Peter May - Snakehead

The roads on either side of the freeway were thick with billboards raised on single stalks advertising everything from adult movies and massage parlours to used cars and ice-cream. Tiny flags fluttered in great profusion over sprawling used-car lots, and enterprising people sold hardware out of what looked like wooden shacks. They turned east off the freeway, and the rising sun shone straight in their eyes. Fuller flicked down his visor and snapped on a pair of sleek wraparound sun-glasses that gave him a slightly sinister air. He turned and grinned at Li. ‘Almost mandatory now for any self-respecting FBI agent. Kind of inscrutable, huh?’ And then he remembered that’s how they always described the Chinese. ‘Uh, no offence,’ he added quickly.

Li smiled. ‘None taken.’

‘Just about there,’ Fuller said. The road took them through small clusters of single-storey housing, past green watered lawns and stands of shady trees. On their left Pete’s BBQ House advertised boiled crawfish as its speciality. ‘You’ll meet INS Agent Hrycyk. He’s an ass, but unfortunately we’re going to have to work with him. He, uh…’ Fuller glanced nervously again in Li’s direction, ‘…he doesn’t much like Chinese.’

Li shrugged, ‘I have been here long enough, Agent Fuller, to know that a lot of people don’t much like Chinese.’

Fuller nodded, embarrassed, glad that he could hide behind the shades. ‘You’ll also meet the Chief Medical Examiner. Attractive enough, but I don’t figure any of us are going to like her much. She’s a real hard case. Dr. Margaret Campbell.’

Li felt as if he had just left his insides somewhere back on the road, and his heart was beating so hard he was sure Fuller must be able to hear it. But apart from a slight colouring of his high, wide cheekbones, not a trace of it showed on his face.

In spite of the air-con, Margaret was perspiring under the heat of the halogen lamps. The body lying face down on the table in front of her was a pale jaundice colour, almost hairless. She was working her way through the external examination, shouting out brief sporadic observations for the assistant at the table to tap into the computer. She would write a full report later and fill out the avalanche of paperwork that would have to go with it.

The knuckles of the subject were severely bruised where, she assumed, frantic attempts had been made to break out of the container. Several of the fingernails were torn and had bled. Dried blood was clotted around the nail beds, and there were smears of blood on the notebook and pencil that had been found with the body. She had identified petechial haemorrhaging around the eyes and in the mouth. She expected to find the same on the surfaces of some of the chest organs. Fingertips, toes and lips were tinged with blue.

‘So what does it all mean?’ Hrycyk asked. He had been watching the process carefully and listening to every word. ‘Petechial haemorrhaging…what is that?’

‘Pinpoint haemorrhages where tiny blood vessels have burst,’ Margaret said. She sighed. ‘On the face of it, it looks like you might have been right, Agent. The haemorrhaging, along with the blue tinging on the fingers, toes and lips, are all consistent with suffocation. But I’m not about to commit myself just yet.’

‘You don’t have to,’ Hrycyk said. ‘I already examined the air intake on the container.’

‘So did I.’

He looked faintly surprised. ‘So you’ll know it was closed?’

‘I know it was closed when I examined it.’

‘Jesus, you people never want to commit, do you?’

‘Oh, I’ll commit alright,’ Margaret snapped. ‘Murder, if you don’t get out of my face.’

Margaret then turned her attention to a tiny bruise and pinprick in the semi-lunar fold of the left buttock, on the medial aspect, almost at the point where the left met the right.

Hrycyk’s eagle eye was on to it immediately. ‘What is it?’

‘Looks like an injection site.’

Hrycyk frowned. ‘You mean he was taking drugs or something? Injecting himself?’

Margaret tutted her irritation. ‘Have you ever tried injecting yourself in the buttock?’

Hrycyk made an effort to picture it. But his imagination came up with a blank. ‘Can’t say I have.’

‘And it’s a single puncture mark, so clearly not a regular occurrence. And very recent. Probably within the last twenty-four hours.’

‘So what was he injected with?’

‘I have no idea. But tox might tell us when we get the results back.’

‘How long?’

‘Ask Major Cardiff. His people are doing all the toxicology.’

‘Dr. Campbell…’ Fuller’s voice separated itself out from the racket beyond Margaret’s autopsy station. Someone, somewhere, was playing rock music very loudly. Some pathologists Margaret knew could only work with music playing, as if somehow the music could drown out the heightened sense of mortality that always seemed to accompany a body on a slab. She turned. Fuller said, ‘This is the criminal justice liaison at the Chinese Embassy in Washington.’

Margaret found herself staring at an oddly alien figure standing awkwardly at the entrance to her station, next to a wary-looking Agent Fuller. She had forgotten how Chinese Li looked after a separation. When she had been with him, she never noticed. He was just Li Yan. The man she made love to. The man she talked and laughed and cried with. Now he was a stranger. A tall, strongly built Chinese man with a square-topped crewcut, and big ugly features that she had once grown to love. She had traced every contour of them with her fingers. He wore a simple white cotton shirt that fitted loosely across his broad chest and shoulders, and was tucked into the narrow waistband of dark, pleated slacks. She had forgotten how beautifully clothes hung on the Chinese frame.

They stood, simply staring at each other, for a prodigious amount of time. ‘Hello, Li Yan,’ she said finally.

‘You know each other?’ Fuller asked, amazed. Li had given no indication of it.

‘Yes,’ Li said. And he knew that Fuller was wondering if he had spoken out of turn about her in the car. But he didn’t take his eyes off Margaret for a minute. The icy sensation in his chest was almost painful. How often had he seen her like this? Hidden behind the mask and the goggles, almost every inch of her covered by cotton or plastic. Except for the gap between the tops of her gloves and the short-sleeved gown. And he saw the freckles there on pale skin, the down of soft, fair hair. He wanted to touch her so much it hurt.

The momentary spell was broken by the almost brutal way that Margaret turned over the body on the table. ‘Mr. Li and I met when I assisted the Beijing police during a couple of murder enquiries. He was deputy head of their Serious Crime Squad.’ Her voice was cold and controlled. ‘I’m glad you’re here,’ she said. ‘Since none of us read Chinese, maybe you can tell us what it was this man was writing in his diary.’

Li looked at the body in front of him for the first time, and it felt for a moment as if the world had stopped turning. He put a hand on the end of the table to steady himself. ‘Wang,’ he said, his voice almost a whisper.

‘You know this guy?’ Hrycyk asked, incredulous.

‘Wang.’ Li’s voice cracked as he said the name again. ‘Detective Wang Wei Pao. Senior supervisor, class three, Tianjin Municipal Police.’ He paused. ‘I didn’t really know him. I briefed him.’

Margaret saw that Li was affected by this man’s death and immediately regretted her callousness. She had spent her life regretting the things she did and said, and the hurt she inflicted on the people she loved.

‘So what the hell was a Tianjin cop doing on that truck?’ Hrycyk demanded to know, untouched by the moment.