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“Okay.”
    “Good,” said Commissioner Hu and smiled.
    The commissioner had one of those smiles that turned his face inside out. As if the action of smiling was completely unnatural for him and he was practising it. And with intense practice came intense fakery. “Pretending is not acting. Acting is about selecting from what you know,” Fu Tsong said in his head. Her voice was so real, so close, so intimate that for a moment Fong lost track of what Commissioner Hu was saying.
    Then he caught the drift. His Hu-ness was upset about his not returning the American consulate’s phone call. His Hu-ness was also going on about a meeting with the Americans later in the day but that he was to allow the Chinese State people to do the talking. Fine, he thought, the last thing I want to do is chat with U.S. Consulate folks.
    “And I thought because your English is so good, you could also translate for us,” concluded his Hu-ness.
    “Pardon me for saying this but I think that we need a professional translator in a situation like this. I speak conversationally but I cannot claim any real expertise.”
    “Conversationally is good enough in this case.”
    “But. . .” Fong never got to complete his sentence. The smile mask was back on and his Hu-ness was indicating that it was time for him to leave. So Fong got to his feet and headed out.
    It was only as he was leaving the secretary’s office (the woman still refused to meet his eye) that he realized why he was being asked to act as translator—the powers that be wanted as few people in on this conversation as possible. But why?

    On leaving the commissioner’s office Fong headed toward the basement of the building and the forensic labs. He knew that there wouldn’t be anything to report yet but he wanted to check and see if there were any preliminary responses. Besides, he liked Forensics and the people who worked there. It was the Buddhist end of police work—silent, slow, and patient.
    He was waved through forensic security and headed down the long corridor toward the main lab in the back. There was the slightest pop of suction as he pulled open the frosted glass door. He thought to himself that this is probably the only well-fitted door in all of Shanghai. He checked for a manufacturer’s label. German, naturally.
    Once inside, the hum of the fluorescent lights was about all there was to hear. Several of the scientists looked up and then returned to their work. They knew Zhong Fong but saw no need to distract themselves enough to say hello.
    Near the south end of the lab he found Xia Hong Shia, who liked to be called by her English name, Lily. Lily was an attractive, tightly put together woman in her late twenties who seemingly spent every penny on her wardrobe. All to fetching effect. Lily’s English wasn’t great but she made a real effort and liked to practice, so Fong addressed her in English. “What’s up, Lily?”
    Momentarily missing the idiom, Lily looked skyward and then smiled at him. “Not a thing fucking.” Lily was especially fond of English slang.
    Pointing at the microscope in front of her, “May I?”
    “Shit, okay.”
    He put his eye to the lens and squinted. He was always amazed how hard it was to actually see anything through a microscope. After a little fiddling with both his eye and the focus, he managed to get an image of some sort of crystal-based solid.
    “What is it, Lily?”
    To explain, Lily reverted to Mandarin. “It’s standard to ask for a piece of the lung. It usually doesn’t show anything, but I found tiny shards of this in the tissue,” she said indicating the image on the slide.
    “And you don’t know what it is yet?”
    “Not yet, copper,” she said in her smiling English.
    There was an unmistakable twinkle in her eye and she stood just a little closer to him than was absolutely necessary. He’d heard rumours that her relationship with her boyfriend had soured but as he looked at her, it occurred to him that his days