The Mao Case

he retreated in haste into the smaller closet, pulling the door closed behind him.
    He heard footsteps in the living room, and then the bedroom. The situation was desperate. The first thing a young girl like
     Jiao would probably do now that she was back home was change her clothes. That meant a visit to the big closet. And as an
     industrious art student, she would then start to work. That meant the small closet.
    Behind the closet door, Chen couldn’t see into the room, but he seemed to catch a whiff of perfume wafting near. He listened,
     holding his breath. She was stepping toward the large closet, as he had anticipated.
    He prayed that after taking off her clothes, she would go to the shower. If so, he might be able to sneak out.
    But then there came another sound, indistinctly, from the living room area —

    “Jiao, I’m back.”
    It was a man’s voice, with a strong provincial accent, though which province Chen couldn’t immediately tell. He was confounded,
     not having heard someone come in with Jiao, nor hearing the door reopen later. What’s more, the voice seemed to come from
     the other end of the living room, not close to the door —
    Could there be another door — a secret one in the living room? Though it was hard to imagine, it would explain Internal Security’s
     failure to detect a man coming in and out of her apartment.
    If so, the mysterious man behind Jiao must be rich and resourceful, having bought this apartment along with the one adjacent,
     and having a secret door installed between the two. But why all the elaborate secrecy?
    He could hear Jiao hurrying out, saying, “Why did you want me to hurry back?”
    “What a nice meal,” the man said with a chuckle. “Fatty pork is good for the brain. I’ve been fighting so many battles. An
     emperor, too, has to eat.”
    The two met up in the kitchen area. Chen hadn’t paid much attention to the dishes on the table there. The fatty pork, which
     Peiqin had mentioned as one of Jiao’s favorites, turned out to be one of the mystery man’s favorites, for an uncommon reason.
    “It’s hot, it’s revolutionary,” the man said, clanking his chopsticks on a bowl. “You should learn to eat pepper.”
    Jiao murmured something in response. “Having just enjoyed the Yangtze River water,” the man went on in high spirits, “I am
     relishing the Wuchang fish.”
    Chen finally recognized the man’s accent as Hunan, possibly affected, as he spoke slowly, almost deliberately. But there was
     something else mystifying about his comment. It sounded like a paraphrase of the two lines Mao wrote after swimming in the
     Yangtze River.
“I’ve just tasted the Yangtze River water, / and I’m now enjoying the Wuchang fish.”
The original carried an allusion to the ambitious King of Wu during the Three Kingdom period. The king had wanted to move
     the
capital from Nanjing to Wuchang, but the people were unwilling, saying that they would rather drink the Yangtze River water
     than eat the Wuchang fish. Mao dashed off the poem, comparing himself favorably to the Wu emperor, having both the water and
     the fish to his heart’s content.
    There might be a fish on the table, presumably a real Wuchang fish too.
    “No, the Huangpu River water,” Jiao responded debunkingly.
    Chen slid the closet door open an inch, trying to peep out. From
     where he stood, however, he couldn’t see into the kitchen area. He fought down the temptation venture out farther.
    Jiao and her company continued eating in silence.
    But Chen saw a mini recorder on the corner table, which reminded him of the one in his briefcase. He took it out and rewound
     the tape to the beginning.
    “Leave the dishes alone,” the man said to Jiao. “Let’s go to bed.”
    The two of them were already moving into the bedroom, his
     footsteps heavier than hers.
    “Haven’t you put up the scroll I bought you?” he asked.
    “No, not yet.”
    “I wrote the poem for you years ago. Now I finally got it back. I paid a high price for it.”
    Chen was totally lost. The man was presumably talking about the scroll in the closet, which had a huge price tag. But Mao
     had composed the poem for Shang, so how could the man outside claim it as his for Jiao?
    And what was the relationship between the two? Obviously, he was the “keeper.” Judging from her response, Jiao didn’t feel
     strongly about the scroll. At least, she didn’t put it up quickly. Having rewound the tape, Chen pressed the