special.”
“No, because of what he showed me.”
Yao exhaled and reached for a chair. He sat and leaned toward her, his face close to hers.
“What did he show you?” he asked quietly.
“The woman in the marsh.”
“Who was she? I asked you before.”
Mei grimaced apologetically. She had tried to keep the Wolf’s secret but it was no good—she needed Yao’s help.
“She worked at Long Tan.”
“A factory girl, was she? The people who manage that place work them to death. They’ve been falling off the buildings for months. Did you see the photos? They’ve put up nets to catch them.”
“This one didn’t jump. She drowned.”
“What difference does that make?”
“She’s the reason for all this. I want to know who she was.”
“How are you going to find that out?”
“By going to the factory. You have to help me.”
Yao frowned. “If I do, you’ll stop making trouble for us? You’ll do what you’re told?”
Mei nodded. Yao rose with a smile, looking more like his old self.
They drove to Dongguan the next day, after lectures were over. The sun was setting by the time they arrived, and uniformed workers poured out of the high-walled complex, filling the street. Yao edged the car forward through the rush and stopped by the gate. A line of vehicles was waiting to get in, but the guards were not in any hurry to let them through. Two studied the truck at the front of the line slowly, as its driver grumbled. The other drivers stood in a huddle, passing around a packet of seeds to chew and spitting dark juice on the ground.
“You go in. I’ll wait.”
Yao looked startled. “Why? You’re the one who brought us here.”
“A woman poking around attracts attention. It’s better this way.”
He sighed. “I don’t even know why I’m here. You owe me, okay? So what do you know?”
“Tang Liu. Nineteen, from Changsha, Hunan. I’ll write her identity number for you.” Mei took a pen and scrawled it on a pad.
“Good memory. Got a photo?”
“That should be enough.”
Mei saw the guard stiffen as he scanned Yao’s card, then wave him through. She relaxed a little: With Yao asking the questions, nobody would spot the resemblance between the dead girl and her. She climbed out of the car to stretch her legs and wandered across the road toward an Internet café.
Inside, kids in tunics sat in rows, yellow headphones clamped to their ears, eyes locked to screens, posting on Weibo and scouring the Internet. She was one of them—the post-1985 generation that had flooded out of Guangxi, Sichuan, and Hunan, following their parents to jobs in factories on the coast. But they weren’t content to work for a few years and return with the cash to build a house and raise one child. They wanted to earn a resident’s permit. They dreamed of buying apartments, despite the high prices. There wasn’t room for them, despite the noise of construction. People talked of the Pearl River’s cities being filled in with concrete and the delta becoming a metropolis of fifty million. Even that wouldn’t be space enough.
Mei walked along an alley, where a tattered old
Hui Chun
poster from the New Year was taped in the dingy entrance to an apartment block to bring the dwellers good luck. The alley, lit by the glow of storefronts, was like a gorge between buildings rising a dozen stories on each side, so close that it looked possible to leap the gap from one balcony to its opposite. A wedge of evening sky was visible high above.
It took Yao an hour to reappear. By the time he did, she’d drunk all the tea she could take and was back in the car.
“There you are. That’s all they had on her. The cops took the file a couple of days ago.”
The recruitment notice yielded only brief details—her date of birth, identity number, and address in Shenzhen. She had walked into Long Tan two months before—as long as Mei had been at the Commission.
“So she joined in July? And she killed herself
last week
?”
“No, because of what he showed me.”
Yao exhaled and reached for a chair. He sat and leaned toward her, his face close to hers.
“What did he show you?” he asked quietly.
“The woman in the marsh.”
“Who was she? I asked you before.”
Mei grimaced apologetically. She had tried to keep the Wolf’s secret but it was no good—she needed Yao’s help.
“She worked at Long Tan.”
“A factory girl, was she? The people who manage that place work them to death. They’ve been falling off the buildings for months. Did you see the photos? They’ve put up nets to catch them.”
“This one didn’t jump. She drowned.”
“What difference does that make?”
“She’s the reason for all this. I want to know who she was.”
“How are you going to find that out?”
“By going to the factory. You have to help me.”
Yao frowned. “If I do, you’ll stop making trouble for us? You’ll do what you’re told?”
Mei nodded. Yao rose with a smile, looking more like his old self.
They drove to Dongguan the next day, after lectures were over. The sun was setting by the time they arrived, and uniformed workers poured out of the high-walled complex, filling the street. Yao edged the car forward through the rush and stopped by the gate. A line of vehicles was waiting to get in, but the guards were not in any hurry to let them through. Two studied the truck at the front of the line slowly, as its driver grumbled. The other drivers stood in a huddle, passing around a packet of seeds to chew and spitting dark juice on the ground.
“You go in. I’ll wait.”
Yao looked startled. “Why? You’re the one who brought us here.”
“A woman poking around attracts attention. It’s better this way.”
He sighed. “I don’t even know why I’m here. You owe me, okay? So what do you know?”
“Tang Liu. Nineteen, from Changsha, Hunan. I’ll write her identity number for you.” Mei took a pen and scrawled it on a pad.
“Good memory. Got a photo?”
“That should be enough.”
Mei saw the guard stiffen as he scanned Yao’s card, then wave him through. She relaxed a little: With Yao asking the questions, nobody would spot the resemblance between the dead girl and her. She climbed out of the car to stretch her legs and wandered across the road toward an Internet café.
Inside, kids in tunics sat in rows, yellow headphones clamped to their ears, eyes locked to screens, posting on Weibo and scouring the Internet. She was one of them—the post-1985 generation that had flooded out of Guangxi, Sichuan, and Hunan, following their parents to jobs in factories on the coast. But they weren’t content to work for a few years and return with the cash to build a house and raise one child. They wanted to earn a resident’s permit. They dreamed of buying apartments, despite the high prices. There wasn’t room for them, despite the noise of construction. People talked of the Pearl River’s cities being filled in with concrete and the delta becoming a metropolis of fifty million. Even that wouldn’t be space enough.
Mei walked along an alley, where a tattered old
Hui Chun
poster from the New Year was taped in the dingy entrance to an apartment block to bring the dwellers good luck. The alley, lit by the glow of storefronts, was like a gorge between buildings rising a dozen stories on each side, so close that it looked possible to leap the gap from one balcony to its opposite. A wedge of evening sky was visible high above.
It took Yao an hour to reappear. By the time he did, she’d drunk all the tea she could take and was back in the car.
“There you are. That’s all they had on her. The cops took the file a couple of days ago.”
The recruitment notice yielded only brief details—her date of birth, identity number, and address in Shenzhen. She had walked into Long Tan two months before—as long as Mei had been at the Commission.
“So she joined in July? And she killed herself
last week
?”
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