Hanging the Devil, page 7
A handful of tradesmen moved to Dafen in the nineties to set up independent art studios. Over time they grew into production houses, massive art factories with artists sitting in a line, each recreating a different part of a known masterpiece by the Dutch Masters, French Impressionists, Spanish Surrealists, or any painter recognized globally.
Orders from museum stores and online art stores around the world, plus a growing middle class in China, drove demand. More artists moved to Dafen, initially trade painters who were content to add texture or background to a replica painting. Soon other artists arrived with bigger aspirations, and independent studios sold original art by local Chinese painters.
Tastes began to shift from West to East.
Chinese aristocracy, who once wanted forbidden Western art on their walls, were buying more Chinese art and antiquities. The floodgates opened after the central government declared that interest in Chinese culture before the revolution was no longer seen as decadent but rather patriotic. Sotheby’s opened a joint venture in Beijing to sell lost Chinese treasures back to the Chinese.
Inside the Special Economic Zones, tech billionaires collected art like wine, building galleries and donating to museums to enhance their social status. Some were investing in emerging artists in hopes of discovering the next Rembrandt, a painter so admired around the world that other countries would finally look to China as a source of creativity instead of copies.
Peng dreamed of being that painter. Now he had put his future in jeopardy.
His foreman, Niu, had forbidden side projects. Peng was the factory’s lead painter, responsible for the most iconic pieces, and Niu didn’t want him distracted.
Without asking permission, Peng cut a deal with a small gallery where he knew the owner to keep 50 percent of anything sold. If he could earn enough to venture out on his own, Peng would leave the factory, but he had never missed a day of work.
He hadn’t told anyone except Yan, and she wouldn’t tell a soul. Peng wondered if the gallery owner had betrayed him, because now Niu was demanding to see him in his office.
“Maybe Niu doesn’t know,” said Yan. “Don’t be so paranoid.”
They crossed the street toward the factory at the center of a three-way intersection, where a main thoroughfare split into a Y-shaped juncture of two smaller roads. The ground floor was painted in bright, primary colors, but the upper floors were drab yellow. Once a textile factory, the building had large windows, good light for a painter’s assembly line.
“When has Niu ever asked for a meeting?” Peng ran his long fingers through his long black hair. “If you can think of another reason why he summoned me, I’ll stop worrying.”
“Maybe he’s giving you a raise,” said Yan. “He’s been so generous to us in the past.”
Peng stopped in mid-stride and looked at Yan, who was struggling to keep a straight face. Her eyes started to water until she burst out laughing. Peng tried to scowl but couldn’t hold it. He coughed, then giggled, then laughed until he had to bend down and rest his hands on his knees.
“Thank you.” Peng was still wheezing as he stood.
Yan brushed his hair away from his eyes. “Don’t worry, I’ll be right outside the door.”
“You wait in the hall.” Peng nodded. “If he questions my dedication—”
“—you’ll admit that you’re selling your own paintings,” said Yan. “And I’ll come in and assure him it’s only a hobby.” She tapped Peng on the chest. “But if he does give you a raise, you owe me.”
“I owe you already.” Peng stared at the wide red factory door. “Let’s go.”
Normally the factory was bustling, but today it felt empty the instant they walked through the door, quiet even for a weekend. Their footsteps echoed on the stairs as they climbed to the second level, where Niu’s office overlooked the main floor. At the top of the stairs was a broad landing and short hallway with a men’s and women’s bathroom on either side. The door to Niu’s office was at the end of the hall.
Yan spoke in a low voice. “I’m going to wait in the bathroom until you’ve gone into his office, so he won’t see me in the hallway. I’ll count to twenty and then come and listen outside the door.”
“Make it a hundred,” said Peng.
“Okay,” said Yan. “Leave the door ajar if you can, I really want to eavesdrop.”
Peng waited until Yan slipped into the ladies’ room before striding the length of the hall to rap on the office door. To his surprise it was unlatched and swung open from his knock. Niu sat behind his desk but didn’t look happy to see Peng.
He looked scared.
Peng caught movement in his peripheral vision as he crossed the threshold. The man who stepped from behind the door was two meters tall, with close-cropped hair and somber eyes. He stared dispassionately at Peng but didn’t come any closer. He was merely making his presence known. That was when Peng realized a fourth person was in the room.
A rustling behind the door preceded the appearance of another unexpected guest. That was how it seemed to Peng. The figure appeared as if conjured by an incantation.
Though Peng heard the swishing of robes, he did not hear any footfalls as the figure pushed the door closed and moved behind the desk. Peng was fairly sure the door didn’t latch but hoped Yan had remained in the bathroom.
The figure was cloaked in black, a flowing changsan robe over loose pants. Gloves extended under the sleeves of the robe, leaving no skin exposed along the arms.
But the most unsettling thing was the face, because there wasn’t any.
An executioner’s hood covered the head, with no face visible within, which made Peng wonder if there was a mask under the hood, as well. His nervous brain jumped to an image of Darth Vader taunting Luke Skywalker.
His subconscious was still in a galaxy far, far away when the figure spoke fluent Mandarin in a digital rasp. The voice was an electronic tangle of discordant sounds, fused together by a microphone secured at the neck of the costume. Whoever or whatever was under the hood didn’t want to be recognized by anyone.
“Peng, I’m so pleased to meet you,” said the voice. “My name is Mogwai.”
Peng tried to swallow but his mouth was dry.
“Perhaps you’ve heard of me?”
Peng nodded. Everyone knew the Devil existed, but meeting him was another matter.
“Your supervisor and I have come to an understanding,” said Mogwai.
Niu didn’t look like he understood anything. He looked angry and afraid.
The disembodied voice drifted across the room, and Mogwai took a step closer to Peng.
“From now on, Peng, you work for me.”
15
“Remember, I work for you.” Sally patted the covers at the foot of the bed until the cat jumped onto Grace’s feet. “And now, I have to go to work.”
“Let me come with you.” Grace was up on her elbows with a scowl on her face.
A scowl is better than a pout.
Sally shook her head. “As my employer, never forget that my job is to keep you safe. The less you are seen, the safer you are…for now.”
“Until you find the men who killed my uncle.”
“Yes.”
Sally was going someplace that wasn’t safe under any circumstances, if Cape was serious about dinner with Russian gangsters. She kept that to herself while keeping her eyes on Grace.
“I don’t want to be alone,” said Grace.
Sally held out her hand and the cat rubbed its cheek against her fingers. “The cat will watch over you.”
“We need to give it a name.”
“I’m sure he has a name,” said Sally, “we just don’t know it yet.”
“What was your teacher’s name?” Grace ran her hand gently across the cat’s forehead. “The one with the scar.”
Sally didn’t say anything for a minute. The memory of the name carried images of her childhood, from her first day at school to the day she left the Triads forever.
Student, assassin, pawn, avenger.
A thousand images flashed across Sally’s memory, and the lightning scar was the thread that tied them all together.
“Xan,” said Sally. “His name was Xan.”
“Was he a good teacher?”
I’m still alive, and that was his job.
“Yes,” said Sally. “He was good at his job.” Sally stood and checked that the blinds were drawn. “Now go to sleep.”
“I took a nap,” said Grace.
“From which I woke you,” said Sally. “And you were awake all last night. If you can’t sleep, read a book. You saw the bookcase in the alcove?”
Grace nodded. “You have books in Mandarin?”
They were speaking Cantonese, but Sally remembered the schools in Hong Kong were teaching in Mandarin these days. “Yes, along with Cantonese, English, Latin, and Russian,” said Sally. “A few in Spanish.”
“Do you speak all those languages?”
“I try not to talk too much, but I did learn how to listen in all of them.”
“Will you be leaving by the big door?”
“No,” said Sally. “I have another way out. So if you hear someone at that door, stay inside, and stay quiet. Understood?”
Grace nodded, and Sally wondered if she was getting the balance right. Keep the child alert to danger but not scared. She turned to leave but hesitated.
“Grace, the pilot of the helicopter… Can you remember any of the words he said?” asked Sally. “What they sounded like?”
Sally had spent the afternoon trying to distract Grace from the night before, but at this point, any clue might help. She was having dinner with a hunch. Grace frowned, her brow furrowed, then she looked at Sally and gave a tentative nod.
“Po-jal-sta,” said Grace. “I don’t know if it’s a word, but that was the sound. He kept shouting it…again and again…” Grace’s voice got quiet. “…when the helicopter started to burn.”
Sally nodded but didn’t say anything.
Grace asked, “That word, is it Russian?”
“Yes.” Sally gestured at the cat. “Take good care of Xan.”
Sally left without offering what the word meant, and Grace didn’t press. It was simply what any man would say to someone about to burn him alive.
Please.
16
“Please tell me you have a plan,” said Maria.
“No,” said Cape, “but I have a reservation.”
“I have plenty of reservations,” said Maria, “including whether I should be seen with you in public.”
Maria’s tone suggested she was teasing, but as Cape drove along Geary Boulevard into the neighborhood known as Little Russia, he felt compelled to say, “If you want to wait in the car—”
“—I will give you the benefit of the doubt,” said Maria, “and assume you’re being gallant and not sexist.”
“You have a career,” replied Cape, “I have a job. There’s a difference.”
Maria cocked an eyebrow. “Meaning?”
“You have more to lose if things go south.” Cape turned the wheel to swing past a garbage truck. “Even off duty and on vacation, you could lose your badge.”
Maria was about to respond when she saw five golden onions on the horizon.
The Holy Virgin Cathedral grew larger as they approached 25th Street, its distinctive onion domes topped with crosses in the Eastern Orthodox tradition, three crossbeams with the lowest slanted at a slight angle off the perpendicular. The largest Russian Orthodox cathedral outside Russia, it dominated the otherwise unremarkable skyline of the Richmond District.
The façade was white, green, and red below the golden towers, with saints painted in the Byzantine style flanking massive wooden doors. It was a colorful anomaly in a neighborhood of stucco apartment buildings, small grocers, and restaurants.
Cape pulled alongside the curb opposite the cathedral and turned off the ignition.
“We got here early.”
“You drive fast.”
“I just knew where I was headed for a change.”
Maria was admiring the cathedral. “I guess there really are Russians in San Francisco.”
“You bet,” said Cape. “The migration started after the Bolshevik business in the twenties, then a second wave after World War Two. The neighborhood is a mix of Russian, Chinese, Irish, and Vietnamese…a little bit of everyone from everywhere, but more known for its Russian influence because they got here first.”
“You know your city.”
“Helps with the job,” said Cape. “San Francisco has a lot of diversity but isn’t very integrated, so most of the underground economy—organized crime—breaks along ethnic lines.”
“This is true in Spain as well.” Maria studied the storefronts on their right, many signs displaying three languages. “The restaurant is close?”
“One street over, on Clement, next to a Chinese seafood wholesaler and a Mexican produce market,” said Cape. “I don’t want to arrive too early—”
“—so your friend can get there first.” Maria took another look at the Byzantine saints before locking eyes with Cape. “Or because you want to interrogate me?”
Cape held up his hands. “I stand accused.”
“You said if I was on vacation—if.” Maria pulled a long face. “You are suspicious?”
“Curious.” Cape drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “I know more about what went down in the museum, but you clearly know something about the thieves. And since we’re about to have dinner with Russian mobsters, I thought maybe we should enlighten each other.”
“In case only one of us gets out alive?” Maria’s eyes danced. “Americans…so pragmatic.”
“You said it, not me.”
“Cierto.” Maria turned in her seat. “Have you ever been to Stockholm?”
“No, but I had an addiction to Swedish Fish.”
“Are those like Gummi Bears?”
“Chewier,” said Cape. “Not as sweet.”
“How about Norway?”
Cape shook his head. “The hotspots I covered as a reporter were…well, hot…Scandinavian countries were too civilized to make headlines.”
“No matter,” said Maria. “During the summer of 2010, Swedish police got a call one night saying cars were on fire in downtown Stockholm.” Maria ran her fingers through her hair as if drawing forth a memory. “But the cars were a distraction, with an added benefit of snarling traffic. While the police were busy putting out fires, thieves broke into Drottningholm Palace a few blocks away and stole several precious works of art, then fled by scooter to the waterfront. They escaped by speedboat before anyone knew there was a robbery.”
“Professionals—”
“—who knew what they were after,” said Maria. “In and out in less than five minutes.”
“What did they take?”
Maria made a give-me-a-minute gesture. “Not long after, an equally daring robbery occurred in Bergen, Norway, at the Kode Museum. This time los ladrones took over fifty pieces, all from the Asian art collection. They broke in through a skylight.”
Cape cocked an eyebrow. “Sounds familiar.”
“The Chinese art collection at Cambridge was next.” Maria counted off events with the fingers of her left hand. “Then, a few years later, a second break-in at the Kode in Norway. Over twenty objects overlooked during the first robbery. This time they vanished within two minutes.”
“You think it’s the same team.”
“Burning cars were used in both Stockholm and the second Kode heist,” said Maria. “The first time in Norway they came in through a skylight, which is what they tried here. That’s no coincidencia; it’s the same team.”
“You knew they were coming,” said Cape. “That’s the mystery, but you haven’t told—”
“—what is the expression?” asked Maria. “You show me yours?”
Cape’s fingers drummed a silent tune on his steering wheel. “I have a client.”
“Who was inside the museum.”
Cape nodded. “That’s all there is to say for now—”
“—because you don’t really know me,” said Maria. “And I’m the police.”
“By any other name,” said Cape.
“Fair.” Maria pressed her palms together as if in prayer. “I’m getting hungry.”
Cape checked his watch. “Let’s give it ten minutes. Plenty of time for you to share the prophecy that brought you here.”
“It’s not magic.” Maria pulled out her phone and thumbed through her photos. “The clues were everywhere.” She scrolled to an album and handed the phone to Cape.
Catalog pages featured photographs of statues, paintings, incense burners, vases, and other items Cape could not identify. Next to each was a short description of the object, its provenance and current location. Some entries appeared in English, others in Italian, French, Spanish, and Chinese. The pages were apparently from different sources. Fonts varied and image quality was inconsistent.
“Auction catalogs?”
“And museum guidebooks,” said Maria. “From all over the world.”
Cape studied the images. “It’s all Asian art.”
“It’s all Chinese art,” said Maria. “Antiques from key periods in China’s history.”
“You think it’s the same buyer?”
“You’re thinking black market,” said Maria. “Think bigger.”
“Organized crime?”
“Bigger still.” Maria pressed her fingers together. “Have you heard of China Poly Group? No reason you should have, unless you’re with military intelligence or an art collector.”
“Those two worlds don’t usually overlap.”
“It’s a company,” said Maria, “based in Beijing.”
“Government affiliated?”
“Defense contractors,” said Maria. “They make missiles, guidance systems, all sort of toys for the Chinese military. Latest estimates put their revenue over a hundred billion dollars.”
“So it’s a well-connected company.” Cape already felt in over his head but now sensed an undercurrent of something much deeper. “What’s that got to do with art?”
