Peter May - The Runner

There were no curtains on the windows, and he stood for a moment looking south at the lights of the city, and the snow driving through them out of a black sky. He turned and cast his eyes around the room. What kind of creature was she that could live in a place like this? Spartan, without personality, without warmth.

He went back to the bedroom. The single bed was dressed with a white duvet and one pillow, neatly plumped and cold to the touch. Sliding doors revealed a built-in closet. Her clothes hung there in neat rows. Tracksuits and tee-shirts and shorts. Nothing for dressing up. Socks and panties were carefully stacked on shelves, and half a dozen pairs of trainers and running shoes sat side by side on a shoe-rack in the bottom of the closet. On the desk, a hairbrush still had some strands of her hair caught between its bristles. There was a comb, a tub of facial astringent, unscented. No make-up. This girl was obsessive. There was room for only two things in her mind, in her life; her fitness and her running.

In the kitchen there were fresh vegetables in a rack, fresh fruit in a bowl on the worktop. In the cupboard Li found packets of brown rice, tinned fruit and vegetables, dried lentils and black beans. In the tiny refrigerator there was tofu and fruit juice and yoghurt. No meat anywhere. Nothing sweet. No alcohol. No comfort eating.

The toilet was spotlessly clean. A shower head on the wall drained through a grille built in to the concrete floor. There was anti-bacterial soap in the rack, a bottle of unperfumed hypo-allergenic shampoo. Li opened a small wall cabinet above the sink and felt the hair stand up on his neck and shoulders. This girl, who wore no make-up, who used unscented soap and shampoo, who cleaned her face with unperfumed astringent, had two bottles of Chanel sitting in her bathroom cabinet, side by side. The same brand as the after-shave he had found in the homes of Sui and Jia Jing. He sprayed each in turn into the cold, clear air of the toilet and sniffed. One he did not recognise. It had a harsh, lemon smell, faintly acidic, certainly not sweet. The other he knew immediately was the same as the aftershave he had breathed in at Jia Jing’s apartment. Strange, musky, like almonds and vanilla. Again, bitter. No hint of sweetness.

It was a coincidence too far, bizarre and unfathomable, and he cursed himself for not having paid more attention to his earlier concerns about the same scents turning up in the other apartments. They had made an impression on him at the time, but it had been fleeting and all but forgotten. He slipped one of the bottles into his pocket and started going through the apartment again in the minutest detail. He lifted the mat in the main room and rolled it into a corner. There was nothing else in the room. In the bedroom he checked inside every shoe, and went through the pockets of all the jogpants. Nothing. He was about to leave the room when something caught his eye lying against the wall on the floor beneath the desk. Something small and gold-coloured that was catching the light. He went down on his knees to retrieve it, knowing that he had found what he was looking for. He was holding a little cylindrical aerosol breath freshener, and suspected that when he finally found this girl she was going to be long dead.

In the hallway outside her apartment, he had locked the door and the gate before remembering that he had meant to call the restaurant to tell them he would be late for the betrothal. He cursed under his breath and fumbled to switch on his phone in the dark. He pressed a key and the display lit up. The slightest of sounds made him lift his head in time to see a fist, illuminated by the light of his phone, in the moment before it smashed into his face. He staggered backwards, dropping his phone, gasping and gagging on the blood that filled his airways. Someone behind him struck him very hard on the back of the neck and his legs buckled. He dropped to his knees and a foot caught him on the side of his head, smacking it against the wall. He heard his own breath gurgling in his lungs before a blackness descended on him, soft and warm like a summer’s night, and his pain melted away.

Plates of food sat piled on the revolving centre of the banqueting table. Delicacies served to the emperor. Snake and scorpion, five-flavoured intestine, jelly fish, sea slugs. And more mundane fare. Meat balls and sesame buns, soup and dumplings. Everything hot had long since gone cold. And everything cold seemed even less appetising than when served. Nothing had been touched. Margaret’s mother had spent much of the time eyeing the table with great apprehension and, Margaret thought, when Li failed to appear and the meal appeared destined to remain uneaten, considerable relief. The gifts in front of them remained unopened.

Margaret was angry and worried at the same time. It was more than an hour since Mei Yuan had called Section One to find out what had happened to Li. Nobody knew. And there was no response from his cellphone. The atmosphere had deteriorated to the point where the tension between the two families gathered for the betrothal was very nearly unbearable. Conversation had long since dried up. Mei Yuan had done her best to stay animated and fill the silences with her chatter. But even she had run out of things to say, and they all sat now avoiding each other’s eyes. Xinxin was fast asleep with her head on Mrs. Campbell’s lap, purring gently, the only one of them unconcerned by the fact that her uncle was more than two hours late.

The two waitresses who had brought the food stood on either side of the door exchanging nervous glances, concerned, embarrassed, and resisting a temptation to giggle. They quickly stood aside as the manageress entered briskly with a harrassed-looking Qian in tow. His face was flushed, colour blushing high on his cheeks beneath wide eyes that betrayed his concern.

Margaret was on her feet immediately. ‘What is it?’

Qian spoke quickly, breathlessly, in Chinese for several seconds and Margaret turned to Mei Yuan to see the colour drain from her face. She looked at Margaret and said in a small voice, ‘Li Yan has been attacked. He is in the hospital.’

Li had been drifting in and out of consciousness for some time, aware of a dazzle of overhead light, the beeping of a machine off to his left, winking green and red lights registering on the periphery of his vision. He had also been only too aware of a pain that appeared to have wrapped itself around his chest like a vice. His head throbbed, and his face felt swollen and incapable of expression. His tongue seemed extraordinarily thick in a dry mouth that tasted of blood. Just to close his eyes and slip away was a blissful escape.

Now he was aware of a shadow falling over his eyes and he opened them to see Margaret’s worried face looking down at him. He tried to smile, but his mouth hurt. ‘Sorry I was late for the betrothal,’ he said.

She shook her head. ‘The lengths you’ll go to just to get out of marrying me, Li Yan.’ And her words brought back to him a dark cloud of recollection, his meeting with the Commissioner. Had it really only been yesterday morning? She added, ‘The doctor says nothing’s broken.’

‘Oh, good,’ Li said. ‘For a moment there I thought it was serious.’ Margaret’s hand felt cool on his skin as she laid it gently on his cheek. It had taken her half an hour to get a taxi, another hour to get to the hospital. The snow had turned to ice on the roads and the traffic had slithered into chaos. ‘Who did this to you, Li Yan?’

‘Some punk kids.’ He cursed his carelessness. They must have followed him up to the seventh floor and waited in the dark for him to come back out.

‘Not related to the case?’

‘I don’t think so. Just muggers. They threatened me outside and I scared them off.’ They had taken his wallet, his cellphone, the keys of the apartment, his Public Security ID.