Karen was staying at Rogue Manor in my absence, and despite the late hour I decided to call. Sometimes she stays up late, catching up on her reading—she’s always reading some mystery book or another—and I thought I’d take the chance. The plan was that I’d let the phone ring twice and if she picked it up, great. If she didn’t—well I’d probably let it ring a few more times. Then if the answering machine picked up, I’d leave her a message.
She got it on the second ring.
“I was hoping you’d call,” she said. “We had a computer meltdown, and it’s still going on.”
I guess it was better than being told the lawn needed mowing.
“I missed you, too,” I said. “What’s the problem?”
The computer in question turned out to be the mainframe at Homeland Security, not the PCs at Red Cell. The situation was not without its lighter moments—hackers had apparently planted robotic programs that sent spam for feminine hygiene products coursing through the Homeland Insecurity Network.
“Give Shunt a call,” I told her. “He’ll be able to fix it.”
Shunt is my self-anointed “computer dude” and all-around tech expert. His birth certificate claims his name is Paul Guido Falcone, but we call him “Shunt” because he has several in his head. They’re some sort of metal inserts placed into his skull because he was born with water in his skull. I think of them as brain gutters. He’s loads of fun in an airport, especially when you’re trying to make a plane.
“Shunt is on vacation in Iceland,” Karen told me. “He recommended some guy named Matthew Loring. You know him?”
“Not at all. But if Shunt says he’s okay, you can trust him. Whether you’ll be able to understand a word he says is another matter.”
We decided Karen would talk to Matthew in the morning, after running a preliminary backgrounder on him with the help of some of our police contacts. Business concluded, we talked about how much we missed each other and what we would be doing if we were together. She was planning on taking a nice warm bath as soon as we got off the phone; I had to take a cold shower.
[ IV ]
I REMEMBERED TOSHO’S WARNING about Sun having someone watching me as I headed back to the embassy for my meeting with the CIA debriefer. If you’re ever looking to become paranoid, go to Tokyo. The crowded, narrow streets feel like they’re closing in, and there’s always someone right behind you.
On the other hand, the crowds make it easy to give someone the slip. I didn’t see a tail, but I backtracked my way across town anyway, sliding in and out of two large stores and a train station before grabbing a taxi. Then just to be sure, I got out of the cab in the middle of the street while we were stuck in traffic and hopped in one going the other way. I suppose it’s still possible I was followed, but if so my tail was damn good.
Most CIA officers don’t have much of a sense of humor, and the man who met me at the embassy was no exception. Jimmy Zim was also about as nondescript as they come: somewhere between twenty and fifty, of average build and height for someone of Asian descent, with a face you could forget while you stared at it. Perfect spy material.
Like most CIA officers, Zim was good with languages; he spoke fluent Korean, Japanese, and several Chinese dialects. He’d obviously seen some difficult times: the backs of his hands and lower arms had hash marks on them, tiny scars that I guessed had been made by a razor—undoubtedly souvenirs from a torture session. He was vague about his job but very specific about his desires: he wanted me to describe what Kim’s palace was like, and wanted to know everything that had happened while I was there. I gave him a full briefing.
If Jimmy Zim knew that Ken Jones’s real goal in urging me to visit Kim had been finding the nuclear weapons, he didn’t let on. They weren’t mentioned or hinted at. I didn’t bring them up either—there was no reason to, since I hadn’t seen them.
Zim was a patient man, listening without comment as I described Kim Jong Il’s underground palace. He took no notes, but I got the impression that he could repeat everything I’d said word for word if asked. I mapped the area out on a satellite photo he’d brought, approximating where Kim’s underground rooms were. There were a lot of places left where the nukes could be. Given the depth of the facility, an air attack aimed at the warheads would need a specific location. A ground assault would also be difficult. But those weren’t my problems.
“Well, that’s it. That’s what I know,” I told him, getting up. “Pleasure meeting you.”
“You didn’t tell me about Yong Shin Jong and Kim’s request that you find him.”
“I didn’t think that’s what you were here for. Besides, didn’t Fogglebottom tell you?”
“Your account would be more precise.”
He had me there. I sat down and told him what I knew, which wasn’t much. When I was done, he nodded.
“And you’re taking the job?” he asked.
“No.”
Jimmy Zim put his lips together. It was the first emotion he’d shown, if that’s what it was.
“The director would like you to,” said Jimmy Zim.
“You’ve spoken to him?”
“I got this.” He reached into his pocket and took out an orange piece of paper. There was an e-mail on it.
Zim: State comm’ed NK-Kim request for Marcinko.
Meet. Render all assistance. Remind Marcinko of
my best wishes, one old sailor to another.
—Adm Jones
Nowhere in that e-mail did it say that Ken wanted me to pursue Yong Shin Jong, but it was as obvious to me as it was to Jimmy Zim that he did. Hell, he wouldn’t have bothered sending it if he didn’t.
He knew I hadn’t found the nukes—I hadn’t activated the locating device he’d given me. Was he asking me to go back? Or did he figure we could worm the information out of Yong Shin Jong?
“Aren’t you supposed to destroy this?” I said to Zim, handing it back. “That’s why it’s on colored paper, right?”
“I intend to as soon as our meeting is over. I didn’t know if you’d take my word for it. You have a reputation for not believing people you don’t know.”
“Why don’t you go and get Yong Shin Jong back? You have more resources than I do.”
“If he’s in China, the involvement of the CIA could be embarrassing,” said Jimmy Zim. “I can provide background information on Yong Shin Jong. It may be that the task is not as daunting as it seems.”
“Who says it’s daunting?”
“Your reluctance speaks for itself.”
Jimmy Zim had several photos of Yong Shin Jong. The CIA had last seen him in Singapore, where he traveled about once or twice a month. Like a lot of Asian millionaires, Kim’s family stashed money in Singapore banks because of favorable tax laws and an emphasis on discretion that made Swiss bankers look like gossipmongers. North Koreans typically passed through Beijing on their way to Singapore, sometimes staying a day or two. Jimmy Zim believed that Yong Shin Jong had disappeared on the return trip, probably after arriving in Beijing.
American intelligence agencies routinely gather tons of information—humint, elint, comint, and every other -int you can think of. Humint is human intelligence, the stuff you read about in spy novels, though in real life it tends to be more along the lines of the bullshit and gossip you pick up at a bar after hours than microdot blueprints for blowing up the world. Elint is electronic intelligence, which includes signals gathered from the air freely—say a transmission of telemetry from a satellite—and not so freely—say electronic signals gathered in a manner that if I told you about I’d have to kill you. Comint is intelligence gathered by stealing communications transmissions. You get the general idea.
The problem for any intelligence agency isn’t so much gathering the goods, but realizing they have the goods when they get them. There’s so much information out there that the real heroes—unsung of course—are the guys and gals who can separate the one slim grain of wheat from the silo of chaff. Germany had all sorts of informat
ion about D-day, but they still couldn’t figure out where the allies were landing. And don’t even get me started about Pearl Harbor.
But I digress. Once the Christians in Action take an interest in you, it’s amazing what they can dig up. So the fact that the CIA had found nothing on Yong Shin Jong in the past three months spoke volumes.
Volumes of what, I had no idea.
“He was booked on a flight from Singapore to Beijing, but we’re not sure that he boarded the plane,” said Zim. “He did not take a state airline out of China. He did not use his own name flying from Singapore following that date. We have also found that a Korean airliner was in Beijing when Yong should have been, but returned home without any passengers. He has not gone back via any flight that we could discover.”
“Maybe he took the train.”
Jimmy Zim shook his head so solemnly I thought it best not to ask how he knew.
“He could have walked across the border,” I said. “Or gone into Russia.”
“Unlikely,” said Jimmy Zim. “Possible. Unlikely.”
“But you think he’s still in China.”
“Yes.”
“The Koreans haven’t asked about him?”
“We’re reexamining communications traffic. But from what you say, if they have, the Chinese haven’t been forthcoming. Maybe they are covering up a murder. Or maybe Yong Shin Jong doesn’t want to be found, and has paid off the right authorities. With your abilities, it shouldn’t take long to find out. And there’s much at stake.”
“Like what?”
“The treaty. And for you, $64 million.”
CIA officers are used to dealing with people who would kill their own mothers for a counterfeit nickel, so Jimmy Zim couldn’t quite get his head around the fact that I didn’t care for the loot. Not that you should get the wrong idea—$64 million is a lot of money to me. But even if I put aside the fact that I’d be working for a slimebag, I doubted I’d be able to collect.
On the other hand, Jones clearly wanted me to take a shot. And now that I knew the general layout of Kim’s palace, I’d have a better chance of finding the warheads if I went back.
“What should I tell the director?” Jimmy Zim asked.
“Tell him to screw himself,” I said. “And maybe I’ll poke around to see what I can find out.”
DECIDING THAT MY first step would be to trace Yong Shin Jong’s journey, I used an embassy phone to arrange a flight to Beijing. I also contacted a friend of mine named Lo Po who has a private detective agency headquartered in Shanghai, and asked him if he could arrange to meet me there.
Lo Po’s father was an American citizen who moved to Hong Kong to do business soon after Nixon visited the mainland in the seventies. The family thrived. Among their many interests is a “research bureau” that aids overseas businesspeople. The company is a cross between a detective agency and a security firm, and it’s Lo Po’s baby. We’ve had occasion to work together several times, but I actually knew him as a friend well before we developed a business relationship. We met six or seven years ago when I was giving a terrorism seminar in D.C.; Lo Po asked so many damn questions during the Q&A that I had to invite him for drinks afterward to get him to shut up. He’d never had Bombay Sapphire before, and after his first sip he professed undying gratitude and friendship for life.
Lo Po has a large number of contacts in the Chinese Communist Party, which he claims is now about as Communist as your typical Iowa Rotary Club. True or not, if anyone could show me around the labyrinthine Chinese government, he could. He wasn’t particularly happy about working for my “client,” however. Kim had arranged for the execution of one of Lo Po’s uncle’s operatives some years before when he ran the firm. The man had been investigating a heroin smuggling operation apparently subsidized by the North Korean government when he met his demise.
“For you, I’ll do this,” said Lo Po. “For anyone else, in no way, Jose.”
I didn’t bother correcting his English.
Last but not least, I sent a text message for Al “Doc” Tremblay—aka Cockbreath and other assorted terms of endearment—asking him to give me a call. Faithful readers will recall that Doc was one of the original plank holders of Red Cell. He had been helping me out a lot lately as a troubleshooter, especially in Asia, and it happened that he was in the Philippines looking after some of our associates. I told him that if he could wrap that up, his assistance would be useful in China.
I NOTICED THE SCOOTER while I was on my way back to the hotel for a nap. It was one of those fancy Japanese rigs, black, streamlined, and absurdly expensive. Its driver was also completely dressed in black, wearing a thickly padded bodysuit with a dark windscreen on his helmet.
The scooter followed my cab as we neared the hotel. I decided to have a little fun, and told the driver to take me into northern Tokyo. We twisted around a bit, Scooter staying with us, until finally I had the cabbie let me out near Ameyoko Market. Back in the day, Ameyoko was the place to get all sorts of black-market bargains; you probably could have outfitted an army there. These days it’s considerably more upscale, but just as crowded.
Walking west, I squeezed through the throng near the Inarico elevated subway line. Scooter had a bit of trouble with the traffic. I had to work to make sure he could keep up while not tipping him off that he’d been made. I tracked up and down through the small side streets, pretending to be a curious visitor looking for an unusual bargain.
A half hour of wandering between discontinued Nikes and unboxed Chanel No. 5 convinced me that Scooter was alone. Finally I looped back toward an alley off the main drag. I took up a spot near a corner fish market, pretending to be mesmerized by the hundreds of eyes staring up at me while waiting for Scooter to appear. When he came down the street and saw me gazing in his direction, he turned his head the other way, as if he’d suddenly developed an unnatural fascination with the iced octopus tentacles on display there.
I made my move just after he passed me. With a hop, skip, and a jump I landed on the back of the scooter, wrapping my arms around his chest and pressing close.
Did I say his? The chest in question was decidedly un-he-like.
“Konniciwa,” I told Scooter. “Nihongo wa hanasemasen. Good afternoon. I don’t speak Japanese worth shit. So let’s use English—what the hell are you following me for?”
Scooter responded by hitting the gas.
The people in the street dove out of the way as we whipped forward. The motorbike jumped the curb and took out a large display of vegetables, but still stayed upright. Cabbage and cucumbers sailed through the air as we careened back into the street, bowling over a group of British tourists along the way. I lifted my left hand up to Scooter’s neck and pressed hard enough to get her attention. She rammed her head backward, bouncing her helmet against my chest several times until my grip on her neck tightened sufficiently to make her stop. In the meantime, we shot up onto the opposite curb, which was high enough to separate us from the bike. We tumbled to the right. The bike flew to the left, crashing through the thin wooden facade of a candle shop that had probably stood here for decades if not hundreds of years—long enough for the wood to dry out so completely that the building ignited moments after the scooter upset some of the candles set out and lit for display. Gas poured from the bike’s ruptured fuel tank, and within seconds Tokyo had an impromptu fireworks display.
Meanwhile, the scooter’s driver and I crashed through a table of women’s handbags and sprawled onto the sidewalk. I dragged her away from the sudden burst of flames, pulling her down the street to a nearby alley. Her body had gone limp and I thought the accident had knocked her out, but as soon as I pried off her helmet she erupted in a frenzy, kicking and punching crazily.
Nothing warms my heart more than a woman with spunk, but there’s only so much spunk I can take. In this case, I reached my fill with her first kick, and retaliated by belting her in the stomach with the helmet. She fell back against the side of the building, dazed but not completely o
ut of it.
She looked very familiar, though it took me a second to place her.
“You drove us to Kim’s palace,” I said, grabbing her by the shoulders and holding her down as she tried to get up. “You’re North Korean.”
“You are most rude, Richard Marcinko,” said the girl. “You no touch chest, understand? Keep hands self.”
“Why were you following me?”
“Mr. Sun sent me. I have information for you. I help. But you no touch.”
“You no kick, I no touch,” I said.
She frowned, but then nodded. I let go and got up. Fire engines were racing down the nearby street, and policemen were flooding into the area. I suggested we find a quieter place to talk.
HER NAME WAS Cho Lim. (She actually said Lim Cho, in the Korean style placing her last name first, but the copy editor told me to anglicize it to make it less confusing and I’m too tired to argue. The “l” is silent in her last name, so it sounds like “im.”) Cho claimed that Sun had assigned her to help me, but that I had left North Korea too quickly for her to properly introduce herself. She’d had to catch a flight to Beijing and then Japan, finally staking out the embassy until she spotted me.
North Korea isn’t known for being big on equal employment, even in the spy business, but there was no reason not to trust her story. Her English was excellent, with almost no accent. Clearly, she worked for Sun and thus couldn’t really be trusted, but she at least came with data: coordinates of a villa outside Beijing where she claimed Yong Shin Jong was being held.
“Why is Yong Shin Jong there?” I asked.
“The Chinese know that the Great Leader will soon join his father,” said Cho Lim. “They do not wish him to succeed as leader.”
“Who do they back?”
Cho Lim claimed not to know. She also didn’t have much information about the layout of the villa or what sort of security arrangements it might have.
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