"Yes, but they would destroy us just as readily. They're terrorists. They want only to destroy."
"I know. Even so, they could be useful. We might walk the same path a while, don't you think?"
"And then?"
DeVore smiled tightly. Lehmann knew as well as he. Then there would be war between them. A war he would win. He looked down at the board again. The fifty-ninth move. What would he have played in Fan's place? His smile broadened, became more natural. How many times had he thought it through? A hundred? A thousand? And always, inevitably, he would make Fan's move, taking the black at 4/1 to give himself a temporary breathing space. So delicately were things balanced at that point that to do otherwise—to make any of a dozen other tempting plays—would be to lose it all.
A wise man, Fan Si-pin. He knew the value of sacrifice: the importance of making one's opponents work hard for their small victories, knowing that while the battle was lost in Chu, the war went on in Shang and Ping and Tsu.
So it was now, in Chung Kuo. Things were balanced very delicately. And one wrong move . . . He looked up at Lehmann again, studying the tall young albino.
"You ask what would happen should we succeed, but there are other, more immediate questions. Are the Ping Tiao important enough? You know how the media exaggerate these things. And would an alliance with them harm or strengthen us?"
Lehmann met his gaze. "As I said, the Ping Tiao are a low-level organization. Worse, they're idealists. It would be hard to work with such men. They would have fewer weaknesses than those we're used to dealing with."
"And yet they are men. They have needs, desires."
"Maybe so, but they would mistrust us from the start. In their eyes we are First Level, their natural enemies. Why should they work with us?"
DeVore smiled and stood up, coming round the desk. "It's not a question of choice, Stefan, but necessity. They need someone like us. Think of the losses they've sustained."
He was about to say more—to outline his plan—when there was an urgent knocking at the door.
DeVore looked across, meeting Lehmann's eyes. He had ordered his lieutenant, Wiegand, not to disturb him unless it was vitally important.
"Come in!"
Wiegand took two steps into the room, then came sharply to attention, his head bowed. "I've a call on the coded channel, sir. Triple-A rated."
DeVore narrowed his eyes, conscious of how closely Lehmann was watching him. "Who is it?"
"It's Stifel, sir. He says he has little time."
"Stifel" was the code name for Otto Fischer in Alexandria. DeVore hesitated a moment, his mind running through possibilities; then nodded.
"Okay. Switch it through."
It was a nonvisual, Fischer's voice artificially distorted to avoid even the remote possibility of recognition. "Well, Stifel? What is it?"
"The moon is down, sir. An hour past at most." •
DeVore caught his breath. "How?" "Eclipsed." - :
DeVore stared across at Lehmann, astonished. He hesitated a moment, considering, then spoke again.
"How many know about this?"
"Three, maybe four."
"Good. Keep it that way." He thought quickly. "Who's guarding our fallen moon?"
"No one. A camera ..."
"Excellent. Now listen ..." ..
He spelled out quickly what he wanted, then broke contact, knowing that Fischer would do exactly as he had asked. ;:
"Who's dead?"
DeVore turned and looked at Lehmann again. His face, like the tone of his words, seemed utterly devoid of curiosity, as if the question were a mere politeness, the answer a matter of indifference to him.
"Wang Hsien," he answered. "It seems he's been murdered in his bed." If he had expected the albino to show any sign of surprise he would have been disappointed, but he knew the young man better than that. "1 see," Lehmann said. "And you know who did it?"
"The agent, yes, but not who he was acting for." DeVore sat behind his desk again, then looked up at Lehmann. "It was Sun Li Hua." "You know that for certain?"
"Not for certain, no. But I'd wager a million yuan on it." Lehmann came across and stood at the edge of the desk. "So what now?" DeVore met his eyes briefly, then looked down at the board again. "We wait. Until we hear from Stifel again. Then the fun begins."
"Fun?"
"Yes, fun. You'll see. But go now, Stefan. Get some rest. I'll call you when I need you."
He realized he was still holding the white stone. It lay in his palm like a tiny moon, cold, moist with his sweat. He opened out his ringers and stared at it, then lifted it and wiped it. The fifty-ninth stone.
The game had changed dramatically, the balance altered in his favor. The moon was down. Eclipsed.
DeVore smiled, then nodded to himself, suddenly knowing where to play the stone.
THE DEAD T'ANG lay where he had left him, undisturbed, his long gray hair fanned out across the pillow, his arms at his sides, the palms upturned. Fischer stood there a moment, looking down at the corpse, breathing deeply, preparing himself. Then, knowing he could delay no longer, he bent down and put his hand behind the cold stiff neck, lifting the head, drawing the hair back from the ear.
It was not, physically, difficult to do—the flesh parted easily before the knife; the blood stopped flowing almost as soon as it had begun—yet he was conscious of a deep, almost overpowering reluctance in himself. This was a T'ang! A Son of Heaven! He shivered, letting the severed flesh fall, then turned the head and did the same to the other side.
He lowered the head onto the pillow and stepped back, appalled. Outwardly he seemed calm, almost icy in his control, but inwardly he quaked with an inexplicable, almost religious fear of what he was doing. His pulse raced, his stomach churned, and all the while a part of him kept saying to himself, What are you doing, Otto? What are you doing?
He stared, horrified, at the two thick question-marks of flesh that lay now on the pillow, separated from their owner's head; then he steeled himself and reached out to take them. He drew the tiny bag from inside his jacket and dropped them into it, then sealed the bag and returned it to the pocket.
Wang Hsien lay there, regal even in death, indifferent to all that had been done to him. Fischer stared at him a while, mesmerized, awed by the power of the silent figure. Then, realizing he was wasting time, he bent over the corpse again, smoothing the hair back into place, hiding the disfigurement.
Nervousness made him laugh—a laugh he stifled quickly. He shuddered and looked about him again, then went to the doorway. There he paused, reaching up to reset the camera, checking the elapsed time against his wrist timer, then moved the camera's clock forward until the two were synchronized. That done, he pressed out the combination quickly. The lights at the top changed from amber to green, signifying that the camera was functioning again.
He looked back, checking the room one final time. Then, satisfied that nothing was disturbed, he backed out of the room, pulling the door to silently behind him, his heart pounding, his mouth dry with fear, the sealed bag seeming to bum where it pressed against his chest.
WANG TA-HUNG woke to whispering in his room and sat up, clutching the blankets to his chest, his mind dark with fear.
"Who is it?" he called out, his voice quavering. "Kuan Yin preserve me, who is it?" A figure approached the huge bed, bowed. "It is only I, Excellency. Your servant, Wu Ming."
Wang Ta-hung, the T'ang's eldest surviving son, pulled the blankets tighter about his neck and stared, wide-eyed, past his Master of the Bedchamber, into the darkness beyond.
"Who is there, Wu Ming? Who were you whispering to?" A second figure stepped from the darkness and stood beside the first, his head bowed. He was a tall, strongly built Han dressed in dark silks, his beard braided into three tiny pigtails, his face, when it lifted once again, solid, unreadable. A handsome, yet inexpressive face. "Excellency." "Hung Mien-lo!"