China Hand, page 4
I sprang to my feet like a jack-in-the-box, recovering barely enough of my senses to greet him. My efforts brought no response or warmth to his wrinkled face. The dean simply stared at me before saying, “My office.”
I wiped my sweaty hands on my pants and followed him into the simple room. A wooden desk stood with chairs on either side, backed by a crowded bookshelf. A mullioned window offered a view of the quad.
He ashed a cigarette I hadn’t noticed. “Take a seat, Mr. Callahan,” he said in his hoarse smoker’s voice, glaring at me through thick, black-framed glasses. Then he sat, studying my bruise with a frown. “Mr. Callahan, we had high hopes for you, coming from Harvard.”
Had? “Yes, sir,” I managed.
“But you clearly have failed to conduct yourself with the dignity we expect of teachers who come to our university. Let’s start at the orientation.” His voice rose as he slapped the top of his desk so hard that I jerked back in my seat. “Do you really think I did not notice you and Mr. Carter gossiping while I was talking?”
Still startled, I couldn’t respond.
“Then, in your first class, right after we gave you a list of forbidden topics, did you really say that at Harvard you had more freedom than IAU students have?”
“I never said that.” I’d thought it, to be sure, but was certain I’d swallowed those words.
“We have reviewed the videotapes, Mr. Callahan. You implied it so clearly that only a fool wouldn’t have understood, and the class monitor is no fool. Rick is my nephew. We are not idiots. I’m not sure the same can be said of you.” His last words were as cold and pointed as icicles.
“I’m sorry. I never intended to imply that.”
“Mr. Callahan, don’t insult me with your lies. We haven’t even gotten to your behavior outside the classroom. Tell me, what were you doing in a drunken barroom brawl last night?”
“It’s a…I was…these Russians were…” I couldn’t think of any way to demonstrate my innocence—and certainly didn’t want to say anything that would call attention to Lily’s presence.
“Enough. I can’t bear to hear you struggle for an honest answer. We cannot have IAU instructors behaving in such a disgraceful manner.”
At least he hasn’t mentioned Lily.
Chen pulled himself close to his desk and leaned forward, like a cat about to pounce. “Then the police stopped you, and you didn’t have your passport. Not even a copy. What did we tell you at orientation? Always have your passport. You can’t follow even the simplest instructions, yet you presume to teach Chinese students? To do what? Get drunk and carouse?”
“Dean Chen, I know this doesn’t look good, and I’m sorry—”
“‘Doesn’t look good?’ It looks atrocious. Why didn’t you have your passport? Did you get so drunk you lost it?”
It had been years since anyone had sneered at me so openly. I felt belittled, humiliated. I tried to explain. “I’m pretty sure it was pickpocketed by a woman who bumped into me yesterday.”
“Chinese?”
“Yes, I think so.”
Chen suddenly rose to his feet and stubbed out his cigarette in an ashtray crammed with butts. He was towering over me, smoke pouring from his nostrils. “You—you—of all people are accusing a Chinese woman of stealing your passport. Is that what you’re saying, Mr. Callahan?”
“No, not really,” I hedged, fidgeting in the seat. “I just don’t know how—”
“Who is she?”
“I don’t know. She bumped into me and then—”
“Where did you keep your passport? Perhaps you can remember that.”
“In my front pants pocket.”
“So tell me…how did it end up in the bushes near the Foreign Experts Building? Because that’s where a Chinese security officer found it this morning.”
I breathed a sigh of relief that my passport had been found. I shouldn’t have. Chen slapped my passport down on the desk with the same vehemence that he put out his cigarette. “What were you doing in the bushes to make your passport fall out of your pants? Tell me, I want to know.”
I was so blindsided by his sordid suggestion that I didn’t know what to say. I stammered, “S-s-s-someone stole it and must have dropped it there. It’s not what you think.”
“Did they put this there, too?” He reached into a desk drawer and pulled out a plastic bag containing a used condom, holding it by his finger and thumb, a look of total disdain on his face. “Is this part of the plot against you?”
I touched my injured forehead, inadvertently setting off a stabbing pain. My skull was pounding, my eyelid spasming. “What are you talking about?”
“It was right by the passport. Your passport. In the bushes.”
“No way that’s mine. Who found it?”
“Our excellent security service. A respectable woman had to pick this up.” He had a look of pure revulsion as he threw the bag on his desk.
I felt more trapped than in that concrete-walled police cell, and had no idea how or why it was happening. “I…I…I was set up, Dean Chen!” What other explanation was there?
“By Chinese officials? Are you saying that you are so important that we would send someone to steal your passport and then plant a used condom in the bushes? You disgust me even more than this evidence of public fornication. Do you know that falsely accusing someone is defamation? Defamation is a serious crime in China, Mr. Callahan. You could go to prison for a very long time. And if the young lady was one of our students, she will be expelled.” He glared at me.
“I wasn’t with any student. There was no public sex—or any sex. And I’m telling you, someone set me up and planted…that.” I gestured vaguely towards the used condom. “Can you do a DNA test?”
“And waste even more money on you? We have all the evidence we need. You would be wise to admit your crime.” He pointed to my passport and the condom, then held up the police report from last night. “We have never had a teacher get off to such a disgusting start, Mr. Callahan.”
I had no reply. It seemed like he already had me tried and convicted.
“Are you sure teaching here is what you want to do?” he demanded.
“Yes, of course.”
“Is this what you wanted to do, or did someone send you here?”
What? “No one sent me here,” I said forcefully. “I came here on my own. I thought it would be interesting to live in China and teach.” Was he insinuating that I was somebody’s stooge?
Dean Chen put the baggie into a drawer as if he could no longer bear the sight of it. Then he sat back in his chair and lit a cigarette. “You thought it would be interesting to live in China and teach.” He shook his head, exhaling a gray cloud. “We have reviewed your activities since arriving at the IAU. Your behavior has been so stupid, so completely irresponsible, that it’s highly unlikely anyone would have entrusted you to spy on us.” He leaned forward. “But it does seem that someone has an interest in you.” He paused, dramatically, to let that sink in. “Who might that be, Mr. Callahan? We want to know why you’re so important to them.” He smiled—either at his own speech, or just because he delighted in watching me squirm.
“I really don’t think I’m important to anyone.”
“I agree that your importance to anyone is almost impossible to fathom. But if you are important to them, then you are also of great interest to us, no matter how disgraceful your behavior has been.”
His eyes bored into mine even more intensely. I looked up and to the right before remembering that unpracticed liars often shifted their gaze in that direction. I couldn’t do anything right, even tell the truth.
“Mr. Callahan, a person you were drinking and carousing with last night is of most importance. Do you know who I mean?”
“Will Carter?” I was about to tell him that Will was innocent, too, but Dean Chen cut me off.
“No, not your fellow carouser. Think. Who else’s company did you keep?”
Not Lily, please. I was certain that if he learned I’d been drinking with Lily, he would expel me immediately. My expression must have given me away.
“That’s right, Mr. Callahan, Miss Jiang. She is very, very important.” He nodded slowly, expressionless.
Feeling too hopeless to argue further, I just sat on the edge of my seat, hands out, palms up, the body language of a beggar.
He drew deeply on his cigarette, eyeing me above the fiercely burning tip. “You were buying drinks for Miss Jiang and her friend.”
“No, I swear. We ran into them there, and then this big Russian guy was trying to manhandle Miss Jiang and…”
“You can’t even remember her friend’s name? You must have been very drunk.”
“Sophie!” Her name came to me in a flash.
“Bravo, Mr. Callahan.”
“I also remember that those Russians had been bullying some others in the bar, and we wanted to make sure Lily and Sophie were safe.”
Chen took a deep breath. “Miss Leilei is more than my assistant. Her father is General Jiang Guangkai, chief of the People’s Liberation Army staff and a member of the Central Military Commission. He is a powerful man. Some people might want to harm him and his family. We’ve had to tighten security here because of threats like these.”
What? Will had said Lily’s father was a general, but the chief of the People’s Liberation Army staff? And someone might want to harm them?
“He spoke with his daughter last night. I was on the phone with him when you arrived. Do you want to know what he said?” Chen’s gaze dipped to my passport.
I nodded.
“He said Miss Leilei believes you saved her from being attacked by that big Russian man, and that your intervention came at a personal cost to you, Mr. Callahan.” He glanced at my bruise. “That much appears true.”
“Yes, sir.”
“That’s the only reason you’re not in jail right now. You protected an important man’s daughter.”
He stubbed out his cigarette. “We will continue our investigation into the disappearance of your passport.” He slid it across his desk. “And that condom. And we will keep IAU Foreign Teachers Association President Blum informed of your actions, as this reflects badly on all of you. Behave, Mr. Callahan. You are on thin ice, as you say.”
“Thank you, Dean Chen.”
“Don’t thank me. Everything about your behavior offends me. But I am willing to abide by the general’s wishes.”
“The general’s wishes?”
“That you be spared immediate expulsion because of your aid to his daughter.” Chen gestured for me to stand, then rose and thrust his face so close to mine that I could smell his tobacco breath. “But I would advise you to reflect on your actions. And if you ever lie to me again, you will be finished.”
Jesus…what does that mean?
My hands shook as I put my passport into my pocket and walked out of the dean’s office, wondering what the hell was going on. I tried to dismiss the idea that I was caught up in a big conspiracy or had been set up. For what? But then I realized that if Chinese officials had indeed engineered this, Dean Chen would have said exactly what he did, just to scare the shit out of me. Because wouldn’t that be the whole point?
You’re under their thumb now. You’ll do exactly what you’re told.
But who am I to warrant such attention?
My head was spinning. But thank God at least Lily had stood up for me. If her father hadn’t intervened, Will and I might still be in jail. Then a surge of questions stopped me in my tracks: Why would a Chinese general help us? What’s in it for him? What will he want from me now?
Besieged by doubt, I walked on to the classroom building. My students wouldn’t arrive for an hour, but I sure as hell couldn’t go back to sleep. I figured I might as well go in early and try to prepare for my lesson.
When I arrived at the door to my classroom, another thought struck me numb: Dean Chen had asked who had sent me to the IAU. It was Professor Lin who had suggested it.
When I considered all that had happened, going back months, I found it hard to believe that the events of the past twenty-four hours had been mere coincidence. But who was the puppeteer? Professor Lin? Was Chen trying to make me suspect him? I thought they were close.
All I knew for certain was there were no strings in my hand. Only keys. But the classroom door was unlocked, and the lights were already on. And there was Lily, sitting at my desk. She smiled at me. Despite all my misgivings, I was drawn to her, finding desire in the slipstream of doubt.
CHAPTER 7
“Hello, Mr. Callahan.”
Lily spoke formally but offered a most informal smile. She sat a couple feet from the desk, legs crossed in her navy skirt. Her arm was draped over the back of the chair, her posture confident.
“You can call me by my first name,” I said softly, standing before her like an errant pupil.
She rolled forward, the wheels of the old wooden chair creaking. “We address each other formally, Mr. Callahan.” Her eyes rolled up to her left. I followed them to the security camera and felt like an idiot.
“Of course, Miss Jiang. My apologies.”
She got up. “Take your seat. I’m not here to usurp you.”
She stepped to the side as I put my gray canvas messenger bag on the corner of the desk and sat down. I felt her warmth on the wood. She stood a few feet away, but her lingering perfume made her feel closer. I found it as inviting as her hands when they rose within inches of my face. I thought she was about to cup my cheeks and searched her eyes for the same attraction I felt, but she was clinically studying my bruise. Without touching me, she directed my head to the side so she could view the injury more closely.
“That must have hurt.” She nodded. “When that beast grabbed me, I felt completely alone…but when you grabbed him, I knew I wasn’t. Thank you.”
“You told your father.”
“Of course.” She was still standing right in front of me. “Those Russians must be dealt with according to the law.”
According to the law. “I guess I would have been, too, if—”
“No.” She shook her head.
The firmness of her response stopped me from asking for clarification. Her point was made: she held power. She was her father’s daughter. She was the dean’s assistant at one of the most important universities in China. “No” said all that and more.
“But we must not meet like that again,” she added warmly.
“I understand.” Then in a whisper, I dared to ask, “So how will we meet?”
She might have offered a fleeting smile. I couldn’t be sure. She said nothing. The silence held for several fraught seconds. I began to perspire, as if her floral perfume had humidified the air.
Then the door opened and Will stepped in.
“Sorry,” he said, squinting as though even the gray light from the windows was too strong, his hangover too painful. “I didn’t know you had company. Good morning, Miss Jiang.”
She gave him a nod and eased away from the desk.
“Come in,” I said, wishing he’d turn around and leave. “We were just talking about last night.”
“I was examining Mr. Callahan’s battle wound,” she said.
Will grinned, no more immune to her charms than I was. “I’m just glad you made it home safely, Miss Jiang.”
“Thank you,” she said. “How are you feeling?”
“Honestly, my head hurts. I’ve been taking aspirin but it’s like throwing pebbles at the Great Wall and expecting it to come tumbling down.”
Lily laughed. I did, too. That was the Will I was getting to know. Quick-witted, gregarious, charming.
“What about you?” he asked me as he came nearer, training his eyes on my bruise, which was starting to make me feel self-conscious. “You really took one for the team.”
“The team?” Lily said. “He was trying to protect me.” She was proprietary with her tone but playful with her manner.
“He sure was,” Will agreed.
“But really, where would we be without you, Mr. Jean-Claude Van Damme?” I said. “You turned Solutions into a scene from Bloodsport. Did Dean Chen call you in, too?”
Will started to nod, then stopped, as if the pounding inside his head would allow no more movement than necessary. He propped his hip against a front-row desk. “I’m supposed to go in there at eleven. You?”
“He said I’m on thin ice.” That was all I offered, mindful of the camera and hidden mic that I presumed was recording every breath we took.
“So I guess we shouldn’t go to the skating rink across town,” Will said with a wink.
“If you do, don’t expect me to fish you two out if you fall through again,” Lily answered, not missing a beat.
I didn’t join in their bonhomie—but then again, I was the only one nursing an obvious injury.
“I should leave you to your lesson planning,” Will said. “And you, Miss Jiang, to your duties.”
I watched him close the door before speaking again. “I wonder if they polish those camera lenses to keep them sharp,” I said brightly to Lily, bringing her attention to the eyes that were upon us.
“Every day,” she answered without hesitation. “A clear eye leads to clear thinking.”
“Sounds like Confucius.”
Her eyes widened, as if she might laugh, but she didn’t. “I’m glad you’re feeling better, Mr. Callahan.”
“Thank you,” I said as she turned and walked away. I tried not to study her shape. I failed, even though I knew that the security camera was watching me as closely.
Seconds after she left the classroom, the students marched in. So much for lesson planning. I was going to have to wing it. Most greeted me in English. A few asked about my bruise. I realized too late that I’d given them the stock answer of a battered spouse: “I ran into a door.” No one questioned my response.
The dean had said to use the first week for introductions, so after focusing on me the first day, I wanted to hear about them. Like if your father’s in the Politburo and some terrorists might come here to kill us all. “Anything you’d like to say. I’ll be all ears. That’s an American idiom, by the way.”
