China Dolls

by Rob Wood

  “I would think the CIA or FBI—whatever—would be all over this,” said Martha.

  “Sure, after the fact,” said Purdy. “The problem is proving that Cao Kai has this plan, will implement the plan, and can be stopped.”

  “Why doesn’t the government just pick him up?” asked Martha.

  “There has been no crime—yet. You can’t just pick up a foreign national for questioning,” said Purdy. “In his case, he was extended certain protections and privileges by the government, as well. He is not only an officer in the Peoples Liberation Army, he is also an investor whom some portray as the poster child for Sino-U.S. economic cooperation.”

  “From their point of view, it’s a matter of evidence,” said Cochrane. “Cao Kai told Lily certain details of his plans. However, that’s not enough for an indictment. Not by a long shot. Our assumption is that he is controlling the disposition of radioactive material stolen from the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan. Where is that material? We think it’s aboard a Venezuelan oil tanker. We believe it exists, but there are no reports of anything even being stolen.”

  “So why do you believe this?” asked Martha.

  “One: Cao Kai has taken a big position in oil futures—a huge gamble. This backs up his story to Lily about his intentions. Two: We can connect him to an agent who may have stolen the radioactive material—someone who died of massive radiation poisoning. Three: We believe he has the means to deliver the material to target via his connections with the Venezuelan oil industry.”

  “So, he has the motive and the means?”

  “And he kidnapped the three of us,” said Cochrane.

  “Kidnapped?” Martha gasped.

  “Yes. Cao Kai wanted us out of the way. Why? Because we can expose his phony cover as an investor and frustrate his move to spike commodities markets.”

  “So why don’t you go to the authorities now—as kidnap victims? That’s a crime!”

  “We have alerted the authorities. I’m not sure they believed any of this. If they take us in for questioning, there will be a delay. We can’t afford that. At least two of Cao Kai’s men had plane tickets to New Orleans for tomorrow. A Venezuelan crude oil carrier, a VLCC, is docking there—tomorrow. We want to get there first. We’ll be happy to talk at length to an alphabet soup of agencies … after tomorrow.”

  “How can I help.”

  “I’d like to charge my phone,” said Lily.

  “We’d appreciate some cash, a few hours’ sleep. . . a little something to eat,” said Purdy.

  “Anything you want, it’s yours. There aren’t any ATMs up here in the hills, but you can have everything that Neil and I have in the way of cash,” said Martha. “There’s a guest bedroom upstairs….and Lieutenant, you’re welcome to the couch if it will suit.”

  Purdy nodded.

  “Raid the refrigerator when you leave. I’ll pack up some sandwiches and lunch things for the road. It’s time I did that for Megan, anyway. Neil drops her off at school on his way to work.”

  “Let me help you with the sandwiches,” said Cochrane. The two women walked into the kitchen.

  Cochrane opened the refrigerator door. “Got a ton of eggs here, Martha!”

  “I’ve got a growing family—and access to my neighbor’s free-range chickens. Scramble some up tomorrow.”

  “I’m not sure I’d dare—around Purdy. He makes his with goat cheese, spinach greens, and Herbes de Provence.”

  “The man’s got to learn he can’t have everything he wants.”

  “Oh, I’d give him everything he wants,” said Cochrane.

  Martha looked at her for a long five seconds. “I’ve got a feeling you better tell me about this guy, Cody.”

  “That’s really why I came, Martha. You’re the only family I’ve got.”

  45

  TRUST

  Less than five hours later, rested and recharged, Cochrane bustled Lily out the door. Purdy brought up the rear, the Zeiss spotting scope under his arm. Just a loan—or so he hoped. He checked to see that there was nothing to connect three strangers to this perfect family nest in the foothills. Then the phone rang. They paused, holding the front door ajar. Listening was a conditioned response, just a precaution, after all. The call rolled over to the answering machine.

  “Neil, this is Martha. I’m at the hospital. I have some gentlemen from the government waiting to talk to me. I wanted you to know I’ll be delayed getting home for lunch. It’s about some missing persons. Just routine, they assure me. Hug Megan for me.”

  Cochrane looked at Purdy. “Government? FBI? That message was meant for us.”

  “We better assume that they’re on their way here,” said Purdy. “We’re a lot more vulnerable out here with our New York plates than we’d be on the interstate.”

  “Not to worry,” said Cochrane. “We’ll be back on the highway in no time. I know every back road through the Pisgah Forest—and the Feds don’t.”

  They shot down the drive with Cochrane at the wheel, but in less than 20 minutes, “shot,” hardly described their winding, bumpy path over back roads, sometimes with the “real highway,” passing overhead on a massive concrete arch that left them dwarfed deep down in a ravine.

  Spring rains had washed out parts of the gravel beneath their wheels. At one time they dipped into a hollow, so low they were eye level with the Timothy and Sweet William waving gently on the roadside.

  “Sure hope that left front strut holds,” said Purdy, as the minivan rocked up and out of the hollow.

  A warm, peaty smell wafted in through the windows. A flock of sparrows dashed through an abandoned primrose hedge, hell bent on some urgent, unknowable errand.

  “What’s that?” Purdy sat bolt upright.

  “Where?” gasped Cochrane. “What do you see?”

  “It’s what I hear. A helicopter. It’s distant—but it’s there.”

  “Probably a life-flight to the hospital. “

  Purdy shook his head. “This is going very slow . . . and coming closer.”

  “What’ll we do?”

  “Assume the worst—that they’re flying a surveillance grid. I’d judge we’ve got a good ten minutes before we’re visible—a pregnant roller skate in the land of pickup trucks. What’s ten minutes away from here? You know, like a town where we can pull into a parking lot.”

  “Well, there’s this place called Trust.”

  “A town?”

  “No. It’s just a name. It’s not even incorporated. It’s got a gas station-store-and cemetery. Gas station guy digs the graves.”

  “Your capitalism is so interesting,” sniped Lily from the back seat. “Pregnant roller what?”

  “I’m thinking we need some gas,” said Purdy. “Let’s do it.”

  Cochrane punched the gas pedal, spitting gravel out from the rear tires. Even so, it seemed the drumming of the helicopter rotors was gaining on them.

  “If we can’t see them, they can’t see us. I hope.”

  They lurched down the road, in and out of clusters of pines, one of which was bleeding sap from the nails holding a board painted with the faded letters ‘T-R-U-S-T.’

  “Here we are.”

  “I don’t see anything.”

  “Up ahead.”

  Up ahead was a building made of limestone slabs, all ragged and random, mortised together by an optimistic mason who never saw a stone that could not be supported, cushioned or engulfed by cement.

  “Gas-oil-cigarettes,” read the sign.

  “There’s a service bay open—pull right in,” ordered Purdy.

  Cochrane pulled in, turned the ignition key off, and the minivan sighed and shivered to a stop.

  “Everybody out.”

  They could see two men in overalls and greasy flannel shirts, still as lawn ornaments at the corner of the building. The men’s faces craned upward.

  Lily covered her ears as the throb of the helicopter welled up and receded, matching the shadow that engulfed the garage bay and then ebbed away
.

  The copter had passed low enough to tousle the tops of a stand of ragged southern pines. The men in flannel shirts waved up at the copter, dropping their gaze on Purdy and company only after the chopper was well away.

  “Like to get an oil change,” Purdy said.

  “Yeah, well I usually drive the cars into the bay myself, know what I mean?” said the oldest.

  “We didn’t mean anything by it. When I said, ’there’s an open bay.” She thought I meant her to drive into it.”

  “She your wife?”

  “No.”

  “Nice looking piece. What about the other one?” he said, running his tongue over his lower lip, as he watched Lily follow Cochrane into the adjoining room marked “Gifte Shoppe.”

  “No. They’re just friends.”

  “No covetous man shall have any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ.”

  “Yeah, well I just need an oil change . . . and some gas.” Purdy looked hard at the old man. “Who are you to call me covetous? You old bastard!” Purdy thought to himself.

  “It’s pay ahead. Cash and go.” The old man said it like he’d just thrown down a gauntlet.

  “Okay,” Purdy nodded. “Fair and square.”

  “John-Ed!” the man hollered to his crony. “The women are in the gift shop. See to their needs.”

  The other man smiled from under his Agri-Pro gimme cap. His teeth hung in a loopy smile like shirts on a tenement clothesline. He shuffled after Lily, who was absorbed by the rows of display tables in the “Gifte Shoppe.”

  The merchandising was as straightforward as a Saturday afternoon flea market. There was a table of old Smoky Mountain postcards. There was a table of used CDs: Elvis, Doc and Chickie Williams, the Statler Brothers. By the cash register were the “Eats”: jars of pickled eggs and pickled pig’s feet, beef jerky, and an apron of potato chip bags behind which loomed an old red soda pop machine.

  “What’s this?” Lily asked Cochrane. Lily was holding a rubber chicken up with her thumb and forefinger gingerly pressed around the neck. The chicken dangled over her upturned face and looked pleased to be considered so carefully.

  “It’s a rubber chicken.”

  “Yes. But why?”

  “It’s supposed to be funny.”

  “Ha!” Lily said experimentally. “And this?” A thin, limp lozenge of pink plastic was draped over her hand. She held it as she would a fine silk scarf.

  “That’s a whoopee cushion.” Cochrane shook her head, knowing this was a mystery that could not be grasped. “You blow it up. You sit on it. It makes a funny noise.”

  “Made in China,” Lily observed.

  “Uh-huh. Listen, Lily, knock yourself out here with the cultural artifacts. I’m going to use the Ladies Room.”

  John Ed sidled over and grabbed a bag of chips. He leaned casually against the pop machine. “You a Japanese?” he asked Lily?

  “No.”

  John Ed frowned. “Vietnamese?”

  “No.”

  “What then?”

  “Filipino,” she said sarcastically.

  John Ed turned this over in his mind. “I’ve read about you … mail order brides and all.”

  Lily stopped to examine a collection of bark-rimmed, wooden ovals. Each 4x6 tablet had a message woodburned into it, then covered with an amber varnish. “Kissin’ don’t last, cookin’ do. The best way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.”

  Lily held them in her hands, puzzling over them as if the words could unlock mysteries.

  “Don’t you believe them things, Sweetheart,” huffed John-Ed, exuding a fragrance mixed from gasoline, alcohol, and tobacco. “That ain’t the way to get a man.”

  He slipped his hand around her and cupped her right breast.

  Lily’s jaw dropped in surprise

  “Just a little feel?”

  Lily transferred the wooden plaques to her left hand in a careful, deliberate motion. John Ed’s hand squeezed her breast as if he were trying to get a grip on a stuck faucet.

  “You Filipinos got nice tits. Chewy nipples I bet . . . Aargh!”

  Lily slammed her heel down on the man’s instep, reached back and grabbed a hank of hair with her right hand. In one fluid motion, she pushed back with her buttocks and rolled him over her right hip. She pulled down on the head, his right hand, empty now, dangling down from her breast.

  Banjo-eyed and befuddled, John Ed hit the ground with a whack. His head and hands bounced on the floor.

  Lily turned and carefully put the wooden plaques back where she had found them on the table. This maneuver left her with her back to John Ed who was puffing now like a breaching whale. He picked himself up, turned and dove at Lily, aiming for a shoestring tackle. Lily pirouetted away from the table of country wisdoms and shot upwards, lifting her legs in a dancer’s splits, three feet off the ground.

  John Ed grabbed an armful of air and skidded down the aisle on his face. He rose, panting and angry. Out of sheer frustration, he picked up an object from the next table and threw it at Lily as hard as he could.

  Lily saw it coming. She caught it softly with both hands and pulled it into her chest. A tight end hauling in a swing pass couldn’t have done better. But a tight end doesn’t pause to contemplate the football. Lily looked down at the object and frowned. It was a porcelain dog dressed as a dentist.

  Her momentary reflection put Lily at a disadvantage. She had to catch the next of John Ed’s missiles one-handed, a stabbing left-handed grab. It was a dog dressed as an old-fashioned golfer with knickers and Gatsby cap.

  Lily’s deft fielding infuriated John Ed. She was making fun of him, humiliating him in the worst way. Yet, at the same time, he was fascinated. He flung a third porcelain at her, a dog dressed as a nun.

  To accommodate the oncoming nun, Lily tossed the dentist lightly in the air. She caught the nun with her right hand, the dentist with her left toe, snapping it up like a hackysak ball. It rose briefly and as it fell down toward her stomach, she folded, lifting her knees and sinking to the floor to cradle it against her midsection.

  John Ed was on her in a second. He slammed all of his weight into her shoulders, snapping her head back against the floor. Lily whipped the golfing dog against his left ear, the dentist into his right. John Ed yowled in pain, sat back and grabbed his ears with his hands. As he shifted backwards, Lily hooked her right foot under his chin and pulled him down prone. She linked her left foot with the right around his neck in a sleeper hold. At the same time, her hands grabbed the toes of his boots, rotating them clockwise in an ankle lock. She twisted her torso over the boots to help hold them down under her. John Ed flailed his arms and beat the floor with his hands, but he could not dislodge her locked feet or reach any vulnerable spot in her body. He throbbed and twitched, and then, as the blood drained from his brain, he ebbed into unconsciousness.

  Lily rose slowly, a porcelain figure in each hand. When she turned away from the prostrate figure, his flannel shirt billowing out of his overalls, there was Cochrane, arms akimbo, eyes blazing.

  “What are you doing?” hissed Cochrane.

  “Just browsing,” replied Lily. She pointed to a sign: “If you break it, you’ve bought it.”

  “I didn’t want to buy anything.”

  46

  EYES ON THE PRIZE

  They drove methodically through Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi. Cochrane bought gas with her sister’s credit card. They rotated drivers. They stared at white lines, black top, and the forbidding carcasses of truck tires, peeled and strewn in careless humps and curves, like so many black lizards on the road shoulder.

  Their destination was Port Fourchon. Purdy said they could monitor LOOP through the spotting scope and be close to the pipeline and terminal facilities at the same time.

  The lack of any definite plan grated on them, on Cochrane most of all. Lily had had a couple of conversations with a contact on Lucky Lady. She and Purdy seemed to be content to wait things out. Cochrane, however, was looking
for “i’s” to dot and “t’s” to cross.

  “How many ships will be in port?” she asked. “How will we know which one is our target?”

  “The offshore port isn’t a port like you see in New Orleans, Melbourne, or Hong Kong,” said Purdy. “It’s an island that sits in deep water. There are no slips or ship berths. Instead, there are four separate mooring buoys at which ships can tie up and offload oil.”

  “Four? How will we know which ship is ours?”

  “If it’s a Venezuelan registered vessel, it will be flying a Venz flag at the stern. That’s required by maritime law. Look for a flag with green and yellow thirds and a crescent of stars.”

  Lily added, “Each vessel also has a unique transponder signature. The Lucky Lady is already checking them out.”

  “She’s there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can she stop the tanker?”

  “No.”

  “No?” Cochrane gritted her teeth. “You know, Purdy, this is worse than jumping out of the plane over the Khunjerab. I just don’t know what to expect.”

  There were no topics of conversation other than the oil tanker. After a while, Cochrane began again. “We should attempt to board the ship,” she said.

  “I doubt that we could get close,” said Purdy. “If we did, how would we move up the hull and onto the deck? And, of course, we don’t have a deep-water capable ship.”

  “According to Lily, we’ve got the Lucky Lady.”

  “It’s still at sea.”

  “Well, couldn’t it intercept the tanker?”

  “That’s a crime. That would ruin Zhang Enterprises. And it wouldn’t work. Shoot it? Crash it? You can’t risk human life, an oil spill, any number of negative outcomes. Besides, what can it do? It’s a pleasure yacht.”

  “Oh, I’d say she’s built for business and pleasure,” said Lily.

  “She’s armed?”

  “Very.”

  “Can she at least slow the tanker down?”

  “You’re talking a bazillion foot pounds of momentum. It takes those babies three miles to stop even when they intend to.”