Peter May - The Fourth Sacrifice

She wondered what fresh developments there had been today, and toyed briefly with the idea of trying to phone Li to find out. But she quickly dismissed the thought. She knew that Li would probably be difficult with her, and that she would probably be awkward with him. Which, in turn, made her wonder if her feelings of guilt were not so much about the investigation as about Li and her relationship with Michael. But, damnit, why should she feel guilty? Li was the one who had turned his back on her. An anger flared briefly in her breast, and then subsided, leaving her feeling empty and sad. And she knew that whatever she felt for Michael she was still in love with Li.

She dropped the autopsy report she had been holding on to the bed, and one of the photographs flipped over. She turned it the right way up and looked at it for a moment. It showed the blood-stained placard that had been hung around the neck of the second victim. She looked at the strange and impenetrable Chinese characters, which meant nothing to her, and was struck by a sudden revelation. Handwriting! Surely the Chinese would have experts in calligraphy able to tell if the characters on the cards had been drawn by the same hand. It had not occurred to her before, she realised, because normal practice would be to compare a written specimen with the handwriting of a suspect, not to compare specimens from different crime scenes. She quickly laid out the photographs of the four placards. But even as she did, her excitement gave way to disappointment. There were only two characters on each one — a nickname and a number. And each was different. The sample was not big enough to make any definitive comparison.

What about the ink? It might be possible to establish that the same ink had been used in each case. But what conclusion could they draw from that? Only, she supposed, that the killer had access to the same ink, in the way that he had access to the same murder weapon. Which simply raised more questions than it answered.

But what if — her mind kept returning to the Chinese characters — what if a calligrapher had been able to establish that they had all been written by the same hand? What would that have meant? There was something in the thought that was only just eluding her.

She tutted with frustration and got up off the bed, catching sight of herself for a moment in the bedroom mirror. With a shock she realised she was still naked. She had not dressed after her shower. And something in her nakedness brought images of Michael into her mind, and she felt the stirrings of sexual desire deep inside. And immediately the guilt returned and she moved quickly away from the mirror to slip into her panties, and the jeans and white blouse she had laid out on the chair. She forced her mind back to blood and headless bodies. She had, she knew, been close to something, something that would make sense both of the things that were different and of the things that were the same.

She had almost given up, and had started clearing away the autopsy and forensics reports when suddenly she realised what it was. It seemed, somehow, so obvious that she wondered why she had not thought of it before. Quickly she searched her purse for her address book, and found the telephone number for Section One that she had previously tried in vain. She hesitated for a long moment, her heart pounding somewhere up in her throat, almost choking her it seemed. Then she sat on the bed, lifted the telephone and called the Beijing number.

There were three long, single rings before a telephonist answered in Chinese. Margaret said, very slowly and carefully, ‘ Qing. Li Yan .’ A gabble of Chinese came back at her. She tried again. ‘ Qing. Li Yan .’ She heard an impatient intake of breath, another burst of Chinese, and then the line was put on hold. After what seemed like a very long time, she heard a man’s voice.

‘ Wei? ’ he said.

‘Li Yan?’

There was a pause. ‘Margaret?’ Something in the way he said her name brought goosebumps up on her arms.

‘Li Yan, I’ve thought of something,’ she said. ‘To do with Yuan Tao’s killer …’ She waited for a response.

‘Well?’ he said eventually, and there was a tone in his voice that this time raised hackles rather than goosebumps, and she remembered just what a frustrating man he could be. She drew a deep breath.

‘You know how you said no one outside of the investigating team and the murderer could possibly know all the details of the killings?’ She didn’t wait for his answer. ‘Well, suppose Yuan Tao’s killer was an accomplice, or at the very least a witness, to the other murders. That would explain how he knew what the modus operandi was. And if he was simply left-handed instead of right-handed, that would explain why that was the only difference in Yuan Tao’s case.’

Another long silence, then Li said, ‘Well, thank you for the thought. I’ll make a note of it in the file.’

She felt her anger rising. ‘And that’s all you’ve got to say?’

‘How is Xi’an?’ he asked, and when she didn’t, couldn’t, respond, added, ‘You and Mr Zimmerman still just good friends?’

‘None of your fucking business!’ she said, and slammed down the phone. And in a single, furious movement, she swept all the photographs and reports off the bed and on to the floor. Why had she even bothered? He didn’t care about her. He didn’t want her sticking her nose into his investigation. He was just a typical chauvinistic, xenophobic Chinese male! She felt tears springing to her eyes, and turned her fury on herself. Why was she upset? Why was she feeling guilty? Why was she wasting her time on this man?

There was a knock at the door, and she jumped up quickly, brushing the tears from her eyes. ‘Yes?’

‘It’s me. Michael.’

She took a deep breath, blinked furiously and checked her hair in the mirror before going to open the door. His smile of greeting was warm and open and friendly, and after her brief exchange with Li she just wanted him to take her in his arms and hold her there. But ‘Hi’ was all she said. ‘Come on in. I’m nearly ready. Just got to put on a little make-up.’ He came into the room and she saw, with embarrassment, his eyes drawn to the pictures and papers strewn over the floor. ‘A bit of an accident,’ she said. ‘I’ll just pick these up.’

‘Here, I’ll help you.’ Michael crouched to gather up the scattered files.

‘No, it’s OK,’ Margaret said quickly. But it was too late. He was already looking at a photograph of one of the headless bodies.

‘Oh, my God!’ He turned away from it, his face screwed up in disgust.

She snatched it from him. ‘Big mistake,’ she said, ‘letting you see stuff like that. Men usually find what I do for a living a big turn-off.’

He stood up, his face pale and shocked. ‘I’ll try not to think about it,’ he said. ‘It’s just a bit of a jolt seeing someone you know with their head cut off.’

‘Someone you know?’ Margaret frowned and then looked at the photograph she had taken from him. It was Yue Shi. ‘Of course,’ she realised. She had not made the connection before. ‘He was a professor of archaeology at Beijing University.’

‘It was a terrible shock when I heard about what happened to him,’ Michael said. ‘I never expected to actually see what happened to him.’

Margaret was concerned. ‘I’m so sorry, Michael. Did you know him well?’

He shrugged. ‘He wasn’t a close friend, but we had a lot of contact while I was researching the documentary series on Hu Bo. He was Hu’s protégé. Studied under him at the university and assisted in several major excavations. He knew the old man as well as anyone. He was invaluable in giving me a picture of Hu Bo the man, rather than just Hu Bo the archaeologist.’