Thera took her red suitcase and rolled it behind Julie Svenson, listening as the scientist complained. Submitting to a search set the wrong tone, Julie said. It would make the Koreans think they were in charge.
“Wrong, wrong message,” said the scientist as she hoisted her bag up and then banged it onto the table. “They’ll think they can boss us around.”
One of the engineers nearby had an American Tourister bag with its red, white, and blue logo on the ID tag. The North Koreans pointed at the logo and began questioning the man closely. In a country still officially at war with the U.S. — and with a museum dedicated to America’s “war crimes” — even such a seemingly innocuous commercial symbol aroused suspicion. The fact that the engineer was from South Africa hardly seemed to matter.
Thera’s stomach began churning as the customs official rifled through Julie’s bag. She saw herself being hauled away, dragged out the large glass doors behind them, and shot on the stained cement.
“OK, Miss,” said the young man, pushing Julie’s bag to the side and turning to Thera. His light tan shirt had ballooned up from his waistline, and he was sweating, despite the fact that the terminal was rather cool. “We check. OK?”
Thera snapped open the suitcase. Four cartons of cigarettes sat at the side of the bag.
The man looked up at her expectantly. Thera, guessing he wanted one of the cartons, nodded. The customs official took one, slit open the end, and poured the boxes of cigarettes onto the table. He chose one pack and opened it, again emptying its contents. Then he selected a cigarette.
I should light it for him, Thera thought to herself, but before she could, he had pushed the cigarette back into the box and began to repack the carton.
He put the boxes back and went through the rest of the things. Thera reached into the pocket of her jacket and took out an unopened pack of cigarettes.
“You could have one,” she said, holding it out to the man. “Sir?”
The custom official’s face turned beet red. He shook his head quickly, then, without even looking in her pocketbook, shoved her suitcase to the side and waved the next person toward him.
“I’m sorry,” whispered Thera.
“Go now,” said the man, without looking in her direction.
20
After talking to Slott, Ferguson spent a few hours lining up new backup hotel rooms and renting cars under a new set of pseudonyms, erasing any connection with the man the Seoul CIA officers had called on. If he’d been operating somewhere else — Cairo, for example — he might not have gone quite so far; it seemed unlikely that they had been followed. But he didn’t know Korea, and the last thing he wanted was to be blindsided here because he wasn’t careful enough.
Running a bit late, he found Guns in the National Science Museum, puzzling out a historical display of Korean weaponry. The captions were almost entirely in Korean, but the marine had a connoisseur’s appreciation of the tools of the trade.
“Better than rifles, huh?” said Ferguson as Guns bent over an ancient sword.
“Not better exactly, but I wouldn’t mind putting it to the test.”
“Maybe later. You have lunch?”
“Like two hours ago at the hotel.”
“Come on and have some again.”
They found a small, inexpensive restaurant about a mile away, took off their shoes, and sat at a low table. A laminated menu hung on the wall next to them. All of the words were in Korean, punctuated by idealized pictures of the dishes that both men had learned from experience had little to do with what they’d actually end up being served. A gas burner sat in the middle of the table; they ordered steak and grilled the raw strips themselves when the dish was brought over.
Ferguson, who hadn’t eaten in more than twenty-four hours, wolfed the food down as soon as the meat reached medium rare. He also devoured most of the kimchi and rice. Guns, still adjusting to the spicy food, looked on with a mixture of wonder and shock as the meal disappeared into his companion’s mouth.
“So what’s the next move?” he asked when Ferguson came up for air. “We go in and look for the material?”
Ferguson shook his head.
“OK,” said the marine.
That was one thing about Guns, Ferg thought: He always went with the program. No muss, no fuss.
“So what do we do?”
“Talk to a man about a truck,” Ferguson told him, counting out his money to pay the bill.
This is all you got?” said Corrigan after Ferguson uploaded the photos to him.
“What, the driver isn’t smiling?”
“Jeez, Ferg, these are blurry as hell. I can’t even read the logo on the grill.”
“Get some truck expert to look at it. Once you get the make narrowed down, we can talk to the police, get a list of licenses.”
“Even if we
“Corrigan, stop whining and see what you can find out.”
While they were waiting for Corrigan to come up with something, Ferguson and Guns drove back to the highway near the waste plant and found a spot to plant two video units, hoping they might spot the truck if it came back. The units were outfitted with miniature hard drives; time-lapse photography let them record for thirty-six hours before transmitting their images to The Cube and starting all over.
Ferguson guessed it would be a long shot that the truck would return. He also had no idea if it was important or not. But he couldn’t stand just hanging around with nothing to do.
They were on their way back to Daejeon when Corrigan called Ferguson on the sat phone, greeting him with a question about what truck model was the most popular in Korea.
“Ford?” guessed Ferguson.
“Hyundai,” said Corrigan. “This isn’t that. You know what number two is?”
“Daewoo.”
“Exactly. This isn’t one of those either. It’s pretty rare,
“Very creative. Who owns the truck?”
“I don’t know. They were only made for about two years. This was about a decade back. See, there was this rich guy named Park tried to set up a company to compete with the Japanese and—”
“Whose truck is it, Jack?”
“I told you, Ferg. I don’t know.”
“Have you ran the registrations?”
“I can’t just call up the division of motor vehicles.”
“Why the hell not?”
“For one thing, they’d get suspicious. Slott says we’re not supposed to do anything that will tip anyone off, especially the government.”
“Lie to the Koreans. Tell them it’s a drug thing. Just get me a list.”
Ferguson snapped off the phone.
“Problem?” asked Guns.
“Corrigan still thinks he’s in the army.”
Guns laughed.
