Wingrove, David - Chung Kuo 02 (48 page)

"And if I
find anything?"

There was a
hammering at the outer door to the apartment. The three men turned,
facing it, Kao Chen getting to his feet. There was an exchange of
voices; then a moment later, Wang Ti appeared in the doorway.

"It's a
messenger for you, Major Karr," she said, the use of Karr's rank
indicating that the man was within hearing in the next room.

"I'll
come," said Karr, but he was gone only a few moments. When he
came back, his face was livid with anger.

"I don't
believe it. They're dead."

"Who?"
said Chen, alarmed.

"The
Ping
Tiao
cell. All eight of them." Karr's huge frame shuddered
with indignation; then, his eyes looking inward, he nodded to
himself. "Someone knew. Someone's beaten us to it."

* *
*

ebert WAS
standing with his Captain, Auden, laughing, his head thrown back,
when Karr arrived. Signs of a heavy fire-fight were everywhere. Body
bags lay to one side of the big intersection, while the corridors
leading off were strewn with wreckage.

Karr looked
about him at the carnage, then turned, facing Ebert. "Who was
it?" he demanded.

"Who was
what?" Ebert said tersely, almost belligerently.

"Was it
DeVore?"

Ebert laughed
coldly. "What are you talking about, Major Karr? They were
Ping
Tiao.
But they're dead now. Eight less of the bastards to worry
about."

Karr went still,
suddenly realizing what had happened. "You killed them?"

Ebert looked at
Auden again, a faint smile reappearing. "Every last one of
them."

Karr clenched
his fists, controlling himself. "Is there somewhere we can
talk?" he said tightly. "Somewhere private?"

Auden indicated
a room off to one side. "I'll post a guard."

"No need,"
said Karr. "We'll not be long."

When the door
closed behind them, Karr rounded on Ebert.

"You stupid
bastard! Why didn't you report what you were doing? Who gave you
permission to go in without notifying me?"

Ebert's eyes
flared. "I don't need
your
permission, Karr."

Karr leaned in
on him angrily. "In this instance you did! Marshal Tolonen put
me in charge of this investigation; and while it's still going on,
you report to me, understand me, Major Ebert? Your precipitate action
has well and truly fucked things up. I had this cell staked out."

Ebert looked up
at the big man defiantly, spitting the words back at him. "Well,
I've simply saved you the trouble, haven't I?"

Karr shook his
head. "You arrogant bastard. Don't you understand? I didn't want
them dead. We were going in tonight. I wanted at least one of them
alive. Now the whole bloody lot of them will have gone to ground and
the gods know when we'll get another chance like this."

Ebert was
glaring back at him, his hands shaking with anger. "You're not
pinning this on me, Karr. It's you who've fouled up, not me. I was
just doing my job. Following up on evidence received. If you can't
keep your fellow officers informed . . ."

Karr raised his
hand, the fingers tensed, as if to strike Ebert in the face; then he
slowly let the tension ease from him. Violence would achieve nothing.

"Did any of
our men get hurt?"

There was an
ugly movement in Ebert's face. He looked aside, his voice subdued. "A
few ..."

"Meaning
what?"

Ebert hesitated,
then looked back at him again. "Four dead, six injured."

"Four dead!
Ai ya!
What the fuck were you up to?" Karr shook his
head, then turned away, disgusted. "You're shit, Ebert, you know
that? How could you possibly lose four men? You had only to wait.
They'd have had to come at you."

Ebert glared
pure hatred at the big man's back. "It wasn't as simple as that.
. ."

Karr turned
back. "You fucked up!"

Ebert looked
away, then looked back, his whole manner suddenly more threatening.
"I think you've said enough, Karr. Understand? I'm not a man to
make an enemy of."

Karr laughed
caustically. "You repeat yourself, Major Ebert. Or do you forget
our first meeting." He leaned forward and spat between Ebert's
feet. "There! That might jog your memory. You were a shit then
and you're a shit now."

"I'm not
afraid of you, Karr."

"No. . ."
Karr nodded. "No, you're not a coward; I'll give you that. But
you're still a disgrace to the T'ang's uniform, and if I can, I'll
break you."

Ebert laughed
scornfully. "You'll try."

"Yes, I'll
try. Fucking hard, I'll try. But don't underestimate me, Hans Ebert.
Just remember what I did to Master Hwa that time in the Pit. He
underestimated me, and he's dead."

"Is that a
threat?"

"Take it as
you want. But between men, if you understand me. You go before the
Marshal and I'll deny every last word. Like you yourself once did,
ten years ago."

Ebert narrowed
his eyes. "That officer with you—it's Haavikko, isn't it?
I thought I recognized the little shit."

Karr studied
Ebert a moment, knowing for certain now that Haavikko had told the
truth about him; then he nodded. "Yes, Haavikko. But don't even
think of trying anything against him. If he so much as bruises a
finger without good reason, I'll come for you. And a thousand of your
cronies won't stop me."

* *
*

TSU MA STOOD in
the courtyard of the stables at Tongjiang, waiting while the groom
brought the Arab from its stall. He looked about him, for once
strangely ill at ease, disconcerted to learn that she had ridden off
ahead of him.

He had tried to
cast her from his mind, to drive from his heart the spell she had
cast over him; but it was no use. He was in love with her.

In love. He
laughed, surprised at himself. It had never happened to him before.
Never, in all his thirty-seven years.

He had only to
close his eyes and the image of her would come to him, taking his
breath. And then he would remember how it was, there on the island in
the lantern light; how he had watched her lose herself in the tune
she had been playing; how her voice had seemed the voice of his
spirit singing, freed like a bird into the darkness of the night. And
later, when he had been in the water, he had seen how she stood
behind her husband, watching him, her eyes curious, lingering on his
naked chest.

One life?,
she had asked, standing in the doorway of the ruined temple.
One
life!
as if it meant something special. As if it invited him to
touch her. But then, when he had leaned forward to brush her cheek,
her neck, she had moved back as if he had transgressed; and all his
knowledge of her had been shattered by her refusal.

Had he been
wrong those times? Had he misjudged her? It seemed so. And yet she
had sent word to him. Secretly. A tiny, handwritten note, asking him
to forgive her moodiness, to come and ride with her again. Was it
merely to be sociable—for her husband's sake—or should he
read something more into it?

He could still
hear her words.
If I were free . . .

Even to
contemplate such an affair was madness. It could only make for bad
blood between the Li clan and himself and shatter the age-old ties
between their families. He knew that. And yet the merest thought of
her drove out all consideration of what he ought to do. She had
bewitched him, robbed him of his senses.

That, too, he
knew. And yet his knowledge was as nothing beside the compulsion that
drove him to see her again. To risk everything simply to be with her.

He turned,
hearing the groom return with the Arab.

"
Chieh
Hsia
." The boy bowed, offering the reins.

Tsu Ma smiled
and took the reins. Then, putting one foot firmly in the stirrup, he
swung up onto the Arab's back. She moved skittishly but he steadied
her, using his feet. It was Li Yuan's horse; the horse he had ridden
the last time he had come. He turned her slowly, getting used to her
again, then dug in his heels, spurring her out of the courtyard and
north, heading out into the hills.

He knew where he
would find Fei Yen; there at the edge of the temple pool where they
had last spoken. She stood there, her face turned from him, her whole
stance strangely disconsolate. Her face was pale, far paler than he
remembered, as if she had been ill. He frowned, disconcerted by
something; then with a shock, he recognized the clothes she was
wearing. Her riding tunic was a pink that was almost white, edged
with black; her trousers were azure blue; and her hair . . . her hair
was beaded with rubies.

He laughed
softly, astonished. They were the same colors—the same
jewels—he had worn the first time they had met. But what did it
mean?

She looked up as
he approached, her eyes pained, her lips pressed together, her mouth
strangely hard. She had been crying.

"I didn't
know if you would come."

He hesitated,
then went across to stand at her side.

"You
shouldn't be riding out so far alone."

"No?"

The anger in her
voice took him aback. He reached into his tunic and took out a silk
handkerchief. "Here . . . What's wrong?"

He watched her
dab her cheeks, and wipe her eyes, his heart torn from him by the
tiny shudder she gave. He wanted to reach out and wrap her in his
arms, to hold her tight and comfort her; but he had been wrong
before.

"I can't
bear to see you crying."

She looked at
him, anger flashing in her eyes again, then looked down, as if
relenting. "No . . ." She sniffed, then crushed the silk
between her hands. "No, it's not your fault, Tsu Ma."

He wet his lips,
then spoke again. "Where is your husband?"

She laughed
bitterly, staring down fixedly at her clenched hands. "Husbands!
What is a husband but a tyrant!"

Once more the
anger in her face surprised him.

She stared up at
him, her eyes wide, her voice bitter. "He sleeps with his maids.
I've seen him."

"Ah. . ."
He looked down into the water, conscious of her image there in front
of him, "Maybe it's because he's a man."

"A man!"
She laughed caustically, her eyes meeting his in the mirror of the
pool, challenging him. "And men are different, are they? Have
they different appetites, different needs?" She looked back at
the reality of him, forcing him to look at her and meet her eyes.
"You sound like my brothers, Tsu Ma. They think the matter of
their sex makes them my superior when any fool can see—"

She stopped,
then laughed, glancing at him. "You see, even the language we
use betrays me. I would have said, not half the man I am."

He nodded, for
the first time understanding her. "Yet it is how things are
ordered," he said gently. "Without it—"

"I know,"
she said impatiently, then repeated it more softly, smiling at him.
"I know."

He studied her a
moment, remembering what her cousin Yin Wu Tsai had said— that
she had been born with a woman's body and a man's soul. It was true.
She looked so fragile, so easily broken; yet there was something
robust, something hard and uncompromising, at the core of her. Maybe
it was that—the precarious balance in her nature—that he
loved. That sense he had of fire beneath the ice. Of earthiness
beneath the superficial glaze.

"You're not
like other women."

He said it
softly, admiringly, and saw how it brought a movement in her eyes, a
softening of her features.

"And you?
Are you like other men?"

Am I? he asked
himself. Or am I simply what they expect me to be? As he stared back
at her he found he had no answer. If to be T'ang meant he could never
have his heart's desire, then what use was it being T'ang? Better
never to have lived.

"I think I
am," he answered after a moment. "I have the same feelings
and desires and thoughts."

She was watching
him intently, as if to solve some riddle she had set herself. Then
she looked down, away from him, the faintest smile playing on her
lips. "Yes, but it's the balance of those things that makes a
man what he is, wouldn't you say, Tsu Ma?"

He laughed. "And
you think my balance . . . different?"

She looked up at
him challengingly. "Don't you?" She lifted her chin
proudly, her dark eyes wide. "I don't really know you, Tsu Ma,
but I know this much—you would defy the world to get what you
wanted."

He felt himself
go still. Then she understood him, too. But still he held back,
remembering the mistake he had made before. To be rebuffed a second
time would be unthinkable, unbearable. He swallowed and looked down.

"I don't
know. I—"

She stood
abruptly, making him look up at her, surprised.

"All this
talking," she said, looking across to where their horses were
grazing. "It's unhealthy. Unnatural." She looked back at
him. "Don't you think so?"

He stood slowly,
fascinated by the twist and turn of her, her ever-changing moods.
"What do you suggest?"

She smiled,
suddenly the woman he had met that first time, laughing and
self-confident, all depths, all subtleties gone from her.

"I know
what," she said. "Let's race. To the beacon. You know it?"

He narrowed his
eyes. "We passed it ten
li
back, no?"

"That's
it." Her smile broadened. "Well? Are you game?"

"Yes,"
he said, laughing. "Why not? And no quarter, eh? No holding
back."

"Of
course," she answered, her eyes meeting his knowingly. "No
holding back."

* *
*

FEI YEN reined
in her horse and turned to look back down the steep slope beneath the
beacon. Tsu Ma was some fifty
ch'i
back, his mount straining,
its front legs fighting for each
ch'i
of ground.