The Middle Kingdom (14 page)

"Go on,
Howard."

"Well, sir.
I'm almost certain this involves Security. Maybe at StarTlevel."

Tolonen looked
at him directly for some moments, then nodded soberly, his expression
unchanged. "I agree—though with great reluctance, I must
say. The very thought of it makes me shudder."

DeVore bowed his
head sympathetically, "Then—"

Tolonen stopped
him with a look. "Let me outline the situation as I see it,
Howard. Then we'll see how this new information fits with what we
have."

DeVore sat
straighter in his chair; his eyes watching the older man intently as
he outlined the situation.

"First—what
kind of weapon was used, and where and by whom was it manufactured?"
Tolonen pulled broad, long fingers through neatly cut gray hair, his
deeply blue eyes fixing DeVore. "We're working on the assumption
that it was some kind of ice derivative. An ice eater. Research into
ice derivatives has been banned by the Edict, but we're not dealing
with legitimate activity here. It's therefore possible that someone
has come up with such a thing.

"Second—who
knew Lwo Kang would be there at that time? Most of those we might
have suspected—Lwo's own junior ministers—died with him.
Only Yang Lai is unaccounted for."

DeVore nodded.
"No trace yet, sir. But we're still looking."

"Good. Now,
third—who took the Security squad off duty?

Are we safe in
assuming it was the duty captain, or was someone higher up the chain
of command behind the decision?" Tolonen paused and shook his
head. "It seems almost inexplicable to me that the officer
concerned acted independently. His record was without blemish and his
suicide would seem to confirm it. But he was a frightened man,
Howard. I believe he was acting under threat."

"I agree,
sir. I knew the man as a cadet and I'd vouch that he would not have
acted as he did without good reason. Our assumption is that his
immediate family was threatened. We haven't yet located them—but
whether that's because he placed them in hiding or whether they were
taken we don't know. Even so, we mustn't rule out another motive.
Gambling debts, perhaps. Or some kind of addiction. Women, maybe.
Even the best men have their weaknesses. In any case, I have a squad
investigating it."

"Good.
Then, fourth—who were the actual assassins? As you know, our
first idea was that it was done from the air—from a craft
overflying the dome. But now we've ruled that out."

"Sir?"
DeVore tensed slightly, suddenly more alert.

"A search
of the area surrounding the dome has brought a number of new items to
light, chief among which is a corpse."

"A corpse?"

"Yes. We
found the body crammed into a narrow feed tunnel, not far from a
ventilation shaft that comes out close by the dome. A Hung
Mao.
Male. Aged thirty-five. He'd been stabbed twice with a
large-bladed knife. Very expertly, so I'm told."

"Then we've
got one of the assassins?"

Tolonen
shrugged. "Well, I wouldn't rule that out, but it's more likely
that the man simply stumbled onto things. His ID shows him to have
been a maintenance engineer, cleared for First Level Security."

DeVore
considered a moment. "It sounds the ideal profession for gaining
access to the dome."

"My own
first thought, Howard, but it doesn't check out with anything else.
We can account for his movements up to the time he got into that
ventilation tunnel. We've checked. He's on camera, climbing into the
access hatch only twelve minutes before the dome went up. He made one
check—timed and logged—halfway up the tunnel. That
accounts for the first five minutes. That'd leave him only seven
minutes to climb the rest of the way, meet his partner, set the
charges, and get back down."

"Time
enough. And anyway, what if his partner set the charges?"

"That's
possible. But then, why would he be needed? And why killed? It
doesn't fit. And anyway, we have something else."

DeVore blinked.
"YouVe been busy, sir."

Tblonen laughed.
"Yes, well, I did
try
to get you, Howard. Anyway, it's
possible we have our men. Two low-level sorts. They were involved in
an incident with Security guards in one of the nearby stacks at Level
Eleven. A CompCam unit noticed that one of the men had no ID match
and had Security investigate. There was an exchange of shots and the
two men got away."

DeVore was quiet
a moment. "But you have them now?"

"No. Not
yet. but listen to this, Howard. You'll never believe it. Do you know
how they got out?"

DeVore shook his
head.

"Well, our
men thought they had them cornered in a distribution elevator. They'd
called up a burner, ready to melt the door locks, but the two
suspects did something to the elevator. They overrode its circuits,
then rammed the whole thing through the floor and into the Net!"

DeVore whistled.
"What happened?"

"The whole
deck had to be sealed and cleaned out. A messy business. Thousands
hurt. More than a hundred and fifty dead. WeVe had to put out a story
about systems failure. But think about it, Howard. Our two friends
must have had inside information. There aren't that many people who
know those elevators go down another ten levels. Just as important,
however, is the fact that they had a device that overrode the
circuitry." He paused. "It makes sense of other things too.
My guess is that they were dropped in. Picked up at one of the
under-Net gates— perhaps near one of the agricultural
processing stations—and landed on top of the City. They did the
job, made their escape down the ventilation shaft—killing our
maintenance man on the way—then emerged at Eleven."

DeVore nodded
slowly. "It. . . makes a kind of sense."

"Good. I'm
glad you think so. In which case there are a few other questions that
need answers. Who were their contacts? Who gave them the information?
Who trained them? Who physically landed them on the roof? This kind
of operation would have needed a lot of planning. A substantial
number of people would have been involved."

Again DeVore
nodded, but this time there was an air of distraction about him.

The General
leaned forward excitedly. "Just think, Howard. If we could get
to just one of those involved—just one!—we could blast
the whole thing open!" He laughed, then slammed his hands down
firmly on the desk top. "And in order that we can do just that,
I've been to see the T'ang."

"Sir?"
DeVore seemed surprised by this new development.

"Yes,
Howard. The T'ang has given me authority. The authority to cut
through bureaucratic tape, to make deals, grant pardons, whatever's
necessary, providing we get information on the people who were behind
this." He smiled broadly. "So you see, Howard. What you
brought me was of great interest. If Wyatt
was
involved,
either as principal or as agent. . . well, I want him. Understand? I
want to know what his motive was, who his connections were."

"So you
think it might be him?"

The General was
silent for a time, then he shrugged. "I don't know. I thought. .
. well, you know what I thought. I listened to the tape of your
conversation with Lehmann. He's an unpleasant specimen, but I agree
with you. He's too bluff, too careless in what he says, to have been
behind this. As for Wyatt, I've met him more than once, and I liked
him." Again he shrugged. "Still, do what you must. The
T'ang wants answers, and he wants them fast."

WHEN DEVORE had
gone, Tolonen summoned the ensign, Haavikko.

Axel Haavikko
was a tall, broad-shouldered young man of nineteen years, his blond
hair cut severely short. On his jacket he wore the insignia of the
elite military school from which he had graduated only eight months
previously, on his chest the embroidered sea-horse patch of a
ninth-grade military officer. He marched briskly across the room and
came to attention before the desk.

"Sir?"

The General
smiled. "At ease, boy. Have you got the tape?"

"Yes, sir.
But I thought—"

Tblonen raised
an eyebrow. "I know. But I decided against it. Major DeVore
doesn't need to know everything. He's tired. I could see it myself.
He's taking on too much, trying to keep abreast of everything."

He leaned back
in his chair, studying the young man; observing that he, too, was
showing signs of strain. "We could all do with some rest, eh,
Haavikko? A break from things. But the evil of this world goes on,
whether we're there to deal with it or not." He smiled kindly.
"Okay, let's see what we have."

The cadet bowed,
then turned and went over to the viewer, placing the flimsy
transparent card he was carrying onto the viewing surface.
Immediately the wall screen above his head lit up, showing two men
pushing their way through a broad but crowded corridor. The tape
sheet had been put together from segments of hundreds of individual
tape sheets, then edited to make it seem as though a single camera
had followed the suspects the whole length of the Main.

"These are
the two men, sir. The one on the left was addressed as Jyan. The
other is unnamed. There's no entry on either in Security Central
records."

The General
sniffed. "Hold that a moment."

The image froze.
A sign behind the first of the men read LEVEL ELEVEN, SOUTH 3 STACK,
CANTON OF MUNICH, the English in blocked black figures above the
blood red Mandarin pictograms. Crowds packed the Main. The second
man—better built than the first; the telltale bulge of a knife
at his waist—had turned to left profile, revealing a short,
livid scar on his neck just below the ear.

"Interesting
types, eh, Axel? From the Net. There's no doubt about it. If Security
Central has nothing, then I'm certain these are our men. Can we tell
where they appeared from?"

Axel tapped the
controls. At once the picture changed— showed a smaller
corridor; dimly lit, almost empty.

"Where's
this?"

"Up five
levels, sir. At Sixteen. It's a maintenance corridor. Not used by the
Public. Watch."

As they watched,
a hatch dropped down from the ceiling and two men lowered themselves
into the corridor, one after the other. The two Han from the other
shots.

"Where does
that lead?"

"There's a
long vertical shaft, about twenty
ch'i
back from that hatch.
It comes out at Forty-one. There we lose them."

"Any reason
why?"

"Camera
malfunction. Vandalism. It seems genuine. TheyVe been having trouble
with that section for weeks, apparently."

"Okay. So
let's get back to Eleven. See what kind of men we're dealing with."

For the next ten
minutes they watched in silence as the situation unfolded. They saw
the fight. Saw Jyan draw and use his knife, then drive the loader
into the elevator. Then, less than a minute later, the screen went
blank.

"That's all
that survived, sir. When the quarantine seals came down most of the
cameras blew. We've pieced this together from Central Records'
copies."

Tolonen nodded,
satisfied. "YouVedoneagoodjob, Haavikko. It shouldn't be
difficult to trace these two. We have arrangements with certain of
the Triad bosses beneath the Net. They'll find them for us. It's only
a question of time."

"Then we do
nothing, sir?"

"Nothing
until we hear from our contacts. But I want us to be ready, so IVe
arranged something. It'll mean that we'll have a squad down there,
under the Net in Munich Canton, when news comes. It'll allow us to
get to them at once. I've put Fest in charge. He has strict orders to
take the men alive if possible. You and Hans Ebert will make up the
squad."

Haavikko
hesitated, then asked, "What are we to do down there?"

Tolonen laughed.
"Until you're called on, nothing. You can treat it as a paid
holiday. Ebert knows the place quite well, apparently. I'm sure he'll
find something for you to do. But when the call comes, be there, and
fast. All right?"

Haavikko bowed
his head. "Anything else, sir?"

"Yes. One
last thing. I want you to make a list."

"Sir?"

"I want you
to compile a list of all those who might have planned this; anyone
who might conceivably have been involved. Not just those with a clear
motive, but anyone who might have had the right contacts."

"Anyone?"

The General
nodded sternly. "Leave no one out, however absurd it might
seem."

The cadet bowed
deeply, then clicked his heels together. "Sir."

Alone again,
Tolonen stood, then went to the window. Far below, the wide moat of
the Security Fortress seemed filled with an inky blackness. In the
early-morning light the two watch-towers at the far end of the bridge
threw long, thin shadows across the apron of the spaceport beyond.

He would not
act. Not yet. For a while he would trust to instinct and let Wyatt
be. See if Wyatt's name appeared on Haavikko's list. Wait for DeVore
to gather something more substantial than the tattle of Above.
Because deep down he didn't believe that Wyatt was involved.

He turned back
to his desk, putting his fingers lightly to the intercom pad.

His secretary
answered at once. "General?"

"Play me
that tape again. Major DeVore and Under Secretary Lehmann. The part
where Lehmann talks about suffocating and bad blood. A few lines,
that's all."

"Yes,
General."

He turned back
to the window, looking down. As he watched, a tiny figure emerged
from the shadow and marched quickly but unhurriedly across the
bridge. It was DeVore.

Major DeVore was
a clever officer. A good man to have on your team. There was no
fooling him; he saw things clearly. Saw through the appearance of
things. And if
he
believed that Lehmann wasn't involved ...