room.” Pan hesitated. At last he said cautiously, “I believe that could be the name General Chu indicated.” A hint of hope crept into his voice as he continued, “Should I rearrest Li Aorong, sir? I could put him under house arrest. At least we would know where he was.” “No!” Niu said instantly. Then he tempered his tones. “That would not be productive.”
The last thing Niu wanted was to alert Wei to his suspicions, or to suggest to Pan that there was more here than a simple counterintelligence investigation. “For now, Major Pan, continue to keep him under surveillance. You are still watching him, are you not?”
Pan gave a slow nod, his gaze warily on Niu.
The nod was so small that Niu had the impression the major hoped it might be overlooked. Niu interpreted it to mean that Wei Gaofan had leaned harder on General Chu than Pan had suggested, which meant Pan was continuing to watch Li Aorong on his own initiative. General Chu did not want to know what Pan was doing, but at the same time, he wanted Pan to make progress.
Niu had believed for many years that this was the way Pan operated and why he was unusually successful — careful not to actually break orders, but bending them to get results. It was what Niu needed now, and one of the reasons Pan was valuable.
“Good,” he told him, resuming his pacing. “Continue exactly as you’re doing.”
“Yes, sir.” Major Pan nodded sagely, well aware that Niu was telling him to keep his name out of it also.
“What else do you have for me?” Niu asked.
“We’ve been examining Yu Yongfu’s business operations, but there seems to be nothing revealing there about Colonel Smith.”
“What about Yu and his actress wife? Do you have any leads?”
“Not as yet.”
Niu returned to his desk chair and sat. “I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Li Kuonyi several times. She’s a clever woman and a good mother.
If she can’t be found, I’d suggest that perhaps she doesn’t want to be.
Which would mean she and her husband might be, how do you say it, ‘ the run’?”
“That had occurred to me,” Pan acknowledged.
“If not, could her father have spirited her away so she’d be unavailable to discuss her husband’s affairs?”
“That, too, master.”
“Or maybe she’s being hidden by powerful forces?”
Pan did not want to discuss that possibility, but at the same time he did not deny it was an option.
“Have you found evidence of anyone else being part of the Empress venture?” the Owl continued.
“Only the Belgian company I spoke of — Donk & Lapierre.”
“Nothing else?”
“No.”
“But you wouldn’t rule it out, Major?”
“I rule nothing out in an investigation.”
“An admirable trait in a counterintelligence officer,” Niu said.
From the moment Pan had entered his office, Niu had been assessing the spycatcher’s position on everything they discussed, but had found it, as always, nearly impossible to be certain. His gaze remained impassive, and his soft face neutral and unsmiling. Still, Niu had no choice but to use Pan, if he wanted to uncover what he needed.
“Continue your investigation as you see fit, but from now on report to me first. I must know all there is concerning the voyage of the Empress, particularly its cargo, and about everyone involved in the transaction. Within the country or abroad.”
“First? In case General Chu should ask questions at some point, may I have that in writing, sir?”
There it was. The agent was covering his back again. Niu almost smiled.
On the other hand, such caution had enabled Pan to survive in a job that was perilous for many reasons and from many directions. The difference between an excellent technician like Pan and a leader was exactly the willingness to take large risks. Pan was no gambler.
At the same time, the Owl was beginning to believe that his lifetime of work for China … his stubborn commitment to his country’s growing into an important and friendly world power … was in jeopardy. To save both his vision and his nation, he would chance anything he must.
“Of course, Major,” Niu said smoothly, “but you must not reveal it unless absolutely necessary. Is that understood?”
“Completely, sir.”
Without another word, Niu wrote a letter authorizing Major Pan Aitu to be his official agent, who must report first to him and to no other.
With a quiet thrill and a moment of nervousness, the spycatcher watched.
As soon as the paper was in his hand and then into his pocket, he slipped out the way he had arrived — through the back door.
It was after one o’clock. He paused in the dark and shivered. Winter’s early chill was beginning to touch Beijing. He was puzzled. For some reason, Niu Jianxing suspected Wei Gaofan of at least corruption … possibly more. He himself suspected Wei of some connection to the Empress and was relieved to be under orders from Niu Jianxing at last.
But not too far under.
He hurried to his car. He must return quickly to Shanghai. There was much to be done.
His eyes snapped open to a pitch-black room. The air stank of droppings and dirt. Somewhere, a rat scurried away. Jon involuntarily shuddered as he listened for the high-pitched chatter and the sharp-clawed click of the horde of rats he imagined circling in the dark. But there was no noise. No rats, voices, traffic, cries of night birds … A pinpoint of light appeared ahead. He had to look up to see the tiny beam. It felt warm, even hot, on his face, but he knew that was an illusion built on hope. An illusion and a spatial delusion caused by the absolute darkness, with no point of reference, no sense of dimension, everything flat black. Except the tiny beam that was real, and by concentrating on it hard enough, moving his head, and opening and closing his eyes, he finally brought it and the room into focus.
He was in a chair, his legs bound at the ankles. Someone was tying his hands behind him, roughly. Nylon rope burned through his skin. The point of light was not a crack in the walls or ceiling, but a reflection from a corner off a small metallic silver box attached high on the wall. A reflection of light from around the corner, in front of Jon and to his left. This room was L-shaped, and Jon was tied to the chair at the rear of the L’s long arm.
Oriented now, he felt better. A wave of something close to euphoria washed over him as if he were on solid ground again, a part of the world— and then it all came back … his excitement that he had finally found the invoice manifest, the note from “RM” that not only showed that the manifest was gone but revealed the dangerous depths of the Altman founder’s arrogance … the lights flashing on, Feng Dun and his killers … He had been guilty of one of the oldest mistakes in the world — so involved he had dropped his guard. Now it was not the knowledge that he would likely die that bothered him, because that was always there in black work. You knew it could happen. It would not, of course, you told yourself. But it could. What shook him was the failure. The president was left to face a deadly confrontation with no acceptable options.
Jon hardly heard the door open around the corner of the L A light flared on overhead, momentarily blinding him. Someone left, and someone else arrived. When his eyes adjusted, Feng Dun stood alone in front of him, scowling.
“You’ve caused us a lot of trouble, Colonel Smith. I don’t like people who cause me trouble.” His whispery voice was measured, his manner unhurried. As he stepped closer, his movement was fluid.
“That’s strange hair,” Jon said. “Especially for a Han. The white makes it even odder.”
The blow smashed into his face, spinning him and the chair over backward. His head slammed against the floor. In the split second between the impact and the pain, he realized Feng had been so fast he had not seen his hand move. Then violent pain overtook him, and he felt blood run hot and sticky down the side of his face. For a few
