Catherine's companion, a civilian to judge by his hair, was talking rapidly, his index finger jabbing the air... Marie knew him! It was the man from the State Department, the one who had come to see them in Maine! The undersecretary with the dead eyes who kept rubbing his temples and barely protested when David told him he did not trust him. It was
McAllister! He was the man Catherine said she was to meet.
Suddenly abstract and terrible pieces of the horrible puzzle fell into place as Marie watched the scene below. The two marines by the second car crossed the street and separated. The one standing with Catherine talked briefly with McAllister, then ran to his right, pulling a small hand-held radio from his pocket. Staples spoke to the undersecretary of state and glanced up at the apartment house. Marie spun away from the window.
He'll be alone, no one with me.
All right.
It was a trap! Catherine Staples had been reached. She was not a friend; she was the enemy! Marie knew she had to run. For God's sake, get away! She grabbed the white-shelled purse with the money and for a split second stared at the silks from the fabric shop. She picked them up and ran out of the flat.
There were two hallways, one running the width of the building along the front with a staircase on the right leading down to the street; the other hallways bisected the first to form an inverted T leading to a door in the rear. It was a second staircase used for carrying garbage to the bins in the back alley. Catherine had casually pointed it out when they arrived, explaining that there was an ordinance forbidding refuse in the street, which was the main thoroughfare of Tuen Mun. Marie raced down the bisecting hall to the rear door and opened it. She gasped, suddenly confronted by the stooped figure of an old man with a straw broom in his hand. He squinted at her for a moment, then shook his head, his expression one of intense curiosity. She stepped out into the dark landing as the Chinese went inside; she held the door slightly open, waiting for the sight of Staples emerging from the front stairs. If Catherine, finding the flat empty, quickly returned to the staircase to rush down into the street to McAllister and the marine contingent, Marie could slip back into the apartment arid pick up the skirt and second blouse Staples had bought for her. In her panic she had only fleetingly thought about them, grabbing the silks instead, not daring to lose precious moments rummaging through the closet where Catherine had hung them among various other clothing. She thought about them now. She could not walk, much less run through the streets in a torn blouse and filthy slacks. Something was wrong. It was the old man! He just stood there staring at the crack in the doorframe.
'Go away!' whispered Marie.
Footsteps. The clacking of high-heeled shoes walking rapidly up the metal staircase in the front of the building. If it was Staples she would pass the bisecting hallway on her way to the flat.
'Deng yi dengf yelped the old Chinese, still standing motionless with his broom, still staring at her. Marie closed the door farther, watching through barely a half inch of space.
Staples came into view, glancing briefly, curiously at the old man, apparently having heard his sharp, high-pitched angry voice. Without breaking stride she continued down the hall, intent only on reaching the flat. Marie waited; the pounding in her chest seemed to echo throughout the dark stairwell. Then the words came, pleas shouted in hysteria.
Marie, Marie, where are you? The footsteps hammered now, racing on the cement. Catherine rounded the corner and began running towards the old Chinese and the door – towards her. 'Marie, it's not what you think! For God's sake, stop!'
Marie Webb spun and ran down the dark steps. Suddenly, a shaft of bright yellow sunlight spread up the staircase, and just as suddenly was no more. The ground floor door three storeys below had been opened; a figure in a dark suit had entered swiftly, a marine taking up his post. The man raced up the steps; Marie crouched in the corner of the second landing. The marine reached the top step, about to round the turn, steadying himself on the railing. Marie lunged out, her hand – the hand with the bunched silks – crashing into the astonished soldier's face, catching him off balance; she slammed her shoulder into the marine's chest, sending him reeling backwards down the staircase. Marie passed his tumbling body on the steps as she heard the screams from above.
'Marie! Marie! I know it's you! For Christ's sake, listen to me!'
She lurched out into the alley and another nightmare began its dreadful course, played out in the blinding sunlight of Tuen Mun. Running through the connecting thoroughfare behind the row of apartment buildings, her feet now bleeding inside the training shoes, Marie threw the kimono-like garment over her head and stopped by a row of garbage cans where she removed her green slacks and threw them inside the nearest one. She then draped the wide sash over her head, covering her hair, and ran into the next alleyway that led to the main street. She reached it and seconds later walked into the mass of humanity that was a slice of Hong Kong in the new frontier of the colony. She crossed the street.
'There!' shouted a male voice. The tall one!'
The chase began, but abruptly, without any indication, it was different. A man raced down the pavement after her, suddenly stopped by a wheeled stand blocking his way; he tried to shove it aside only to put his hands into recessed pots of boiling fat. He screamed, overturning the cart, and was now met with shrieks from the proprietor, obviously demanding payment as he and others surrounded the marine, forcing him back into the kerb.
There's the bitch?
As Marie heard the words, she was confronted by a phalanx of women shoppers. She spun to her right and ran into another alley off the street, an alley she suddenly discovered was a dead-end, closed by the wall of a Chinese temple. It happened again! Five young men – teenagers in paramilitary outfits – suddenly appeared from a doorway and gestured for her to pass.
'Yankee criminal!' Yankee thief!' The shouts were in the cadence of a rehearsed foreign language. The young men locked arms and without violence intercepted the man with close-cropped hair, crowding him against a wall.
'Get out of my way; you pricks!' shouted the marine, 'Get out of my way or I'll take every one of you brats!'
'You raise your arms... or a weapon-' cried a voice in the background.
'I never said anything about a weapon!' broke in the soldier from Victoria Peak.
'But if you do either,' continued the voice, 'they will release their arms, and five Di-di Jing Cha – so many trained by our American friends – will certainly contain one man. '
'Goddamn it, sir! I'm only trying to do my job! It's none of your business!'
Tm afraid it is, sir. For reasons you do not know. '
'Shit!' The marine leaned against the wall, out of breath, and looked at the smiling young faces in front of him.
'Lai!' said a woman to Marie, pointing to a wide, oddly shaped door with no visible handle on what appeared to be a thick, impenetrable exterior. 'Xiao xin. Kaa-fill. '
'Carefull I understand. ' An aproned figure opened the door and Marie rushed inside, instantly feeling the harsh blasts of cold air. She was standing in a large walk-in refrigerator where carcasses of meat hung eerily on hooks under the glow of mesh-encased light bulbs. The man in the apron waited a full minute, his ear at the door. Marie wrapped the wide silk sash around her neck and clutched her arms to ward off the sudden, bitter cold made worse by the contrasting oppressive heat outside. Finally, the clerk gestured for her to follow him; she did so, threading her way around the carcasses until they reached the huge refrigerator's entrance. The Chinese yanked a metal lever and pushed the heavy door open, nodding for Marie, who was shivering, to walk through. She now found herself in a long, narrow deserted butcher's shop, the bamboo blinds on the front windows filtering the intense noonday sunlight. A white-haired man stood behind the counter by the far right window, peering through the slats at the street outside. He beckoned for Marie to join him quickly. Again she did as she was instructed, noticing an oddly shaped floral wreath behind the glass of the front door whic
h appeared to be locked.
The older man indicated that Marie should look through the window. She parted two curved bamboo slats and gasped, astonished at the scene outside. The search was at its frenzied peak. The marine with scalded hands kept waving them in the air as he went from store to store across the street. She saw
Catherine Staples and McAllister in a heated conversation with a crowd of Chinese who obviously were objecting to foreigners disturbing the peaceful if hectic way of life in Tuen Mun. In his panic McAllister apparently had shouted something offensive and was challenged by a man twice his age, an ancient in an Oriental gown who had to be restrained by younger, cooler heads. The undersecretary of state backed away, his arms raised, pleading innocence, as Staples shouted to no avail in her efforts to extricate them both from the angry mob.
Suddenly, the marine with the hurt hands came crashing out of a doorway across the street; shattered glass flew in all directions as he rolled on the pavement, yelling in pain as his hands touched the cement. He was pursued by a young Chinese dressed in the white tunic, sash and knee-length trousers of a martial-arts instructor. The marine sprang to his feet and, as his Oriental adversary ran up to him, he pounded a low left hook into the young man's kidney, and followed it with a well-aimed right fist into the Oriental face, pummelling his assailant back into the store-front while screaming in agony at the pain both blows caused his scalded hands.
A last marine from Victoria Peak came running down the street – one leg limping, his shoulders sagging as if damaged from a fall – a fall down a flight of stairs, thought Marie as she watched in amazement. He came to the aid of his anguished comrade and was very effective. The amateurish attempts at combat by the berobed students of the unconscious martial-arts instructor were met by a flurry of slashing legs, crashing chops and the whirling manoeuvres of a judo expert.
Suddenly again, with no warning whatsoever, a cacophony of Oriental music swelled, the cymbals and primitive wood instruments reaching abrupt crescendos with each stride of the ragtag band that marched down the street, its followers carrying placards mounted with flowers. The fighting stopped as arms were restrained everywhere. Silence spread along the main avenue of commerce of Tuen Mun. The Americans were confused; Catherine Staples choked back her frustration and Edward McAllister threw up his hands in exasperation.
Marie watched, literally hypnotized by the change outside. Everything came to a stop, as if a halt had been ordered by an announcement from some sepulchral presence not to be denied. She shifted her angle of sight between the bamboo blinds and looked at the ragged group approaching. It was led by the banker Jitai! It was heading for the butcher's shop!
Her eyes darting, Marie saw Catherine Staples and McAllister race past the odd gathering in front of the shop. Then across the street the two marines once again took up the chase. They all disappeared in the blinding sunlight.
There was a knock on the front door of the butcher's shop. The old man with white hair removed the wreath and opened it. The banker, Jitai, walked in and bowed to Marie.
'Did you enjoy the parade, madame?' he asked.
'I wasn't sure what it was. '
'A funeral march for the dead. In this instance, no doubt, for the slain animals in Mr Woo's cold storage. '
' You...? This was all planned?
'In a state of readiness, you might say,' explained Jitai. 'Frequently our cousins from the north manage to get across the border – not the thieves but family members wishing to join their own – and the soldiers want only to capture them and send them back. We must be prepared to protect our own. '
'But me...? You knew?
'We watched; we waited. You were in hiding, running from someone, that much we did know. You told us that when you said you did not care to go before the magistrate, to "press charges", as you put it. You were directed into the alley outside.'
The line of women with the shopping bags-'
'Yes. They crossed the street when you did. We must help you. '
Marie glanced at the anxious faces of the crowd beyond the bamboo slats, then looked at the banker. 'How do you know I'm not a criminal?'
'It doesn't matter. The outrage against you resulting from two of our people is what matters. Also, madame, you do not look or speak like a fugitive from justice. '
'I'm not. And I do need help. I have to get back to Hong Kong, to a hotel where they won't find me, where there's a telephone I can use. I don't really know who, but I have to reach people who can help me... help us. ' Marie paused, her eyes locked with Jitai's. 'The man named David is my husband. '
'I can understand,' said the banker. 'But first you have to see a doctor. '
'What?'
'Your feet are bleeding. '
Marie looked down. Blood had seeped through the bandages, penetrating the canvas of her shoes. They were a sickening mess. 'I guess you're right,' she agreed.
Then there will be clothes, transportation – I myself will find you a hotel under any name you wish. And there is the matter of money. Do you have funds?
'I don't know,' said Marie, putting the silks on the counter and opening the white-shelled purse. That is, I haven't looked. A friend – someone who I thought was a friend – left me money. ' She pulled out the bills Staples had placed in the purse.
'We are not wealthy here in Tuen Mun, but perhaps we can help. There was talk of taking up a collection. '
'I'm not a poor woman, Mr Jitai,' interrupted Marie. 'If that is necessary and, frankly, if I'm alive, every cent will be returned with interest far in excess of the prime rate. '
'As you wish. I am a banker. But what would such a lovely lady like yourself know of interests and prime rates? Jitai smiled.
'You're a banker and I'm an economist. What do bankers know about the impacts on floating currencies caused by inflated interests, especially in the prime rates? Marie smiled for the first time in a very long time.
She had over an hour to think in the countryside quiet as she sat in the taxi that drove her down to Kowloon. It would be another forty-five minutes once they reached the less quiet outskirts, particularly a congested district called Mongkok. The contrite people of Tuen Mun had been not only generous and protective but inventive as well. The banker, Jitai, apparently had confirmed that the hoodlums' victim was indeed a white woman in hiding and running for her life, and that therefore, as she was in the process of reaching people who might help her, perhaps her appearance might be altered. Western clothes were brought from several shops, clothes that struck Marie as odd; they seemed drab and utilitarian, neat but dreary. Not cheap, but the kind of clothes that would be selected by a woman who had either no sense of design or felt herself above it. Then after an hour in the back room of a beauty shop she understood why such a costume had been chosen. The women fussed over her; her hair was washed and blown dry, and when the process was over she had looked in the mirror, barely breathing as she did so. Her face – drawn, pale and tired – was framed by a shell of hair no longer a striking auburn but mouse-grey with subtle tinges of white. She had aged more than a decade; it was an extension of what she had attempted after escaping from the hospital but far bolder, far more complete. She was the Chinese image of the upper-middle-class, serious, no-nonsense tourist -probably a widow – who peremptorily issued instructions, counted her money, and never went anywhere without a guidebook which she continuously checked off against each site on her well-organized itinerary. The people of Tuen Mun knew such tourists well and their imposed portrait was accurate. Jason Bourne would approve.
There were other thoughts, however, that occupied her on the ride to Kowloon, desperate thoughts that she tried to control and keep in perspective, pushing away the panic that could so easily engulf her, causing her to do the wrong thing, make a wrong move that could harm David – kill David. Oh, God, where are you? How can I find you? Howl
She searched her memory for anyone who could help her, constantly rejecting every name and every face that came to her because in o
ne way or another each had been a part of that horrible strategy so ominously termed beyond-salvage -the death of an individual the only acceptable solution. Except, of course, Morris Panov, but Mo was a pariah in the eyes of the government; he had called the official killers by their rightful names: incompetents and murderers. He would get nowhere, and conceivably bring about a second order for beyond-salvage.
Beyond-salvage... A face came to her, a face with tears running down his cheeks, muted cries of mercy in his tremulous voice, a once-close friend of a young foreign service officer and his wife and children in a remote outpost called Phnom Penh. Conklin! His name was Alexander Conklin. Throughout David's long convalescence he had tried repeatedly to see her husband but David would not permit it, saying that he would kill the CIA man if he walked through the door. The crippled Conklin had wrongfully, stupidly made accusations against David, not listening to the pleas of an amnesiac, instead assuming treachery and 'turning' to the point where he had tried to kill David himself outside of Paris. And, finally, he had mounted a last attempt on New York's 71st Street, at a sterile house called Treadstone 71, that nearly succeeded. When the truth about David was known, Conklin had been consumed with guilt, shattered by what he had done. She had actually felt sorry for him; his anguish was so genuine, his guilt so devastating. She had talked with Alex over coffee on the porch, but David would never see him. He was the only one she could think of that made sense – any sense at all!
The hotel was called the Empress, on Chatham Road in Kowloon. It was a small hotel in the crowded Tsim Sha Tsui frequented by a mix of cultures, neither rich nor hardly poor, by and large salesmen from the East and West who had business to do without the largess of executive expense accounts. The banker, Jitai, had done his job; a single room had been reserved for a Mrs. Austin, Penelope Austin. The 'Penelope' had been Jitai's idea, for he had read many English novels and 'Penelope' seemed 'so right'. So be it, as Jason Bourne would have said, thought Marie.
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