He stopped and tears rolled down his cheeks.
“But my brother… well, he tried to live up to an ideal of proletarian heroism that was peddled by our parents, and was found wanting. He was a sore disappointment, but not like me, not for ideological reasons. Oh no, he was a disappointment because he was in the military but never fought; an officer without being a leader; a military middle-class bureaucrat without the potential to go any further.
“He came back from his trip to Wuhan very, very depressed. Unloved, criticised and unwanted by his own family – our own family – despite having tried his best to live up to their ideals.”
He held up his hands as if in surrender.
“We argued. I accused him of being a dreamer whose dreams were too big and too outdated to ever come true. He accused me of… never mind. He was depressed and I argued with him instead of helping him.
“So, being in London and chancing on curious stories about Wales – he saw that as a sign of good luck. An opportunity to end his military career with a moment of glory. My brother was unable to resist the lure. He rented a car and drove to Wales without a moment’s hesitation.”
Chen leaned back and looked at the ceiling, though his eyes were focused somewhere else in the past. Peri respectfully allowed him some moments alone inside his own head. But at last, she asked, “How deep was your brother’s despair?”
Chen abruptly sat up straight and looked at her. “He would not take his own life,” he said firmly. “He was not that type of personality. He did not take his own life.”
“I am sure you are correct,” said Peri, gently. “But was he of a mind to take, shall we say, uncharacteristic risks?”
“He was a careful man. He was never minded to take risks, especially not risks to his own life, or anyone else’s life. What are you asking?”
“If he meant to make a point, and to seek out – what did you call it? A moment of glory? Then, perhaps, he would act in an atypical way. I am asking, from your knowledge of your brother, is this possible? Even likely perhaps?”
Chen seemed to reluctant to reply, but eventually said, “It is possible.”
Peri let the silence stretch out, but it was clear that Chen was not going to say any more than that.
“You mentioned curious stories about Wales,” she said at last. “Do you know what these stories were?”
“No,” he said. “It was obvious that something had caught his interest. I asked, but he was very cryptic in his reply.”
“Cryptic? How?”
“He said something nonsensical about gods and dragons, and laughed. He spent some time using the Internet, looking for other reports about Wales. He grew quite excited at one point. I heard him say something to himself about being scared away. And that is all I know.”
“Scared away? Did he say who or what had been scared away?”
“That,” he repeated slowly, “is all I know.”
Peri let the silence stretch out a little, but it was clear that Chen was going to volunteer nothing else. “From here, Mr Chen, I will be going to Wales. On behalf of the UN, I intend to examine his possessions for items of relevance to his work. Are you content that I should do so?”
She shot a glance at Mr Yang. “The local police will already have examined and catalogued his belongings, after all. They will be signed over to consular staff when their investigations are complete.” Yang nodded.
“Well, thank you, Mr Chen and Mr Yang. Mr Chen, I know this must have been difficult for you. I will not encroach any further on your time. Unless there is anything else you feel we might address…?”
Chen simply stood and started moving towards the door. Yang spoke for the first time, in a surprisingly high-pitched voice for someone Peri had mentally labelled ‘a hood from security’. “Please assure Ms Li of my best wishes,” he said with a slight bow.
“I will assure Ms Li that your assistance in this matter was invaluable,” she replied politely.
A few minutes later came a gentle tap on the door. “May I?” said a voice.
Peri looked up and smiled. “Of course you may, Tommy, come in. It’s good to see you.”
The door opened wide to admit a small, middle aged man dressed entirely in blue denim. “Long time, no see, all that malarkey,” he said with a grin. “Last time I saw you must have that big inter-agency training exercise in South.” He was referring to the headquarters of the Secret Intelligence Service, which was south of the Thames. By the same logic, MI5 were sometimes ‘North’ and GCHQ were ‘West’.
“That’s right,” she said. “The one where I got bacon grease all over the baccarat tables in the double-oh agent training centre. I’m barred now, you know.”
They both laughed at the thought of fictional spies playing ridiculous card games.
“So,” Tommy went on. “How you doin’ Peri? I hear you’re gettin’ a bit notorious over in the Big Apple, am I right?”
“I’m not sure that’s true,” she answered with a laugh. “But come on, it’s late, it’s your weekend, and I don’t want to take up too much of it. I gather you’re doing event management these days?”
“All right,” he said, “Down to business it is. Yeah, I’m the one who normally gets handed Buckthorn events. So you want to know all about our mysterious Chinaman?”
“Please.”
“Right, here goes. Exhibit one.” He pulled out a laptop and rapidly cued up an audio clip. “Call to the Buckthorn line, May 26 at 16:43 hours. I’m sure you know these things work. The caller dials some number that looks like it’s in the back of beyond, it bounces around the country for a bit, then comes into our event centre. The call was fielded by Gareth, but I doubt if you’ll need to bother him, there wasn’t much to the call”
He tapped a key.
“Yeah? What is it?”
“Code word buckthorn. Status green.”
“Identity?”
“Uniform, November, Tango, India, Echo, zero, zero, niner, six.”
“Thank you. Please stand by for a call-back.”
“And that’s all, she wrote,” said Tommy. “As per standard protocol, Gareth checked the ID and saw it was the UNTIE team lead, John Chen. That sent his eyebrows up to his hairline, I can tell you! We don’t often get calls from Chinese spooks. He’d said the magic word, Buckthorn, but status green, so not urgent. He contacted me, I called Chen on the contact number in the database, and all I got was nothin’. His phone was off. This was 16:49 hours, so his phone had gone off the network within five minutes of his call. Strange, but he’d said status green, so I didn’t worry.”
Peri grinned at him. “And yet you’ve made the point that he said ‘green’ twice now. Come on, Tommy, don’t get all remorseful on me. How could you know he’d just fallen off a cliff?”
He shrugged. “Anyway,” he went on, “I put in a note to try his number hourly, and thought nothin’ more of it.”
“When did you hear he’d been fished out of the drink?”
“The followin’ day. Friday. Bloody hell, only yesterday. As soon as the locals ran an ID, it came up flagged for SO15 at the Met, and they contacted us. The fact he’d called out a Buckthorn meant I’ve been at work ever since, tryin’ to work out what the hell he was up to. I mean, he’s pissin’ around on our turf! What’s that all about?”