Chapter 2

The senior management meeting lasted two hours. Everyone came out looking grim. Mr. Huang had nearly come to blows.

None of the executives had offered a viable plan. They had simply kept pressing him to raise money quickly.

They wouldn’t even gamble their own savings on Xincheng. If it went bankrupt, they feared losing everything themselves.

People filed out afterward. Mr. Huang and Xu Min were the last to leave.

Mr. Huang’s brows were knotted together. Xu Min looked little better.

Mr. Huang went into his office alone. Xu Min gave me a somber glance, then followed him.

I knew he was about to explain his plan.

I was intensely curious. What sort of idea would he refuse to mention until they had exhausted every other option?

So I stood outside the door and eavesdropped.

That was how I learned of a scheme so vile it deserved to wipe out its makers’ family lines.

...

Put simply, every asset Xincheng owned was mortgaged. It would take a large sum to release them.

The question was where to get it.

Besieged on all sides, Xincheng could barely keep operating. There was too little cash on the books. Raising that sum was impossible.

Mr. Huang had no substantial personal assets either. Even his villa had been bought in the group’s name.

In those circumstances, Xu Min proposed a plan.

It came down to one word.

“Fraud.”

For a developer, building housing was the only way they might make money now.

But construction required materials and labor. Both cost money—money the group did not have.

Xu Min told Mr. Huang they could use defective, substandard materials from factories.

For labor, they could engage contractors on agreements that paid them as the work reached specified stages.

When it came to project approvals, Official Meng could give them some special consideration.

They would put up a low-quality housing development and offer the apartments for presale. Once buyers paid, they would immediately divert the money and leave the project unfinished.

After Xincheng recovered, they could repay the buyers. It would effectively be a loan from the public.

The plan seemed highly feasible. Mr. Huang was delighted.

If they followed Xu Min’s proposal, there would be some social fallout, but at least it would remain manageable.

...

Mr. Huang accepted the plan and set it in motion.

He didn’t follow Xu Min’s proposal to the letter. He made a few adjustments based on how the property industry actually worked.

He would find someone to set up a construction company. That company and Xincheng Group would then establish a limited-liability project company together, with the recruit serving as its legal representative.

The development would be built in the project company’s name.

Once presales began, its legal representative would withdraw the proceeds.

That way, even if the project was abandoned, Xincheng Group would not have to shoulder the debt. The project company’s legal representative would take all responsibility. Xincheng wouldn’t even have to repay the buyers’ advance payments.

The only catch was that the legal representative would have to flee abroad and never come back.

I didn’t understand all those convoluted arrangements. I simply did whatever Mr. Huang told me.

...

He gave me fifty thousand yuan and told me to find someone. He listed his requirements.

First, the person had to work in real estate, know the rules, and have at least ten years’ experience.

Second, his background had to be clean. No ties to rival developers. If he had any connections to them, hostile ones would be preferable.

Third, he must have absolutely no connection to Xincheng Group and no criminal record.

Fourth, he had to agree to the job and keep his mouth shut. Ideally, we would have something on him.

I thought it over. Nobody I knew met all four requirements. The third alone—no connection whatsoever to Xincheng—ruled out almost everyone.

So I went to the group’s projects department to see a colleague named Zhou Qian.

...

Zhou Qian had been one of the company’s earliest employees.

He knew how to read people and handle relationships. When Mr. Huang went out on business, Zhou was the person he most often took along.

He was one of the few people Mr. Huang truly trusted.

After thinking it over, I could only turn to him.

I called him down to the parking garage and explained the matter privately.

He asked no questions after hearing the requirements. He thought seriously for a while, then said, “I know someone who fits everything. I’ll take you to meet him tonight.”

After work, we went out to eat. We stayed until eight. He had some food packed up, then took me to a grocery store to buy two cartons of milk and a bag of Want Want snacks. Only then did he give me an address.

In the car, Zhou Qian told me about the man.

“His name is Wang Changping. Back when I was still doing construction estimates, he was already a project manager. Strict as anything. The jobs he supervised were always well built.

“A few years ago, he had an accident. Apparently, some workers lost their grip while moving steel pipes. Something fell from above and smashed his leg. They had to amputate it at the hospital.

“The company classified it as a workplace injury. They paid all his hospital bills and gave him a substantial settlement. In theory, if he lived frugally, he still had a future.

“Unfortunately, he has a seven-year-old daughter. She was diagnosed with leukemia at three. The kind they can’t fully cure. With medicine, she lives. Without it, she dies. The drug she needs costs more than twenty thousand a bottle, and a bottle only lasts a month. Two hundred and eighty thousand a year in medication alone.

“When he was a project manager, his salary, allowances, and project bonuses added up to three or four hundred thousand a year. He could afford her medicine and still live reasonably well.

“But after he lost his leg, he lost his job too. The settlement didn’t last long. When life became impossible, his wife divorced him.

“Now he wears a prosthetic leg and works two jobs a day. Works himself to death just to buy medicine for his daughter. He’s perfect.

“More than ten years in the trade. Clean background. No ties to the group. Most importantly, a daughter who needs medicine to stay alive. That’s our leverage.”

I felt sorry for Wang Changping.

But I couldn’t deny it. He was exactly the man Mr. Huang wanted.

...

We parked outside his building, an old red-brick block.

Carrying our gifts, we went up to the third floor.

Zhou Qian knocked on the door to the right. A little girl’s voice answered.

“Who is it?”

“Uncle Zhou Qian.”

“Uncle Zhou, Dad’s not home.”

“Open the door first and let me in. I’ve brought you something to eat.”

“I can’t. Dad says I mustn’t open the door for anyone when he’s not here.”

“But I’m not just anyone. I’m your Uncle Zhou.”

“I’m not opening it. Please wait a little. Dad will be home soon.”

Zhou Qian turned to me with a smile.

“See? He’s brought her up well.”

I nodded.

“Yes. Very well.”

...

We waited in the corridor until nine. At last, slow, heavy footsteps sounded on the stairs.

Zhou Qian looked up, got to his feet, and called down, “Wang?”

“Eh? Zhou?”

He put the gifts down and hurried downstairs to help Wang Changping.

I heard them talking below.

“Zhou, what brings you here?”

“Came to see your little girl. And introduce you to a chance to make some money.”

“As long as it pays, I’ll do anything.”

They reached the landing between the second and third floors. I saw Wang Changping.

His right leg was amputated. His eyes were slightly swollen, his face covered in stubble.

One glance and he was exactly the picture people imagine of a man struggling to survive.

He pointed at me and asked Zhou Qian, “And this gentleman...?”

“A shareholder in our group. He’s come especially to see you.”

Wang Changping quickened his pace, searching his pocket for his keys.

“I’m sorry to keep you waiting. Come in. Have some water.”

He opened the door and went straight to the kitchen.

Zhou Qian followed with the gifts. I went in last.

While they prepared the water, I looked around.

The apartment was almost empty.

There was no sofa or television in the living room. Just a square table and two chairs. It looked as though everything that could be sold had been sold.

On the table sat a bowl with a little noodle broth left in it. The girl’s dinner, probably.

I glanced into the kitchen. There was a small stool beneath the stove. Perhaps she had cooked the noodles herself.

On the largest living-room wall hung several kindergarten certificates and a framed family photograph.

It showed Wang Changping with his wife and daughter.

He looked bright and handsome. Nothing like the man before me.

The little girl in the picture was carefree and happy, holding a toy wand.

My gaze shifted a little to the right.

A girl in a face mask, a little over a meter tall, was half hidden behind a doorframe. She watched me with a puppy’s eyes.

She said nothing. She swayed slightly, looking at me, then away.

She was much thinner than in the photograph...

I can’t describe what I felt in that moment. Only that I could hardly breathe.

I stood there for a few seconds, then opened my briefcase and took out a stack of hundred-yuan notes. After a moment’s thought, I took out another.

I carried both stacks into the kitchen. Wang Changping was still boiling water. I pressed the money into his hands and pulled Zhou Qian toward the door.

“Not him. Find someone else.”

Out in the corridor, Zhou Qian pulled his arm free.

“Feng, why not? He can do it. His leg’s bad, that’s all. He can do it.”

I shook my head.

“It’s not his leg. I can’t choose him. After the job’s done, Mr. Huang will send him abroad. How’s a disabled man supposed to survive overseas with his daughter?”

I started down the stairs.

Zhou Qian called after me.

“His daughter will die without her medicine! More than twenty thousand a bottle! Where’s a disabled man going to find that kind of money? What do you expect him to do?”

I stopped.