Fatal Weakness—Yang Hengjun (2.2)

致命弱点 Fatal Weakness
扬恒均 Yang Hengjun

第一章 我是谁? Chapter 1 Who am I?

Part 2.2

I'm stunned by what I hear, that I might actually want to contribute to social order. I think of one news story I've seen recently, that over five hundred police throughout the country die on the job each year, and over half of those are from overfatigue. I know that some cops are rotten, but by and large most of them approach their jobs responsibly. I nod.

Chief Zhang gives an excited smile, then says nervously, "if you agree, just sign your name and we can begin."

I look at him as I ask, "do I need a lawyer?"

"What talk is this? We haven't arrested you. Do you want a lawyer? Again, didn't you say you haven't murdered anyone? So what do you need a lawyer for?"

Despite all their courteousy, I can sense how serious this is. If I really wanted to leave, they couldn't stop me. But then again, it wouldn't take them long to get a warrant, and I bet they won't be too courteous then. If this goes badly, I'll still have being arrested in connection with a murder case on my record. Though I don't even know what's going on with the case right now. Stay here and I'll have food and a place to sleep and shit, so I might as well cooperate with them for a few days. I tell them I'll cooperate, and they appear to relax.

"I think, Mr. Yang, that you'll probably want to wash your clothes and whatnot. I tell you what, if you agree, I'll take you by your place tonight when I get off work; it'll save you the trip, seeing that all our police cars are all out on duty right now."

I silently hand him the key to my apartment. I get that they've put so much towards solving this case. Everything's done so formally at the police station these days; just getting a warrant takes a day or two of paperwork. I know they're just offering to take me to get some clothes so they can check around my apartment. Except for two or three porn videos from Hong Kong, there's nothing in my apartment worth hiding, so they can search all they want.

I hadn't planned on staying here for over three weeks. After the first week, when I began to lose patience and wanted to leave, the two Chiefs had by then already gathered sufficient evidence to formally arrest me. And so I stayed in that detention cell, only now the door was being locked up tight by somebody else, someone outside the door.

The first week in that cell went by not a whole lot differently than if I'd been back in my small apartment. Rong'er's autopsy was on the waiting list, so until they could prove it was homicide, they had no way to carry on in their investigation. But Chiefs Li and Zhang still found time to come chat with me for an hour or two each day. The topic of our discussion over that week didn't change, that being exploring the question 'who I am'. I told them that with top marks, I was able to get into Peking University in 1983 all the way from Hubei, majoring in international politics. After graduation I worked for the government, later going to get a Masters in politics at Columbia in New York. Not long after coming back, I quit my job in Beijing and came to Guangzhou by myself. I worked a few jobs since coming to Guangzhou, but lately had just been staying at home.

Most of the time the two Chiefs wouldn't interrupt, just listened attentively as I went on. When Chief Zhang heard I'd gone to Peking and Columbia, he couldn't hide his feelings of yearning and admiration. I didn't stop talking, and they were happy to keep on listening, and I talked all the way through university back to my high school and primary school days. I couldn't even help telling them about the first time I saw the words 'Long Live Mao Zedong', and how to this day nothing excites me more than the feeling I had when wearing my red neck flag, and the countless times between primary school and high school that I came home with awards and certificates, all of which I reported to the two Chiefs in vivid detail. My thinking was that within a week, I'd not only just let them know who I am, but also to make sure they understood how pure I've always been. I was sure this would help them in breaking the case. They're both very reasonable and can understand basic common sense: how could I possibly ever commit an act so heinous as murder?!

And thus I eased up, freely recalling up my past, often surprising myself with just how rich my life has been. Tiring as it was, a week had gone by but I had yet to cry. Twice Chief Zhang tried to comfort me like a father: "cry if you need to. Most people don't get through the first week here without crying, and it might even be better if you do."

By the time the second week began, I'd already been formally arrested. Obviously, my introduction to 'who I am' hadn't worked; what those police believe in is evidence. Rong'er had been dissected, which came as some relief; when you die you should be put to rest, but Rong'er was put in that pose on the bed, not an easy thing for me to see.

Monday morning Chiefs Zhang and Li came to interrogate me together. The second he came through the door, Chief Zhang told me the results of the autopsy. The analysis showed that although medication was the cause of death, there were no signs the deceased had been forced to swallow anything. Yet there remained two points for which the possibility of murder could still not be ruled out. The first was that the drug which led to the deceased's death was an American product currently unavailable within China, and forbidden for sale within America. As this medication leads to death instantly without causing any pain, it's been seen in the west by advocates of euthanasia as the ideal suicide drug. For a hooker like Rong'er, it would be very difficult to get hold of this medication. Further, as this medication leads to "death with no feeling"—a statement, after all, made by a living person—whether or not death is in fact instantaneous and without feeling is something that only God and the deceased know. This is why the medical examiner was still unable to believe that the deceased, after having consumed the medication, would still be able to go as far as to put herself in such a provocative pose for the medical examiner to see. The postmortem results did not rule out that the deceased's body was moved after death.

As I listened to Chief Zhang explaining all this, I noticed Chief Li had a thick book in his hands. When I saw the book's title, I felt myself break out in a cold sweat. As far as I could tell, that 500-page criminal psychology textbook could only have two uses: one, to place heavy blows on my head, creating a minor concussion that would make me lose control, the kind that makes people tell the truth and the whole truth. This tactic leaves no visible bruising, and is in complete accordance with new police regulations prohibiting the abuse of suspects. Though, in view of my having graduated from Peking University and studied in America, possibly returning with an overseas background, not to mention the public anger arising from the fact that one university student named Sun from Hubei was just beaten to death in one detention center, I ruled that possibility out. Not that it would be much better if they used this book as reference when interrogating me. The two Chiefs sat down and Li took took off his shoes, placing the thick, heavy book on the floor and his feet on top it. I quietly let out a deep breath.

"Mr. Yang, last week you basically told us everything about who you are but, in our experience, ninety percent of criminal suspects do exactly the same. That's why, over this past week, we still haven't figured out who you are, who you really are. We're wondering, from now on, when we question you, will you really tell us who you actually are? We'd like you to answer every single one of our questions truthfully. You've spent time in America; they say people there only tell the truth when talking to their priests and their psychologists, but lie when talking to police, if they talk at all. I have to warn you, this is China, where the people tell the police and The Party the truth."

I let my head drop, and for the next week there were interrogations every day, such a difference from the first week. I couldn't keep telling them who I think I am, and had to answer each of their questions in consideration of who they think I really am.

"You and Xie Wanrong weren't married, and she's a prostitute. Are you admitting that you pay for sex?" Chief Li asked. "Of course, you have no girlfriend. People always need to take care of their biological needs, this we understand, but paying for sex is illegal."

I had no choice but to explain myself. I said I stay with Rong'er not to take care of my biological needs, but the psychological ones. We'd known each other for two years. You could say it was love at first sight, but she's a hooker, and a high-class, high-cost dancehall hooker at that. Our relationship had nothing to do with money or sex, we haven't even had sex. She would always talk about her plan, to save up a big stash of money and then stop selling herself, and I decided to wait for that day...

"Wait, wait, what did you just say? You're not telling us that the two of you have never had sex, are you?" Chief Zhang almost jumped up he was so taken aback.

I told them it's not as bad as they they think. If our definition of sex was the same as former American president Clinton's, then no, Rong'er and I have definitely not had sex. Seeing the look of disbelief in their eyes, I went on to explain that I'd taken Rong'er as my girlfriend, but I'm still an old square. Until she washed her hands of whoring, I always would have felt her body was unclean. Not to mention that every time she took off her pants she could make over a thousand yuan, that got me thinking too much. Thinking so much that there was a bit of a mutiny down there.

"So you're saying, Mr. Yang, that you have a hooker girlfriend but that you never have sex? Then how do you satisfy yourself?"

I had no choice but to explain even more: I'm already middle-aged, right? And I've been everywhere, seen it all. I don't have a my own family or stable sex partners. My sex life is like food, I eat when I'm hungry, that's just what I'm used to. Rong'er and I weren't as weird and innocent as you're thinking. Our plan was to wait two more years, and then we'd be together. Except for the few days each month when it wasn't convenient for Rong'er to have me over, I'd go there at night. It was then that she'd put on her sexiest underwear, just like the one she's wearing in your photo, and she'd act out all the seductive poses of our sex fantasies, and that was enough for me. Of course sometimes Rong'er would use her mouth and hands to take care of me, that's just how it was. You must think I'm pretty low, eh? Police comrades?

The second week, with the Chiefs' coaxing, I finally realized I'm not as proud of having once worn that red neck flag as I thought, proudly showing off my awards to mom and dad. It seemed like I was finally starting to get to know myself, conquering myself. By the beginning of the third week, I felt like I'd been stripped naked and made to stand in front of them. I didn't just stop seeing myself as an angel, but even started to believe it was entirely possible that I could kill someone, or that I already had.

The third week was spent in a muddle of self-abuse and deeper self-questioning. I barely had a chance to speak. Ever since the two police comrades had helped me realize 'who I really am' in the second week, they hadn't let up since. I vaguely remember them taking turns growling the same questions at me, more of a 'let us tell you who you really are'.

I finally understood that the person who understands me the most on this earth isn't myself. By far it's these two police chiefs. If last week I was standing naked before them, then this week it's my soul that's been stripped before their eyes. By the time this week ended, I was already perfectly clear as to what trash I am. Every time the interrogations would end, I felt like I'd slipped into a coma.

"Mr. Yang, did you kill Xie Wanrong?" On Friday before he went home, Chief Zhang had suddenly shouted this at me, and suddenly everything went deadly still. Crazed, I looked from Chief Zhang's burning red eyes to Chief Li's triangles. It's a pity these two see through me so much more clearly than I do myself, and tragic that they still get to go home for the weekend. I feel like confessing, ending this all, but something in my blurred consciousness reminds me that if I confess, it'll only be the beginning, not the end. So, I told them to let me think it over for the weekend, and promised that come Monday I'd tell them the truth.

All of Saturday I refused to eat. I told them it wasn't a hunger strike, but because my mind was so messed up that starving seemed the only way I could sober up. That evening, as I lay on the wooden bed, I felt like bawling my eyes out. I sometimes used to cry in secret before, and the next day I would always feel back to normal. But this time I couldn't seem to get the tears out, which made me all the more nervous. Had I already given myself up completely to despair?

When they turned the lights out, I laid there with my eyes closed, letting my mind wander. I thought back to years before of one picture from a war in Africa: a kid all skin and bone kneels beside her mother, long having starved to death, and my mood goes extremely heavy. I think next of the SARS sufferers, separated from their loved ones by a window as they lay dying. Saying goodbye to loved ones through such a thin plane of glass is so much more unbearable than living without them after they're gone.