Dragonfly

mcalister: How was it done?

rice: General Lin keeps a mistress in Seoul. We went to her, threatened her, and got her cooperation. When he visited her last March, we drugged his wine, planted a series of subliminal commands deep in his subconscious mind. When he woke, he had no knowledge of what had been done to him. When he is told to do so, he will seek out Chai Po-han and trigger him.

mcalister: When he's told to do so?

rice: Yes.

mcalister: Then you've established a sort of double trigger. Is that right?

rice: Yes.

mcalister: Why so complex a mechanism?

rice: The sophisticated surgical facilities we needed to implant the spansule of bacteria existed only here in the States. We couldn't haul it off to Korea and turn General Lin into Dragonfly. We had to operate on someone who was visiting the Washington area. Then we had a problem setting up a trigger man. We couldn't use any of the three deep-cover agents the CIA has in China, because they're not Committeemen. So we had to rely on a Westerner who was one of us. Now, Chai Po-han doesn't have much contact with Westerners in Peking. Our man would have a difficult time getting to him without causing a spectacle. General Lin, on the other hand, has a great deal of contact with Westerners and with his countrymen alike. Our man, we realized, could trigger General Lin; the general could then trigger Dragonfly.

mcalister: I understand. But who is your first trigger man, the one who gives the word to Lin?

rice: Alexander Webster.

mcalister: Our ambassador to China?

rice: Yes.

(A babble of voices)

mcalister: Are you saying our embassy in Peking is a nest of Committeemen?

rice: No. Just Webster.

mcalister: You're positive of that?

rice: Yes.

(Ten seconds of silence)

mcalister: What disease is Chai Po-han carrying?

rice: A mutated strain of the bubonic plague.

mcalister: In what way is it mutated?

rice: First of all, it's transmitted differently from every other kind of plague. Most strains are carried by fleas, ticks, or lice. Wilson's plague is totally airborne.

mcalister: It's transmitted through the air? Through the lungs?

rice: Yes. You're contaminated simply by breathing.

mcalister: What are the other mutations?

rice: It's extremely short-lived and has a very low level of fertility. In three days it will be dead and gone.

mcalister: So the Nationalist Chinese can move in then?

rice: Yes.

mcalister: What other mutations?

rice: The bug needs just nine to twelve hours after it hits your lungs to kill you.

mcalister: Is there a vaccine?

rice: Yes. But Wilson didn't produce much of it. You don't need much if the plague's one hundred percent abated by the time you send in troops.

mcalister: How much vaccine is there?

rice: One vial. Webster has it.

mcalister: What about the other Americans at the embassy?

rice: They will be sacrificed.

mcalister: How noble of you.

rice: It was necessary. They aren't in sympathy with The Committee. They couldn't have been trusted.

mcalister: How many people will die if Dragonfly is triggered?

rice: We have computer projections on that. Somewhere between two million and two and a quarter million deaths in the Peking area.

mcalister: God help us.

When McAlister switched off the tape recorder, the President said, “You sounded badly shaken on the tape, but now you're so damned calm. And it isn't over!”

“I've sent my message to Canning,” McAlister said. “I have faith in him.”

“Let's hope it's well founded, or we're all finished.”

“In any event,” McAlister said, “there's nothing more that you or I can do. Let's talk about that unorthodox plan of mine.”

SEVEN

PEKING: SUNDAY, 1:30 A.M. UNTIL DAWN

The CIA's third deep-cover agent in Peking was very much like the first two deep-cover agents in Peking. He was in his sixties, just as Yuan and Ku had been. His name was Ch'en Tu-hsiu. Like Yuan and Ku, he had lost his family and money when the Maoists assumed power. Like Yuan and Ku, he had fled to Taiwan, but had returned soon enough as a dedicated CIA operative who would live under the Maoists for the rest of his life and pass out what information he could obtain. He had worked hard to prove what a loyal Maoist he was. As a result, and because he was an intelligent man to begin with (as were Yuan and Ku), he was promoted and promoted until he became Vice-Secretary of the Party in the Province of Hopeh, which included the capital city of Peking. And finally, just like Yuan and Ku, he was judged a truthful man by the computerized polygraph.

Canning could not understand it. He examined the machine, found it to be functioning properly, and asked Lee Ann to go through the list of questions once more. Ch'en answered precisely as he had the first time; the machine said he was not a liar; and Canning was baffled.

Lee Ann said, “If neither Yuan nor Ku is the trigger, then it has to be Ch'en, doesn't it? I'll ask the questions a third time.”

She did that.

The purple line didn't move through any of Ch'en's answers.

After having been misled with Sung Ch'ung-chen, General Lin was very suspicious. He stood stiff and straight, not bothering to work off the excess energy that always filled him, letting it build up toward an explosion. “You mean to say that none of your deep-cover agents knows about Dragonfly?”

“I don't understand it,” Canning said.

Lin's face was twisted, blush-red beneath his olive complexion. “What sort of trick is this?”

“It's no trick,” Canning said.

“This entire affair has been some sort of hoax.”

“I don't think so.”

“You don't think so?” the general raged.

“If it was a hoax,” Canning said, “then I was a victim of it too. I don't know why the CIA would want to hoax you or me.”

The general moved closer to him, glared up at him. “I want to know why you've come all the way around the world to waste my time here in Peking. What have you really been doing in China?”

“Exactly what I've told you I've been doing,” Canning said, exasperated. But he could understand the general's anger.

“Sooner or later you will tell me what the trick is.”

“There is no trick.”