A Loyal Character Dancer

misplaced youth of those years. One thing led to another, and to still another, so the result could hardly be recognized. The chain of causality was perhaps more intricate than Western mystery writers, whose works he translated in his spare time, would care to admit.
     
    On the cool April breeze, a melody wafted over from the big clock atop the Shanghai Customs Building. Six thirty. It had played another tune during the Cultural Revolution: “The East Is Red.” Time flowed away like water.
     
    In the early nineties, under Deng Xiaoping’s economic reform, Shanghai had been changing dramatically. Across Zhongshan Road, a long vista of magnificent buildings, which had once housed the most prestigious Western companies in the early part of the century and then Communist Party institutions after 1950, were now welcoming back those Western companies in an effort to reclaim the Bund’s status as China’s Wall Street. Bund Park, too, had been changing, though he did not like some of the changes. For example, the postmodern concrete River Pavilion stood like a monster beside him, slouching against the first gray of the morning, watching. So, too, had Chen changed from a penniless student to a prominent chief inspector of police.
     
    Still, it remained his park. In spite of a heavy work load, he managed to come here once or twice a week. It was close to the bureau, a fifteen-minute walk.
     
    Not too far away, a middle-aged man practiced tai chi, striking a series of poses: grasping a bird’s tail, spreading a white crane’s wings, parting a wild horse’s mane on both sides ... Chief Inspector Chen wondered what he might have become had he persisted in practicing. Perhaps he would now be like that tai chi devotee, wearing a white silk martial arts costume, loose-sleeved, red-silk-buttoned, with a peaceful expression on his face. Chen knew him. An accountant in an almost bankrupt state-run company, yet at that moment, a master moving in perfect harmony with the qi of the universe.
     
    Chen took his customary seat, a green-painted bench which stood under a towering poplar tree. Carved on the back of the bench in small characters was a slogan that had been popular during the Cultural Revolution: Long Live the Proletarian Dictatorship. The bench had been repainted a couple of times, but the message showed through.
     
    He took a collection of ci out of his briefcase and opened to a poem by Niu Xiji. The mist disappearing / against the spring mountains, / the stars few, small / in the pale skies, / the sinking moon illuminates her face, / the dawn in her glistening tears / at parting. ... It was too sentimental for the morning. He skipped several lines to reach the last couplet: With the green skirt of yours in my mind, everywhere, / everywhere I step over the grass so lightly.
     
    Another coincidence, he mused, tapping his fingers on the bench back. Not too long ago, in a riverfront cafe on the Bund, he had read this couplet for a friend, who now stepped over the green grass far, far away. Chief Inspector Chen had not come here, however, to indulge in nostalgia.
     
    The successful completion of a major political case, involving Baoshen, the vice mayor of Beijing, had led to unexpected repercussions in his professional work, and in his personal life, too. He was still emotionally as well as physically drained. In a recent letter to his girlfriend Ling, he had written, “As our ancient sage says, ‘Eight or nine out of ten times, things go wrong in this world of ours.’ People are no more than the chance products of good or bad luck in spite of their intentional efforts.” She had not replied, which did not surprise him. Their relationship was strained because of that case.
     
    A gray-Mao-jacketed figure appeared behind him and addressed him in a serious, subdued voice, “Comrade Chief Inspector Chen.”
     
    He recognized Zhang Hongwei, a senior park security officer. In the seventies, Zhang had worn a Mao badge on his jacket, patrolling energetically as if steel springs had been installed under his feet, casting mistrustful glances at the English textbook in Chen’s hand. Now a bald, wrinkled man in his fifties, Zhang walked with a shuffle, his gray Mao jacket unchanged, except for the missing Mao badge.
     
    “Please come with me, Comrade Chief Inspector Chen.”
     
    He followed Zhang to a corner partially obscured by a cluster of evergreens level with the embankment, about fifteen feet away from the back