The Altman Code

by Robert Ludlum

  “Appreciate it. Thanks. Why aren’t they moving?” They were statues, armed and ready. An impenetrable line perhaps, but they could still be gotten around. They could still be shot. Why did they not fire first? Were they afraid, because they were outnumbered?

  “They’re not worried,” Asgar decided. “As I said, they may have more troops coming up.”

  At that moment, Jon sensed motion on his other side. He spun on his heel. “Randi.”

  Randi Russell appeared, her face grim. “What can I do?” Her blond hair was dyed black, and she wore a crumpled business suit. She, too, stared across the clearing at the silent Chinese soldiers.

  “Where the hell did you come from?” Jon asked, but his heart was not in their usual banter. The troops would not wait much longer.

  “I flew in with the late Ralph McDermid, may the bastard rest in hell. He needed an interpreter.”

  “Lucky for us and Li Kuonyi he did. You’ve been with us from the start?”

  She nodded. “Lurking up here. After the bloodbath below, I spotted Feng moving in on the other two. So I opened fire to drive him into the rocks.”

  “I owe you again.”

  “Don’t mention it.” Trying to be light, but not succeeding. “This cargo manifest the woman has . . . that’s what you need?”

  “Yes.” Jon gave her the highlights, concluding with the standoff in the Arabian Sea. “McDermid set the whole thing up with Li Kuonyi’s husband. Somehow, a Chinese politico got into the act, too. God knows what’s going to happen, but it’s not good. Not for peace . . . not for the future . . . not for the world. Sorry you got caught in this, Randi. Asgar’s right. He can’t risk the future of his people. There’s no time left to change anything anyway.” He turned to Asgar. “You and your fighters better get away while you can. If you can.”

  “You’re not coming?”

  “That’d only put you in greater danger. Uighers don’t have the world’s only superpower to protect them. We do.” He clapped him on the shoulders as he had seen Uighers do. “Take the two million. You can make better use of it than Li Kuonyi, the Chinese government, or us.”

  “Sorry it worked out this way. Bad show all around, but perhaps we can do this again someday. Do it right.” Asgar gave a signal, and before Jon and Randi could blink, he and his men had stepped into the trees and vanished.

  Now there was no protection at all from the Chinese soldiers.

  “Jon,” Randi said quietly, nodding at them.

  They did not pursue the Uighers. Instead, they parted, and an officer stepped through the line, walking across the clearing toward them.

  “That’s what they were waiting for,” Jon said.

  “A captain. Infantry, from the insignia,” Randi agreed.

  Jon, Randi, and Li Kuonyi stepped away from the fallen trunk. Kuonyi clutched the manifest in one hand, the cigarette lighter in the other. It was no longer alight.

  The captain’s expression was stern, his step authoritative. He glanced to the right, toward where the dead Feng Dun lay in his own blood. He slowed and stopped, his expression uncertain. A pudgy little man, also in the full uniform of the PLA, appeared from the rocks behind Feng.

  As the new man walked steadily toward the infantry officer, Randi whispered, “He’s wearing the insignia of the Public Security Bureau—internal security and counterintelligence.”

  “Swell. The Chinese KGB.”

  Major Pan Aitu had watched the first act of the drama at the Sleeping Buddha from behind the statue of a ferocious dragon that guarded the entrance to the Cave of Full Enlightenment. As the action had progressed, he had circled around, following it.

  Night-vision binoculars had enabled him to study the band of Uighers who had attacked Feng Dun and his gangsters, including a few PLA soldiers, which had told him much. The clothes, faces, and weapons of the twenty-odd hillside guerrillas had made him smile his benign smile. Disciplined Uighers, with AK-47s. He had long since decided Colonel Smith had made his escape with the help of an unknown Shanghai cell of Uigher resistance fighters. Now they were here, too, where the elusive Feng Dun had murdered Yu Yongfu and the rich American, McDermid, to obtain the cargo manifest of The Dowager Empress. Could Colonel Smith be far away?

  Pan’s admiration for Li Kuonyi’s cunning had increased ten-thousandfold. But if Wei Gaofan were to be defeated, Pan would still need to intervene. The appearance of the depleted squad of infantry only confirmed his decision.

  Now as he stood before the captain, who was staring uncertainly at his PLA uniform, his rank, and his internal-security insignia, he said mildly, “I am Major Pan Aitu, Captain. Perhaps you know of me?” He looked the tall captain up and down.

  The captain regained some of his martinet air. He held his ground. “Captain Chang Doh, and yes, I have heard of you, Major.”

  “Then we can dispense with the preliminaries. You are, I believe, under the personal orders of a commander who’s a friend of Wei Gaofan. You’ve been unofficially detailed to aid Feng Dun, whom you can see is now quite dead. Under his completely illegal orders, you have lost PLA soldiers, both wounded and killed.”

  The captain’s face went ashen. “I cannot speak of my orders, Major.”

  “Oh? There are many more soldiers hidden among the trees under my command. At the same time, I myself have written orders to investigate and, if needed, prevent the activities of the late Feng Dun. To assuage any doubt, here are my papers.” He handed Niu Jianxing’s authorization to the captain.

  The captain read slowly, as if he hoped the documents would disappear from his fingers. Unfortunately for him, the orders confirmed that Major Pan was operating in his capacity as a counterintelligence and internal-security officer for the member of the Standing Committee who was in charge of such operations. The captain, on the other hand, was in the weak position of being merely an infantry officer working for a personal friend of a member of the Standing Committee, who was not in charge of the military.

  As Jon, Randi, and Li Kuonyi watched, the infantry captain returned Major Pan’s papers, took one step back, and saluted smartly.

  “Looks as if the major’s won the argument.”

  Li Kuonyi relit her lighter. “You can have the manifest before he gets here. I want passage to the United States for myself and my children and asylum. Otherwise, I burn it now.”

  “No two million?”

  She shrugged. “That was for my husband. I’m an actress, a good one. I’m already becoming known in America. I’ll earn my own millions.”

  “Done.” Jon grabbed the manifest and the lighter at the same time, before she changed her mind.

  When the major reached them, he smiled at Jon and introduced himself in English. “I’m Major Pan Aitu, Colonel Smith. It’s my pleasure to meet you at last. You’ve been most interesting to investigate. Unfortunately, there’s no time left. Give me the cargo manifest.”

  “No!” Randi said instantly. She snatched the lighter and flicked it on. “I don’t know why you want it, but—”

  Jon stopped her. “Turn it off, for now. There’s not enough time to get it to Washington anyway so the president can send it on to Zhongnanhai. Let’s hear what our fellow agent has to say for himself.”

  The diminutive major’s eyes flickered. He pointed to where the eight soldiers were disappearing into the trees. “They’re now under my orders. Did you know that Captain Chang took two prisoners? One is an American captain, the other an old man. I can guarantee you, them, the two ladies here, and Madame Li’s two children quick passage to the United States. We’re on the same side in this, Colonel.”

  “Why help Li Kuonyi?” Randi asked.

  “Let’s just say I admire the lady’s intelligence, resourcefulness, and artistry. I also admit that she’s a complication we don’t want. None of what’s happened can or will become public. In your country or in mine. But success is slipping away, even for me.”

  Jon considered. The major did not want the manifest destroyed. There was nothi
ng more China could gain unless they did want the Dowager boarded. A decision had to be made, and only he could make it. America had nothing more to lose and everything to gain.

  He asked the critical question: “Do you have a way to stop the cargo ship before it’s too late, Major Pan?”

  “Yes.”

  He handed Pan the invoice manifest.

  The major turned on his heel, motioned them to follow, and ran across the clearing and through the trees to another open space where a helicopter waited, its motors silent. Pan spoke into a walkie-talkie. As they closed in, the rotors roared to life.

  The Arabian Sea

  The moon was at its brightest as the John Crowe moved across the long, slow swells to close in on the Empress, still steaming ahead at full speed toward the Strait of Hormuz, which was faintly visible in the distance. The boarding party stood in the lee of the Crowe’s aft superstructure, armed, ready to lower the boats, ready to motor to the Chinese freighter.

  In the communications-and-control center, Lt. Commander Frank Bienas paced, stopping every few minutes to lean over the shoulders of the radio, radar, and sonar specialists. He was peering at Operations Specialist Second-Class Baum’s radar screen, when Hastings on sonar boomed, “Sub’s moving!”

  Bienas barked, “How fast?”

  “Looks like full speed, sir.”

  “Heading toward the Empress?”

  “Sort of, sir, yes.”

  “What the hell does ‘sort of’ mean, technician?”

  “It means she’s angling in toward the Empress, but her course’ll take her around the stern.”

  “So they’re heading for our side, armed and ready?”

  “Maybe, sir. I guess so.”

  “Then say that, damn you!”

  The shocked silence was broken by Hastings’s stiff words, “I can’t tell you where the sub’s headed, Commander. Only her speed and course.”

  Bienas flushed. “Sorry, Hastings. I guess I’m kind of strung out.”

  “I guess we all are, sir,” Hastings said.

  The executive officer activated the intercom to the bridge. “Jim? Looks like she’s coming to our side, full speed.”

  On the bridge, Jim Chervenko acknowledged the message, his gut tight: “Okay, Frank. The moment she comes ’round, let me know.”

  “Aye-aye, sir.”

  Chervenko switched off the intercom and stared astern. Then he bent to the intercom again. “Sparks? Open a channel. Hail the freighter.” He straightened, watching the hard-driving freighter no more than a half mile away now.

  The intercom squawked. “They’re not responding, sir.”

  “Keep trying. Let me know when they do.” He pressed another switch. “Ready, Canfield?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Chervenko nodded to himself, recognizing the young lieutenant’s eagerness to go into battle. He remembered when he had been like that in what seemed now another world. “Put one across her bow. And Canfield?”

  “Yessir?”

  “Don’t hit her.”

  A pause. “No, sir.”

  Chervenko raised his night binoculars to focus on the fast-moving bow of the Empress. He listened to the five-inch fire and watched the geyser erupt no more than a hundred yards ahead of the bow. A rewardingly large splash. That should shake their shorts.

  He counted: One, two, three, four . . .

  The intercom squawked again. “He’s responding,” the radioman said. “He’s demanding to know the meaning of our aggression.”

  “Tell him to cut the crap, stop dead in the water, and prepare to receive a boarding party. Tell him I better not see even a tin can go overboard, or I’ll put the next round from the five-inch down his gullet.” Chervenko suddenly felt nervous. He studied the Empress again. When it slowed, he let out a breath. So far so good. He was about to give the order to lower the boats, when there was another signal.

  Frank Bienas’s agitated voice burst out: “The sub’s come around, Jim! Submerged. Torpedoes in the tubes.”

  There it was. Sweat broke out on Chervenko’s forehead. He bellowed, “Prepare for evasive maneuvers. Send off the Seahawks!”

  Out of the corner of his eyes, he noted that the Empress was hardly moving. She was almost dead in the water, barely gliding ahead as she rose and fell on the swell. But the main target of his gaze was astern, where the telltale trail of a torpedo could appear any second.

  He saw no torpedo. What he did see was a giant shape rising ghostly in the moonlight, a monster emerging from the depths.

  It was the Chinese submarine. As Chervenko watched, incredulous, it moved slowly toward the Crowe five hundred yards astern and a few hundred yards closer to the stationary Dowager Empress.

  The intercom announced, “He’s hailing us, sir!”

  Chervenko’s eyebrows shot up to his officer’s cap. Now what? “Pipe him onto the bridge.”

  The stiff, vaguely angry voice said in stilted English, “Commander Chervenko, I believe. This is Captain Zhang Qian of the People’s Liberation Army submarine Zhou Enlai. I have received orders from Beijing to join you in boarding the outlaw vessel Dowager Empress to search for and destroy any and all contraband cargo. I am further instructed to place a crew aboard the vessel to sail it and its personnel back to China.”

  Chervenko did not move. He stood there gazing out over the dark Arabian Sea, the intercom in his hand, and told his heart to stop thundering. It was over. Thank God, it was over. Someone had done their job. Someone . . . probably many . . . whose risks and sacrifices he could only imagine and whose names and faces he would probably never know.

  “I’m at your service, Captain,” Chervenko said politely. “And, of course, once the contraband is destroyed, we will be pleased to escort the ship back to Shanghai. Wouldn’t want an outlaw vessel like this one to slip away or fall into someone else’s hands, now would we?”

  Epilogue

  Beijing

  The heads of the ten men seated around the ornate imperial table in the Zhongnanhai meeting room turned in unison to the door to the left of the general secretary. They watched as a slender man in the uniform of a lieutenant commander of the PLA navy entered. He whispered in the ear of the general secretary, and the secretary nodded.

  When the young officer left, the secretary explained, “We have good news. It’s over. The captain of the Zhou Enlai reports the boarding of the Empress by parties from the Zhou Enlai and the American frigate John Crowe. Many tons of contraband chemicals were found. The contraband is destroyed. The officers of the cargo vessel are in our custody, and the ship is returning to Shanghai, escorted by the American frigate.”

  A murmur of both approval and relief traveled around the table. Wei Gaofan said, “A close thing, but must we allow an American frigate to escort our ship?”

  “I expect,” the secretary said mildly, “the frigate captain insisted. Under the circumstances, we can hardly protest.” His eyes were tiny points of black stone behind his thick glasses as he fixed his gaze on General Chu Kuairong at the far end of the table. “How could this have happened, General Chu? An illegal enterprise of such unimaginable danger conducted by our citizens under our very noses?”

  “I believe,” Niu Jianxing said, “I must be the one to answer that, Secretary.”

  Wei Gaofan interrupted angrily, “None of us can be expected to answer for all the failures of those who conduct actual operations.”

  Niu did not look at Wei. He addressed the room in general. “Our colleague Wei appears to want to pass the culpability down to those least able to defend themselves.”

  “I resent—!” Wei snapped.

  The secretary cut him off: “If there’s an explanation, Jianxing, tell us.”

  “There is,” Niu said quietly. “A simple explanation of various forces—a weak businessman, the greed inevitably fostered by free-market economics, the conspiracy of certain Western corporations, and the corrupt arrogance of a member of this very committee.”

  As the Owl
enunciated the last words, there was a shocked pause. Then the room erupted in outrage, protest, and shouted questions directed back at Niu.

  Wei Gaofan, his temple-dog face choleric with rage, shouted, “Such a statement is tantamount to treason, Niu! I call for a vote of censure!”

  “Which one of us are you slandering, sir!” Shi Jingnu demanded.

  “It’s unconscionable!” called one of the youngest members.

  “Unless,” the secretary said quietly, “Niu can prove his accusation.”

  The room instantly was silent, questioning.

  Someone muttered, “I can’t believe it.”

  “Believe it,” General Chu growled, his unlit cigar rolling around his thin-lipped mouth.

  Niu pushed himself away from the table and walked to the door. He opened it and beckoned.

  Still in his PLA uniform, Major Pan Aitu marched inside. Niu escorted the pudgy spycatcher to the table and stood beside him. “Major, detail your investigation, if you please.”

  In his gentle, completely expressionless voice, Pan laid out the conspiracy from Donk & LaPierre’s approach to Yu Yongfu with the contraband deal, to Li Aorong’s and Wei Gaofan’s involvement, until Jon Smith had at last handed the only existing manifest to Pan, who had faxed it from Dazu to the Standing Committee.

  Wei Gaofan’s hard face paled. Still, he grumbled, “It seems, with the tragic death of Li Aorong only an hour ago, all those named by Major Pan are dead. Except for me, of course. I categorically deny—”

  Pan gazed steadily at Wei. “Not all of them are dead, sir. Li Kuonyi—without father or husband—is alive. Many of Feng Dun’s men survived. The captain of infantry is, of course, alive, as is your friend, the general, who sent the captain to help Feng Dun retrieve the manifest. All have given me official statements.”

  For a moment, Wei Gaofan did not move. His features seemed to melt, but his jaw clamped tight. “Niu Jianxing has forced them to lie!”

  “No,” the secretary said thoughtfully, studying Wei as if seeing him for the first time. “There is only one liar here.”