The Color of Jadeite. Eric D. Goodman
But we aren’t dealing with a burglar.”
“Then what are we dealing with?” Salvador asked.
“An information thief.” Wei Wei glanced at me. “Looks like Wang’s got rivals, looking for the tablet. Just like us.”
Mackenzie looked confused. “The more the merrier.”
“Not always.” Wei Wei looked at Mackenzie and Salvador. “Who are our new friends?”
“Oh,” I said, figuring this was as good a time as any to make the introductions. I threw their names back and forth.
The pathetic man continued to huff with a worried face, sitting in the bushes below us. Wei Wei said, “This guy was here to intercept the message we were supposed to get. Apparently, Dr. Wang dispatched our first clue here, but this man got to it first. He didn’t know what to make of it and thought the answer may be in my purse.”
“Clue?” Mackenzie looked annoyed. “What is this, Scooby-Doo?”
“Yeah.” Salvador laughed. “Hey, gang, let’s split up and look for clues!”
I threw them the look an embarrassed parent might throw a child.
Wei Wei glanced at them, then at me. “I can assure you this is no joking matter. We must take each clue seriously if we’re to find the tablet.”
“I’m with you,” I agreed. “Did our pick pocket cough up the clue?”
Wei Wei sighed. “I have a bad feeling that what’s left of the message is just a shadow of the intended information.”
“The old game of telephone,” I said with a nod.
She looked at the man and clarified the information one more time, like she was learning a line of poetry for recital. She translated, “Take your first step where the last Ming took his last.”
I considered it. “The last of the Ming emperors died here in the Forbidden City, didn’t he?”
“That’s right,” Wei Wei said.
“Emperor Chongzhen,” I remembered. “He killed himself.”
“Not just himself,” Wei Wei said. “He also killed his daughter and concubines, anticipating an angry mob.”
“Great,” Salvador said. “So it’s here. Shouldn’t be too hard to find.”
“Except for one thing,” Wei Wei said. “There are 9,999 rooms here in the Forbidden City.”
I looked from Wei Wei to Mackenzie and Salvador and watched their spirits sink. Then Mackenzie looked at Salvador, cracked a smile, and repeated the one-liner. “Come on, gang, let’s split up and look for clues.”
5
Begin with the End in Mind
I wasn’t sure Mackenzie would know the clue if she came across it, not being up on her Chinese history—and I knew Salvador wouldn’t know a clue if it jumped out of a ding pot and bit him on the ass. Much as I wanted to split up and conduct a search alone with Wei Wei, we stuck together after cutting the petty thief loose.
“So, what’s the story?” Mackenzie asked. On the flight over, I’d given Mackenzie and Salvador the skinny: that I’d been hired—and them with me—to search for an ancient Chinese treasure and that we’d be meeting someone in Beijing to point us in the right direction. But aside from that and a few pointers on Chinese culture and customs, I figured we’d get filled in together upon arrival.
We didn’t.
At the center of Beijing’s Forbidden City, Wei Wei led us into the Hall of Middle Harmony, where the emperor used to wait before greeting guests or attending events in the Hall of Supreme Harmony.
“Why here?” Salvador asked.
Wei Wei said, “I imagine an emperor would consider his suicide and the mercy killing of his women to be a ceremonious event. This hall makes sense.”
Salvador stood watch to make sure no guards or officials came near as Wei Wei, Mackenzie, and I crossed the “no entry” ropes and began poking around the ornate hall.
“It’s been a few decades since the jade tablet crossed my path,” I said. “Last I heard, it had been discovered after being lost for centuries. But it was in the hands of a private collector. That was a good thirty years ago, and once it was privately held by an undisclosed collector, I figured it was as good as lost to the world—again.”
Wei Wei looked behind a metal door that seemed to serve no more purpose than to look nice. “That’s part of the story,” she said. “Yes, it was in the eighties that the tablet was found. It didn’t really make international news, barely even registered here in China, because it was not something most people were aware of in the first place. It wasn’t put in a museum or shown off, always kept private. And the world was still under the spell of another Chinese treasure: the discovery of the Terracotta Army in Xi’an. That was very public, very big, and instantly became a wonder of the world. So the tablet was all but forgotten by everyone but the handful of scholars and collectors focused on it.”
Mackenzie peered underneath the bed-like throne at the center of the room. “Does that mean our clues will eventually lead us to the man who has it in his living room? This is all for the jollies of some rich Ross Perot-type prankster?”
“Not at all.” Wei Wei glanced behind another metal door. “The owner of the tablet, who never allowed his identity to be revealed, died—of natural causes. But before he did, he cast elaborate plans to preserve the tablet.”
“Guys,” Salvador called in to us. Mackenzie, Wei Wei, and I looked up and saw that, in addition to the watching tourists, a uniformed guard was strolling toward the hall. The three of us rushed toward the center of the room to hide behind the large yellow flags draped from ceiling to floor. We stood, just waiting to be apprehended and kicked out for trespassing (at best)—or thrown into a Chinese prison (at worst).
“Coast is clear,” Salvador called in. We released sighs of relief and went about searching the last nooks and crannies of the hall.
Mackenzie picked up the cushion of an ornate chair as she picked up the conversation. “So Daddy didn’t leave the treasure to the kids in his last will and testament, or try to sell it?”
Wei Wei looked startled at the thought. “No. The collector decided the tablet was more valuable than any amount of money offered for its sale. And he believed that the average citizen did not deserve to view such a wonderful possession of such an important emperor. That included his own children. He didn’t think it belonged in a museum or university or with the government for just anyone to enjoy.”
“Interesting concept,” I said, “coming from a Communist society. Don’t the people, in theory, enjoy all the same privileges in the People’s Republic?”
Wei Wei led us out of the Hall of Middle Harmony and toward the Hall of Preserving Harmony. “You’re assuming that wealthy elitist collectors share the same view as the idealists,” she said. “Obviously a person who values Imperial history so highly holds both the Empire and its fragments in equally high regard.”
We entered the Hall of Preserving Harmony and searched for something out of the ordinary. All connected in a line, each hall had its own charms, but they felt very much the same. Wei Wei continued. “The owner of Emperor Xuande’s tablet decided that it should not fall into the hands of anyone who did not deserve it. And since he knew of no one who could prove themselves worthy of the prize, he hid it.”
I looked underneath a chair. I’d heard a good bit about the jadeite tablet’s history, but this chapter about the collector’s game was news to me. “He must have had faith that someone deserving would come along and follow the clues.”
Mackenzie agreed.