“I don’t work for them anymore. You’ve already seen to that. And there isn’t anything more you can threaten me with.” At least that was true. Peter Parker might have power to hurt her but it wasn’t infinite.
“Interesting.” Peter’s smile was the flavour of vindication. “Then you’re even more deluded than I could’ve imagined. What could you possibly do to help, and why would I even think about letting you?”
“Because Will means something to me.”
Peter reached for his desk phone, held the handset, about to call security, she guessed.
“Yes, your big career break, your walk on the wild-side, your million dollar chequebook journalism kiss and tell. You’ve done enough damage. I cannot understand what Will saw in you. Leave now, before I have you escorted all the way back to the airport.”
Darcy looked at Bo. He was facing away from Peter. He’d put his sunglasses on. Unreadable. But Peter was perfectly clear. This was the end of the line.
“Will would not want her hurt,” said Bo.
“Will is not in control here anymore,” snapped Peter.
24. Steamed
“When we see men of contrary character we should turn inward and examine ourselves.” — Confucius
Will was one of ninety-two foreigners at Quingpu Prison. But since the others were being held for minor offences on short sentences, like theft or fraud, they were kept separate from the main prison population.
Will was a dangerous murderer so despite his white-devil blue eyes and his ability to buy himself out of almost anything—or maybe because of those two things—he was placed in the general population. The Australian consulate tried reasoning and shouting but in the light of the charges he was facing there was very little they could do, unless he copped another beating, and then they could act. And that wasn’t exactly a remote possibility.
After that first night in a cell on his own he was moved. He now had four cellmates. All of them awaiting sentencing like he was. Two of them were gang members, judging by their tattoos—the bigger of the two had lost an eye and his lid was sewn crudely shut, the other hardly had any teeth. Cellmate number three had lost all but the thumb off his left hand and number four had puckered, contorted scars on his face and body which made Will’s look like they weren’t trying hard enough.
The gang members spoke a Han dialect and patchy Cantonese, Lefty spoke some of their dialect and Scarface didn’t talk. Will didn’t think they’d be exchanging life stories or plotting escape together, huddled happily around a purloined set of Chinese Checkers, any time soon.
On his first day in the group cell the guards offered him a steam bun for breakfast in addition to a root vegetable porridge they all got. He almost had it in his mouth before he realised the trap. Five men, one steam bun. He broke it into four pieces and offered his new besties the treat. He could live without bun, but he wasn’t keen on coping another beating quite so soon.
He didn’t sleep that first night, partly because they kept the lights on—it was never night time at Quingpu—but also from fear of being jumped when he was least able to protect himself. It made him a zombie the next day which was dangerous in itself and freaked Pete out. Pete who thought he’d given up, and who was tearing himself inside out trying to find a way out of this. Trying to avoid what might be the simple answer. Occam’s razor. That Will was guilty.
The second night he had no choice but to sleep though fitfully. He kept waking with a start as if it was possible to forget where he was. And every time he woke, Scarface was watching him.
So a new routine was born. Every morning, Will would break a steamed bun into four and share it around. Outside their cell he would exercise gently, trying to repair, and keep to himself, or spend time with Pete, who came as often as they’d let him. At first every day, and then less and less often.
Every evening he’d lay in his place on the sleeping platform, and let his mind take him somewhere more pleasant. Invariably the Palace Suite at the Pen, often by detour of another cell-like room in the bowls of Pudong airport where he’d first entrapped an ink-stained princess in his web of deceit.
On the evenings where icy cold rooms, bold dares and the surprise of gorgeous satin skin featured, he was restless, tossing and turning as he reviewed the moment he’d become the engineer of his own decline. There were a dozen things he could’ve done differently to change the course of that evening, the course of his life since then.
He could’ve omitted nothing, confessed more or walked away, though he knew no matter how sensible that last path was, he’d never have taken it. Not even if he’d guessed he might end up in the Shanghai Prison Administration Bureau’s model restitution facility for law-breakers.
At the end of the first week, Lefty returned his portion of steamed bun to Will. An offering, a trap; was hard to tell. Three and a half sets of eyes watched him. He said thank you, popped it in his mouth and swallowed it. He got smiles all round. They were bonding over steamed buns. That was the day it was announced publicly he’d been jailed for murder so being amused by a steam bun exchange seemed a frivolous matter. Still, he’d told Pete. He meant it to reassure him he was getting on all right, but it had the opposite effect. It convinced Pete he’d given up.
Next morning Will offered the whole steamed bun to Lefty. There was a quick exchange of looks all around, an understanding was had, and Lefty ate the whole bun, rolling his eyes at the simple pleasure. By week’s end they’d each had a whole steam bun of their own and Scarface no longer watched Will try to slee
p.
This was his life now. Using his privilege as a foreigner to share steam buns with his cellmates, keeping his head down, exercising to rebuild his strength, trying to help Pete come to terms with the fact he’d have to run Parker from now, and spending his nights with Darcy. Until the day the steam bun didn’t arrive and the interrogations started.
That was the day Scarface spoke in broken English. He’d known what was about to happen when the bun didn’t come. He grunted at Will, two words, “Tell nothing.” It was good advice, the same as Pete’s, as it turned out.
Now each day they’d take Will from his cell to an even more brightly lit room where the furniture was bloodstained—deliberately, theatrically; probably both. There wasn’t much preamble. They told him he was going to die for killing Feng, and he should confess so he’d have a clear conscience. They told him this over and over again in multiple languages. They varied the details but the end result was always the same. He’d forfeit his life because he was a foreign capitalist pig, a thieving, murdering scum who didn’t deserve to live. It was kind of like making up words to Green Day songs, except nowhere near as much fun.
The first interrogation made him feel oddly buoyant, because the abuse was only verbal. Verbal abuse he could block out. It was physical abuse he was terrified of. While he’d had medical attention, it’d been basic. He doubted he’d ever be able to breathe through his nose again, and he was glad there were no mirrors around. Pete’s expression had been enough to judge by. His ribs pained constantly, and there was something wrong with his shoulder. If he got beaten again he might end up with severe injuries that never healed.
Being physically weak in a place like this was its own death sentence, and no matter how many superficial friends he made with steamed buns, he was and always would be on his own.
But as the interrogations wore on, they became harder to handle. Will recognised them for the brainwashing technique they were, but it didn’t make it easier to stay mute through each ninety minute harangue. And now he barely saw Pete. He would come to the prison and be turned away by this problem or that, by one lie after another. They were torturing Pete too.