They stood near a cluster of houses that formed a floating village. Multidecked tour boats rested at anchor, as did many of the junks, their fan-shaped sails finding no wind. A tiny boat appeared with a fisherman standing in it, rowing with two oars crossed in an X. Malone watched as the man found his footing and tossed a net out into the water, its weights opening the mesh like a flower.
“Once,” he said, “years ago. On an assignment, I came through on the way into China.”
“As you will today,” Ivan said. The Russian was studying the sky, looking for something. “Border is less than two hundred kilometers north. But we do not go that way.”
“I get the feeling you’ve done this before,” Stephanie said.
“Sometimes.”
Pau Wen had remained quiet during the long flight, sleeping most of the way, as had they all, trying to adjust to a six-hour time difference. Pau gazed out at the calm sea with a sense that he’d been here before, too. A light fog steamed from the sea’s surface, filtering a rising sun. Oyster-colored clouds dotted a blue sky.
“Tran Hung Dao, Vietnam’s grand commander, faced off Kublai Khan’s army here,” Pau quietly said, “in 1288. He placed bamboo stakes in the rivers so that when the Chinese boats arrived at low tide, which he knew they would, the hulls would be pierced. When that occurred, his troops swooped down and slaughtered the invaders.”
Malone knew the rest of that story. “But the Chinese returned, conquered, and dominated here for nearly a thousand years.”
“Which explains why Vietnam and China are not friends,” Ivan said. “Long memories.”
On the flight, Malone had read what Stephanie had hastily amassed on Pau Wen. His background was one of academics, focusing on history, anthropology, and archaeology, but clearly he was a consummate politician. How else could someone become the confidant of both Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping, two utterly different personalities, and prosper under both?
“My uncle was a fisherman,” Pau said. “He sailed a junk. As a boy, I would go out on the water with him.”
Maybe fifty or more of the distinctive ships floated in the bay.
“The cotton sail is dipped in a liquid that comes from a plant similar to a yam,” Pau said. “That’s what gives the red-tan color. It also prevents rot and mildew. My task, as a boy, was to care for the sails.” Pau made no effort to hide a nostalgic tone. “I loved the water. I still recall sewing the coarse cotton panels together, one seam at a time.”
“What are you after?” Malone asked.
“Are you always so direct?”
“Do you ever answer a question?”
Pau smiled. “Only when I want to.”
Cassiopeia grabbed three bags from the dock. Earlier, she’d volunteered to find food and drink, and Ivan had provided her with several hundred Vietnamese dong.
“Soft drinks and bread,” she said. “Best I could do this early. In another hour there’s a café open just beyond the end of the dock.”
A small village nestled close to the shore—a cluster of low-slung pastel-colored buildings, rooftops bare and silent, a few faint curls of smoke wafting from several of the chimneys.
Malone accepted a Pepsi and asked Ivan, “Let’s see if
“Time to time, we sneak into China. They have coastal radar, but rocks and mountains give shelter.”
“We’re going to sail a junk in?”
Ivan shook his head. “Not today.”
Malone had also asked and received from Stephanie three other reports. One was on Karl Tang, China’s first vice president and the Party’s vice premier. Tang came from simple beginnings, trained as a geologist, rising steadily within the Communist Party until he was now one step from the top. In China’s convoluted political system, the Communist Party was intimately interwoven with the national government. Every key governmental position was occupied by a Party official. Which explained why the president also served as Party premier. No one ever achieved election to any position without the Party’s consent, which meant Karl Tang was a man of great power. Yet he required an oil lamp from an ancient grave so badly that he stole a four-year-old boy?
Ni Yong seemed the antithesis of Tang. Right off was his name, using the traditional form of last first. He’d grown up in Sichuan province in a village where nearly everyone was named Ni. He served two decades in the military, rising to high rank. He’d also been in Tiananmen Square in June 1989 when the tanks appeared. The West considered him a moderate, perhaps even a liberal, but they’d been fooled before by Chinese bureaucrats who said one thing then did another. Ni’s administration of the central disciplinary commission was widely regarded as admirable, a refreshing change of pace from the Beijing usual. The hope was that Ni Yong could become a new breed of Eastern leader.
The final report dealt with Viktor Tomas.
