Three miles from the mainland coast, it was a fortress built by the adherents of the White Lotus Society. That must have been back in 1797, when the anti-Manchu forces were gathering on the coast for the final showdown that turned, at last, into the Tai Ping rebellion. I remembered that a hundred years later, Sir Robert Hart, the great Irish-Chinese statesman, had mapped the coastline around Canton—till then a shoreline almost unknown to the West—in an effort to deny the security of their hideouts to the opium smugglers whose silver drain was having a chaotic effect on the Chinese economy. His success at stabilizing the government’s source of income had been largely due to his memorable attention to the smallest possible detail, and the records he had left—the few that survived—were masterly. Hart’s pro-Manchu energy had earned him the vicious enmity of the pirates, the gangsters, and the smugglers who still operated openly along the coast in the name of some obscure political fanaticism. The Boxers had burned his house down with all its priceless records, all, that is, except the diary he had kept for forty years, and the maps of the coast which he had presented to the Emperor.

I was thinking, suddenly, of the map in Bonelli’s office, knowing now what that chord was, that its delicate penmanship had evoked. Just a worthless fake, Bonelli had said. But at that time we hadn’t known each other very well, and the little lie, which I was sure it was, had perhaps been necessary for the sake of an intelligent security.

Now, the name of the unscrupulous Dowager Empress Tzu Hsi kept knocking at the back of my mind, clamoring for some sort of notice; and when I’d sorted out the bits and pieces, I remembered that her son, the Emperor T’ung Chi, was an amateur cartographer and had, in turn, donated all his maps to one of the Canton museums. His collection was a famous one; did it include, I wondered, any of the rare Robert Hart maps? It was a probability, at least.

On the island, there was no sign of life. The rocky massif was dark, and I fancied that the powerful glasses were bringing it close enough for me to hear any sounds if sounds there were on it; the stillness and the clarity of the night made the fancy irresistible. But the great stones were silent as death. It was hard to recognize them as a fortress; from this distance, they were a jumble of granite blocks set against granite cliffs and washed with the spray of the granite sea.

I went downstairs to find Bonelli in his own little fortress. He was at the great teak desk in a corner of the main fan-tan room, paying large wads of notes to a small and somber Chinese who watched carefully as the notes were counted, a thin and alert old man who waited till the paying was done, not taking his eyes from the money, and then looked up at me and said, in tolerably good Portuguese: “I have to thank you for this, Cain Sin-san.” He turned away and placed the money on one of the tables, and Bonelli got up and said cheerfully, taking my arm and guiding me away:

“A great deal of money is riding on your well-being, Cain. If you stay alive for a few more days, I will be ruined.”

I didn’t believe it. I knew that he was shrewd enough to bet heavily on my continued survival, and I wondered how he’d feel when I told him what I was planning. I said: “Remember the T’ung Chi map collection? I have an idea it was sold to the Portuguese, but I can’t remember when. Or even if that’s a fact.”

He looked at me in surprise. There was a touch of suspicion there too. “How should I know a thing like that?”

I said: “How could you possibly not know? That’s the collection your Robert Hart came from.”

“Oh.”

We were moving into his office, and he stood in the doorway watching me as I went to the fine old map that was over the divan. Its penmanship was splendid.

I said: “I never really did believe that this was a fake.”

He said, seeming surprised: “Did I say it was a fake? What a foolish thing to do! But then, you had only just arrived, and I did not really know very much about you, did I? I said to myself: I will trust this man completely, but only when I know him a little better. So you will forgive me?”

“Of course.”

“And if you’re interested in maps, I have much better ones. In my vault, there’s a half-section of Peutinger’s Tabula, the only one in the world outside the great museums.”

The Hart map was of the area around Amoy, more than three hundred miles too far north to interest me at the moment.

I said: “I’m more interested in the T’ung Chi collection.”

Bonelli frowned, a distant look in his eyes. “The Emperor she placed on the throne before she died, what was his name?”

“Kuang Hsu.”

“Ah yes, Kuang Hsu’s entire estate was broken up when he died, and part of it was presented to the Portuguese here in Macao more than a hundred years ago.” He shrugged. “In those days; you may know, it was essential for the Chinese that the colony retain its status quo as an outlet to the West. Hong Kong, you remember, was just beginning to thrive, and the Cantonese saw the eventual decline of Macao as a result. So they tried to bribe the Portuguese to build bigger harbors here, to strengthen the colony as a counterweight to the British influence in Hong Kong. It was not a very successful overture, but part of the price the Manchus paid was Kuang Hsu’s collection of jade, twelfth-century armor, and maps. Somewhere around 1843, I think.”

“And the Robert Hart maps were part of the collection?”

He podded. “And they’re still here in the museum.”

I said: “Where’s Mai?”

He looked at me in surprise. “You do not wish to hear how I acquired one of them? It was really quite a coup. Just the faintest touch of illegality, and quite a brilliant stroke of double-dealing.”

“Is there a map of Siang-chu island in the collection?”

“There must be. The purpose of Sir Robert’s maps was to further his fight against the Boxers. And Siang-chu, in those days, was a collection point for Boxer weapons smuggled in from Japan. So, provided that he was able to gain access to the island he must have mapped it with his customary efficiency.” He looked hard at me and said: “But there’s nothing on Siang-chu any more, nothing but an old fortress which is slowly crumbling into the decay that comes even to the best of us in time.”

“No military outpost of the Canton defenses?”

“Nothing, nothing at all.”

“How sure are you of that?”

Bonelli raised his oh-so-elegant shoulders. “I am perfectly sure. One of my junks was driven ashore there in the last typhoon we had, and the crew spent the night on the island before we were able to rescue them.”

I said sharply: “But that’s mainland territory. The Reds didn’t try to stop you landing there to pick them up?”

He said very slowly: “No, they didn’t. I must admit, I wondered about that at the time. I still wonder about it. If you consider how touchy they are about territorial rights...Yes, I still wonder about it.” His white hands were waving about like butterflies in the breeze. “And now, no doubt, you have learned something about Siang-chu that intrigues you. Would you mind telling me what it is?”

I said: “That’s where Ming disappears to when he drops out of sight.”

He stared. He said at last: “That’s a very dangerous piece of knowledge to have, Cain! If it’s true. And will you give me leave to doubt it?”

I said: “Of course, if you’ll tell me why.”

“We-e-ell...first of all, Red China could not so easily be fooled if someone had taken over their abandoned little fortress. Even though there’s no military presence there of any sort...” He broke off. “Are you suggesting that the Chinese know about it and choose to leave him alone? To turn a blind eye?”

I could hear the wheels turning in his mind, and I let him talk. He sat down primly on the edge of the divan, his knees close together, and a finger to his cheek, and he said thoughtfully:

“For them it would be merely a case of turning a blind eye to what’s going on, would it not? And Ming, no doubt, is useful to them from time to time. He supplies them with hijacked military equipment once in a while. Yes, perhaps it just might be possible. Some minor official who needn’t really be particularly corrupt, if someone higher up the echelon had told him: Leave alone the man who sells us so much that we need. Yes, it’s possible. It might even perhaps be likely.”

I said: “In short, he’s harming their mortal enemies, so why should they make it difficult for him?”

“Their mortal enemies?”

“Ming is a thorn in the side of honest Western governments in their search for peace on earth and goodwill towards men.”

Bonelli said, tilting his chin up ridiculously: “I would give your comments more thought, Cain, if I did not detect a note of sardonic ill-humor in that comment. Why is it that your people can only regard as mortal enemies anyone who does not agree with them?” He crossed over to the bar and poured some cognac. Remy Martin Fine Champagne, and when he handed me the glass, he said, frowning: “Yes, now that I come to think of it, it would explain a lot that has always been inexplicable.”

I said: “The skipper who was washed ashore on the island. It wasn’t by chance Theophilo?”

“Indeed it was.”

“And no one disturbed him? No one at all?”

“No one.”

“Surely he’d take a look at the fortress while he was there?”

Bonelli’s eyes were taking on a very shrewd, alert sort of look, the look of a man who has something to hide and who fears you may be on to it. But it occurred to me that almost any comment you might make in Bonelli’s secret world would have him worried if he weren’t absolutely sure what you were looking for.

He said slowly: “No, there was a typhoon raging. It would have been impossible to climb up off the lower level. When we finally got a dinghy in there to take them off, they’d washed themselves to the rocks to keep from being washed away.” He made a decision. He smiled and said softly: “And now, the next step is really the deadly one, is it not? Are you really going to take it?”

“With your help, yes. I’m going to take it.”