beaten the pompous Hans and taken over China himself.”
He drained his ale. His voice was grim as he continued, “Now we’re the slaves, only worse. The Chinese force us to take Han names, speak Han, and behave like Han. They close our schools and refuse to teach us in anything but Han. They send millions of their own to populate our cities, destroy our way of life, and drive us from our farms into the desert or the high steppes with the Kazakhs, if we wish to survive as a people. They don’t let us pray to Allah, and they demolish our historic mosques. They’re stamping out our language, customs, and literature. My father was Han. He dazzled my mother with his money, status, and education. But when she refused to abandon Islam, to raise me and my sister as Han, to leave Kashgar for the pestilence of the Yangtze valley or the swamps of Guangzhou, he abandoned us.”
“That must’ve been rough.”
“Ghastly, actually.” He went to the refrigerator for another ale. He gestured, silently asking whether Smith wanted one, too.
Smith nodded. “And your Brit accent?”
“I was sent to England.” He brought the brown ales to the table and poured. “My mother’s father felt a Western-educated man would be useful.
My people despair when I’m arrested.” He shrugged.
“You studied in London?”
“Eventually, yes. Public schools, then the London School of Economics.
My education might seem rather useless here.” The microwaves sounded, announcing the food was ready. He brought the steaming platters and bowls and sat down again.
“They want you ready to lead, if they ever get free. I assume you’re not the only one sent away to be educated.”
“Of course not. There have been several dozen of us over the years, including my sister.”
“Does the world know about you Uighers? What about the United Nations?”
Asgar heaped stewed mutton cubes, onions, peppers, ginger slices, carrots, turnips, and tomatoes onto his plate, and Jon did, too. From the large bowl they took handfuls of a thick fried rice dish with more carrots and onions. As Asgar ate, he dipped the cubes of mutton into the dark liquid in the smaller bowl and accompanied it with one of the crisp pancakes, held like a slice of bread.
Jon imitated him and found the food spicy and delicious.
“The U. N.?” Asgar said between mouthfuls. “Of course, they know about us. But we have no standing, while China has an embarrassment of it. We want our land for growing crops and grazing our animals. China wants it because it’s rich. Oil. Gas. Minerals. You like the mutton?”
“It’s delicious. What do you call the crisp flat fried bread?”
“Nang.”
“And the rice?”
Asgar chuckled. He laughed a lot for someone who spoke so bitterly.
“It’s called ‘ eaten with the hands.’ ” He shrugged. “It’s always been the same for all the peoples of Central Asia. We rode west because we were poor and wanted better land and opportunities. We were fierce, and we had great leaders. Our time passed with the centuries — too much petty bickering, too many small leaders with small kingdoms led by smaller and smaller minds. Eventually the tide flowed back on us in the eighteen hundreds, as it always does with any people, sooner or later.”
He peered at Jon over his glass. “Remember that, American.”
Jon gave a noncommittal nod.
Asgar took a slow drink of the ale. “First there were the Russians with their eyes on India, but glad to pick us up along the way. Then the Chinese came, because they considered our lands their lands. Finally, it was the British, protecting ” India. They called it the Great Game, and you’re wagering on it again. The only difference for us and most of the world is that it’s the Yanks now, not the Brits.”
“And you Uighers? What are you doing?”
“Ah, now you’re asking the crucial question. We’re taking back our country, of course. Or, since we never had a ” in the European sense, only a people, we’re taking back our land.”
“This is your underground?”
“You might say. Not many of us at the moment, but more every day in I I
Xinjiang, across the border in Kazakhstan, and other places. We’re only a resistance, a nuisance, alas. Just ambushers, saboteurs, and bandits.
We harry the Han. The Han claim there’s only some seven or eight million of us. We say we’re thirty million. But even thirty million on horses and pickups can accomplish little against a billion with tanks.
Nevertheless, we must resist. It’s our nature, if nothing else. The result is, we’ve become an ‘ region.’ That’s meaningless in the larger picture, of course, especially with Urumqi already a Han Chinese city, but it shows we have them worried enough to try to bribe us.”
Jon helped himself to seconds. “That’s why you told Mondragon about the old man who says he’s our president’s father, right?”
Asgar nodded. “Who knows whether he is? In any case, he’s still an American that the Chinese have held secretly for almost six decades. We hope that will call fresh attention to China’s miserable human-rights record and its systematic destruction of its minorities, particularly those of us who are totally non-Chinese. We live a lot closer to Kabul and New Delhi than we do to Beijing.”
“Especially if he really is the president’s father.”
“Especially.” Asgar smiled, his white teeth flashing again.
Jon finally pushed his empty plate away and picked up his ale. “Tell me about this old man. Where is he?”
“In a prison near Dazu. That’s about seventy of your miles northeast of Chongqing.”
“What kind of prison?”
“It’s more like a protected farm. It houses mostly political prisoners being ‘,’ petty criminals, and old men considered minor escape risks.”
“Low security?”
“By Chinese standards, it’s low. It’s completely fenced and heavily guarded, but the prisoners are in barracks not in cells. There’s little interaction with the outside world and few visitors. The old gentleman who says he’s David Thayer has some privileges, like a room in the barracks with only one cell mate, some books, the newspapers, and a special diet. But that’s about all.”
“How did you manage to get his story?” “As I told you, a lot of the prisoners are political. Some are Uighers.
We have an activist network and information grapevine inside for outside news. Thayer heard about the human-rights treaty, knew our people are against the Chinese and could get word out, and so he told them who he was.”
Jon nodded. “What information do you have about his history?”
“Not much. Our people say he keeps to himself and talks little, especially about his past. There’d probably be big trouble if he did.
But from what he did say, he’s been in prisons from maximum to minimum over the years, depending on Beijing’s power fights and new theories. It sounds to me as if they moved him around a lot to keep him isolated and hidden.”
It sounded logical, and it gave Smith enough to report to Fred Klein as soon as he could get out of the country. But his inability to speak Chinese gave him few options. Without help, he was essentially limited to the usual avenues of foreign visitors entering and leaving the country — international airports, a few passenger ships, and fewer trains. With Public Security looking for him, as well as the mysterious group from the island, those exits would be shut down like vaults.
Asgar had been watching. “What do you think the American government will do about David Thayer?”
“Depends on the president. If I had to guess, I’d say that right now, with the treaty so close to being signed, nothing. He’ll tend to wait until the treaty’s a reality, then he’ll bring up the subject of David Thayer to China’s leaders.”
“Or maybe leak it to the newspapers to put pressure on Beijing?”
