Salan was known as le Mandarin or le Chinois, but less on account of his long sojourn in the East than for the impassive mysteriousness with which he surrounded himself — and which gave rise to a multitude of rumours about him.

XREF: Relates to how public reputation and rumor are built through opaque personalities — echoes of enigmatic figures in fiction and history. FICTION: A mysterious, rumor-generating character could be a strong centerpiece for a story about unreliable public perception.

Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace- Alge…, loc. 536