Damn her! he thought, then grunted as Wei-kou pummeled his back. Yet mixed in with his anger was the memory of how powerful she had looked, standing there before the apple tree, that tiny skull cradled in her hand. A Yang world. That was what she’d said. A hard, dry, masculine world. Was she right? Was that really what they’d made?
Wei-kou placed her hands firmly on his shoulders. “Relax, my husband, please, relax. . . .”
But it was suddenly difficult to relax. All of the ease he had been feeling earlier, all of the happiness he’d felt listening to the magpie calling in the garden—all that had drained from him now, leaving him empty and despondent. Like a dead tree, he thought, remembering how the wind had soughed through its branches.
Tomorrow. He would see to it all tomorrow. Yet when Wei-kou had finished, he got up again, put on his robe and went to his study, then stood before the screen, looking up into the brightness, watching the Eldest Daughter and her fable of the tree that died.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Fire in the Lake
He had not been asleep more than four hours when he was woken by a knocking on the bedroom door. “Master Kao!” the maid called urgently. “Master Kao! You must come at once! There is an urgent message for you!”
Chen struggled up from the depths in which he’d been floating and sat up. For the first time in a long, long while he felt relaxed. And happy. He turned, smiling, conscious of Wang Ti there in the darkness beside him. They had made love. For the first time since the loss of her child, they had made love. He shivered, remembering how her eyes had opened to him; how she had softly called his name.
So long he’d waited. So long. . . .
Leaning across her he pulled back the hair from her brow and placed a small soft kiss there, careful not to wake her, then eased back the cover and got up.
He threw on a gown and went out. The maid, Tian Ching, was waiting for him outside, her nightgown tightly wrapped about her. She bowed, then turned, pointing to the vid-phone in the comer.
“It is your office, Master. They said to wake you.”
Chen thanked her then went across.
It was his lieutenant, Wilson.
“Major Kao ... I thought you’d want to know at once. We’ve got our
killer!”
“Alive?”
“Yes, sir. And keen to talk, it seems.”
Chen’s face lit up. “Excellent! How did we get him?” Wilson laughed. “Purest accident, as it turns out! One of our drug squads hit a Triad-run gambling den down-level and picked him up in the trawl. They were about to let him go when his face came up on the screen. So your all-points warning worked! They captured him at Nordhausen, so they’ve taken him to the garrison at Kassel. I’m headed there now.” “Okay. I’ll meet you there. It’ll take me ... what? ... an hour and a half at most. But keep him isolated, okay? And take some of our men—men you can trust—to guard him. If a certain Company director finds we’ve got his man—which I’m sure he will—he’ll be anxious to remove the evidence, and I don’t want any mistakes this time. I want to nail that bastard Comwell!” “Sir!”
He cut connection, then turned away, hurrying to his bedroom to dress. But he had taken only two paces when the vid-phone’s chime sounded again. Chen turned, staring at the flashing screen. “Who the hell. . . ?” He went back and pressed to connect, then stood back as a young face filled the screen.
“Hannah?”
“You’ve got to come, Kao Chen. At once. Something terribly impor-tant’s happened.”
He stared at her, wondering what on earth could be so important that she would phone him at half past three in the morning. “What’s happened? Has someone died?”
“No. But they will, if you don’t help us.” He sighed. “Look, I can’t. An important lead has just come up on one of my cases and I’ve got to follow it up right away. Can’t it wait? Can’t I pop in to you on my way back?”
She shook her head. “You don’t understand. This is so important that, well ... I can’t tell you over the phone, but you’ve got to come, you just have to!”
He made to shake his head, but there was real fear in the young woman’s face. Erfut—it was only fifteen minutes from Kassel by cruiser. If he were to call in first and reassure her . . .
“Okay,” he said finally. “I’ll try. But I’ve got to see to this other matter first, okay?”
She nodded, grateful, then cut the line.
Shit, he thought. Then, taking a long, calming breath, he tapped Wilson’s code into the phone and waited to be connected.
the two men sat back from the screen and looked at each other.
“Well? What do you think?”
“I think our friend the Junior Minister has lost his nerve. I think he’s confided in his daughter and she’s panicked him.” “I agree.”
“Then what are we to do?”
“We do what we have to do, neh? The I Lung’s instructions were quite explicit.”
“And the girl?”
“She must die too.”
“A fire?”
“That would be best, neh? No witnesses . . . and it can be made to seem quite natural. An accident...”
“I like that.”
“Good. Then let’s get moving, before our meddling Major has a chance to fuck things up.”
“What about him? What do you think his connection with the young woman
is?”
“Sexual, probably. I’m told his wife is mad. They probably haven’t slept together for years.”
“Then how do we deal with him? A bribe?”
“It depends on the attachment. If he’s besotted with the girl... well, it could be difficult. I think we might have to kill him.” “Messy . . . There’ll be an inquiry.”
“I know. But it can’t be helped. If we can make it seem as if he’s been killed for another reason ...”
“That shouldn’t be too difficult. He has a long record of getting involved in things he shouldn’t have meddled in.”
“Then we’ll do that. But first the girl and her father.”
they had been up half the night, talking, trying to work out how best to approach the matter.
The problem was a simple one. Li Yuan had to be told, but to get to Li Yuan—especially these days—one had to go through numerous intermediaries, and any one of these might be in the pay of the First Dragon. Indeed, to think otherwise would be naive.
To go direct, that would be ideal, yet it was impossible. Even to get to his Chancellor, Nan Ho, would mean negotiating whole levels of bureaucracy, and at some critical point a warning bell would sound, the I Lung would know, and the game would be up. So what were they to do?
Hannah had come up with a solution. They would approach the matter indirectly, through the Security officer, Kao Chen. Chen, she remembered, had access of a kind to Li Yuan. He had told her about his friend, Major Karr, and how he had been made Chia ch’eng— Honorary Assistant to the Royal Household. If Chen could persuade Karr to seek a personal audience with the T’ang . . .
She busied herself, making ch’a, while her father paced the room behind her. Strangely, she had never felt closer to him than tonight. Talking this through, she had found herself appreciating for the first time just how subtle a mind he had . . . and what a minefield the world he inhabited really was.