her, coming closer with every second.
The other man in the doorway silhouetted against the light from the hallway. More words in the language she didn’t understand. The small man turned and said something.
They were talking about her. She knew they were talking about her.
Her eyes darted left and right. How could she let them know who he was?
Then she saw the letter lying on the table, next to her bed. She grabbed it while the men were talking and crushed it tightly into a small square in her palm.
She closed her eyes again. She prayed like she had been taught by the nuns at her school before the illness, mumbling the words over and over again.
Blessed Virgin Mary, pray for us.
Blessed Virgin Mary, pray for us.
Blessed Virgin Mary, pray for us.
The men finished speaking. Through her mumbled words, she heard his breathing. Short, sharp bursts of breath, as if he had been running.
She couldn’t help herself, her eyes opened again. The metal cylinder began to come closer, lowering, pointing directly at her now. The metal eye getting larger with every step.
‘Sleep well, child,’ he said in Chinese.
They were the last sounds she ever heard.
Detective Sergeant Strachan strode up the steps of Central Police Station and pushed through the double doors.
As soon as he entered, he was hit by a wall of sound. Two half-naked rickshaw drivers were arguing with each other in a dialect he didn’t understand. A woman was wailing in the corner, bemoaning the loss of her little boy. A group of hawkers were pushing and shoving each other, and, in turn, being hustled by a Sikh guard into the corner with shouts of I mi te, I mi te in Indian-accented Shanghainese.
At the centre of the mayhem, as calm as the eye of a storm, was Sergeant Wolfe, perched behind his desk, above it all.
Strachan elbowed his way through the crush to the Sikh sergeant who guarded the entrance to the interior. It was one of the times he loved most. The sense that he knew what was going on behind these closed doors whilst the rest of Shanghai remained ignorant.
His father had brought him here before he was killed. Proudly showing him where he worked and what he did. Strachan had sat on the knee of the desk sergeant, played with the beards of the Sikhs, listening to the arguments in all the languages of China; Mandarin, Shanghainese, Chiuchow, Hakka, even the sing-song tones of the excitable Cantonese. He remembered some of the words even to this day. Being able to say, ‘Good morning’ in eight different dialects amused him.
His father loved being a policeman, walking the beat, sorting out the problems on his patch. Strachan had listened to all his stories when he came home in the evening, sitting by the fire. The tales of cheating merchants, kidnappers, burglars, con-men, pickpockets, street fighters, and card sharps were his bedtime stories. It was inevitable that one day he would join the police, even though his mother, in her Chinese way, had tried to persuade him against the idea.
‘It’s not the profession of a good boy. Become an accountant or a lawyer instead.’
‘I don’t want to be an accountant or a lawyer.’
‘Get an education first and then decide.’
He had done as she wished. Went to St John’s University, got his degree and then decided.
She wasn’t happy but knew he had made his mind up. ‘You’re just like your father. Stubborn as a Yangtse boatman.’
He took that as a compliment.
The Sikh sergeant closed the door behind Strachan, and he experienced the familiar surge of excitement. He was here, where it was all happening, where death and glory, life and sadness, truth and lies stalked the corridors. Even after five years in the force, he still enjoyed the same thrill every time he stepped through that door. The divide that separated the world of normal people and his world; the underworld.
He pushed through the gate and walked down a short green-walled corridor. The only light came from a single dim bulb hiding behind a frosted-glass sconce. A door on the right was stencilled with the words Detective Office in thick block letters. He opened it. Immediately the group of detectives in the corner fell quiet and stared at him.
‘He’s here, lads. Danilov’s little chum.’
The voice came from a ginger-haired detective seated at a desk on one side of the group. . Strachan ignored him.
‘And where’s the great detective today? Solving another devilish plot?’ The group of detectives sniggered.
Strachan faced them. They all stopped laughing. ‘It’s his day off. He deserves one day to himself.’
‘He deserves one day to himself,’ mimicked the ginger detective. ‘Shame he missed the murders last night, wasn’t it?’
Inspector Danilov’s daughter placed the plate of syrniki in front of him. The food was slightly charred at the edges and gave off a strange orange glow.
She had decided that he needed to eat more regularly, and part of this new healthy regime was a home-cooked breakfast, just like his wife used to make back in Minsk.
Except she didn’t cook like her mother. She cooked like a poet with a vivid imagination; everything was overdone and overwrought.
‘Thank you, Lenchik. It looks delicious.’
There was no answer. Since coming home she had gradually lapsed into an uncommunicative silence, but he would keep trying. ‘Is it a new recipe?’
Again, no answer. She turned back to the stove and took her own plate.
She sat down opposite him. Inspector Danilov saw the puzzled look on her face and that slight tilt of her head to the left. A movement she had made even when she was three years old, explaining to him why her doll had made such a mess on the floor.
Was she pretty? He couldn’t judge. A father can never judge his own daughter.
He stared at the syrniki. What doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. He tucked into the food with gusto. The strange texture fought with the leftover taste of the opium he had smoked the night before, creating a bitter mixture in his mouth.
He fought the urge to gag and closed his eyes, imagining he was eating a dish from the Princess Ostrapova’s cafe.
‘It’s not that bad,’ he mumbled through a mouthful of starch.
‘It’s not that good, either.’ She pushed the food away from her across the table.
Danilov continued
