CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

12:32 P.M.:

Brian Kwok was screaming and beyond terror. He knew he was in prison and in hell and it had gone on forever. His whole insane world was an instant of never-ending blinding light, everything blood-colored, the cell walls floor ceiling blood-colored, no doors or windows, and the floor awash with blood, but everything twisted and all upside down for somehow he was lying on the ceiling, his whole being in torment, frantically trying to claw his way down to normality, each time falling back into the mess of his own vomit, then the next instant once more in the blackness, grinding pulsating voices laughing, drowning out his friend, drowning out Robert who pleaded with the devils to stop stop for the love of God stop, then once more the eye-tearing head-exploding bloodlight, seeing the blood waters that would not fall, groping desperately, stretching down for the chairs and table that sat in the blood water but falling back, always falling back, floor meeting ceiling everything wrong upside sideways madness madness the devil’s invention …

Bloodlight and darkness and laughter and stench and blood again, on and on and on …

He knew he had begun raving years ago, begging them to stop, begging them to let him go, swearing he would do anything but let him go, that he was not the one they sought, not due for hell … It’s a mistake, it’s all a mistake, no it’s not a mistake I was the enemy who was the enemy what enemy? Oh please let the world turn right side up and let me lie where I should be lying up there, down there, where oh Jesus Christ Robert Christ help, help meeeeee …

“All right, Brian. I’m here. I’m putting everything right. I am. I’m putting everything right!” He heard the compassionate words come soaring out of the maelstrom, drowning the laughter. The enveloping blood went away. He felt his friend’s hand, cool and gentle, and he clutched it, terrified lest it was another dream within a dream within a dream, oh Christ Robert don’t leave me….

Oh Jesus it’s impossible! Look there! The ceiling’s there where it should be and I’m here, I’m lying on the bed where I should be and the room’s dim but soft where it should be, everything’s clean, flowers, blinds drawn but flowers and the water properly in the vase and I’m right side up, I’m right side up. “Oh Christ, Robert…”

“Hello, chum,” Robert Armstrong said gently.

“Oh Jesus Robert thank you thank you, I’m right side up oh thank you thank you …”

It was hard to talk and he felt weak, his strength gone, but it was glorious just to be here, out of the nightmare, his friend’s face misted but real. And smoking, am I smoking? Oh yes. Yes I think I remember Robert left me a packet of cigarettes though those devils came and found them and took them away last week … thank God for smoke … When was it, last month, last week, when? I remember yes but Robert came back again and gave me a secret drag last month, was it last month? “Oh that tastes so good, so good and the peace, no nightmare, Robert, not seeing blood up there, the ceiling awash, not lying up there but down here not in hell oh thank you thank you …”

“I must go now.”

“Oh Christ don’t go they may come back no don’t go sit and stay please stay. Look, we’ll talk, yes, that’s it, talk, you wanted to talk … don’t leave. Please talk …”

“All right, old friend, then talk. I won’t go while we talk. What do you want to tell me, eh? Certainly I’ll stay while you talk. Tell me about Ningtok and your father. Didn’t you go back to see him?”

“Oh yes, I went back to see him once, yes, just before he died, my friends helped me, they helped me it only took a day, my friends helped me … that, that was so long ago….”

“Did Ian go with you?”

“Ian? No it … was it Ian? I can’t remember … Ian, the tai-pan? Someone went with me. Was it you, Robert? Ah, with me in Ning-tok? No it wasn’t you or Ian it was John Chancellor from Ottawa. He hates the Soviets too, Robert, they’re the great enemy. Even in school, and devil Chiang Kai-shek and his assassins Fong-fong and … and … Oh I’m so tired and so pleased to see you….”

“Tell me about Fong-fong.”

“Oh him. He was a bad man, Robert, him and all his spy group they were against us, the PRC, and pro-Chiang, I know; don’t worry as soon as I read the … What are you asking me, eh? What?”

“It was that rotten Grant, eh?”

“Yes, yes it was and I almost fainted when he knew I was … I … where was I oh yes but I stopped Fong-fong at once.… Oh yes.”

“Who did you tell?”

“Tsu-yan. I whispered it to Tsu-yan. He’s back in Peking now … Oh he was very high up, though he didn’t know who I really was, Robert, I was all very hush-hush.… Yes then it was in school, my father sent me after old Sh’in was murdered … thugs came and flogged him to death in the village square because he was one of us, one of the people, one of Chairman Mao’s people, and when I was in Hong Kong I stayed with … with Uncle … I went to school … and he schooled me at night.… Can I sleep now?”

“Who was your uncle, Kar-shun, and where did he live?”

“I don’t … don’t remember….”

“Then I must go. Next week I’ll come ba—”

“No wait, Robert, wait, it was Wu Tsa-fing, on … on Fourth Alley in Aberdeen … number 8, lucky 8, fifth floor. There, I can remember! Don’t go!”

“Very good, old chum. Very good. Were you at school long in Hong Kong?” Robert Armstrong kept his voice soft and kind and his heart went out to his friend that once was. He was astonished that Brian had broken so easily, so quickly.

The client’s mind was open now, ready for him to take apart. He kept his eyes on the shell of the man who lay on the bed, encouraging him to remember so that the others who listened secretly could record all the facts and figures and names and places, the undercover truths and half-truths that were spilling out and would continue to spill out until Brian Kar-shun Kwok was a husk. And he knew that he would continue to probe, to cajole or threaten or become impatient or angry or pretend to want to leave or curse the jailer away who would interrupt, if necessary. With Crosse and Sinders monitoring the in-depth debriefing, he was just a tool like Brian Kwok had been a tool for others who had used his mind and talents for their own purposes. His job was just to be the medium, to keep the client talking, to bring him back when he rambled or became incoherent, to be his sole friend and his sole prop in this unreal universe, the one who brought the truth forth—like John Chancellor of Ottawa, who’s he? Where does he fit? I don’t know yet.

We’ll get everything the client has now, he thought. We’ll get all his contacts, his mentors, enemies and friends. Poor old Fong-fong and the lads. We’ll never see them again—unless they turn up as agents of the other side. What a rotten filthy business this is, selling out your friends, working with the enemy who, everyone knows, wants you enslaved.

“… in Vancouver it was wonderful, wonderful, Robert. There was a girl there who … Yes and I almost married her but Sensible Tok, Sensible was my 489, he lived … he lived on … oh yes it was Pedder Street in Chinatown and he owned the Hoho-tok Restaurant … yes Sensible Tok said I should honor Chairman Mao before any quai loh…. Oh how I loved her but he said it was the quai lohs who raped China for centuries.… You know that’s true that’s true….”

“Yes that’s true,” he said, humoring him. “Sensible Tok was your only friend in Canada?”

“Oh no Robert I have dozens….”

Armstrong listened, astounded by the wealth of information about the inner workings of the Canadian Mounted Police, and the extent of Chinese Communist infiltration throughout the Americas and Europe and particularly on the Western seaboard—Vancouver, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego—wherever a Chinese restaurant or shop or business existed there was the potential of pressure, of funds and most of all of knowledge. “… and the Wo Tuk on Gerrard Street in London’s the Center where I … when I was … Oh my head aches I’m so thirsty….”

Armstrong gave him the water that contained stimulant. When he or Crosse considered the moment correct, the client would be given the thirst-quenching, delicately flavored Chinese tea that was his favorite. This contained the soporific.

Then it was up to Crosse and Sinders what happened, whether it was more of the same, more of the Red Room or the end of the exercise and then, carefully, the gradual bringing back of the client to reality, with great care, so that no permanent damage was done.

It’s up to them, he thought. Sinders was right to put on the pressure while we’ve time. The client knows too much. He’s too well trained, and if we’d had to give him back without knowing what he knows, well that would have been irresponsible. We’ve got to keep ahead.

Armstrong lit two cigarettes and inhaled his own deeply. I’ll give up smoking for Christmas. I can’t now, not with all this horror. It was Brian Kwok’s wailing screams so soon, barely twenty minutes after being put into the room for the second time that had shattered him. He had been watching through spyholes with Crosse and Sinders, watching the insanity of trying to reach the ceiling that was the floor that was the ceiling, astonished that someone so strong, so well trained as Brian Kwok would break so quickly. “It’s impossible,” he had muttered.

“He may be faking,” Sinders said.

“No,” Crosse had said. “No. It’s real, for him. I know.”

“I don’t believe he’d break so easily.”

“You will, Robert.” And then when Brian Kwok had been carried out to be brought to this room, clean and nice and the Red Room had been mopped clean, Roger Crosse had said, “All right, Robert, try it, then you’ll see.”

“No, no thanks. It’s like something out of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,” he had muttered. “No thanks!”

“Please try it, just for a minute. It’s an important experience for you. You may be caught by them, the other side, some day. You should be prepared. One minute might save your sanity. Test it, for your own safety.”

So he had agreed. They had closed the door. The room was totally scarlet, small but everything tilted, the lines all wrong, angles all wrong, the floor meeting the ceiling in one corner, perspectives all wrong, no angles ordinary. The tilted ceiling far above was a sheer sheet of scarlet glass. Above the glass, water washed down to be recycled and come down again. Attached to this tilted glass ceiling surface were scarlet chairs and a table and pens and paper casually on the table, scarlet cushions on the chairs, making it seem the floor, a false door nearby, almost ajar …

Sudden blackness. Then the blinding strobe and the stunning impact of the scarlet. Blackness, scarlet, blackness, scarlet. Involuntarily he groped for the reality of the table and chairs and the floor and door and stumbled and fell, unable to get his bearings, water above, the glass vanished, just insane scarlet water on the floor above. Blackness and now voices pounding and again blood-colored hell. His stomach told him that he was upside down though his mind said it was just a trick and to close your eyes it’s a trick it’s a trick it’s a trick …

After an eternity, when at length normal lights came on and the real door opened, he was lying on the real floor, retching. “You bastard,” he had snarled at Crosse, barely able to talk. “You said a minute, you lying bastard!” His chest heaved and he fought to his feet, reeling, barely able to stand or to stop vomiting.

“Sorry, but it was only a minute, Robert,” Crosse said.

“I don’t believe it….”

“Honestly, it was,” Sinders said. “I timed it myself. Really! Extraordinary. Most effective.”

Again Armstrong felt his chest heave at the thought of the water above and the table and chairs. He put those thoughts away and concentrated on Brian Kwok, feeling that he had let the client ramble enough and it was now time to bring him back. “You were saying? You passed over our dossiers to your friend Bucktooth Lo?”

“Well no, it wasn’t … I’m tired, Robert, tired … what ar—”

“If you’re tired I’ll leave!” He got up and saw the client blanch. “Next month I’ll se—”

“No … no … please don’t go … they … no, don’t go. Pleassssssse!”

So he sat back, continuing the game, knowing it to be unfair, and that with the client so totally disoriented he could be made to sign anything, say anything at whim. “I’ll stay while you talk, old friend. You were saying about Bucktooth Lo—the man in Princes Building? He was the go-between?”

“No … not … yes in a way … Dr. Meng … Dr. Meng would pick up any package that I left … Meng never knew that I … that it was me … the arrangements were by phone or by letter … he would take them to Lo who was paid … Bucktooth Lo was paid to give them to another man, I don’t know who … I don’t know …”

“Oh I think you do, Brian, I don’t believe you want me to stay.”

“Oh Christ I do … I swear it … Bucktooth … Bucktooth would know … or perhaps Ng, Vee Cee Ng, Photographer Ng, he’s on our side, he’s on our side Robert … Ask him, he’ll know … he was with Tsu-yan importing thoriums …”

“What’re thoriums?”

“Rare earths for … for atomics, for our atomics … oh yes we’ll have our own A-bombs and H-bombs in a few months….” Brian Kwok went into a paroxysm of laughter. “The first in a few weeks … our first explosion in just a few weeks now oh of course not perfect but the first and soon an H-bomb, dozens, Robert, soon we’ll have ours to defend against those hegemonists who threaten to wipe us out, in a few weeks! Christ, Robert, think of that! Chairman Mao’s done it, he has, he’s done it … yes and then next year H-bombs and then Joe, yes we’ll get back our lands, oh yes, with atomics we cancel out theirs … we will, Joe’s going to help, Joe Yu’s going to … Oh we’ll stop them now, stop them we’ll stop them and take our lands back.” His hand reached out and he held Robert Armstrong’s arm but his grip was weak. “Listen, we’re at war already, us and the Soviets, Chung Li told me, he’s my emergency … em, em contact … there’s a war, a shooting war going on right now. In the north, divisions, not patrols near the Amur they’re they’re killing more Chinese and stealing more land but … but not for long.” He lay back weakly and began to mumble, his mind wandering.

“Atomics? Next year? I don’t believe it,” Armstrong said, pretending to scoff, his mind blown as he listened to the continued outpouring that was giving chapter and verse and names. Christ, A-bombs in a few months? A few months? The world’s been told that’s ten years away. China with A- and H-bombs?

Carefully he let Brian Kwok peter out and then he said casually, “Who’s Joe? Joe Yu?”

“Who?”

He saw Brian Kwok turn and stare at him, eyes strange, different, boring into him. Instantly he was on guard and he prepared. “Joe Yu,” he said even more offhand.

“Who? I don’t know any Joe Yu … no.… What, what … what am I doing here? What is this place? What’s happening? Yu? Why … why should I know him? Who?”

“No reason,” Armstrong said, calming him. “Here, here’s some tea, you must be very thirsty, old chum.”

“Oh yes … yes I am … where … yes … Christ what’s happ … happening?”

Armstrong helped him drink. Then he gave him another cigarette and further calmed him. In a few moments Brian Kwok was again deeply asleep. Armstrong wiped his palms and his forehead, exhausted too.

The door opened. Sinders and Crosse came in.

“Very good, Robert,” Sinders said excitedly, “very good indeed!”

“Yes,” Crosse said. “I felt he was coming back too. Your timing was perfect.”

Armstrong said nothing, feeling soiled.

“My God,” Sinders chortled, “this client’s gold. The minister will be delighted. Atomics in a few months and a shooting war going on right now! No wonder our Parliamentary Trade Commission made such marvelous progress! Excellent, Robert, just excellent!”

“You believe the client, sir?” Crosse said.

“Absolutely, don’t you?”

“I believe he was telling what he knew. Whether it’s fact, that’s another matter. Joe Yu? Does Joe or Joseph Yu mean anything to you?” The others shook their heads. “John Chancellor?”

“No.”

“Chung Li?”

Armstrong said, “There’s a Chung Li who’s a friend of Br—the client’s, a car enthusiast—Shanghainese, big industrialist—could be him.”

“Good. But Joe Yu, that triggered something in him. Could be important.” Crosse glanced at Sinders. “Proceed?”

“Of course.”