Shan hesitated, looking at the name again, and then searched the Metok file for the name of the Public Security officer who had supported the engineer’s prosecution. Huan Yi. The same officer who had been disciplined for his handling of the deaths in the northern mountains had later assembled the case that caused Metok’s execution. Amah Jiejie was on the phone, speaking with uncharacteristic impatience, as Shan walked past her to Tan’s office. “You never told me why you took me to see the hail chaser released,” he pointed out to the colonel. “You said there was trouble coming. It could only be because you had already found trouble. You meant more trouble.”

Tan rose from his desk and closed the door, then stood at his window, staring in the direction of his prison camps for several breaths before turning to Shan. “Six weeks ago I was at a meeting at the new supply depot. My driver waited in the car. It was cold so he kept the engine running. When I returned to the car he was unconscious.” The colonel opened a drawer in his deck and tossed a wad of cloth at Shan. “This had been stuffed in the exhaust.”

Shan straightened the cloth. It was a Tibetan prayer flag.

“Three weeks later I came to the office not long after dawn. Amah Jiejie wasn’t here yet. I went to look for something at her desk. This had been left in her chair” Tan said. He extracted another object and dropped it on his desk. Shan studied it, confused, then picked it up. It was a bundle of sticks wrapped with a vine. Inserted in the sticks was the cutout image of a skull. Pasted to the back side of the skull was a small photograph of the Dalai Lama.

“You saw the hail chaser,” Tan said. “He had a bundle of sticks like this. It was recorded in the crime report.”

“A bundle of dried juniper, yes. The fragrance attracts the deities. But this isn’t juniper.” Shan pulled out the image of the skull. “It would have been blasphemous to do this. No Tibetan left this on the chair.”

“My driver would have died if I had returned a few minutes later.”

“Not Tibetans,” Shan said again.

“So I was made to understand.” Tan returned the objects to his drawer. “Don’t tell her.”

“Who led you to understand it wasn’t Tibetans?” Shan asked. But then Amah Jiejie opened the door and motioned Shan back to the conference room.