The Outcast (27 page)

“So they found another witness. After all, Gundalai saw it.”

“Which itself was a useful coincidence,” Nergui said. “If Gundalai hadn't seen it all, we'd have no reason to be concerned about Odbayar's absence.”

“We'd have been aware of his presence at the hotel,” Batzorig interrupted. “We've had someone working with the hotel management overnight, piecing together a list of who was in the hotel at the time of the explosion. Not easy. Their record keeping isn't the best in the world, even for the hotel residents. And there was no proper evacuation of the hotel after the blast, so there was no roll call of who emerged. We don't know about most of the attendees at the rally, for example. But Odbayar's on the list because he was the main speaker. So, even without Gundalai's account, we'd have known that he was missing.”

“Very good,” Nergui said. “Assuming that Odbayar is indeed missing, we would eventually have known. But how long would it have taken us?”

“I don't know. We got the first list of names about an hour ago, I suppose.”

Nergui nodded. “So we wouldn't even have known till then that Odbayar was at the hotel?”

“We've been collating names from various sources. The witnesses we've interviewed.”

“I'm not questioning the work that's being done. I'm saying only that, without Gundalai's intervention, it could have taken us a long time even to learn that Odbayar had been at the hotel. Even then, we wouldn't necessarily have assumed he was missing. We'd have had to contact his home, identify anywhere else he might have gone after the explosion—”

“Contact his father?” Doripalam said.

Nergui smiled. “Quite possibly. But even if we couldn't track him down, our first concern would have been to confirm that he wasn't a victim of the explosion. It could have been a long time before we started to worry about him being missing in a more general sense.”

There was a moment's silence as Doripalam and Batzorig took in the implications of Nergui's words.

“You think Gundalai's made up his story?” Doripalam said finally. “That this is something that he and Odbayar have concocted between them? Is that what you're saying?”

Nergui shook his head. “Gundalai sounded sincere this morning. But perhaps he saw what he was meant to see. The one person who would recognise the significance of what he was seeing.” Nergui gestured towards the newspaper headline. “In any case, it looks as if someone's keen to let us know that Odbayar really is missing.”

“Not just us,” Doripalam pointed out. “Now that's hit the streets, everybody will know.” He paused. “Including Odbayar's father.”

“Which might also be the intention,” Nergui agreed.

“So why haven't you received a call from on high?” Doripalam said. “The minister must be aware of this by now.”

“No doubt,” Nergui said. “Unfortunately, I must have forgotten to recharge my cell phone last night. I imagine he's trying to track me down as we speak. I'll call in shortly.”

Doripalam stared at him. “I never know what games you're playing, Nergui. But this seems riskier than most.”

“They're all risky,” Nergui said. “The skill lies in playing the odds.”

“It's your career. What about the other story?” He picked up the
second newspaper and pointed to the headline. “You think this is a plant as well?”

“I think so. We've done a good job in keeping a lid on this story. I think someone wanted to prise the lid off.”

“It's an enormous story,” Doripalam said. “Potentially an international story. Our first serious terrorist attack. Our first suicide bomber.”

“Except it wasn't,” Nergui pointed out. “Well, perhaps a suicide, as it turned out. But not a bomber.”

“But will anyone believe that? Now it's out in the public domain, I mean. It's going to be difficult for us to deny the story. We might have gotten away with it before this appeared.” He waved the newspaper in front of him. “Even those who saw the shooting wouldn't have known quite what they'd seen. When it failed to appear in the media, they'd just have assumed some government-led conspiracy. But now the press has gotten hold of this—”

“It's going to be difficult to come up with an alternative story. Quite so. And if we say the bomb was just a fake—well, it sounds too bizarre to be true.” Nergui nodded. “So potentially we have a panic. Perhaps an international panic. Particularly if you then factor in the murders and last night's explosion. Presumably, it's only a matter of time before those stories are leaked as well.”

“Assuming that all this is linked.”

“Assuming that all this is linked,” Nergui agreed. “If not, it's a hell of a coincidence. But I don't know how it's linked. And I don't know how it's linked to Wu Sam, that's if our visitor really is him.”

Batzorig coughed quietly. “Sir.”

Nergui looked up, his expression suggesting that he had momentarily forgotten the young man's presence. “Batzorig,” he said, “you had some good news, too, as I recall. I hope it compensates for all this.” He pushed the newspapers away across the desk.

“I'm not even sure it is good news, but—”

“It must be better than this. Go on.”

“Well, sir, it's about Wu Sam. Or at least about Professor Sam Yung, if he turns out to be the same person. It seems that Professor
Yung is something of an expert on Mongolian history. He's here on sabbatical—timed to coincide with the Genghis Khan anniversary.”

“And where is he now?” Doripalam asked.

“He's away. They'd organised the usual round of official sightseeing for him. But he was keen to do more than that, apparently. Wanted to go off on his own.”

“On his own?” Nergui's tone suggested that this was a highly unorthodox proposal.

“Well, with a guide. A former student who spoke decent English, I understand.”

Nergui nodded. “A young man, then?” he said, his toneless voice betraying no hint of his thoughts. “And where did they go?”

“North,” Batzorig said. “To Genghis Khan's birthplace.”

The vodka bottle was empty, but Tunjin showed no obvious ill-effects. If anything, his mind felt clearer than earlier in the day when he had still been recovering from the after-effects of whatever narcotics had been used on him. He felt calm, as if the drink had taken the edge off his anxiety. That was why alcohol was such a pernicious drug. Half a bottle of vodka, and you could actually persuade yourself that the stuff was good for you.

Not good for Solongo, though. He wasn't sure how much she'd drunk before his arrival, but it was more than anyone, or rather anyone who wasn't like Tunjin himself, should have been drinking at this time of the day. And she looked tired. Not just physically tired, but worn down, as though some long-standing struggle was finally becoming too much for her.

“What about the exhibition?” he said, finally. His mind was still wrestling with his own predicament, trying to work out what he should do next, but the possibilities eluded him. It was easier to focus on someone else's troubles. “Shouldn't you be at the museum?”

Solongo had retreated from the kitchen back into the larger living room. Through the open doorway, Tunjin could see her sitting in a corner of a large sofa, her legs neatly tucked under her. She had a box file open on her knees and was carefully sorting through a pile of crumpled papers. She looked up.

“Of course I should,” she said. “I decided they could probably manage without me for an hour or two.”

“Very wise,” Tunjin said. “You had a shock yesterday. Maybe more
than you realised.” Perhaps that's why she'd been drinking this morning, he thought. But somehow he doubted that it had been solely attributable to the previous day's experience. Either way, Doripalam really ought to have been here. Ought to
be
here, looking after her.

“But I need to go back,” she said. “We only have three days till the opening.”

“But everything must be ready,” Tunjin pointed out. “More or less, I mean.”

“You mean if we're not ready now, we never will be,” she said. “Well, that's true enough. And we're at the stage where we could open without causing too much embarrassment to anyone,” she shook her head. “Embarrassment, again. Do you ever think we place too much emphasis on all that? Our good name, our national pride. All that stuff?”

Tunjin sat himself on the opposite end of the sofa. “I don't think I'm the one to ask,” he said. “It's never been that important to me, all that national identify stuff. I've never done too much to enhance the Mongolian image.” He stretched out his large limbs, feeling the frame of the sofa creaking under his weight. “But it's hardly surprising, is it? We have to cling to something.”

“But all this birth of the Mongol empire stuff, what does it mean now?”

“You're supposed to be the expert. I think it's just something we have to—I don't know—to reclaim before we can move forward.” He stopped, conscious that his words sounded uncharacteristically earnest.

Her expression suggested that she was taking his sentiments seriously. “I suppose it could be something like that. I hope it is, and we're not just getting mired in the past, pretending we can somehow recapture ancient glories.”

“It depends who you are,” Tunjin said. “There are plenty who'd like to think that way. Looking for a new Genghis Khan ready to take control.”

“If he's out there, he's keeping very quiet,” Solongo commented.

“Probably just biding his time,” Tunjin said. “Waiting for his moment.” He stopped suddenly, his fogged mind trying to reach for some thought. “And perhaps this is it,” he went on, not sure what he was saying. “Perhaps this is the moment.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don't know,” he said. “But I was thinking if some modern-day Genghis Khan was out there—or someone who thought they were—well, now would be their moment, wouldn't it?”

“The anniversary, you mean?”

“The anniversary and everything that goes with it. Your exhibition. The new statues. The Genghis Khan memorial. All the pageantry. Everything that's been lined up for this summer. If that wasn't their moment, when would be?” He paused, rubbing his hands through his sparse hair. “Perhaps that's what this is all about. The anniversary.”

“I don't understand,” she said. “This is what what's all about?”

“What's happened,” he said. “The supposed bombing in the square. The body in the museum.” He paused. “Me being framed. Wu Sam.”

“You think Wu Sam sees himself as the new Genghis Khan? How does that work? He's not even Mongolian.”

“He is,” Tunjin said, frowning. “I remember that. Ethnically, he was Mongolian. He was from Inner Mongolia. He'd moved to Beijing as a child—his father was some kind of Party apparatchik. But they were Mongolian. That was why he developed his interest in Mongolian history.”

“Wouldn't that have been rather suspect? In Communist China, I mean?”

“Who knows? The ways of the Party have always been a mystery to me. But that kind of thing can cut either way. It depends on your motivation. It depends on how you're perceived.”

“That's true enough,” she said, thinking back to her own father's time as a senior Party official. As a teenager, observing his activities with the cynical detachment of youth, she could never comprehend the subtle shifts in official mood that led to individuals being in or out of favour. Her father had been as deft as anyone at riding
the waves of change. But that was probably how everyone felt until the unexpected undercurrents finally dragged them under. Her father's reputation had definitely been on the wane near the end. Even she, as a teenager, had been able to sense his declining confidence, his increasing paranoia. Ironically enough, it was the sudden arrival of democracy that had given him the opportunity to reinvent himself one more time.

“But I still don't understand,” she said. “Where does Wu Sam fit into this anyway?”

“I'm not sure,” Tunjin admitted. “Maybe he doesn't at all. Maybe I'm chasing ghosts.”

“But you think there's something?” She had put aside the box file and was watching him intently, as though she could read something in his expression.

He looked back up at her, surprised by her seriousness. “Yes,” he said, finally. “I think I do. I don't know whether it's Genghis Khan or—” He stopped, wondering what he was saying. There was silence in the room, a sudden intensity, as though a storm was brewing. But the sky through the broad windows was as blue as ever, and the dust motes drifted slowly in the unwavering beams of sunlight.

Tunjin opened his mouth to say something more. And then, almost as unexpected as if there had been a clap of thunder outside, the room was filled with a sudden piercing noise.

For a second Solongo looked almost as startled, as if she had forgotten where they were. Then she shook her head and pulled herself slowly to her feet. “There's someone at the door downstairs.”

Another mile or two brought them into the first real shade. Sam steered the truck carefully into a cluster of fir trees and drew slowly to a halt. “We can stop here for a few minutes,” he said. “I need a comfort break. There are some bottles of water in the back if you want one.”

Odbayar pushed open the passenger door. Outside, the heat was
as intense as he'd expected, despite the shadow of the trees. For a moment, it left him breathless, as though the oxygen had been sucked from the air.

The day was as still as he'd ever known, with no breath of breeze to alleviate the temperature. Other than the sound of Sam's footsteps as he walked slowly away, the silence was almost complete. Somewhere in the trees ahead, Odbayar could faintly detect the sound of birdsong. And somewhere beyond that, there was the sound of water on rocks, the far-off murmuring of a stream.