by James Church
“What did you do to the little bear?”
“Me? Nothing. He said he felt a little queasy from dinner. We exchanged a few words, then he started turning green and disappeared around the corner.”
“Well, be careful what you eat at breakfast. We can’t be stopping every few miles. And no, I don’t know if they’ll have noodles.”
“Surely they have noodles. Once upon a time they looted any city they could find for two thousand kilometers in every direction. They must have brought back the local fare. How much mutton can one person eat?”
“I’m going out to get our suitcases. Do something with this stove or the fire will go out and we’ll be cold tonight. Which bed do you want?”
“Does it make a difference?” He tested one, then walked the long way around the tent to test the others. “No difference. None of them will do my back any good. I’ll take the one on the right. That way, when I lie on my right side, I’ll be facing the stove.”
There wasn’t any sense asking how that mattered. I retrieved the suitcases and had just locked the car when Ding materialized out of the dark.
“It wasn’t easy getting permission for you and your uncle to stay here tonight. Beijing wants the plan under way by tomorrow morning at the latest, and for that to happen you’ve got to be in Ulan Bator, not out here with the sheep. That means you’ll have to leave before dawn.”
“What about the quarry?”
“He’s here. We know he’s here.”
“And the seal?”
Ding paused. “It’s here.”
“You just don’t know where.”
Ding snarled. “We know where, we know who, and we know how.”
“You forgot the why. Why do you need me?”
“I don’t. Believe me, I don’t need you for anything, but someone back home thinks you have the magic touch. You have a golden résumé in Beijing, it seems. Too bad we’re not in Beijing.”
“Yeah, too bad.” I looked around. “So why did we have to meet all the way out here a hundred kilometers from electricity and running water? There isn’t any place in Ulan Bator, a nice restaurant maybe, where you could have handed me the envelope?”
“Making sure, that’s all. No eyes or ears that we don’t know about out here. By the way, getting lost like that wasn’t smart. Don’t do it again. People might not understand.”
“Next time, be somewhere easier to find.”
“Next time? I don’t think so.”
He stuck close beside me as I walked back to the ger. As I opened the door, he poked his head in and looked at my uncle. “Pleasant dreams, Inspector.”
My uncle didn’t say anything, but after I came in and shut the door, he got up and stood closer to the stove. “I was right. That man is a menace.”
“We’ll be done with him in a few hours. We leave tomorrow early. Get some sleep.”
“After breakfast?”
“Before.”
“Again we have to drive in the dark over the trackless wilderness? What makes you think you can find the highway?”
“Stop worrying. I have a map, don’t I?”
My uncle laughed with the gusto of a condemned man, went back to the bed, and pulled the covers over his head.
Chapter Two
The return to Ulan Bator was less difficult than I’d feared. My uncle dozed in the backseat most of the way. Occasionally he sat up and looked out the window.
“Are we there yet?”
“We are. In fact, we passed it an hour ago. I’m hoping to get to the Gobi Desert before lunch. The intense heat and lack of moisture will do you good.”
“Yes, well, wake me when we arrive. Better yet, push me out the door and let the wolves finish the job.”
“We’ll be in the city in about half an hour, assuming we don’t run into a sheep.”
“How do you know?”
“Because we just passed an enormous statue of Chinggis Khan on horseback.”
“Really, why didn’t you wake me?” He looked out the back window. “I would have liked to see it.”
“Some other time. Ding said Beijing wants us in position by ten at the latest. Everything needs to be done in forty-eight hours.”
“What’s the crashing hurry?”
“He didn’t say. Anyway, it will leave us plenty of time for sightseeing later. Better this way than something that has to be dragged out.”
“I don’t think I trust Ding.”
“There I’ll agree with you.”
Once in the city, we crawled in traffic for half an hour until we got to the tallest building we could find, not difficult because it was taller by far than anything else for two hundred kilometers in every direction. Next to the building was an open square that fronted an elaborately decorated structure.
“The map says this is the Parliament Building. We can hope it has at least that right.” With the crush of morning traffic, there was no way to move into the next lane. We sat going nowhere, staring at the building, for several minutes.
“You’re going to have to park this thing,” my uncle said finally, “and I don’t know how. Maybe we should abandon it right where we are. Traffic isn’t moving anyway. It’s not as if anyone would notice for a while.” He watched two men trot by briskly on small horses. “Proud fellows,” he said.
2
In Parliament Square, we stood doing nothing but looking around for a few minutes.
“I’ve been thinking,” I said, letting my eyes roam over the scene in case Beijing was working someone into position on the edge of the square to signal us the next move. Ding hadn’t been expansive on this point. All he’d told me was that everything was under control and in place. As far as I could tell, there were only locals strolling around. “You need to send something to Miss Du. Nothing elaborate, just enough to keep her from calling her cousin with the bulldozer.”
“Torpedo off the port bow,” my uncle said.
From the far edge of the square, the funny little man with a three-day growth of beard and battered shoes appeared, seemingly out of thin air. Again his erratic motor pushed him from side to side but aimed well enough so that in thirty seconds he arrived in front of us. Again he presented postcards for sale. I was in no mood to haggle. I told him to go away. He grinned wildly and reminded us that his house had burned down. He needed money, he said, or his children would starve.
“We all have a sad story sooner or later, friend. Maybe tomorrow.” I have a soft spot for starving children, but this was not the time or place to talk about it. All that mattered to me was that he was blocking my line of sight.
“You still owe me for the map,” the little man said, “but never mind. Buy these. How about not tomorrow? How about right now?” He pushed a card at me. “Look, here’s something nice. See? Horses crossing a river under the open sky. Brings tears to your eyes, am I right? You can have it for next to nothing. Even for nothing. A loan. If you don’t write home with it by tomorrow, you can trade it in for something different.”
“Not interested in sky,” my uncle said. “You have anything else?”
The man quivered with pleasure. “Sure, plenty more.” He produced a new card. “The best you’ll find. Very rare.”
My uncle stared at it. “This doesn’t look like anything around here. Much too much green. Where do you hide all those trees?”
“You kidding? We have plenty of trees. Tons of them, birch trees out the arse if you know where to look.” He gave my uncle a lopsided grin.
I snatched the postcard from his hand. “We’re busy right now, do you mind?” I turned the card over. Written on the back was a small number 5. Hard to believe that we were hiring people with such crummy shoes, but you never really knew what Headquarters was thinking these days. “We’ll keep this one. Good luck with your house,” I said, “but we don’t need any more of these. Not enough stamps.” I pocketed the card.
“It’s my birthday today.” The man suddenly didn’t look so down at the heels. “You can give me a
present. Cash is always nice.”
My uncle dug into his pocket. “What’s this worth?” He held up some local currency that had the number 1,000 on it. “Here, go get yourself a bath. Buy some ice cream for the kids.”
The man scuttled away across the square and disappeared so quickly it was as if he had never existed. I looked around. Across the street I spotted a bar under an English-language sign that read IRELAND’S FIFTH. It didn’t seem likely to me that it would be open at this hour, but as we approached, I made out a hand-lettered sign hanging on the door that promised BREAKFAST ALL THE DAMNED DAY.
My uncle chuckled to himself as we went up the steps to the entrance.
“Let’s go in,” I said. “Something funny?”
“No, just the Irish.”
The front door was unlocked, but our way inside was blocked by a middle-aged man, a European with thinning red hair and big hands. He looked somberly at both of us until I flashed the postcard. Without a word he stood aside and motioned for us to come in. There were no lights inside the bar, and barely enough daylight from three windows along the back wall to attempt walking without banging into something. I could make out a solitary figure at the bar, but I couldn’t distinguish any features through the gloom. One of the tables was occupied.
“Who are those people over there?” I didn’t know what the plan was, or even if there was a plan. All I could figure was that we were supposed to meet someone here. It might be I was wrong and this was the wrong place. I was just moving on instinct, that and a postcard with the number 5 on it. It couldn’t be coincidence that the greasy little man had showed up for a second time out of nowhere.
“They’re Kazakhs.” The somber European who had met us at the door had disappeared into the darkness, his place taken by a very tall youth wearing a long white apron that brushed the top of his shoes. He handed me a menu. “They’re not very bright on the whole, or so I’m warned.”
“Is that a fact?” My uncle edged forward. “Would that be your opinion, as well?”
“If you know a smart Kazakh, I’d like his business card.”
“It was a woman, a bank manager as a matter of fact, and I don’t think she’d give you the time of day. Do you mind if I go over and say hello?”
“Doesn’t bother me what you do. They’ve been waiting for someone, though they won’t say who.”
My uncle turned to me. “Come along if you want, but don’t say anything until I give you a sign. Try to commit the conversation to memory, and be ready to write it down as soon you can find a piece of paper in this cave. Maybe there’s something you can use at the bar, a napkin or a paper towel.”
“Commit what to memory? What makes you think they know anything we want?”
“What makes you think they don’t?” Before I could reply, he walked over to the table and spoke briefly to a man whose eyes shone through the darkness like those of an angry eagle. The man stood to shake hands and motioned to the others to make room for my uncle. It seemed awkward to go over at this point, so I stayed where I was and watched from across the gloom. At first, there wasn’t much that you would have called communication going on. The five of them—two men and three women—sat very still. It turned out both of the men had fierce eyes, intense and unblinking. They listened to my uncle, barely nodded when he paused for a response on their part, and spoke no more than a couple of words each when he tapped his finger a few times on the table to indicate that it was their turn. After the second man had squeezed out his few words, he stared at my uncle, as if taking his measure, then stood and walked out of the place. The remaining four stayed quiet, almost motionless, until one of the women leaned across the table and began speaking rapidly in a low voice to my uncle. When she finished, she shook her head sadly. After a moment, the two other women took the last man by the arm and, with one of them walking on either side, led him away. When they had gone, my uncle started to get up as well, but something seemed to occur to him and he sat down again. At that point, he motioned for me to join him.
“This is my nephew,” he said to the woman who had stayed behind. “He is a specialist in finding missing people, aren’t you, nephew?”
The woman gazed at me. My uncle looked at the ceiling and smiled. “He is quite familiar with the events surrounding the disappearance of your mother. Whether he will be able to help, we’ll have to see. First, he’ll need to know something of what you saw the other day.”
“Uncle, can I have a word with you?” I am a big fan of teamwork, as long as both parties know what they are doing. Back at the Ministry, teamwork was encouraged as the magical key to success; the praises of teamwork were sung endlessly at meetings; we were constantly reminded by brightly colored posters sent to each bureau monthly not to forget teamwork in everything we did. Teamwork takes communication, however. In this case, I had no clue what my uncle was up to.
“A word, of course, nephew. First let me introduce you to Kim Joo-si.” He turned to the woman and said in Korean, “I leave it to you, Miss Kim, to explain things as you wish to my nephew. I have a phone call to make but will return as soon as I can.”
Apparently, my team was signaling that I was to sit and listen to this woman. Apparently, she was looking for her mother, whether actually or metaphorically I couldn’t yet tell. In any case, I wasn’t interested in becoming a traveling missing persons bureau. I didn’t know her; I didn’t know her mother. Besides, if she was Kazakh, what was she doing with a Korean name? Was she the reason we had been directed to this place, or were we about to fall into a big hole of misdirection? Ding hadn’t said anything about looking for someone’s mother, or mentioned a code with the word “mother” in it. I looked at the woman more closely. There was nothing but an achingly sad expression, two melancholy eyes set in an oblong face that seemed etched into permanent despair. What she knew or didn’t know, how she fit or didn’t fit with what we were supposed to be doing in Ulan Bator, I couldn’t glean. For some reason my uncle didn’t want to take part in discovering her exact utility to us, or maybe he wanted me tied down while he went off to do something else. In any case, it wasn’t good use of my time given that I had less than forty-eight hours to go. Equally relevant, just looking at her was about to get depressing. I did the only thing I could think of; I stood up to leave.
“Sit down.”
Her lips might be sorrowfully composed, but that didn’t stop them from speaking with considerable authority. I sat.
“You are interested in a certain seal and a certain man?” The woman had no hesitation about getting right to the point.
“Go on,” I said.
“I know where you can find both.” She was using Korean now, speaking in a loud voice, a little too loud considering I was right across the table.
“Lots of people seem to know what I need, yet I am left in the dark,” I said quietly. “Excuse me for asking, but why should I believe you and not someone else?”
“You believe whatever you like. Most people do. I’m telling you as payment for your help in finding my mother. I have no money, otherwise.”
I almost laughed out loud. Well, money or no, she had my attention. She’d given me a choice. I could take the bait about my predecessor, or I could follow up about the seal. I cared mostly about the former, but there was no sense letting her know that, so I focused on the latter. “What do you know about the seal?”
“It’s worth a lot.”
“A lot can mean anything, depending on who is doing the buying and who is doing the selling.”
“You think I’m trying to sell it? Then you’re a fool, a bigger one than I thought.”
“I barely sit down and you already think I’m a fool? Not very nice. Or perhaps we’ve met?”
“Never. I dreamed of you last night, and in my dream you were a fool, but only a small one.”
“You dream often of men you’ve never met?”
“Not often. Only when something is about to happen, something bad.”
Automatically, I t
urned and swept the restaurant with my eyes. If something bad was about to happen, I preferred to see it coming. Now that I was more accustomed to the low light, I noticed a couple sitting at a table against the side wall. I could also get a better fix on the figure at the bar, a lanky man with a face like old leather. The tall waiter with the long white apron was nowhere to be seen.
“Nothing here to worry about,” I said. “It looks quiet enough. Irish bars don’t get rowdy until evening, right?”
The woman put one hand to her lips, whether contemplating my observation or hiding a smile I wasn’t sure. “This one gets rowdy if more than two people are drinking,” she said. “Don’t worry, whatever it is I was warned about in the dream might not happen right this moment. But it will happen, it always does.”
You should know, sister, I thought to myself, it was your dream. I tried to steer us back on track. “Maybe you can tell me more about the seal in the meantime.” I quickly weighed my options. I could sit here sparring with her all day long, trying to figure out who she was. Or I could step on the gas. If she could go right to the point, so could I. “Can you get it for me?” I leaned forward a little to watch her reaction. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the man at the bar move slightly. From then on, it seemed to me imperative to keep track of him.
“How come you don’t ask about your friend?” In a flash, the woman’s eyes became those of an eagle. If her fingers had been replaced by talons at that moment, I wouldn’t have been surprised.
“Maybe I don’t have any friends,” I offered.
“That’s not wise,” she said. “Everyone should have friends. Of course, it’s up to you. What about my mother?” The woman reached into her blouse and fished out a small sliver locket, which, when she opened it, revealed an old, slightly grainy black-and-white picture of a girl in traditional dress standing out on the empty grassland and holding a lamb. The picture had at one time been folded in fourths, and the upper right quadrant was missing.
“Very beautiful. Your mother when she was young? Here in Mongolia?”
“I thought you were supposed to know everything. That’s what the old man said. No, this was taken back home, in the difficult times.”
