Shadow of the Dragon полностью

She’d been caught up in the idea of Falun Gong, but had never been a devout follower. Official accounts said she’d fallen getting out of the van, but however it happened, both her feet were broken on the first day. By that night, she made a video statement that Falun Gong had been a horrible mistake and that it no longer interested her at all. She implored her friends to stay away. And they probably would — from her.

Auntie Pei felt sure the mindless woman would have made the same statement in return for a stick of chewing gum. There had been no need to break her feet.

She glanced through the window at the approaching men.

They barged in without knocking, as she knew they would. The bald one was older, somehow missing even his eyebrows, and smelled faintly of old socks. The younger wore his smug frown like an accessory, the way some men wore an expensive watch. Both were dressed in khaki slacks and striped, three-button polo shirts of slightly different patterns, though the younger one’s clothes were newer and better tended. He was single, Pei thought, and still cared what girls might think of him. The stinky, browless one was comfortably married and beyond such trivialities as grooming and hygiene.

Mr. Frown did the talking.

“Professor Liu,” he snapped, hooking a thumb over his shoulder toward the house across the alley from her office. The sneer perked into the slightest of smiles when Auntie Pei blanched at the sight of the black pistol as his shirttail rode up.

She put a hand on her desk to steady herself. “What?”

“Professor Liu Wangshu!” the man barked, louder this time. “When did you see him last?”

“Ah, ah.” Pei clucked, struggling to control her breathing. They were not here for her after all, but for Liu, the university professor who lived in one of the villas across the alley. These were not the first men who had come to talk to him. Instead of waning, her sense of dread grew deeper, pressing at her chest, making it difficult to speak.

She swallowed, lifting the teacup in a remarkably steady hand. “It has been at least two weeks. Maybe three. I assumed he was away on a business trip. He travels someti—”

“We are quite aware of how often he travels,” Mr. Frown said. The MSS man gestured over his shoulder again, this time for the benefit of his balding partner. “She is useless.”

Both men wheeled and strode out the door without another word.

Auntie Pei gasped, awash with relief.

When it came to members of the Ministry of State Security, useless was a very good thing to be. Perhaps she would be able to keep herself from becoming embroiled in whatever this was. She opened the lap drawer of her desk and took out a slip of paper, reading the number out loud to steady herself as she entered it into her phone. The tall man who had left her the paper was from the government. He’d worn a hat, pulled low over his eyes, but had taken it off when he spoke to her, respectful, not like the bad-egg MSS officers. He’d understood Auntie Pei’s standing in the community. Still, there had been danger to him. Not aimed at her, but to whomever he happened to be hunting. His instructions had been clear — couched as a polite request.

Should anyone come looking for Professor Liu, she was to call him immediately, day or night.

It was a simple favor, he’d said. Auntie Pei knew better.

Chau Feng hammered on the professor’s door with the meat of his fist. He looked up at the camera mounted above the frame where the front wall met the eaves of the house. An empty paper wasps’ nest hung in the corner, less than a foot from the plastic box.

Chau’s bald partner stood behind him, like always, probably thinking about brewing his homemade beer instead of how much trouble they would be in if they could not locate Liu Wangshu.

The professor’s bank account had not been accessed for almost a month. A preliminary glance into his activity online revealed he had not sent or received a single e-mail in fifteen days.

“I’m allergic to wasps,” Lung said, apparently just noticing the empty nest.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Chau said. Pity that it was too cold for wasps…

Chau shook his head. He had more important matters to think about than his partner being stung to death.

Professor Liu had effectively disappeared from the face of the earth. His secretary at Bohai Shipbuilding Vocational College had just had a baby, but as far as she knew, he’d not been at work for several weeks. He was her boss, so she’d not questioned him.

Chau Feng heard another nail being pounded into his coffin at every new piece of news. It would have been different if the men they babysat were spies — or at least scientists who made bioweapons, or nuclear bombs, or missile guidance systems.

Professor Liu Wangshu designed boats, nothing dangerous or even remotely exciting. Beijing was interested in him for some reason, though, and if they were interested in him, then Chau Feng was supposed to be interested in him as well.