“No.” He was still trying to draw a line somewhere. “I’ll take the shower by myself.”

“As you please,” she said casually. “You’re so different.”

She scrambled down, knelt at his feet, and began to unlace his shoes.

“No,” he protested again in embarrassment.

“You have to take your shoes off-that’s only civil.”

Before he could say or do anything, she reached out to unbutton his shirt. Feeling the heat of her breath on his shoulder, he took a step back. She then took a bathrobe from behind the door and threw it to him. He hurried into the bathroom, still wearing his clothes, the robe draped over his shoulder, thinking to himself that he must resemble some character in a movie.

The bathroom was no larger than the one at the Writers’ Home; it contained an oval tiled tub with a rotatable shower head and a large towel on a stainless-steel rack. A mirror hung over a cracked blue porcelain sink. A worn rug was spread out in front of it. There was no lack of hot water, though.

He had agreed to her proposal because he needed time to think, but he knew he could not stay in the bathroom too long. With a few ideas, half-formed in the vapor of shower, he emerged wearing her scruffy flannel bathrobe, the frayed belt brushing against his bare legs.

She was waiting, sitting cross-legged on the bed, painting her toenails a bright vermilion. The window filtered the light onto the plain white coverlet. Then she thrust her legs out in front of her, flexed her toes luxuriantly, lifted one foot above the other, waggled the toes at him, and giggled.

“Ah,” she said, “much better.”

There was a small bikini-girl poster above the sofa, and underneath it was a line in bold characters: Time is money! a new political slogan he had seen in Guangzhou.

“Take off your robe,” she said, putting a finishing touch on her toenails with a steady hand. She then capped the polish bottle tightly, and put it aside on the nightstand. To his surprise, she lay down on her back, and waved her feet in the air as if doing synchronized swimming. Her red toenails arced in the air.

“Must I?”

“Must I help you?”

He was flabbergasted as she jumped up and helped him off with the bathrobe. Luckily, he had put his shorts back on. She guided him to the bed where he lay down, and then she turned him over. Lying on his stomach, he was very nervous as he became aware that she, too, had gotten onto the bed.

She put both her hands on a stainless-steel bar suspended from the ceiling. With the bar bearing the weight of her body like a gymnast, she started massaging his back with her toes.

It was a bizarre experience. The first two or three minutes, he was perspiring with trepidation. Any second, she could stamp down violently on his bare back, a complex of vertebrae, discs, ligaments, and nerves. But soon he started to have mixed feelings. Her bare toes and heels pressing upon him elicited sensations of ice and fire all over him. His pleasure was actually heightened by his trepidation.

She must have had some professional training. Her toes concentrated on his trouble spots, working kinks out of his back, and reducing the tension in his body. He didn’t feel so bad anymore. Not about the case, nor the budget, nor the politics involved.

“You make my feet warm,” She was finally finished, her face flushed with exertion, her brow beaded with sweat.

“Marvelous,” he said.

“It’s good exercise for me, too.”

“It’s the first time for me.”

“I know,” she said, her hand lightly touching the knot of her robe. “What about the full service now?”

That was something he could not do. A line he must not cross. This was the time to flash his I.D. Chief Inspector Chen should now take her to the police bureau and charge her with prostitution. But what about Professor Xie? He had given her his promise. News of what had become of Xie Rong would be too terrible a blow to the old intellectual who had already suffered a lot. The arrest would also incriminate his new friend Ouyang. Also, once she was taken into custody here, he was not sure if his local colleagues would help with his investigation. He was not sure that he could work out a deal for Xie in exchange for her information about Wu Xiaoming.

“You are sweating all over.” He sounded more like a client so that she would not grow suspicious. “Take a good shower yourself. I’ll stay here and close my eyes for five minutes.”

“Yes, there is nothing like taking a short nap,” she said. “I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”

The moment she disappeared, he took a mini-recorder out of his briefcase and put it under the pillow. He put his shirt back on and buttoned several buttons before he closed his eyes for just a minute. In spite of himself, he dozed off. When he was awakened by the slamming of the bathroom door, it took him a few seconds to realize where he was.

She stepped out of the bathroom, naked except for a large bath towel draped around her shoulders. Fine-limbed and thin, she looked more like a high-school girl waiting for a regular checkup-except for a broad patch of black hair spreading over the lower part of her abdomen. She examined herself in the mirror, the water beading on her skin under the fluorescent light, which turned her face opalescent. Then she caught him gazing at her in the mirror. Startled, she pulled the towel down to cover her hips, but then she shook her wet hair, and gave him a long, steady look.

She started slowly toward the bed. He smelled the soap on her skin, still wet from the shower. Clean, fresh. Her body glowed.

“You are special,” she said.

He was so acutely aware of her, it took all his willpower to stop her from touching him.

“Let’s talk,” he said.

“No,” she touched a finger to his mouth, “you don’t have to say anything.”

“We don’t know each other yet.”

“Haven’t we talked enough?” she said. “Unless you want to talk about money.”

“Well-”

“Mr. Ouyang has paid for a whole day’s service, and you’ve given me a handsome tip,” she said. “So you can have the whole day, and the night, too. You don’t have to worry about it. If you want to buy me a dinner afterward-”

“No.” He sat up resolutely. It was not just all the years studying the People’s Police Morals Manual that had made Chen immune to such provocation. “I want to talk to you about something else.”

“What?”

“I’m a cop.” He produced his official I.D. “I’m here to ask you some questions.”

“You S.O.B!” She put one hand over her breasts and the other over her pubic hair.

It struck him as an absurd attempt at modesty, as if his being a cop had suddenly changed her identity, too.

“You won’t get into trouble if you cooperate with me,” he said. “I give you my word.”

“Then why didn’t you say so from start?”

“When I came to you, I was not prepared to see you like this. Ouyang had just told me that you were the one I’ve been looking for. I was surprised, and you did not give me a chance to say anything. “ He handed the bathrobe over to her. “Put it on before you get cold.”

“I don’t trust you,” she said, taking the bathrobe. “Why should I cooperate with you?”

“I can have you arrested,” he said, taking out the recorder from under the pillow. “Once you are put in jail, you’ll have to talk anyway, but that’s not what I want to do.”

“What a treacherous sneak!”

“I’m a police officer.”

“So why don’t you go ahead and put me there?”

“Ouyang is my friend. Besides-”

“Why did you lie to Ouyang about being a poet?”

“No, I didn’t. I am a poet.”

It took him some time to ferret out his Writers’ Association membership card from his wallet.

“Then what the hell do you want with me?”

“Just a few questions.”

“You are so horrible.” She broke down, sobbing with fear and humiliation. “When I was ready-”

He had attained authority over her with his surprise revelation of his official identity. But they were still involved in a highly dramatic scene. He, in his half-buttoned shirt and underpants; she, in a bathrobe. The knowledge of her nakedness under the robe, soft and bulging in the right places, was disturbing. He poured her a cup of tea to calm them both.