Qiu Xiaolong - Shanghai Redemption

He was then beginning to have second thoughts about the visit to Lu, who could be an overenthusiastic host, which was not something he was looking forward to.

The subway station announcements came every two or three minutes. He glanced up at the blinking station map opposite him. The train was now passing through the tunnel under the river, and the next stop was Lujiazui.

There he found himself moving toward the door.

White Cloud had told him about her new apartment in Lujiazui. He wasn’t going to ask her to put him up for the night, he reassured himself. He just wanted to drop in for a short visit. It was on the way to Lu’s.

What Qian had told him about the Heavenly World’s law firm was a potential lead, and White Cloud might be able to tell him something more about it. She might also know some other details that she hadn’t shared in her earlier phone call. Walking out of the subway in Lujiazui, he thought of a phrase he’d read years earlier- the way up is the way down . Why did he think of that phrase now? He had no idea. Near the exit, he saw an old woman with thread-bound white jasmine sprays in a bamboo basket. Fragrant and yet only one yuan for a single bud. It was something he hadn’t seen for a long while. Perhaps it was too cheap for this new age. Leaning down, he paid for a single white spray. In his childhood, his mother would occasionally pick up a spray of jasmine for ten cents, wear it through a buttonhole in her mandarin dress, and then, one or two days later, put it in a cup of green tea.

At this moment, she was alone in the hospital, frail, frightened. He felt wretched at the thought of it. Once again, he was tempted to turn around and go to the hospital. But what about his meeting with Old Hunter tomorrow morning? From the moment he left his mother’s side, Chen would probably be shadowed, which would then lead his enemies to the retired cop. The “burglary” of his mother’s room could have been arranged simply to smoke him out, as well as those trying to help him.

He looked up to see a lone black crow flying overhead. In a forest of surrounding high-rises, the tiny darksome bird seemed to come out of nowhere. Possibly, it was another omen.

White Cloud had told him that the apartment complex was close to the subway, but the streets were new to him, and tall buildings obstructed the view, so it took him a while to find the Bingjiang subdivision.

Chen walked through the gate to the building. At the entrance, there was a gray-attired doorman sitting in a cubicle. He poked his head out and asked sleepily, “Who are you visiting?”

“3012. Miss Bai.”

“The elevator is just over there, but you have to call up first.” The doorman asked no further questions but simply sat back, grinning, with a cigarette in his hand.

Chen was about to push the intercom when the elevator came down. A young mother stepped out, pushing a red stroller. He got in without bothering to call up.

He got out on the thirtieth floor, found apartment 3012, and pressed the doorbell two or three times. There was no response. But since he was already there, he took out his cell phone and called on the cell he’d given her.

“Who’s there?” she said, having picked up the phone on the first ring.

“Me. You gave me the address in your salon the other day, remember?”

“Yes, please come up. The top floor.”

“I’m already at your door.”

“Oh, just one minute.”

The door opened, and she was standing there in a white robe, drying her hair with a towel, her face glowing.

“Sorry, Chen. I was taking a shower. I didn’t hear the doorbell. Luckily I had the cell phone with me in the bathroom,” she said. “What favorable wind has brought you over today?”

“I was in the subway, and I heard ‘the next stop is Lujiazui,’ so I decided to get out and drop by for a visit.”

“I’m so glad you did.” She looked excited, as she finished towel-drying her hair.

“I should have called first, but what a nice apartment! It suits your status as a successful businesswoman.”

“You don’t have say that, Chen. Besides, the room is a mess.”

It was a spacious living room, but it was something of a mess. There were rumpled clothes on the couch by the window and a yoga mat stretched out on the floor, with a pair of high heels beside it. It looked like she’d been doing her workout routine before taking a shower.

Following his glance, she blushed. She pulled up a chair for him and seated herself on the edge of the couch. Her hair still wet, she gave off a clean smell, probably of herbal shampoo. Barely settled on the couch, she stood up again.

“What would you like to drink?”

“Water is fine with me.”

“I’ve a bottle of very rare Irish whiskey.”

“Whatever you have.”

She took a bottle from a glass cabinet, poured for him half a glass of the amber-colored liquid, straight, and for herself, just two or three drops over a lot of ice cubes.

“Oh, I’ve forgotten to give you the apartment tour,” she said, combing the slightly wet hair with her fingers. “Finally, I have something like a home in the city of Shanghai.”

“That’s the Shanghai dream, isn’t it?”

“In a couple of hours, when all the lights are on, there is a fantastic view of the Bund across the river. It’s your favorite part of the city, and you can’t miss it.” She added softly, “You told me how, as a student, you spent so many mornings studying in Bund Park, dreaming about the future.”

So she wanted him to stay for “a couple of hours.” After all, it was his first visit here. She was probably aware that there was something more than the merely social behind his unannounced visit. But for the moment, she seemed to be pleased to have him there.

Had we but world enough, and time … But they were not in Andrew Marvell’s world, and there wasn’t the time.

Her cell phone rang. She picked it up and looked at the screen without saying anything. It was probably a text message.

“Sorry, it’s about business,” she said, typing a response. “I have to reply.”

“What a hard-working businesswoman.”

“You don’t have to laugh at me.”

“I’m in no position to laugh at a successful entrepreneur.”

“Let’s go into the other room,” she said with a touch of coyness. “It’s too messy in here.”

It was to the bedroom rather than the office that she led him, however. She gestured him to a corner sofa, and then perched herself on the edge of the bed. She was half facing an antique mahogany dressing table, which must have been made in the days when a Chinese lady didn’t have the luxury of a separate bathroom. Now the table served more as a decoration than as furniture. Not far from them, the bathroom door was ajar.

“Sorry, my hair is still wet,” she said, taking a look into the mahogany-framed mirror above the dressing table before she sat down again, half reclining against the headboard.

He’d come here on the spur of the moment, but now the situation unnerved him. She was surprisingly nice to him, lying there gazing at him.

He was in such deep trouble. Why drag her in? There was no way he could ever pay her back.

She seemed to be reading his mind, but she said nothing.

“I want to thank you again for your help that day at the salon,” he started with difficulty.

“You were my first customer there-my first personal customer. Usually, one of these girls would wash a customer’s hair. And guess what? That afternoon I thought of something from my childhood in the Anhui countryside. In those days, it took a lot of effort to wash one’s hair. For my father, it was almost like a ritual, and he did it only once or twice a year. On New Year’s Eve, my mother had to boil two kettles of hot water, and then dip his head in and out of a small plastic basin, constantly mixing hot and cold water. I was a little girl then, and I remember giggling at the sight of his hair covered in grayish bubbles.”