The Interior Page 35

  David tried to clarify what he meant. “I thought it was anything for profit. Business relations with foreign countries should be preserved no matter what the cost.”

  “Come on,” she said, her fatigue deteriorating to impatience. “With China and the U.S. it’s always the same. One minute they’re friends; the next minute they’re enemies. These things have little to do with us or even how things really are.”

  David thought back to his country’s yearly hullabaloo over whether or not to give China most favored nation status and the ongoing conflicts over human rights while at the same time investing billions of dollars. These thoughts brought back the conversation they’d had with Pearl Jenner in the bar of the Shanxi Grand Hotel. All of that work she had talked about—the manufacturing of toys, computer chips, clothes—all of that went on even as American politicians beat their chests about China’s unfair trade practices, its selling of nuclear technology to rogue nations, and its attempts to influence American elections. It was part of the American psyche not to look at the shades of gray in the big picture.

  “We’re so close-minded,” Hulan said, as if reading David’s mind, except that she was speaking of her own people. “The Chinese were the first explorers. It is said that we were the first ones to the Americas. We had fleets going across the Pacific, exploring, trading, but we looked, we saw, then we came home, shut the door, and built our walls even higher. I listen to these people on the news…” She shook her head in disgust. “They speak with smiling faces and tell one story as though it were true, but tomorrow they may have a completely different agenda to sell. One day we’re forbidden to use the Internet; the next we’re encouraged to use it. The day after that? Who knows? We might be forbidden again. Yesterday, every time a new deal was signed with an American company, these same reporters were covering it as though it was a great gift to China. Today those same deals are stained. Tomorrow, you may still see the deal with Tartan and Knight go through. If it does, these people will be doing stories about how the factory is bringing prosperity to the countryside. Three months ago you were our new friend, our hero; today you are once again a suspicious foreigner.”

  “How do you stand it?”

  “How do you?” she asked back. “It’s not so different in the U.S. Here our ‘truth’ is usually political propaganda. In the U.S. propaganda is disguised as ‘truth.’”

  Pearl Jenner reappeared on the screen. “I’m an American by birth,” she said, “but I felt it was my duty as someone of Chinese blood to step forward. In America freedom of the press is a Constitutional right. It’s our duty to expose wrong. That I have been able to help my ancestral homeland…”

  Hulan shook herself. What were they doing sitting here, watching television, and having a chat about Sino-American relations? It was only a matter of time before Hulan was arrested. David could probably get her to the U.S. embassy. Rob Butler might be able to finagle political asylum, but this all seemed a pipe dream. Because if they came after Hulan, then they’d come after David too. In the meantime Sun would be tried and executed. Miss Quo, innocent of all charges, would also face prosecution. Henry Knight and Tartan would settle their differences, and tomorrow newspapers in China and the U.S. would talk about the acquisition, about the money that had changed hands, about the profit that would be made. No matter what, Hulan and David shouldn’t be wasting time. They needed to get moving. But it wasn’t so easy to leave Beijing if the government was looking for you. More than a half million of the city’s citizens were engaged in watching. Intersections with traffic lights had cameras to track cars through the city. There were ways around these devices. Certainly David and Hulan had gotten out of Beijing once before when the stakes had seemed as high. But it wouldn’t be so easy this time.

  As all this ran through Hulan’s mind, Miss Quo had continued her sniffling. Hulan crossed to her and patted her hand. David too had been lost in thought, and suddenly he said as he pushed himself off the edge of the table, “I’ve got to try and reach Miles. This whole thing has gotten out of hand.” Without moving, Hulan watched as he picked up the phone, dialed, and asked for Miles Stout’s room.

  “I called my father in California this morning,” Miss Quo said to Hulan. “I told him not to come home. He has money there. He’ll be okay. But Mama and me?” Two new rivers of tears sprang from her eyes. “I’ve brought disgrace upon our family. My father will be abandoned in a foreign land. I’ll go to jail. Mama will die all alone.” An idea suddenly came to her, and she quickly stood. “I have to run away. Maybe I can leave the country. Dissidents do it. Maybe I could too. I have money. Pay a little here. Pay a little there. I could be in Vancouver by tomorrow.” The young woman quivered in terror. “I don’t want to die.”

  Hulan felt sorry for the girl. She’d been raised in a house of privilege. She’d never known hunger or suffering. She was too young to have experienced the Cultural Revolution. Instead she’d partied, swilled champagne, gone to karaoke bars and nightclubs, dressed in designer clothes, traveled the world. In an hour her whole life had fallen apart in a way she could never in her worst nightmare have imagined.

  “Did you do anything wrong?” Hulan asked gently.

  “They say I did.”

  “Do you think you did anything wrong?”

  Miss Quo shook her head.

  “Then you have nothing to be afraid of.”

  In the background Hulan heard David raise his voice. “Listen, Miles, you can’t do that. You need a vote from the full partnership.”

  Hulan felt a tap on her arm. It was Miss Quo. “I was asking you, how can you say that? Don’t you know what they’ll do to you?”

  “Yes, but I also didn’t do anything wrong.”

  Miss Quo’s eyes widened. “You’re not going to stay here, are you?”

  Hulan glanced back at David. He gripped the receiver so tightly that his knuckles had gone white. “Special circumstances?” David shouted into the phone. “What are you talking about? When I explain to the partners what’s been going on over here…”

  David was talking like he was going to get out of China, but they’d never go anywhere but jail unless they got moving. The more Hulan eavesdropped on David’s conversation and the more she talked to Miss Quo, the more she wanted to go home and wait it out. She was too tired to run. Her arm throbbed, her body burned, and all she wanted was to lie down under a cool, wet cloth and sleep. She registered David’s anxious look and thought he understood what she was thinking, but the words that came out of his mouth were all wrong.

  David slammed down the phone. Without explanation he began issuing orders: “Everybody up! Let’s get out of here. We’re going to the American embassy!” When Hulan and Miss Quo didn’t move, he barked, “Now!”

  Miss Quo jumped up. Hulan slowly drew herself to her feet as David threw a couple of things in his briefcase and Miss Quo scurried about looking for her purse and…What was she jabbering on about? Her umbrella? Then someone pounded on the door, and the others froze in place. Hulan thought it was one of the funnier things she’d ever seen, but the look of horror on Miss Quo’s face trapped the laughter in her throat.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about Sun and the bribery?” Henry Knight demanded, as he finally burst through the door. “Did you know all along this was brewing? Did you know he was going to be arrested?”

  David, briefcase in hand and ready to flee, asked, “Has he already been arrested?”

  “Now, how in God’s name am I supposed to know?” Henry queried, dramatically throwing himself into a chair.

  David just looked at the man.

  Henry began to take in the scene: Miss Quo in her pink Chanel suit, eyes swollen and red, her bag over her shoulder and an umbrella in her hand; David looking rumpled, harried, with his briefcase in one hand and his laptop in the other; and Hulan swaying there as if she were ready to keel over for an afternoon siesta except it was only 10:30 in the morning.

  “What’s going on here?” Henry asked.


  “In case you don’t know it, Sun isn’t the only one who’s in trouble,” David answered. “I’ve been named, as have Miss Quo and Miss Liu.”

  “Well, I know that! But you aren’t going to turn tail and run away like scared dogs, are you?”

  “That’s precisely what we’re going to do.”

  “But you have a duty to your client.”

  David didn’t have time to talk with Henry about this. He looked at the two women. “Come on, let’s go.”

  They made for the door, but Henry jumped up and blocked them. “If Sun’s arrested,” Henry said, “he’ll be executed. His death will be on your head.”

  “If he’s arrested and I go down to the jail to help him, I’ll probably be arrested too. If I’m lucky, I’ll simply be expelled from the country. If not—”

  Henry grabbed David’s shirt. He was a small man but wiry and tough. “You’ve got a duty, boy. The man’s innocent.”

  “Like you’re innocent of illegal practices in your factory? Like you’re innocent of paying off Sun?”

  Henry shoved David away. “Do you realize that at this very minute my son is selling my company out from under me? That vulture Randall Craig and your partner Miles Stout are trying to rip my life away from me, but I’m not going to let them. I’ll use every penny I’ve got to keep them from getting Knight. What’s happened there, if it’s to be believed, is terrible. But I’ve got money too, and I’ve got people in New York poised to buy the stock. If Tartan wants war, I’ll give it to them. Because I’m telling you right now, whatever happened in that factory before is ending. The past record won’t matter anymore—”

  “Of course it will, Henry. It’s the key to everything. Tartan wants your company for the very abuses you insisted you didn’t have. And your pal Sun has moved the whole thing along. Now,” he added forcefully, “we’re leaving.”

  “What if I told you I knew where Sun was?”

  David motioned at the walls around him. “I’d say you’d better be careful where you say that. I don’t think the Chinese will take kindly to your hiding a criminal.”

  “I’m not hiding him, but I know where he is, and…” He once again grabbed David’s shirt, pulled him very close, and whispered, “I’ve got a plane.”

  The phone rang. Miss Quo stared at it. When it rang a third time, she picked it up. “Phillips, MacKenzie & Stout,” she said, taking a stab at a cheerfulness she didn’t feel. The voice on the other end spoke for several seconds with Miss Quo nodding. “Please hold,” she said at last, “I will see if he’s in.” She held the receiver out to David. “It’s for you.”

  “I don’t have to take it. I no longer work for the firm.”

  “She’s calling from America.”

  “Oh, Jesus,” David said, “Jenner must have sent her story out on the wire. We’re probably all over the papers in the States too. Just say no comment.”

  Miss Quo shook her head. “No, it’s a woman from Kansas. She says she’s been trying to reach you for a long time.”

  21

  DAVID MOVED SWIFTLY TO THE PHONE. “ANNE?”

  After a long-distance delay, Anne’s voice came floating over the line. “Is this David Stark?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ve wanted to talk to you and apologize for how I acted at my brother’s funeral. I think anyone would have been upset. But when we heard the circumstances—that he’d been killed instead of you—well, I, we…”

  David listened impatiently while Anne struggled with her apologies. He was chafing to go. Yet these few seconds gave him a chance to take stock. Where was Hulan? She’d been awfully quiet. His eyes scanned the room. Henry was still at the door, ready to bar it again if they tried to leave. Miss Quo was looking nervously out the window. And Hulan had sunk into a chair and appeared to be dozing. The skin on her neck and arms looked pale, while two bright blotches of color heightened her cheeks. A new and completely different wave of concern swept over him, but he tuned back into the phone call as he began registering Anne’s words.

  “I thought he’d gone to you for help. I thought, now isn’t that bad karma? I mean, you go to someone for help and you end up getting killed. That’s why I was so rude.”

  “He didn’t come to me for help,” David said. “I invited him to dinner. I wanted some information—”

  “I know that now,” she said. “But at the time I was only going off what Keith had told me. He called me that day. We were very close, and whenever he had a problem he’d call. He was troubled. He said he was going to meet a friend, someone he could talk to. He had dinner with you, so I just assumed that…”

  As on the day of the funeral, David felt that there was no reason to ruin the Baxter family’s memories of their son and brother. “We just had dinner—”

  “I know, I know. All I’m saying is that when I saw you at the funeral, all I could think was that you hadn’t helped him. I’d told him before to go to the FBI. He’d laughed at my ignorance. He said he didn’t need the FBI; he needed the State Department. Then he told me that he had friends down at the U.S. Attorney’s Office who might put in a good word. But he didn’t go to you.”

  No wonder Keith had acted so strangely that night. He was ready to throw away his career by going to the feds to rat on his client. “Was it about what was happening with the Knight deal?”

  Even over the thousands of miles David heard Anne’s deep sigh. “It was about his girlfriend. She was Chinese. He wanted to bring her over here. He thought political asylum might work.”

  David couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

  “Anyway,” Anne continued, “that day at the funeral I was angry at you for not helping him, but actually it was someone else. I met him there.”

  There was only one person at the funeral to whom Keith might have gone. “Rob Butler,” David surmised.

  “That’s right. He came up and introduced himself. He said he’d tried to do what he could for my brother. Do you think he tried to help?” Anne asked.

  David thought back to his last meeting with Rob and Madeleine. He’d asked them point blank what they thought about Keith’s death. They both said that they thought it had been a botched attempt by the triads to kill David. He’d also asked if Keith was under investigation. Again, both Madeleine and Rob had said no. Why hadn’t Rob mentioned Miaoshan? (It had to be Miaoshan.) If he thought she was eligible for political asylum, it must have been because Miaoshan could offer something—the proof of the Knight-Sun bribery. Would Rob have lied to David? And for what reason? Keith was dead. The girl was also dead, and her papers were in China. There was no case without evidence. Most important, had Keith used Miaoshan to circumvent getting in trouble himself? He offers up the girl, lets her hand over her information about Sun and Knight, and he walks away clean?

  “Hello? Are you there?” Anne asked.

  “I’m sorry,” David said. “I was thinking. I have so much to ask you, but…” He saw Miss Quo staring out the window. She didn’t seem to be panicking. “Things are a little crazy here.”

  “That’s okay,” Anne said. “Before you ask me anything, let me explain the real reason I’m calling. My brother sent me some papers before he died. They were here when we got back to Russell. I don’t know what they are, but he put a note on them. ‘If something happens to me…’ Can you imagine what it’s like to get something like that in the mail? My brother was dead! It’s been like some horror movie, only we can’t turn it off or walk out of the theater.”

  “What are they?” David asked, although he already suspected what they were.

  “Pages and pages of numbers. They don’t mean a thing to me, but in the note he wrote that they were a key.”

  A key? Miaoshan had her set. Sun had his. Now it appeared that Keith also had his own set. Could it possibly be a key?

  “Anne”—he tried to put as much conviction into his voice as he could—” about the papers…”

  “You’re going to tell me about the girl and how Keith wanted t
o marry her.”

  No, he wasn’t, but he let it go for now.

  “We’re from Kansas,” Anne went on. “We don’t see a lot of Asians where we live. But our feeling was that if Keith was in love, that was his business. We’d do our best to welcome this Meow-meow. Even her name was foreign to us. I mean, it wasn’t really Meow-meow, but it sure sounded like that to my dad, so that’s what we’ve been calling her around here. Anyway, you can see why we thought it was a good thing they’d be living in L.A. They have all sorts of people out there, and they wouldn’t have stood out so much.”

  David and Hulan had known that Miaoshan was having an affair with an American. They’d thought it was Aaron Rodgers—and maybe she’d still had an affair with him—but Keith was who mattered. He must have met her during his regular pre-sale visits to Knight International. Keith and Miaoshan? Why hadn’t David seen that from the beginning? When Miles had said Keith’s girlfriend wasn’t from L.A., David had assumed that she’d been a hometown girl. That image fit with what he knew about Keith. Even now it was hard to imagine his friend, who was overweight and in his late thirties, with an eighteen-year-old Chinese factory worker. Of course, things like that did happen. It was called a mid-life crisis. The manipulative Miaoshan must have seen Keith as incredibly gullible. And she’d pushed at that gullibility by asking for and receiving all kinds of gifts—the fancy underwear, the jeans, the makeup, the…Suddenly he remembered the sickening sweet smell at the funeral and what Hulan had said about Miaoshan’s bunk.

  “Do you wear White Shoulders?” David asked Anne.

  “Yes, my mother and I both do,” she answered, surprised.

  “Keith must have had it bad.” It slipped out before David could stop himself.

  “He was head over heels,” Anne said. “My parents and I hadn’t seen him—I mean, we only talked to him on the phone or over the Internet, but you know what I mean—that lovesick since eighth grade when he’d gone gaga over Maryellen Sanders. He was calling me all the time, wanting to know what he should get her. I even bought a few things for her myself. And she must have felt the same way. Meow-meow gave Keith all sorts of things.”