The Ghost War

Kowalski had nearly gone into hiding after the Chinese announced that they’d arrested Li Ping for unspecified “crimes against the state.” He’d guessed, correctly, that the United States had discovered how Li had used him to help the Taliban and passed the evidence to Li’s enemies on the Standing Committee.

For two anxious days Kowalski wondered whether the United States would come after him too. Then he heard from friends at Langley and the Pentagon that he was safe. Both America and China wanted to pretend that their confrontation had never happened. China apologized for torpedoing the Decatur— Beijing called the attack a “tragic and unnecessary accident”—and agreed to pay $1 billion in reparations to the United States and sailors on the ship. The Chinese also ended their nuclear aid to Iran, and — in a move that offered ironic proof of China’s new military prowess — gave the American navy a fully functioning Typhoon torpedo to reverse-engineer. In turn, the United States was paying millions of dollars to the families of the students who had drowned when the Decatur rammed the fishing trawler. Neither side wanted to dredge up Kowalski’s involvement and admit that Li had funded the Taliban. After all, Li had manipulated the United States as badly as his own government. More disclosure would only mean more embarrassment for both sides.

* * *

KOWALSKI KNEW HE OUGHT to let the matter rest there. He’d escaped retribution. As a rule, he prided himself on staying above the fray. His vainglorious clients fought the wars. He sold tools, nothing more. But this time reason failed him. Presidents and generals begged him for the weapons they needed. He was no one’s servant, no one’s whore. No one touched him without his permission.

Yet when he closed his eyes each night he felt thick silver tape across his face, hands squeezing his neck tight. Insolence. Beyond insolence. A stone in his shoe, irritating him with every step. He couldn’t allow it. He needed to know the name of the man and the woman who’d done this to him.

Of course, they worked for the United States. The arrest of Li Ping proved it. But even his best sources, two former CIA agents who now ran a boutique lobbying firm in Reston, hadn’t been able to crack the secrecy surrounding the China case. Every morning the question gnawed at Kowalski. Then Anatoly Tarasov, a former KGB agent who ran his security, found the answer.

“We want to know who attacked you in East Hampton. Why are we asking in Washington? Let us ask the police in East Hampton.”

Kowalski knew Tarasov was right. They should have realized before. Of course the police had known all along. That was why they’d taken so long to get to the mansion that night. Why they hadn’t pushed harder to keep him and his men inside the country.

“I don’t mean ask them directly—”

“I understand, Anatoly.”

And after two days of drinking beers with off-duty East Hampton cops, a Long Island private detective found the answer that had eluded Kowalski’s expensive informants in Washington.

The detective passed the name to the lawyer in Queens who’d hired him. From Queens it jumped over the East River to a white-shoe law firm in Manhattan, made a U-turn, and crossed the Atlantic, landing at the offices of an investigator in Geneva. Only then, properly washed, did John Wells’s name arrive at Kowalski’s Zurich chateau.

KOWALSKI HEARD SOFT STEPS APPROACHING. He turned as Tarasov walked in. The Russian was under six feet, close to two hundred pounds, with a cruiserweight’s broken nose and solid chest, which he showed off under tightly tailored white shirts. He had a nasty temper, especially when he was drunk. Kowalski had seen him beat a bouncer in a Moscow club nearly to death after the bouncer stared too long at his girlfriend. He was a very good head of security, and Kowalski paid him enough to assure his loyalty.

“John Wells,” Tarasov said. “I’m very sorry I didn’t get to meet him.” Tarasov had stayed in Zurich to mind the estate when Kowalski went to the Hamptons.

“As am I, Anatoly.”

“So what would you like me to do?”

Kowalski shook his head. He couldn’t possibly go after John Wells. And yet. No. It was madness.

Tarasov stood next to Kowalski. Side by side they looked at the placid lake. Tarasov tilted his head forward and wrinkled his smashed-up nose like a pit bull that wanted off his leash. “John Wells,” he said again.

“And the woman? Who was she?”

“I don’t know yet. Another from the agency, no doubt. We’ll find out.”

“Would you say I’m a man of my word, Anatoly?”

“Of course,” Tarasov said.

Kowalski opened the drawer desk where he kept his personal pistol, a Glock 19. Simple, effective, not too expensive, nothing like the fancy toys he sold the Africans. He hefted the gun, pointed it out over the lake, then slipped it away.

“I made a promise to the man who attacked me. And I think… I must keep it.”

AT THE SOUND OF FOOTSTEPS in the corridor, Li Ping dragged himself off his cot and stood before the heavy steel door that covered his cell. A panel slid open and a plastic tray popped into Li’s hands.

“Thank you.”

As an answer the little slot clanged shut. Li looked at his lunch. A cup of lukewarm tea, an overripe orange, a bowl of rice soup. And the pills, of course.

Li was in isolation in a concrete cell in a maximum-security military prison just outside Beijing. The jailers had laughed when he’d asked to see his wife. But for the last few days, they’d given him copies of China Daily, the official Party paper, as well as a couple of the semi-independent Beijing dailies.

Showing him the papers wasn’t an act of charity. Zhang and the Standing Committee wanted him to know his position was hopeless. They had united to portray him as a rogue general who had brought China to the brink of war for his own benefit. During the last days of the crisis Li had illegally ordered the attack on the Decatur, they said. They had even hinted that Li might have acted on behalf of Russia to weaken China. Of course, they were lying. They’d approved the Decatur attack, and they knew he wasn’t working for Russia or anyone else.

But no matter. Zhang had won. Li would never forget the moment when Zhang showed the Standing Committee the papers that proved Li had used army money to help the Taliban. Zhang’s triumphant look. The anger of the committee members, the shock on the faces of men who hated being surprised more than anything. Soon enough they found their voices. They ranted and raved, accusing him of treason, telling him he’d nearly destroyed all China’s progress. Zhang merely smiled as they denounced him. Li didn’t bother to deny what he’d done. He’d been trying to save China. If these cowards wanted to punish him, so be it.

ZHANG HAD COME TO HIS CELL a few days earlier, just after the newspapers started to arrive. With Li’s lunch that day were three oversized pills, two white and the third blue. They were unmarked, but Li understood their purpose. He left them untouched, finished his lunch, and handed back the tray.

A few minutes later his cell door opened. Zhang stepped inside. “General.”

“Minister. Did you come for the pills? You’re welcome to them.”

“You’ve always been generous.”

“And you’ve always been a thief.”

“If you weren’t such a fool you’d be dangerous, Li. Don’t you see you almost caused a war? Bones turned to ashes for your fame.”

“The Americans would have backed off. Now, thanks to you, they’ve humiliated the Chinese nation.”

“Do you really think SO! Has anything changed? Every day they buy our steel and televisions and computers. Every day they send us more money. Every day our economy grows faster than theirs.”

“And every day you steal more from the people. Every day peasants die from hunger because of your crimes. Don’t judge a hero by victory or defeat.”

“Hero?” Zhang laughed. “You’re a deluded old ox we should have ground up years ago. Why do you think the people didn’t riot when we announced your arrest? Why do you think they went home from Tiananmen quietly