The headquarters of Section One were still besieged by people who had been summoned to make statements. The offices and hallways of the building were baking in the afternoon heat. Corridors were lined with people on chairs, or squatting with their backs to the wall. Cigarette smoke hung heavy in the still air, in long horizontal strands, like mist. Officers and interviewees alike were crotchety and tired. Even the cheap standard-issue stationery slipped into typewriters by secretaries had gone limp. The temperature rose as Li and Margaret climbed the stairs to the top floor, and by the time they had reached the detectives’ office Li’s shirt was sticking to him in a tapering line down his back, turned sheer by perspiration. Margaret could see clearly the sculptured lines of muscle interwoven across his shoulders and upper back. She knew the names of every one, memorised during hours spent studying for anatomy exams: trapezius, hood, latissimus dorsi, erector spinae. She knew the way they were layered and overlapped, and what they looked like beneath the skin. She had never regarded them as anything other than anatomical. Until now. There was something animal, sexual and attractive, about the way they pressed against the wet, semi-transparent cotton of Li’s shirt. She cursed herself under her breath. What in God’s name was happening to her? She forced her eyes away.

Li’s heart sank as he turned into the detectives’ room and saw heads lift and faces light in expectation. The door to his office stood ajar, and beyond it the room seemed to glow, as if filled with sunlight, and yet his windows, he knew, faced north-east and only caught the sun obliquely in the early morning. Necks craned to catch his expression as he pushed the door open. His office was unrecognisable. All the furniture had been moved. A large fish tank filled with golden carp stood on a table in one corner. Flowers bloomed in pots all along the windowsill. A small tree in a porcelain pot spread large fleshy leaves into the office from another corner. His desk now faced the door, side-on to the window on its left. The filing cabinet that had stood behind the door had been moved to the far corner. The floor was covered with paint-spattered blankets, and a painter in overalls stood on a stepladder spreading bright yellow paint over cream walls that had gone grey with age and smoke. The previously jammed window stood wide open—no doubt, Li thought furiously, to let the paint fumes escape.