Norgay won’t be hurrying inside to escape the weather. Trudging north on Yunnan Road, he adjusts his gait and slows down. He doesn’t want to arrive too early for his two o’clock appointment. He’ll make his grand entrance with less than a minute to spare.
It’s been a month since he and Gato separated in Bilbao.
Norgay employed a roundabout itinerary returning to Tibet. His arduous trek involved a series of connecting flights terminating in Delhi. He hiked across smuggling trails that crisscross the border between India and his homeland. He spent the following week lining up two additional team members. Both are ex-monks. He gave them the code names Yin and Yang.
He originally wanted backups for the new operatives. But deeper into the planning, he reconsidered his manpower goals. Recruiting two men up to the task would be difficult enough. He also knew that enlisting more people would increase the chance of detection or mishap. Limiting the group to four was consistent with his usual strategy of keeping things simple, and adding by subtraction.
He met with the monks separately and provided them with cash and logistical information. Neither knew the other was involved. After he finished their orientation, Norgay headed east, traveling through China’s rural backcountry until he reached Nanjing. Gato arrived a few days later. The Spaniard had to change his original travel plans at the last minute. He spent an extra week in Bilbao correcting an assembly glitch.
The former capital was Norgay’s first choice for a gathering point. It’s less security conscious than the current one. He found safe houses straightaway. The city’s crowded streets and eight million residents allowed them to remain inconspicuous. There was another advantage to staying in Nanjing. It was a reasonable staging area for each of the operational theaters.
They were still in Bilbao. Norgay had just completed his makeover.
He and Gato were drinking cider and finishing a platter of marmitako. Norgay was on the defensive about the monks he planned to recruit.
“I’ll keep them on a tight leash.”
“What will they know about my role?”
“Nothing.”
“They could sabotage the entire operation.”
“Stop worrying about them. They’ll be totally walled off. They won’t even know about each other.”
The ETA delivered the product on time.
Its mules showed Norgay how to use it. The next thing he had to do was pick a date. He decided a Saturday would maximize the impact. It couldn’t be any old weekend. They would have to strike quickly. The Basques warned him that a Chinese hit squad was sniffing around Bilbao, asking lots of questions, and running down every lead.
Gato was the first team member to join him in Nanjing. They planned how Yin and Yang would get to Xi’an and Guangzhou. The Cat was still uncomfortable about working with monks. When he asked if they were trustworthy, Norgay answered in the affirmative and summarized what he knew about them.
“Each holds a grudge against the Chinese that goes way back. The PLA abducted and murdered Yin’s father. Yang didn’t lose a family member, but a local party official stole his family’s livestock. The police burned their farm to the ground when his parents protested. Both were expelled from their monasteries for engaging in anti-Chinese activities. They were tortured until they renounced their crimes. They’ve been living on charity since the Ethnic Affairs Commission exiled them to a shithole in Central Tibet.”
“Do they know the ending?”
“That doesn’t scare them. They’ll come back at a higher station.”
“I prefer working with other atheists.”
“We’ll do that next time.”
Gato raised an eyebrow. “Say what?”
“When we’re reincarnated.”
Norgay went to a surplus store and purchased four XXL jackets with Beijing Olympics 2008 on the front. The coats are predominately red, with yellow and white accenting on the sleeves and across the top. He had originally planned to buy dark clothing, but followed the advice of an ETA engineer who shared a counterintuition from his Bekaa Valley training: “Avoid the brown coat syndrome. That’s how fascists profile freedom fighters. You might as well write ‘TERRORIST’ across your forehead.”
Norgay met separately with Yin and Yang before they left Nanjing. He synchronized their precision watches and walked them through their assignments.
He called his collaborators last night. All three answered, “I can’t hear you,” to confirm their readiness. When Norgay hung up, they dismantled their unregistered phones and flushed them down the toilet.
CHAPTER 41
NORGAY TURNS LEFT onto East Nanjing Road.
He lowers his umbrella until it hides his face, dodges the oncoming foot traffic, and blends into the swarm of shoppers.
His destination is a short walk away. It’s on this side of People’s Park, near the end of the vehicle-free zone. This is his second trip to Shanghai No. 1 Department Store. On Thursday, he started and ended his trek at exactly the same time. His dry run was flawless, and he hasn’t altered his original plan.
He chose this target—and assigned it to himself—because of its history and symbolic value. Open since 1934, Shanghai No. 1 is a national landmark. It survived Mao, the Red Guards, and the Cultural Revolution. The ten-story building anchors China’s most famous shopping street.
Norgay completes his westbound trip at 1:55:47. He’s on the south edge of the walkway, directly across the boulevard from the store. He gazes at the entrance. There don’t appear to be any complications. He tilts his umbrella back and studies the building’s rounded edifice, granite walls, and the iconic SHANGHAI sign attached to the roof. The upper elevations appear to be problem free.
He takes another look at the front doors. Nothing has changed. There aren’t any physical, human, or logistical obstacles. If Thursday were any indication, store personnel won’t interfere with his operation. Everything seems to be going smoothly.
It’s 1:56:04, too early to cross the boulevard. He doesn’t want to attract attention, and there’s no benefit to moving sooner. He knows the layout and where he’ll transact his business. Shortly before two, he’ll enter the building and make a beeline for the lipstick counters.
Norgay thinks about the ramifications of what he’s doing. He’ll never see his family again and will be misunderstood and vilified. Worse, he won’t have any further impact on his country’s future. He tries to convince himself that turning back isn’t an option—not after persuading the others to make the ultimate sacrifice.
His brain continues to cramp. Norgay knows he lacks feeling and that he objectifies other people, particularly the Chinese. He broods over the path he chose. Should he have tried harder to find spiritual meaning in life? Could he have found a peaceful way to accomplish his goals? Was he destined at birth to end this way? He isn’t troubled by the finality of his actions. Death is inevitable and he doesn’t believe in a deity or an afterlife. His only uncertainty is about the viability of his cause. Most of his countrymen have accepted the Chinese yoke or fled to Dharamsala. They may never find the courage to fight for independence.
Regaining his concentration, Norgay decides none of that matters anymore. He’s going ahead with the plan. It’s 1:57:54. He has two minutes to get into position. It’s time to cross the boulevard. He’s on the move when he spots a sun disk flag approaching from the west. A tour guide is holding it high as she leads a phalanx of elderly Japanese toward the store. The old-timers are in a tight formation. They’ll provide excellent cover as they get closer.
He touches his cyanide tablet. It’s loose in his pants pocket. He practiced his hand-to-mouth drill before leaving the hideout. If something goes wrong, he’ll only need two seconds to get the bitter compound down his throat.
Norgay stops walking fifteen meters west of the entrance. Pretending to window-shop, he tries to picture what the rest of the team is doing. Gato is inside Beijing’s One World Department Store. Yin should be entering Xi’an’s Ginwa Mall. Down in
Guangzhou, Yang is mixing with shoppers in the Wangfujing lobby.
It’s 1:58:25, time to get closer to the front doors. The Japanese have already entered the store, but there are hundreds of other people within a twenty-meter radius. They allow Norgay to remain inconspicuous and offer him the option, if necessary, of completing his mission right here.
He contemplates the payload strapped to his body. His vest is filled with C-4 plastic explosive and thirty-five pounds of ball bearings and nails. It will be easy to activate. All he has to do is press the button inside his jacket. Detonation—the bomb maker likened it to an omnidirectional shotgun blast—gets things going. The shrapnel accounts for most of the lethality. The store’s counters, mirrors, and metal furniture will add to the carnage.
His emotions are acting up again. He looks at his left hand. It’s shaking. So is his right. He worries people will notice. That makes him even more anxious. His mood continues to darken when he sees one of the store’s beauticians. The young woman is huddling under an umbrella. She’s sharing a smoke with a purple-haired geek. He remembers her from his first visit. She was one of the people who snickered when he walked by their counters. They didn’t attempt to keep their voices down and he heard what they called him—“darky,” “scum,” a “Tibetan lowlife.”
He cautions himself to forget about the beauticians. They’re about to get what they deserve. It’s 1:58:41. He assesses the activity around the front door. Streams of shoppers are cycling in and out. There are no slowdowns and they won’t affect his plans. The operation is almost going too well. He wonders if he’s walking into a trap.
“Stop that man!”
The command came from inside the store. Norgay doesn’t have time to react before a thick-bodied man barges into the street. The guy is wearing a uniform. But his mustard-colored shirt and darker pants seem out of place. He looks more like a two-bit watchman than a cop.
The middle-aged Han has cleared the threshold congestion. Norgay does his best to appear nonthreatening. He isn’t successful. The man’s attention is drawn to the Tibetan’s skin color and his suddenly way-too-bright jacket.
Norgay presumes the Chinese discovered his plan. He reaches inside his zipper and puts his hand on his vest. Before he pushes the button, his mind shifts into overdrive and fires off a stream of asyntactic thoughts.
• Don’t panic.
• Who is this guy?
• Not Thursday’s elderly doorman.
• The old guy wasn’t in uniform.
• Security guard? Policeman?
• Aggressive.
• Built like a brick shithouse.
• Weapon?
• Reacting to something unrelated?
• Doesn’t like me.
• Why?
• Four seconds to make a decision.
The watchman starts walking in his direction. Norgay focuses on the man’s upper extremities and hips. His hands are empty and he doesn’t appear to be wearing a holster. Norgay feels mildly relieved until he realizes armed reinforcements could be hiding inside the store. The guy keeps coming. They are five meters apart when a shopper taps the man’s sleeve and points to the east.
“Hurry,” she says. “He’s running away. There he goes—the teenager in the hoodie.” Several other bystanders shout different versions of the same thing. The watchman glares at Norgay one last time before jogging the other way. The miscreant stops long enough to stash a computer-sized object in a trash barrel. The watchman is in hot pursuit. He’s running at full speed and slowly closes the gap.
Norgay collapses his umbrella, merges with other shoppers, and steps into the store. It’s 1:59:11. He hadn’t planned on entering the building this soon. But the watchman leaving his post is an opportunity too good to pass up. Norgay moves deeper inside and surveys the cosmetics department. Shoppers are packed together sampling lipstick and perfumes, discussing beauty secrets, and buying the latest face paint. His harvest will be even larger than he expected.
He elevates his sight line. The adjustment improves his view of ground zero. It also causes him to lose track of what he’s doing. He steps on the rear wheel of a toddler’s stroller. His foot rotates when it hits the floor, and he twists his ankle. He swears in Tibetan. His voice is loud and angry. People are staring at him.
Norgay glances at the two women—they’re both Caucasian— standing next to the stroller. The older lady is studying his every move. When she says, “Sorry,” he’s too flustered to respond. The women are having a spirited discussion. The older woman is doing most of the talking. He thinks she must be discussing his outburst. His impression changes when the younger woman—she hasn’t looked at him— searches for something in her handbag, then the stroller.
Norgay’s face brightens when the child smiles and grabs his hand. He makes eye contact with the older woman and nods at the front doors. He does it again, more emphatically this time. She appears to understand his signal. Holding on to her companion’s arm, she steers the stroller toward the exit.
They stop at the nearest cash register. The older woman cuts in front of other shoppers and attempts to get a clerk’s attention. A well-dressed man—he appears to be a manager—stops what he’s doing, says something in Chinese to the women, and points to the end of the line.
The older woman turns the stroller away from the counter. She tightens her grip on the younger female and elbows their way through the queue. They exit the front doors and go west on the boulevard. The younger woman stops to ask a question. The older one cuts her off. “Hurry up,” she says. “I’ll explain later.”
It’s 1:59:43. The cosmetics department is filled to capacity. Norgay slides past a stationary female shopper, then two more, before coming to a complete stop. A lipstick artist—she’s on the other side of the Chanel display—is staring at him.
He recognizes her face. The woman’s gasp confirms she also remembers his. She pushes a toddler’s bottle out of the way and reaches for the closest landline. He considers rushing the counter, but knowing it’s too late, lets her finish dialing.
The last thing he hears is the collective hum of a hundred conversations. Norgay checks his watch as the seconds tick away. He reaches inside his coat and wishes his partner farewell.
“Peaceful journey, Gato.”
CHAPTER 42
CHINA IS MOURNING yesterday’s victims.
Brannigan was on the summit when it happened. He saw the news on his phone, hurried to his room, and turned on the television. Government efforts to control the news were unsuccessful. CNN and the BBC were all over the story. They showed graphic pictures, updated the body count, and interviewed survivors.
He had no reason to think Kylie was involved. But he called anyway. She didn’t answer. He left a message. Four hours later, he repeated it in a text and an email.
Kylie
Worried about you.
Please call me.
Michael
By midnight his emotions had spiraled out of control. He woke up Rocky at his daughter’s apartment. He hadn’t heard from Kylie since dropping her at Marielle’s hotel. Brannigan interjected work issues into their conversation. But he knew what Rocky was thinking. Why was this American so concerned about someone he met two days ago?
He brought his computer and cell phone to bed. He checked them every five minutes. Kylie didn’t call or send a message. He fell asleep at 4:00 a.m. and woke up two hours later. He considered calling her again, but decided it would be inappropriate, particularly at that hour.
Noon was his cutoff. If she hadn’t responded by then, Brannigan would call her lead technician. The Aussies have been working over the weekend. He was certain Nigel had talked to her since the bombing and would confirm she’s okay.
Kylie feels like a doctors’ relief act. She has enriched physicians and hospitals in Urumqi, Hong Kong, Sydney, and—starting yesterday— the Paris of the Orient.
It’s early Sunday morning. An ambulance rushed her to Shanghai’s Xin Hua Hospital
after the bombing. She’s still here. Kylie had hoped she would never see another trauma center. But she prefers her hospitalization to the alternative, a slab at the morgue.
She’s sitting up in bed. Her neurologist has just finished his examination.
“Everything checks out, Ms. Ryan. Physically, you’re fine.”
“Thanks for the good news, Dr. Liu. I have a busy day tomorrow.”
“Yes you do. But you’ll be spending it here.”
Kylie pastes on a happy face. “That isn’t necessary.”
“You need treatment.”
“I’ve already recovered.”
“Unfortunately, that’s not true.”
“I’m fine. Really.”
“Emotionally you’re not.”
“I’m just a little scattered—”
“Your PTSD spiked.”
“How could it? I don’t remember seeing anything.”
“That’s part of the problem. You suppressed those memories.”
“What have I forgotten?”
“You wanted to go back into the store.”
“Why would I do that?”
“To help the survivors.”
“Did I?”
“Your mother held you back.”
“That proves my point. I didn’t—”
“This isn’t productive.”
“Why not?”
“You’ll have to trust my judgment.”
Marielle gave the doctor a detailed history. The whole area was like a war zone. Kylie saw dozens of maimed people crawling out of the store. She was crying and irrational during her trip to the ER. The medics had to put her in restraints and administer IV Valium. That didn’t work and they had to knock her out with something stronger. She doesn’t know the other victim in her ambulance died on the way to the hospital.
Dr. Ma—yesterday’s on-call psychiatrist—has been managing Kylie’s PTSD. She was jittery and continued to dissociate even after he boosted her medications. He initially confined her to bed. Although he later allowed her to move around, Dr. Ma was still concerned about her safety. He assigned a nurse’s aide to stay within arm’s reach and monitor her activities.
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