Spy Games

by Adam Brookes

  Mangan inhaled, tried to collect his thoughts, think. He stayed in Mandarin.

  “What are you doing here, Peanut?” he said.

  “I’m not going back into business with you, if that’s what you’re worried about. One time was enough. Thanks all the same.” He made a tight no gesture.

  “But what…”

  The man turned to him, the eyes ticking with calculation.

  “This is where I washed up, Mang An. After everything. This is where they put me. And you could say the Thais find me useful. So many Chinese here! Everywhere! Running here and there, spying, stealing things, smuggling, money laundering. So I do a bit of this, bit of that.”

  “And what are you doing today?”

  “Today? Well, I would say I am trying to ascertain why Chiang Mai is swarming with Chinese goons, even more than usual. Quite brazen, these goons. Barging around, frightening people. Some seem to be military. And the others, the ones we saw tonight, as I say, corporate. And these corporate goons are very jumpy. They want something, or someone. My masters in Bangkok are keen to know what or who. They say to us, get the fuck up there and find out what’s going on. So we let them run, a bit of watching, a bit of listening. And suddenly, here you are, too.”

  He paused, inhaled.

  “So, your turn, Mang An.”

  Mangan shifted in his seat. Pain flared on his right side. He wondered if he had cracked some ribs.

  “It’s just a meeting. Nothing important.”

  “Any Thais involved?”

  “No.”

  “Sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t screw me around, Mang An. I can help you here, and you need all the help you can get. But you must tell me this. Any Thais?”

  “None—really. All foreigners. Nothing to do with Thailand. Third country meeting.”

  “China?”

  “Yes.”

  “You are running a Chinese source and you meet him here.”

  Mangan said nothing.

  The man considered.

  “Is that who they want, Mang An? The source?”

  “Couldn’t say.”

  “Yes. You could.”

  “I’m guessing they want the source more than me.”

  “So why are they chasing you?”

  Mangan laid his head back, closed his eyes.

  “I don’t have answers for you.”

  The man opened the door of the car, spat theatrically.

  “If it were up to me, I’d take you in and question you properly. Politely, but firmly. But my masters say I’m to let you run.”

  “You’ll probably learn more that way.”

  The man they’d called Peanut turned in his seat and looked at him.

  “Small world, ours, isn’t it, Mang An?”

  He started the car again, cigarette between his teeth, reversed out of the parking space, the car veering from side to side. He has only just learned to drive, thought Mangan.

  “I’m to take you to your hotel. You get your stuff. Then, I think, you leave.”

  “No,” said Mangan.

  They were squealing up the ramps.

  “If you stay, they will find you.”

  “They’ll find me quicker on a plane or a train.”

  “Maybe. But I tell you this. My people won’t be so charitable next time.”

  Mangan thought for a moment.

  “I’ll leave soon,” he said. “Just let me out. I’ll make my own way.”

  “What?”

  “Let me out.”

  He pulled the car over abruptly. “Your funeral, Mang An.”

  Mangan opened the rear door, forced himself out, his ribs an agony, legs stiffened and shrieking. He leaned down at the driver’s window.

  “I suppose I should say thank you,” he said.

  “I suppose it doesn’t matter if you do or you don’t.”

  Mangan nodded and made to go.

  “Mang An.”

  He turned back. Peanut was proffering something, something the size of his hand, wrapped in cloth.

  “This is strictly unofficial now, understand? Just for old times’ sake, yes?”

  Mangan nodded, took it.

  “You’ll need it, Mang An. Before this is over.” Then he pulled away fast into the traffic, oblivious, tuk-tuks swerving, honking at him.

  Mangan felt the heft of a pistol in his hand.

  Kai used a public phone at Oxford railway station. He fingered the business card of the detective who’d investigated the theft of the laptop. He telephoned the number, got voice mail. He hung up quickly. He felt light-headed, precipitous, as if suspended over some chasm. He was conscious of crowds of commuters around him, but he seemed to hear nothing. He went to the men’s lavatory, sat in a cubicle for twenty minutes, hugging himself. He wondered where this would end. He thought of his father, of the ministrations of Uncle Checkbook. He went back to the phones, called again. Detective Constable Busby answered.

  “I want to report a missing person,” Kai said.

  56

  Outside Oxford

  The place was only thirty or so minutes north of the city. Nicole turned off the main road, and a mile later she could just make out stands of beech trees and a body of water in the darkness. The road was potholed, barbed wire to either side, and led into woodland.

  She pulled in before a silent bungalow in the trees, its pale paintwork streaked with mold, drifts of leaves against its walls. A sign: Holiday Lets. Fishing, Swimming. The minivan was already there. She got out, stood listening. Just wind hissing in the trees. She went to the door, tapped.

  Madeline Chen was slumped on a foul, mildewed sofa, her eyes open. The only light was from a table lamp, the curtains drawn. Two of the men were with her. The third, they said, was outside, circling the property. She heard the crackle of a walkie-talkie.

  They waited. Two hours, three. The girl began to move, stirring on the sofa, looking at them, her mouth working.

  The two men began to undress her, her limbs still limp, unresisting. They left her underwear on, picked her up and sat her on a kitchen chair, taped her hands behind, her ankles to the chair legs. Her look was coming back to life, her eyes drenched in fear now.

  Nicole dragged a chair over and sat in front of her.

  “Madeline, can you hear me, sweetheart?”

  The girl’s eyes focused on her.

  “Can you speak? Or just nod if you’re understanding me.”

  The girl nodded.

  “You’ll be back to normal very soon. I promise.” She raised her eyebrows, gave the girl a questioning look. The girl nodded again.

  “I’m going to ask you some questions and it’s very, very important that you answer them, okay? It’s very important, Madeline. And then when you’ve answered them, we can all get out of here and get back to normal, and no one will know any of this happened.”

  The girl’s eyes roamed around the room.

  “It’s important for you and for your family. Some people are making some stupid mistakes, Madeline, and it’s important that you should not be one of them. So you can carry on with your life and we can be friends.”

  The girl blinked, her face pallid, a sheen on her forehead.

  “I think your father, or someone in your family has told you something about a plan. A plan to attack the Fan family. To ruin them. You’ve heard about this, haven’t you?”

  The girl made a barely discernible shake of her head.

  Nicole looked down, put her hand to her mouth. Let’s try this again.

  “You need to let us know what this is about, sweetheart. Really, you do. Let’s think back.”

  She raised her hand and put it to the girl’s cheek.

  “You father has spoken about this, hasn’t he? You’ve heard him speak about it, haven’t you?”

  The girl seemed to be making a monumental effort, leaning back in her chair. She jerked forward and spat at Nicole. One of the men handed Nicole a tissue and she wiped her face, waited
a beat, smiled.

  “I don’t doubt your bravery, Madeline. I don’t doubt your loyalty to your family. Those are good things. But some mistakes have been made, sweetheart, and we just need to make a readjustment or two.”

  Nicole looked meaningfully at the two men in the room.

  “And we don’t have very long. It’s much better you talk to me than to them.”

  Madeline was starting to speak, the words coming out half-formed, as if her lips were numb or cold.

  “I don’t know,” she said.

  “But you do,” said Nicole.

  “Not… anything.”

  “But you told the Fan boy, didn’t you, that something was going to happen.”

  “Don’t know what will happen.”

  “Well, Madeline, we have to know what you do know, sweetheart.”

  The girl sat back, shivered.

  Nicole sighed, rubbed her eyes.

  “Where is your father now?”

  The girl shrugged, her eyes down.

  “When did you last talk to him?”

  Madeline thought.

  “Last week.”

  “And what did you talk about?”

  Another shrug.

  “When did he last talk to you about the Fan family?”

  She shook her head.

  “When you said ‘something is coming’ to Fan Kaikai, what did you mean?”

  “Nothing. I just meant… that things are changing. China is changing. That’s all.”

  “I think you meant something a bit more specific than that.”

  She shook her head.

  “You have to do better than this, Madeline.”

  She shook her head again. Nicole leaned in to her.

  “You have to do better. These men… they’re waiting. Soon they’ll want to take over.”

  The girl blinked, fear staining her eyes.

  “Why? Who are they?”

  “They are from Beijing, sweetheart. They’re very, very serious. This whole thing is very serious. You must start talking to us, properly now.”

  The girl was shifting, squirming, looking at the men. A tear rolled down her cheek.

  “I know,” said Nicole. “So talk to me. What did your father say about the Fans? About a plan.”

  The girl looked away, crying now.

  “Nothing. Just… just he wanted to get rid of them.”

  “Okay, that’s good. That’s very good. Well done. Now when was this?”

  “Spring. March, maybe.”

  “Good. And what exactly did he say?”

  “Just like what I told you. They had to go. Things would change.”

  Nicole was nodding, smiling.

  “Good, good. Now what did he say about when, and how?”

  The girl looked at her, shook her head, closed her eyes and the tears spilled out.

  One of the men spoke.

  “All right. Time now.”

  Nicole ignored him.

  “Come on, Madeline. Quickly now. Tell me. Just tell me anything he said.”

  The man walked across the room, gestured at her with his chin. Nicole sighed. The girl was shaking.

  The man was holding a plastic bag, a length of elastic. He spoke again.

  “We need to move this along.”

  Nicole looked up at him. He gestured again with his chin. She looked at Madeline, then got up and walked away. The girl began making a mewling sound, straining against the tape.

  Chiang Mai

  Mangan found he was all but past caring. Exhausted, dehydrated, sweat and fear in his pores, the pain in his side flaring with each step.

  And at exactly that point, Philip, when you are exhausted and lonely and afraid, and you get sloppy, is when they find you.

  He remembered Patterson talking, at one of their sessions at the Paddington house.

  So when you find yourself there, go to ground, if you can. Lock the door, close the curtains. Do nothing. Sleep. Eat. Wait for daylight. Then make a plan.

  He took a taxi, then another, then walked for a while. It was midnight and the streets were quietening. He went into a late night supermarket, wandered up and down the aisles. Up and down. Nobody wandered with him.

  He bought a bottle of vodka, antiseptic cream, bandages, sticking plaster, plastic bags. The man behind the counter looked at him, saw the dried blood on his shirt and whatever had happened to his chin and frowned.

  He paid, took the carrier bag, walked to the back of the store, slipped through a plastic curtain into a storage area. A woman in a surgical mask and rubber gloves was sweeping the floor. She gestured at him, urging him back the way he had come. Mangan said something, pointed to his watch and smiled, kept walking. A steel door led out to an alleyway, the reek of piss. He didn’t know where he was. He kept walking, then took a taxi he found crawling slowly along the street.

  Back at the Banyan, he stood in the bathroom, picking pieces of grit from the gash on his chin. His shin was scraped raw and badly bruised. He taped his ribs, poured an inch of vodka, lit a cigarette and sat on the bed.

  He unwrapped the pistol. It was a Chinese thing, metallic and heavy, the butt emblazoned with a star, a weird retro look to it, bringing to mind People’s Liberation Army propaganda posters, rosy-cheeked soldiers, the glow of a Maoist dawn behind them, brandishing just such a weapon. Two full clips. He unloaded it, worked the slide, found the safety catch.

  One of the two passports, the weapon, the two clips and some of the money went in plastic bags and into the cistern in the bathroom.

  He logged on to the darknet site.

  Transfer effected>

  He turned off the light and stood at the window for a while. He watched the insects drifting through the light from street lamps, a dog, watchful, pacing.

  No response.

  He lowered himself gingerly onto the bed, tried to sleep.

  57

  Outside Oxford

  Nicole left the room, walked down a darkened hallway to a grimy kitchen, battered Formica cabinets, a stove, vinyl floor tiles. The place smelled of damp. She sat at the table. A pack of cigarettes lay there, a lighter. One of the men’s, obviously, Zhongshan brand.

  Poor tradecraft, she thought. They’ll find the butts.

  She took one, lit it, exhaled, closed her eyes, ran a hand through her hair, listened. She was part of it, now. The realization was thick, heavy, tinged with loathing. This filthy place. She had thought of herself as something other than this. To Gristle, she was just… whatever he needed her to be. She felt a flicker of anger. His protection be damned.

  A thump from the front room, muffled voices.

  She sat, smoked, waited.

  The man came into the kitchen after seven or eight minutes. It doesn’t take long, she thought. She stood up and went back to the front room.

  The chair had fallen over and Madeline, still taped to it by the hands and ankles, lay on her side. She shook violently, her face white, hair plastered to her forehead, jaw trembling. Her chest was heaving, as if she’d run a long way. The man lifted her and set the chair on its feet. Nicole leaned over her.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  The girl’s look was stunned, disbelieving.

  “Now you must tell us what your father said, Madeline, or I’m afraid it will happen again.”

  She was moaning, shaking her head, her mouth distending, turning down at the corners.

  “Tell me, Madeline.”

  The man walked back across the room, opening up the plastic bag, and Nicole heard a muffled scream as she left the room.

  It took four applications of the bag—whether from the girl’s innate toughness or her panic and confusion, it was hard to tell. Nicole looked at her watch. It was nearly four in the morning. She wanted to be gone by daylight.

  “Madeline.”

  The girl was slumped in the chair, tendrils of snot and saliva dangling from her. She seemed very small and weak.

  “Madeline.”

  The head moved upward frac
tionally.

  Nicole leaned over, put her hand under the girl’s chin and pushed the head up.

  “Did your father talk to you?”

  A nod.

  “When is he going to move?”

  “Soon. This month.”

  “Why now?”

  “Before Beidaihe.” Beidaihe, the annual retreat of the Communist Party elite to a scruffy beach resort. The place where strategies were planned, deals were done.

  “What did he tell you is to happen?”

  “Arrests.”

  “Who?”

  “Fans.”

  “All of them?”

  A nod.

  “Names, Madeline. Who else is involved?”

  “The staff.”

  “Your father’s?”

  A nod.

  “Who else?”

  “There’s a colonel. 2PLA. He’s in the south. Kunming. Friends down there.”

  “His name, Madeline?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “Really?”

  A nod, the tears coming again.

  “In Kunming? Is that where the friends are?”

  “There’s a place, somewhere they control. It’s… on the border. There.”

  The man was stepping forward with the bag. But Nicole gestured no. There wasn’t much more.

  What there was, was another hypodermic. And a medevac jet waiting at Kidlington airport twelve miles away. The real interrogation was still to come, somewhere out of the country, somewhere secure. And Nicole pushed the thought to the fringes of her mind, picked up her things, left without a word, gunning the Mini down the track.

  Gristle was waiting. He’d come in on a diplomatic passport and was sitting, crumpled, diminished, on the edge of the bed in the Hounslow safe house. The traffic roared past outside, trucks rattling the windows. She leaned against the mantelpiece, exhausted.

  He just said, “And?”

  She walked across the room and handed a memory stick to him.

  “The recording’s on there,” she said.

  “Tell me,” he said.

  “There wasn’t much, but enough, maybe.”

  “Tell me.”

  “It sounds like some kind of factional thing. General Chen wants to take down the Fan family, all their people, networks. He’ll use 2PLA to do it. They have some sort of support structure in Kunming, the southwest.”