The Last Six Million Seconds by John Burdett Read Free Book Online Page A

gulped another inch. “Look, you tell me to stop the investigation, I’ll stop. Until then—I mean, I’m not going to be the one to give in to them. The British can, you can, but I won’t.” Under the commissioner’s gaze he added reluctantly, “Unless ordered, of course.”
    Of course obedience was a Confucian virtue. During the siege of Nanking, Chan had read, Japanese machine gunners had fired down narrow streets into charging Chinese soldiers until the roads were blocked with mountains of bodies like sandbags and some of the guns had melted. Any other race would have taken cover after the first casualties, but the Chinese kept coming. Why? Because they had been ordered to. It was this self-obliterating obedience the British would rely on when they turned six million free people over to the criminal regime in Beijing. Anywhere else the riots would have started long ago.
    Tsui dropped the frown. He smiled. Chan wondered if the tiny diamonds in his eyes were the beginning of tears. “You have my support—and my blessing. But please remember, we are a small tribe.”
    “Chinese?”
    “No—free Chinese. And I’m afraid there’s a compromise that has to be made.” Chan swallowed more beer. “If the case is allowed to go ahead, you’ll have to work more closely with Riley.”
    Chan used a Cantonese word. It was identical to the one Tsui had recently translated in his head. Tsui laughed.
    When they left each other on Queen’s Road, Central was deserted. Chan walked aimlessly down the main street in a western direction. It was fear, not the time of night, that had cleared the city of people: The tropical storm had intensified, and there was a rumor that it would go up to eight during the night. Even though the wind was not yet at typhoon level, it pulled at Chan’s hair, and he leaned into it as he pressed on all alone with his thoughts. Arabs feared the sun, Russians the cold, Californians earthquakes; inSoutheast Asia wind could become a ferocious beast stronger than buildings. He had read a contemporary Chinese poem in which wind was a billion invisible people in a stampede, smashing everything in their path. The poet had not needed to stress the point: In ancient mythology wind was a manifestation of the Dragon; the Dragon Throne had belonged to the emperor of China.
    Tonight, though, Chan had a feeling that Alan had changed course, as typhoons often did, leaving him the freedom of the streets. He could not remember the last time he had experienced space to spare. It was an eerie sensation, as if the lights of the city had been left on exclusively for him. A chrome-plated pillar on Connaught Road curved the light streaming from an empty Pekinese restaurant; in the bright pillar five hundred fragmented and windblown Chans populated a town full of lurid lights, small restaurant tables and the illuminated Chinese character for Beijing, repeated to infinity.

8
    T wo hours later Milton Cuthbert had composed and sent a fax to the Foreign Office in London over a secure telephone line. The fax recommended that the FO take the unusual step of ordering the governor to order the commissioner of police to take Chan off the case. Without an explanation the FO, Cuthbert knew, would have trouble believing that a Hong Kong policeman of any race could pose a threat to international relations.
    Cuthbert admired the chief inspector’s tenacity. Indeed the commissioner of police had not done the Eurasian detective full justice in his short résumé. Cuthbert had discovered that Chan achieved a 90 percent success rate in the detection of serious crime. It was said that in regard to the remaining 10 percent Chan usually identified the culprits but lacked sufficient evidence to prosecute. Chan was a brilliant policeman or a dangerous fanatic, depending on what desk you sat at.
    The diplomat was renowned for his ability to express on a half sheet of paper the essence of any problem no matter how subtle and complex, and it was the