The Quantum Spy

by David Ignatius

  “How should the device be programmed?”

  “To contact the center. As for a normal agent.”

  “But it will be discovered. The FBI follows all embassy intelligence officers, ours and the PLA’s, both. They will obtain the transmitter.”

  “Precisely.”

  Wang Ji bowed slightly, in deference to Li’s cunning.

  “How should these operational messages be transmitted, minister?”

  “Normal cipher protocol. Including to the embassy in Washington.”

  “The PLA will read them.” Wang smiled, seeing another layer.

  “Indeed. They will be impressed, confused, and uncertain. They would like to destroy us. The talk is everywhere. The matter was referred to the Standing Committee of the Politburo after the death of Dr. Ma. They took no action, but the issue will come back. Our survival is at stake. Can I trust your loyalty, Wang Ji?”

  “Yes, minister. Eternally.”

  “You have a brother in the PLA, don’t you? He is a senior general now in the Third Department. They tell me you have dinner with him often.”

  “Yes, of course, sir. My brother’s position is well known.”

  “Does he tell you what role you will play if the PLA is successful in abolishing the Ministry of State Security? A senior one, I am sure.”

  “We do not talk about our work, minister. We are both very respectful of the division between his service and mine.”

  “I wonder if your brother knows anything about the listening devices that have been installed at the Ministry. You should ask him sometime.”

  Wang, embarrassed, said nothing. He reached for a cigarette, then put it back in the pack.

  Li Zian, tall and composed, studied his scruffy deputy.

  “I wonder, Comrade Wang: Does your PLA brother know that you are a left-wing deviationist? Does he realize that you are a follower of Leon Trotsky and maybe the Gang of Four, too? He cannot know this. He would be shocked, certainly. But I do know. I have indulged you. I have protected your secret, because you are valuable to me.”

  Wang Ji took a step back. He shook his head.

  “This is unworthy of you, minister.”

  “Just advice from a friend. These are very difficult times. We must stay in our own boats and carry out our duties. Otherwise, accidents will happen, and we may find ourselves in great difficulty.”

  When Li Zian returned to his office, he found waiting an encrypted personal message from General Fang, the head of the liaison department of the General Political Department of the Central Military Commission. It was a summary of a meeting that had been held the day before with members of the PLA Second and Third Departments.

  The Central Military Commission was concerned that American “special activities” had led to the death of Academician Ma Yubo. Such behavior required a response from China. There must be retaliation; power only understood power. The identities of the members of the American team responsible for the death of Academician Ma Yubo were known to the Central Military Commission. Therefore, working with the PLA Second and Third Departments, the liaison department would consider how best to take a proportionate response to the death of Academician Ma.

  The message requested concurrence by the Ministry of State Security.

  Li considered the equities of the case: Rukou was still operating, but vulnerable and under surveillance. He resented any interference from the PLA, but perhaps there was an opportunity in what General Fang proposed. Li sent a written response on the most secure internal channel. He affirmed the Central Military Commission’s judgment that the death of a Chinese scientist was a serious matter and must be avenged. Li offered a few suggestions about proper targeting.

  Li sat for a long time in his office with the door locked and the lights out. He thought of Rukou, so brave and isolated. An intelligence chief lives for such an opportunity and prays to be worthy of such an agent. Would it be possible to protect the peerless Rukou by entangling his true agent with a false one? That would require great skill and courage on the part of the agent, heroic daring, but perhaps this was the challenge that Rukou craved. The very best intelligence officers understood that the truth was so important that it must be enclosed in a carapace of deceit.

  29.

  KYOTO, JAPAN

  Mark Flanagan hadn’t wanted to leave Tokyo, but now that he was “officially” installed in the executive suite of the Science and Technology division, it was impossible for him to maintain two residences. He had advised his wife Edith a week ago to begin packing; now it was time to go to Japan and bring her home. Edith Flanagan had been upset about leaving their apartment in a fancy high-rise building in Roppongi Hills. As the price of cooperation, she insisted that her husband take her on a last festive trip to Kyoto, her favorite city in Asia. She was a veteran of so many overseas moves that she knew to exploit her moment of leverage.

  Before taking the long flight to Japan, Flanagan had stopped to see Harris Chang. He had developed a protective feeling for the younger officer. He admired his skill as a CIA operator, the physical bravery he had shown in the military, and even more, the cheerful, outward-facing optimism he had displayed as an intelligence officer. The agency could be a dark place, but Chang had seemed to carry his own sunshine and self-confidence until recently.

  Flanagan hadn’t been told any details, only that there had been an “inquiry,” which was now “resolved.” But it was clear from Chang’s demeanor that something was wrong. Flanagan asked if there had been trouble after his return from Mexico City, but Chang cut him off in mid-sentence. He assured Flanagan that everything was fine.

  Flanagan confided that he was going away for a few days to Tokyo and Kyoto with “the Mrs.” He said he’d be back soon and wanted to take Chang to a Washington Capitals hockey game. A friend had seats behind the glass. Even that didn’t get much of a rise from Chang. Flanagan was worried that something was bothering his friend. He gave Chang his personal cell phone number, which he disclosed only to his wife and the local station chief because the device tracked his movements.

  “This is your hotline, Harris,” Flanagan said, writing the number. “Call me if anything comes up.”

  Flanagan called Kate Sturm from the departure lounge, asking her to check on Chang. Something had happened in Mexico. Sturm advised him to leave it alone. This was Vandel’s show. Flanagan headed off to Asia with a sense of apprehension, knowing that something was wrong, but not sure what it was.

  Flanagan had taken many dangerous assignments in his decades with S&T. Installing and servicing surveillance devices was some of the riskiest work the agency did. As he became more senior, his reputation grew, so that officials of allied intelligence services befriended him and asked for his advice on difficult technical problems. But Flanagan’s status in the secret world had its costs. He was “known.” His presence was now declared to foreign governments. He no longer traveled under the radar as he had when he was a junior officer.

  Flanagan had always refused offers of protection by local services or escorts from the agency’s Global Response Staff. He had never carried a firearm. He knew, vaguely, that he could be a target for hostile intelligence services, but as with most things that worried other people, Flanagan found a way to compartmentalize. “That’s all bullshit,” he would say in his squeaky, Boston Irish voice. And he meant it.

  When he arrived in Japan, Flanagan paid a last, melancholy visit to his apartment, which overlooked midtown Tokyo and, a few miles further on, the emerald expanse of the Imperial Palace. He would have been happy to have stretched out his tour running the S&T regional base a bit longer, living in splendor and enduring the occasional operational trips to Singapore and the rest. Asia was a tonic for a senior officer. And he knew how much Edith liked her circle of friends in the American community in Roppongi. She went to cooking classes and jazz-dancing lessons and had even learned how to make little animals with origami paper-folding. But it was time.

  The apartment was empty. The move
rs had come the day before Flanagan returned. They had swept the place like a swarm of locusts. The movers had even wrapped and packed the rags Edith used for cleaning. The couple stayed the night at a nearby, too-American hotel.

  Edith Flanagan’s consolation prize was Kyoto. They took the bullet train the next morning from Tokyo Station. Edith had reserved seats in the fancy “Green Car,” because it was their last trip. The train departed, as always, at the very second it was scheduled.

  Flanagan was in a reflective mood. He was happy to see his wife and relieved to be dealing with something other than work. Maybe it was time, after this case was over, to put in his papers. The fun part, living overseas and ignoring Headquarters, was finished. He could probably double his salary in retirement. He had technical skills and a high security clearance. Half the “Beltway bandits” who did contract work for S&T had already sent feelers.

  Flanagan had other things he wanted to do, too, besides making money: volunteering in a homeless shelter; counseling school kids; giving back to a world that had been generous to him. During the long flight to Tokyo, he recalled how in college he had considered becoming a priest. He had even sent off an application to a seminary, about the same time he was making inquiries at the CIA. What a long time ago.

  “What are you thinking about?” asked Edith, as her husband stared out the train window toward Mount Fuji. She was a compact woman with green eyes and a rosy, carefully tended complexion.

  “I was thinking about Father Paul,” he said. “He was our campus priest at Cornell. Not much of a parish; everybody was too stoned to think about going to Mass. But Father Paul listened to all my BS. I was a very confused kid.”

  “You aren’t the confused type, honey. You’re an engineer. Your first job was at the CIA, for goodness sake. That doesn’t sound very confused to me.”

  “You didn’t know me in college. I wanted to save the world, one way or another. Father Paul counseled me. I told him I was thinking about going to a Jesuit seminary. He listened. He even wrote me a recommendation. But he said it would be a mistake.”

  “You weren’t cut out for celibacy,” said Edith, giving her husband a nudge.

  “It wasn’t just that. Father Paul said I wasn’t ready. He said it might be a passion, but that didn’t mean it was a vocation. I was crushed. It was like getting rejected by Harvard, except it was God.”

  “Whatever happened to Father Paul?”

  “He died a few years ago. I couldn’t get back for his funeral. I was on assignment. Story of my life. I stayed in touch with him over the years. Funny thing: He never once asked me what I did in the government.”

  “He probably knew,” said Edith.

  “Must have. Who knows? Maybe Father Paul was the agency spotter at Cornell.”

  Mount Fuji loomed out the right window of the train: perfect, conical, implausibly large. Edith insisted on taking photos of it, even though she had dozens already.

  They stayed in a hotel that was directly above Kyoto Station. Flanagan wrangled the luggage through the knots of Japanese who clogged the station passageways and took the bags up the escalator to the hotel. The room was tiny. Flanagan had to turn sideways to enter the bathroom, and his too-long legs dangled over the foot of the bed. Edith was delighted with the little room, as with nearly every aspect of Japan’s tidy, fussy lifestyle.

  Flanagan checked in with the CIA duty officer at the embassy when they arrived. He always did that, anywhere. The duty officer, a young woman on her first foreign posting, reminded him to keep his phone on and said she would inform the boss. A few minutes later the station chief texted him an animated GIF that showed the Russian president giving the Chinese president a blow job.

  They went sightseeing as soon as they had unpacked. The two had traveled to Kyoto twice before, so they had seen all the famous temples and shrines already, but Edith wanted one last look. She bundled them into a taxi, crisply fitted with linen seat covers, and they sped off for an ancient temple in the hills that was famous for its “love shrine.” The pilgrim was supposed to walk with his or her eyes closed for fifty feet to assure finding true love.

  Flanagan made the walk every time they came to please his wife; he always peeked.

  The temple was so crowded that the American couple could only move slowly from place to place. Flanagan had an odd sixth sense that someone was watching him. He caught one man loitering at the entrance to the temple; another moving past them in line and then lingering; a third looking like a man who had been on their train, but wearing a cap and dressed in a different outfit. So many foreigners were visiting the hilltop shrine that nearly every nationality seemed represented in the crowd, but Flanagan had a fleeting thought that there were more non-Japanese faces than he remembered seeing before in Kyoto.

  Snap out of it, he told himself. Your mind could always play tricks, if you let it.

  Edith wanted to catch one more sight that afternoon, one more Eastern treasure, before it got late. Flanagan was feeling claustrophobic and proposed that they walk in the wide open gardens of the old imperial palace, but Edith said no: She wanted to see the Zen rock garden at Ryoan-Ji, with its thirteen rocks arranged just so on a bed of sand that was swept each morning by the monks.

  The monastery was packed. Part of the game for visitors was to traverse the wooden floor of the viewing gallery to check the legend that no matter where you stood in the shrine, you couldn’t see all thirteen stones in the garden. There were so many people in the gallery they could move only slowly. Flanagan felt the same sense of being observed. Too many people didn’t look like tourists; they were too young, or too fit, or too deliberate.

  “I don’t get this place,” said Flanagan. “Rocks and sand. What’s to contemplate?”

  “You’re not a Buddhist. Shush!”

  They made the tour, navigating the human traffic from one end of the rock garden to the other and then back again. Flanagan wanted to return to the hotel. He had made a reservation at his favorite restaurant in Kyoto. He was on vacation. Why did he feel as if he was working? Why did he look at each passing face and wonder if he’d seen the person somewhere else in a different costume?

  They queued up to retrieve their shoes at the entrance to the temple. As they were nearing the front of the line, Flanagan felt a sudden, sharp pain in his right calf. An older man had stumbled, colliding with him and hitting his leg on the way down. It seemed to happen almost in slow motion, like a choreographed scene in a modern dance.

  The clumsy man mumbled apologies and limped away toward the men’s room. He looked to be Korean, maybe Chinese. Flanagan thought the fall was odd, and his leg was throbbing where the man had made contact. He waited a minute for the man to exit the men’s room so he could get a better look. But after a minute the man still hadn’t appeared, and Edith was tugging at his arm, so they left and took a taxi to the hotel.

  Flanagan’s leg was still aching in the taxi. He rolled up his right trouser cuff and saw a red swelling and what looked like a small puncture wound. His pant leg, too, seemed to have been perforated. Flanagan was alarmed for a moment, and then put the thought of a deliberate attack out of his mind. No way, he thought to himself. The man who stumbled into him must have been carrying a pen or some other sharp object. This wasn’t a movie; real life didn’t have assassins walking around Zen temples.

  “Everything okay?” asked Edith, watching her husband massage his calf.

  “Yeah, fine. That guy gave me a poke. I’ll be fine. I’m hungry.”

  When they returned to the hotel, Flanagan tried to take a nap. He thought maybe he was tired, or suffering from jet lag, or had a bug. He tossed and turned and slept fitfully. His wife kissed him and said he needed a drink and a good dinner.

  Flanagan had made a reservation at a teppanyaki restaurant on the top floor of a nearby hotel that overlooked Higashiyama Hills. But he wasn’t very hungry by the time they got there. He was sweating, and he had the chills. He looked at his watch; it was now four hours after the i
ncident at the temple.

  He ordered a gin gimlet and tried to forget about the pain, but he began to feel nauseous after a few sips, and when he went to the men’s room, he vomited. He needed to use the toilet, too, urgently, and he saw that there was blood in his stool. That was when he got worried.

  Flanagan walked unsteadily back to the table. As he sat down, he nearly collapsed onto the hot range where the chef was cooking morsels of beef.

  “You’re not well,” said Edith. “We need to call a doctor.”

  Flanagan shook his head. He steadied himself, found his cell phone, and called the number of the duty officer at the embassy in Tokyo.

  “I think I’ve been poisoned,” he told the young woman on the other end of the phone. “I need help right away. I’m in Kyoto. Send whoever there is.” Flanagan gave the address of the hotel and stumbled back to the men’s room, where he vomited again.

  A private ambulance arrived fifteen minutes later, dispatched by the Koanchosa-cho, the Public Security Intelligence Agency. A paramedic took Flanagan’s vital signs and said his blood pressure was low and falling. They took him to Takeda Hospital, about a mile away.

  Flanagan called the duty officer in Tokyo again. He explained where they were taking him and described his symptoms.

  “It’s probably ricin,” said Flanagan feebly. “What’s the antidote?”

  The officer checked on another line with the ops center at Langley, which had been alerted. There was a delay of about thirty seconds while an agency physician was contacted. The duty officer came back on the line.

  “There isn’t an antidote,” she said. “Get them to hook you up to an IV right away. Lots of fluids. That’s all you can do. We’re sending someone to Kyoto on the next train.”

  Mark Flanagan’s nausea and diarrhea worsened through that night, and he became severely dehydrated despite the transfusions. After thirty-six hours his liver, spleen, and kidneys began to fail. A urine test indicated the presence of an alkaloid found in the castor bean plant from which ricin is extracted, but it wasn’t conclusive. Edith kept shouting at the doctors to do something. In thirty years of marriage, she had come to think that her husband led a charmed life. He was one of those men who never got sick or tired or complained of a headache. She thought it must be a mistake; bad things didn’t happen to her husband.