terms about his law firm ("The best and most profitable in all of China "), about David's return to China ("You think I'm joking when I say you will steal my business! Everywhere I go people say to me, I only want that new American lawyer. Isn't that right, Governor Sun?"), about David and Hulan's true love ("A love that has spanned two continents, two decades, and an ocean"). He entertained the table with his recent dining exploits. He still frequented the Black Earth Inn, where other former Phillips, MacKenzie associates met once a week for a meal and to network, but he'd also found a new place that he was quite fond of. "Like the Black Earth, the Autumn Jade Western-style Food Restaurant is also a nostalgia restaurant. I'm not talking about one of those nightclub places like they have in Shanghai -all gangsters and beautiful femmes fatales. No, this one is from my parents' generation. The Autumn Jade celebrates the fifties and our relationship with the Soviet Union. I tell you, until I went there I had never had food like that. It is nice if you want a retreat from the luxury life. You understand my meaning?"

Nixon's main interest was Governor Sun. It turned out they had met before, and they bantered easily about mutual friends and business acquaintances. But Nixon never let well enough alone.

"Every day I go to my office building I think to myself, no one can believe I have climbed so high. Every day I remember back to the Cultural Revolution and my years on the Red Soil Farm with Liu Hulan. Are you familiar with that place, Governor Sun? It is in your home province of Shanxi, not too far from Taiyuan."

"Attorney Chen, many people remember the Red Soil Farm. It was a model in our province and a place where I took many visitors."

Nixon snorted. "We never saw you, right, Hulan?"

"And I don't recall meeting you either, Attorney Chen," Sun said.

"How could you?" Nixon queried. "You were one and we were one thousand. Besides, we were too busy working in the fields under that sun of yours."

"That sun, as you call it, belongs to all of us," Sun responded smoothly. "And, as much as I like Beijing, I find the heat as harsh here as in the countryside. Only here you see no blue sky, only haze, coal dust, and Mongolian dust." Sun turned his attention to Hulan. "Now I understand who you are, Miss Liu, or should I say Inspector Liu?" Sun addressed the table. "Did you know that our beautiful companion tonight is the daughter of a very famous man in China and Miss Liu herself is a notable person in her own right?"

Doug asked the question that some of the Americans were wondering about. "What are you, then? A policewoman?"

Nixon Chen laughed. "Policewoman? Ha! She is with the Ministry of Public Security. Do you know what that is?" When Doug didn't answer, Nixon elaborated in his oddly colloquial English. "You don't want to know! It's like the FBI or KGB. Liu Hulan is one of our best investigators. Little fish, big fish, they are the same to her. She reels them in, slits them open, and sets them on the steamer. With Liu Hulan you are cooked!"

As Nixon spoke, David casually observed the others' reactions. Sun seemed indifferent, as did Randall Craig. Henry stared at his son, while Doug tried to look everywhere but at his father. In fact, it seemed to David that Doug had tried to catch someone's eye at the next table, but David couldn't see whose. Miles's fair complexion looked sunburned, but his expression was the same one he presented in the courtroom-coolly unconcerned. And Hulan, well, she looked amused.

"I'll tell you where she learned that," Nixon continued as a second course of sauteed squid arrived. "On the Red Soil Farm. There was no forgiveness there."

"Those were dark days for all of us," Sun said.

Hulan, who'd read Sun's dangan, knew that this wasn't the case. "But you were only a visitor to the Red Soil Farm, while we-and others like us-had to live and work there or at places like that," she said.

"Or places that were worse, like hard labor camps," Sun said knowingly.

"Anyone who reads a newspaper or watches television knows that my father spent time at the Pitao Reform Camp in Sichuan Province," Hulan said. "For some people, like my father and myself, personal stories of misdeeds and good works, of sacrifice and punishment, are very public. For others…" She let her voice drift off, hoping that Sun would accept the challenge.

But Sun was a politician. In his career, success was tied to the ability to deflect difficult questions. "The media is a game we must play, Inspector. I think many of your problems have stemmed from your inexperience. You let them say what they want about you. You never fight back. You do not wear a smile on your face. You don't work behind the scenes to build friendships. And so you react when you should be ruling what is said."

"That's a Western view," Hulan observed. "I think you've seen too many western movies!"

"You're absolutely right," Sun agreed cheerfully. "You want to know when I saw those movies? It was at the end of the war with Japan. They had them for the American soldiers who came to help us. Remember that, Henry?"

Henry barely nodded.

Sun continued. "Later I saw other western movies, and I'll always remember them for the way that people stood strong for what they believed in. Such an American trait, don't you think? To be unafraid to speak your mind, to believe in the human right to grow and change and be free?"

"It is words like that that make you very popular in China," Nixon said.

"It is words like that that we all want to follow," Sun clarified.

"This is why you are at the center of power," Nixon went on.

Sun tipped his head, modestly accepting the compliment. "But this isn't America. I can say many things today and tomorrow who knows?"

"Maybe tomorrow will bring even greater freedom. You can't turn back the clock," Nixon said.

"I just want my province to prosper and improve the quality of life for my people."

It was pure political talk, and Randall Craig, like many of the others at the table, was caught up in the sentiment. "It is people like you who will make China great in the next century."

"But, Mr. Craig, it is people like you who will make that possible. When you bring money to people, it changes their lives."

Hulan glanced at David. Was this the first parry in a new relationship that would be based on illegal money changing hands? David in turn shot a look across the table to Miles, but the senior partner was smiling and acting every inch the part of the great facilitator. Then David's eyes drifted over to Henry. This man, usually so light-hearted, had grown increasingly dispirited through dinner.