Dragonfly

by Dean Koontz

  Chong stood up and caught the toothless man's attention. "Will we arrive late in Peking?"

  "No. This is a scheduled lay-by."

  Chong collapsed into his seat and sighed with relief.

  When the outbound train came along ten minutes later, it roared by within a few feet of Chai's window. It was nearly overflowing with young people on their way to the communes. Colorful posters affixed to the flanks of the cars proclaimed the joy and dedication of the young Maoists within. But Chai could not see all that much joy or dedication to the Fifty-Year Farm Plan in those faces that peered back at him from the passing cars. Oh, yes, occasionally there was someone grinning rapturously at the thought of serving the People; but the vast majority of them showed nothing but resignation and, occasionally, despair.

  Chai sympathized with them. He ached with pity for them. And he thought, miserably: I have become a reactionary, an anti-Maoist, and an enemy of the People.

  Deep down within, he knew that his pity was for himself as well as for these strangers flashing past. It was not merely self-pity for what he had been through—the sixteen-hour days of brutalizing labor, the weeks he had been assigned to collect human waste for use as fertilizer on the rice paddies, the weevils in his food, the fevers which had swept the communes when there was no medicine to combat them—but he was also full of self-pity for those things he felt he might yet suffer. If his father died, or was removed from power, what would become of him? If his father could not protect him, would he be sent back to the Ssunan Commune? Yes. Definitely. There was no doubt about it. He was only temporarily safe, safe only so long as his father's heart continued to beat, safe only so long as his father's enemies in the Party remained weak. Within the next few years he would be back in the country again, a slave laborer again. He was afraid for himself, and he despaired of his future.

  There had to be a way out.

  And of course, there was a way out.

  He saw the door to escape. But to open it and pass through was no simple matter. It was a monumental step, a denial of his past, his family, everything. It was a decision that he would have found impossible, a change in outlook he would have thought despicable, before Ssunan.

  Leave China.

  Forever.

  No. It was still unthinkable.

  Yet . . .

  Was a return to Ssunan any more reasonable? Did he wish to end up like Chong Shao-chi, this miserable man beside him? Did he want to be forty years old, a champion killer of rats, whose greatest pleasure in seven years was a one-night reunion with his family?

  Remembering his trip to America, Chai suddenly saw that there was one great flaw in the social system of the United States—and one great flaw in China's system as well. In the United States, there was an unreasonable selfishness, a destructive desire to possess more and more things and to obtain more and more power through the acquisition of more and more money. In China, there was an equally unreasonable selflessness; the Party was so concerned about the welfare of the masses that it overlooked the welfare of the individuals who composed the masses. In the United States, there had seemed to be no peace and contentment, for life there was a frantic process of accumulation and consumption and reaccumulation to fuel a new round of consumption . . . Yet in the United States you could live outside the system; selfishness was not dictated by the government or demanded by the people. And even if the greedy capitalistic rabble roared around you—was that not better than to live in the People's Republic, where you had little or no choice, where the self was denied and virtue was not a choice but a requirement?

  If only, he thought as he watched the commune-bound train pass, there were some country in the world where the two systems had been merged, where the flaw in each canceled out the flaw in the other.

  But there was no such place. That was a child's dream and always would be.

  How terrible to be raised to have a fierce belief in your government and society, only to be given the wit, knowledge, or experience to suddenly see that the system was unjust, imperfect. Chai saw that he had been forced by his society to make certain decisions which that same society had taught him were decadent and shameful.

  But there was only one escape from an intolerable future, and it was far from the perfect answer: leave China.

  Now.

  But how?

  As the outbound train finished passing and their own train began to move once more toward Peking, Chai Po-han wrestled with his conscience and tried to make himself accept the only future that made any sense at all.

  FIVE

  CAPITOL HEIGHTS, MARYLAND:

  FRIDAY, 9:05 P.M.

  McAlister took Burt Nolan's pistol from the seat. He held the gun above the dashboard and studied it in the purplish-white light that filtered into the Mercedes from a nearby mercury-vapor street-lamp. He found, the red safety and flicked it off.

  Nolan watched none of this. He stared intently out of his side window at the houses across the street.

  Shoving the gun into his coat pocket, keeping his right hand on the butt, McAlister opened his door and got out of the car.

  Unarmed but game, Bernie Kirkwood climbed out of the back seat and followed his boss across the sidewalk.

  Carl Altmüller's house was a small two-story Colonial saltbox, pale-gray, with black shutters and trim. A neat, matching gray-and-black saltbox garage stood at the top of the sloping driveway. The garage doors were closed. The house was dark; apparently Altmüller was not at home.

  McAlister felt somewhat foolish stepping into this peaceful scene with his shoulders tensed and a loaded gun in his pocket. Nevertheless, he kept his hand on the gun butt.

  The doorbell was set beneath a clear three-watt night light. The chimes produced a four-note melody that sounded like distant Christmas bells striking up "Joy to the World."

  No one came to the door.

  "Maybe it's his night for macramé lessons," Kirk-wood said.

  McAlister rang the bell again.

  Nothing. No one. Silence.

  "He could be at a prayer meeting," Kirkwood said. "Or counseling a troop of boy scouts."

  Ringing the bell a third tune, McAlister said, "Have you ever considered a career as a comedian?"

  "No. You think I should?"

  "Well, it would be something to do after I've fired you."

  "Yeah. We could form a team. You'd be the straight man."

  "I don't intend to fire myself."

  "Yeah," Kirkwood said, "but you won't last long without me."

  Turning away from the front door, McAlister said, "Come on. Let's have a look around."

  "Around what?"

  "The house."

  "Why?"

  "I want to find a way in."

  "You're going to break and enter?" Kirkwood asked, shocked.

  "I won't break anything unless it's necessary. But I damned well am entering."

  Kirkwood caught him by the arm. "Let's get a warrant first."

  "No time for that."

  "You don't sound like the Bob McAlister I know."

  "I've changed," McAlister said, feeling hollow inside, chilled. "Probably for the worse. But I've had no choice." He pulled free of Kirkwood's hand. "Bernie, do you realize the trouble we're in if Rice is one of these Committeemen?"

  "It's a major scandal," Kirkwood said, pushing his damp woolly hair back from his forehead.

  "It's more than that. We're sitting on a time bomb. Bernie, look, suppose you were a Committeeman with a cover as a famous liberal thinker. Suppose you were a fascist who was the right-hand man to a liberal President who trusted you. You could see, in the years ahead, thousands of opportunities to subtly misuse your power to fascistic ends. You were just beginning . . . How would you conduct yourself? What would your first priority be?"

  Kirkwood thought about it for a moment, then said, "Protecting the power I've finally gotten. Which would mean protecting my cover. I'd lay low. Play it cool. Go easy."

  "And is that what Rice is doing—
supposing he is a Committeeman?"

  "No. He's taking big risks. Like trying to use federal marshals to monitor our investigations. If one of the marshals rejected his offer and told us about it, Rice would have a lot of explaining to do."

  "Exactly," McAlister said. "And when he told me that Bill Fredericks hadn't been very cooperative in arranging for the marshals, Rice had to know there was a good chance I'd catch him in his lie."

  "You think he no longer cares whether he's caught or gets away with it?"

  "It looks that way to me. Which means Dragonfly will be used soon. So soon, in fact, that Rice figures if we nail him, we won't have time to make him tell us Dragonfly's identity. We won't have time to stop the project before detonation."

  "But he'll end up in jail just the same," Kirkwood said. "Is he fanatical enough to spend the rest of his life in prison for a cause?"

  "Maybe he doesn't think he'll go to trial, let alone to prison."

  "I don't follow you."

  "My imagination may be running wild. I'm beginning to see some very ugly possibilities. Like . . . Maybe the Dragonfly project, as big as it is, just isn't the whole bundle. Maybe it's only one element in a much larger scheme."

  "Such as?"

  "Maybe Rice is taking these risks because he expects his people to seize control of the United States government during or immediately after the crisis in China. If that was what he was anticipating, he would have no fear of jail."

  Kirkwood was dumbfounded. He looked up at the stars, then at the quiet houses across the street. "But that's . . . Well . . . I mean . . . For God's sake, that's screaming paranoia!"

  "Paranoia?" McAlister said wearily. "That's just a way of life, like any other. These days, it's just another way to get along."

  "But how could they do it? How could they seize the government?"

  "I don't know."

  Kirkwood stared at him.

  "Go back to the car."

  Kirkwood didn't move.

  "Keep Burt company."

  "We aren't compatible."

  "I can handle this myself."

  "I'll go with you anyway."

  "It's breaking and entering, remember?"

  Kirkwood smiled grimly. "If we get sent to the same prison, we can share a cell."

  They circled the house, looking for a barrier that was flimsier than the solid-oak front door. They tried the first-floor windows, but those were all locked. The rear door was as formidable as the front door. Finally, on the north side of the house, they came upon a set of four French doors, and these looked flimsy enough.

  Because there were no lights in the house next door, they didn't try to conceal what they were doing. McAlister wrapped Kirkwood's woolen scarf around his right fist and smashed one of the foot-square panes of glass in the first door. He reached through, fumbled around for several seconds, but was unable to find the lock. He broke another pane—and found no lock. He moved to the second door and broke two more panes before his trembling fingers located the cool metal latch.

  They went into the house, glass crunching under their shoes.

  After he found a wall switch and turned on the dining-room light, Kirkwood said, "By the way, what in the hell are we looking for?"

  "I've been waiting for you to ask. We're looking for a corpse.

  Kirkwood blinked. "One corpse in particular? Or will we take anything we can find?"

  "Carl Altmüller."

  "Are you serious?"

  "Deadly."

  "But why would they kill him?"

  "Maybe they didn't need him any more."

  "But if Altmüller is already theirs, if they've bought him and put him in their pocket—"

  "The Committeemen are fanatics," McAlister reminded him. "So far as we know, however, Altmüller's just an ordinary guy who happened to be in a position where they needed someone but where they could not place anyone. So maybe they bought him. But because he really wasn't one of them, they wouldn't trust him. You can never be sure that money will keep a man's mouth shut. But a bullet in the head does the job every time."

  "Jesus, you sound like a cold son of a bitch!" Kirkwood said, shivering slightly.

  "Sorry." He felt cold too.

  "Why didn't you tell me this outside?"

  "If you'd thought there was a corpse in here, you'd have gone straight to the police. You'd have insisted upon a warrant."

  "Of course."

  "And we don't have time."

  Kirkwood locked eyes with him for a moment, then sighed and said, "Where do we start looking?"

  Heading for the door of the dining-room closet, McAlister said, "Check the front room. When we've finished downstairs, we'll go upstairs together."

  Grim-faced, repeatedly clearing his throat, Kirk-wood went into the living room and turned on more lights. He came back within a few seconds and said, "I think I've found a clue."

  "Clue?"

  "Buckets of blood," Kirkwood said shakily.

  "Buckets" was an exaggeration, although there was certainly a cup or two of it. Or, rather, there had been a cup or two. Gouts of blood had spattered the sofa; but now it was dried into a maroon-brown crust. There was even more blood, also dry and crusted, on the floor in front of the sofa.

  "Looks like you were right," Kirkwood said.

  Kneeling on the floor, rubbing his fingertips over the blood crust on the sofa, McAlister said, "And maybe I wasn't."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Altmüller worked with you just this afternoon, didn't he?"

  "You know that he did."

  "Did he look healthy to you?"

  "Sure. Yeah."

  "He was definitely alive?"

  "What are you driving at?"

  "When was the last time you saw him?"

  Kirkwood thought. Then: "Five-thirty."

  "The earliest he could have been killed here in his own home was six o'clock. Not even three and a half hours ago." He patted the stains on the sofa. "If that were the case, this blood would still be damp. Even wet—congealed but wet. At the very least, this stuff has been here for a couple of days."

  The house was crypt-quiet except for the soft ticking of an antique mantel clock.

  Reluctantly, Kirkwood touched the stains. "Whose blood is it?"

  "Altmüller's."

  Kirkwood swayed on the balls of his feet. "But you just said—"

  "I'll explain when we find the corpse."

  "Upstairs?"

  McAlister got to his feet. "They wouldn't kill him and lug him up all those steps. He's in the kitchen or basement."

  "I'd still like to think he's just spending the evening at a prayer meeting."

  In the kitchen McAlister found a smear of dried blood on the lid of the freezer. "Here we go." He opened the lid.

  A rolled-up rag rug was stuffed into the freezer, and there was obviously a body inside of it.

  "Help me get him out," McAlister said.

  As they lifted the rug out of the freezer, thin plates of frozen blood cracked and fell away from the rags and hit the floor and shattered into thousands of tiny shards.

  McAlister peeled the rug back from one end of the corpse until the face was revealed. Dark, sightless eyes, webbed with ice crystals, gazed up at him. "Carl Altmüller."

  Surprised, Kirkwood said, "But Altmüller has blue eyes, and he isn't as old as this man!"

  "This is Carl Altmüller," McAlister repeated adamantly. "The man you're describing is the one who killed Altmüller and has been impersonating him since Thursday morning. I'd bet on it." He was shaking inside with both fear and rage.

  "Then Altmüller wasn't bought."

  "That's right."

  "Are all our federal marshals impostors?"

  "The Committee would need only one or two men planted in our offices."

  "But there might be another one?"

  "Yes."

  "Now what?"

  "We go to the agency headquarters and pull a photograph from the files. Then I go to the White House
while you get your ass to the hospital."

  "Hospital?"

  "You're going to show the photograph to a young woman of the streets who has fallen on bad times recently."

  Kirkwood said, "Oh, yeah."

  PEKING: SATURDAY, 2:00 P.M.

  General Lin Shen-yang was in the embassy drawing room, pacing back and forth, when Canning and Lee Ann came down from the third floor. He was not at all what Canning had been expecting. By all Western standards, of course, he was somewhat on the short side, as were most of the Chinese. But he was not also slender and wiry like many Chinese men; instead, he was broad and muscular, and he had the face of a barbarian warrior. He did not move with the serenity or perfect grace of an oriental; rather, his manner was aggressive, quick, extremely energetic. The moment that they entered the room he strode toward them.

  Stubbing his cigar in an ashtray, Webster got out of an easy chair and made the introductions.

  The general and Lee Ann conversed in Chinese for more than a minute. From the way she was smiling, Canning could tell that Lin was flattering her.

  Then the general turned to Canning and shook hands. In nearly unaccented English he said, "There are two vans waiting outside. I've got six soldiers in the one. We'll ride in the other. We have no time to waste, and I would appreciate it if you were to give me the names of your deep-cover agents in the Peking area."

  "Not quite so fast," Canning said. "I've got a few things to explain."

  "Then explain," the general said impatiently.

  "There is a certain procedure we will follow," Canning said. "I'll give you only one name at a time. Together we'll go and arrest that man and bring him here to the embassy." He pointed to the polygraph that stood in its steel security case in the center of the room. "We will interrogate him here, using that machine. If he is not the trigger man for Dragonfly, he will remain here in the embassy until he can be flown back to the United States on one of our own aircraft. Then we will proceed to the second name. And then to the third. I will not turn any of these agents over to you—not even the trigger man for Dragonfly."

  Incredibly, the general nodded and said, "Perfectly understandable. I would insist upon the same terms if our roles were reversed."