by Marc Cameron
“Late last night,” he said, “one of our case officers received a flash communication from VICAR. Apparently, MSS operatives first believed the professor had defected or was taken by the Russians. They confronted agents working for the SVR in a Huludao pastry shop near the professor’s home. One of the male Russian agents was killed in the initial contact, while an adult female and her adult brother were taken prisoner. The MSS officers questioned them, but eventually ascertained the Russians didn’t have the professor. According to the female Russian, the Chinese were still working out the details of their theory when a new man kicked in the door and started shooting. She thought he may have been a gangster, but he immediately shot one of the MSS operatives as soon as he burst in. She was just able to escape—”
Ryan raised his hand. “Hang on a minute. Someone other than the MSS officers was shooting?”
“That’s correct, Mr. President. The newcomer. The female SVR agent described him as a tall Asian male with a long coat and a felt hat, a fedora, but she didn’t stay around long enough to get a good look at his face. She told her SVR handler that she heard at least five more shots as she fled down the alley. Local news says three Chinese and two Russians were killed at a Huludao pastry shop in an apparent botched robbery. The SVR report eventually landed on VICAR’s desk. In VICAR’S words: ‘The Chinese know you have Liu Wangshu.’”
“And we’re sure we don’t?” Ryan asked. “One of your operatives doesn’t have him on ice at some Busan safe house right now waiting for the heat to blow over?”
“That possibility did cross my mind,” Foley said. “Liu Wangshu would be a good get, for whoever gets him. He’s privy to all sorts of treasure regarding Chinese submarine technology. But I’ve been assured by station chiefs and DIA assets in that part of the world that we are in no way culpable for this.”
Ryan finished off his coffee and set the mug on the side table, none too gently. “Okay. Then tell me who is culpable.”
“We do not know, Mr. President,” Foley said. “Not yet. There’s a possibility that he’s gone into hiding on his own, wanting to defect. The Chinese want him bad, which means he’s likely holding timely intelligence. If he’s getable, we should get him.”
“Agreed,” Ryan said.
He looked around the room. Everyone present appeared to know something he did not.
Yet.
“Let’s have it,” he said, eyeing Mary Pat.
“Though Professor Liu’s disappearance is problematic, the remainder of VICAR’s communication is far more troubling.” She gave an exhausted sigh. “Sir, it appears we have a mole problem.”
7
A mole?” Ryan whispered.
The revelation wasn’t a surprise. Wise intelligence organizations operated under the assumption that there was always a mole in their midst. What startled Ryan was that the unflappable Mary Pat Foley, who’d been doing this job since the days of dead drops in Gorky Park and midnight rendezvous in East Berlin, thought the information important enough to bring to him. That meant she believed the mole was highly placed enough to be a real danger.
The KGB had run moles in the U.S. government and the U.S. government ran moles in the KGB. Colonel Mikhail Semyonovich Filatov, cryptonym CARDINAL, became personal friends with Ryan after Ryan had assisted in his extraction from the Soviet Union.
But for the names and faces, nothing had changed.
“According to VICAR’s report, much of his information was verified by a Russian asset working within the Chinese Ministry of State Security. This Russian asset suggested to VICAR that the PRC was checking the depth of U.S. involvement regarding Professor Liu with a source they had embedded within the U.S. intelligence apparatus.”
Ryan rubbed a hand over his hair and fought off a yawn. It was much too early for this.
“Let me get this straight,” he said. “Our asset inside Russian intelligence tells us the Russians have an asset in the People’s Republic of China, who let it slip that Beijing has an asset in our house?”
“That’s correct, Mr. President,” Foley said. “We even know what they call him—SURVEYOR.”
Ryan scratched his chin, thinking that he needed to shave. The incredible irony of the situation was overshadowed by the danger a mole posed to the U.S. case officers and their agents. It didn’t take much more than a hunch in some countries for suspected assets to “accidentally” fall out of a window.
“If SURVEYOR mistakenly believes we have Liu,” Ryan said, “then maybe he’s not that highly placed.”
“Perhaps,” Foley said. “But I get the impression MSS is still in the process of contacting him . . . or her, to confirm. Newly acquired intelligence sources are among our most compartmented reports. If the Chinese think SURVEYOR has access to that information, at the very least, China believes their mole is in a place to do them some real good. And I don’t mind telling you, that scares me.”
“Containment?” Ryan asked.
Foley nodded. “We’ve already started to subtly wall things off,” she said. “Other than the people in this room, VICAR’s most recent communication has only been shared with four individuals, and VICAR’S identity is extremely close-hold.”
“So,” Ryan said. “A mole hunt, then. The Bureau and Agency working in a coordinated effort?”
It wasn’t really a question.
Both directors rushed to be the first out with: “Of course, Mr. President.”
The FBI’s drive to build a case for violation of the Espionage Act that would bring a conviction in federal court versus CIA’s overarching desire to protect the intelligence apparatus and plug the leak sometimes brought the two agencies to loggerheads. Mary Pat’s job as director of national intelligence was, among other things, to see that long-fought turf battles didn’t get in the way of the end goal.
Ryan turned to Foley, making it clear that she would be his point of contact.
“Good to hear it. What’s our next move?”
“According to the Russians’ source in Beijing, the PRC is actively hunting a Uyghur woman with some as-yet-unknown connection to Professor Liu.”
“Uyghur,” he mused. Ryan had been a thorn in Beijing’s side of late, taking a political stand against the Chinese surveillance state and the government’s internment of ethnic Uyghur Chinese citizens. Beijing’s official stance was that they were not after the beard or veil, but targeting people who posed a future risk of the “Three Evils”: terrorism, separatism, or religious extremism. From Ryan’s perspective, it was about the closest thing on the planet to a Philip K. Dick novel.
There had been attacks by separatist groups—bombings, knife attacks—but Beijing’s reaction had been crushing and broad. Hundreds of thousands of men and women had been rounded up and held for weeks or months for purposes of reeducation and assimilation into Han Chinese culture. Children, effectively orphaned while their parents were interned, were housed in state schools for indoctrination into a more “Chinese” way of thinking.
“Where’s she from, this Uyghur woman?” Ryan asked.
Foley shot a glance at D/CIA.
“According to VICAR, her name is Medina Tohti,” Director Canfield said. “She’s originally from Kashgar. Her husband was arrested and taken to one of their reeducation camps outside Urumqi. Nothing in the report indicates if he’s alive or dead. At this point, we do not know what her connection is with Professor Liu. As we’ve discussed, he’s something of a playboy. There’s a theory that they may have had an affair at some point. Perhaps when he visited western China.”
“Where are they looking for her?” Ryan asked.
“Word is, she’s joined a Uyghur separatist group,” Foley said. “Something called Wuming. Beijing lists them as a terrorist organization.”
Scott Adler scratched his forehead. “Sorry to interrupt, but you’re sure it’s Wuming?” The secretary of state was conversant in sever
al languages, among them, passable Mandarin.
“That’s right,” D/CIA said.
“Wuming means ‘nameless,’” Adler said. “It would be like us saying the terrorist group formerly known as al-Qaeda.”
“Anonymous?” Foley asked.
“Yes,” Adler said. “Sort of.”
“That fits,” the FBI director said. “Wuming is on our watch list as well. Beijing says they’re responsible for no less than nine targeted assassinations in western China. They’ve never claimed responsibility or even called their group by name. Beijing links the attacks together because of the MO.”
“And that is?”
“They don’t blow up things indiscriminately or run through a crowded train station with knives. They hunt specific people, much like the Israelis have done.”
“So Beijing gave them the name Wuming?” Ryan asked. “They don’t use it themselves?”
“Appears so, sir,” the FBI director continued. “No one seems to know where the Wuming operatives are based, but judging from the attacks they’re believed to be responsible for, we think they have to be somewhere in western China between Urumqi and Afghanistan.”
“What we do know,” Foley said, “is that Beijing is pulling out all the stops to find Medina Tohti. Facial recognition, surveillance, interrogations of anyone who might be connected with her or the Wuming.”
Bob Burgess spoke next. “What about other family?”
“VICAR mentions a ten-year-old daughter,” Canfield said. “Hala. She’s supposed to be staying with Tohti’s sister in Kashgar—the girl’s aunt. I’m sure they’re up on the sister’s cell phone and any social media. They’re watching her, but so far, no sign of Medina.”
Ryan finished his second cup of coffee and gave a slow shake of his head, thinking this all through. “The MSS has a long reach.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. President,” Canfield said. “I didn’t make myself clear. The MSS isn’t looking for Medina. The people hunting her appear to be military intelligence, specifically PLAN operatives. They’ve shut the MSS out of their investigation completely, apparently blaming them for the brouhaha with the Russians—and losing Professor Liu Wangshu in the first place.”
“Navy intelligence,” Ryan mused.
“That would be Vice Admiral Zheng’s shop,” Burgess said. “He’s a piece of work, that one. If half the stories about him are to be believed . . .”
“I believe more than half,” Ryan said, changing the subject. “I’d like you all to hold off on anything to do with Professor Liu or this Uyghur woman, Medina Tohti. Focus all your efforts instead on finding the mole. The last thing we need is another PARLOR MAID,” he said.
The FBI director blanched at the words. It hadn’t been many years since MSS agent Katrina Leung had agreed to be an asset for the FBI and then doubled back to spy for China. She also happened to be romantically involved with two of her FBI handlers while working for China. The incident still gave Bureau bosses indigestion. It didn’t go well with the coffee roiling in Ryan’s gut, either.
He patted the side table with the flat of his hand, mulling over the details of what he knew.
“SURVEYOR, eh? That’s an apt name for a spy in this Great Game we’re playing with China. I’m sure you’re all up on your Kipling.”
Mary Pat smiled. Most everyone in the room, except for Commander Forestall, squirmed in their seats.
“The boy, Kim,” Ryan said. “What was his job in the novel?”
The CIA director sighed with relief. He knew this. “A spy.”
“Right,” Ryan said, nodding slowly, like a teacher who was almost, but not quite, satisfied with the answer. “But his job had another name. A legend, if you will.” The leader of the free world showed mercy and answered his riddle almost as soon as he’d asked it. “He was trained as a ‘pundit’—a surveyor in the area north of British India to see what the Russians were up to. I wonder if the spymasters in Beijing see the connection to their code name?”
Foley scoffed. “We’re talking about the Chinese, Mr. President. They are masters at little details like that. They just believe we’re too ignorant to pick up on them.”
The FBI director stared down at his coffee. “Some of us are . . .”
“Don’t beat yourself up,” Foley said, giving Ryan the side-eye. “The president reads Kim the way a preacher studies the Good Book. His version is probably cross-referenced and annotated.”
“I’m a good Catholic boy,” Ryan said, getting to his feet, prompting everyone else in the room to follow suit. “Don’t test me on my Bible, either. I do admit to having several copies of Kim. They make good gifts.” He nodded to van Damm. “I’d like frequent briefings on this, Arnie. Mary Pat, hang back a minute, please.”
The chief of staff ushered the group out through the secretaries’ suite. He’d rearrange Ryan’s schedule, delegating the meetings and appointments he could. Presidential schedules were fluid at the best of times, lifting and shifting to meet the needs of the day. Van Damm ran Ryan’s like a combination boxing coach, concerned physician, and overprotective father. Arnie van Damm was a pro, and Ryan yielded to his expertise almost as much as he pushed back—which was saying a great deal.
“I’m assuming you have the same gut feeling that I do, Jack,” Mary Pat said once they were alone. They’d been friends long enough that she felt comfortable calling him by his first name in the Oval if there was no one else around.
“If your gut is telling you that you’d like to know more about what connection the Uyghur woman has to the missing professor, then you’re absolutely right.” He motioned to the couch again. This was not a spur-of-the-moment discussion one had on the way out the door.
“Exactly,” Mary Pat said, returning to her customary seat. “And since the mole has some connection to the CIA’s China desk, the issues overlap. Giving the Agency point on this could put Adam Yao, VICAR’s handler, in danger, not to mention rendering any mission a failure before it even gets off the ground. Mr. President, I believe this would be a good time to utilize the services of our friends at The Campus.”
It wasn’t lost on Ryan that his friend had suddenly grown more formal. The Campus was an off-the-books quasi-government entity that performed contracted work under the guise of former Senator Gerry Hendley’s financial arbitrage firm across the river in Virginia. Ryan and Hendley had formed it, years before, for missions such as this, that required a deft touch, without the layers of bureaucracy attendant to even the best government agency. Ryan’s old friend John Clark ran the show under Hendley, serving as director of operations. An extremely capable man leading a talented team. Still, for the most part, they acted independently . . . a separation of powers, so to speak. Activating them personally was something Ryan never took lightly. Beyond that, sending in The Campus meant sending in his own son.
“It looks like we are indeed thinking the same thing,” Ryan said. “Chinese intelligence is hunting for this Uyghur woman. Perhaps we should look in that same direction. Do we have a starting point to give Clark?”
Foley leaned back, folded her arms, and crossed her ankles, staring up at the ceiling. “Didn’t this place feel larger when we used to have to venture over here from our little cubicles at Langley?”
Ryan waited. Mary Pat often took a beat or two to answer, while she thought things through.
“We know her ten-year-old daughter, Hala, is staying with Medina’s sister in Kashgar. We have a tentative address, a newly renovated area not far from the Jiefang street market.”
“Stands to reason that Medina Tohti will want to make contact with her daughter at some point,” Ryan said. “Clark’s started with less and gotten what he was after.”
“Adam Yao’s worked with The Campus before,” Foley said. “I trust him completely. He can help them with logistics getting into China.” She chuckled. “I’ve gotta say, this is the perfect
job for Clark and his team—finding a woman who has likely aligned herself with a separatist group that is on our terrorist watch list and is actively being hunted by law enforcement. Then snatching this woman out from under the noses of not only the militant separatist, but Vice Admiral Zheng, the butcher’s intelligence operatives in the midst of one of the most heavily surveilled locations on the planet.”
“You’re right,” Ryan said. “Tailor-made for John Clark. Mind if I ask where they are?”
Mary Pat looked at her watch. “About now,” she said, “I’d imagine they’re in the air.”
8
Domingo “Ding” Chavez tapped his cell phone to answer the call. The interior of the thirty-year-old Russian Mi-17 helicopter squealed and chattered as if voicing strong objections to being in the air. The oil company had purchased this one from the Cambodians in the late nineties, after the Dry Season Offensive when they’d used it to go after the Khmer Rouge. Chavez consoled himself with the fact that while most Russian aircraft were lacking in finesse, they were generally cloddishly overbuilt—and could be fixed with a hammer and a screwdriver. A puddle of oil along the bulkhead said this bird was likely overdue for such an appointment. Chavez was partial to the Bell UH-1H. Though not exactly cheap, surplus birds could be had for a quarter of a million. Still, he understood that folks around the former Saigon might still have a little aversion to Hueys thumping the air over their heads.
Chavez pushed the tiny boom mic away from his mouth as he spoke, using a natural voice, despite the racket in the chopper. Connected to his phone via Bluetooth, the Sonitus Molar Mic clipped to his back tooth easily picked up his end of the conversation while transmitting incoming sounds via his jawbone instead of his eardrum. The device was comfortable enough for Chavez to forget it was there—which is what sold him on it in the first place. It worked with the radio in his pocket as well, linked via the wire-loop necklace through the same near-field technology used with surveillance earbuds. More and more tech was moving to cell phones, but the radios worked virtually anywhere and allowed him to talk to the entire team at once.