The Hamlet Murders Read Online Free Page B
Author: David Rotenberg
mirror. “You have, haven’t you?”
He nodded.
“He was a lot older than me.”
“Bob?”
She nodded. “He was going to marry me.” She wagged an elegant finger at her drunken self in the mirror and corrected herself. “He told me he was going to marry me.” Without warning, her control abandoned her and she yelled, “He promised me!” and threw her highball glass at her image in the mirror. The sound of the crashing shards of glass was drowned out by her screaming. Then there was an unnatural silence. As if the world held its breath. Then quiet words tumbled from her lips and her tears fell on the bar and Fong almost reached over to comfort her.
But he didn’t. Instead he arrested her for the murder of her boss, whom she loved, who had promised to marry her.
He didn’t get back to his rooms on the grounds of the Shanghai Theatre Academy until almost three in the morning. Usually he entered from the west gate and went directly home. But that night, the tears of the woman he’d arrested for killing the man she loved seemed to have opened a wide hole inside him. The image of her crying at the bar wouldn’t go quietly into his mind’s storage vault. Instead it grabbed the sides and fought. Screamed and shrieked and refused to go into the darkness. So he walked the long way around and entered the far gate. The heat of the day had finally abated a few hours back and the scent of the sea tinged the gentle easterly wind.
Fong’s city was quiet. Shanghai was never fully asleep but it got quiet from 2:30 to 5:30 in the morning when the 18 million souls finally allowed today to become yesterday. Fu Tsong had loved this time – after today, before tomorrow.
A moment of vertigo passed through him. He leaned against the cool mud wall of the nearest building to stop the world from spinning – if only for a moment – and felt as alone as he’d ever been since he cast his wife’s body into the quick-drying cement of the huge construction pit deep in the Pudong, almost seven years ago. He shook that thought from his head and stood up straight. He was getting too old for late nights – and young love. Looking over his shoulder, he realized he was leaning against one of the old theatre’s side doors. Naturally it would be the theatre. The poster to his right announced that the place was playing Geoff Hyland’s production of Hamlet. Fong noticed that the poster art was better than usual. Then he noted that the fabulous Hao Yong was playing Gertrude – “Was she already old enough to play Hamlet’s mother?” he wondered. Fong still remembered her incredible performance as the young Indian girl in Geoff’s first production in Shanghai, The Ecstasy of Rita Joe. And now she was playing the melancholy prince’s mom. Fong nodded and said to the air, “I guess she is.”
Fong remembered the rehearsal he had sat in on two weeks earlier and Geoff’s hand on his shoulder. And the business card with the plea. Nonsense. Just more Western paranoia about working in the Middle Kingdom.
Fong reached into his pocket and felt the key to the theatre on his key ring. He remembered the night Fu Tsong had given it to him. Images raced through his mind. Fu Tsong’s face became Hao Yong’s and that became the face of the woman-who-killed-theman- she-loved.
When he finally found sleep that night, he dreamt of women’s tears falling and him trying to catch them before they disappeared into the dense richness of the Chinese earth.
CHAPTER FOUR
A DEATH, A MEMORY AND A NOTE
T he next day was about paperwork. Not Fong’s favourite thing, although he was pleased to be able to pawn some of it off on Shrug and Knock. That night Fong picked up his toddler daughter Xiao Ming at Lily and Chen’s rooms as he did every Wednesday. They had dinner outside on Good Food Street, surrounded by the savoury smells of the cooking mixed with the human smell of thousands of people and the gentle hint of Yangtze’s saltwater tang on the
He nodded.
“He was a lot older than me.”
“Bob?”
She nodded. “He was going to marry me.” She wagged an elegant finger at her drunken self in the mirror and corrected herself. “He told me he was going to marry me.” Without warning, her control abandoned her and she yelled, “He promised me!” and threw her highball glass at her image in the mirror. The sound of the crashing shards of glass was drowned out by her screaming. Then there was an unnatural silence. As if the world held its breath. Then quiet words tumbled from her lips and her tears fell on the bar and Fong almost reached over to comfort her.
But he didn’t. Instead he arrested her for the murder of her boss, whom she loved, who had promised to marry her.
He didn’t get back to his rooms on the grounds of the Shanghai Theatre Academy until almost three in the morning. Usually he entered from the west gate and went directly home. But that night, the tears of the woman he’d arrested for killing the man she loved seemed to have opened a wide hole inside him. The image of her crying at the bar wouldn’t go quietly into his mind’s storage vault. Instead it grabbed the sides and fought. Screamed and shrieked and refused to go into the darkness. So he walked the long way around and entered the far gate. The heat of the day had finally abated a few hours back and the scent of the sea tinged the gentle easterly wind.
Fong’s city was quiet. Shanghai was never fully asleep but it got quiet from 2:30 to 5:30 in the morning when the 18 million souls finally allowed today to become yesterday. Fu Tsong had loved this time – after today, before tomorrow.
A moment of vertigo passed through him. He leaned against the cool mud wall of the nearest building to stop the world from spinning – if only for a moment – and felt as alone as he’d ever been since he cast his wife’s body into the quick-drying cement of the huge construction pit deep in the Pudong, almost seven years ago. He shook that thought from his head and stood up straight. He was getting too old for late nights – and young love. Looking over his shoulder, he realized he was leaning against one of the old theatre’s side doors. Naturally it would be the theatre. The poster to his right announced that the place was playing Geoff Hyland’s production of Hamlet. Fong noticed that the poster art was better than usual. Then he noted that the fabulous Hao Yong was playing Gertrude – “Was she already old enough to play Hamlet’s mother?” he wondered. Fong still remembered her incredible performance as the young Indian girl in Geoff’s first production in Shanghai, The Ecstasy of Rita Joe. And now she was playing the melancholy prince’s mom. Fong nodded and said to the air, “I guess she is.”
Fong remembered the rehearsal he had sat in on two weeks earlier and Geoff’s hand on his shoulder. And the business card with the plea. Nonsense. Just more Western paranoia about working in the Middle Kingdom.
Fong reached into his pocket and felt the key to the theatre on his key ring. He remembered the night Fu Tsong had given it to him. Images raced through his mind. Fu Tsong’s face became Hao Yong’s and that became the face of the woman-who-killed-theman- she-loved.
When he finally found sleep that night, he dreamt of women’s tears falling and him trying to catch them before they disappeared into the dense richness of the Chinese earth.
CHAPTER FOUR
A DEATH, A MEMORY AND A NOTE
T he next day was about paperwork. Not Fong’s favourite thing, although he was pleased to be able to pawn some of it off on Shrug and Knock. That night Fong picked up his toddler daughter Xiao Ming at Lily and Chen’s rooms as he did every Wednesday. They had dinner outside on Good Food Street, surrounded by the savoury smells of the cooking mixed with the human smell of thousands of people and the gentle hint of Yangtze’s saltwater tang on the
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