Dragonfire

by Ted Bell

  CHAPTER 1

  Washington, D.C.

  December 6, 1941

  A very good morning to you, gentlemen!” President Franklin Delano Roosevelt said, appearing in the White House cabinet room all hale and hearty.

  The president then lit a cigarette and fixed it into a tortoiseshell holder and placed it in his mouth at the jaunty angle that the press liked so much. The act served as a signal for everyone to light up as well. Missy LeHand, the president’s secretary and the woman closest to him on the White House staff, handed round the coffee.

  Then Roosevelt got right down to cases. Winston Churchill wanted a face-to-face meeting with him as soon as humanly possible. Harry Hopkins had passed on the message and urged FDR to agree to such a meeting.

  The president sensed a ripple of unease among the cabinet members, including a deep frown on the face of Secretary of State, Cordell Hull. Old Hopkins had gotten his way again, jamming up the cabinet members’ diplomatic channels with his own private agenda.

  FDR was well aware that his cabinet resented Hopkins, but then so did all the other politicians in town. He also knew that every man in front of him, on this cold and sunny Saturday morning, was engaged in some sort of feud or other with their own deputies or rivals. He could step in at any time and replace any one of them. And they damn well knew it! So they could listen to what Harry was reporting back and advise their president on what he should do.

  He cleared his throat loudly and said, “Well, gentlemen, what do you think?”

  One by one, they spoke in turn. Cordell Hull’s cautious view was reinforced by an even more negative reaction from Ickes. He said, “What would America gain from such a public meeting, one which would be feted by the British press and interpreted as just one more step down the road to war? Lindbergh and all the other isolationists would absolutely crucify this administration. I’ll tell you that much, Mr. President!”

  Even Knox, who was the most pro-British, was against the idea. He said, “The merest suggestion that the president was going to such a meeting would only strengthen the isolationist case and swing public opinion further behind them.”

  When wrapping up a discussion, Roosevelt always made sure that everyone had had their say. He listened carefully to the balance of the men in the room. “Well, does anyone have anything else to add?”

  “I certainly do, Mr. President,” Cordell Hull said. “I wonder, is that really all that Harry Hopkins had to say?”

  “Yes, he said a good deal. Now, anyone got anything else?”

  There was silence.

  “Good,” said the president. “That’s decided, then.”

  Hull fired back, “What’s been decided?”

  “I’ve decided that I’m going to think about it,” said Roosevelt, looking down his nose at the man.

  * * *

  —

  At 9:30 P.M., on that December 6, a certain Lieutenant Lester Schulz, paunchy and slightly out of breath, arrived at the White House with a locked pouch containing a top secret document. The leather pouch contained thirteen parts of the fourteen-part Japanese reply to the hard-line U.S. proposal presented to Japan in November. The messages had been sent from Tokyo to the Japanese Embassy in Washington, but they had been intercepted by American intelligence. The United States had cracked the Japanese diplomatic code, code-named “Purple” in August 1940.

  American officials had been reading top secret Japanese messages before her diplomats received them, meaning that President Roosevelt had the advantage of knowing what the Japanese government was doing and saying for the sixteen months prior to the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. They had not, however, thus far cracked the military code. So, while the U.S. government was aware of Japan’s diplomatic maneuvering, it remained cloaked in darkness about the specific movements of Tokyo’s Imperial Navy.

  Harry Hopkins, former secretary of commerce and one of Roosevelt’s speechwriters and his closest confidant, delivered the documents to the president in his study. The president, in a pensive mood, his Scottie Fala perched on his lap, said, “What have we got here, Harry?”

  “You’ll see,” Hopkins said. “It ain’t good. I’ll tell you that much.”

  As Hopkins paced back and forth, the president read the fifteen typewritten pages carefully for about ten minutes. Most of it outlined Japan’s peaceful intentions in the region and laid the blame for the rising tensions on the United States. The final section of the document announced there was no chance of reaching a diplomatic settlement with the United States “because of American attitudes.”

  Roosevelt looked up, stared at Hopkins, and said, “This amounts to a declaration of war, Harry. Sooner rather than later. Most likely precipitated by a Japanese attack on British, or possibly Dutch, possessions somewhere in the region. Maybe the Philippines.”

  Hopkins pulled up a chair and sat. He was doing what he was best at, which was why he was held in the highest esteem by the president and his closest thing to a real friend in Washington.

  “Yes, by God. And I think we damn well ought to consider pushing the Pentagon for a preemptive strike against those bastards. Rather than sit back and wait for war to come at the convenience of the Japanese. Strike the first blow at their homeland and prevent any sort of unpleasant surprises. I urge you to immediately get the Navy and Army Air Corps brass over here and—give these bastards a righteous punch.”

  But Roosevelt was a student of history. And like Lincoln on the eve of the Civil War, he understood the political appeal of having the enemy fire the opening shot.

  “No, Harry. No, we can’t do that. We are a democracy and a peaceful people.” And then, raising his voice, he said somewhat cryptically, “But by God, we have a damn good record when it comes to waging war! And by God and all that’s holy, I will take it to them!”

  * * *

  —

  FDR was still in his bed with the newsapers on that frosty Sunday morning when he received notice that his military aide, Admiral Alex Beardall, would be bringing the locked pouch containing the missing fourteenth, and final, part of Japan’s diplomatic response. The man delivered it to the president at 10:00 A.M. and waited patiently at his bedside while the president read it. Then read it again.

  This document, Roosevelt clearly saw, instructed the Japanese ambassador to destroy the code machines at their Washington embassy and to deliver the message to the secretary of state at 1:00 P.M. And said that the “chances of achieving peace in the Pacific were gone, because cooperation with the American government has been lost.”

  The president turned to the admiral and said, “It looks as though they are breaking off negotiations. They’re planning to strike, Alex. But when? And where?”

  Roosevelt’s first scheduled appointment on Sunday, December 7, was with the outgoing Chinese ambassador, Dr. Hu Shih, at 12:30 P.M. The elderly ambassador had taken the midnight train down from New York for the meeting. They met in the Oval Study. FDR was anxious to let the ambassador know that he had sent a private appeal directly to the Japanese emperor.

  He told Dr. Hu: “I want to assure you, sir, that if the Japanese emperor does not intervene and restrain his military, war between the United States and Japan is utterly inevitable. We will be in this fight together, your country and mine. To the bitter end. May I have your unbridled assurances that your replacement here in Washington will be up to the Herculean task before us? He has some mighty big shoes to fill, I will say.”

  “Indeed,” the ambassador replied, still holding his hat in his lap. “Too kind. But more than up to it, Mr. President.”

  “He’s coming to see me tomorrow. I’ve read every last scrap they’ve given me. What I would appreciate is not our appraisal, but your personal appraisal. He’s very young, isn’t he? A bit untested in the intricacies of world affairs? Current events in Europe as well as the Pacific, especially in this most tenuous of times? You know
him, of course. You were part of the team that selected him.”

  “Of course. Since boyhood. I’m an old friend of his father’s. A man who, outside of Chiang Kai-shek, is probably the most powerful man in China not in the government. The Tang clan is one of the oldest and most powerful families in the country, dating back four or five hundred years. They have amassed vast holdings around the world, vast wealth.

  “The son has been groomed by his father since the age of two to take over leadership of the family. But also to assume a position of power on the world stage. He has been to the finest schools. Eton, then Le Rosey, in Switzerland of course, in the early years. Later, he completed his undergraduate studies at Christ’s College, Cambridge. He read history, of course, literature, and political studies. Took a first in all three.”

  “Impressive,” FDR agreed.

  “Then on to Oxford for his postgraduate PhD candidate work. Again, political studies and history. He took a first in both, I can tell you. The boy looks like some Hollywood action hero. But I will say that he is brilliantly educated—that, no one can deny.”

  “A love of history. I like that. Did he concentrate on any particular period?”

  Hu smiled. “So glad you asked, Mr. President. Yes, he did. He has made his lifetime of study attaining a first-rate understanding of one country and its internal workings. The political life of the United States of America.”

  “I’m beginning to like this young fellow.”

  “You’ll like him even more when you meet. He has a natural charm, a warmth from within, that belies his fierce intelligence. He’s almost preternaturally attractive to the ladies, I’m afraid. His father and I have discussed this potential weakness, and I’ve already assigned someone in the embassy to watch him like a hawk. My old secretary, actually. I believe you’ve met her.”

  “Miss Li?”

  “Ah, yes, Miss Li. God, I’ll miss her, Mr. President.”

  “I must say, you’ve made my day, old sport. I’ve been worried about seeing you go for months now. But I think I’m going to like the cut of this fellow’s jib. I really do. Yes. Very much looking forward to our meeting.”

  The two old comrades gossiped a bit more and then said their final good-byes.

  Both of them almost blissfully unaware that all hell was about to rain down on them in a matter of hours.

  CHAPTER 2

  Washington, D.C.

  December 8, 1941

  It was ice-cold in Washington, D.C., that memorable morning in the first week of December. It was also the day after the Day of Infamy, when unending waves of Japanese “Zeros” and carrier bombers had dropped their ordnance and left burning what had once been home to the most powerful Navy in the Pacific.

  As it happened, it was also the day that the new Chinese ambassador disembarked from his train at Union Station.

  Whether or not he intuited this, this new posting was going to take him for what would prove to be an extremely wild ride. He would remember those days years later and wonder how on earth he’d survived.

  “Oh, no, no, no. That cannot be accurate,” Tai Shing Tang, age thirty-one, said as he leaned forward across the polished mahogany dresser top, rubbing his raw red eyes. He blinked a few times, then peered more closely at his reflection in the cloudy glass of the gilded dresser mirror.

  He could not believe his eyes.

  Who is that dreadful-looking old fellow staring me down? Cannot possibly be me . . . some kind of flaw in the old mirror glass? An apparition? Surely, a ghost of Christmas past?

  * * *

  —

  What he faced was not a pretty sight. By the looks of him, last night had obviously been a very late night. Most of it had taken place downstairs in the chaotic Chinese Embassy, in the gilded Grand Ballroom. A room from another time, another place. Some wag reporter had given it a nickname that had stuck. In a Washington Post article on the new Chinese ambassador, the room had been labeled “the Chinese Versailles.”

  To say the least, the ambassador could not remember any of the many moments at the boisterous welcome reception the embassy staff had pitched in his honor.

  The early part of the evening was all pretty much a wash now. A fleeting parade of blurry faces, a fading rosy blush on a passing young girl’s cheek, a succession of snapshots of evanescent flirtations, some serious eye contact, foolish sideways glances, firm diplomatic handshakes, snippets of broken conversations, and lipstick phone numbers scrawled on cocktail napkins or scribbled inside restaurant matchbooks and stuffed willy-nilly into one’s jacket pockets.

  And now this morning, his jaw ached from the fixed smile he’d worn all the night long.

  Ah, well, after all, he was the new Chinese ambassador to the United States. If all this hoopla and folderol were to be his new life in Washington, then so be it. And he’d damn well better get used to it. He undid his pajamas and dropped them in a puddle on the hardwood floor, then donned his dark red velvet bathrobe and headed for the steaming bath his valet had drawn ready.

  In the aftermath of all the hullabaloo surrounding his arrival, he’d sought escape beyond the walls of the embassy. Luckily, as the last guests began drifting off, there were those anxious to help him leave the dregs of the evening to others. Tiger had looked round for Yang Yang-Tsing, his new minder. “Minder” was not a word he was familiar with, but minder he was.

  His new aide-de-camp was the ever-smiling, deferential personage who was now his constant shadow. Yang-Tsing, of the angelic countenance framed by silky black hair, the potbellied, small-footed physique, and the semitransparent yet sometimes caustic wit. And yet . . . and yet . . .

  And yet . . . there was just something about the man that didn’t ring true. He seemed to have little to no idea what the position of ADC to a major political figure entailed. And he had a disturbing habit of staring at the ambassador that was both discomfiting and annoying. Like the ambassador was mere bacteria on a glass slide under a microscope. And sometimes when Yang-Tsing stared, it felt like he was surreptitiously trying to hypnotize Tang! Gave him terrible headaches . . .

  And then one day it hit him. He’d seen this fellow once, long ago, in China. He picked up the telephone and asked his secretary to summon Yang-Tsing to his office immediately.

  “Come in!” Tiger said, and the man almost seemed to slide into the room.

  “No! Don’t sit down. This won’t take long.”

  “Yes, sir!” Yang-Tsing said, eyes darting nervously about.

  “We’ve met before, haven’t we?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And where might that have been?”

  “In Guangzhou, sir.”

  “Where in Guangzhou?”

  “Your father’s automobile factory, sir. Brilliance China Auto.”

  “You worked there?”

  “Yes, sir. I was your father’s driver at that time.”

  “And how is it that you appear in Washington?”

  “Your father, he helped me get my job.”

  “He did? Why?”

  “He says he worries about you all the time. Wants me to keep an eye on you. Make sure you’re okay, he said.”

  “So you talk to him about me?”

  “Once a week, yes, sir.”

  “All right. Go back to work. I don’t want to be disturbed. Show yourself out. No! Stop. Turn around.”

  “Yes?”

  “I will give you this warning but once. Disobey me and you will not be around long enough for regrets. This conversation never took place. I will be listening in on your weekly calls with my father. And I will tell you exactly what you can and cannot say! Do you understand that?”

  “Yes, Mr. Ambassador!”

  “Get out of my sight.”

  * * *

  —

  There was, that same evening, also in attendance, a devilishly handsom
e young Brit, a Royal Navy commander on loan from Navy Command Headquarters based at Whale Island, Portsmouth. Horatio Black Hawke was his name, former Spitfire pilot shot down by the Luftwaffe over the English Channel. Assigned as liaison to the military attaché here at the Chinese Embassy. A hail-fellow-well-met type, but with charm to burn, a flyboy with acres of military decorations upon his breast.

  Hawke, then. His smart uniform a dark navy blue tailcoat with a standing collar, white with gold edging, and worn with gold shoulder boards, plus a ceremonial saber with full-dress sword belt with three gold stripes.

  Tang had asked around about this hale English fellow with whom he would soon be working. Lord Hawke, for starters. Aristocrat. But apparently the man never used his title, which the ambassador found amusing but becoming. Sixth richest man in England, indeed! Direct descendant of Alex Black Hawke, or Blackhawke, an infamous pirate who’d carved a name for himself with his bloodstained cutlass, looting more than half the gold and treasure in Port Royal and on the Spanish Main. Apparently, his portrait had long hung above the hearth in the White Dog Inn in Port Royal, Jamaica. Beneath it, some wag had carved the words:

  Black be his name, and black be the colour of his heart.

  This current “Blackhawke,” born in Oxfordshire in the same year Tiger had been born, 1910, was a cat of a madly different stripe. One of the most popular boys on the society pages, clearly a piratical swordsman in his inevitable ascendancy. “Debutante catnip,” one society columnist had called him.

  These two handlers had emerged from the crowd and steered the young diplomat out the embassy’s front entrance and into an idling black Cadillac limousine with great plumes issuing from the exhaust pipe.

  And then it was round and round Washington town, with stops at 1789 in Georgetown and Martin’s Tavern and Old Ebbitt’s Grill and, last, a mandatory nightcap at the bar known as Off the Record. It was centrally located, downstairs at the Hay-Adams Hotel situated directly across the street opposite the White House.