Death of a Red Heroine

his own, “Do we have to take the case?”
    “Well, that’s a good question.”
    “I responded to the call because there was nobody else in the office and I couldn’t find you. But we’re only the special case squad.”
    It was true. Nominally their squad did not have to take a case until it was declared “special” by the bureau—sometimes at the request of another province, and sometimes by other squads, but more often than not, for an unstated political reason. To raid a private bookstore selling pirated hard-core CDs, for instance, would not be difficult or special for a cop, but it could get a lot of attention, providing material for newspaper headlines. “Special,” in other words, was applied when the bureau had to adjust its focus to meet political needs. In the case of a nameless female body found in a small remote canal, they would ordinarily turn it over to the sex homicide group, to whom it apparently belonged.
    That explained Detective Yu’s lack of interest in the case though he had taken the phone call and examined the crime scene. Chen riffled through the pictures before he picked one up. “Let’s have this picture cropped and enlarged. Someone may be able to recognize her.”
    “What if no one comes forward?”
    “Well, then we must start canvassing—if we’re going to take the case.”
    “Canvassing indeed,” Yu picked a tiny tea leaf from his teeth.
    Most detectives disliked this drudgery.
    “How many men can we call upon for the job?”
    “Not too many, Comrade Chief Inspector,” Yu said. “We’re short. Qing Xiaotong’s on his honeymoon, Li Dong’s just resigned to open a fruit shop, and Liu Longxiang’s in the hospital with a broken arm. In fact, it’s just you and me on the so-called special case squad at the moment.”
    Chen was aware of Yu’s acerbic undertone. His accelerated promotion was going to take some living down, not to mention his new apartment. A certain measure of antagonism was hardly surprising, especially from Detective Yu, who had entered the force earlier and had technical training and a police family background. But Chief Inspector Chen was anxious to be judged on what he could achieve in his position, not on the way he had risen to it. So he was tempted to take the case. A real homicide case. From the very beginning. But Detective Yu was right. They were short of men, and with many “special” cases on their hands, they could not afford to take on a case that just happened to come their way. A sexual murder case—with no clue or witness, already a cold case.
    “I’ll talk to Party Secretary Li about it, but in the meantime, we will have the picture copied and prints distributed to the branch offices. It’s a necessary routine—whoever is going to take the case.” Chen then added, “I’ll go to the canal if I have some time in the afternoon. When you were there, it must have been quite dark.”
    “Well, it’s a poetic scene there,” Yu said, standing up, grinding out his cigarette, and making no attempt to conceal the sarcasm in his tone. “You may come up with a couple of wonderful lines.”
    “You never can tell.”
    After Yu left, Chen brooded at his desk for a while. He was rather upset with the antagonism shown by his assistant. His casual remark about Chen’s passion for poetry was another jab. However, Yu’s critique was true—to some extent.
    Chen had not intended to be a cop—not in his college years. He had been a published poet as well as a top student at Beijing Foreign Language Institute. He had his mind set on literary pursuits. Just one month before graduation, he had applied to an M.A. program in English and American literature, a decision his mother had approved, since Chen’s father had been a well-known professor of the Neo-Confucian school. He was informed, however, that a promising job was waiting for him in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In the early eighties, all graduates had their jobs assigned by the authorities, and as he was a student on the president’s honor roll, his file had been requested by the ministry. A diplomatic career was not his own choice, even though such a position was generally considered fantastic for an English major. Then, at the last minute, there was another unexpected change. In the course of the family background check by the authorities, one of his uncles was found to have been a counterrevolutionary executed in the early 1950s. It was an uncle whom he had never seen,