Quiller Bamboo q-15

by Adam Hall

  She looked confused.

  'Would you know,' I asked her, 'if anyone was following you?'

  'I have never thought of it.'

  'Don't worry about it.'

  They could have followed her, or they could have passed my description on to the police, for what it was worth. The police had come into the cafe, but that had been because of the drunk.

  She'd gone straight to an empty table and sat down facing me, holding her eyes on me, a warning in them.

  'I'm going to fucking sue them!' On his feet now, swaying between two friends, a woman trying to quieten him.

  Pepperidge watching me: he'd caught her whisper.

  I had said: 'I'll be at the small hotel two blocks from here, in Xingfu Donglu; it's called the Sichuan. Get Chong to pick me up there at eighteen hundred hours. Tell him to wait outside.'

  'Understood.'

  'You the police? I want to talk to you! I've been ripped off by a bloody travel agency!'

  I passed close to her table. 'Can I go to your hotel?'

  'Of course.'

  Through the back way past the toilets and stacked crates and some bicycles and a hen in a cage, slipping on broken eggs and finding the door and the yard and the alley; she came behind me but vanished soon afterward and got there before I did, to the hotel. We weren't tagged, didn't have to lose anyone.

  It was the only place I could go, the only rendezvous I could give Pepperidge for Chong, and if I walked any farther than two or three blocks I'd run into a police patrol.

  'Towel not very big,' Su-May said, dissembling. CAAC insignia.

  I took it into the shower, a cramped corner of the bathroom lined with sheets of plastic, flakes of plaster from the ceiling embedded in the grime on the floor, a streak of rust down the wall under the tap, but the water was warm as she'd promised, and as I stood under the thin sputtering jets I was conscious of the benison not only of the healing water but of the grace of womanhood that had offered me this much comfort at a time when I badly needed it, more in point of fact than comfort, a kind of sanity regained, a renewal of the heart, the means, even, by which I could conceivably do what I had to do, after all. When dark came it would be easier; the dark has so often been my shelter, the ultimate safe house when all other doors are shut.

  I found my clothes and Su-May said, 'Leave your coat off. I will give you shiatsu.' She'd pulled the bed away from the corner so that she could move around it. 'Cold now, but you will soon be warm."

  There were hours before dark came, and I lay down and she began working on me.

  'You're an air hostess, an interpreter, and you practice shiatsu. You're very accomplished.'

  'I have a license as therapist. Must understand, many people in China do two or three different jobs if they can, to afford anywhere nice to live, nice food. I earned more than my father, and he is university professor.' Her fingers moved over the tsubo points. 'Tell me where there is pain.'

  'All right. The message will have reached him by now, the one I told you I'd send.'

  Her hands paused. 'So quick?'

  'By telephone.'

  'From here?'

  She meant from Lhasa. It worried her. 'From here to London,' I said, 'and from there to Beijing.' I'd asked Pepperidge, told him she'd been helpful to me at the PSB station.

  My eyes were closed, but I felt her attention in the stillness of her hands. If I could reach Beijing so easily, who was I, what other powers did I have? 'Thank you,' she said at last. 'It means very much to me. My mother is dead; I have only my father. My brother was killed in Tiananmen Square. My father will have worried about me; I vanished from out of his life when I came here. Now there is the message.' She cupped her hands against my, face for a moment, very gently, then went on with her work. 'Please relax. Your muscles are so tight everywhere.' In a moment: 'It hurts just there?'

  'Yes.'

  'Very well.' She worked on the tsubo point, and warmth flowed, and hope flowed with it. I would have, yes, to go to ground, but the Jeifang, the big green truck, would offer me safety, and there might still be a last chance of getting Xingyu to the airport, some time in the night.

  'And there,' I said.

  'Very well. Your head is in pain, because of this?'

  'Bit sore, yes. I tripped and fell, hit the edge of a door."

  Even the partial truth is uttered seldom in our trade; I felt saintly.

  The dung in the stove was glowing now; I could see it at the edges of my lids. It seemed less freezing in here, because of the stove and her hands and what they were doing to me, easing away some of the fear that always dogs the foot steps of a creature that knows it's hunted.

  'You have pain also in your heart,' she said.

  'No.'

  'I do not mean in your heart, exactly. In your spirit. There is a ghost there.'

  Immediate gooseflesh: I felt the hair lifting on my arms. It's always haunted me, this business of taking a life in the course of a mission. It's nothing to do with guilt: the man in the temple would have taken mine if it had suited him. It's that the closeness to death, your own or another's, brings you to the edge of the unknown, where quantum forces play among the infinite reaches of the universe, and souls drift like leaves on the cosmic wind, seeking their new incarnation. It awes me, in a word, but then of course there's the physical thing, the sweat and the muscle burn and the mechanics of force and leverage as one body tears the life out of another, there's that too, and it leaves a taste in the mouth, and in the heart a feeling of despair. Post mortem, also, animal triste est.

  I said to her, 'I've got quite a few ghosts. One more won't hurt.'

  Her hands moved over me, tracing the meridians, and in the stove a pocket of trapped air popped.

  'Did you kill him?'

  That thing,' I said, 'on the wall. What is it?' The skull of the dog, set in a pattern of straw and coloured wool.

  Bloody thing had been worrying me ever since I'd come into the room.

  'It is a spirit trap. When enough bad spirits have been caught in it, someone will take it down for burning.'

  'How will they know when it's full?'

  'I think they just leave it for a time, knowing what it will do.'

  Spiritual Airwick, traps bad karma, replace as necessary, so forth. I'd given her an answer, in any case, by not answering; she knew anyway: she could feel his ghost in my spirit.

  'Why a dog?'

  'Because they are sacred. Please turn over, and relax more if you can.'

  'Did you go into that cafe for something to eat?"

  'Yes.' Her fingers moved along my spine, seeking the knotted tsubo points, pressing.

  'You're still hungry, then.'

  'No. It was for comfort. The world is very frightening.'

  In a moment I said, 'It won't be long before they change the regime in Beijing, and then your father's going to be safe, and a hero. It happened all over Europe.'

  'Yes, I very much hope. But until it is real, I am frightened. If the Public Service Bureau here in Lhasa finds my name in the records and sees who my father is, they will send me straight to Beijing, and use me as a hostage to bring him from hiding. So I am afraid every hour, every minute. Hurt here?'

  'No.'

  'Here?'

  'Yes.'

  Her finger pressed, kneading. Against my closed lids the light was fading over the minutes; before long now it would be dark, and I would have a cloak for my clandestine purposes.

  'There's nowhere else," I asked her, 'that you can stay? Where they can't find you?'

  She pressed again, and a nerve flared. 'I have one or two friends in Lhasa, yes, but I cannot go to them. It would mean danger for them. I know some other people, but not well. They might turn me over to the police; it happens a lot. Everyone is frightened. Everyone.'

  'It won't last long,' I said. 'The leaders are old, and the people are enraged.'

  I turned my wrist and looked at my new watch, a cheap digital thing, the best I could find; I'd bought it from a st
all on my way to the cafe. The time was now 5.41, and we lacked nineteen minutes to the rendezvous.

  'The people are enraged,' Su-May said, 'yes, but the soldiers have guns. It is always the same.' She worked in silence for a time, and I watched the shadows darken across the floor, and heard the sounds from the street below diminishing; a man shouted and a dog yelped; bells had begun tolling, two, then three, then many, their carillon summoning the night.

  'That is all,' Su-May said, and took her hands away. I didn't move for a minute or two; my whole body was tingling.

  'You're gifted,' I said. 'I feel well again.'

  'I am glad.'

  I got off the bed and found my coat. 'How much do I owe you?'

  'Nothing. I earn a little here and there, translating for the tourists, acting as a guide.' In the shadowed room the expression in her long dark eyes was hidden. 'What happened in the temple has great value for us, for the Chinese people. We rejoice in the downfall of even one of the enemy.' The glow from the stove touched her face on one side, bringing a spark of light into her eye. 'You are going now?'

  'Yes.'

  'But where? You are like me; everywhere is dangerous for you."

  A siren had started up somewhere, its undulating sound threading through the tolling of the bells.

  'If the police are looking for me,' I said, 'I can't stay here.' I wanted to check my watch again, but couldn't now; I didn't want her to know I had any kind of appointment. The rendezvous must be close, but the timing wasn't critical. Chong was Bureau, Pepperidge had said; I could therefore expect routine procedures from him: if I weren't down there in the street at 1800 hours he'd wait for me to make circuits.

  Su-May moved closer to me in the shadows. I think she wanted to say something important; I could feel it. The siren was louder, coming toward the building.

  'Think of a friend,' I said, 'someone you can trust, and shelter there. It might not be for long.'

  In a moment she put her hand on my arm. 'It is difficult. Everything is very difficult for me to understand. There are things I would like to tell you, but I cannot.' I waited, not interrupting. There was no warmth from her hand on my arm; she was still cold, still frightened. Then she said quietly, 'You must be careful. When you go down to the street, make sure you are not followed.'

  That, was the important thing, I suppose, that I'd felt she'd wanted to say.

  'By the police?'

  'No. By anyone.'

  'I'll be careful,' I said, and took her hand from my arm and kissed it and went out and down the stairs and waited in the hallway until the siren's howling had died to a moan. Through one of the windows I could see the vehicle was an ambulance; it had stopped some fifty yards along the street, and people were gathering to watch. There was one minute to go, but when I walked into the street the huge green Jeifang was already waiting there higher up with its engine running, facing away from the scene of the accident and out of sight from the hotel windows, and I crossed over and the door of the cab came open and I climbed inside and we started off. There wouldn't be anyone following us: he'd be in the ambulance by now.

  It looked all right until we got as far north from the town as the No. 4 truck depot along Jeifang Beilu, I mean the vehicle we were in was good cover and Pepperidge had protected the rendezvous and I was looking forward to telling Xingyu Baibing we were going to get him to the airport and fly him into Beijing tomorrow — he'd be seeing his wife sooner than he'd expected — but as we approached the crossroad where Daqing Lu runs east-west we saw red lights flashing in the dark and Chong said it was a police roadblock and put his foot on the brakes.

  Chapter 17: Chong

  'Not police,' I said. 'They're military.' I could see the vehicles had camouflage paint on them, as the lights of the traffic swept across their sides.

  'Yes,' Chong said. 'Soldiers.'

  There was snow blowing on the wind; there'd been a few flakes in the town when we'd left there ten minutes ago.

  Most of the traffic was coming the other way, from the north; the soldiers weren't stopping it; against the dark background of the hills we could see lighted batons waving the stuff through: jeeps, a tourist bus, horse-drawn wagons. Another big green Jeifang overtook us from the south, from the town, and came to a stop behind the traffic piling up against the barrier, a couple of hundred yards from where we were standing.

  'What are they looking for?'

  Chong sat with his thin shoulders hunched over the wheel, a big moth-eaten fur hat dwarfing his small face, his jaws working on some chewing gum. 'They're always looking for something.'

  'Can we go north any other way?'

  'We could turn back and get onto Linkuo Lu.'

  'Then where?'

  'North again as far as the Sky Burial Grounds, then west, then north again on the road we are on now.'

  'How long would that take?'

  'Maybe forty-five minutes.'

  'Let's do it.'

  'Okay.'

  'Turn your lights off before-' But he'd hit the switch already and looked at me and away again and made a U-turn and switched the lights on and throttled up, some heavy metal clanking in the rear of the truck.

  'What are we carrying?'

  'Mining gear.' He'd learned his English in the States, or from an American. 'I'm on contract."

  'What's your cover story for this run?'

  'Oh, I sometimes work late.'

  'Do you know what we're going to do?'

  He looked at me briefly again. 'Pick him up, take him to the airport at Gonggar.'

  We rumbled through the night.

  It is difficult. Everything is very difficult for me to understand. There are things I would like to tell you, but I cannot. Her long eyes shadowed.

  What things?

  You must be careful. When you go down the street, make sure you are not followed.

  Why had she said I could go to her hotel when she'd known there'd be surveillance on it from the street?

  By the police?

  No. By anyone.

  Who?

  The snow slanted across the windshield, whitening from the dark across the headlight beams. When we turned again I asked Chong if we were now on Linkuo Lu, the road to the north he'd talked about.

  'Yeah. Maybe another thirty minutes now.'

  I wound the window down an inch and the freezing air blew in, but it was better than the exhaust gas seeping up through the floorboards.

  'You know you've got a leak in the exhaust on this thing?'

  "Sure. Leaks everywhere.'

  Head was aching again because of the bumps when we went across potholes; everything rattled and bounced, the windshield, the seat, the floorboards, the brains inside my skull.

  I would ask Pepperidge to get a coverage on her from London; her father was a university professor and she was an employee of the Civil Aviation Administration of China with a licence to practice shiatsu, and all those things would be in the official records. London could get one of our sleepers in Beijing to raise everything there was on her background; if we ran into trouble it might be useful: I could get some idea of where her loyalties lay, what value she might have for the mission, what dangers she might pose. But of course if we could get Xingyu to Beijing tomorrow it wouldn't matter a damn, nothing would, mission completed, so forth.

  'Shit,' Chong said.

  Red lights flashing, a mile ahead of us to the north.

  'Are they at the crossroad?'

  'Yeah.'

  'We should turn west there, then north again?'

  'Yeah.' He braked and ran the big truck onto the rough ground at the side of the road and doused his lights.

  'Have you seen military blocks like this before?'

  'You bet.'

  'I mean at two adjacent crossroads?'

  'Not so much. Thing is, when they block every goddam highway, means they're probably in a ring right around the town.'

  Traffic was coming past us from the north, running into the screen of snow and breaking
it up, sending it into eddies as the wind took it again.

  'This snow. Is it going to settle?'

  'Guess not. The ground's too dry. It'll maybe pile up into drifts against the scree, that's all. It's too cold for it to keep on coming down.' He moved his gum to the other side of his mouth. 'We go back?'

  A ring around the town, Jesus, it wouldn't matter where we went, we'd run into a block. In a minute I asked him, 'If I weren't with you, would you have any trouble getting through?'

  He thought about it. 'I can't answer that. I mean sure, in the ordinary way, maybe I'd get through okay, my cover's watertight, I've got my contract I can show them, this is one of my regular routes and everything, but see, it depends what they're looking for, what they want, they can just say, look, I don't give a damn if you're the king of Siam, you just turn around and get your ass back down that highway. With these people you can't make any predictions.'

  'Switch this bloody engine off, will you?' I got the window down as far as it would go, blast of cold air but at least it was fresh. Snow blew against the side of my face, and I put a gloved hand up. The wind hit the truck, rocking it on its springs. I didn't know, suddenly, what we were doing here: with a ring of military checkpoints set up around the town there wasn't a chance of reaching the monastery and bringing Xingyu Baibing back through an armed blockade.

  Your instructions are to get the subject to Beijing as soon as possible.

  Pepperidge.

  No go.

  'Chong, was there a phone anywhere along the road we've just come up, any building we could phone from?'

  'Guess not.'

  'Are you sure?'

  'Yeah.'

  He was probably right. The only buildings I'd seen were sheds, barns, ruined temples.

  'Then where is the nearest phone?'

  'Way back down there on Dongfeng Lu, the Telecommunications Office.'

  Thirty minutes away. We don't often feel like asking for instructions at the highest level from London when we're stuck in the field with the odds stacked and the chances thin because we know the situation and the environment better than they do; but tonight I thought there was a case for putting a signal through, phoning Pepperidge: We're cut off by roadblocks set up by the military and there's very little chance of bringing this thing off until at least the morning, if then, so please signal London and see what they say.