A Loyal Character Dancer

him.”
     
    “They want me to spy on him?”
     
    “That is too strong a word, Catherine. Just pass on the information you happen to have about him. What people is he associated with? What cases does he handle? What books does he read and write? That kind of thing. The CIA has its own sources, but you are someone they can trust.”
     
    She agreed but she did not like it.
     
    Then the phone rang again. It was Chen.
     
    “How are you this morning, Inspector Rohn?”
     
    “Much better.”
     
    “Your ankle?”
     
    “The paste has worked. No problem today,” she said, rubbing her ankle, which still felt slightly tender.
     
    “You scared me yesterday.” There was relief in his voice. “Are you up for another interview today?”
     
    “Sure. When?”
     
    “I have a meeting this morning. What about this afternoon?”
     
    “Then I’ll do a little research in the Shanghai Library in the morning.”
     
    “About Chinese secret societies?”
     
    “Right.” In addition, she was going to collect some information about Chen. Not merely for the CIA.
     
    “The library is also on Nanjing Road. A taxi will take you there in less than five minutes.”
     
    “I’ll walk if it is so close.”                             
     
    “That’s up to you. I’ll meet you at twelve in a restaurant opposite the library, across the street. The Verdant Willow Village. That’s the name of the restaurant.”                     
    “See you then.”
     
    After a quick shower, she left the hotel. She strolled along Nanjing Road, an extended shopping center, not only lined with shops on both sides, but also with rows of peddlers in front of the shops. She crisscrossed the street several times, lured by the interesting window displays. She had not done any shopping since her arrival.                                   
    At the intersection of Zhejiang Road, she had to resist the temptation to enter a vermilion restaurant with engraved pillars sustaining a yellow-glazed tile roof—an imitation of the ancient Chinese architectural style. A waitress dressed in the Qing dynasty costume bowed enticingly to the people passing by. Instead, Catherine bought a piece of sticky rice cake from one of curbside peddlers, nibbling it like the Shanghai girls walking in front of her. It was rather fashionable to talk about the Chinese people as natural capitalists, born wheelers and dealers, and to explain the economic boom in that way, but she believed it was their collective energy released after so many years of state economic control, being given the opportunity to do something for themselves for the first time, that had led to the transformation she saw around her.                             
    And she encountered no more curious glances than she would have in St. Louis. Nor did she meet with any accident except shoulder-bumping and elbow-pushing as she squeezed past a crowded department store. She had been disturbed by the accidents in the last two days, but perhaps she had been clumsy from jet lag. She was well rested that morning. Soon she came in view of the library. She gave small change to beggars on the steps as she would have done in St. Louis.
     
    As she entered the Shanghai Library, an English-speaking librarian came over to help. She had two subjects, the Flying Axes and Chen. To her surprise, Catherine found practically nothing on triads in their literature. Perhaps writing about those criminal activities was forbidden in contemporary China.
     
    She found several magazines containing Chen’s poems and translations. And a few translations of mysteries under Chen’s name, too. Some of them she had read in English. What fascinated her was the stereotyped “translator preface” for each of the books. It consisted of an introduction giving the author’s background, a brief analysis of the story, and an invariable conclusion using political clichés— due to the author’s ideological background, the decadent values of the Western capitalist society cannot but be reflected in the text, and Chinese readers should be alert against such influence ...
     
    Absurd, and hypocritical too, but such hypocrisy might have accounted for his rapid rise.
     
    The librarian stepped into the reading room with a new magazine. “Here is a recent interview with Chen Cao.”
     
    There was a color picture of him in a black suit