by Barry Eisler
That made sense. “So not the kind of thing you could use against a UN official.”
“Exactly.”
Something was nagging at him. About Vann and Zatōichi both. Then it hit him.
“I told Vann to vary his routes and times. Maybe he listened, maybe he didn’t. But Dillon couldn’t be sure regardless, and if he was going to emplace an IED, he’d have to know which way and at least around what time Vann would be going past it.”
“That’s true, but they might have put, say, two in place, to make sure they were covering all the possible routes.”
“I reconned that area. If I were the one emplacing the device, I would have wanted four separate locations, depending on what entrance or exit the target might use. So now we’re talking about not just multiple devices, but multiple spotters, too. And that doesn’t feel quite right. They’re in a hurry. Improvising. And there are cameras on the UN perimeter, too, so even if you emplaced the device far enough away, you’d still be taking chances on having all these spotters conducting initial recon.”
“What are you thinking, then?”
“They had to have some kind of eyes on Vann. But from what you just told me about these microdrones . . . I mean, how far along are they operationally? Maybe not dragonflies, and forget about the explosives, because that seems not to have been what happened here, but what about the size of a small bird? Like a hummingbird, something that could persistently circle at fifty or a hundred feet, where no one would ever even see it?”
“That kind of drone is . . . very far along.”
“I’ll be damned. That’s how they worked it with Zatōichi. I couldn’t figure out how he could be coming from the opposite direction. But if they knew my location and direction, he could come from anywhere. And, of course, they did know. They knew I’d try to see Vann. So it’s not as though they had to search for me throughout the entirety of Phnom Penh. They could just fly one of their tiny drones in circles all day long around Vann’s office. And once I showed up, they could sic Zatōichi on me from any direction they liked.”
“And the direction they wanted would have been something other than coming up behind you.”
“Right—if I saw him coming up behind me, I might have reacted. Coming from somewhere I hadn’t even been seemed like nothing. He might have had me, too, if I hadn’t noticed a few anomalies telling me this Zatōichi was a fake.”
“I’d say your instinct about this all being improvised after you killed Gant was on the money.”
Dox wondered whether he’d been saying too much. Maybe he should have let Kanezaki do more of the talking, and kept his own speculation to himself. On the other hand, he doubted he was giving away that much by thinking out loud. On the other other hand, he supposed it was possible that mostly he was trying to act as if Kanezaki was definitely trustworthy, because he wanted so much to believe it.
He decided he didn’t care. “Still, to send Dillon out to do this personally, or, more likely, to supervise a team . . . What the hell is DIA getting from Sorm that would make them take these risks?”
“Or as you put it, what does Sorm have on them?”
“Right, or both.”
“I don’t know the answer. But I’ll tell you who does.”
“Dillon, I get it. Well, if I can ask him, I will. But then again, I’m not really in the mood to talk anymore.”
“I know. And I’m not arguing.”
“Good.”
There was a pause. Kanezaki said, “Speaking of which, I have one more bit of intel. It’s ambiguous, but maybe you can make sense of it.”
“Tell me.”
“Dillon is meeting Sorm. Tonight.”
Dox felt a little adrenaline hit move out through him. “Where?”
“That’s the ambiguous part. At ‘the tents.’ Does that mean anything to you?”
Dox considered. Tents in Bangkok could mean one of the night markets, bazaars characterized by hundreds of stalls, each sheltered under a colorful tent. It sounded like Kanezaki’s intel tracked Labee’s lead about Rot Fai in Srinakarin. It was such welcome news that for an instant, Dox wholeheartedly believed it. But then he forced himself to slow down.
“How do you know that?”
“Come on, sources and meth—”
“Bullshit, sources and methods!” Dox erupted. “I do not have time for your sources and methods. You tell me sources and methods, I’m going to think you’re playing me. Now, I’ve been trying, really trying, to give you the benefit of the doubt. But the last so-called intel you gave me was bullshit and almost got me killed. And maybe you don’t realize it, but you are this close—I mean this fucking close—to having a major problem with me. So you tell me right fucking now how you came by this new ‘intel.’”
There was a long pause. It felt like capitulation. Dox waited.
“All right,” Kanezaki said. “Okay.”
There was another pause. Finally, Kanezaki said, “I’m into the cable traffic of the DIA director himself.”
Dox shook his head, half-pleased, half-disgusted. “My lord, if you spent half the time spying on the Chinese and Russians as you do on each other, who knows what you might uncover?”
“Whatever. Now you know.”
“Now I know what? How do you know this intel is reliable?”
“Are you joking? The DIA director’s own cable traffic?”
“Hang on a minute. When was the last time you got anything really useful to you, or compromising to them, from this channel?”
No response.
“Okay, how long have you been doing this? Six months? Six years? How long?”
Kanezaki sighed. “It’s been a little under a year.”
“Okay, in that year, what have you gotten that’s truly to your advantage or their detriment?”
“Well, it’s been a little while, but—”
“Oh, wait, don’t tell me, the only real nugget you got was right at the beginning, am I seeing it clearly now?”
There was a pause. “Not exactly. I mean, at the outset, there were some difficult negotiations under way between CIA and DIA. About a sensitive, far-reaching op and who would run it. What I learned from the cable hack was invaluable to our winning the contract, so to speak.”
“You see? That’s exactly what I’m talking about. You cleaned their clock in your sensitive-op-negotiation pissing contest or whatever it was and they said, ‘Hell, how did old Kanezaki figure out our exact negotiating position and how to end-run us?’ And they examined all their vulnerabilities, and maybe found some sign your hackers had left behind. ‘Well, Kanezaki, that wily son of a bitch,’ they said, ‘he cracked the director’s cable traffic!’ And what did they do next? You tell me, what did they do?”
Silence. He realized he’d used Kanezaki’s name in front of Labee. And said a whole lot of other shit he probably shouldn’t have, on top of it.
The hell with it.
“I mean, tell me,” he went on. “Tell me, have you ever gotten anything valuable after that? Anything earthshaking? Anything DIA really and truly wouldn’t want you to have?”
“Well, no, but the general background itself is—”
“Bullshit, general background! After the first intrusion, you didn’t get shit! Now they knew you were in there, they knew, so you tell me, why didn’t they close that channel down? Would you have expected them to shut down a compromised channel? Would a shutdown be standard practice for you intel-community types? Or might you do something else? Tell me, goddamnit, I want to hear you say it!”
“Damn it. They wouldn’t shut it down. They’d keep using it—”
“Exactly! Bingo! Go to the head of the line! They’d keep it—and play you with it. They’d feed you false intel you’d think was real, just like they did about Pattaya and Les Nuits, where I almost got fucking killed as a result!”
There was a long pause. Kanezaki said, “Damn it. You’re right. I’m sorry. Shit.”
Dox was still hopping mad, but all at once
he felt bad, too. He hadn’t meant to browbeat the man like that. Not exactly. It was just . . . he realized he’d been so afraid Kanezaki wouldn’t be able to persuade him he was still trustworthy.
“All right, all right. I’m sorry for getting so disagreeable.”
“You have nothing to apologize for. They’ve been playing me. I should have seen it, and I didn’t. And I almost got you killed as a result.”
“Well, on the one hand, that’s all true. But on the other hand, no harm, no foul, right? Life’s full of lessons, and this one came fairly cheap compared to the alternatives.”
“I guess.”
Damn, he sounded so morose. “Anyway,” Dox said, looking for a way to get him back in the game, “this is actually good news, isn’t it? Because—”
“I know. I get it. Because when I knew but they didn’t know I knew, that was good. But when they knew that I knew but I didn’t know they knew, that was bad. But now that I know they know that I know, and they don’t know it, it’s good again.”
That was actually a little hard to follow, but it sounded about right. “Something like that, yeah. The thing is, DIA is playing you again. And they think they’re getting away with it. But now you know better. And that gives us the advantage. He who laughs last, laughs best, isn’t that true?”
“I’m sorry, Dox. I . . . don’t know how I missed this.”
“Well, that’s a conversation for another time. For now, I’ll just say maybe you placed too much residual faith in your ‘community.’ For you, these intel squabbles are a contact sport. But for the other guys, it’s no game. You’re a good man, and you projected your values onto some people who weren’t worthy of it. Now you know better. And I know it hurts to have the scales fall from your eyes, but at least now you can see clearly, right?”
“I’m not crazy about the view, but . . . yeah.”
“The view is the view, son. You have to see it clearly if you don’t want to start bumping into things.”
“All right, I think we’ve beaten this metaphor to death.”
Dox laughed, glad the man seemed to be rallying. “Now tell me exactly what that cable said. And this was, what, Dillon briefing the director?”
“Yes. It said, ‘I’m meeting Red tonight at the tents to review the trade.’”
“‘Red’?”
“Yes, probably a reference to Sorm’s Khmer Rouge past. We’re not always as clever with pseudonyms as we should be.”
“And what’s ‘the trade’?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe some aspect of what they get from Sorm, and what they give him in return. Or it’s just bullshit, because as you’ve persuasively argued, they know I’m into that channel of cable traffic.”
“Anything else in the cable?”
“Yes. Dillon says he told Red to get a new phone and under no circumstances to use any unit he’d ever used before or that could otherwise be associated with him. He told him to leave the new unit off until he was at the tents. Then he should use it to call Dillon and tell Dillon where they should meet.”
“If that’s true, it means Sorm has Dillon’s number, and we can expect him to use it. Maybe something you can key on. But do you think he really told Sorm all that?”
“Hard to say. He might have. Or it might have been entirely for our benefit. Or some combination.”
“Judging from the way old Gant played me, I think it’s safe to say these guys hide their lies in as much truth as possible. My guess is it’s both true . . . and for our benefit.”
“Meaning?”
“I don’t know yet. I need to think about it. This ‘You know that I know that you know’ stuff gets confusing.”
Kanezaki chuckled. “Now what do you make of ‘the tents’? You must have some idea, because it’s the one thing you haven’t asked about.”
Dox hesitated. He still hadn’t fully decided on whether Kanezaki was playing him. He didn’t think so, but . . .
And then he decided that for the moment, he had to at least act as if he trusted him. He could always abort later if he changed his mind.
“I have reason to believe ‘the tents’ is a reference to the Srinakarin Rot Fai Night Market.”
“What reason?”
“Sources and methods, son. Sources and methods.”
“That’s cold. But I guess I deserve it.”
Dox chuckled. “Anyway. Let me do a little thinking on all we just talked about, and I’ll call you later.”
“I’ll be standing by.”
Dox ended the call and returned the phone to the Faraday case. He briefed Labee on the conversation. She’d heard most of it anyway.
“His information tracks with mine,” she said when he was through.
He nodded. “Maybe.”
“But you don’t like it.”
He tried to piece together what was bothering him. Some of it felt obvious. But some of it . . . less so. He decided to start with the first, hoping doing so would shed some light on the second.
“Yeah, the thing about the Night Market sounds good and it tracks with your lead. But still, it’s coming from . . . well, you already heard me say his name.”
“You were upset.”
“Yeah, I sure was.”
“Why don’t we just call him K. ‘My guy’ was always a little awkward anyway.”
He laughed. “Okay, fair enough.”
“And by the way. My guy is Special Agent B. D. Little. Homeland Security Investigations.”
He looked at her. “You didn’t have to tell me that.”
She shrugged. “I know he’s using me, though I still don’t know exactly how. And besides, I like what you said to K. about how the only way to make sense of things is to know who your real friends are. I haven’t had many friends. But . . .”
Her voice trailed off and she looked away.
He wanted to reach for her hand, but thought maybe it would be too much.
“Hey,” he said. “You know I feel the same.”
She nodded.
To save her further discomfort, he went on. “Anyway. If K. set me up before, he could be doing the same thing again. When I first asked him for help, he claimed to be twitchy about killing a DIA asset, but maybe that was all bullshit. Maybe he was protecting Sorm for his own reasons. I can’t shake this feeling we’re going to show up at the Night Market and it’ll be just like Pattaya all over again.”
She looked at him, seemingly back in control of herself. “What do your instincts tell you?”
He considered. “He wouldn’t do it. Couldn’t. It’s not who he is.”
“And haven’t your instincts always been reliable before?”
For a moment, he thought of Tiara. “Well, maybe there was this one time, but that’s not really relevant to what we’re talking about here.”
“So the answer is yes. Your instincts have always been reliable before.”
He nodded. “Yeah. That’s true.”
“Then that’s your answer. K. isn’t lying. Your instincts are right. You should trust them. The way you always have.”
He chewed on that. He knew she was right. He didn’t think Kanezaki was setting him up. But something was still bugging him. He just couldn’t figure out what it was.
“Let’s git,” he said. “All this talk of drone strikes makes me twitchy. Plus I think it’s past time you and I had a little conversation with the Night Market’s most reprehensible denizen, Mr. Udom Leekpai.”
27
Two hours later, Carl and Livia were sitting in the shade of a corrugated awning at a place called Best Friend Bar 10, each with an ice-cold bottle of Chang in front of them.
Carl had told her about a guy in Bangkok he had met through Kanezaki—a guy named Fallon who Carl said was “all right.” She wasn’t entirely sure what that meant, but was learning to trust his occasional understatements and the judgment behind them. Carl had texted the guy, If you’re available, I’d be grateful to meet you again ASAP at the same place as last time. Semper fi. The gu
y had immediately texted back that he would be there in two hours.
They’d barely had time to sip their beers when a solid-looking white guy of maybe sixty in aviator shades came around the corner. He nodded when he saw them, then glanced left and right, perhaps a little surprised that Carl wasn’t alone.
Carl waved, then said to the bartender, “A Singha for my friend, sir, thank you.”
Fallon stopped at the stool alongside Carl, which put Carl in the middle. Livia moved her stool back and Carl spun around. Now they could all see each other.
Fallon took off his shades and set them on the bar. He looked at Livia, then at Dox. “Well,” he said. “I’m glad not all your stories are sad ones.”
Carl laughed and they shook. The bartender put a Singha on the bar in front of Fallon, who took a big swallow.
“Fallon,” Carl said, “meet Labee. Labee, Fallon.”
They shook. He had a good grip.
“Labee and I have found ourselves in a bit of a pickle. And to resolve it, we were planning to have a private conversation with a certain Thai gentleman who may not speak English. We would thus like to avail ourselves of your translation services, and possibly some of the other services I’m hoping might fall under the general heading of Tips, Tours, and Trips.”
Fallon sipped his beer. “Does this have anything to do with our mutual friend?”
“Indirectly, yes.”
“Because I would have expected him to get in touch himself.”
“Well, I could have done it that way. But it would have taken more time. Of which we don’t have a lot. Plus, there again, you were kind enough to give me your card.”