Back in the living room, Marion placed the cup beside the pot.
“I prefer white tea to be steeped at least ten minutes,” said the man. “Which will allow us time to talk.”
Marion waited.
The man clasped his hands behind his back and began a slow perambulation of the room. “I’m looking for something,” he said. He stopped in front of the banner hanging on the wall, examined it.
Marion said nothing. He put together in his mind the most efficient set of moves necessary to put the knife in the man’s throat.
“Do you know where it is?” the man asked.
“You haven’t told me what you’re looking for.”
“You don’t know?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
The man waved this comment off as if he were waving away a mosquito. “What were you going to do with it?”
Marion said nothing. All was prepared in his mind. “Tea?”
The man turned. “It hasn’t steeped long enough.”
“I prefer it on the more delicate side.”
“Help yourself, then. I’ll wait.”
Marion bent forward with an easy motion and picked up the iron pot by the handle. His mind was as clear and bright as a diamond. He tipped the pot up, filling the cup with hot liquid, placed the pot down, brought the cup up in an unhurried motion as if to his lips and then, with a quick flick of the wrist, sent the scalding contents into the man’s face while at the same time extracting the knife with a lightning motion, slashing it across the man’s throat.
But the man, and the throat, weren’t there, and the knife flashed harmlessly through the air. Briefly overbalanced by the motion, Marion’s weight went forward, and as he tried to recover, an arm with a clawed hand came shooting out of nowhere; Marion saw what looked like metal talons; he tried to duck but it was too late; he felt a savage tug on his throat and a sudden burning rush of air.
The last thing he saw was the man standing beside him, clutching what he realized was his own bloody, pulsing windpipe.
Nodding Crane took a few steps back from the twitching body as blood pumped out onto the carpet. He dropped the grisly part and waited until all was still, then he stepped around the obstruction and into the kitchen. He washed his hands three times in very hot water and carefully examined his suit. There were no flecks of the xiǎorén, the small person, on his clothing. All the force of the movement had been away from his body. There were just a few drops of blood on his left wing-tip shoe, which he meticulously cleaned with a damp rag, followed by a quick polish.
Back in the living room, the blood had ceased to flow. The carpet had absorbed a great deal of it, keeping the bloodstain from spreading. Stepping around it again, he poured himself a cup of tea and tasted it with pleasure. The steeping time had been perfect. He sipped it down and poured another, bringing to mind a particularly appropriate thought from his vast storehouse of Confucian philosophy: When punishments are not properly awarded, the people do not know how to move hand or foot.
38
Gideon Crew strolled around the baggage carousel, as if awaiting luggage. He had no luggage coming in, of course, but he wanted to check out who else was there. Mindy Jackson’s parting words rang in his ears. “Nodding Crane is remarkable only in that he is unremarkable. Except for flat eyes and a perfect physique.” There were, of course, many Asians at the carousel, including a number who fit Mindy’s rather unhelpful description.
Don’t get paranoid, he told himself. Focus on the next step.
He extracted his wallet, riffled through the money he had left. About a thousand. Not for the first time, he felt a stab of annoyance at how Glinn and company seemed to have abandoned him.
But when you return to the States, he’ll be waiting. I doubt you’ll survive.
His next step was obvious. If Wu hadn’t passed off the plans after exiting customs, and they weren’t on his person, he might have passed them off to someone before clearing customs. Conveniently, Gideon was now inside the customs security zone. Even as he pondered his approach, the endless looped warning rang out again on the PA system: Please report suspicious persons or unattended luggage to the appropriate authority.
Carpe diem.
He looked about, spied a TSA guard. “Excuse me,” he said, “I believe I’ve seen something suspicious and wish to report it to the appropriate authority.”
“I can take the report,” said the guard.
“No,” said Gideon primly. “I have to report it to appropriate authority. It’s very important.”
“As I said, I’ll take the report.”
“But the announcement said appropriate authority,” Gideon said, more loudly. “No offense intended, but you’re a guard. I want to speak to someone in authority—just as the announcement directs. There’s no time to waste. I’ve seen something very startling, and I need to report it immediately.” He compressed his lips and put on a truculent expression.
The guard’s eyes flickered. “All right, follow me.”
He led Gideon through a back door and past a warren of windowless cubicles and passageways to a shut door. The guard knocked, and a voice called them in.
“Thank you,” said Gideon, entering, turning, and shutting the door in the guard’s face.
He turned back and saw a soft, dough-like man seated behind a large desk completely covered with paper. “What’s this?”
The guard tried to enter but Gideon, standing at the door, blocked it with his foot. He tossed his passport on the desk and said, “CIA. Send the guard away.”
The man lifted the passport to examine it. The guard knocked again. “Open up.”
“Thank you,” the man called to the guard. “That will be all. Return to duty.”
He turned his attention back to the passport and scowled at the diplomatic stamps. “Doesn’t say anything about CIA. Got a badge?”
“Of course not!” Gideon said sharply. “We don’t carry ID when we work under diplomatic cover.”
The man put down the passport. “Okay, what’s up?”
Gideon gave the man a long, hostile stare. “Captain Longbaugh?”
“That’s what the badge says. Now you better tell me what’s on your mind, sir, because as you can see I’m pretty busy.” What he could see was that Longbaugh was used to dealing with petty bureaucrats and officials. He was going to be a tough nut to crack.
Gideon pulled a notebook from his pocket, consulted it. “On June seventh, at twelve twenty-three AM, a Japan Airlines flight arrived with a passenger on board, Mark Wu. He was followed as he left JFK, and his taxi was forced off the street in Spanish Harlem. Perhaps you read about that accident. Eight people were killed, including Mr. Wu.”
“I did.”
“We need a copy of the security tapes that captured his movements from the point of debarkation to where he hired the taxi.”
Longbaugh stared at him. “I’ll need to see some sort of paperwork on this.”
Gideon took a step forward. “We’ve got an ongoing terrorist situation here and you want to ‘see paperwork’? Is this where we still are, after 9/11 and two wars?”
“Sir, we have procedures in place…”
Gideon leaned in and screamed into Longbaugh’s face like a drill sergeant, hitting him with spittle. “Procedures? Paperwork? When people’s lives are at stake?”
It was, he realized, a high-risk/high-reward approach. If it didn’t work, he was screwed.