Atvar picked his words with more care than he would have imagined possible when speaking to a Tosevite: “Tell this male that his demand for all of Poland is refused. Tell him further that, as far as the Race is concerned, the cease-fire between our forces and those of the Deutsche may continue while we address other issues. And tell him that. If the Deutsche are the first to break the cease-fire, the Race will retaliate forcefully. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Fleetlord, I understand,” von Ribbentrop replied through Uotat. “As I have said, theFuhrer is not in the habit of making threats he does not mean. I shall convey your response to him. Then we shall all await his reply.” The Big Ugly licked those soft, pink lips again. “I am sorry to say it, but I do not think we will be waiting long.”
Major Mon handed Nieh Ho-T’ing a cup filled with gently steaming tea. “Thank you,” Nieh said, inclining his head. The Japanese was, by his standards, acting courteously. Nieh still thought of him as an imperialist eastern devil, but one could be polite about such things.
Mori returned the half bow. “I am unworthy of your praise,” he answered in his rough Chinese. The Japanese hid their arrogance behind a facade of false humility. Nieh preferred dealing with the little scaly devils. They made no bones about what they were.
“Have you decided which course would be most expedient for you to take?” Nieh asked. Looking around the Japanese camp, he thought that should be obvious. The eastern devils were ragged and hungry and starting to run low on the munitions that were their only means of coercing supplies from the local peasants. The arrival of the little scaly devils had cut them off from the logistics train that ran back to Japan. They were better disciplined than a band of bandits, but not much stronger.
But after their major nodded, he did not give the reply Nieh had hoped to hear: “I must tell you we cannot join what you call the popular front. The little devils do not formally stop their war against us, but they also do not fight us now. If we attack them here, who can say what that will provoke them to elsewhere in the world?”
“You join with them, in effect, against the progressive forces of the Chinese people.”
Major Mori laughed at him. He stared. He had thought of many possible reactions from the Japanese, but had not expected that one. Mori said, “You have made an alliance with the Kuomintang, I see. That must be what transforms them from reactionary counterrevolutionary running dogs into progressives. A nice magic trick, I must say.”
A mosquito buzzed down and bit Nieh on the back of one wrist. Smashing it gave him a moment to collect his thoughts. He hoped he was not turning red enough for the Japanese to notice. At last, he said, “Compared to the little scaly devils, the reactionaries of the Kuomintang are progressive. I admit it, though I do not love them. Compared to the little devils, even you Japanese imperialists are progressive. I admit that, too.”
“Arigato,”the major said, giving him a politely sardonic seated bow.
“We have worked together against the scaly devils before.” Nieh knew he was pleading, and knew he should not plead. But the Japanese, man for man, were better soldiers than either the troops of the People’s Liberation Army or the forces of the Kuomintang. Having Mori’s detachment as part of the local popular front would give the little scaly devils a great deal of added grief. And so Nieh went on, “The artillery shells with which you supplied me were put to good use, and caused the little devils many casualties.”
“Personally, I am glad this is so,” Mon replied. “But at the time you got those shells from me, the little devils and Japan were at war with each other. That does not now seem to be the case. If we join in attacks against the scaly devils and are identified, any chance of peace may be destroyed. I will not do that without a direct order from the Home Islands, no matter what my feelings are.”
Nieh Ho-T’ing got to his feet. “I will return to Peking, then.” Unspoken was the warning that, if the Japanese kept him from returning or shot him, they would find themselves rather than the little devils the focus of Chinese efforts from then on.
Even though he was but an eastern devil, Mori had enough subtlety to catch the warning. He too rose, and bowed once more to Nieh. “As I say, I wish you personal good luck against the little scaly devils. But, when set against the needs of the nation, personal wishes must give way.”
He would have phrased it differently had he been a Marxist- Leninist, but the import was the same. “I bear you no personal ill-will, either,” Nieh said, and left the Japanese camp in the countryside for the hike back to Peking.
Dirt scuffed under his sandals as he trudged along. Crickets chirped in the undergrowth. Dragonflies skimmed by, darting and twisting with maneuvers impossible for any fighter plane. Farmers and their wives bent their backs in fields of wheat and millet, endlessly weeding. Had Nieh been an artist instead of a soldier, he might have paused a while to sketch.
What he was thinking about, though, had nothing to do with art. He was thinking Major Mori’s Japanese had lingered close by Peking too long already. The little scaly devils. If they ever thought to do it, could use the Japanese against the popular front in the same way the Kuomintang had used warlord forces against the People’s Liberation Army. That would let the little devils fight the Chinese without committing their own troops to the effort.
He had nothing personal against the Japanese major, no. But, because he respected Mori as a soldier, he found him all the more worrisome: he had the potential to be more dangerous. With the razor-sharp logic of the dialectic, that led to an ineluctable conclusion: Major Mori’s pocket would have to be liquidated as soon as possible.
“It might even work out for the best,” Nieh said aloud: no one to hear him but for a couple of ducks paddling in a pond. If the little scaly devils were subtle enough to understand indirect hints, the disappearance of possible allies would give them the idea that the popular front would not only prosecute a campaign against them, but would do so vigorously.
He reached Peking in the middle of the night. Off in the distance, gunfire rattled. Someone was striking a blow for the progressive cause. “What are you doing here at this hour?” a human gate guard asked.
“Coming in to see my cousin.” Nieh showed a false identity card, and handed the guard a folded banknote with it.
The guard returned the card, but not the money. “Pass in, then,” he said gruffly. “But if I see you coming around again so late, I am going to decide you’re a thief. Then it will go hard for you.” He brandished a spiked truncheon, reveling in his tiny authority.
Nieh had all he could do not to laugh in the fellow’s face. Instead, he ducked his head as if in fright and hurried past the guard into Peking. The roominghouse was not far away.
When he got there, he found Liu Han chasing Liu Mei around the otherwise empty dining room. Liu Mei was squealing with glee. She thought it a wonderful game. Liu Han looked about ready to fall over. She shook a finger at her daughter. “You go to sleep like a good girl or maybe I will give you back to Ttomalss.”
Liu Mei paid no attention. By Liu Han’s weary sigh, she hadn’t expected Liu Mei to pay any attention. Nieh Ho-T’ing said, “What will you do with the little scaly devil called Ttomalss?”
“I don’t know,” Liu Han said. “It’s good to have you back, but ask me hard questions another time. Right now I’m too tired to see straight, let alone think straight.” She ran and kept Liu Mei from overturning a chair on top of herself. “Impossible daughter!” Liu Mei thought it was funny.
“Has the scaly devil been punished enough?” Nieh persisted.
“He could never be punished enough, not for what he did to me, not for what he did to my daughter, not for what he did to Bobby Fiore and other men and women whose names I do not even know,” Liu Han said fiercely. Then she calmed somewhat “Why do you ask?”