She paused to scan the table. So far, no face had assumed the shape of its owner's political inclination. She went on in the same voice of controlled outrage, describing the assault on Lady of Leisure by quoting almost verbatim from the transcript of the sole survivor of the attack. She left out only such details as the name of the man who had commanded the attacking vessel, such tidbits being more useful in behind-closed-doors negotiations.
As she spoke, she glanced around the table. Sure enough, delegates from nations friendly to the United States looked outraged; those from unfriendly countries appeared scornful or, at best, impassive.
T'ing seemed barely interested.
She bit back her anger and went on. "If it weren't for the timely intervention of a United States Navy fighter plane on routine patrol from the aircraft carrier USS Jefferson, it's safe to say there would have been no survivors of this tragedy at all. No one to have brought this story before the public. As it is, we have such a survivor, as well as the eyewitness testimony of four American aviators--including the heroic pilot who drove the attacking helicopter off without firing a single shot of her own. We also have physical evidence of the most conclusive and terrible kind--pieces of wreckage and the corpses of one hundred and sixteen men and women, all riddled with twenty-two millimeter bullet holes--the same caliber as the cannons mounted on PLA Navy Z9 helicopters."
She looked around again, matching everyone eye for eye. T'ing's face remained impassive, his eyes half-closed as if he were listening politely to a folktale recited by a child. Again, she reined in her anger.
"This murderous assault," she went on, "would, of course, be unconscionable no matter where it occurred. However, it's all the more disturbing because the site is Hong Kong, which is of crucial importance to the economic well-being of the entire Southeast Asia region. The wanton massacre of the Lady of Leisure is certain to rekindle the doubts felt by many nations regarding the trustworthiness of China's pledge to honor the provisions of the Sino-British Agreement of 1985. The massacre of the passengers on Lady of Leisure represents an unprovoked act of aggression so extreme it eclipses even the student killings in Tienanmen Square. It ..."
She realized T'ing was coming to his feet, rising as slowly and inexorably as the mercury in a thermometer. She fell silent, surprised by an act of rudeness she'd come to expect of the Cuban and Libyan representatives, but never of the Chinese.
When he had everyone's attention, T'ing said, "Your passion about this matter is understandable, Madame Ambassador. However, the fact that an atrocity occurred in the vicinity of the People's Republic of China does not automatically mean we are responsible."
Wexler remained silent.
"The People's Republic of China denies any knowledge of, or involvement in, the act of piracy and murder you describe. We remain completely committed to the agreement under which the illegally annexed Hong Kong territories were returned to our control.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, the attack upon the American yacht was not, in fact, carried out by personnel or equipment from the People's Liberation Army. Major General Wei Ao, the officer in charge of the Hong Kong garrison, assures us that all PLA personnel and equipment were accounted for on the evening in question; the records supporting this claim are available for anyone's review.
Wexler knew that the value of such documents was equal to the ash they would make when burned. "What of the witnesses, Mr. T'ing?" she asked coldly, refusing to sit.
T'ing's eyes shifted her way briefly, then back to the table at large. "We believe that this incident was the result of an illegal narcotics transaction. We know that one of the guests aboard the yacht, Pablo Cheung, was a notorious racketeer and drug dealer in Macau; Macau itself, yet another illegally sequestered fragment of Chinese territory, is a haunt of gangs and gangsters as terrible as America's own Chicago or New York. As for your witnesses, Madame Ambassador, by your own admission one of them is a very frightened and no doubt shocked young man, who might or might not have himself been involved in the narcotics activities aboard the yacht. Perhaps he really thought the attackers were in military equipment, perhaps he can't tell the difference--or perhaps he fabricated that detail. How would we know? He has been questioned only by representatives of the United States, who can hardly be considered neutral in this matter. And this, despite the fact that this man is a citizen of China, not the United States, and the People's Republic has repeatedly asked for his return.
"As for your other so-called witnesses, they are fighter pilots of the United States Navy ... and I doubt I need to remind anyone at this table that no one is quicker to look for an excuse to involve her military in situations where they do not belong than is the United States."
Wexler drew herself to her full height. "If you're accusing the United States government of trying to take advantage of this tragedy to-"
"There is a word for what you are showing now, Ambassador," T'ing said. "'Paranoia.' I have accused no one of anything; I merely recite historical fact. I'm sure the governments of Iran, Iraq, Libya, Korea and many other nations will agree."
T'ing bowed and sat.
Wexler did not. She continued to recite the official United States position on the massacre, but in the back of her mind, she wondered.
T'ing had interrupted her. Stood up and cut her off. For him, that was the equivalent of hysterics. Either that, or he wanted her to think he was hysterical.
No. After all these years as an ambassador, she'd learned to trust her instincts. Something was very wrong here, beyond even the murder of one hundred and sixteen innocent people. As awful as the massacre had been, there was some deeper work going on. Of course, the disguise of one motive behind another was business as usual for the Chinese, who were steeped in the teachings of the semi-mythical Chinese military philosopher Sun Tzu "All war is deception." But the Lady of Leisure massacre seemed to be more than mere sleight-of-hand to mislead an international audience. If even T'ing was out of the loop ... What was going on in China?
Saturday, 2 August
2200 local (-8 GMT) Hangar Bay USS Jefferson
"Looks like war to me." petty Officer Jackson Ord waited a moment, then pulled his head out of the small compartment set into the side of Tomcat 304 and saw that one of the tow tractors used to haul planes around the hangar had pulled up next to him. Behind the wheel sat Petty Officer Orell Blessing, a Vipers ball cap perched on his red head. Jackson didn't want to talk to Orell, far less listen to him, but what could he do? He longed for the last few days, when Orell had been gone on leave to Hong Kong.
You didn't ignore Orell Blessing. Didn't kid him about his name, either. Orell was six and a half feet tall, no matter which way you turned him. Barely made it through the passageway doors. Rumor was he could carry five tie-down chains in each hand, one hooked over each finger ... and those chains weighed twenty-five pounds apiece.
There were a lot of terrific things about the Navy--good, regular food; clean rooms; good work; more money than he could spend--but Orell Blessing was not one of them. He was one of those white-on-white dudes who, under all the grinning and back-slapping, really didn't believe that the Confederate Army got its ass whupped in the Civil War. Suspected the blacks would all come creeping back to their slave cribs any time now. Navy was full of dudes like that, but most of them you could ignore. Not Orell.
The only time Jackson felt belittled by having greasy hands, by being a junior petty officer in the U.S. Navy, was when Orell chugged up on his tow tractor.
But right now, Orell wasn't looking at him; he was staring across the hangar bay at the three rows of body bags and chunks of blasted, burned fiberglass lined up there. What was left of yesterday's "incident." People said the morgue couldn't hold all the bodies and shit; it had reached its limit. So they put that stuff in here, the way they used to lay the dead out in the parlor back home, for people to pay their last respects. Except these bodies were in black bags, and had no relatives on the ship. Seemed like bad luck, having them there.
/> Not that he'd say any of that to Orell. He glanced around to see if his shift supervisor, Petty Officer Rinaldo, was in sight. Wasn't. That figured; guys who outranked you weren't ever around when you needed them. And Orell never came around when Jackson was with any brothers, either. Wiping his hands on a rag, Jackson said in a carefully neutral voice, "I don't got time to talk to you right now, man. Busy with this hydraulics line."
"Don't got time to talk to me, eh?" Orell said, grinning, and winked. Guy came from West Virginia white trash, got dumped out of his division for shit details all the time, couldn't even qualify as a Plane Captain, but acted like he had some degree from Harvard. "Got lots of time to fix that baby. Gonna drop bombs on your yellow brothers though, right?"
"What you talkin', man?"
"What I talkin'? I talkin' look around you. I talkin' pay attention. We got us lots of airplanes and bombs here. And now we're gonna use 'em, and guess what? Not one of 'em's gonna land on whoever shot up that yacht. We don't even know who those people were."
Now Jackson couldn't resist looking toward the bow, at the rows of bodies. Two officers stood amongst the bags, heads close together in discussion. One officer was short and blond-haired, with glasses; Jackson didn't know who he was. The other was Bird Dog Robinson, the pilot who usually flew this bird. Jackson hadn't had much personal contact with Bird Dog, although the other plane crew members either loved him or hated his guts. Right now, both he and the blond-haired officer looked grim as hell. He looked back at Orell. "Somebody kills Americans, we gotta do something."
Orell grinned. "I agree. Absolutely. What we should do is load this here bird up and send it off to drop ordnance on a bunch of poor people didn't do anything but go fishing last night. Know who lives in Hong Kong, Jackson? A few dozen billionaires, and about fifty million people living in shit, just like your family does back home. Nice, huh? Think about it. Who's gonna die when we go deliver our payback for what happened to that yacht? The billionaires? Not likely." Orell bobbed his head toward the corner, then turned and bobbed it in the other direction, toward the crew of technicians working on the bomb-damaged aft elevator. "A whole bunch of colored people gonna die for this. But there's too many of 'em anyway, so that's okay. You just make this plane work real nice, son."
Orell winked, draped his massive, freckled hands over the wheel of the tow tractor, and hit the gas. As he pulled away, he had to turn abruptly to avoid three more men walking across the hanger floor. When Jackson saw who one of those men was, he almost crammed his head right back into the service bay, because it was Rear Admiral Wayne walking along right there. With him was some little Chinese guy in an oversized T-shirt and khaki pants, and a corpsman from the ship's hospital.
But the Admiral didn't glance his way, or even seem to be aware he existed. No doubt Orell would point out that was typical of officers. Wouldn't mention--wouldn't need to mention--that most of the officers were white, too.
"Excuse me, Petty Officer Ord." Beaman's voice came from between two parked planes. Jackson whirled, almost rapping his head on the corner of the open service hatch. Beaman was as black as the F14 was silvery-gray, and would have been swallowed up by Orell Blessing's shadow, but the Plane Captain was nobody to screw around with. "Maybe you'd like me to have Lieutenant Commander Robinson come over here and tell you what it's like to fly a Tomcat when an improperly tightened hydraulic line gives way, and all the fluid leaks out of the control surface system. Would you like that, sailor?"
"Sorry." Then he waved his wrench at the figures in the corner. "I was just wondering what's going on."
Beaman barely glanced across the hangar. "The brass have their work to do, Ord, and we've got ours."
"But what do you think's going to happen? Think we're going to mix it up with the Chinese?"
"I don't get paid to have opinions outside this hangar bay. I get paid for the same thing you do making sure these birds are ready to fly when and if they do have to fight. And it so happens this bird has to be ready to fly tomorrow."
"Already?"
"Yep. We're going to be cycling planes pretty fast for the next few days."
Jackson glanced toward the corner with the body bags. The Admiral was there now, bending over one of the bags, the Chinese man bending down with him. "Why?" Jackson said.
"Because they tell us to, Ord. Because they tell us to."
"I don't see him, Admiral," Martin Lee said in a voice as thin as the gauze bandage taped over one of his ears. "Mr. McIntyre is not here, and he was not in the morgue. He is ... his body is one of the missing." Batman nodded. It was amazing, really; from memory alone, Lee had identified every single one of the corpses brought back from Lady of Leisure, often based on no more than a piece of jewelry on a severed hand or the color and length of hair on a crushed skull. Still, eight bodies were missing--including Phillip McIntyre's, it appeared. That wasn't a bad ratio, considering all that had happened. And as for McIntyre, his disappearance was no surprise at all. Lee himself had stated that McIntyre was shot to death inside the yacht well before the helicopter arrived. Which meant his corpse was now feeding crabs at the bottom of the South China Sea.
But Batman said none of that. Instead, he put a hand on Lee's shoulder. When the man turned, Batman held out his other hand and said, "Mr. Lee, thank you. I know this was difficult, but you were very brave."
Lee stared at his hand for a moment, as if afraid it would not be attached, then reached out and shook it. "May I go home now? My wife was very worried over the phone. She is pregnant."
"The doctor's given you a clean bill of health," Batman said. "As soon as arrangements are finalized, we'll fly you back." He didn't mention how difficult it had been to make those arrangements. For several hours the PLA had refused to allow any American military aircraft or surface vessels access to Hong Kong without prior "inspection." At the same time, they were demanding that Jefferson immediately release the wreckage and corpses they'd recovered from LadY of Leisure. Catch-22. Fortunately, the civilian aeronautical authorities in Hong Kong had quoted certain provisions of the Sino-British agreement, pointed out that American warships docked in Hong Kong all the time, and insisted that the return of Hong Kong citizens, living and dead, did not fall under the purview of national security. Rather to Batman's surprise, the PLA had backed down.
Batman signaled the corpsman to take Lee back to sick bay. As the young man was led off, he hardly seemed to be aware of his surroundings, far less who he was with.
"Tough," Bird Dog said, watching him go.
Batman nodded. "I wouldn't want to have his nightmares for the next few nights."
"Admiral," Lab Rat said, "what were the autopsy results?"
Batman shrugged and looked down at the body bags. "Officially, a couple of these people drowned. Of course. That was after they took a cannon hit or two. The rest were simply shot to pieces."
"Except Mr. Lee."
"Yes. He got lucky; he was hanging onto the section of boat that had all those explosives inside. Would you fire a cannon into that at close range?"
"And the Chinese are still claiming they had nothing to do with this," Bird Dog said. It was not a question.
Lab Rat snorted, a rare display of disbelief from a man who had seen almost every form of misdirection and chicanery. "They just presented a theory at the U.N. claiming the whole massacre was part of a Hong Kong drug war. We're talking a story as thin as my father's hair, but some people have grabbed hold of it anyway. For some people, believing any old lie is better than fighting China."
Batman stared down at the body bags, thinking of the terror and agony they represented. "It's my fault. I should have pushed for an immediate retaliatory strike before the Chinese got their bullshit on the table."
"The Joint Chiefs would almost certainly have vetoed it," Lab Rat said.
"I still should have made the request." Batman shook himself. "Never mind. Okay, the explosion yesterday might have been a fluke, but we're still in agreement that this whole thing
isn't over, right?"
"I'd say it's just begun," Lab Rat said.
"So would I," Bird Dog said.
"Then from now on, we're going to behave accordingly. There are thousands of American citizens in Hong Kong, with more flying in every day. We're going to do our damnedest to make them feel safe here."
Lab Rat nodded. "Good."
"Admiral?" Bird Dog said.
Batman looked at him.
"If you're increasing Combat Air Patrol, I'd like to request some air time. I'm getting rusty, if you know what I mean."
"Do I ever," Batman said. Then he remembered something. "No offense, Bird Dog, but I understand you've had a little trouble finding an RIO who wants to fly with you."
Bird Dog's eyes widened. "That's not true at all, sir. Gator Cummings. And my RIO, Catwoman--she loves to fly with me."
Batman debated calling the young aviator on his rather freeform interpretation of events. Surely the aviator knew that everyone on Jefferson was aware of the circumstances of his split with "the same RIO" he'd had for so long. According to scuttlebutt, the RIO, Gator, had finally demanded transfer--not just to another pilot, but to an entirely different ship. "Back in Cuba, he put me into the water," Gator had said. "Then I turned around and flew with him again in Turkey. After that, I started wondering if maybe I had a death wish. I decided to get as far away from that maniac as I possibly can."
Gator was now flying with VF-91 off the USS Eisenhower.
Maybe Bird Dog had learned something from that whole experience--certainly, the youngster was trying hard to do well in his new position as advisor. Finally, Batman nodded. "Talk to CAG. Tell him I said it was all right."
Bird Dog grinned with the palpable relief of any Naval aviator who hadn't been in the air for a while. It made Batman long, more than ever, for the feel of a Tomcat strapped around his own body.
Carrier 14 - TYPHOON SEASON Page 8
