The Master of Rain

Forty-six

A few minutes later, after watching Granger walk into his office and shut the door, Field went down to C.1. Caprisi was standing by the door, talking to one of the secretaries, and Field waited until she had gone back to her desk.

The American went to get himself some water.

“Where do you think she’s gone?” Field asked.

“I’ve no idea.”

“Do you think they know she is working for us?”

“I didn’t even know. Is she?”

Field realized he was making a fool of himself. “We need to find the boy and we won’t without her.”

“If she’s chosen to be lost, then we’re wasting our time. People disappear here, if you haven’t noticed. If she’s been taken, we’ll never find her.”

Field contemplated for the first time the possibility that Natasha might be dead already.

“You’ve left a note?” Caprisi asked.

Field’s throat was dry. He wondered now if even leaving the note was dangerous. “Yes.”

“Caprisi!” Macleod shouted.

Both of them walked down to his office and shut the door behind them. Macleod retreated behind his desk, shaking his head. He was half-angry and, Field thought, half-amused, in the way that a father is with a troublesome but spirited child.

“So you’re being tailed as well,” Macleod said.

“Lu’s men.”

“Then I want you in the office, unless otherwise agreed. In fact, in the office, period. We’ll arrange an escort back to your quarters tonight.”

Caprisi looked at Field. “We believe Natalya Simonov’s son can positively identify the killer,” the American said. “We need to look for him.”

“Not today, gentlemen. If you’re being tailed, then you’re at risk, and I can’t afford the manpower to move you around with an escort all day.” Macleod leaned across and pushed his paperweight from side to side. “I’m going to fix a watch on the factory tomorrow, so we’ll see what transpires. Perhaps that will be your evidence.” Macleod stood. “Is Chen fit?”

“No.”

“Fit enough to supervise a watch?”

“I doubt it.”

Macleod looked annoyed by this. “Don’t cause me any more trouble, will you, boys.” It was not a question.

Field felt caged in the office, so, after lunch, he resolved to return to Katya’s house.

He tried to get out of the station the back way. He walked through the canteen and the kitchen and emerged into a small side alley by the rubbish bins. He could see no sign of anyone, so stepped out into the street. He kept close to the wall and ducked under the steam that was pouring from an open kitchen window.

He had only walked ten yards when he saw them leaning against the wall at the far end of the alley: two on each side of the street. They straightened and Field stopped. For a moment he felt like testing them out, the adrenaline pumping through him, but his instincts told him the risk of inadvertently leading them to Katya’s house was too great. He turned back. There was no choice but to sit by the phone and wait.

That night Lu’s men were still out front, but Granger shoved Field roughly into the back of his Chevrolet and then turned to check that they were not being followed.

Granger had dismissed Macleod’s suggestion that they would need an escort.

The house was close to Penelope and Geoffrey’s, just behind the Bund, and of similar design and size, with a veranda and high-ceilinged, airy rooms. “Good man, Field,” Granger said as he guided him into the hall. “You can lose your jacket. Wu!”

Granger went on through to the back while his number one boy took Field’s jacket and revolver, then sprayed his ankles awkwardly with paraffin.

“Many bites . . . buzz . . .”

Field smiled. The man had not a single tooth, so “buzz” sounded like his father breaking wind. He paused, gathering himself.

Caroline Granger rose swiftly as he came onto the veranda at the back, offering her hand. She wore a simple, short black dress with a gold and diamond necklace, her dark hair shiny and her smile warm. “We meet properly at last.” She turned. “You know Penelope Donaldson.”

“We’re related,” Penelope said without standing. “I’m his auntie.”

Penelope was also dressed in black. She looked at him as he sat down, dark eyes resting upon his face. He tried to smile back.

“Some champagne, Richard?” Granger held a bottle in one hand, a glass in the other.

Field hesitated.

“Hesitation means consent.” He poured the glass and handed it to him.

Field took out his cigarettes and offered them around, but Granger shook his head and reached for his own as he sat on the wicker sofa beside his wife.

“I’ve been getting a hard time,” Granger said, leaning back in his chair and placing both feet on the glass table in front of him. “The ladies here believe their kind are in the process of proving themselves our equals in some ways, and our superiors in most.”

“That woman who is planning to swim the Channel,” Caroline explained. Patrick doesn’t believe she’ll be able to do it and certainly does not find it a cause for celebration.”

“I’d like to see her bloody dance.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Penelope asked.

“That she’s probably not very feminine,” Caroline went on. “Patrick likes his women strapped to the bed.”

Penelope giggled.

Field took a sip of the champagne and a drag of his cigarette. He looked out, through the smoke, across the startlingly green lawn. They were surrounded by bigger buildings, but the garden felt private; the city was a distant hum above the noise of the gas lights.

The doorbell rang and Granger stood to go to the front door. Penelope stared at him as they heard Charles Lewis and Geoffrey in the hallway.

“The lovely Mrs. Granger,” Lewis greeted his hostess as he came onto the veranda. “What a pleasure. Dickie . . . how nice.” Field stood and Lewis gripped his hand hard, his manner icily polite, his glare piercing. He stared at Field for a moment, then moved along to Penelope. “Here’s my girl . . .” He kissed her, too warmly.

Geoffrey came through the door. “Evening, nephew,” he said, his face split by a smile of genuine warmth. Field felt a stab of guilt in his belly. “Sorry we’re late. The Empire Day preparations are killing me, and then Charlie and I were yapping in the club about the cricket.”

They shook hands. Geoffrey kissed first his wife and then Caroline. He sat on the wicker sofa beside Penelope. Granger opened another bottle of champagne and poured both men a glass, before refilling the others, ignoring Field’s gesture of refusal.

“We almost got mown down outside,” Geoffrey said. “Some moron absolutely hammering along.”

“Drunk,” Lewis said.

“You know they have white lines in the middle of the road in England now, and even lights—red and green to slow everyone down.”

“Traffic lights,” Lewis added.

“Yes. That’s what we need.”

Granger returned to his seat and put his feet back on the glass table. “Breaches of traffic protocol are,” he said, “the very least of our problems.”

They were silent for a moment. Field wondered whether they all knew about the interview with Lewis. Granger lit another cigarette.

“They’ve still got these bloody strikes in England,” Geoffrey said.

“At least it’s not just us,” Granger said.

“Bolshevism is never going to take hold in England,” Lewis said. “Not a chance, you mark my words. It’s a nonissue.”

“They’re still on strike,” Geoffrey said.

“The English worker’s too damned sensible.”

“The war hasn’t helped.”

“The war hasn’t helped anything,” Lewis went on. “But if they weren’t so obsessed with their own problems—the government, I’m talking about—then they might pull their heads out of their backsides for long enough to get a glimpse of what we’re actually up against here.”

“They do know,” Geoffrey said.

“No they don’t. They’ve no idea. You might as well call this the battle for Western civilization, because that’s what it is.”

“That’s a bit melodramatic, Charlie,” Penelope said.

“No it’s not. We don’t fly under the flag of the colony and they never let us forget it, but that makes our struggle all the more important.”

“You sound like a politician,” Penelope said. “When you go home, you can stand for Parliament.”

“Who says I’m going to go home?”

“What, never?”

“What is there to home? A long, fruitless struggle to find a decent bloody servant.”

“But you’re so young, Charlie,” Caroline said.

“America beckons, if anywhere. I’d like to hear Louis in concert—now, that’s something that would be worth a journey. Are we going to have some music, Patrick?”

Granger stubbed out his cigarette and put down his glass. He disappeared inside but left the doors open, so that the sound of Louis Armstrong’s band soon filled the veranda.

“Keeping you up, old man . . .” Granger was at Field’s shoulder. He ruffled his hair with a throaty laugh. “Fine rugby player, girls,” he said approvingly, pointing at Field’s head. “Strength, ability, speed, aggression, tactical awareness.”

He was looking at Caroline and she nodded. “You’ll go far,” she said. “One day Patrick will start deciding promotions and pay according to what happens off the pitch.” She looked up at him, smiling. “Though, of course, if he becomes commissioner, he will have to change.”

“If,” Geoffrey said quietly. “There’s no ‘if’ about it.”

“We cannot have that bloody Scot,” Lewis said. “Not under any circumstances.”

“What do you think, Richard?” Granger asked.

Field frowned. “About what?”

“This is a time for testing loyalties, don’t you think?”

Field nodded. “Yes.”

They were all staring at him.

“The commissioner formally announced today he is to retire,” Geoffrey said.

There was another silence.

“I think,” Lewis said, “that the police force is the ethical arbiter of a city, don’t you?”

Field stared at Granger, then at Lewis, whose eyes were fixed upon him, his face taut. Geoffrey was smiling at Field encouragingly. “I think,” Field said slowly, “that a police force reflects the ethics of the city but does not necessarily generate them.”

“Well said, Richard,” Geoffrey inserted. “Well said indeed.”

A Chinese servant appeared at the door and Granger stood. “Dinner, I believe.”

The women left the room first, followed by Granger and Geoffrey. Field was last, and as he came toward the door, Lewis suddenly spun around in front of him. “All right, Richard?”

Field didn’t answer.

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but I think you and your American friend need to be very careful.”

“What do you mean?”

“I hear rumors, old man.”

Field waited for him to go on.

“Take my word for it: be careful when you are out and about.”

Field felt the tension and aggression in his back and neck.

“I’m warning, not threatening.”

“You’re always warning.”

“And you’re not listening.” Lewis’s voice was still icily polite, his glare piercing. “I’m warning you and you’re not listening. I don’t want to see you go down, but I’m not going to say it again.”

Lewis turned around, leaving Field confused and angry.

He breathed in deeply and walked through to the dining room. He was ushered to a seat between Penelope and Caroline Granger.

Field watched Granger as he leaned across to talk to Geoffrey. He thought of the questions that cluttered his mind.

“How are you enjoying Shanghai?” Caroline asked. She was leaning toward him, smiling warmly.

“It has its moments.”

“Only moments?”

He shrugged. “It’s different.”

“Charlie is an evangelist,” she said quietly, glancing across the table at Lewis. “We’re not all blind to the city’s faults.”

Field was not certain what she meant, so picked up a spoon and began to eat the avocado on the side of his plate, which was extremely ripe.

“Most of us went through phases . . . excitement, disillusion . . . realistic tolerance.”

“Of what?”

“Of the poverty, of the inequality. Rome wasn’t built in a day.”

“But it was built nonetheless.”

She frowned. “So much better that we are here than the alternative. We have to lead by example. That’s what Patrick believes.”

“Of course.”

“And if we can’t set an example, then we shouldn’t be here. Otherwise what’s the point?”

Field took a last mouthful of avocado, then put his spoon down, noticing that it was silver. He was thinking about Lewis’s words and the sense of urgency in his voice. “Where did you meet Patrick?” he asked.

“In Ireland.”

“You don’t sound Irish.”

“School in England.” She smiled again. “My father should have been loyal to the English, but he was a believer and we hid Patrick in the house.” She touched Field’s arm. “That’s what I love about Shanghai. You may have a past, but even if everyone knows about it, they don’t hold it against you.” She glanced at her husband, a look of deep, measured affection. “Anyone can be anyone.” She got up, still smiling, to supervise the preparation of the main course, and Field took the opportunity to go down the corridor to the lavatory. He washed his hands and then his face in the big enamel basin. He looked at his bloodshot eyes in the mirror and wondered what was happening to him.

He thought of Patrick and Caroline and how easy they were together, and the wealth on display—the silver and the servants and the big airy rooms. Was that what he wanted in life? To scramble to the top, to accumulate?

He wondered if he could stay in this city, if he could accumulate wealth under Patrick and take possession of Natasha. If he cooperated, wouldn’t they give him that?

Is that what Patrick was always doing—subtly offering him a chance to join the club? Was he just missing the opening?

He still didn’t understand the question of the supplement. Were the previous payments from someone else, not Granger, or was Granger just being disingenuous?

Field wondered what in his father’s upbringing had made him so hostile toward the idea of pleasure and ease. Honor wasn’t going to feed anyone, and it had certainly never fed them. Perhaps integrity was a luxury of the rich.

The door opened behind him and she stepped in. “Jesus, Penelope . . .”

“Keep your voice down.”

“For Christ’s sake, they’re only in the next room.”

He saw immediately that she was drunk. She was fumbling for something in a long thin silver and black handbag. “Everyone gossips, Richard. Everyone in this city. Everyone will soon know.”

“Is that what you want? Why me, all of a sudden?”

“Why not?” She looked up. “Are you ashamed, Richard? Of what we did?”

Field didn’t answer.

“Just an easy fuck, is that it?” she asked, her face twisted. She shook her head. “I can see what you think—see it in your eyes. It is the same with the others: just an easy fuck. Well, you don’t get off that lightly.”

“I’m not ashamed.”

“But you still think it was a mistake?”

Field saw no point in provoking her.

She looked down. “Geoffrey will go back to work tonight. You can drop me home.”

He moved toward the door.

“You’ll be mine now, when I want you.”

“You’re drunk.”

“All of a sudden, you don’t like the idea of fucking me when I’m drunk.”

Field looked at her, his disgust no longer disguised.

“I’m an easy lay when I’m drunk, aren’t I, Richard?”

“I don’t like the idea of fucking you under any circumstances.”

She yanked her dress up and took a step toward him. “Don’t you want to stick it in, Richard? Or have you had enough already? Want to go back to that Russian bitch, is that it?”

She lunged for him, her dress still raised, thrusting her crotch against his and trying to kiss him, her tongue on his lips before he could take hold of her arms and force her back.

“Penelope?”

They both heard the soft shuffle in the corridor outside. She stepped back, straightening her dress and checking her hair in the mirror. She was suddenly cool and calm. “Yes,” she said.

“You all right?”

“Yes, I’m fine.”

“Where is Richard?”

“I don’t know. I think he must have gone upstairs.”

They waited, heard a shuffle as Geoffrey moved away again. Field leaned back against the wall, catching sight of himself in the mirror and shutting his eyes in despair. Penelope let herself out quietly, without saying another word.

Field slipped up the stairs to cover himself. When he returned to the dining room, he squeezed between Patrick’s back and the Chinese sideboard, avoiding Geoffrey’s eye and looking as if he had just been sick.

“Are you all right?” Caroline asked.

“I’m fine,” he said, sitting down. “Just been feeling a bit off-color all day.”

“Working the boy too hard, Patrick,” Lewis said sourly. “You should take a break, Dickie, go down to the coast.”

“He’s working on a murder,” Geoffrey said sharply. “He’s hardly got time for that.” Field looked up and saw the hurt in his uncle’s eyes and knew that he had heard.

That he knew exactly.

The meal dragged after that, like nothing Field had ever experienced. It was even worse once the women had retired and the four men were left to their port. Geoffrey and Charles Lewis returned to a discussion of British politics, a conversation that neither Patrick nor Field contributed to.

As soon as Field could reasonably get away with it, he announced his intention to leave, explaining that he still did not feel at his best. He managed to avoid meeting Geoffrey’s eyes as they shook hands, and then Patrick was on his feet to show him to the door. Patrick finished his cigarette as Field put on his holster and jacket. Lewis came into the corridor and leaned against the wall, glaring at him.

Field went back to the veranda, walking past Lewis without comment. He said good night to Caroline and Penelope and then came back to shake Patrick’s hand.

“Good luck, old man,” Lewis said, still watching him.

Field stepped out into the street.

The road was deserted save for a black sedan parked outside a house twenty yards away. As he looked at it, its lights came on and it pulled out into the middle of the road. For a moment Field wondered if it was someone he knew—Caprisi perhaps—and then he heard the rattle of the machine gun and felt a stinging pain in his shoulder.

He was over, on the ground, his head on the sidewalk staring at the night sky, the car’s tires screeching as it stopped, the bullets punching into Granger’s car in front of him and into the sidewalk beside his head.

There was pain, blinding, in his arm—his left arm. He reached into the holster with his right, the gun in his hand now, pointing toward the sky, his finger on the trigger, squeezing off a shot, into the air.

He moved. He swung himself around as the door above him opened and he saw Patrick Granger charging out, as if in slow motion, his gun in his hand. He fired. He was shouting. Field turned his head once more to see a man towering above him, a machine gun in his hand, his face exploding.