It was past nine in the evening. Though the May Day holiday began tomorrow, plenty of lights still burned in the municipal government office building.
Holidays were for the rank and file. Leaders never really got a day off.
As Haicheng's deputy mayor, Zhu Jianming routinely worked overtime. Leaving on time was the rarity. Today, for instance, he had only just finished his last engagement and returned to his office with his secretary.
The secretary first topped up Zhu Jianming's cup with hot water, then quietly walked over to the desk and set down several documents requiring his signature. Finally, he pulled a freshly printed briefing from the bottom of his folder.
"Deputy Mayor Zhu, this is an extra briefing put together this evening. The general office said you should take a look."
Zhu Jianming took off his jacket, draped it over the back of his chair, and drew a deep breath, trying to ease the fatigue of a busy day.
"Make me some tea."
After giving the instruction, he took the briefing and lowered his head to read.
"Public sentiment and business developments concerning key enterprises across the city."
He had to read material like this almost every day. Most of the time, the contents were reassuringly routine: a manufacturer had brought a new production line online, a biopharmaceutical company had received approval for clinical trials...
In truth, reading it made little difference. Almost everything that made it into a briefing was good news that had already been confirmed.
If something bad happened unexpectedly, it would never wait for a briefing. He would have heard about it through other channels long before then. So the briefing's real function was almost to put him to sleep-after reading it, he could fully appreciate that the city's economy was running steadily and