Quiller Bamboo

I got Xingyu into the Dongfeng and checked for the radio and the map and started the engine and waited. 'Chong, we're going!'

The whole place was roaring and I thought I saw Trotter, his huge body silhouetted against the flames as I hit the gear in and rolled the thing out of harm's way, still no sign of Chong, but there was a sweep of bright light coming in from the highway and I got into motion again with the headlights off and took a dirt track where the smoke was rolling, used it for cover and kept going as more lights silvered the landscape and I saw a personnel carrier, red star on the cab, it must have been in the area and I suppose you can't blow a temple up in the dark without attracting attention, Chong, where was Chong, we had to keep going before the military picked us up in their headlights, I think the first time I'd called out to him without getting an answer was just after the shot, the second one, so it could be that.

Something bumping against me in the cab, Xingyu, and I pushed him upright.' When did you last get insulin?'

'Who are you?"

He sounded lethargic, slurred, sat there lolling, so I reached over and got his seat belt round him and hit the door lock down, who are you, stressed out of his mind.

The dirt track was coming to an end and I turned the lights on and kicked the dip switch and took the road to the right, away from the blazing temple, throttling up and shifting into top, the main town to the left, to the north, the river on the other side, Gonggar behind us in the west but forget Gonggar, find shelter, it was all we could do now, I'd been with Chong when he'd drawn the map, sitting in the truck while I was watching for Su-May.

'Okay, this is where the foothills begin, so this is where they are, along this line here."

The caves.

'Which one should we make for?'

'Listen, we take our pick, a whole lot of them are going to be big enough to hide the truck, so we can set up our base facing the south, keep a watch on the road, this one here, the only way in and it ain't that hot anyway, mostly rocks, but if they take the search parties that far it's the road they'll use.'

We checked our radios and synchronized watches and he started peeling a fresh stick of gum and I said, 'All right, this is what we'll do if I can get them to pick me up. You'll take over the truck and keep me in sight until you see where they're taking me. If it's in the town or where anyone else can get hurt, report on your radio to my DIP and he'll bring in support. If it's anywhere remote, where you can use your bombs, do it at your own discretion.'

He thought for a moment. 'Okay. Zero?'

Eighteen hundred hours. 'I'll work around that. But you're only a backup, Chong. If I can do anything on my own, I'd rather do it. A bomb is a blanket weapon and if Xingyu's there I don't want him endangered.'

He dropped the Wrigley's wrapper onto the floor. 'Like to kind of modify that,' his tone a little hurt, 'I mean you can pick locks with those babies, you do it right.'

'No offence.'

We talked about where to bring the truck, covering a dozen assumed sites, urban and remote and in between. We talked about signalling if any were possible, access, egress, how to keep Xingyu protected, how to get him clear. And finally we talked about eventualities and their appropriate action. 'If one of us can't get away,' I said, 'he's left behind, and the other one takes Xingyu.'

'Gotcha.'

He'd got out of the cab of the truck and buried himself among the equipment we were carrying back there, and began waiting it out.

'Where are we going?'

Xingyu. I looked across at him in the backwash from the headlights. He was crouched into his coat, his face drawn, his eyes dull, but he sounded interested in who I was, where we were going.

'Dr Xingyu, it's a few minutes past six in the evening. When did you have you last shot of insulin?'

'I cannot remember. Are we going to Beijing?'

'Yes. To meet your wife.' No particular reaction, perhaps a look of cynicism. 'How much warning,' I asked him, 'do you get when you're running low on insulin?'

He turned his head to look at me. 'A little while.'

'What do you mean by a little while? Ten minutes or an hour or what?'

'About half an hour.'

'Then I want you to tell me as soon as you feel you're ready for another shot.' He didn't say anything. 'Do you understand?'

'Yes.'

'Are you hungry?'

'No.'

'Thirsty?'

'No.'

'All right. Let me know if you need anything.'

Chong had dumped a bag of provisions in the back of the truck when he'd kept the rendezvous, and I'd asked him to include a first-aid kit. The mask was still in its cheap cardboard box wedged behind the seat, and I would have liked to use it, but we'd need fresh water, clean hands, and time, up to an hour. The risk of taking this man along a highway in a truck tonight without the mask on was appalling, but the risk of being stopped by the police or the military was worse, if I tried fitting the mask and failed to get it right: they'd detect it and rip it off his face, finito. The risk of pulling up anywhere to look for shelter was the worst of all, and the only chance we had was to get to the foothills and the caves and stay there until Pepperidge could work something out.

The blaze was well behind us when I looked back, a bright ember against the horizon that left a trail of orange fire reflected along the river. Headlights were sweeping the area as the emergency teams moved in, and two vehicles, quite distinct, were behind us on the road out of the town. I noted them, because they could be military.

I picked up the radio and switched it on.

'Calling DIF, DIF, DIF.'

'Hear you.'

'Subject is in my care.'

In a moment: 'Very good.'

Since we'd broken radio contact soon after noon today Pepperidge had been sitting in his hotel room trying to make himself believe that I'd somehow manage to stay alive, because he'd known I meant to get in their way and that's something the directors in the field always hate and always try to keep you from doing: the risk is of course totally calculated but wickedly high. He hadn't expected jam on it: I'd located and secured Xingyu Baibing.

'I'm proceeding according to plan.' It was all he needed:

I'd told Chong to take him a copy of the map and it showed the caves. 'We should be there in an hour.'

'No precise location at this point.'

'No. I'll send that.' I watched the two sets of headlights in the mirror. The distant vehicle had pulled up on the one immediately behind me. 'There's a temple on fire southeast of the town and the emergency crews — and I assume the police and military — are already on the scene. There are several dead. One of them might be Chong.'

In a moment: 'Noted.'

'He did very well. The subject appears physically normal except for stress and extreme fatigue.'

'You have insulin?'

'Yes. But please note: I estimate that we shall be exposed for another half hour on a public highway, and the Koichi artifact is not in place, repeat not in place.'

Hesitation, then, 'Half an hour.'

'Estimated.'

I gave him tune to think. I'd located and secured the subject but the chances of getting him under cover were shockingly thin, with his face undisguised and a major search operation by the military still in progress. There was also an added risk: if any of them had got out of that temple alive they would have tried to follow this truck. One of those people had still managed to pull off a couple of shots after the first bomb had gone in, or it could even have been the two of them, each with a gun. Trotter had been running a first-class cell with highly trained personnel and if he'd been killed in the Buddha room, any surviving hit man would know what he'd got to do. If Trotter couldn't fly Xingyu into Beijing himself, he'd want him dead.