A Death in China - Carl Hiaasen [37]
His thoughts were sour. History taunted him. The architecture was inspired, ripe with passion. The city was full of such masterpieces.
But where did they come from? The ages, Wang Bin reflected sadly. The dynasties. Where could one find such imagination now? And, worse, how could it flourish?
The thin man in the stuffed chair waited until the deputy minister turned from the window. “I’m deeply sorry we were not successful,” he said in Chinese. “The cadres were clumsy, and their actions were dangerous. I would punish them but …” He clasped his hands together.
“Both dead?” Wang Bin asked.
“One, yes. The other is badly injured.”
Wang Bin asked, “Did Stratton leave on the train?”
“Yes,” the thin man said. With nervous hands, he lit a cigarette.
“Liao and Deng are on their way to Xian?”
“The plane leaves in an hour,” the thin man reported. “Their documents are in order. No questions were raised. Officially, they are joining the inventory team at the tombs.”
Wang Bin rigidly walked to the sparse desk and sat down. His voice tightened. “This is very delicate, you understand Comrade Xi? Stratton has put us in a fragile posture. He is no ordinary tourist, I assure you.”
Xi was soothing. “Deng is a trustworthy man. Have you ever known him to fail? In two days the threat will be gone, I am certain.”
“I hope so,” Wang Bin said, rising. “Now send in my visitor.”
“The embassy has sent Miss Greer. She wants to apologize formally for Mr. Stratton’s inconsiderate change of heart. They have even offered to send an American soldier back with the casket.” Xi grinned. “It’s ironic, isn’t it?”
“A thoughtful gesture,” Bin said sarcastically.
The deputy minister was halfway to the door when Xi reminded him: “Comrade, your mourning band. Don’t forget.”
Chapter 9
“ONE OF HISTORY’S MOST PATHETIC lines was uttered in this city,” J. Paul Prudoe was explaining. “It occurred in 1911, as the last dynasty, the Qing, was falling. The Qing were Manchu, of course, and the majority of Han people hated them as barbarian invaders. The Manchus imposed their rule in Xian with an army of occupation that occupied its own quarter of the city. When the people rebelled against the Manchus in 1911, there was a fearful slaughter. Many Manchus died. There was an English hospital here then and a few Manchus wound up there with dreadful self-inflicted wounds.
“An English doctor asked one of the wounded soldiers—his name is not recorded, alas—why he had attempted to slit his own throat. The soldier replied: ‘Because the wells were full.’”
J. Paul Prudoe, erect in a stiffly pressed safari shirt and hair-by-hair perfect Van Dyke with an artful sprinkling of gray, paused for effect. He surveyed the room. Around him, twenty-three art historians waited expectantly.
“‘The wells were full.’ Starting with the commanding general, an old man who realized that defense was hopeless, the Manchus had thrown themselves down the wells to avoid capture. The wells were thirty-six feet deep, and when they were full, a warrior’s only honorable escape was to slit his throat. Subsequently, of course, the city is famous for the so-called Xian Incident, when the Communists caught Chiang Kai-shek in a farmhouse during the Civil War, but let him go. During the last days of that war, the giant man-made hill—the tumulus of Emperor Qin, dead for more than two thousand years—was literally an armed camp, fortified with machine guns and snipers. How the muse of history must have smiled at that.”
J. Paul Prudoe was the envy of America’s art historians. He spoke with the zeal of a revivalist, the slick, contrived passion of a corrupt politician. His presence on the tour, tramping through museums and riding the buses like any old AAH, was the celebrity magnet that had drawn so many of his nominal peers to China in the first place.
Stratton, slouched and alone at the rear of a reception room in Xian’s Renmin Daxia Hotel, disliked Prudoe’s showmanship as much