The 9th Directive

'From Pangsapa.' He had an odd look in his eyes because of the way I'd spoken I'd sounded jubilant.

Why shouldn't I? It was what I was here for. Kuo. 'He made contact,' Loman said. 'He gave me the whole route.'

'Anything else?'

'One item. He reports that another man has joined the Kuo cell.'

'Total of seven? Let 'em all come.' I should have given it thought. I didn't. I was too busy feeling cocky, kicking my heels. 'What was Pangsapa's price?'

'He didn't ask for payment.'

'Civil of him.'

Pangsapa had a nose for a bargain: it would pay him to keep in with us and share the success. It would cost us nothing but the slight trouble, afterward, of confirming officially that he had helped to safeguard the guest of his own beloved country. Loman wasn't the only one eager for honors, but Pangsapa would use them to gain favor in high places. Inspection of his shipments would become perfunctory.

'He urged me to keep him in contact with us,' Loman said, 'so that he can signal further information as soon as he has any.'

'All right,' I said, 'but don't lead him to me – don't let him know where I am. Look out for tags – he hung one on me when I left his office two days ago and I had to flush him. Don't let him crash the party. What about Scarface – did you warn her off me?'

'She wasn't outside when I looked for her.'

'You bet she wasn't.'

'I found she was tagging me, as soon as--'

'You bet she was. Hoping you'd lead her back to me at some new place where we thought we'd be safe.'

'I just led her to the Embassy.' He added reflectively, 'She's with Mil. 6, you know.'

'She's what?'

'Someone tipped me off.'

'Mil. 6 is protecting the Bureau? From what? From precisely what?'

He said tonelessly: 'We don't know. That's just it. We don't know.'

'Jesus Christ – the blind leading the blind!' But something warned me. I was too jubilant, too cocky. Everything was set up: the rendezvous, Kuo, the Husqvarna – but there was this thing, this damned thing, that didn't fit into any pattern at all. I don't like mysteries.

The bounce had gone out of me. Like poor old Loman I was sobering up. 'From Kuo?' I asked him.

'What?'

'Does Mil. 6 think it can protect me from the Kuo cell?'

'You are in no danger from Kuo. He is in danger from you.'

'All right, what are they trying to protect me from?'

The colored kites hung motionless, muffling any echo, but it seemed my question echoed and I wished I could have bitten it back. I was getting too interested in my own skin, getting frightened because there was something I didn't know about, couldn't recognize, couldn't fit in with known patterns. Stomach-think. Unhealthy. Let fear take over and you're in the worst danger of alclass="underline" danger from yourself.

There was only Kuo I had to deal with and he was a sitting duck.

Whatever it was that I didn't know about wasn't important. It seemed important just because I didn't know about it. Turn the bloody thing inside out, make it make sense. Rationalize, brain-think it out and forget it.

There are always areas of the unknown in any operation. You start your mission and you light your lamps as you go, picking your way through the dark, making your journey from lamp to lamp and never looking back. But there are patches of dark and you skirt them, have to, because your lamps are too small to show you everything. They light only the way.

The kites hung without moving, their shapes strange and their colors garish and meaningless. Those nearest me were well-defined, identifiable. The others, gathered behind them in the deeper gloom, were the hosts of the unknown.

I must needs take comfort in the ancient lore of my trade. Fear springs from imagination and without imagination we cannot survive.

Loman hadn't answered me. It didn't matter. The question shouldn't have been asked. I said:

'Let's have the dope. Schedule, people, so forth.'

'Very well.' He looked more confident. This was his home ground. The schedule remains unchanged. The Person will arrive in Bangkok tomorrow at 1150 hours in an aircraft of the Queen's Flight captained by J.F. Wooldridge. On board will be Wing Commander G.M.G. Thompson, medical officer, Rear Admiral Charles Nixon-Thorpe, Superintendent Forsythe and Inspector L.W. Johns, Special Branch.'

Larry Johns. They'd blown up a River Police launch from under us on the Estuary thing in 1961. What was he doing shepherding VIP's?

'The plane will be met by the following: H.R.H. Prince Ruchirawong, Foreign Minister; Marshal Sumate Photicharoen, Governor of Bangkok; General Luen Punnaken of the Army; Air Marshal Gorinajdela; Admiral Suwannasorn; Sir William Cole-Verity, British Ambassador. Others present--'

'Will you be there?'

'Of course.'

'Is that when you start calling me up?'

He had sold me the idea of a two-way radio to keep me in touch with what went on. Since radios can become jammed inadvertently I had insisted on a fail-safe in Lumpini Park: a boy with a kite.

He said: They leave the airport at 1205, arriving at the Palace at 1300. That is when you'll receive my introductory signal. Leaving the Palace after luncheon the Person arrives at the Embassy at 1525. He will stop there for fifteen minutes to congratulate the Ambassador's staff on the success of British Week. He will therefore leave the Embassy at 1540 and take the shortest route to Rama IV by Lumpini Park, turning right toward the Link Road.'

'No stops?'

'No.' He drew a breath and got it over quickly: The motorcade will arrive at the Link Road at 1550 or thereabouts.'

Ten minutes to four. The rendezvous. There'd be a bit of heat-haze but less exhaust gas than there was normally because traffic would have been stopped. It wasn't a bad time of day for the job.

I looked at my watch.

'Fair enough. Fifteen hours from now. Then you're off the hook.'

'The mission will be over,' he replied thinly, 'whichever way it goes.'

'I'll tell you which way it'll go. You haven't pushed me up and down every bloody street in this town for nothing. One fine day you'll get your medal, Loman.'

He didn't answer. His anxiety even inhibited anger. I asked him: 'Only one thing left. What reactions have they been getting from the Person?'

'They've had a lot of trouble with him, of course. He's very difficult to handle in a case like this. He has refused to let them put any of the shields on the car.'

'Rear plastic quarter-light'

'Including that.'

It was important. The rear shield would cover a following shot if for any reason at all Kuo failed to make a kill head-on. The oriels formed a ring round the temple and there was a gallery inside, and he could move round within a hundred and eighty degrees if he had to. No shield: no cover. I said:

'Then I won't have to miss.'

He looked away. The subject was distasteful to him.

Then he shouldn't mix with the wrong people.

I said, 'Why didn't the Palace override his orders?'

'They tried. The King had given instructions about shields but the Person got wind of it and wrote him a private letter. The gist of it was a reminder that His Majesty had been pleased to drive through the city of London in an open car at the time of his State Visit. The letter suggested that the rigors of an English April were surely more treacherous to the health than any inclemency to be expected in the city of Bangkok.'

'Public Relations stuff?'

'No. The letter was vouched for. You know how private a letter is, once the tenth secretary has passed it on for filing. Besides, it's typical of the Person. He put his feelings in a nutshell for the Evening Standard when he said: 'I want to be able to see the people, and some of them may want to see me.' Behind the whole story is of course a very definite request: no shields. And behind that decision is his personal view of the situation – he feels he will best serve his country by demonstrating that anonymous threats are for the wastepaper basket.' He looked down at his feet. 'I rather wish we weren't quite so responsible for the safety of quite so good a man.'