Dialogue

Chapter 9

9 Just after four o’clock in the afternoon, I arrived at the front gate of the National Art Museum of China, where I saw a notice posted: “The China Avant-garde Art Exhibition is temporarily closed due to an incident.” Later I learned that Song Liwei had written this. I said to the security guard at the door: “I am Xiao Xiao. I am the one who fired the gun, I want to go in and give myself up.” “Go, go, go! Clear out! Whether you’ve fired a gun or not, whatever trouble you’ve stirred up, nobody’s allowed to come in here!” The security guard’s face was full of resentment towards this girl who said she wanted to enter to turn herself in. It hadn’t been easy to muster the resolution to go and turn myself in, and now, having got to the door, I wasn’t even allowed to enter. Flustered to the point where I didn’t know what to do, I suddenly caught sight of someone familiar: “Hou Han!” I shouted loudly, somebody inside saw me, a walkie-talkie transmitted an order to the front door, and the security guard let me enter. Alone I traversed the square of the Museum, my heart shrinking. When I started up the flight of stairs to the entrance, I spotted some people standing there, presumably members of the preparatory committee for the exhibition. I felt like saying: “I’m sorry!” to them, but it was already impossible. A large detachment of police swarmed out towards me, and I was escorted into a room in the west wing of the Art Museum. As soon as I was inside, all the police who filled the room stared at me. An aggressive dislike formed in the air. A middle-aged man in plain clothes came towards me, pulled me over to a sofa in the middle of the room, and sat down next to me. “Young lady, I know your dad. We’re old friends. We’ll just have a little chat. Don’t be scared.” Such a frank beginning calmed my strained nerves a little. However, the atmosphere in the room made me incapable of opening my mouth. On an impulse, I said to the plain-clothes man next to me: “Uncle, can you make all the police in this room go outside?” Dialogue 100 He waved his hand: “All of you had better go outside.” In a moment the room became quiet. It was obvious that this plain-clothes man was no lowranking officer. “Now there’s only the two of us, I’ll ask you a few questions.” I nodded. “The gun. Are you the one who fired it?” “Yes.” “Why did you fire it?” “It was an artistic performance.” “What? Artistic! All right, I won’t ask you any more questions about that. Where is the gun now?” “I’ve given it back.” “Right. Uncle is going to take you somewhere.” I left the room with that kind plain-clothes policeman, and we got into a small car parked in the square. The car drove out through the main gate, and then arrived somewhere and I got out of the car. The man in plain clothes, however, did not get out of the car, which made a one hundred and eighty degree turn and sped off. A female police officer escorted me into a rather small room: “Take off everything you are wearing and put it on the table.” I took off all my clothes one by one, and piled them on the table. “Stand up straight, don’t move!” I was carefully searched all over, and after that had to sign my name and have my fingerprints and photograph taken. So this was “being taken to the police station”. This was the reality I had to go through. In any case it was at my own insistence that I had entered, so I could only confess everything. After just over half an hour, a police officer came in and pointed to the things on the table: “We are confiscating that camera, but collect everything else, and follow me!” In the gathering darkness, the car entered Beijing City’s Dongcheng District Detention Centre. I got out of the car and was taken to a room where a middle-aged man was sitting upright behind a rectangular table, and in the middle of which was placed a square stool. I sat down on it...