Shan refused the bait. "The UN Antiquities Commission. How are you involved?"

"Sometimes they ask to borrow a truck. Or some ropes."

"Ropes?"

"They explore caves. They climb mountains."

"Do they take artifacts?"

Fowler stiffened. "They record artifacts," she said with a stern look. "I guess you could say I am a member of the local committee."

"There's a committee?"

Fowler did not respond.

"What of the conflicts? Without government support you could not operate. Your mining license."

"Please don't remind me."

"And a permit to operate a satellite system, that is extraordinary. But you are opposing the government-"

Sergeant Feng appeared at Shan's side and made a sharp guttural sound, one of his warnings.

"- the government removal of artifacts," Shan continued, in English.

Rebecca Fowler's eyes flashed with surprise. "You speak it well," she said in her native tongue. "We are not in a position to stop anything the government does. We just believe governments should act openly in dealing with cultural resources, especially resources of a different culture. The Antiquities Commission helps collect evidence."

"So you have two jobs?"

Feng stepped between them with a resentful glare, but seemed uncertain what to do.

Fowler was six inches taller than Feng. She continued to speak, over his head, but switched back to Mandarin. "How about you, Inspector? How many jobs does an unofficial investigator have?"

Shan did not answer.

Fowler shrugged. "My job is mine manager. But the Commission has only one expatriate: Jansen. A Finn. He asks other expatriates working in the remote areas to serve as his eyes and ears."

"Your committee."

Fowler nodded, looking uncomfortably at Sergeant Feng.

"You still didn't say why you were at the cave."

"Didn't even know there was a cave. Until the PLA trucks got noticed."

"By whom?"

"Army trucks are conspicuous. One of my Tibetan engineers saw them when he was climbing."

"But army trucks can be explained in many ways."

"Not really. There're two patterns of truck traffic in the high ranges. Maneuvers. Or new construction for military camps or collectives. These weren't maneuvers, and there was no construction equipment entering the site. The trucks weren't carrying things in. Not much, anyway."

"So you decided they were carrying things out. Very clever."

"I couldn't be sure. But as soon as I arrived I saw two things. Your colonel. And a cave crawling with soldiers."

"The colonel could have other reasons to be there."

"You mean the murder?"

"I have had several American friends," Shan observed. "They are always quick to jump to conclusions."

"There's a difference between jumping to conclusions and being direct. Why don't you just say no? Tan would just say no. Jao would just say no, if it suited." She ran her fingers through her hair. Shan realized she did it when she was nervous. "That day at Tan's office, you openly defied him. You're not like other Chinese I've known."

It was going too fast. Shan drained his cup and asked for more. As Fowler moved toward the conference room by the door he studied the bulletin board. There was a hand-written document in one corner, in Tibetan. With a start, Shan recognized it. It was the American Declaration of Independence. He led Sergeant Feng away from it, to the conference room, where Fowler sat on the table, waiting for him with the tea.

"So you are replacing Prosecutor Jao?" Fowler asked.

"No. Just a short assignment for the colonel."

"He would have been disappointed. Jao used to read Arthur Conan Doyle. Loved his murder investigations."

"You make it sound like a habit."

"Half a dozen a year, I suppose. It's a big county."

"He always solved them?"

"Sure. It was his job, right?" she asked in a taunting tone. "And now you have already arrested the murderer."

"I didn't arrest anyone."

Fowler studied Shan. "You sound like you don't think he did it."

"I don't."

Fowler could not conceal her surprise. "I'm beginning to understand you, Mr. Shan."

"Just Shan."

"I understand why Tan wanted you away from the cave when I was there. You're- what? Unpredictable, like he described the Tibetans. I don't think your government deals well with unpredictability."

Shan shrugged. "Colonel Tan prefers to deal with one crisis at a time."

The American woman studied him. "So what was his crisis, you or me?"

"You, of course."

"I wonder." She sipped her tea. "If it wasn't your prisoner who killed Jao, then who was the murderer?"

"Your demon. Tamdin."

Fowler's head snapped up. She looked around to see if her staff was listening. They were gathered at the far end of the room. "No one jokes about Tamdin," she said in a low voice, suddenly tinged with worry.

"I wasn't."

"Every village, every sheepcamp around here has been telling stories of demons visiting. Last month there were complaints about our blasting. They said it must have awakened him. There was a work stoppage for half a day. But I explained that we only began blasting six months ago."

"Blasting for what?"

"Dikes. A new pond."

Shan shook his head in bewilderment. "But why build ponds? Why all this water? How can you produce minerals? There is no mine."

Fowler smiled. "Sure there is," she said, seeming relieved to change the topic. "Right out the front door." She grabbed a pair of binoculars and gestured for him to follow. She led Shan outside along a path that rimmed the largest pond, walked briskly to the center of the largest dike, the one that was built across the mouth of the valley, then paused for Yeshe and Sergeant Feng to catch up. "This is a precipitation mine."

"You mine rain?" Yeshe asked.

"Not what I meant. But I guess that's one way to describe it. We mine the rain of a hundred centuries ago." She pointed across the ponds. "This plain is the bottom of a bowl. No outlet but the Dragon Throat, and it was blocked up here by an ancient landslide. It's a volatile geology. The surrounding peaks were volcanic. Lava flowed down the slopes. Lava is filled with the light elements. Boron. Magnesium. Lithium. Over centuries rains dissolved the lava and washed the salts into the bowl. A salt lake would build up. In time of drought a crust would form over the lake. A foot thick. Sometimes five feet thick. Then a cycle of wet years would fill the basin with water again, with the dissolved minerals. Then another crust. Every few centuries another eruption would replenish the slopes. It's how the Great Salt Lake in America was formed."

"But these lakes are manmade."

"The natural salt lake is there. In fact, eleven of them. In layers, underneath us. We just moved clay to build surface ponds. We pump up the brine into our ponds for evaporation." Fowler pointed toward three small sheds across the valley floor, ganglia in a network of pipes. "Three wells do all the work."

"But where is your plant?"

"In the ponds. With the right concentration we can precipitate out boron particles. Each lake is periodically drained and we harvest the product that has accumulated on the bottom. The trick is to maintain the concentration. Get it wrong and we wind up with table salt. Or a stew of metals too expensive to separate."