“No, Minister. The last thing China can endure is an open civil war for political control. The chaos would be insurmountable. The world would take advantage of our turmoil. This must be a private affair. Between you and Tang. I will not involve anyone else, or allow you to do so.”
“It seems Tang has involved the army.”
“And I have taken measures to prevent that from happening again.”
“So what am I to do?”
“You can start by listening. I have to tell you what happened, in 1977, just after Mao died.”
CASSIOPEIA RELEASED THE HARNESS AND DROPPED THE REMAINING few feet to the ground. She was soaking wet, but thankfully the morning air carried warmth. Pau Wen dropped beside her. She was impressed with the older man’s agility.
“You okay?” she asked.
“Quite fine.” He smoothed out his soaked shirt and trousers.
They stood at the edge of a broad field that stretched eastward from the lake a kilometer or more. The chopper moved off a few hundred meters and touched down, spanking up a cloud of dust. She trotted back toward the shore, arriving as Malone emerged.
“There’s no telling how many parasites and bacteria I now have inside me,” he said, water cascading from him.
She smiled. “Can’t be all that bad.”
“Easy for you to say. You’re not going have six toes and three arms in a few days.”
Pau Wen stepped beside her. “Actually, this part of the lake is relatively clean. The northern portions are another matter.”
“Where’s your boyfriend?” Malone asked.
She didn’t like his tone but understood the resentment. Viktor had known their destination because Ivan had known, which meant one or both had sold them out.
But that made no sense.
The Russians were intent on finding Sokolov. Why end the mission before it started?
She heard footsteps cracking across the dry earth behind them and turned to see Viktor, dressed in a green flight suit, walking their way.
Malone rushed past her and planted a fist in Viktor’s face.
FORTY-NINE
MALONE WAS READY WHEN VIKTOR SPRANG TO HIS FEET. HE sidestepped the first lunge and landed another punch in Viktor’s gut, which he immediately noted was hard as steel.
“You sold us out,” he said. “Again.”
Viktor lowered his fists. “Malone, are you that stupid? Karl Tang doesn’t give a damn about you. It’s
“And you expect us to believe that?” Malone asked.
“Tang wants you dead,” Viktor said to Pau. “In order to save them, I had to save you.”
Pau faced Malone. “We need to head north. Tang has a long reach in this country.”
“I can take you wherever you need to go,” Viktor said.
“And why would we trust you?” Cassiopeia asked.
“I just blew a pilot out of the sky. That doesn’t show you whose side I’m on?”
Malone caught the change of tone. Softer. Calmer. Reassuring. A voice seemingly just for her. But he wanted to know, “Karl Tang is going to let us roam free around China in a PLA helicopter? We can just do as we please?”
“If we hurry, we can be gone before he has time to react. My orders were to make sure the fighter strafed the lake with its cannons so no one swam to shore. I changed those. It’ll take them a little while to regroup. One thing I’ve learned is that, unlike you or me, the Chinese are not improvisers. This was not an officially sanctioned action, so some local commander somewhere is right now trying to figure out what to do.”
Malone ran a hand through his wet hair and tried to assess their options.
There weren’t many.
He stared out on the lake and noticed that none of the junks approached either the debris in the water or the shore where they stood.
He turned and was about to ask Viktor another question when a fist slammed into his jaw. The blow stunned him, sent him to the ground, the bright midday blacking in and out.
“Don’t. Hit. Me. Again,” Viktor said, standing over him.
He contemplated retaliating, but opted not to. He was still gauging this foe, undecided, except that Viktor had just saved their lives and he apparently liked Cassiopeia. Both of which bothered him.
“Are you two through?” Cassiopeia asked.
“I am,” Malone said, standing, his gaze locked on Viktor.
“I’m not the enemy,” Viktor said.
He rubbed his jaw. “Since we have little choice, we’re just going to have to take your word on that. Fly us north.”
“Where?”
“Xi’an,” Pau said. “To the tomb of Qin Shi.”
NI STRAINED TO HEAR THE PREMIER’S SOFT VOICE THROUGH the phone.
“The time just before and after Mao died was chaotic. Politics shifted back and forth between Maoism and something utterly different. What that new direction was to be, no one knew. Mao himself tried to balance these conflicting views, but he was too old and weak to keep them in check.”
Though young, Ni remembered the early 1970s, and knew that the Gang of Four, radical Maoists led by Mao’s wife, had favored tactics such as class struggle, anti-intellectualism, egalitarianism, and xenophobia. Their opposition advocated economic growth, stability, education, and pragmatism.
