“As you wish.” Wood frowned and returned to his outer office.
Mcdermid touched his intercom button. He was feeling more cheerful. With the strange arrival of Jon Smith, things were looking up. “I’d be delighted to see Dr. St. Germain,” he told the receptionist. “Ask him to give me fifteen minutes, and then I’ll be down.” As she gave her usual pert reply, he severed the connection and dialed his man, Feng Dun.
“Where are you, Feng?”
“Outside.” Again Feng cursed Cho, the assassin chosen for the night. He had failed to eliminate Smith, and his corpse had not been discovered in time to send a replacement. “My men saw him go in. Did he return to Donk & Lapierre?”
“No. He’s up here in the penthouse lobby. He wants to see me.”
“You?” A moment of shock. “How does he know you’re even in Hong Kong?”
“One wonders. I’m fascinated. I think we’re lucky he survived your killers. I want to learn more about this unusual doctor’s sources.”
Chapter Twenty-One
To Major Pan Aitu, the small office of Niu Jianxing — the legendary Owl— was intriguing. As ascetic as a monk’s cell, it had unadorned walls, shuttered windows, a worn wood floor with no rug, a simple student desk and chair for the master himself, and two wood chairs for visitors. At the same time, the desk and the floor were clogged with haphazard piles of files and documents, ashtrays stinking with masses of half-inch butts of the English cigarettes that were Niu’s one indulgence, stained tea mugs, food-encrusted paper plates, and other detritus that indicated his days were long and intense. It was a contradiction that mirrored the man himself.
As a longtime intelligence agent, Major Pan was an astute reader of the intricate maze of individual psychologies, and so he enjoyed himself while Master Niu continued to read the report he had been bent over when Pan arrived. The only sound was of Niu’s turning over sheets of paper.
Major Pan decided the office displayed the serenity of the solitary thinker, as well as the cluttered turmoil of the man of action, fused together in the same person. Yes, the Owl was a throwback to those giants who had founded and led the revolution. Poets and teachers who became generals. Thinkers who were forced by the necessity of history to brawl and kill. Pan had known only one of those revered ones — Deng Xiaoping himself, in his extreme old age. Deng had been but a young general back in the idealistic years between the Shanghai Massacre and the Long March. Major Pan did not like many people. He found it a waste of time. But there was something about Niu Jianxing that appealed to him. Niu, true to form, broke the silence without looking up, a hint of rush in his voice.
“General Chu tells me you have a report he would have you give me directly.”
“Yes, sir. We thought it best, considering your request for information on the cargo ship.”
“The Dowager Empress, yes.” Niu nodded down toward his paperwork. “You have what I want?”
“I may have some of it,” Pan said, cautiously. He had learned to use extreme care when making claims or promises to leaders of the government, especially to those on the Standing Committee. Niu Jianxing looked up sharply. His decidedly unsleepy eyes were hard points of coal behind his tortoiseshell glasses. His sunken cheeks and delicate features showed displeasure. “You don’t know whether you have it, Major?” The intelligence agent felt a moment of emptiness. Then-. “I know, Master Niu.” The Owl sat back. He studied the small, pudgy Major Pan, his little hands, his appeasing voice, his benevolent smile. As usual, Pan was dressed in a conservative Western suit. He was the perfect operative — slippery, anonymous, clever, and dedicated. Still, for all that, Pan was also a product of the Cultural Revolution, Tiananmen Square, and a too-rigid system that left little room for the individual.
Plus, there was the five-thousand-year history of China that valued the individual even less. If Niu continued to push for a yes-or-no answer, the spycatcher would say no rather than give a positive statement that could be construed as a declaration of success. If he were to know everything Major Pan had learned about the Empress before the Standing Committee met later today, he would have to let him tell it his own way.
Niu repressed a sigh of frustration. “Make your report, Major.”
“Thank you, master.” Pan explained who Avery Mondragon was and described his disappearance the day before Jon Smith arrived in Shanghai. “You believe this Mondragon is, or was, an American intelligence agent?”
Pan nodded. “I do, but not an ordinary one. There’s something unusual about the Americans involved in this case. They act like undercover spies, yet they’re not spies. Or at least not affiliated with any of the intelligence agencies we know of in the United States.”
“That would apply to Colonel Smith — the doctor and scientist — also?”
“I believe so. His scientific work isn’t a cover. He really is a medical doctor and scientist. At the same time, he appears to be using his specialty as a cover.”
“Interesting. Are these American operatives private? Perhaps working for a business or an individual?”
“It’s possible. I will continue to seek an answer.”
Niu nodded. “It may be of little practical significance. We shall see.
Go on, Major.”
Pan warmed to his report. “A cleaning woman discovered the body of a man named Zhao Yanji in the office of the president of Flying Dragon Enterprises in downtown Shanghai. Flying Dragon is an international shipping company with connections in Hong Kong and Antwerp.”
“Who was Zhao?”
“Flying Dragon’s treasurer. Not only is he dead, the company president is missing, as is his wife. The president’s name is Yu Yongfu. His wife is Li Kuonyi.”
“The beautiful actress?”
“Yes, sir.” The major related the rapid rise of her husband into wealth and power with the apparent help of her father, the influential Li Aorong.
The Owl did not know Li Aorong personally but by reputation. “Yes, of course. Li is high up in Shanghai’s municipal government.” What he did not say was that Li was also the protege of Wei Gaofan, one of his hardline colleagues on the Standing Committee. All things considered, Wei was the most powerful of all the hard-liners, and Li Aorong’s politics were identical to Wei’s.
“Yes,” Pan acknowledged. “We spoke with Li. He has no explanation for the murder of Zhao or the disappearances of his daughter and her husband. But?” Pan moved forward, perching on the edge of the straight chair, as he explained about An (”Andy”) Jingshe, the young interpreter who had studied in the United States and who was seen in Colonel Smith’s company. Later, Andy was found shot to death in his car. “That is, so far, what we know.”
The Owl’s expression was somber behind his large glasses. “An American in Shanghai disappears. Colonel Smith arrives the next day. The treasurer of a shipping company is murdered. The president of that company and his wife vanish. And an American-educated Shanghainese interpreter is killed that night. Is that your report?”
“With the addition that when we finally located Colonel Smith again, he evaded us, fled, and has apparently gotten out of China altogether.”
“We can speak of that later. When does my request for information about the cargo ship, The Dowager Empress, appear in your report?”
Pan sat back, chastised. “Flying Dragon Enterprises is the owner of the Empress.” He should have said that earlier.
“Ah.” Niu’s chest tightened. So that was the connection. “You have formed an opinion of these events?”
“I think that after Yu Yongfu acquired Flying Dragon, his treasurer discovered something he didn’t like, something that concerned the United States. He leaked it to Mondragon, who took the information to the Americans. Or tried to. Something went wrong. Mondragon was most probably killed and the information lost. Smith was sent in to retrieve it. Also, it seems to us that Andy Jingshe was an American asset assigned to guide and interpret for Smith.”
The minister pursed his lips, thinking. “Therefore … people in our country — not our security forces — are
