Feigning illness.
That old lunatic, Pierre, wasn’t sick at all.
But if he wasn’t sick, why was he hiding upstairs and refusing to see anyone?
Did he really travel all this way to Hua Country just to eat steak and drink red wine in his hotel room?
Li Jianming’s mind rapidly rearranged all the clues.
’What if he’s not upstairs?’
The thought sent a chill down Li Jianming’s spine.
What if there was no one in the presidential suite at all? What if Arthur ordering two steaks was just an act, a smokescreen?
Then where did Pierre go?
Li Jianming didn’t return to the lobby sofa.
He strode out of the hotel and went to an IC card payphone booth across the street.
He pulled a business card from his wallet, picked up the receiver, inserted the card, and dialed a number.
The phone rang five or six times before it was answered.
"Hello, who is this?"
A capable, middle-aged man’s voice came from the other end.
"Jianguo, it’s me, Li Jianming."
"Oh! Teacher Li!"
The voice on the other end immediately became respectful.
"What brings you to call me? Are you in Shanghai?"
The man’s name was Zhao Jianguo. He was a former graduate student of Li Jianming’s from over a decade ago. After graduating, he had returned to Shanghai and now held a respectable position as a section chief in the city’s Public Security Entry-Exit Administration.
"Yes, I’m in Shanghai."
Li Jianming skipped the small talk.
"Jianguo, I need your help with something urgent. This can’t go through official channels. I need you to look into it for me privately."
"Just tell me what you need. As long as it doesn’t violate any major principles, I’ll definitely help you."
"Help me look up a foreigner, a Frenchman named Pierre. He came to Shanghai these past couple of days for that topology conference."
Li Jianming spoke quickly and clearly.
"I need you to check two things for me. First, check with the city’s emergency medical services and a few of the major hospitals qualified to treat foreigners, like Ruijin or Huashan. See if they have any ambulance dispatch records or prescription records for this person from the last two days."
"Second, check the railway and airline systems. See if there are any records of tickets being purchased with his passport in the last two days."
The other end of the line was quiet for a few seconds, followed by the sound of keyboard clicks.
"Teacher Li, please hold on. For the first thing, I’ll call a friend at the Health Commission right now. I should have an answer in a few minutes. For the second, I’ll have to check the system. Don’t hang up."
Li Jianming clutched the receiver, listening to the static on the other end as he stared at the hotel entrance across the street.
Five minutes later, Zhao Jianguo’s voice came back on the line, tinged with a hint of confusion.
"Teacher Li, I’ve checked. There are no ambulance dispatch records for this foreign guest in the entire city’s emergency network. I also asked the foreign patient departments at Ruijin and Huashan Hospitals. They’ve never seen this person and haven’t issued any prescriptions for him."
Li Jianming sneered. He was faking it, just as expected.
"What about the ticket records?" he pressed.
"Nothing."
Zhao Jianguo’s reply was firm.
"There are no ticket purchase records under his passport in the foreign ticketing systems for the train stations or the airport. According to the system, his current status is still registered as a guest at that five-star hotel."
Li Jianming froze for a moment.
’No tickets? He hasn’t left Shanghai?’
’Could it be that the old man really was just bored with the conference and was holing up in his hotel room, refusing to come down no matter what?’
"Alright, I understand. Thanks for your trouble, Jianguo. I’ll treat you to dinner some other day."
"Don’t mention it, Teacher Li. Call me anytime if you need anything."
After hanging up, Li Jianming retrieved his IC card.
He stood in the phone booth and lit a cigarette.
The lighter’s flame flickered in the wind before catching the cigarette. He took a deep drag, the harsh smoke flooding his lungs and clearing his muddled head a little.
No ticket purchase records.
Pierre was still in Shanghai.
This conclusion allowed Li Jianming to breathe a small sigh of relief.
As long as the man was still in Shanghai, he was willing to wait here for a week if he had to, just to corner that old lunatic in his room.
But as Li Jianming smoked, he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong.
The image of Arthur’s overly relaxed back kept flashing through his mind.
If he were simply faking an illness to hide upstairs, it would be a major scandal in international academic circles if the organizers forced their way in and exposed him.
No matter how arrogant Pierre was, his assistant wouldn’t be so completely off his guard.
Unless... unless Arthur was certain that no matter who investigated, they would never be able to find a trace of Pierre in this city.
The fingers holding Li Jianming’s cigarette suddenly froze.
He had overlooked a fatal blind spot of the era.
This was 2004.
An old foreign man who couldn’t speak a single word of Chinese, or a foreign assistant who didn’t understand the language.
How could they possibly go to the train station by themselves and use a passport to buy a ticket?
The clerk at the ticket window wouldn’t understand English, and most of the signs at the station only had Pinyin. If Pierre really wanted to leave, he absolutely would not have bought the ticket himself.
He would have to find a middleman—someone who understood Chinese, knew the ropes, and could actually get a ticket—to buy it for him.
And that middleman, for the sake of convenience, would most likely not use a foreigner’s passport for the real-name registration to buy a regular ticket. Instead, they would use their connections or simply buy an unregistered soft-sleeper ticket with their own ID card!
No wonder Zhao Jianguo’s system couldn’t find any ticket purchase records under Pierre’s passport!
Li Jianming threw his half-smoked cigarette violently to the ground and stomped it out.
He spun around, strode across the street, and instead of returning to the hotel lobby, charged directly toward the adjacent international conference center.
「At two in the afternoon.」
The backstage area of the conference affairs team on the first floor of the conference center was in complete chaos.

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