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.”
He sighed. “That’s what I feared. But not tonight, I beg of you. If anything should happen to you tonight, really, it’s a most infelicitous time for me.”
“The lottery?”
“Yes. Any time after tomorrow at four o’clock. If you insist on getting killed off, I beg of you, do it tomorrow after four o’clock.”
I said: “Get Theophilo up here for me, will you? Can you do that for me?”
He drifted across the room, clicking his tongue, and I went to find Mai. I was getting rather fond of Mai in a puzzling, inexplicable sort of way, and I thought she might like to visit the museum, that we might go there together, almost, but not quite, like tourists who are determined to see everything there is to see in a strange and exciting town.
◆◆◆
We broke into the museum with not the slightest bit of trouble. It was comforting to know that even if we were caught, some kindly judge would lecture us and fine us a few thousand patacas, but we were quite careful none the less. I picked the lock on the door that led to the cellars, and we crept through the corridors silently enough not to disturb the somnolent guards we saw dozing over their little teak tables; one of them had an alarm clock to wake him when it was time to make his rounds again; I pushed the alarm button home to stop it from ringing at its appointed time, and we crept silently on like thieves in the night, which is what we were for the moment. A patrolling guard, ill-shaven and half-asleep, passed us by as we took cover behind a twelfth-century chest of ivory-inlaid ebony that was supposed to be by Lu Sing-chu but looked to me like a fake; it lacked the great master’s emphasis on the fine incised line as a transpository device; it was probably by his lesser known pupil Su Ling. We found the map room, put a chair under the door handle, just in case, drew the heavy drapes and switched on the lights.
I found the map I wanted in ten minutes: it was somewhat stylized in the fashion of the day, but well detailed and marvelously intricate. And knowing Robert Hart’s passion for precision, I was sure that it was accurate as well. I rolled it up carefully, and we went out together the way we had entered.
And an hour after we had left it, we were back in Bonelli’s office. Theophilo was there, waiting for me, his scarred old face wreathed in smiles and his voice a little thick with too much whisky. I told him what we had to do, and watched the smile grow broader as he listened.
◆◆◆
There was a sharp, cold wind whipping up the tops of the waves as the junk sailed slowly west in the darkness. There were no lights showing, and the only sound was the abominable creaking of the masts and the occasional flap of the brown sails: it was cold enough to wear heavy sweaters, and the blown spray was like ice-drops on our faces, refreshing and stimulating and somehow cleaner than I thought the job ahead of us might be.
In the darkness. Theo spoke quietly, his voice almost a whisper. I had told him very little of my thinking, because I wasn’t able to explain it even to myself; all he knew was that he was going to put me ashore on Siang-chu and stand by to come running if I yelled loud enough; and from the expression on his face, I knew that he hoped I would yell at the top of my voice before he got bored sitting around as backup man. He said now:
“You go to kill Ming? Is good.”
I shook my head. I said: “Ming is not the objective, though he’ll probably try to run interference.”
He said nothing, but stood there staring ahead into the darkness, looking up at the clouds once in a while to bless the hidden moon.
I smelled perfume, and Mai was silently beside me, turning to look up at me with a somber look in her eyes.
Another thing I could not explain to myself: a woman along on a job like this?
But Mai, somehow, was not just another woman. I thought that I might need her skills, her knowledge, her extraordinary capacity for quick and silent action. In spite of her unfeminine expertise in aggressive matters, the softness of her skin over those tight muscles, the oriental delicacy which was a counterpoint to the unexpected savagery that I knew to be there, had caused a very considerable impression on me, an impression of quite the wrong sort that had no place at all in the present circumstances. It wasn’t love, or anything even remotely like it; it was a cruel and animal urge that made me want to feel her body beside me more than anything in the world. Bed had nothing to do with it either; and it wasn’t platonic: I wanted to share danger, not with just any woman, but with Mai.
So there she was. When I’d told her what I was going to do, she had merely nodded, not asking me if she was supposed to come along too but just taking it for granted. It was as though her allegiance to Bettina had unaccountably been switched to me, that she was there, expectant and receptive for anything that I might want. I had the feeling that she understood my twisted desires more than I understood them myself; it’s far easier for the Orientals to think in terms of nonlogic than it is for us, even though, inexplicably, we sometimes act as if we hadn’t a brain in our heads. And for me, when emotion fights with intellect, I’ll take the side that seems the better one at the moment, heart or head.
Bonelli had merely raised an expressive eyebrow when it became apparent that she was expecting to be a sort of bodyguard for me. He looked at me a little quizzically, and thought for a while, and had said at last: “A watery grave together, is that what you want?”
