Chen grunted. He had allowed Li to have his way yesterday only to have that decision thrown back at him today by Old Yifu. It rankled. “First we tell her we want her, then we tell her we don’t. Then we tell her we’ve changed our minds and want her after all. She may very well not want to do it now.”

“We can live in hope,” Li muttered under his breath.

“What was that?”

“I said we can only hope she will,” Li said.

Chen grunted again and started out the door. Then stopped. He turned back. “Almost forgot. Deputy Procurator General Zeng wants to see you.”

“Me?” Li was taken aback.

“Yes, you.”

“What about?”

“I’ve absolutely no idea. But when a high-ranking procurator says jump, you jump. Nine o’clock, at the Municipal Procuratorate.” And he was gone. But the door opened a second later and he poked his head back in. “If I didn’t know better, I’d suspect you already knew—all togged up like that.” He shut the door again.

Li sat wondering what a Deputy Procurator General could possibly want with him. Procurators were among the most powerful people in Chinese law enforcement. It was the People’s Procuratorate who issued warrants for arrest at the request of the police. The Procuratorate also reviewed evidence collected by police and determined whether there was sufficient merit in pursuing a case through the courts. They would then fulfil the role of prosecutors. In particularly sensitive cases, regarding matters of state, corruption, fraud or police malpractice, the People’s Procuratorate was empowered to pursue its own investigations. It was sufficiently unusual for a detective to be summoned to the presence of a Deputy Procurator General, outside the specifics of a case in hand, for Li to feel faintly uneasy about it.

Two uniformed officers, gun belts strapped around khaki-green shirts, stood to attention in the shade of large umbrellas on either side of the main entrance to the Municipal People’s Procuratorate. Li parked his Jeep in the street and walked in through the gates with a sense of trepidation.

The Procuratorate was housed in a modern three-storey building backing on to the High Court, not far from the Municipal Police Headquarters in the old legation quarter. Windows up and down and along the length of the grey-brick building stood open, like so many mouths gasping for air. A detachment of the Armed Police responsible for guarding public buildings was exercising in a compound in front of a huge mural depicting a traditional scene of ancient rural China. Li walked briskly past in the rising heat of the morning and went inside, where he was asked to wait.