“The park is a lucky place for you,” she said, “in accordance with the five-element theory. Little wonder, Chief Inspector Chen.”

“Explain, Chief Inspector Chen?” Li asked.

Apparently Li did not know so much about Chen’s life as she did, though the Party Secretary had hand-picked Chen as his successor.

“It’s a joke made by my father, Party Secretary Li,” Chen said. “Actually I had another idea that evening. Inspector Rohn happened to ask me about the two lines on my folding fan. Daifu’s couplet. My thoughts flowed to the mysterious death of Daifu, and then back to the body in the park. It further supported the supposition that the body had been placed there to distract attention or to shift the blame, as I had suspected in Daifu’s case.”

“But you did not mention that to me, Chief Inspector Chen,” she said.

“Well, these ideas did not coalesce until I got back home late that night. I dug out the poem in an attempt to recollect all the possibilities I had studied before writing it. As an unexpected result. I was able to recite those lines in Moscow Suburb the following day,” he said with a smile. “No, it’s not my favorite poem, Inspector Rohn, though it might have put me in a poetic mood at the Huating Market.”

Party Secretary Li looked at Chen, and then at Catherine, before he broke into a broad smile. “That’s how Chief Inspector Chen moves in his investigation-by leaps and bounds.”

“As for what happened at the market, let me say a word about contingency. There’s no better way to describe it. I happened to be there, together with Inspector Rohn. As she put it, it’s a chain of seemingly irrelevant links. Daifu’s couplet, a light green cellular phone, the rain, the line of Oriole’s wet footprints, Su Dongpu’s lines. So I thought of the poetry anthology left at Wen’s home. If one link had been missing, we would not be sitting here at this moment.”

She wondered whether his colleagues could follow this cryptic explanation. She happened to be there, but even she did not understand all his references. The light green cellular phone, for instance. He had never mentioned that before.

Yu made an obvious effort to refrain from asking questions. Qian remained respectfully self-effacing throughout. But Li appeared eager to season the discussion with political clichés.

“You have performed brilliant work in the glorious tradition of the Chinese police force, Chief Inspector Chen,” Li declared, though perhaps he was still largely in the dark.

“I could not have made progress without the collaboration of Inspector Rohn, or the work of Detective Yu,” Chen said earnestly. “In his interview with Zheng, for example, Detective Yu pushed for the clarification of a gangster’s phrase-She changed her mind. What did he mean-changed her mind? That was a question I had in my mind while talking with Wen the following day.”

“You kept a lot of questions to yourself, Chief Inspector Chen,” Catherine said.

“I was not sure whether they were worth exploring, Inspector Rohn. After our visit to Wen, you asked me why I insisted on talking to Wen and Liu instead of bringing in the local police. For one thing, Wen’s cup is full. I did not want to put too much pressure on her. But there’s another reason. I tried to find some answers from my conversation with them.”

“Did you find any?”

“Not from Liu, except that Wen had not told him anything. Then we both talked to Wen. What she said about her life in Fujian was true, but she did not say a single word about the gang’s contact with her. Nor did she really answer my question about the delay in making her passport application. But what made me most suspicious was her insistence on going back to Fujian.”

“Was that so suspicious?” Li asked. “A mother wanted to see her son’s grave for the last time.”

“Did she go to visit his grave when we were there? No. She did not even mention it. Back home, the first thing she did was to take a small package of chemicals from under the table. To keep as a souvenir, she explained to me. That might make sense, but the fact that she explained her action to me did not. It was her home. She could have taken anything she wanted without comment. On the way, she had said little, and now she was volunteering explanations.”

“That’s true,” she said, “Wen hardly said anything during the trip.”

“After the battle in the village, she could have paid a visit to the grave, but she still didn’t. It no longer seemed important to her. Then I happened to hear one of the local policeman silence a wounded gangster speaking Mandarin. That was strange. Before I had time to inquire, however, Superintendent Hong’s request for elucidation of a proverb diverted my attention.”

“The Chinese proverb about justice eventually overcoming evil,” she said.

“Exactly. So it was not until we reached the airport, and heard the flight announcement in both Mandarin and Fujian dialects, that I realized what I had overlooked. The Flying Axes is a local gang. How come the wounded gangster spoke Mandarin? I decided not to stop to investigate because my top priority was to get Wen and you safely back to Shanghai.”

“That was the right decision, Chief Inspector Chen.” Li nodded.

“The moment I got back to Shanghai, I talked to Old Hunter, who had gathered information on Gu. I also had a discussion with Meiling. The parking lot could legally be granted to the club, according to her research. Then I went to meet Gu. At first Gu did not put much on the table, so I laid out my cards and Gu turned cooperative.”

Catherine stole a glance at Li, wondering whether Chen had discussed everything with his boss.

“Yes, you had to open the door to the mountain,” Li said.

“According to Gu, the victim in Bund Park was a liaison head of the Flying Axes, surnamed Ai. Ai came to Shanghai to look for Wen. He paid a formal visit to the Eldest Brother of the Blue, who was against a chicken-flying-and-dog-barking search in the city. As long as Wen was not in police hands, the Eldest Brother saw no danger for Jia Xinzhi. So Ai had no choice but to disclose the real plan of the Flying Axes-the plan to have Wen poison her husband once she had joined him. With a stinking rat like Feng, the Fujian gang considered it in their best interests to get rid of him once for all. The Green Bamboo learned of the plan. They need Feng alive; they want Jia eliminated. And they murdered Ai.”

“How did Gu get all this information?” Yu asked.

“The Eldest Brother of the Blue was upset that without his permission, Ai had brought Fujian problems to Shanghai. But then what the Green Bamboo did-planting Ai’s body in Bund Park-was even worse. So Gu learned from the Eldest Brother not only about the Green Bamboo, but about the Flying Axes as well. The moment I had all this from Gu, I decided to go to Suzhou. Wen was determined that if she had to go to the United States, she would kill Feng. I did not think I could change her mind. If there was anyone capable of doing that, it would be Liu. Liu agreed to accompany me here. That was early this morning.”

“You made the right decision, Chief Inspector Chen,” Li said, loud with official approval. “As one of our old sayings goes, When a general fights on the borders, he does not have to listen to the emperor all the time.’ “

It was then that a phone started ringing in the meeting room. Qian produced his cell phone in embarrassment. With his hand cupped over the receiver he hurriedly said, “I’ll call you later.”

“A light green cell phone. Almost bamboo-colored. It’s a rarity,” Chen said deliberately. “The only other one of the same color I have ever seen was in the Huating Market.”

“It’s a coincidence.” Qian seemed to be flustered.

“That could explain all suspicious incidents,” Chen said.

There had been many coincidences during the course of the investigation, Catherine reflected, but she did not know what Chen was hinting at.