Death of a Red Heroine

It was difficult to guess her age. The way she dressed was almost like a teenager, or else it was too fashionable for him. She had wide black eyes and a straight nose; her hair was pulled back and held in place by a kerchief. Her full lips were moist, sensuous, even somewhat wanton.
    “I’m Detective Yu Guangming, of the Shanghai Police Bureau. I need to ask you a few questions.”
    “What have I done?”
    “Not about you, but about someone you know.”
    “Show me your identification,” she said. “I’m on my way out.”
    “It won’t take long.” He produced his I.D. “We’d appreciate your help.”
    “Okay, come in.”
    It was a small, cozy apartment, but unkempt for the home of a young single woman. A creased bedspread lay over the unmade bed. On the table was an empty but unwashed ashtray. There were no framed pictures, but a number of magazine photographs of cars and movie stars were taped to the wall. On the floor were two pairs of shoes, peeping out from under the bed. There was one thing in common between Jiang and Ning. Each had an apartment to herself.
    “What do you want from me?” she said after he seated himself on a rattan chair.
    “A few questions about Wu Xiaoming.”
    “Wu Xiaoming—why me?”
    “You’re his girlfriend, right?”
    “No, he’s just taken a few pictures of me. For his magazine.”
    “Really?”
    “Yes, that’s all.”
    “Then you don’t have to worry about answering my questions. If you cooperate, everything you say will be kept off the record.”
    “Now what do you mean, Comrade Detective?”
    “Wu is involved in a murder case.”
    “Heavens, what . . .” Her black eyes grew even wider now. “How?”
    “We don’t know everything yet,” he said. “That’s why your help would be appreciated.”
    “But I cannot help you. I hardly know him at all.”
    “You can refuse to cooperate, but then we’ll have to go to your work unit,” Yu said. “Huanpu Elementary School, right?”
    “Go there if you want to. That is all I will say,” she said, standing up and making a gesture toward the door.
    She was beginning to irritate him with her attitude, so damned antagonistic. And he did not like this way of conducting the interview. There was some hard object on the rattan chair beneath him, which made him feel even more uncomfortable as he sat opposite her.
    “But there is more than that, I’m afraid,” Yu said. “We’re not talking about your pictures in magazines, but about the ones in his album. Surely you know them better than I.”
    “What are you talking about?” She flinched involuntarily, but she covered it well. “Show them to me.”
    “We will show these pictures to your principal, every one of them.” He was bluffing now. “They’re by no means decent for a schoolteacher. And a number of other people will see them, too.”
    “You’ve got no right.”
    “Yes, we have every right. We’re here in socialist China. The Party authorities are calling on the people to fight Western bourgeois decadence. These pictures will serve as a good example.”
    “How could you do that!”
    “We can do whatever we want with them,” he said, “as evidence in a criminal investigation. We also have a witness who can testify to your relationship with Wu. Since you’re obstructing our inquiries, we’ve no choice.”
    She sat completely straight on the edge of the sofa, her knees tightly together. She was not only red in the face now. There were small drops of perspiration along her hairline in spite of her effort to hold herself together.
    “What do you want me to do?” she finally said with a note of panic in her quivering voice.
    “Tell us everything about your relationship with Wu,” he added, “including all the details, like a paperback romance.”
    There was a bit of sarcasm he could detect in his own voice. No point, he told himself, to putting her through too much of an ordeal.
    “Where shall I begin?”
    “At the very beginning.”
    “It was about a year ago, I think. Wu came to me as a photographer from the Red Star . He asked if he could photograph me, claiming that I had a typical high-school teacher’s face, and that he was working up a proposal for People .”
    “A typical highschool teacher’s face,” he repeated.
    “It’s not very flattering, but he had his ways of pursuing people.”
    “So the pictures were published?”
    “Yes, but actually he had little interest in the publication, as he told me later. He just