The police pathologist, Dr. Meng, adjusted the focus of the microscope and studied the sliver of flesh that he had cut from the ear. Brian Kwok watched him impatiently. The doctor was a small pedantic little Cantonese with thick-lensed glasses perched on his forehead. At length he looked up and his glasses fell conveniently onto his nose. "Well, Brian, it could have been sliced from a living person and not a corpsea possibly. Possibly within the last eight or ten hours. The bruisinga here, look at the back" Dr. Meng motioned delicately at the discoloration at the back and at the top "a that certainly indicates to me that the person was alive at the time."

"Why bruising, Dr. Meng? What caused it? The slash?"

"It could have been caused by someone holding the specimen tightly," Dr. Meng said cautiously, "while it was being removed."

"By what knife, razor, zip knife, or Chinese chopper cooking chopper?"

"By a sharp instrument."

Brian Kwok sighed. "Would that kill someone? The shock? Someone like John Chen?"

Dr. Meng steepled his fingers. "It could, possibly. Possibly not. Does he have a history of a weak heart?"

"His father said he hadn't I haven't checked with his own doctor yet the bugger's on holiday but John's never given any indication of being anything but healthy."

"This mutilation probably shouldn't kill a healthy man but he'd be very uncomfortable for a week or two." The doctor beamed. "Very uncomfortable indeed."

"Jesus!" Brian said. "Isn't there anything you can give me that'll help?"

"I'm a forensic pathologist, Brian, not a seer."

"Can you tell if the ear's Eurasian or pure Chinese?"

"No. No, with this specimen that'd be almost impossible. But it's certainly not Anglo-Saxon, or Indian or Negroid." Dr. Meng took off his glasses and stared myopically up at the tall superintendent. "This could possibly cause quite a ripple in the House of Chen, heya?"

"Yes. And the Noble House." Brian Kwok thought a moment. "In your opinion, this Werewolf, this maniac, would you say he's Chinese?"

"The writing could have been a civilized person's, yes equally it could have been done by a quad lob pretending to be a civilized person. But if he or she was a civilized person that doesn't necessarily mean that the same person who did the act wrote the letter."

"I know that. What are the odds that John Chen's dead?"

"From the mutilation?"

"From the fact that the Werewolf, or more probably Werewolves, sent the ear even before starting negotiations."

The little man smiled and said dryly, "You mean old Sun Tzu's 'kill one to terrorize ten thousand'? I don't know. I don't speculate on such imponderables. I only estimate odds on horses, Brian, or the stock market. What about John Chen's Golden Lady on Saturday?"

"She's got a great chance. Definitely. And Struan's Noble Star Gornt's Pilot Fish and even more, Richard Kwang's Butterscotch Lass. She'll be the favorite I'll bet. But Golden Lady's a real goer. She'll start about three to one. She's a flier and the going'll be good for her. Dry. She's useless in the wet."

"Ah, any sign of rain?"

"Possible. They say there's a storm coming. Even a sprinkle could make all the difference."

"Then it better not rain till Sunday, heya?"

"It won't rain this month not unless we're enormously lucky."

"Well if it rains it rains and if it doesn't it doesn't never mind! Winter's coming then this cursed humidity will go away." Dr. Meng glanced at the wall clock. It was 5:35 P.M. "How about a quick one before we go home?"

"No thanks. I've still got a few things to do. Bloody nuisance this."

"Tomorrow I'll see what clues I can come up with from the cloth, or the wrapping paper or the other things. Perhaps fingerprinting will help you," the doctor added.

"I wouldn't bet on that. This whole operation is very smelly. Very smelly indeed."

Dr. Mengnodded and his voice lost its gentleness. "Anything to do with the Noble House and their puppet House of Chen's smelly. Isn't it?"

Brian Kwok switched to sel yap, one of the main dialects of the Kwantung Province, spoken by many Hong Kong Cantonese. "Eh, Brother, don't you mean any and all capitalist running dogs are smelly, of which the Noble House and the House of Chen are chief and dung heavy?" he said banteringly.

"Ah, Brother, don't you know yet, deep in your head, that the winds of change are whirling throughout the world? And China under the immortal guidance of Chairman Mao, and Mao Thought, is the lead"

"Keep your proselytizing to yourself," Brian Kwok said coldly, switching back to English. "Most of the thoughts of Mao are out of the writings of Sun Tzu, Confucius, Marx, Lao Tsu and others. I know he's a poet a great one but he's usurped China and there's no freedom there now. None."

"Freedom?" the little man said defiantly. "What's freedom for a few years when, under the guidance of Chairman Mao, China's once more China and has taken back her rightful place in the world. Now China is feared by all filthy capitalists! Even by revisionist Russia."

"Yes. I agree. For that I thank him. Meanwhile if you don't like it here go home to Canton and sweat your balls offin your Comniunist paradise and dew neh lob mob on all Communists and their fellow travelers!"

"You should go there, see for yourself. It's propaganda that communism's bad for China. Don't you read the newspapers? No one's starving now."

"What about the twenty-odd million who were murdered after the takeover? What about all the brainwashing?"

"More propaganda! lust because you've been to English and Canadian public schools and talk like a capitalist swine doesn't mean you're one of them. Remember your heritage."

"I do. I remember it very well."

"Your father was mistaken to send you away!" It was common knowledge that Brian Kwok had been born in Canton and, at the age of six, sent to school in Hong Kong. He was such a good student that in '37, when he was twelve, he had won a scholarship to a fine public school in England and had gone there, and then in '39, with the beginning War II, the whole school was evacuated to Canada. In '42, at eighteen, he had graduated top of his class, senior prefect, and had joined the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in their plainclothes branch in Vancouver's huge Chinatown. He spoke Cantonese, Mandarin, seiyap, and had served with distinction. In '45 he had requested a transfer to the Royal Hong Kong Police. With the reluctant approval of the RCMP, who had wanted him to stay on, he had returned. "You're wasted working for them, Brian," Dr. Meng continued. "You should serve the masses and work for the Party!"

"The Party murdered my father and my mother and most of my family in '43J"

"There was never proof of that! Never. It was hearsay. Perhaps the Kuomintang devils did it there was chaos then in Canton. I was there, I know! Perhaps the Japanese swine were responsible or triads who knows? How can you be certain?"

"I'm certain, by God."

"Was there a witness? No! You told me that yourself" Meng's voice rasped and he peered up at him myopically. "Ayecyah, you're Chinese, use your education for China, for the masses, not for the capitalist overlord."

"Up yoursJ"

Dr. Meng laughed and his glasses fell on to the top of his nose. "You wait, Superintendent Kar-shun Kwok. One day your eyes will open. One day you will see the beauty of it all."

"Meanwhile get me some bloody answers!" Brian Kwok strode out of the laboratory and went up the corridor to the elevator, his shirt sticking to his back. I wish it would rain, he thought.

He got into the elevator. Other policemen greeted him and he them. At the third floor he got out and walked along the corridor to his office.. Armstrong was waiting for him, idly reading a Chinese newspaper. "Hi, Robert," he said, pleased to see him. "What's new?"

"Nothing. How about you?"

Brian Kwok told him what Dr. Meng had said.

"That little bugger and his 'could possiblys'! The only thing he's ever emphatic about's a corpse and even then he'll have to check a couple of times."

"Yes or about Chairman Mao."

"Oh, he was on that broken record again?"

"Yes." Brian Kwok grinned. "I told him to go back to China."

"He'll never leave."

"I know." Brian stared at the pile of papers in his in tray and sighed. Then he said, "It's not like a local to cut off en ear so soon."

"No, not if it's a proper kidnapping."

"What?"

"It could be a grudge and the kidnapping a cover," Armstrong said, his well-used face hardening. "I agree with you and Dunross. I think they did him in."

"But why?"

"Perhaps John was trying to escape, started a fight, and they or he panicked and before they or he knew what was happening, they or he'd knifed him, or honked him with a blunt instrument." Armstrong sighed and stretched to ease the knot in his shoulders. "In any event, old chap, our Great White Father wants this solved quickly. He honored me with a call to say the governor had phoned personally to express his concern."

Brian Kwok cursed softly. "Foul news travels quickly! Nothing in the press yet?"

"No, but it's all over Hong Kong and we'll have a red hot wind fanning our tails by morning. Mr. Bloody Werewolf Esquire assisted by the pox-ridden, black-hearted, uncooperative Hong Kong press will, I fear, cause us nothing but grief until we catch the bastard, or bastards."

"But catch him we will, oh yes, catch him we willl"

"Yes. How about a beer or better, a very large gin and tonic? I could use one."

"Good idea. Your stomach off again?"

"Yes. Mary says it's all the good thoughts I keep bottled up." They laughed together and headed for the door and were in the corridor when the phone rang.

"Leave the bloody thing, don't answer it, it's only trouble," Armstrong said, knowing neither he nor Brian would ever leave it.

Brian Kwok picked up the phone and froze.

It was Roger Crosse, senior superintendent, director of Special Intelligence. "Yes sir?"

"Brian, would you please come up right away."

"Yes sir."

"Is Armstrong with you?"

"Yes sir."

"Bring him too." The phone clicked off.

"Yes sir." He replaced the receiver and felt the sweat on his back. "God wants us, on the double."

Armstrong's heart jumped a beat. "Eh? Me?" He caught up with Brian who was heading for the elevator. "What the hell does he want me for? I'm not in Sl now."

"Ours not to reason why, ours just to shit when he murmurs." Brian Kwok pressed the up button. "What's up?"

"Got to be important. The Mainland perhaps?"

"Chou En-lai's ousted Mao and the moderatestre in power?"

"Dreamer! Maotll die in office the Godhead of China."

"The only good thing you can say about Mao is that he's Chinese first and Commie second. God-cursed Commies!"

"Hey, Brian, maybe the Soviets are hatting up the border again. Another incident?"

"Could be. Yes. War's coming yes, war's coming between Russia and China. Mao's right in that too."

"The Soviets aren't that stupid."

"Don't bet on it, old chum. I've said it before and I've said it again, the Soviets are the world enemy. There'll be war you'll soon owe me a thousand dollars, Robert."

"I don't think I want to pay that bet. The killing'll be hideous."

"Yes. But it'll still happen. Again Mao's right in that. It'll be hideous all right but not catastrophic." Irritably Brian Kwok punched the elevator button again. He looked up suddenly. "You don't think the invasion from Taiwan's launched at long last?"

"That old chestnut? That old pipe dream? Come off it, Brian! Chiang Kai-shek'll never get off Taiwan."

"If he doesn't the whole world's in the manure pile. If Mao gets thirty years to consolidatea Christ, you've no idea. A billion automatons? Chiang was so right to go after the Commie bastards they're the real enemy of China. They're the plague of China. Christ, if they get time to Pavlov all the kids."

Armstrong said mildly, "Anyone'd think you're a running dog Nationalist. Simmer down, lad, everything's lousy in the world which is now and ever shall be normal but you, capitalist dog, you can go racing Saturday, hill climbing Sunday and there're lots of birds ready to be plucked. Eh?"

"Sorry." They got into the elevator. "That little bastard Meng caught me off balance," Brian said, stabbing the top-floor button. Armstrong switched to Cantonese. "Thy mother on your sorry, Brother."

"And shine was stuffed by a vagrant monkey with one testicle in a pail of pig's nightsoiL"

Armstrong beamed. "That's not bad, Brian," he said in English. "Not bad at all."

The elevator stopped. They walked along the drab corridor. At the door they prepared themselves. Brian knocked gently.

"Come in."

Roger Crosse was in his fifties, a thin tall man with pale blue eyes and fair thinning hair and small, long-fingered hands. His desk was meticulous, like his civilian clothes his office spartan. He motioned to chairs. They sat. He continued to read a file. At length he closed it carefully and set it in front of him. The cover was drab, interoffice and ordinary. "An American millionaire arrives with smuggled guns, an ex-drug peddling, very suspect Shanghainese millionaire flees to Taiwan, and now a VIP kidnapping with, God help us, Werewolves and a mutilated ear. All in nineteen-odd hours. Where's the connection?"

Armstrong broke the silence. "Should there be one, sir?"

"Shouldn't there?"

"Sorry sir, I don't know. Yet."