“What a shame! Only five thousand yuan,” Chen said. Some of his more lucrative translation projects had paid him as much, for only ten pages or so, though he knew he had gotten the project because he was chief inspector. He glanced at his leather briefcase. It contained a sum of at least five thousand yuan – which he brought to buy a wedding present for Ling. But he had been having second thoughts about it after watching her leave in that luxurious limousine last night. It might be a large sum for him, but it was nothing to her.

He picked up the briefcase, snapped it open, and took out an envelope. “A small ‘red envelope’ of about five thousand yuan, Mr. Diao. Far from enough to show my respect, it is only a token of my admiration.”

It was a bulging envelope, unsealed, with a hundred-yuan bill peeping, which bore a portrait of Mao, declaring as the supreme Party leader to China, “The poorer, the more revolutionary.”

“What do you mean, Mr. Chen?”

“To tell the truth, I’m interested in writing something about Shang, publishable or not. So the envelope is in compensation for your invaluable information. For a businessman like me, it’s an investment, but it also shows my respect for you.”

“An old man like me, Mr. Chen, doesn’t have anything to brag about, but I think I can size up a man well. whatever you are up to, you aren’t after money.”

“whatever you tell me is not black or white. Nor will anyone be able to prove it’s from you, Mr. Diao. Outside of this room, you may say you have never met me.”

“Not that I was so unwilling to tell you the story about Shang, Mr. Chen,” Diao said, draining the cup, “but what I gathered could be just hearsay. You can’t take it literally.”

“I understand. I’m not a cop, so I don’t have to base every sentence on hard facts.”

“I didn’t write the book about Shang, but that doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t be written. In ten or fifteen years, aspects of the Cultural Revolution may be totally forgotten. Oh, you’re not recording our talk, are you?”

“No, I’m not.” Chen opened the briefcase again, showing the contents.

“I trust you. So where shall I begin?” Diao went on, barely waiting for an answer. “Well, I won’t beat about the bush. About Shang: believe it or not, I happened to know a peddler, whose fish booth was crushed by her body falling out of a fifth-story window -”

The roast Beijing duck arrived with the waitress as well as a white-clad and -capped duck chef, who peeled the crisp duck skin in front of their table with a flourish.

“The slices of crispy duck skin, wrapped in the paper-thin pancake with the special sauce and green onion was the Empress Dowager’s favorite,” the waitress said. “As for this one special dish of fried duck tongues mantled with red peppers like maple-covered hills, can you guess how many ducks?”

“Can I ask you a favor?” Chen said to her. “All of these are fantastic, but can you serve the rest of them together? We are just beginning an important talk.”

“I’ll let our chef know,” she said, bowing low like a Manchurian girl before she headed to the door. “You go ahead.”

“NOW, BACK TO THE story,” Chen said. “You were just talking about the end of Shang’s life, about the fishmonger.”

“Oh yes, he was indeed a talkative monger, giving a vivid description of her death scene, though I wonder how he could remember those details after so many years.”

“Did Shang die instantly?”

“No, she didn’t. She said a few words before she lost consciousness.”

“What did she say?”

“She said she lived on the fifth floor.”

“What could that mean?”

“He had no clue,” Diao said reflectively, picking a tiny fishbone out from between his teeth. “Did she want to draw attention to her room on the fifth floor? She could have been tortured or pushed out of the window. Did she want people to call for an ambulance, using the phone in the room? In those days, there was only one public phone station in the neighborhood. What went through her mind in her last moments, no one can say.”

“What then?”

“Well, she was so ‘black,’ people avoided her like the plague while she lay there. No one did anything except for watching and finger-pointing. A couple of red-armbanded men then rushed out of the building, speaking in a Beijing accent -”

“Hold on, Mr. Diao. In your book, you mention a special team from Beijing. So those men were from that team?”

“The fishmonger had no idea who they were, but they stood around her, keeping others away from the scene. When an ambulance finally arrived, she was long dead.”

“Did the police come?”

“It took hours for a police car to arrive. What did they do? They tried to wash away the bloodstains on the curb. For that matter, they didn’t do it thoroughly. Flies swirled around the dark red spots for days.”

“What a tragic fate!”

“A fate full of twists and turns,” Diao said, finishing a duck-stuffed pancake and wiping the sauce stain on his fingers with the napkin, as though wiping away memories. “As you know, she first became well-known in the forties. She must have attracted a lot of men – rich and powerful ones – and that shadowed her after 1949. Things were different in the early fifties. Young lovers kissing in Bund Park then could have been detained for pursuing a ‘bourgeois lifestyle.’ But Shang continued to lead a ‘notorious bourgeois life.’ What’s worse, her husband got into political trouble, which spelled the end of her career.

“It was then that a guiren appeared in her life. Guiren – you know, an important man who brings about a change of luck into one’s life. One day, she got a handwritten note from the mayor of Shanghai, ‘Please come, Comrade Shang.’ So she hurried to the China-Russia Friendship Hall, where she was received by Mao. There was a grand dance party that evening. Swirling in Mao’s arms, she told him about her troubles. Shortly afterward, she was assigned new movie roles, one after another. In the fifties, the movie industry was state controlled and planned. Only a few movies were made each year. A lot of talented actors and actresses couldn’t get parts – whether or not they had political problems. Against all odds, in one movie she played a militia woman, for which she even won a major award. She visited several foreign countries as a member of a Chinese artists delegation. And at a convention, the Party leaders would receive the delegation members before or after those visits abroad. So she appeared in newspaper pictures together with Mao.”

“You have done a thorough study, Mr. Diao.”

“Let me say one thing about my research. Even in the official publications, Mao’s passion for dancing has been acknowledged. After 1949, social dancing was condemned and banned as part and parcel of the bourgeois lifestyle, but within the high walls of the Forbidden City, Mao still danced to his heart’s content. According to the interpretation given in the People’s Daily, Mao worked so hard for China that these parties were necessary to provide relaxation for our great leader. But that’s nonsense. As for what happened after he danced with Shang, I don’t think I have to go into graphic details.”

“No, you don’t,” Chen said. “But I have a question. During those years, perhaps there weren’t too many gifted partners in the Forbidden City. As a celebrated actress before 1949, Shang must have danced well. Could it be that Mao came to her for that reason?”

“It takes a couple of hours for a young girl to learn how to dance like a pro. Mao was no dancing master. There was no need for him to go to the trouble to look for a partner in another city. Mao wasn’t without rivals at the top, in those days. Even his special train was bugged. What would people say about his relationship with such a notorious actress?” Diao went on, putting a crispy duck tongue into his mouth. “But he couldn’t help it. When he first met her, she was in her mid-thirties, in the full bloom of a woman’s beauty, elegant, highly educated, and from a good family too. Her dancing was like waves rippling in the breeze, like clouds wafting in the sky. And he could have watched her movies as early as in Yan’an. Madam Mao was also an actress, we shouldn’t forget that.”