The Master of Rain

Five

Caprisi led Field down the stairs to the basement and through the swing doors of Pathology to the darkened lab at the end. There was a single, bright light in the ceiling and the room was heavy with the smell of formaldehyde. Krauss, in his long white coat, was standing next to Maretsky.

Lena Orlov lay flat on her back on a metal trolley in front of them. A white sheet covered her from the swell of her breasts to below her knees. Somehow she looked more peaceful here.

“No assault,” Maretsky said, shaking his head.

“No sexual assault,” Caprisi corrected.

“Time of death,” Krauss said, with only the faintest hint of a German accent. “I would say around one o’clock in the morning. If the Russian neighbor found her at one o’clock in the afternoon, then I think she’d already been dead almost twelve hours.”

“No consensual sex?” Caprisi asked.

“Not as far as I can tell.”

“Then why the fancy underwear and the handcuffs?”

Krauss shrugged. Field didn’t know if it was the light, but Lena Orlov’s skin looked even whiter than it had in the flat.

“Some kind of fantasy,” Maretsky said. “Was she a prostitute?”

“We’re not sure of her circumstances yet,” Caprisi said. He turned and it was a second or two before Field realized that he was required to expand.

“Her file is thin,” he said.

“There’s a surprise,” Caprisi said.

“She used to be a tea dancer,” Field went on. “She attended meetings with known Bolsheviks, but I agree with Caprisi, that needs further investigation, because it looks like she was from an aristocratic background in Russia.”

“All right,” Maretsky said firmly, as if not wanting to dwell on this. “So it’s the usual gray area. A tea dancer makes an arrangement with a man for a sexual meeting, either through her association with Lu or some other avenue. She lets him into the flat . . . Did anyone see him come in?”

“I just sent Chen back down,” Caprisi said, “but Lu owned the building, so you can be reasonably sure that no one will have heard or seen anything.”

“The man comes in,” Maretsky went on. “He makes sure she is in these panties . . .” Maretsky thought for a moment, a chubby fist to his mouth, staring at Lena Orlov’s face through his dirty, round, steel-framed glasses. “I think this is a precise fantasy. Everything must be right. He gets her to wear these particular underclothes. Perhaps they have had a relationship or . . . arrangement, and she knows this is his exact fantasy. He handcuffs her to the bed.” Maretsky’s accent seemed to get thicker, Field noticed, the more he had to think, as if the process of drawing on a mental filing cabinet compiled during a different era automatically transported him back there. “Then he . . . This is the point.” He shrugged. “One could say it is a convenient way of ensuring that she cannot resist or fight. Perhaps it even allows him to put a hand over her mouth. But, of course, it’s more than that. This is part of the fantasy. She must be helpless. Supine. Entirely under his control.”

They were silent again.

“So they’d met before?” Caprisi asked. “Whoever it was, it was definitely not a first assignation?”

“Possibly.” Maretsky shrugged again. “Probably. I would guess there was a pattern that led up to this: same setting, with the underwear and the handcuffs, but not going to this point. Perhaps culminating in some form of violence, but not murder.”

Field looked at Lena Orlov’s face. There was no sign of any bruising there, nor on her neck or shoulders, but she seemed nonetheless to bear the hallmarks of a victim. Perhaps it was because of what he knew, or thought he did, of her circumstances, but he could imagine her allowing herself to be beaten.

He saw Natasha Medvedev again in his mind’s eye, strong hands clutching at her shoulders until the knuckles whitened. Would she have submitted herself to violence in this manner?

“So it couldn’t be the result of an argument?” Caprisi asked. “Jealousy? Lovers’ quarrel?”

“It’s possible, but it is better to begin with what is likely.”

Maretsky displayed a disarming modesty. Field thought it was the deliberate act of a clever man to tailor his manner to his audience.

“But you think not?” Caprisi asked.

Maretsky turned to the pathologist.

“Savage stabbing. Eighteen in all,” Krauss said, nicotine-stained fingers pressed to his lips. He dropped a hand and pulled back the sheet, revealing Lena’s naked, punctured body. The blood had been cleaned from her skin, which made the livid bruising around the stab wounds even more visible. There were so many holes that in some places the skin looked as though it had been stretched too thin and hung like thread. In others—around the top of her vagina—incisions grouped close together had created deep craters. Field blanched and turned away. Caprisi eyed him curiously, as if surprised at his squeamishness.

“See,” Krauss went on as Field forced himself to turn back. “Frenzied. Again and again, in her stomach and in the upper part of her sexual organs.” He reached down and put one long, slim, bony finger on the dark mound of hair at the base of Lena Orlov’s stomach. “Here, and on her breasts also.”

“This is not sudden anger,” Maretsky went on, no longer prepared to invite conflicting views. “Not the anger that stems from a disagreement or jealousy: that would be done in a flash, then instantly recoiled from. One incision, or a couple at most, instantly regretted as the perpetrator senses this will result in death and that he has gone too far. No, this stems from a deep-seated rage. It is perhaps sexual in nature. It has been building for a long time. The relationship . . . arrangement . . . has been leading up to this point, though poor Lena has not known it. It has exploded here.”

“He’s done this before?” Caprisi asked.

“Perhaps.”

“Perhaps, or he has?”

“He has, I would say.”

“But we haven’t seen anything like it?”

“I’m checking the records. And we’re talking to the French gendarmerie. We’ve even contacted the Chinese police, not that that will do any good.”

Once again, they all stared silently at Lena Orlov’s body, until Field cleared his throat and took a step back.

They left Maretsky and Krauss together in the basement—both, Field thought, in their own way, creatures of the darkness—and got back into the lift. Caprisi pulled across the metal cage door with unnecessary aggression and leaned back heavily on the wall behind him.

“I’m sorry to be ignorant,” Field said, “but are all tea dancers prostitutes?”

“Try one for size and you’ll see.”

Caprisi hit the buttons for the third and fourth floors, then leaned back again with a sigh, his face softening. He seemed suddenly less hostile. “You know,” he went on, “they say these Russian women commit suicide at the rate of one a week. They come here with nothing . . .” Caprisi turned to him. “You imagine, you grow up in a beautiful house, with a large staff and the belief that the world is there to serve you and then”—he flicked his fingers—“all gone. Months if not years of terror as you escape across the vast wilderness of your country, and then you wind up here, penniless, your father and mother probably dead. How do you support your siblings? What do you do to stay alive? If you do nothing, then you live on the streets and slowly starve to death.”

The lift seemed to be moving more slowly than ever. Field thought of the big house his own mother had been brought up in and the shame of his father’s bankruptcy.

“Some teach English, or music, or French or Russian. Many of them go to the cabarets and offer themselves for a dance at a dollar a time. You want more? Maybe, maybe not. Depends on their mood, on you, on the money.”

They’d reached the third floor. Caprisi jammed his foot in the door.

“That’s the demimonde. Les entraîneuses, they call them. The entertainers. Beautiful, sad women, reduced to a life nothing could have prepared them for, and which many cannot manage.”

Caprisi was staring at Field with intense, dark eyes. “Try one, Field, and see how much you hate yourself.” Then he stepped out and walked away.

Field now put his foot against the door. “I didn’t know you were married.”

Caprisi turned. “Who says I’m married?”

“The photograph . . . I thought . . .”

“Don’t pry, Field. I told you that.”

“Why did Chen have to restrain you today?”

“Don’t make me repeat myself.”

They stared at each other.

“What do you want me to do?” Field asked.

“Whatever you were sent here to do. Write up your file. Tell Granger.”

“I was sent to help.”

Caprisi smiled thinly. “Tell Granger you’ve helped.”

“What about Lena Orlov?”

“What about her?”

“Shouldn’t we find out where she worked, what her life was like, who she mixed with, whether anyone saw the man in her apartment?”

“I should.”

Field frowned. “Shouldn’t this go a little beyond internal politics?”

“Tell Granger that.”

Field felt the sweat breaking out on his forehead again. “You don’t trust me, do you?”

Caprisi shook his head. “No.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t trust anyone from Granger’s mob.”

“That doesn’t make sense. We’re from the same force.”

“You think so? Then good luck to you, Dickie.”

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t patronize me.”

Caprisi frowned. “Why would I want to do that?”

“I may be new, but I’m not stupid.”

“I’ll have to take your word for that, Dickie.”

Caprisi held his stare. Field tried hard to see what was behind the American’s dark eyes. He suddenly felt as if everyone in this city were a total, unfathomable stranger, and would remain so.

“All right,” Caprisi said, his face softening again. He took a pace toward him. “All right, Field. I’ve got some paperwork to do, but come down in a couple of hours and we’ll go from there.”

Field looked at his watch, embarrassed.

“You have a social engagement. Drinks at the Shanghai Club?”

“He’s my uncle.”

Caprisi looked as if he was going to say something else, then thought better of it. “Tomorrow morning, then. Nine o’clock, if that’s not too early for you. We’ll meet and then go to the ten o’clock briefing.”

“What about Lu?”

“Easy, polar bear.” Caprisi smiled. “As I said, welcome to Shanghai. It’s one slow step at a time, if we manage to take any steps at all.”

Granger was on the phone when Field knocked on the glass door of his office a few minutes later, but shouted, “Come in.”

Field stood awkwardly in front of him, trying to pretend he wasn’t listening to the call. Granger was discussing arrangements to go to the cinema with his wife. He smiled at Field as he suggested they see Trifling Women.

The office was small. A bookcase behind him was lined with leather-bound volumes. There was a black-and-white photograph of an attractive dark-haired woman.

Granger said, “I love you, too,” and put down the phone. He leaned back on his chair, taking a cigarette from the silver case on the table and a box of matches from the pocket of his waistcoat. “Have a seat.” He pointed at the leather chair in the corner.

Field shook his head. “I don’t want to bother you, sir. I just need the current file on Lu Huang.”

Granger frowned. “Why are you asking me?”

“They seemed to think you had it.”

“Danny told you that?”

Field hesitated. “He said he thought you had it.”

“Shit. I don’t think I have.” Granger sucked in the smoke and blew it out slowly, still leaning back on his chair, his big head resting on the bookshelf behind him. “Biers is so bloody anal about all that stuff.”

Field watched the thick smoke being dissipated by the ceiling fan. He decided Granger was one of those people it was almost impossible not to like. Doubts that crept into your mind when you were away from him were almost instantly quashed upon return to his orbit by the warmth and force of his personality. “Sorry to bother you, sir.”

Granger stood, throwing his cigarette into the metal bin in the corner. He moved around the desk and placed a large arm around Field’s shoulders. “Anytime. Like to keep in touch.” They were at the door. “Must get you round for dinner. Caroline always wants to meet my new boys.”

“Yes, sir.”

Granger reached again for his cigarettes and lit another, inhaling the smoke and blowing it noisily toward the ceiling before offering one to Field. “How are you finding the city?”

“Exciting.” Field hesitated. “Overwhelming, on occasions.”

“You’ll get used to it.” Granger waved his arm expansively. “Greatest city on earth.”

“Better than Dublin?”

“Jesus!” Granger laughed derisively as he returned to his side of the desk and sat himself down once more. “The work’s a bit dull for you, but we’ll get you doing something more interesting . . . Ready for the match on Saturday?”

“Yes.”

Granger pointed his cigarette. “You know, you want to watch that little shit Caprisi. He’s their scrum half. He might be a Yank, but he’s learned fast and he can play.”

“I’ll watch him.”

“Good. See if you can break his leg before Saturday. How’s your diary? For dinner, I mean.”

Granger was smiling and Field found that he was, too. “I’m busy, but I think I’ll be able to fit in with whatever your wife suggests.”

Granger nodded and Field took a pace toward the door. “What did you want with the Lu file, anyway?”

Field turned. “Just . . . background.”

Granger’s eyes narrowed fractionally. “Sure.”

Field closed the door quietly and returned to his cubicle in the corner. It was almost six o’clock. The office was empty, Yang’s chair pushed neatly up against her desk. He thought he’d walk down to the Bund, despite the heat, which gave him fifteen or twenty minutes to kill before he was due to meet Geoffrey. His dinner jacket—his father’s—was on a hanger on the hatstand in the corner.

Field sat at his desk, still clutching the brown files he’d taken out of Registry earlier and the envelope he’d forgotten to drop into the mail room. Lu Huang’s name was written in pencil on the outside of the top file, faded with age. There was a typed summary on the front of this background file, and above it, Granger had written in pencil: For MI6. Copy to State Department, Washington, P.G. Jan 12th 1926.

Lu Huang is the head of Shanghai’s notorious Green Gang, the most powerful triad, whose influence is pervasive across both the International Settlement and the French Concession, particularly the latter. He currently resides at 3 Rue Wagner, in a house full of bodyguards and concubines. We estimate he has around twenty thousand men at his beck and call, armed and loyal to his every whim. This is more than double the number of soldiers and police officers at the Settlement’s disposal, even if one includes administrative members of the force. We have expressed our views on this situation before and do not need to repeat them here.

Lu originally hails from the township of Gaoquiao in Pudong. His early life is shrouded in mystery and myth, but there is a general consensus that his family was poor. They drifted to Shanghai, like so many others, to try to make their fortune, but found only squalor and disease. Lu’s mother died in the first year here, when he was a small boy (aged five or six, we estimate). His father remarried the following year, another woman from their township, only to die himself shortly afterwards. The stepmother then returned to the village but was kidnapped by Brigands. Lu, now about seven or eight, was left to fend for himself.

He returned to Shanghai, drifted into a life of petty crime and then into the welcoming arms of the Green Gang, rising to prominence and then ultimate power through a combination of cunning and ruthlessness unique even for one of the most vicious organizations in the world. During 1923 he effectively oversaw the destruction of the Red Gang and is now undisputed master of crime in the Shanghai metropolitan area. He is probably the most powerful man in all China.

The primary source of the Green Gang’s income is opium illegally imported from India, an operation we believe is worth millions of dollars a year. Lu controls every aspect of its distribution and sale, as well as having a grip on prostitution across the city. He has a close relationship with the authorities in the French Concession (diplomatic discretion should perhaps prevent us from indicating how close).

In the past year, Lu has made great efforts to present himself as a legitimate and respectable member of the community, buying a series of “front” companies, donating money to charity, and making regular appearances in the social columns of the North China Daily News. The changing perception of him in normally conservative high society is partly due to the increasing sense of insecurity of the International Settlement as a result of the anarchy that continues to tear the country apart. There is great fear, as I have already documented, that the communists, who now hold sway in the south, will soon conquer the whole of the country. It is felt by some that Lu may be an important figure in ensuring that the Settlement and the French Concession are not in any way violated (the Alabama and Sheffield arrived today, serving as a reminder of the consequences to any Chinese force of attempting such an action).

As recorded in previous dispatches, we have ourselves made contact with Lu, whilst in no way, as a force, weakening our attempts to stifle and close down his criminal activities. It is clear, though, that he is as committed as we are to the total resistance of Bolshevism. He has, on occasion, provided useful intelligence on Michael Borodin and other Comintern agents who are trying to foment revolution in the Settlement, funding the communist army in the south and operating under the cover of the Soviet consulate (see summary on activities of Sov. cons. and Comintern 11th Dec 1925).

At the bottom, Granger had written, again in pencil: Borodin. Communists on move. Unifying China? Pact with devil?

The rest of the file was full of newspaper clippings, many detailing Lu’s charitable and legitimate business activities. One had a photograph of him handing over a check to a middle-aged woman at the Horticultural Society of Shanghai charity tea. He was a portly man in a long silk top, a chubby hand holding his end of the check up toward the camera lens. Another showed him doing the same for the Sisters of Mercy Orphanage.

Field shut the file and tapped his fingers on its cover. This was only a summary, so he wondered what was in the “current” file that was still in Granger’s possession.

Field opened Natasha Medvedev’s folder with a mixture of nervousness and excitement. A passport photograph of her, of poor quality, was attached to a single sheet. Her summary was as sparse as Lena Orlov’s.

Natasha Medvedev resides at the Happy Times block on Foochow Road, on the top floor. She is a native of Kazan on the Volga and arrived in Shanghai via Vladivostok on the 12th January 1922. She is an associate of Michael Borodin.

Beneath that, Field could only see a series of dates and times, listing meetings she had attended at the offices of the New Shanghai Life. This information had obviously come from an informant, because alongside each entry, someone—Prokopieff, probably—had written: said nothing of note. There was also a list of the seven occasions upon which she had been seen entering the Soviet consulate. Two of these were late at night.

Field picked up his pencil and tapped it gently alongside each entry, going down the page. Natasha Medvedev was, he thought, just as vulnerable as Lena Orlov had been. Russians did not enjoy the rights of extraterritoriality here—the right to be governed by the laws of their own country—so anyone caught “fomenting revolution” was liable to be tried by the mixed courts and then expelled to the Chinese city and the merciless hands of the local warlord. This had happened a month ago to a Hungarian. He’d been tried, found guilty, and “put in prison,” but his family was still trying to locate him.

Field returned to Lena Orlov’s file and placed the two summaries next to each other.

The two women were from the same town and they’d attended the same meetings at the New Shanghai Life on the same days.

He stood, looking at his watch, suddenly worried he would be late.