The Brad West Files

by Fritz Galt

  The officer’s first question had been about Liang. They were onto him. Who had tipped them off? It couldn’t have been May. Was it Sullivan? Hong Kong was part of China. Would the Hong Kong authorities alert Beijing that he was coming? He could already picture being greeted at the airport by a firing squad.

  If he could only figure out what these officials were up to. Perhaps Sullivan was the key. He certainly was no NTSB investigator. Maybe he was with the FBI or CIA or NSA or some such three-letter acronym that stood for no damn good. After all, Sullivan had glibly mentioned sending May’s behavioral patterns to the “profiling department.”

  Brad also got the distinct impression that he was being used somehow, like an unsuspecting stooge or drug mule.

  Surely the CIA wouldn’t have shipped him to China only to meet his demise at the hands of Liang’s henchmen. If they wanted him for more than that, what was so unique about him that they had targeted him for the covert assignment? Did the U.S. Government want May as badly as he did?

  He looked back upon the various events that had nudged him on his current trajectory. There was the expulsion from grad school, his totaled pickup, the eviction from his dormitory, the free pass to China, the packet of money, May’s sudden departure, and the troubling, yet intriguing, letter from her father. All these factors led directly or indirectly to his decision to fly to China.

  It was a rather chilling thought that someone might have orchestrated all of this. But if the spooks wanted so desperately for him to do their bidding, what was it he was supposed to be doing?

  May was the draw. She had led him like a panting adolescent to where he was, 30,000 feet above the world’s most populous nation and heading straight to its capital city. First there was her lovemaking, purely spontaneous, or was it? Then the letter from her father, the Chinese anthropologist who had made the important new find. How had it ended up with him? He squirmed his right foot about. The letter was still there, concealed between his foot and his shoe. And finally, he couldn’t deny that May had dropped enough money for him to buy a new truck or, more likely, to take an extended holiday to Asia.

  So, while May was drawing him in like a spider to the center of her web, all his misfortunes had been kicking him out the door. He had no job, career, home or money to keep him in Tucson.

  And the funny thing about it was that he wanted to be there. Helping May solve her problems was a good thing. It was his business and, damn it, she needed him.

  What he would do once he landed in Beijing was anyone’s guess. He couldn’t go to the military, since Liang was a member of that crowd. He couldn’t go to the Chinese authorities, since Liang was the president’s grandson. He could contact the U.S. Embassy, but they wouldn’t be interested in his love life. No, he would have to take the indirect approach and first find her father through the institution he knew best, academia.

  As long as there wasn’t a line of AK-47s waiting for him once he stepped off the airplane, he would be happy.

  Then another thought occurred to him.

  Was he making it all up? Was this some sort of Beautiful Mind scenario? After all, he was hearing voices, well one voice anyway. Soaring high above the earth, a miniature Kahlua bottle in one hand, was he building castles in the sky?

  He should stop taking himself so seriously. He had just had a run of bad luck, and he had fallen in love.

  Surely that wasn’t unique in the history of mankind.

  He fidgeted in his seat. For once, no one was seated next to him. He unbuckled his seatbelt and reached down his crotch to move a stubborn wad of soggy bills back where it belonged.

  Just then an airline hostess stopped by with the loose end of his buckle. “May I help you with that, sir?”

  Earl Skitowsky’s undergraduate students were just filing out of the air-conditioned classroom with notions of Chinese dynastic continuity and the impending summer break dancing in their heads.

  He shut his annotated textbook and slipped it into his briefcase. With Professor Richter having put the entire department in the national spotlight, there was a noticeable shift among the teaching assistants away from backpacks and toward briefcases.

  He had no lunch packed away, and he thought of Brad, whose latest tragedies always made for good lunchtime conversation.

  He grabbed his cell phone and dialed his Chinese dream girl.

  The phone rang once, then was answered by an automated message from the phone company. The number was no longer in service.

  Huh? Jade hadn’t told him that she was changing her number.

  Shit-ka-bibble. He fell back in his seat. He hoped she hadn’t blown the country without saying bye and without some goodbye lovemaking. He’d heard that it was even better than pity-sex, and he was longing to verify the theory.

  Maybe she had just moved back to Davis-Monthan. He could try his luck by calling the base operator. But if the military managed to trace his call and connected him with Brad in any way, he was nailed.

  But wouldn’t they know who and where he was by then? Why hadn’t they tracked him down? Maybe they were waiting for him to lead them to Brad. In that case, it was better to play it cool until he knew what was going on.

  At the bottom of his open briefcase, he noticed Igor Sullivan’s business card. Somehow, contacting an NTSB investigator seemed less risky than the military. Certainly as a government official, Sullivan could check his PDA for Jade’s whereabouts. Didn’t they keep a computer record of all foreigners in the country?

  He lifted his cell phone and dialed the office number printed on the card. As it rang, he flipped the card over. Oh yes, Sullivan had written in his cell number by hand. He could use that as a backup if Sullivan wasn’t in the office.

  Numerous clicks later, he had the feeling he was being passed between several telephone switching stations.

  At last the line picked up. “This is the Central Intelligence Agency. How may I direct your call?”

  Earl turned off his phone at once.

  On the approach to Beijing Capital International Airport, Brad was hoping to catch a glimpse of the Great Wall of China. But he was arriving from the south, and the wall was to the north of the city. The plane reduced altitude, and he was treated to a view of orchards, fishponds, walled villages, and the occasional truck or bus crawling from place to place.

  On the horizon, he saw some activity in the air. Either it was a busy airport or something was happening.

  Military jets screamed back and forth and helicopters hovered just over the tarmac. It looked like some military exercise was underway, unless of course the Russians were attacking.

  They couldn’t be there because of him. Or could they?

  By the time the airplane touched down, he had broken out in a sweat. They were in a remote part of the airfield. He checked for armored vehicles but saw only green grass.

  They began taxiing toward the terminal. Along the way, he spotted a line of limousines outside an old part of the airport. It appeared that various dignitaries were departing that morning. Maybe the show of military force was there for them. As a world capital, Beijing must have state visits every day. However, he expected to see foreign flags flying from the limos, and he didn’t.

  He looked upward. Fighter jets continued to buzz low and crisscross the airport’s airspace at risk to the safety of airliners taking off and landing.

  The military didn’t seem to have noticed his plane landing, which was good news. He wiped the back of his neck with the cloth on his headrest. So if not for him, why all the military? Could the country be that concerned with security? How could anybody be that paranoid?

  He was still drying off his face when they approached a new chrome-and-glass terminal. This was more like it. He’d just try to fit in with the crowd.

  Before they came to a stop, passengers had already unbuckled and grabbed their belongings. He couldn’t even wedge into the aisle until the exits opened and everyone had passed.

  The plane was evacuated in record time.
Was it him? He sniffed his armpits, then pulled his backpack down.

  It wasn’t easy to heft it in front of him while working out the kinks in his nylons.

  The same flight attendant who had caught him with his hand down his pants caught his eye at the exit. He pulled himself together and tried to straighten out his walk.

  “Equipment problems,” he said. “Cheerio.”

  Whatever distraction the military had caused may have worked in his favor. Once inside the passenger terminal, there was no visible security presence. He tried to walk normally from quarantine to immigration to customs. And they let him pass with no more than the usual scrutiny.

  Before he knew it, he was passing through sliding glass doors that led into a crowd of waiting people. There were tour guides, hotel drivers, personal drivers, and relatives. He found himself immersed in the bosom of communist China.

  Having braced for difficulty, he suddenly found himself at a loss for what to do. People hurried past him into the muggy summer day. Shouldn’t his actions appear equally purposeful?

  He hadn’t seen any hotel reservations board in the terminal, and taxi drivers were trying to grab his backpack for him.

  Okay, he’d go with the flow.

  He let a cabbie lead him past a double line of waiting cabs and across several traffic islands. Then the man shoved him and his backpack into the back of a small red cab. The white seat covers reeked with cigarette smoke, and the door slammed shut with a hollow clink.

  He searched around for a seatbelt and found none. So that was the way things worked. He’d just have to adapt. Maybe not all Chinese drivers were as dangerous as May.

  The engine gunned to life, and Brad sat back to watch. They peeled out of the airport onto a wide highway that was nearly empty. The driver turned around inside the glass enclosure where he sat and looked at him for directions.

  Brad uttered the only Chinese word that came to mind, “Beijing.”

  The driver nodded and gripped the wheel more firmly. He swerved around several slower cars that were hogging the fast lane.

  Brad enjoyed the stands of healthy-looking trees on both sides of the highway. It was a lovely welcome to the city. Occasional billboards advertised the latest computer companies and gave the country an air of sophistication.

  The driver downshifted as they approached a roadblock. Military? Brad scrutinized the span of small cubicles strung across the highway. It reminded more like tollbooths in the United States.

  The driver pulled up to a guard who sat behind a booth and handed her a red Chinese dollar. She gave him a receipt and the gate lifted up before them.

  It was a tollbooth. Another great import of the American motor culture.

  That reminded him. He didn’t have any Chinese currency to pay the driver. Already the meter read fifty somethings. Surely, the guy would take American greenbacks, as proletariat in communist countries could always use hard currency.

  Soon, the trees gave way to a construction project that seemed determined to rip up all vestiges of nature. Workmen appeared to be laying down train tracks alongside the road. Then modern apartment buildings sprang up side-by-side in a sudden phalanx. The taxi passed under an overarching highway with several ramps. Sleek black cars zoomed onto the expressway, and taxis of all colors began to materialize. More high-rises loomed directly ahead. They had reached Beijing.

  Once again, the driver turned back to him for directions.

  Brad didn’t have the vaguest clue where to go. He’d lay some English on the guy. Maybe he’d shoot for the low end of the lodging market to avoid standing out. “Do you have a YMCA?”

  “Shenme?”

  Uh oh. The English wasn’t working.

  He looked around for signs or brand names he could recognize. But they were immersed in a sea of Chinese characters. The expressway petered out into a residential and commercial district with a park lining the road. He wasn’t getting anywhere, and the meter was up to 80 yen, or whatever it was.

  He waved at the driver to pull over. “Stop here.”

  They pulled into a separate bicycle lane, forcing the bicycle riders into the steady stream of cars and buses. The men and women pedaling past seemed unfazed by the taxi’s maneuver and steered into traffic to avoid them.

  Brad dug into his pocket where he had placed a small wad of cash and pulled out a fifty-dollar bill. “Will this do?”

  The man took it and looked at it. Then he shook his head and handed it back.

  That didn’t work anymore than a ruble on a New York street.

  Brad looked out the window in desperation. One of the buildings read “Communications Bank of China” in plain English. Those were the two things he needed most, communications and money. He pointed to the bank.

  The driver nodded and made a left turn across four lanes of traffic. This caused a mass of oncoming vehicles to slam on their brakes and swerve around him. Hmm, maybe it was Chinese drivers in general.

  “Wait here,” he said, and motioned to the driver to stay put. He grabbed his backpack and slipped out the door. The guy seemed to trust him. He wasn’t so sure he even trusted himself. But the guy’s trust implied some sort of strict repercussions if he didn’t pay the fare, and he didn’t want to test Chinese law enforcement. It seemed weird, but maybe the guy was just trusting.

  The bank was devoid of customers. Was it even a retail bank? He approached the first teller and shoved four fifty-dollar bills under the window. “Chinese money?” he asked. It was embarrassing to resort to pidgin English.

  The woman nodded and counted out a stack of bills of different denominations, each with Mao’s picture on it. Thank Mao that Chinese currency used the Arabic number system.

  He took it, pocketed the receipt, and waddled back to the driver, who stood smoking a cigarette by his open door. Brad gave him a hundred. That should take care of him. He left the man staring at the bill and started to leave down the sidewalk.

  A moment later, he felt a tap on the shoulder.

  Oh no. He turned around.

  It was the driver.

  “Yes?”

  The guy handed him a twenty, complete with a receipt and a crooked smile.

  Right. Okay, so that’s the way it worked. People wouldn’t try to stiff him.

  He stuffed the change in his pocket, thought confidently of all the cash stashed in his pants, adjusted his crotch and set off to find his way around the city.

  Maybe Earl was onto something. The Chinese weren’t all that bad.

  Liang had a military chauffeur take him back to Zhong Nan Hai for a final visit with President Qian. The next time he returned to the lake, Liang would be president. He was sure of that. Nobody, not even that pesky American, could impede his plans to set China on its new course.

  President Qian was looking especially healthy and happy. That wouldn’t last for long. The old guy had taken some time out of his busy schedule to eat lunch with him in an open-air pavilion.

  Qian talked effusively about Liang’s contribution to the Three Gorges Dam. “It may well be my most lasting legacy,” he said between slurps of lion’s head soup.

  “I’m flying down there today to check on last-minute arrangements,” Liang said. “The ribbon-cutting ceremony is in four days, and I want everything to go smoothly.”

  “I have done as you requested,” Qian said. “This morning, the Central Committee departed Beijing for their last river cruise.”

  “And Prime Minister Yang Shuping as well?”

  “As you requested.”

  “You honor me,” Liang said.

  The president looked proudly at his grandson. “And how are things going with the new head of security at the dam?” He seemed more concerned about Liang’s love life than the safety of his politburo.

  “Of course you are talking about May,” came a voice from behind a red column.

  Liang turned and saw a young woman slinking out of the shadows. Her slender body was caressed from neck to toe by a clinging green chi pao
dress. Her hair was dutifully pinned up. She shuffled up to the president on slippers and bowed low to the venerable man.

  “Jade!” Qian cried out with a mixture of surprise and pleasure. She was one of Liang and May’s frequent guests to the lake and another favorite of the president.

  Liang couldn’t hold back an ironic smile at Jade’s obsequious behavior, for she would shortly put an abrupt and dramatic end to the old man’s life.

  Chapter16

  Brad walked stiffly past an austere brick apartment building. In front of it, makeshift restaurants cluttered the sidewalk, giving the city a lively, residential feel. He had to remind himself to be watchful of anyone following him.

  It was so easy to feel obscured by the large, spread-out city where everyone seemed preoccupied with his or her own business. On the other hand, his height, his light-colored hair and his casual attire made him stand out.

  If the immigration official in Hong Kong had known that he was coming for Liang, he had to assume that Liang knew as well. Liang had already tried twice to rub him out while he was with May. Plucking him off the streets of Beijing would be child’s play.

  The more he thought, the more vulnerable he felt, so much so that he turned and hurried between buildings into the nearest alley.

  Tiny attached shacks lined both sides of the lane. Their doors were perpetually open to children, uncles, aunts, parents and grandparents passing in and out.

  Under a tree at one corner, men slapped Chinese chess pieces onto a board. Steam billowed from round baskets filled with white mounds of dough. Bicycles rang their bells to pass him and clanked when they hit potholes. On a nearby thoroughfare, cars honked and poorly maintained bus brakes squealed.

  He glanced over his shoulder. In fact there was someone back there. It was an unusually tall Chinese man in a worn black suit.

  Brad turned down several alleys at random just to prove to himself that he wasn’t imagining things. The stranger was no longer there. Good. He could breathe easier.

  The sizzle and aroma of deep-fried food began to work on him, and his stomach started to growl for attention.