“Many people suffered in those years.”

“I tried to start over but people avoided me like a piece of stinking meat. And after all these years, they are still telling their horrible stories about me and Qian. Do you think I really care about anything now?”

Peng was lost in self-pity, half drunk, his face red like a cockscomb. Yu didn’t think he could get any more out of him, not with six bottles of beer empty on the table.

“You have suffered a lot, but don’t try things like blackmail. It won’t do you any good.”

“Thank you, Mr. Journalist. I won’t if I have any other choice.”

“If you happen to think of anything else, you may contact me,” Yu said, putting down his cell phone number on a scrap of paper.

“I will,” Peng said, draining the last cup.

“Don’t tell anybody about our talk. Some people may try to get you into trouble,” Yu said, rising. “Take your time here.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’m going to finish the noodles too.”

Walking out of the restaurant, Yu turned back to see Peng burying his face in that bowl of noodles again, the same scene he had witnessed earlier. Perhaps there was a reason Peng’s coworker had commented on his rice-eating capability.

CHEN ARRIVED AT THE tea house on Henshan Road, in the company of Old Hunter. The waitress recognized them, led them into the private room, and left them alone.

As soon as he seated himself at the table, Old Hunter started briefing Chen about what he had done and what Yu had found out from Peng. For once, he wasn’t like a teasing Suzhou opera singer but instead talked fast, not digressing at all. Chen listened without interruption. Old Hunter then drained his cup and stood up. “I have to leave, Chief.”

“Why such a hurry?” Chen said. “The second cup of tea is the best.”

“I have to get back to the hot-water house opposite her apartment complex. An old security guard named Bei has a habit of fetching hot water in a stainless-steel cup and scurrying back to his cubicle around noon. I bet he buys a penny’s worth of hot water to warm up his cold rice. The owner of the hot-water house will try to introduce me to him today.”

“Be careful. Internal Security is watching.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be sitting there, it will be simply a chance meeting between two old customers at the hot-water house. Who’ll bother? So you see, I’m going to have a second pot of tea in an hour. Bei’s retired too. Two retirees may have plenty to talk about.”

“Really, like in one of your favorite proverbs, a piece of older ginger is spicier indeed.”

“Spicier indeed,” the retired cop echoed with a wry smile. “But I’ll tell you what! It’s another Mao case, and my left eyelid has been twitching all morning. That may not be a good omen.”

“Rub your left eye three times and say, ‘It’s a good omen,’ ” Chen said, smiling. “It works, according to my mother.”

Chen rose to accompany the old man to the door of the tea house, watching him until he was out of sight. Then Chen came back to the table, to the suddenly solitary teacup. The waitress must have removed the other one.

He was disturbed at the thought of Yu’s involvement, though it might not be something that could be helped. For such a Mao case, Old Hunter alone could do only so much, and Detective Yu had to chip in, a reinforcement which was already making a difference. There was no stopping a loyal partner like Detective Yu from throwing in his lot with Chief Inspector Chen.

What Yu had discovered was a possibility not to be ignored, Chen contemplated, sipping at the tea without tasting it.

If Peng had seen the mysterious round-faced man only once and Internal Security hadn’t seen him at all, either before or after, it practically excluded the possibility of his being a secret lover. More likely, he was a one-time buyer who negotiated with Jiao at Joy Gate. It would have been out of the question for her to bring the valuable antique to the dance hall. So they then chose to close the deal at her apartment. As for Peng’s glimpse of the “intimate scene” at her window, it might not mean that much. After all, Peng might not be a reliable narrator.

Such a scenario threw light, however, on several aspects of the mystery: the source of Jiao’s money and the timing of it too. In today’s market, those antiques could be worth millions – so long as she could find a buyer. That also explained her frequent visits to Xie’s place – potential buyers. Furthermore, selling the hoard piece by piece accounted for the fact that Jiao didn’t have a large bank account but yet was capable of living in affluence.

At least it appeared to be more solid than the scenario about a book advance. A publisher could hardly have paid the money if they didn’t get the Mao material, whatever it might be.

There was something that didn’t add up, however, in the treasure scenario. True, Mao could have easily carried anything out of the Forbidden City. Kang Sheng, one of Mao’s closest allies in the Party, smuggled out quite a lot from the palace. Since Kang was tied up with the Gang of Four during the Cultural Revolution, his stealing was exposed. But Mao didn’t have to smuggle out artifacts. Mao was more than an emperor – he was a communist god. Women ran to him, not the other way round.

Such a scenario could be a scandal, but the Beijing authorities didn’t have to acknowledge it. After all, nobody could prove it. So why would they have launched an investigation?

The solitary teacup on the table stared back at him.

Finally, as he was about to leave, his cell phone vibrated violently, as if rippling out of the half-empty cup.

“A girl’s body was found in Xie’s garden,” Lieutenant Song said shortly.

“What?” Chen stood up. “When?”

“Early this morning. I called your home, but you weren’t in. So I got your cell phone number from Party Secretary Li.”

Chen thought he had given Song his number, but it wasn’t the time to worry about that. He glanced at his watch. It was probably already two or three hours after Internal Security had arrived at the crime scene.

When Chen made it to the mansion, to his surprise, he didn’t see any police outside.

Nor a curious crowd lingering on the street.

There was no one in the living room, either, as he stepped in.

At the end of the living room, however, he glimpsed a plainclothes cop stationed at the foot of the staircase. Xie must be in his bedroom upstairs.

Chen walked out into the garden. The body had been removed. Internal Security hadn’t waited for him. There were two cops still checking around the area cordoned off with yellow plastic tape. It was close to the spot where Chen sat with Xie the other day, under the blossoming pear tree.

Song strode over, and Chen gestured for the lieutenant to follow him to the back of the garden. He didn’t want others to overhear anything.

Song showed Chen pictures of the crime scene in silence. The girl was in a yellow summer dress, with the straps fallen off her shoulders, her skirt pulled high over her thighs, and one white sandal missing from a bare foot. She appeared to have suffered some sort of sexual attack. There wasn’t much indication, however, of any struggle in the pictures – nor in the garden, as Chen shifted his gaze to the cordoned-off spot.

It was Yang, the girl who had tried to take Jiao and him to another party just a couple of days earlier. Like Jiao, she was also said to come from a “good family,” though Chen had no idea what hers really was.

“Considering the circumstances, we have blocked the news for the time being,” Song said. “She was killed in a struggle against a sexual attack.”

Chen nodded, holding up a picture for close examination. “Any clues?”

“The identity of the deceased has been established. Yang Ning. One of Xie’s students. The time of death is estimated to be between ten p.m. and midnight last night.”