the surveillance team. Axton listened closely to the exchange over his radio between the Cockney cab driver and the Chinese spy. Kang gave the address for a building in Canary Wharf, downriver from London proper. Axton ordered the mobile watchers to maintain a loose pursuit of Kang in case he decided to stop along the way. The watchers on foot regrouped and boarded vans that were to shuttle them to Canary Wharf.
Axton smiled with devilish delight as Kang’s taxi slipped into the afternoon traffic with five different vehicles taking up position ahead or behind. Today, Kang was traveling with the finest government escort in all of London, with the possible exception of the Queen.
The taxi arrived at the building and Kang paid the fare, plus a reasonable tip. Along the way, he had directed the driver to take less direct routes, under the premise of a little sight-seeing. This tactic, which Kang was using to shake loose any unwanted surveillance, allowed Axton to get part of his team in place before the spy arrived.
Axton hoped that this modern high-rise was Kang’s true destination; otherwise, his forces would be spread perilously thin. He found himself holding his breath, waiting to see if Kang would hail another cab or proceed on foot.
‘Twelfth floor-the lift has stopped on the twelfth floor,’ the watcher in the lobby announced.
‘I read you,’ the second watcher replied. ‘I’ll be there in a second.’
‘Don’t jump out too quickly,’ Axton said cautiously. ‘We don’t want to startle him this early in the game.’
The watcher slowly exited the stairwell, which was around the corner from the elevator lobby, next to the lavatories. Kang rounded the corner just as the watcher feigned an exit from the men’s room. Kang passed by, taking little notice of the young man hunched over the water fountain. Using his peripheral vision, the watcher, who was truly thirsty after bounding up twelve flights of stairs, observed Kang enter a suite at the end of the hall.
‘He’s gone in,’ the watcher whispered into his microphone. ‘The doorplate reads PARNELL ASSOCIATES.’
‘Good work,’ Axton responded. ‘Hold position on twelve; your relief is on the way up.’
Axton then turned to the radioman in the van. ‘Get the Home Office on the line. I want to find out who Parnell is and what kind of shop he’s running.’
‘Good day,’ Kang greeted Parnell’s assistant as he entered the suite. ‘My name is Ba Xan. I have an appointment with Ian Parnell.’
‘Yes,’ Paulette replied coolly. ‘I’ll let him know you’ve arrived. Please have a seat.’
Kang seated himself on the black leather sofa, but his eyes never left Parnell’s executive secretary. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end, as she was selfconsciously aware of his unwanted attention.
‘You may go right in, sir.’
Kang nodded and walked into Parnell’s office. Inside, both Parnell and Roe were waiting at the conference table. Kang sat in a chair opposite them. ‘I received your message. What have you discovered?’
‘The information that you are seeking is available through the Moy Electronics computer network, but only under a very restricted set of circumstances. It is impossible for our source to obtain this information without alerting Moy and the American government.’ Parnell slid a synopsis of the Spyder’s latest report across the table. ‘This outlines the structure of the Moy computer network and identifies the barriers to the files you want. Moy Electronics maintains complete documentation on every project. The high-security projects that they develop for the U.S. government are kept on a separate computer and only Phillip Moy himself can authorize a tie-in for file transfers. We cannot imitate that authorization.’
Kang scanned the report, stopping when he reached the section describing the computer that held the cipher files. The only time that this computer was brought online with the Moy network was for transmission of software upgrades to the U.S. government. ‘Can you access this computer during one of these transfers?’
‘In theory, yes,’ Roe answered, ‘but only if we knew precisely when such a transfer would take place. We would need to access the computer just as the U.S. government does, with all the correct passwords and protocol, in order to download any information. The problem is, we don’t know when the next transfer will occur or what authorization codes they’ll use.’
‘We have pushed our source inside Moy Electronics as far as we dare,’ Parnell concluded. ‘The information you’ve requested is simply beyond our grasp.’
Kang sat quietly, his face displaying nothing other than deep contemplation of the information just presented. He said nothing for what seemed an eternity to Parnell and Roe-Westerners with no sense of patience. Roe held her composure well, but Parnell’s anxiety telegraphed from his face and hands.
‘Your work is not yet complete.’
Parnell’s manner turned to ice. ‘We have a deal-’
‘Yes, we do,’ Kang agreed, interrupting Parnell in midsentence. ‘And the conditions for terminating that agreement have not been met. You have told me nothing about Moy’s security that I didn’t already know. If you knew when Moy’s next transfer would occur and you were provided with the access codes, could you then obtain what I want?’
Parnell deferred to Roe for the answer.
‘Maybe. If we had that information ahead of time, we might be able to simulate a legitimate government access into Moy’s computer.’
Kang smiled. ‘Good. Then once you have acquired the ciphers, the final payment will be transferred into your account.’
‘We still have no way of knowing when the next transfer will take place,’ Parnell objected, ‘or what the access codes will be.’
‘Those details aren’t your concern anymore. Just make sure that you’re ready when the time comes.’
Axton pressed his luck once more, placing two taxis with fresh drivers around the corner from the high-rise. New watchers inside the building informed him when Kang left Parnell’s office and boarded the lift. Kang made no other stops in the building. He hailed a taxi as he walked out to the curb. One of Axton’s cars picked up the fare. The driver almost choked when Kang directed him to a hotel; it was a serious statement about the man’s confidence that he wasn’t being followed.
Kang remained at his hotel for the rest of the day, ordering room service for an evening meal before retiring. He rose early the next morning, checked out of the hotel, and hired a taxi to Heathrow Airport, where he caught a flight to New York.
Within an hour of Kang’s departure, Axton found himself summoned before Sir Daniel Long, the head of British Intelligence.
‘Good afternoon, Axton. Do sit down.’ Long ignored Axton’s disheveled appearance. Having once been a field agent, he understood completely. ‘I believe some congratulations are in order. Bravo to you and your team on the Kang surveillance.’
Axton acknowledged Long’s praise with a curt nod. ‘We know where he went, sir, but we haven’t discovered what he was up to. Why did he visit this consultant, Parnell? Skimming off a few pounds from his operational fund, perhaps? No, he’s running some kind of operation, but I’ll be damned if I can figure out what it is.’
‘Actually, your surveillance has shed some light on one aspect of this mystery.’ Long opened a file folder on his desk and pulled out a report that Axton had filed from Hong Kong. ‘A few months back, you observed a meeting between Kang and a Hong Kong national.’
‘Wu Zhusheng,’ Axton recalled.
‘Precisely. The transcripts from your report indicated that Wu had acquired some new technology from the Moy Electronics Corporation. I think that you’ve uncovered Wu’s source.’
‘Parnell is selling industrial secrets?’
Long nodded and closed the file. ‘We’ve got no proof of that charge, but we have heard Parnell’s name before. It seems he’s a rather capable fellow who provides his clients with a wide range of services.’
‘Some of which might not be legal, I presume.’
‘That implication has been made,’ Long replied. ‘This is the first real evidence that Parnell might be stealing fire.’
Axton, too, knew the ancient Greek legend of Prometheus, the titan who stole fire from the gods and illuminated the world. He paid the ultimate price for that technology transfer.
‘Where do we go from here, sir?’
‘We expand your surveillance operation to include the home and offices of Ian Parnell. He’s been positively linked with a known agent of a foreign country, which is enough to justify the warrants. Get me a list of what you’ll
