Olen Steinhauer - An American spy

The girl was in her midtwenties, small boned with a wide, flat nose and pebbly eyes. She found him as he was finishing his second drink, and introduced herself formally as Liu Xiuxiu, then took the stool beside him. A Caucasian man in the corner was playing progressive jazz on a piano. Zhu ordered her a glass of Chardonnay, while he drank his Glenlivet. She, like Sung Hui, was from Xinyang, but that was where the similarities ended. This girl knew exactly what she was doing.

The conversation began with formalities, and he admired how she was able to ride the flow of topics and then control it without ever seeming to interfere. Like most conversations that week, Wenchuan and the whole devastated Sichuan province soon became its focal point. Liu Xiuxiu said, “Fifty thousand. I can’t even imagine that many people, can you? If forced, I could count that high, but I can’t picture it.”

“After a certain number,” he said, “the mind just balks.”

“Exactly.”

He took a sip of whisky. “Earthquakes are just scratching the surface. In three years, the Great Leap Forward killed at least twenty million from starvation. That’s a number I’ve spent decades trying to grasp. I never will.”

Appropriately, Liu Xiuxiu grew quiet and looked into her glass. A lesser escort would have said, I don’t know anything about politics, but Liu Xiuxiu’s silence suggested she knew enough to hold her tongue. Xin Zhu, however, was drinking on a ravenously empty stomach, and his judgment suffered. He said, “Back then, Xinyang was hit very hard. The political semantics are wonderful-we call it the Three Years of Natural Disasters. There was nothing natural about what happened. The food was there, sitting in the silos, but no one was allowed to eat it because the grain was needed to fulfill quotas.” He smiled, raising his glass. “The Great Leap!”

Hearing his own delirious words, he expected her to set down her glass and walk out. Perhaps she would throw the Chardonnay into his face, but the glass remained in her hand, and she said, “Have you eaten?”

“No.”

“Perhaps a restaurant would be a good idea?”

She was going to take care of him. He Qiang had done very well.

Though she suggested a place up Minsheng Road, he patted his stomach and told her that speed was of the essence, so they hurried to the Fook Lam Moon in another wing of the hotel. Zhu ordered shark’s fin, while Liu Xiuxiu settled on fried rice with chicken and octopus. As he gorged himself on an appetizer of chilled shrimp they looked out over the Bund, where colonial-era European banks and customs houses cut through the high-rises. The sight filled him with the desire to discuss history, but he was starting to slide out of his idiocy and didn’t want to push his luck. “How long have you been in Shanghai?” he asked, switching to English.

She smiled modestly and placed her hands in her lap beneath the edge of the table, and he noticed in this different light of the restaurant that her skin was like opaque glass. It made him think that, if enough illumination were applied, he would be able to see through the skin to her organs and blood vessels. In very competent English, she said, “I came six years ago, to study nursing at Jiao Tong, but…” She faded out. “Academics did not suit me.”

“You have residence papers?”

She nodded but did not elaborate.

“And how do you know He Qiang?”

Another smile. “His cousin was a schoolmate in Xinyang, and when I came here I got in touch. He Qiang has been very kind to me.”

Zhu wondered how kind, and how many rules He Qiang had bent for this pretty girl. He still hadn’t gotten a proper meal, though, and until then he would continue to be magnanimous. “It must be difficult.”

“It has been,” she admitted, bowing her head. “Without friends like He Qiang, it would have been much more difficult. But now, I’ve..” Again, she faded out, then raised her head. “I’ve adjusted.”

There was something piercing about that two-word sentence that, even in English, made Zhu want to weep. He understood why He Qiang had set them up together for this fictitious date. She was lovely, and she would, if asked, go to bed with him, but her true value lay in the fact that she had adjusted to the hard life of Shanghai. She could adjust to anything, even working for a man as problematic as Xin Zhu.

In addition to her fluency in English, which she had first studied and then perfected through her job, she knew a smattering of German. When he quizzed her about Shanghai, he found that she could recall the most insignificant details-the color combinations of shop signs, the names of most of Shanghai’s doormen, as well as their wives-and that nothing he said was forgotten by her. Most importantly, she had-also, no doubt, because of her job-the uncanny ability of making him feel comfortable in his own skin, which was no small feat.

The food was delicious and restorative, but she barely touched her rice, though when he ordered the fruit platter for dessert she ate ravenously. She showed no hesitation when he suggested they go up to his room, but in the elevator, she seemed unsure about what to do, so she left her hands by her sides. He unlocked the door and let her in first, and it was she who first spotted He Qiang, standing in the bathroom doorway, gesturing for her silence. That, remarkably, did not throw her off. She walked to the dressers and, hands clasped in front of her stomach, waited. He Qiang smiled at Zhu.

Taking off his jacket, Zhu said, “You are a very beautiful woman.”

Smiling now, too, Liu Xiuxiu said, “You’re too kind.” Then she said, “Let me help you with your shoes.”

“Thank you,” he said, but when she stepped forward, he waved her back and went to the bed, sat down, and took off his own shoes. “That feels nice,” he said.

Seductively, she said, “Mmm.”

“Come here,” he said, then pushed himself onto the bed so that it squeaked. “Mmm,” he groaned.

Liu Xiuxiu covered her smile with a small hand.

As if he were alone, Zhu fluffed a pillow and closed his eyes, then opened them. He gestured to Liu Xiuxiu, pointed at his watch and held up one finger, then waved her away. She nodded. To He Qiang he showed two fingers, then closed his eyes again. He Qiang led Liu Xiuxiu to the bathroom and quietly closed the door behind them.

As instructed, Liu Xiuxiu left at one in the morning, conspicuously holding her high-heeled shoes in her hand until she was outside his door, where she crouched and slipped them on. In the lobby, as she would later report, she noticed a few different men watching her but was unable to discern who among them had only professional interest.

At two, He Qiang woke Zhu and made him tea; then they sat together at the desk. Each had a sheet of paper and a pen, and they talked in the written word. Specifically, French. Zhu wrote in an elegant script, He Qiang in the block capitals of someone with far less education than he had. Zhu wrote: The things one does to be unheard. He Qiang smiled and nodded.

I like her. She’s available? ABSOLUTELY. HATES HER JOB, LOVES HER COUNTRY. Relationships? EX-HUSBAND, CRIMINAL. NO PROBLEM. Criminal class? GREEN GANG. COLLECTS PROTECTION MONEY, CUTS TENDONS. Divorce? He Qiang nodded.

I want her in Beijing tomorrow-Monday. Possible? Another nod.

She’s not coming back. UNDERSTAND. You come, too.

He Qiang had begun to smile again. Since the killing of the American agents two months ago, he had been left to wander, which was no good for him. The call to fly to Shanghai and again impersonate his boss had been a welcome respite from his aimless days. Now he was being called back to the pit. He wrote, GOOD.

Zhu considered that word, bon, then wrote, Tomorrow the committee will try to get rid of me. I will hold them off, but in the meantime, you and Liu Xiuxiu will work on another project. The Americans are preparing their retaliation.