A Death in China - Carl Hiaasen [70]
Kangmei’s hands explored the steering wheel. “What if they don’t believe me?”
“How many policemen will there be?”
“One, perhaps two at the most. It is so late …”
Stratton was thinking. He removed the dusty driver’s cap and placed it on Kangmei’s head. Gently he tucked her silken pigtails underneath it. “There! You look like a teenage boy.”
She glanced down at her chest.
“Well, almost,” Stratton said. He climbed into the flatbed and concealed himself in the rummage and lumber. “Okay,” he called from the back. “Let’s go.”
The truck lunged forward, then coughed into a stall. Kangmei tried again with the same results. The third time the clutch engaged perfectly and the truck found the pavement. Stratton smiled to himself.
Kangmei drove slowly, eternally grateful that the stretch of road was straight so she could devote all concentration to mastering the transmission.
As the truck crested a small hill, Kangmei noticed a swatch of yellow light below. Half in panic, she mashed both feet on the clutch and let the truck coast. Gradually the details of the small police station became clear: a white booth, with a Chinese flag posted on the tin roof. Three bulbs hung from a slender wire; one lit the building and the other two a zebra-striped gate that blocked the road. Inside the booth stood a man in a blue-and-white uniform. He seemed not to notice how the truck stuttered downhill, Kangmei fighting for the brakes.
She brought it to a stop with a brief screech of the tires. The policeman, who had been dozing on his feet, glanced up sharply and peered out the window of the booth.
As he approached, Kangmei shook her hair out from under the cap.
“Ni nar?” the policeman demanded—the universal inquiry of Marxist China.
Kangmei gave the name of a commune not far from her own birthplace. She told the policeman she was a barefoot doctor there.
“Are you a driver too?” The policeman eyed her. He did not have a flashlight so he stood very close, sticking his head through the window of the cab. In the flatbed, Tom Stratton held his breath.
“No, Comrade, I am not a driver. This truck is assigned to the commune.” Kangmei made up a common name. “Children are sick, and so is the regular driver,” she went on. “We have run out of medicine and I am going to get some more at the clinic in Chungzho.” She fumbled in her blues for an imaginary piece of paper.
The policeman shrugged and waved her on.
“Xie, xie, ni,” Kangmei called in the earnest tones of a heroic worker. She pressed the accelerator, lifted her foot off the clutch—and promptly stalled the truck. Heart pounding, she wrestled with the stick shift. First gear. She could not find first gear. Again she tried to move the truck and again the engine died. Don’t flood it, Stratton prayed from beneath the lumber and crates.
The policeman laughed and ambled back to the truck. “I hope you are a better doctor than you are a driver,” he said. “Let me try.”
“No, Comrade, I can do this,” Kangmei said defiantly. “I must do this myself—for my commune.” She turned the key, and from under the hood came a dying whine.
“Too much fuel in the carburetor,” the policeman diagnosed. “Wait a few minutes and it will be fine.” He opened the door to the cab. “Would you care to come in for a drink of tea?”
Kangmei reached for the door and slammed it. “No,” she said sternly. “I must hurry, Comrade. I told you, the children are very sick.”
Stratton had no idea what was being said. The slamming of the truck door alarmed him. Through the slats of the crate above his head, Stratton could see nothing but stars and wispy clouds. Gradually he levered himself up, turning his head slightly to gain a view of Kangmei. Suddenly the woodpile shifted and one of the vegetable crates fell, banging on the steel flatbed.
The policeman jumped at the noise. “What!” he said. “What was that?” He walked to the back of the truck and peered into the rubble of cargo. “Are you alone, driver?”
Kangmei