The doctor took a small metal case from his bag and extracted a hypodermic syringe and two phials.
“Does he have any allergies?” he asked.
“Assume not.”
“What if he does? He may...”
“Then we go to Plan B,” Quayle said dryly. “Just do it.”
The doctor looked at his watch and raised an eyebrow at Eicheman who nodded. Then, rolling the man’s pyjama sleeve up, he pushed the sharp needle into the arm and pressed the plunger down steadily.
“Two or three minutes and you can start. Shall I do the other now?”
“No,” Quayle replied. “Give me twenty minutes here first.” Then, finding another chair, he sat down at the side of the American and began lightly slapping his wrist. “Hi there,” he said with a West Coast accent. “My name is Eddie and I am your friend.”
The man mumbled something and shook his head. Behind them, Eicheman looked at Cockburn with a raised eyebrow. He hadn’t known that Quayle was an interrogator. Alongside them was a young bearded man in dirty jeans, the Cantonese interpreter.
“Don’t you remember me? I’m your friend Eddie,” he said soothingly. “We always have lots of fun talking and things... Let’s talk now, shall we?”
The man mumbled again – but this time the enunciation of the sounds was clearer.
“So Don, how are things?”
“Not… Don...” he said, slowly lifting his big head, eyes still closed. “Leonard. Leonard Kavics.”
“Sure,” Quayle said. “Sorry Leonard. My mistakes! So how’s things? Pretty good?”
“Yeah.”
“Where are we keeping the girl. Leonard?”
“Which girl?” One eye opened a fraction.
“The one we grabbed in Spain.”
“The limey bitch? Oh sure…” The voice was slurred. “They gave her to the gooks. They should sell her ass on the streets...”
“What gooks?” Quayle asked, keeping his anger in check. “The slopes? The ones in Hong Kong?”
“Yeah. Fung Wa’s boys. They got her tight waiting for the man.”
“What man Leonard?”
“The Brit pinko.”
“Quayle?” Quayle asked.
“Yeah.”
“What’s our group called, Leonard?” In the next room, two tape machines faithfully recorded every word, a technician leaning over them to adjust audio record levels and enhance them wherever he could.
“Our group? Why don’ you know what we’re called? Everyone knows what we are called” His answer had a childish tone.
“You know me, Leonard. Had a few beers. What can I say. I forgot! So tell me again Leonard…”
“Minutemen.”
“We’re called Minutemen. Everywhere?”
“Just in the old U S of A. Here it’s something else.”
“What’s it called here?”
“Can’t say it. Kraut something. Night guard.”
“Nachtwatch?”
“Yeah that’s it,” he said, smiling awkwardly, one eye open like a drunk.
“Why are you here Leonard?”
“I’m a Spec,” he said proudly through his haze. “Mission specialist.”
“Wow. An expert!” Quayle said admiringly.
“Yes, sir!”
“An expert at what?”
“Things that float through the air. I’m an expert aerosol,” he giggled.
“What things?” Quayle asked, his spine going cold.
He put one finger to his lips. “Shsss... bugs. C.D.T.B.As.”
“What does that mean Leonard?”
“Tactical Bacterial Agents... command dispensed.” He held up a hand like he was holding a spray can. “Yessiree. Twenty-two years at Fort Dixon.”
“We gonna get some lefties Leonard?”
“They ain’t telling me, but I tell you this. You don’t use faox ATs for fruit flies.”
“What’s faox?”
“Fast oxidising. Two minutes later, three at most, you can breathe deep and live long.” The drugged speech had a drowsy monotone quality and Quayle tried to match it as best he could, like a bad amateur actor reading lines.
“Getcha ha ha… breathe deep live long, ha ha. ATs?”
“Alpha grade is sci-fi stuff. A thimble sized toxic nightmare for the baddies. Whole companies... poof!”
“Gee Leonard, that kind of stuff must be hard to come by. Where did we find it? Tell our friend John here. John likes sci-fi. Tell us all about the alpha grade.” He signalled with his hand for Cockburn to move forward.
Quayle stood up and looked at Eicheman, indicating he was going next door to start on the Chinese and that the interpreter should join him.
As they reached the corridor, the young German breathed out loudly, relieving his tension.
“My God, they must be mad!”
“Did you here my tone in there?” Quayle asked when the interpreter arrived. “Soft, like to a child…”
“Yes. You want that style?”
“Must have. Will it work in Cantonese?”
“Mandarin would be easier, but yes. I’ve done unconscious interrogations before,” he replied in English.
“Good. We want to know where they have a girl called Holly Morton. They’re holding her somewhere in Hong Kong. But where exactly? And who is this Fung Wa character? Get all the names you can. Locations, contacts, any clues to finding them quickly. Got that?”
“Yes,” he said, suddenly all business, “but we must record this. Cantonese and Mandarin are tonal languages. In a drugged state the tones might be out. That could give different meanings. I’ll need to listen again and again to some words he’ll use, to fix the context correctly. Also if he was an accent or a dialect.” He paused. “If they sent him here, he’ll speak English, surely?”
“He may remember using English later. Also his English isn’t that good. Use Chinese. Just do your best. We are recording. I want Holly back. That’s first. I don’t care what Kurt has told you. We get the information on Holly first. Then you move onto anything else. That clear?” His eyes glittered for a second, the force of will flowing from him like heat from a brazier.
The young man nodded and pushed open the door into the second room.
*
The team arrived at Hong Kong’s Kai Tak airport within an hour of each other, using four different airlines.
Quayle had travelled alone. In the men’s rooms at the airport he changed into the uniform of a Qantas flight steward and, watching the time, emerged half an hour later in time for the Qantas flight in from Melbourne and the reciprocal flight eastbound. That would give him a group of upwards of twenty men in similar garb to become lost in, and each crew would think him part of the other. After waiting until he heard the landing announcement, he gave it another twenty minutes and then walked onto
