Peter May - The Killing Room

‘And you think I have?’ Margaret asked.

‘Xinxin adores you. You were all she talked about that night when I drove her and Li Yan back to the hotel. About how Magret came to get her at Tiananmen Square, about how great Magret was at flying a kite, about the hours Magret spends reading to her at bedtime.’ She smiled ruefully. ‘I could never be those things to her. So I could never be those things for Li Yan.’ She looked down at her hands, and Margaret was almost shocked to see that her eyes were moist. ‘The men in my life always seem to have other priorities. I’m just getting to recognise it a bit earlier now.’

Margaret didn’t know what to say. She thought about Xinxin babbling on to Mei-Ling about Magret this and Magret that. She thought about all those hours spent reading and re-reading the big picture books, the jigsaws that they pieced together time and again. She thought about how Xinxin would slip into the big double bed with Li and Margaret on a Sunday morning when Margaret would stay over on a Saturday night, her warm, soft little body insinuating its way between them, snuggling in for comfort. And suddenly all her fears and anxieties spilled over in big salty tears that ran silently down her face. She wiped them quickly away with the back of her hand. ‘I just hope we find her before … before that bastard does anything to hurt her.’

Mei-Ling looked up and saw the wet streaks on Margaret’s face. She nodded grimly. ‘We have that in common at least.’

Neither of them had been aware of the door to the canteen opening, and they were not aware of Li until his shadow fell across the table. A momentary frown flitted across his face. Something, he knew, had passed between Margaret and Mei-Ling. But none of that mattered any more. ‘I have a warrant,’ he said, ‘to search Comrade Cui’s clinic.’

Darkness fell as the convoy of police and forensic vehicles headed west on Yan’an Viaduct Road. The last daylight glowed faintly under the pewter-coloured clouds that were gathered on the far horizon. The haloed lights of another Shanghai night pricked the darkness around them, dragged in liquid smears back and forth across rain-battered windscreens.

Margaret sat in the back of Mei-Ling’s Santana. She saw her own reflection in the side window switched off and on like a TV screen image as she reflected the light from the overhead street lamps at regular intervals. She looked haunted, like the ghost of her grandmother that she had seen in herself the night before.

Everything now was moving so quickly it was difficult to maintain a grasp of it all. The only constant was the fear that gnawed like a hungry animal trapped inside her. Fear of finding Xinxin and realising a nightmare. Fear of not finding her. Fear of never finding her, which would be worse, almost, than anything.

She caught Mei-Ling watching her in the rear-view mirror and wondered what had brought about her change of heart. Had it really been seeing Li with Xinxin, hearing Xinxin babble on about Margaret? The men in my life always seem to have other priorities , she had said, and her words had been laden with the bitterness of experience. A Yang Orphan was how her aunt had described her. And Margaret remembered Aunt Teng’s grave interpretation of Mei-Ling’s Heavenly Element of water — meaning danger, something hidden, anxiety.

The convoy, lights flashing, eased its way between the parked cars in the street leading to the clinic. Cyclists, huddled in dripping capes, swerved aside to let them by. But even from here Li could see that the clinic was in darkness. When they drew up outside it, he saw also that the gates were closed, and secured with a chain and padlock. His first reaction was anger. He jumped out of the car and ran to the gates, and stood impotently in the rain, clutching the black-painted wrought iron, peering between the spiked uprights for any sign of life beyond. There were no vehicles, no lights, just puddles forming in the pitted tarmac between clumps of weeds that had not been apparent when the car park was full. He rattled the gates in frustration and turned to find Mei-Ling and Margaret sheltering under a large black umbrella. Officers were gathering behind them on the sidewalk. The rain ran down Li’s face. ‘They knew we were coming,’ he said through clenched teeth. ‘Someone told them we were coming.’ And he felt as if he knew exactly who that someone was. ‘Somebody get some cutters and get this fucking gate open,’ he shouted.

It was nearly ten minutes before an officer arrived with a large pair of cutters that sliced through the metal chain like a hot knife through butter. He opened the gates and all the vehicles crowded into the forecourt. Under the shelter of the canopy over the main entrance, the detectives and forensic officers who were to enter the clinic stripped off wet outer clothing and pulled on white gloves and plastic shoe covers. Margaret did the same. She saw that Li’s white tee-shirt had been soaked, even through his jacket. It was almost translucent, and she could clearly see the firm, muscular shape of him underneath. Margaret looked round to find Mei-Ling watching her again. Mei-Ling drew her brows together, made a moue with her mouth and drew a short sharp breath in through her lips. In spite of everything, it made Margaret smile. In other circumstances, perhaps she and Mei-Ling might have found something more in common than a shared lust for Li.

Detective Dai forced the double doors into the clinic. A splintering of wood. Then silence, except for the crackle of a dozen or more police radios. And then a loud creaking as the doors swung open into the darkness beyond. Several flashlights snapped on, and a small group led by Li pushed open internal glass doors and entered the reception hall, beams of light criss-crossing in the dark. The floor here was tiled. A reception desk facing them was empty. The drawers of two large filing cabinets behind the desk stood open, picked out by several flashlights. Whatever records they might once have contained were gone. There was not so much as a single scrap of paper in the reception area. Only a half-drunk mug of tea on the desk gave any clue as to the hurried evacuation of people and files.

None of the light switches was working, and an officer was dispatched to find where the electricity supply came into the building and restore the power. Li said, ‘There must be some state record of who was employed here. I want names. And I want arrest warrants out on all of them.’

‘You got it, Chief,’ Dai said, and he unhooked the radio mike from his belt.

‘Including Cui Feng,’ Li added. Which silenced everyone. Dai glanced at Mei-Ling.

She said, ‘Be careful, Li Yan. We can’t go arresting someone like Cui Feng without evidence.’

‘Then let’s find some!’ Li’s raised voice startled everyone. ‘I want every employee brought in for questioning.’

‘Sure,’ Dai said, and he turned away into the dark to bark instructions into his radio.

‘Where’s the operating theatre?’ Margaret asked.

‘In the basement,’ Mei-Ling told her.

Margaret looked at Li. ‘Can I take a look at it?’

He nodded. Mei-Ling said, ‘I’ll take you.’

The two women followed the beams of their flashlights through double doors and down a narrow staircase to the suite of rooms in the basement where all the clinic’s operations took place. Upstairs they heard other officers moving around, systematically working their way through the building, calling to each other in the dark. Down here it was deathly quiet. Across the hall, through double swing doors, were the preparation and recovery rooms. Facing them were the doors to the theatre suite. Above the door, Margaret’s flashlight picked out the normally illuminated box sign in Chinese and English warning that they were about to enter the surgical area. On the wall to the left was a square push-button about the size of a postcard, that could be punched or hit with the elbow to let in any one of the surgical team, or the patient’s gurney. Only in this case, Margaret thought, if Jiang Baofu was to be believed, it was not a patient on the gurney, but a victim.