The Risk Agent

39

10:09 P.M.

THE BUND

The Ministry of State Security Superintendent occupied a red leather chair behind a plain and unattractive desk in a small gray office with no view. Overweight and jowly, he had wet lips, an auditor’s scowl and an impatient disposition.

Shen Deshi, wearing a sling, a piece of his head shaved and stitches showing, tried to look confident in the uncomfortable chair facing the man.

“What a cock-up,” the superintendent said, speaking Shanghainese. “I would ask you to repeat all that, but I don’t wish to hear it. If the Americans push to bring charges against you-”

“Yes. I understand.”

“You took him at gunpoint?”

Shen kept his mouth shut. His forehead and upper lip were perspiring, telltale signs of weakness. The superintendent could cut his balls off if he wanted.

“You were to secure any evidence of environmental contamination. To tidy up any loose ends before this hand recovered from the river spread trouble like a disease.”

Shen Deshi shrank in the chair.

“Instead, we face a possible inquiry from the Americans? If I’d wanted this kind of attention, I’d have hired a public relations firm.”

Shen looked to buy his way out. He collected himself and spoke with courage. “I have some physical evidence outside,” he said, “that implicates the American cameraman. His video camera.”

“Destroy it, you fool.”

“Of course. As you wish.”

“The last thing we need,” the superintendent said.

“There is another matter,” Shen said, leading up to his moment of truth.

“Explain.”

“One hundred thousand U.S.,” he said. “Also one hundred forty thousand yuan.”

The superintendent lit up like a dragon boat festival parade. He squinted at his major and rubbed the back of his pudgy right hand across his lips.

“What is it you propose?” He pulled open a drawer and lit a cigarette. Located a chocolate bar and broke off a chunk and stuffed it into his pink hole. Smoke escaped as he spoke and chewed. “Please, Major.”

“I retired last week. Should an inquiry arise, I was acting on my own.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” the superintendent said. “I will have the paperwork prepared. Lay low for a day or two. I will call off the search for you within forty-eight to seventy-two hours. Just long enough to look like we gave it an effort.”

Shen Deshi nodded. “As you wish.”

“This is good for us,” the superintendent said.

Us, was all Shen heard. “Indeed.”

“Your integrity has never been questioned.”

Shen swallowed dryly. “I thank you, Superintendent.”

“And the evidence?”

“The contents of the duffel remain unreported. I came to you directly, as you advised. Therefore, not filed. Not recorded.”

“We do not want such evidence filed! It’s a fucking mess!” Smoke surrounded him now.

“Precisely so, sir.”

“So it must be decided what to do with this…evidence…no doubt.”

“No doubt.”

The man wanted Shen to propose the alliance. He would not do so himself.

“I could turn the funds over to PAP.”

“One possibility.”

“Or attempt to return it to those who paid it out.”

“Kidnapping ransom? A Western insurance company, no doubt. They will hardly miss it.”

“This had occurred to me also,” Shen said, his heart quickening. “Yes.”

“There must be another solution,” the superintendent said. The moistness of his lips had spread to the butt end of his cigarette, which was now smeared with chocolate. “Hmm?” he said, encouraging his major.

“It had occurred to me how much good such funds could do for schools, for earthquake and flood victims. But of course it could never be seen to come directly from the Ministry.”

“Heaven forbid!”

“But individuals. That’s another matter.”

“Entirely,” the superintendent said.

“If we were to, say…divide the sums…in a percentage that takes into consideration your seniority, of course, Superintendent. My ten years with the Ministry. Your fifteen. Say, sixty, forty.”

“Seventy, thirty.”

“Sixty-five, thirty-five.”

“Agreed.”

“We could oversee the distribution of the sums far more responsibly than any bureaucracy like the Ministry.”

“Your point is well taken. Well said, Major. Yes. I see the clarity of your thought on this matter.” He hesitated. “When can we see to this resolution?”

“At your convenience. Of course.”

“Not here. The park. This evening’s tai chi. A bench in the park.”

“Of course,” Shen Deshi said.

“Do not disappoint me. No second thoughts. Hmm?”

“No, sir.” Shen Deshi could only imagine the hell that would befall a man who crossed Ho Pot.

“Dismissed,” the man said.

Shen Deshi stood, painfully and slowly. The Ministry of State Security was commissioned to combat corruption and corporate environmental abuse. He marveled at the irony.

“Let’s get one thing straight,” the superintendent said. “Technically, this is not blood money.” He was asking, not telling. He didn’t want to hang for the offense.

Shen Deshi thought of the Mongolian’s face as he slipped off the boat. He thought of the butcher-block table inside the tannery where the Mongolian had filleted the cameraman. The buzzing of the flies.

“No, of course not,” he said. “Just lost and found.”

“Lost and found.”

“Yes.”

“Well, then. Let’s get on with it.”

Shen dragged himself to his car with great difficulty. He unlocked it and, deciding to check on his future, opened the back door and leaned inside.

Opening the back seat could be a hassle. The mechanism jammed even when a duffel bag was not packed beneath it. And so it did again. Given his cracked ribs and bad arm, Shen could hardly move, much less heave the hinged seat forward, but he finally gave it one strong pull and the seat came open.

It was said that when one died, his life passed before him, from childhood to the present, that the gates to heaven were more a mirror than a door. Shen’s life flashed before him, and yet, except for some broken bones, he lived.

The back seat was empty.

It took him a moment to process not only the reality of his situation, but its enormity. He moved the seat back and forth, as if a heavy duffel might have slipped out onto the car floor when the seat came open.

He’d hidden the money there himself. Had been in the car with it all but the few minutes…

The whore!

He’d left her in the car while he’d gone to inspect the tannery. She’d pulled the car around following the American’s arrival.

He brooded over what the hell to do about it, while from the back of his mind raised the Greek chorus: Run!