Decoded

by Mai Jia

  [To be continued]

  Due to his profession and his overly cautious nature, to say nothing of his fear that something might happen, Rong Jinzhen was trapped within a valley of secrets. Days and nights passed in this fashion; from beginning to end he was like a fenced-in animal. His approach to life at Unit 701 soon became familiar to everyone: he had a singular attitude – stiff, almost suffocating. His only joy was to pass the time in a world of the imagination. But now he was on his way to Beijing. It was only his second time away from the complex and it would also be his last.

  As his habits dictated, Vasili was once more wearing his windbreaker – a crisp beige jacket, very stylish, with the collar turned up. He looked terribly mysterious. Today, however, his left hand was not buried in his pocket; instead it grasped a leather suitcase. The suitcase was neither big nor small. Brown in colour, it was made of cowhide with a hard shell; a perfectly common travelling safetydeposit box. Inside, however, were the files on BLACK, a veritable ticking time-bomb. Vasili’s right hand, Rong Jinzhen noticed, was constantly twitching inside his pocket as if he had some nervous tick that he was self-conscious about. Rong Jinzhen of course understood that Vasili had no nervous tick; his pistol was in his pocket. Jinzhen had once inadvertently caught a glimpse of the weapon and he had overheard what people said about it. Rong Jinzhen couldn’t help but feel somewhat aghast: holding tight onto that firearm had become a habit, a need for Vasili; something he couldn’t do without. Taking this thought further, Rong Jinzhen felt a sense of enmity, of terror. A sentence came into his mind – ‘A pistol is like money in one’s pocket; it can be taken out and used at any moment.’

  Thinking that there was a weapon next to him, perhaps even two, Rong Jinzhen felt anxious. They might be pulled out suddenly to deal with trouble, like water is used to douse flames. But sometimes water can’t put a fire out. If that were to happen . . . he could dwell on it no further. Meanwhile, the muffled sound of gunshots rang in his ears.

  Of course Rong Jinzhen understood that if anything happened, if they were hopelessly outnumbered and outgunned, Vasili would not hesitate to turn the pistol on him and fire. ‘Death before divulging secrets.’ Rong Jinzhen repeated this maxim in silence. The sound of gunshots that had begun to fade once more echoed in his ears.

  This sense of impending failure, a sense that catastrophe was just waiting to happen, accompanied Rong Jinzhen throughout his trip to the capital. No matter how he tried to beat it back, to resist it, he couldn’t help but think that the road was long and the train moved ever so slowly. It was not until he arrived safely at headquarters that his mood began to change and the dread in his heart subsided to be replaced by a warm and relaxed feeling. At that moment, he bravely thought that there was no need for him to frighten himself so in future.

  ‘What could possibly happen? Nothing. After all, no one knows who you are; no one knows that you carry top-secret information,’ he mumbled, as though berating himself for his earlier silliness.

  2.

  The conference began the day after he arrived.

  It had a grand inauguration, with four deputy heads of the Intelligence Service in attendance. An elderly, grey-haired senior official acted as host. According to the introduction provided, the elderly man was the first director of the research section. Privately, however, many said he was the first secretary and military advisor for official XX. Of course, Rong Jinzhen cared little about titles. The only thing he was thinking about was what the senior director had said – ‘We must decipher BLACK; our country’s security depends upon it.’

  ‘What we are talking about here,’ he said, ‘is decryption; but not all attempts at decipherment have the same objective or significance. Some ciphers are broken to ensure victory on a battlefield; others are cracked to demonstrate military superiority; still others are decrypted to guarantee the safety and security of a nation’s leader; and others for diplomatic reasons. Some are even broken simply to satisfy professional pride. There are of course numerous other reasons for decryption, and yet, out of all of those many reasons, none truly involve the very security and safety of the nation as a whole. To speak frankly, this extremely sophisticated cipher now being deployed by X country threatens the very integrity of our nation. There is only one means by which we can resolve this precarious situation and that is by swiftly decrypting BLACK. Some people say, give me a place to stand and I will move the earth; decrypting BLACK is where we take our stand. If we say that at present the security of our nation is in a critical situation, that we are being pressured, then decrypting BLACK will be the key to fighting against this threat.’

  The emotional and yet stately inaugural address delivered by this solemn and respected elderly official brought forth a resounding chorus of applause. When he spoke, his silver hair moved in unison with his excited gestures, as if it too were speaking.

  In the afternoon, it was time for the professionals to give their lectures. Rong Jinzhen was ordered to take the lead, giving a report that lasted well over an hour on his progress towards deciphering BLACK. Unfortunately he had made no progress whatsoever. Later, on the way back to Unit 701, he regretted having publically shared his own bewilderment at the conference. Over the course of the next few days, he spent countless hours listening to the opinions of other cryptographers as well as attending the two final closing addresses. Taken as a whole, Rong Jinzhen felt that the entire conference had been more of a discussion and not a rigorous research symposium. It had all been rather frivolous and shallow. The lectures had been more flowery speech and clichéd slogans than anything of substance. There had been no meaty debates, nor any cold, detached contemplation. From beginning to end the conference seemed as though it had been floating on a calm sea and all that Rong Jinzhen could do was to blow bubbles – the tranquillity and monotony had been suffocating.

  It could perhaps be said that deep down Rong Jinzhen despised this symposium and everyone who attended it. Later, however, he felt that feeling this way was uncalled for; and what’s more, it was useless. BLACK, he had come to realize, was a cancer eating at his body. For years he had tried to get at it, and still he was no closer to it. Death now shadowed him, sinisterly threatening him. Those who had attempted to help were neither geniuses nor sages, only gossipers. To think that they could find a cure for this cancer, that they could be the Saviour, was completely absurd, a dream, complete nonsense.

  [Transcript of the interview with Director Zheng]

  A lonely and exhausted man, Rong Jinzhen would spend his days absorbed in thought, or perhaps we should say fantasy. Every night he would purposefully dream. As I understand things, he encouraged himself to dream every night for the following reasons: first, he had previously grasped that a certain lucidness came with his dreams (some said that it was whilst dreaming that he found the means to decipher PURPLE). Secondly, he began to suspect that the creator of BLACK was a monster gifted with a form of intelligence completely alien to humankind, and since he himself was human, the only way to get close to it would be in his dreams.

  When he first came upon this idea it boosted his morale; it was as if he had found a way out. I heard that he was now instructing himself to dream every night. Dreaming had become one of his responsibilities. His deliberate excessiveness, however, only resulted in bringing him to the verge of mental collapse. One look at him and you could see that all manner of dreams were coming upon him thick and fast, never-ending. The dreams were disorderly, without coherent thought; the only thing they accomplished was to disrupt his normal sleep. In order to restore some normality to his nights, he had no choice but to dismantle the dream patterns he had become entangled in. He took to reading novels and going for walks before heading to bed. The former helped put him at ease, especially considering the stresses of the day. The latter would tire him out. The results were positive. To use his words: reading and walking before bed were his two sleeping pills.

  Still, Rong Jinzhen dreamed a great deal. He had taken everything from this w
orld and experienced it in his dreams. In a sense, he had two worlds of existence: one real, the other a dream. People say that everything on land is also in the sea, but not everything in the sea is on land. Rong Jinzhen’s situation paralleled this: the things he had in his dreams did not necessarily exist in the real world, but everything from the real world was most certainly to be found in his dreams. I guess you could say that for Rong Jinzhen everything possessed a duality: on the one hand was reality – the realness of things, the living world; on the other, the dream, virtuality, chaos. As the idiom ‘baseless gossip’ suggests, we only accept the real world as evidence. But for Rong Jinzhen, there was always a duality: the real and the dream, and only he knew of the latter. It goes without saying that his dream world was more absurd, more incoherent than reality . . .

  [To be continued]

  Now, a more tranquil Rong Jinzhen realized that to hope for someone else to offer advice on how to decipher BLACK, to hope that someone else could put him on the correct path – that was just nonsense from his dreams, an absurdity within an absurdity. To console himself he reiterated, ‘Don’t count on anyone but yourself, don’t hope for someone else to help; they cannot tell you the right path, it’s not possible, not possible . . . ’ He repeated this to himself, believing perhaps that such a mantra might make him forget the disappointment of the conference.

  As it turned out, reciting this mantra did in fact make him feel better; it was not entirely without benefit. Rong Jinzhen was able to find some reassurances in it; four in fact:

  1. Attendance at the conference allowed him to see that the Head of the Intelligence Services was immensely concerned about the progress made towards deciphering BLACK and the future thereafter. This made Rong Jinzhen feel somewhat stressed, but it also encouraged him, urging him on in his attempt to decrypt the cipher.

  2. Attendance at the conference also allowed him to witness how nearly everyone in his profession fawned over him, either in speech or by deed (say for instance by shaking his hand overly affectionately, or by bowing at the waist instead of just a nod, or by politely smiling at everything he said, and so on). Rong Jinzhen had discovered that in their secretive world, he was a celebrity, loved by all. Before he had had some awareness of this but had never really been sure. Now that he knew, he couldn’t help but be a little cheered by it.

  3. At the first drinks reception of the conference, the elderly statesman had made an impromptu promise to provide Rong Jinzhen with an incredibly sophisticated calculator, capable of over 40,000 calculations. Such a gift would be tantamount to providing Jinzhen with an internationally top-ranked assistant!

  4. Before leaving, he had bought from the Yesterday Bookstore two books he had long desired, one being The Riddle (a translation of The Writing of the Gods by the famous cryptanalyst Klaus Johannes).

  In sum, then, what makes a trip worthwhile?

  For Rong Jinzhen, it was getting these particular items. With these in hand, Rong could happily head back to Unit 701. The train ride home would be free of incident, and free too of men hiding in shadows. Vasili would have no difficulty in booking a soft sleeper car for the journey. Once on board, Rong Jinzhen felt at ease, in total contrast to the journey six days before.

  He really was quite happy to be departing the capital. Another reason for this happiness was that the night before leaving, the city had received its first winter snowfall, almost as though it had been arranged as a special send-off for this man from the south. The snow had fallen intensely, blanketing the ground, brightening the darkness. In this wintry setting, Rong Jinzhen waited for the train to depart. The silence of the falling snow and the scent of moisture it carried in the air filled his heart with peace; it was a splendid daydream.

  Such a start would have satisfied even the fussiest of people, making Rong Jinzhen feel quite confident that this would be a relaxing journey home.

  But what happened was anything but.

  3.

  The trip home was completely different. For one thing, it was two days and three nights, whereas the train to Beijing took three days and two nights. Two of the nights had already passed, and the second day was in the midst of dying away. Except for sleeping, Rong Jinzhen spent his time reading his newly purchased books. It was quite obvious that he felt nothing of the anxiety or fear that had marred his previous train ride. The fact that he could sleep well and enjoy reading was proof enough. A journey home has certain advantages. For their party this was especially so since they had been able to get a sleeper car that had its own independent heating unit, which somewhat separated their berth from the rest, making it a more secure location. Rong Jinzhen couldn’t help but feel rather pleased and happy about their good fortune in getting such a car.

  No one can deny that for a man who lacks courage, who is overly sensitive and rather cold and detached, to be removed from close proximity to others is a most pressing desire, an overriding concern. At Unit 701, Rong Jinzhen was always taciturn and uncommunicative, always aloof from the world around him. This was how he maintained his distance from people, how he separated himself from the crowd. Whichever way you looked at it, his motivation for befriending the chess-playing lunatic must have been to ensure his own ostracism from everyone else. To associate with the lunatic was the best means to make sure that he was left alone. He had no friends and no one tried to be his friend: they respected him, they admired him, but they weren’t affectionate towards him. He lived a solitary life (and even the chess-playing lunatic left Unit 701 when his dementia began to come under control). Most people said that he was untouched by the world around him: he never got close to people, and was always alone and rather depressed-looking. But loneliness and depression did not bother him; the greater torment was enduring the myriad idiosyncrasies of other people. From this point of view, he did not much fancy the rank of section chief, or even the title of husband . . .

  [Transcript of the interview with Director Zheng]

  Rong Jinzhen got married on the first of August in 1966. His wife’s surname was Di, an orphan who had come to work for us quite early, initially as a telephone switchboard operator. In 1964 she was transferred to the cryptography section as a security officer. She was a northerner, rather tall – half a head above Rong Jinzhen – and she had quite large eyes. She spoke a most proper Mandarin Chinese, although she never said very much. When she did, it was in a low tone of voice. Perhaps that was due in large part to her position as a keeper of secrets.

  To speak of Rong Jinzhen’s wedding – well, I’ve always felt that it was exceptionally odd, as if fate were teasing him in some way. Why do I say that? It’s because I know that in the beginning there were a great many people who were concerned about his marrying someone. Some even thought that they should propose to him, in an effort to somehow bask in his glory I suppose. And yet maybe not, perhaps it was his own indecisiveness, or some other reason. But whatever the cause, whenever the possibility of marriage arose, he always shut the door. It seemed as though he simply lacked interest in women and marriage. But then later, I don’t know how, and with very little fanfare, he married Miss Di. He was thirty-four at the time. Of course, his age was not an issue, I mean, he was a little old, but if someone was willing to marry him, then what’s the problem? None. The problem came after they were married: BLACK came and stole him away. It goes without saying that if he hadn’t married Miss Di at that time, he would probably never have got married: BLACK would have prevented that. Their wedding gave people an odd feeling, just like when you are about to close a window and a bird abruptly flutters into the room: it’s a little strange and yet it seems almost like fate, and you don’t really know what to do – is it good or bad omen, something right or wrong?

  To tell you the truth, he was a terrible husband, completely unreasonable. He would often not return home for days, sometimes staying away for the best part of a couple of weeks; and then when he did go home, he would hardly say a word to his wife: he would just eat then leave again, or eat, sleep,
and then leave when he got up. That was their married life. They lived together but she rarely saw him, and spoke with him even less. As section chief, an administrative leader, Rong Jinzhen was not up to the task. Generally, he would show up at his office an hour before the day ended; the rest of the time he was squirreled away in the his cryptography room. He would even unplug the telephone to ensure that he would not be disturbed. It was in this fashion that he shirked the responsibilities and pains of being a section chief as well as a husband. He seemed to preserve his customary habits and longed-for style of life: a solitary existence – living alone, working alone, not wanting anyone to trouble him or to help. What’s more, things only became more extreme after BLACK entered the picture. It was as if he had to hide himself away, that doing so was the only means by which he could find the hidden secrets of this cipher . . .

  [To be continued]

  Rong Jinzhen was reclining in a rather cosy soft sleeper bunk, feeling as though he had finally found a safe place to take refuge in. It had been indeed rather fortunate that Vasili had secured two berths in a soft sleeper car. Their travelling companions were a retired professor and his nine-year-old granddaughter. The professor must have been around sixty years old. He had previously served as vice-chancellor at G university, but because of an eye disease he had resigned not long before. He carried himself with authority, liked to drink and smoke Pegasus cigarettes – this was how he whiled away his time on the road. His granddaughter, who aspired to be a singer when she grew up, spent the time singing, using the carriage as a stage. The two of them, one old, one young, served as a tranquilizer for Rong Jinzhen, putting him at ease. In this simple and unsophisticated space, he felt devoid of any sense of foreboding. Or to put it another way, he was able to forget his own timidity, and he devoted his time to his two most important endeavours: sleeping and reading. Sleep compressed the long dark nights into a dream; reading dispatched the boredom of the days. Sometimes he would lie in the dark, unable to sleep, unable to read, and instead passed the time by letting his imagination run wild. This was how he spent the journey home – engaged in sleeping, reading, and flights of fancy. The hours slipped by one after another, as he gradually drew ever closer to the last leg of the trip and home, back to Unit 701.