The Mao Case

know.”
    “So many things on your mind, I know. You’ve been acting differently.”
    “Don’t worry.
No matter how winds blow and waves beat, / I’m at leisure, like strolling at a courtyard.”
    “Don’t quote him all the time. I’m so sick and tired of it. Tonight, you’re not even as good as the old man!”
    “What old man are you talking about?”
    “Aren’t you talking about him, acting like him, and being him all the time?”
    It dawned on Chen that a fiasco had been playing out in the bedroom. “Mao” kept reciting the poem as sexual stimulation so
     that he could come in cloud and rain with Jiao, but he failed.
    “Let’s take a short break,” “Mao” said. “I need to close my eyes for a minute.”
    “I told you not to hurry,” she said.
    Another short spell of silence engulfed the room.
    “Oh, have you met with Chen of late?” “Mao” said abruptly.
    “I heard that he’s just come back to Shanghai. Where he’s been, I have no idea. Why?”
    “This afternoon he sort of approached me at the cocktail party.”
    “He has business connections. Don’t worry about him. I’ve told you that he’s a nice man.”
    “He’s very nice to you, of course.”
    “He has a book project on the thirties, so he asked me some questions.”
    “So you had a candlelight dinner with him the other night.”
    “What? How do you know about that?”
    “And you’re nice to him too.”
    “Mao” said sarcastically, “He’s so
different, as you’ve said, talented, and capable of buying you an expensive dinner too.”
    “No, that’s not true. He’s nothing but a would-be writer, I assure you.”
    “He is anything but what he claims to be. He is one who might have high connections. I just got a tip about him, and his appearance
     at the cocktail party was no coincidence. I’ll find out. The damned monkey won’t get away from the palm of Buddha.”
    The “monkey” he referred to was the one in the Journey to the West. In the classic novel, Monkey tried to challenge the power
     of Buddha, who turned his palm into the five-peaked mountains and crushed the monkey underneath. Chen hadn’t “approached”
     a Hunan-accented man, however, at the cocktail party that afternoon.
    “What are you going to do about him?”
    “See, you are concerned about him even when lying naked in my arms.”
    “You’re being so unreasonably jealous. If that’s what you want, I’ll stop seeing him. I accepted his invitation because he
     was helping Xie. There’s nothing going on between us.”
    “Well, let’s not talk about him now.”
    “Mao” didn’t seem to want to pursue the subject too far. Whoever “Mao” could possibly be, he was possessive, taking Chen as
     a threat.
    Again, the old familiar sound surfaced, bubbling up from the stillness of the room. This time, “Mao” didn’t recite any lines.
     Chen heard only his labored breathing and the screeching of the wooden-board mattress.
    But “Mao” failed again. “I’m too tired today,” he mumbled.
    Sliding open the closet door a bit, in the semi-darkness Chen could
     make out only the silhouettes of two white bodies on the bed, both partially sitting up, propped up against pillows.
    “You’re beat today,” she said, “what with your worries about Chen, what with —”
    “What are you talking about?” “Mao” snarled in exasperation. “You
think Chen could beat me? Tell you what! He won’t get away so easily the next time.”
    “I have nothing to do with him. Really. I swear by my grandma’s soul.” Jiao took it seriously, whatever he meant by “the
     next time.”
     “He goes to Xie’s place only for his book project.”
    “Why the hell can’t you stop going there? Neither Chen nor Xie is your damned business.”
    “I’ve been studying painting there because of you. You wanted me to be educated and cultured — to be worthy of you.”
    “I wanted you to dabble a little, like Shang — to be like her in every way.”
    “But I have been learning a lot of things there. Xie’s really knowledgeable.”
    “So you really care for Xie, I see… .”
    “Oh, how can you say that?” she exclaimed. Then something fell to the floor, like a glass, breaking and splintering.
    She might have knocked a cup from the nightstand with a sudden motion. In the Romance of Three Kingdoms, Liu Bei, too, dropped
     his cup when Cao Cao made an unexpected comment about Liu’s secret ambition.
    “Don’t move,” she said, springing up from