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“Get moving.”
She watched his retreating back, regretting the need to maintain a cruel facade to protect her position and ensure her status at the ministry. Mao had said that women hold up half the sky, but Chinese men still held the most powerful positions in the workplace.
As Hulan began walking toward the shore, the Caucasian couple gradually came into focus. They were in their mid-fifties. The woman wore a mink coat and a matching hat. She looked frightfully pale, and even from a distance Liu Hulan could see she’d been crying. The man was, as newspapers customarily reported, extremely handsome. His face, even in the middle of a Beijing winter, was tan. His rugged good looks evoked the prairies and dry winds of his home state, where he had been first a rancher and then a senator.
“Good morning, Mr. Ambassador, Mrs. Watson. I’m Inspector Liu Hulan,” she said in virtually accentless English. She shook hands with both of them.
“Is it our son? Is it Billy?” the woman asked.
“We don’t have an identification yet, but I believe it is.”
“I want to see him,” Bill Watson said.
“Of course,” Liu Hulan agreed. “But first I have a couple of questions.”
“We’ve been down to your office,” the ambassador said. “We’ve told you all we know. Our son has been missing for ten days and you haven’t done a thing.”
Liu Hulan ignored the ambassador and looked into Elizabeth Watson’s eyes. “Mrs. Watson, can I get you anything? Wouldn’t you rather wait inside?” As the woman resumed her weeping, her husband strode to the edge of the lake.
Hulan held on to Elizabeth Watson’s hands for a few minutes and watched as she willed herself back to a seeming indifference. Speaking as the political wife she was, Elizabeth Watson said, “I’m sure you have your duties. It’s okay, dear. I’m okay.”
Liu Hulan rose and went to Watson. They stood side by side, neither speaking, just gazing out across the icy expanse to where the body had been found.
Without turning to face the ambassador, Liu Hulan broke the silence. “Before you identify the body, there are some things I need to ask.”
“I don’t know what more I can tell you, but go ahead.”
“Did your son drink?”
The ambassador allowed himself a small laugh. “Inspector, Billy was in his early twenties. What do you think? Of course he drank.”
“Begging your pardon, sir, but I think you know what I mean. Did your son have a drinking problem?”
“No.”
“Have you ever known him to use drugs?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Are you sure?”
“Let me put it to you this way, Inspector. The president of my country would not have appointed me to this post if there were drug problems in my family.”
Good, Liu Hulan thought. Get angry. Get angry and tell me the truth.
“Was Billy despondent?”
“What are you implying?”
“I’m wondering if he was happy here. Often people in our expatriate community, especially the spouses and children of those who have been sent abroad, become lonely or depressed.”
“My wife and son love China,” he said, his voice rising. “Now I’d like to see if that person out there is Billy.”
“I’ll take you, but before we go, I’d like to explain to you what will happen. Our customs here may be different from what you’re used to in America.”
“I’m not accustomed to having my son die either in China or America, Inspector.”
“Bill,” his wife pleaded softly.
