Flower Net (Red Princess 1)

The two center lanes were devoted to automobiles, great trucks carrying scrap metal, produce, and gasoline, buses packed with humanity and with goods of every sort strapped to the roofs, and motor scooters whose drivers tempted fate as they wove in and out of traffic. Everyone passed any and everything he or she could. Typically cars swung left out around an obstacle and into oncoming traffic. Sometimes—and it happened more often than David would have liked—two cars abreast would do this maneuver, pushing the one farthest to the left into the oncoming “pedestrian” lane.

But for all this tumult the actual pace was relatively slow. Hulan kept at a steady twenty or twenty-five miles an hour except for those moments when she would push the car to seventy or eighty. So, although Guanxian City was only thirty-four miles from Chengdu, it took almost two hours to reach. Leaving the City of Brocade, they passed through the villages of Xipuzhen, Pi Xian, Ande, and Chongyizhen before hitting the outskirts of Guanxian, known—as the concierge had said—as the home of the famous Dujiangyan Dam and irrigation system. This system, Hulan explained, was known to all Chinese, for it had been in use for more than two thousand years.

On they drove, following the banks of the Min Jiang, finally reaching Guanxian proper. Prosperity had hit this town hard. The whole area was caught in a vortex, catching up one or more centuries in just a matter of years. Old-style farmhouses-low stone edifices with tile roofs-were dwarfed by the new multistory office and residential towers that rose next to them. Near the river, new plantings had yet to soften the brutal cuts into the landscape made by the construction of a series of villa parks similar to the one David and Hulan had seen when they first arrived in Chengdu. Hulan had never been here before, but she surmised that this town had always been a resort of sorts. Now that the Sichuanese had real money, they were buying homes and apartments for weekend getaways. She suspected that truly wealthy businessmen, who could afford a car and driver, might even make this commute daily.

David and Hulan began seeing advertisements for Panda Brand Deer and Bear Farm. From billboards pink, powder blue, and soft yellow cartoon animals (but no pandas) beckoned all to come visit them in their wonderful home. Hulan followed the signs to a residential neighborhood, drove under a high gate that read PANDA BRAND DEER AND BEAR FARM and FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC in Chinese, Korean, and Japanese, and into a parking lot filled with tour buses.

Hulan and David followed more signs leading down a lovely tree-lined pathway to the “observation area.” To their right were low houses hidden behind high stone walls. To their left, they could see into open pens where a small herd of deer grazed. They passed a guide in a uniform and a perky blue hat hurrying her charges back to their bus. But after this tour group, the lane was deserted except for a few molting chickens and a couple of kids on bicycles who ignored the farm for the everyday sight it presented. The two investigators climbed a set of stairs and crossed over a small bridge, which served as the observation deck above the pens. They continued farther into the complex, turned a corner, and came upon two side-by-side enclosures for the bears.

The pens were open, clean, and home to perhaps thirty Asiatic brown bears, more popularly known as moon bears for the white marking that resembled a crescent moon on their chests. Seeing humans, the animals, as a mass, lurched to their feet. Immediately, David and Hulan could see that these animals had no corsets, no drains, or any other foreign objects attached to them as they swayed over to just under the overhead bridge. Looking down upon their round heads, David saw that they were much smaller than he expected. They looked like pudgy ten-year-old boys—short, plump, with goofy faces that looked up at the visitors longingly. The bears balanced on their hind feet and begged for handouts.

Hulan and David retraced their steps and entered the souvenir shop. The room was large enough to hold several tour groups at once. Despite the obvious popularity of the place, the manager saved energy—a mandate throughout the country—by keeping the lights off. So, although fluorescent fixtures hung in pairs from the

ceiling, the only illumination came from the waning daylight that filtered through the windows.

Along the perimeter of the room were glass display cases behind which young women waited to serve customers. In the middle of the room, a few final tourists gathered around a long table where they could pick up, fondle, and smell ginseng or deer musk. Several full sets of still-fuzzy deer antlers lay atop these other remedies. The other two walls were bordered by low couches and tables where customers could sit, sip tea, sample the wares, and bargain for the best price. Just as Guang Mingyun had said, the Panda Brand Deer and Bear Farm did not openly sell bear products in any form. Again and again David and Hulan asked if there was any bear bile for sale, each time trying variations on their question. David complained of liver problems. Hulan said she needed bile for her mother, who had been ill many years. David said he wanted to take some back to America to give as gifts. But each woman they asked insisted that there was no bear bile for sale there. It was against the law.

At five minutes to five, the stragglers from the last tour group left. Once the others were gone, Hulan approached another saleswoman and said that a friend in Beijing had suggested they come here for bear bile. “She was mistaken,” the clerk answered tartly. When David offered a bribe, no one took it. Then the manager came out and began locking up. “It’s time to go home,” he told Hulan in Chinese. “You can come back another day.”

Reluctantly David and Hulan left but lingered by the car to watch as the clerks filed out. Most left in groups of three or four, throwing their sweaters over their shoulders, swinging lunch pails, gossiping and laughing. A final group stepped out into the parking lot and stood together talking. The manager closed the door behind him, said good night to his employees, then set off down the walkway that led past the deer and bear pens. Three of the women gave last waves, mounted their bicycles, and pedaled away.

One young woman remained. She was dressed in pale pink shorts, a skintight white vest, flesh-colored knee-highs, black patent-leather high heels that had seen better days, and a black leather jacket, which she left open. She wobbled across the cobblestoned parking lot to David and Hulan. “I know where you can get bear bile, but it will cost you,” she said.

“How much?”

“For directions, a hundred dollars U.S. For the product, you will have to do your own negotiating.”

“One hundred dollars is a lot of money,” Hulan observed. It was almost a third of the average annual income in her country.

“I will not bargain with you,” the woman responded with a toss of her hair.

“You’ll take us there?”

“I said directions, a hundred dollars.”

“What if you’re not telling the truth?”

“I work here every day. You can find me tomorrow.”

David pulled out his wallet and handed the money to the young woman. The budding entrepreneur counted the bills, folded them, and squeezed them into her pocket. Only then did she give the directions to the Long Hills Bear Farm, which, she explained, was also owned by the Guang family.

After the woman had disappeared down one of the alleyways, Hulan sighed. “Can you drive?” That was the last thing David wanted to do, but hearing the fatigue in Hulan’s voice, he took the keys. Fortunately, he had several side streets to navigate before he reached the main road. Still, it came faster than he wanted, for suddenly there he was, trying to keep alive and not kill anyone else. At first he drove slowly and cautiously. After five diesel trucks passed him, he picked up the pace. When a man with a pushcart strolled into the automobile lane to pass two old women without even looking back over his shoulder to see what was coming, David tapped the horn for a few half-hearted trills. When a bus spewing black exhaust slowed just long enough to allow a woman to throw up out the rear window, David crossed the center line, put his foot to the floor, laid his hand firmly on the horn, and got around the offending vehicle. Once back in his lane, he turned to Hulan and grinned.

After another hour, when they reached the small village of Yingxiuwan, David turned off the main road and crossed a bridge over the upper reaches of the Min Jiang. The road narrowed and automobile traffic all but ceased. Still, pedestrians wandered along the side or down the middle of the road. From here, David and Hulan followed the Pitao River, a tributary of the Min Jiang. The car’s engine groaned as the incline grew steeper. By now, David was almost wishing for the zaniness of the main highway as the road turned into slithery gravel and deep potholes. To their right, a deep ravine cut into the rhododendron-covered mountains, their tops cloaked in mist. Even up here, every inch of soil was put to good use. There were terraces, of course, but more impressive were the tracts of land sometimes only a few feet wide that were planted with cabbages, bok choy, and onions.

Twilight was just falling when Hulan yelled, “Stop the car!” David pulled over to the edge of the ravine. “Look!” she said excitedly. “Look down there!”

David leaned across her and peered over the cliff. He saw the river and some men working along the bank. Behind them, an imposing building—low, compact, windowless—sat bleakly and totally out of place in this almost idyllic environment.

“Do you know what that is?” She didn’t give David a chance to answer. “It must be the Pitao Reform Camp. It’s the place where my father was sent.”

“Let’s take a closer look.”

“I don’t think we should.”

“We’re up here. They’re down there,” he reasoned. “I think we’ll be okay.”

They got out of the car and stood together on the edge of the precipice. Inside the yard of the camp, where not one blade of grass grew, they could see several men in dull gray uniforms breaking boulders into rocks. Others packed these rocks into baskets, slung them onto their backs, and carried their heavy loads through the front gate and down to the riverfront. Another group of men stood in a row in the water, some only up to their ankles, others up to their waists. Although Sichuan Province was much warmer than Beijing, the waters that rushed by came from recently melted snow. The men with the baskets set down their burdens and began passing the rocks from man to man out into the river.