by Adam Brookes
“Shouldn’t we talk to the Clarkes before we make diagnoses?” said Patterson.
Hopko looked surprised.
“Oh, Malcolm Clarke died years ago. But Sonia’s still alive.”
“And will that help us?”
“Do you know, I think it might.” Hopko beamed. “Because the word was that Sonia did all the work.”
He could have used his new mobile phone, but something in Peanut understood the function of the cut-out. And that something—call it tradecraft—told him one phone for Mangan, another for the professor.
So he took a bus, and then he walked, to Beijing South Railway Station, the morning frigid, the color of ashes. He stayed with a crowd, where he could. Three times he cut abruptly on to quiet side streets. He found no one on his back. But the sense of precariousness was growing in him.
He made his way through the murmuring crowd, migrants most of them, with their cheap luggage, string bags of fruit, cigarettes, to find the station a shining silver dome, sparkling lights affixed to nests of white steel. He saw a train that looked like something from the science comics he hoarded as a child, sleek, white, sculpted. It looked like a missile. He stared at it, wondered at its shimmering modernity, and had to tear himself away.
No one was using the public phones. He dialed slowly, using the card Yin had given him.
“Yes?”
“It’s me. We’re going out for dinner. You’re paying.”
Silence.
“The Oasis. In Qianmen. Six o’clock.”
Nothing.
“Do you hear me, Jinghan?”
“Yes.”
A long day, spent weaving through south Beijing. He’d been tempted for a moment by the Revolutionary History Museum on Tiananmen Square, but caught himself. The thought of the plainclothes men made his stomach lurch.
So he followed the railway tracks south for a time, and then west, into a district of light industry. He walked into a sharp wind that howled between silent, still factory buildings. Weeds sprouted through the asphalt. A strange whitish dust had settled on roofs and car windows. Then through broad tree-lined streets, north to Taoranting Park, where he sat for an hour listening to a knot of old men singing Beijing opera to each other. They had set up their operational base in a concrete pavilion by a lake. They had laid newspapers on the stone table, a bag of fruit, a thermos full of tea. One played an erhu, its two strings mournful in the gray cold over the lake, the green water. The men ignored Peanut. There was no one else. A few flakes of snow fell.
Another round of Hopko’s Fancies, this time for the benefit of higher orders. Roly Yeats, Head of Western Hemisphere and Far East Controllerate, now sat in Hopko’s sanctum beneath the fine, fragile leaves of bamboo and waited for the conundrum to be placed before him. He was once a lecturer at Manchester, Patterson knew. He was impish, ginger-bearded and elusive, Patterson thought. He rubbed his hands together.
“Yup, okay. So what have we got, Val?”
Hopko had assumed the advantage by placing herself behind her own desk.
“Well, it’s a poser.” Hopko looked over her glasses and smiled.
“Fire away, then.” Yeats had a northern twang, for authenticity, thought Patterson.
Hopko turned to Patterson and looked expectant. Patterson swallowed, and began.
“Well, we’ve all seen the latest from Charteris. The contact has turned up unbidden at Mangan’s flat, handed him a fragment of a white-hot document and left. We have a photo of the contact. And a letter with a phone number.”
Hopko said, “Charteris was clumsy, but at least he got hold of the material.”
Drinkwater of Security was tensed, ready to leap.
“Could we please have a bit more bloody detail? Where did Charteris and Mangan meet? Under what circumstances? Was anyone watching their backs? This feels slipshod, frankly.”
Yeats looked benign. “Perhaps Charteris was improvising, frankly.”
“He bloody well was improvising, I’d say.”
“Is that a sin, in the circumstances?” said Patterson.
Drinkwater leaned forward and for once talked straight at her.
“In Beijing improvising is a sin,” he said. “In Beijing we plan. We consult. We do not improvise, unless we want to be eaten alive.”
All present regarded Drinkwater for a moment, then Yeats turned to Waverley.
“Tom.”
“Well, the document changes things somewhat, doesn’t it?” he said, evenly.
“Tell us why, please.”
Waverley cleared his throat. “Charteris is right. Even this, the table of contents, reaches the CX threshold. This is useable intelligence.” He ran a hand through his hair. “The consensus was really pretty strong that the DF-41 program was dormant, or abandoned. Not just us, the Americans, too. And the Japanese. But this, just this, seems to tell us that it’s alive. And how. Mobile, long-range ballistic missiles built for multiple thermonuclear warheads, in testing, if this is to be believed. Why don’t we know about it? And what the hell is the April sixteenth incident? We have no idea.”
“So it’s gone for assessment?” said Yeats.
“To Defence Intelligence. And they’re already breathing heavily.”
“Why, do you think?”
“Well, they see missile program, Roly. Major intelligence requirement. Crucial. And the cover sheet and number match known formats for Leading Small Group Documents, though obviously they grumble that it’s a photocopy. They’ll want the original, and the rest of it, mark my words.”
Yeats stirred. “Are we not getting ahead of ourselves a little?”
“All the usual caveats, Roly,” said Waverley quickly. “Maybe it’s fake, maybe it’s being peddled, whatever. But we need to start looking for collateral, and, reluctantly, I think we must take a closer peek at our mystery man. Poems and all.”
“Yes, what’s the poem about, anyway? Lotus? What is it?” said Drinkwater.
Hopko looked over her glasses.
“It’s an excerpt from a work called Li Sao. It’s very ancient. Written by a man named Qu Yuan. A reflection on loyalty and rejection and exile, told through a shamanic journey.”
Silence for a moment, while the notion of ancient Chinese shamanic journeys was digested.
“Well, what does he mean by it?” Drinkwater sounded offended.
“He says he quotes it by way of explaining his motivation,” said Patterson, in the hope of offending Drinkwater further.
“Yes, I’m aware of that, thank you. But how does it explain his motivation? I mean, really.”
“I’m not sure it helps us much,” said Hopko quietly.
“And what about the rest of it?” said Yeats. “Does anybody have a view on his offer of service?”
“Yes, I do, Roly,” said Drinkwater. “And it’s not bloody repeatable.”
“The thing is.” Yeats folded his arms. “The thing is, this all feels very unusual. And I find I’m less interested in the document—forgive me, Tom—than I am in the notion that this chap wants us to believe he has access. So who is he? What access has he got? And is he righteous? Or is he bad? I think we should take a sniff of him—if, and only if, we can do it at arm’s length. No direct contact with Beijing Station.”
The room was silent for a moment, Drinkwater biting his lip, Hopko looking over at Patterson questioningly. What now? Patterson thought.
Yeats put his palms on his knees, elbows out, as if to rise. “Minute and plan of action to me, please, Val. Assessment to me, please, Tom. And, Simon?”
“Yes?” said Drinkwater.
“Unclench a little.”
They all rose to go. As Patterson walked down the corridor, Yeats slowed and waited for her.
“Good work…“
“Patterson, sir.”
“Oh, call me Roly, please. I rather get the sense you’d like to be involved in this operation, if operation there is to be.”
She didn’t reply, sensed something in his look, danger
.
“Just be sure to keep me apprised, won’t you?” he said.
12
Beijing
By six the cold was coming on. Qianmen was thick with people and glittered with winter lights. Peanut, tired and chilled, turned on to a pedestrian street hung with red lanterns. A medicine shop spilled its woody reek into the street. The smell at once comforted him and enlivened in him a powerful desire for something, for a life in an unnamed town somewhere filled with the familiar, a life not yet lived.
Oasis was cavernous and dim. Sour-faced waiters wore beaded waistcoats and embroidered skullcaps. On the walls were murals of maidens, curvaceous and green-eyed, in clothes of revealing gossamer. The Exotic Silk Road! The Sensuous Desert! Brash central Asian synth-pop blared in a language Peanut couldn’t identify. There was to be a floor show. Peanut took a booth at the back of the restaurant. He ordered lamb kebabs in chili and cumin, noodles with sweet peppers, salad, bread and beer. He waited.
Twenty minutes later the silver-haired professor eased himself into the booth. He was expressionless.
“So this is what you ate, is it? All those years. Is this why I’m here? A reminder?” said Wen Jinghan.
“No, Jinghan. I ate corn bread for all those years. This is what I didn’t eat.”
“For all those years.”
“Don’t get petulant with me, Jinghan. You’re here because I told you to be here.” Peanut forked a chunk of dripping lamb on to a plate, added salad, and shoved it across the table at Wen, who stared at it.
“Tell me how it works,” said Peanut.
Wen Jinghan took his time.
“Where’s your sister?”
Peanut stopped chewing.
“Mei’s in New Zealand,” he said.
“She got away.”
“Yes, she got away.”
“Are you in touch with her?”
Peanut sat back.
“What are you trying to say to me, Jinghan? You’re not making a threat, are you?”
Wen looked up. “No. No threat. I just wanted to ask.”
“Because if it is a threat.”
“And your mother passed away, what, ten years ago? While you were away. My mother went to the funeral. Did you know that? Wore a black armband. Did all the bowing, everything. We sent a big wreath.”
“Did you now.”
Wen Jinghan withdrew a cigarette from a pack—Zhonghua brand, Peanut noticed, expensive, the cadre’s cigarette—and lit it slowly, collecting himself. Peanut took more lamb, tore off more bread, too quickly, he knew. Wen watched him.
“Clever of you to remember the anniversary of my father’s death. Do you think about your own father much?” Wen Jinghan said.
Peanut didn’t answer.
“When I saw you looming out of the trees, up there at the temple, I thought you’d come to be my friend again,” said Wen.
“No, you didn’t, Jinghan. You started to shit at the sight of me.”
Wen exhaled slowly. “This little scheme of yours. Is it working?”
“This little scheme of ours. And yes, thank you.” Peanut pushed his plate away from him. He reached over and took a cigarette from Wen’s pack, lit it. “Now. Tell me how it works.”
“How what works?”
“Your access. You mentioned networks.”
The professor just half-smiled, shook his head. Peanut stood up and walked around to Wen’s side of the booth. He looked around quickly. The restaurant was full and loud, plates clattering, music thumping. Peanut slid into the booth next to Wen and laid a hand on the back of his neck, applied gentle pressure. Wen had both hands braced against the side of the table now, pushing back.
“Jinghan, do not try to talk your way out of this. You are in. And you have a lot to lose.”
Wen Jinghan said nothing, his head forced down towards his plate. Peanut suddenly slackened his grip and Wen’s head jerked backwards.
“Tell me how it works.”
Wen stared furiously at the table, breathing hard, his nostrils flaring. A waitress looked, then looked away.
“Networks.”
“They are stand-alone networks. Do you know what that means?”
“Indulge me, Jinghan. I missed the… the what do you call it… the digital revolution.”
“It means that you can’t get access to them. They are secure. They are not connected to any other network. Passwords and fingerprint scans. And when you log on to them, every move you make is tracked by fifteen-year-old shits from some utterly unnamed security department. So, no, you can’t get anything from them for your sordid little scheme.”
The floor show had started. A couple in cartoonish Arabian dress danced on a stage to a pulsing Uighur love song. The man, heavy-browed, a scar on his bare shoulder, took the woman by the waist from behind and ran his hands down to her hips while she writhed. With an extended second finger he made a rotating motion against her skin, as if stimulating some exquisitely sensitive point. She feigned gasps. He stuck his tongue between his teeth and leered into the audience, some of whom were now up and dancing.
“You have printers, Jinghan.”
“You are a fucking baby.”
“Print things out.”
“Every time I print, the system monitors what I’ve printed. The fifteen-year-olds come and knock softly on my door. So polite. Professor, so sorry to bother you. But have we perchance been printing out these blueprints, those reports. Now, why would we need to do that? I print, I die.”
Peanut exhaled. “I like the sound of blueprints.”
“Fuck you, Huasheng.”
“So tell me how we do it.”
Wen Jinghan drew deeply on his cigarette and looked down, and Peanut knew instantly that there was a way.
“You will tell me, Jinghan. Really, you will.”
“We must find him first. And then we can take a look at him,” said Patterson.
They were in Hopko’s office, talking through an operational framework. Hopko wore kitten heels and a suit of some plum color. She was standing, holding her glasses by the earpiece.
“Go on,” she said, a note of caution in her voice.
“Well, we can’t use Charteris. All station officers are ruled out, Roly says. Drinkwater was close to foaming at the mouth at the thought of it.”
“So?” said Hopko.
“It will have to be a Visiting Case Officer.” Patterson tried to sound nonchalant, looked at her notes. “We use the telephone number and make a direct approach. Three days max, in and out. Probably best to use the Hong Kong land border and a train to Beijing.”
“And the Visiting Case Officer would be you, I imagine.”
“I know the case as well as anyone,” she said.
Hopko grinned. Patterson went on.
“Val, I have been with the Service now for well over a year. I am experienced. In the army I handled agents. In Iraq.”
“I know you want a run, Trish.”
“But what?”
“But China is a denied area. There will be no VCO.”
Patterson was nonplussed.
“Too dicey to contact him directly, too uncertain a payoff,” said Hopko. “If P77396 turns out not to be WINDSOCK at all but some MSS thug dangling us, ghastly consequences for all concerned. You’ll be picked up and under the lights in no time: thoroughly blown and even more thoroughly embarrassed.”
So how? wondered Patterson.
I will deal only with you, Mr. Mang An.
“Val, you’re not suggesting…“
“Why not?” said Hopko.
Mangan.
Patterson caught herself. The notion of using a civilian grated on every fiber of her military being. She tried not to sound too incredulous.
“Forgive me, but why on earth would Mangan consent to get involved? He’ll run a mile, won’t he? Sanctity of the press and all that.”
“He may, Trish, he may,” Hopko said, with what Patterson considered an indecent measure of equanimity.
H
opko had walked across the room and closed the door, using it to punctuate, change the subject.
“So,” she said. “How are you finding it?”
How am I finding what? thought Patterson.
“Do you miss the army?” said Hopko.
“Do I look as if I do?”
Hopko smiled. “Just wondered.”
Patterson shrugged. “It’s taken me a while to adjust to the, um, culture.”
“It’s just that—and this isn’t a criticism, merely an observation—you seem rather distanced from your work. I wonder if you’re happy in it.”
Patterson was startled.
“Well, I don’t think that’s the case at all, Val.”
She thought for a moment.
“I’ll admit to feeling on the back foot at times. Some of the older officers… “She didn’t complete the sentence.
“Like who? Between us, of course.”
“Do you know what Simon Drinkwater said to me? My second or third day in the P section? He was surprised to see me on the China beat. Thought I might be a bit… ‘conspicuous’ was the term he used. Thought I should look to the southern hemisphere.”
Hopko shook her head.
“Drinkwater is a frightful shit. But you’re not the first black officer in the Service, even if people like Drinkwater make you feel like you are.”
“It didn’t really matter in the army.”
“And we must ensure it doesn’t matter here. Are you ready for an operational role, Trish?”
Patterson, thoroughly wrong-footed now, sought to regain her balance, leaned forward on her chair.
“You know I am.”
“Well, then. Fancy a day out?”
13
SIS, Vauxhall Cross, London
She took a Service car. By late morning she was in the Chilterns, the motorway snaking past fields touched with frost.
As she drove, Patterson considered Valentina Hopko, her superior officer. Her mentor? Perhaps. She had sought intelligence on Hopko where she could, sought to understand the unlikely alchemy that had produced her. Hopko’s father was British, but of an émigré family—Ukrainian, was it?—working in the Gulf as an engineer. Her mother was Lebanese, and little Val spoke Arabic to her, Russian to her father and English to the Filipina maids. Her early years were spent all over the Middle East, Muscat, Sharjah, Basra, soaking up accents, stories, geography, scatological vocabulary.