Fatal Weakness—Yang Hengjun (2.3)

致命弱点 Fatal Weakness
扬恒均 Yang Hengjun

第一章 我是谁? Chapter 1 Who am I?

Part 2.3

By Sunday afternoon, I was already feeling back to normal. Around just after four, the guard came and told me someone had come to get me out. They didn't take me to the interrogation room, but into a room marked "Police Chief's Office". Inside I saw my old superior, Director Zhou, head of the Ministry of State Security. He was looking kindly towards me, I thought if I hadn't cried myself dry the night before, I'd have cried then. I quickly said my goodbyes to Chiefs Zhang and Li, who were both present, and to someone else who looked to be the station chief or something, and then with Director Zhou I left the police station at which I'd just spent three weeks.

* * * * * * * * * * *

"How'd you know I was in the police station?" I ask Director Zhou after we've already sat down at the tasteful, tranquil coffee shop inside the five-star China Hotel.

"I went to the apartment at the address you'd given us and saw the mailbox was crammed full of letters, some of which had even fallen on the floor. I picked them up and saw they were bills."

"Of course they were bills. Nobody would write me. Nobody writes letters these days anyway," I say, woodenly.

"The problem was, I saw that most of the bills were overdue. 'Hah, I thought. Would our little Yang go and stop paying his utilities bills? He must be in trouble.'" Director Zhou says this humourlessly; as he's speaking I almost start laughing, but don't. He must have noticed my expression, and asks with concern, "they didn't torture you in the police station, did they?"

"No, it's not cool to force confessions through corporal punishment and torture these days." For three weeks I was in there, sitting when I wasn't lying down, that's why my back's all stiff now. I say, "actually, the police comrades don't really like all that, it's just sometimes they're in a hurry to solve a case, with pressure coming down from above and all. Not to mention, a faster confession from a suspect not only saves on state spending, but sometimes even saves a life.

"They told me they had you in there for three weeks, but no matter what tactic they used, you just wouldn't crack. On the surface it looked like you were going along with their interrogations, but then time after time you let them down. They couldn't help but admit, you're the toughest suspect they've come across in years...heh, heh." Director Zhou, seeing me furrow my eyebrows and saying nothing, asks with a serious tone of voice, "I'm asking, did they torture you or not?!"

"They didn't. Under national law, torture isn't allowed; the cops are very clear on that."

"Well good, good." Director Zhou relaxes, adds some sugar to his coffee. "So you're saying, you didn't confess to anything?"

"Nothing. Though I think I was about to; I wouldn't have lasted for much longer!" I take a sip of my bubble tea, and for a moment I feel at ease. To tell the truth, when I was inside, I sure missed these tough little pellets it's become so popular to put in milk tea over the past few years.

"What would you have to confess?" Director Zhou almost sprays coffee out his nose. "I mean, would you confess to murdering that woman?"

"Maybe, but I didn't kill her, you know."

"Uh-huh. I had no idea police interrogation techniques had improved so quickly these last few years. They actually almost made you confess." Director Zhou smiles again, "that's good to see."

"After the first week inside, there were a few times when I thought about just confessing. I stopped wondering if it were possible that I might kill someone, or if I already had. Though I hadn't in fact killed anyone, I didn't just have motive to, but in my heart and in my bones I felt it completely possible that I was a murderer. Thinking about it now, it seems impossible. Tell me, Director Zhou, what do make of all this?"

Director Zhou took a long look at me and shook his head. "Little Yang, the highest level of interrogation techniques will make anyone confess to whatever the interrogator wants them to, whether it's a crime they actually committed or not."

My mouth hangs open with shock, and I look at Director Zhou's benevolent face with disbelief. I know that just after Liberation, there was a time when Director Zhou worked in counter-espionage and reconnaissance. From his appearance today, I have no way of imagining what he was like back then, but someone at the Department once told me that at the time, Director Zhou was a master interrogator. Back in the early days of Liberation, well-trained Taiwanese spies suffered through the stormy Taiwan strait and when they finally got to shore, snuck into Beijing. After they were caught, it took less than an hour of sitting in front of Director Zhou for them the break down and confess everything. Thinking of this, my curiosity peaks and I lift my body up out of the deep, soft sofa, and probe: "Director Zhou, you're saying that if one just acquires the highest levels of interrogation technique, you believe they can make anyone confess? Even those who didn't commit any crime?"

"Not bad, kid." Director Zhou takes a sip of coffee, his voice clearly lowered. "As long as they're human, they'll have weaknesses. Those doing the interrogating just need to seek out the suspects' weakness, then everything is solved."

But Director Zhou doesn't look the least bit like he's got 'everything solved'. He finishes his sentence, lowers his head and continues drinking his coffee. I don't speak either, just look away from Director Zhou and let myself fall back down into the sofa. I'm not fully convinced by what Director Zhou has just said; or rather, I haven't yet fully absorbed it. Like, some people's weaknesses are hidden deep down, so deep they themselves don't know they have such a weakness. Then there's the weaknesses some people appear to have but aren't fatal. Then again, some people, like me, toil through life with no desires or needs. Save dying, I don't know what 'fatal' weakness I have. There's one more kind of person, the kind who aren't even afraid to die; even if you get hold of their fatal weakness, what's the use?

There's a depressed feel in the air, and minutes later Director Zhou raises his head, saying silently, "everyone has a weakness." I notice his eyes are a bit moist from the coffee, and I guess he must be thinking back to his Cultural Revolution days. According to the rumors back at the Ministry, back in the day, the rebels figured out Director Zhou's fatal weakness, killing his wife and son. They say at the time his kid was only three. I don't know all the details, but nor do I want Director Zhou to be thinking about this, so I change the subject.

"But if the suspect hasn't even committed a crime and still confesses, what good is that for the interrogator? How can they crack the case?"

"Such is the high art of interrogation," Director Zhou says, drifting back out of his memory, "grabbing hold of the suspect's fatal weakness, and using means of mental or physical torture until the suspect comes close to crumbling. This is when suspects break, and spill everything out. Those who have done this will tell you, in most cases, so they can escape sooner, even the innocent will confess; sometimes they'll even exaggerate, or describe things down to the last detail.

"Director Zhou, I don't believe it. You call this the high art of interrogation?" I can't even hide that I'm puzzled and displeased.

"Just let me finish. Reaching this step requires a high level of learning in interrogation, especially when use of physical torture and anesthetic drugs isn't allowed; to reach this stage, the interrogator needs to grasp two points: one is the suspect's fatal weakness; the second is to have a certain knowledge of psychology, and no lack of either. Getting the suspect's oral confession is only the first step; the next step is what's crucial in breaking the case, that being knowing which parts of the suspect's oral confession are real, and which parts are false."

I make like I understand, but I really don't; you know, books have been written about everything on the planet, but there's no book that teaches you how to force a confession!

"At this point, the interrogator must be clear; the suspect's confession was forced out, some of it will be untrue. Because they're about to break down, it's easy to tell the difference between the truth and their lies. It's always easier at this point for the interrogator to tell the difference than at the beginning, when suspects will put on an air of speaking from the heart. Take you, for example, if you'd really murdered Rong'er, you'd have confessed to giving her some drug or another and described how you committed the crime. But these details would only have been known to the police after a careful autopsy. If the details you gave had matched what the police have, then the chance that you made them up would have been one in a million. This would have proven beyond a doubt that you are guilty! But there's another scenario, where in an attempt to free yourself sooner, you start lying through your teeth. Like when you said you fed her some sleeping pills, because you thought that's how most people kill themselves. Or like when you admitted to having had a sexual relationship with her, these things of course could be found out by the police through an autopsy. But when you're about to break down, whether you're lying or telling the truth, it's all done unconsciously. That's why interrogators with grasp over the highest level of interrogation techniques can determine the veracity of confessions made on the brink of emtional collapse.

"Brutal!" I can't help but sigh.

"Of course, this kind of interrogation isn't suited for most criminal cases. I'm talking about cases of national security, of espionage or terror cases that pose serious risk to public safety." Stopping for a sec, with a serious look, Director Zhou shakes his head. "It's just too bad that so many interrogators make the mistake of using these interrogation tactics. They get suspects to confess while in a state of mental disarray and think they've completed their task and can report back to their superiors, when really they haven't reached step two. Who knows how many false convictions confessions forced under torture have resulted in."

I think out loud, "nearly forty years old and I have no idea what my own fatal weakness is, or else I could have prevented all this. See, I'm a person who worries so much about even letting his bills go unpaid that you could tell from looking at them that something must have happened to me, yet—"

"Little Yang, it wasn't from your overdue bills that I knew you were in trouble," Director Zhou softly cuts in, "I phoned you before I came, then phoned your parents' home—"

"My parents?" I ask nervously, "they don't where I've been."

"Right, they didn't know where you were, and they told me you hadn't been home to see them for two weeks straight, hadn't called either. So I knew something must have happened to you."

"I tense up at the mention of my aged parents, but try my best to keep my cool in front of Director Zhou. Deep down, though, I know that no matter how cool an exterior I try and keep my nervousness behind, hiding it from Director Zhou's sharp eyes will just be in vain. I'm lucky Director Zhou came to find me, just like a parent would. As I rush towards forty, he's the only person who can call me Little Yang and still leave me feeling warm; with him, there's no need to hide everything.

"Little Yang, I'll try and hurry up with what I have to say, you ought to be getting home," Director Yang says, staring at his coffee as he speaks. He's already on his third cup, and a lazy aroma rises up from the coffee and spreads through the air. "Of all the young people I know, you're the one I like the most. When you first left the Ministry for State Security, I lost track of you for a while. Though, I respect you, especially your choices. You weren't paid that much working for us, and your parents weren't used to Beijing's climate. You came to Guangzhou to look for work, so I had no way to help you out; luckily you get paid a lot more than you did in Beijing, that at least makes me feel better. Only that I hated to see you leave, I feel you you would have made one extremely outstanding intelligence agent."

I'm a bit moved, my eyes a bit watery. These last few years since I got out of the game and came to Guangzhou, I haven't done too badly for myself, but I've always something wasn't right. Just take what Director Zhou said; none of the bosses I've worked for over these past few years have ever given me this kind of praise. They've all did their best to give free rein to my abilities and were never been stingy in raising my pay, but they still almost never gave me compliments. I think mostly they we're afraid I'd get too proud, or that complimenting me would lead to me recognising my own worth, and demanding higher wages. Of course, not long after the boss praised them, some staff did take off for better jobs.

"Little Yang, I didn't come just to see you, there's another thing, I wonder if you can help," Director Zhou says quietly, quickly, clearly, "you could say it's an assignment..."