The Edge of Madness (13 page)

‘A great intellect doesn’t necessarily make a man right.’

‘Nor necessarily make him wrong, Harry.’

‘I stand rebuked. And if he’s a friend of yours…’

‘No, never a friend, not like you, Harry. But a relevant man, that’s Marcus Washington.’ Nipper at last delivered their two glasses of wine, holding them in stiff, extended arms, desperate not to spill them.

‘Thank you, young man,’ the President said.

Nipper bent towards them conspiratorially. ‘Mr Shunin over there has asked for a whisky. Do you think I should give him an ordinary one or one of Granny’s specials?’

‘Just whatever’s on the table, I suggest,’ Blythe whispered in return.

‘Save the specials for later,’ Harry added, bending low. ‘For us.’

Nipper nodded in his most serious manner and stepped back across the room to the Russian.

‘Kids,’ Harry said once more.

‘Bloody men!’ she exclaimed, raising her glass to thank him for rescuing her. ‘Time to stop being a sentimental slush-bowl, Mr Jones. Let’s get to business.’ She turned to smile at Shunin. He accepted her summons and walked towards them, an enormous whisky in his hand.

‘This is like being on the bridge of a ship,’ he exclaimed solemnly, indicating the view through the windows. ‘But not the
Titanic
, I hope.’ He raised his glass to them and drank.

‘To those in peril on the sea,’ Harry said, returning the toast, praying there was a Russian sense of humour buried in there somewhere.

Soon Washington and Konev made their appearances; only D’Arby was missing. Strange, Harry thought, for the host to keep others waiting, but almost everything D’Arby had done since they’d arrived puzzled him. As he thought about it, a nail of concern began driving itself into his skull, but even as Harry puzzled about him the Prime Minister was there, amongst them, taking a glass of wine, apologizing for his late arrival. ‘I’ve been scanning the news channels,’ he explained.

‘Perhaps we should all report what we have discovered,’ Shunin suggested.

No, thought Harry, it wasn’t so much a suggestion. With that heavy Eastern European delivery of his, with its detached and relentless pace that was reminiscent of an artillery barrage, it came across as more of an instruction. And they obeyed. The six of them gathered before the library window, suspended halfway between jagged rocks and the doorstep of heaven, and told what they knew.

The reports they shared were like the patterns of a kaleidoscope, a picture that could be seen from so many aspects, yet one that still came from the same puzzling source. More troops had appeared in Beijing, guarding every major approach road and rail link as well as pitching up outside many more embassies. And it wasn’t only the Chinese ambassador in London who had been recalled; most of the ambassadors from major Western capitals were on their way home to Beijing, although no one would say why. Konev told them that
Russian units stationed along the border with China were reporting an unusually high number of Chinese air patrols along much of its length, while there had been an eruption of coded military and diplomatic radio traffic across the country that was more intense than anyone could remember. The Chinese authorities were talking–screaming–at each other, even though they were maintaining a steadfast silence to the rest of the world. Meanwhile in New York, the Beijing Opera Company had failed to appear for the start of their nationwide tour. They simply hadn’t got on the plane. When the reins in China were jerked, everyone felt it, even the divas.

It was clear that Sammi Shah’s beating hadn’t been an accident. The Chinese juggernaut was on the move, ready to squash anyone who stood in its way, although in what direction it was headed no one could say for sure. Except D’Arby. He sat by the window, a little apart from the rest of them, rolling his glass in both hands. He didn’t say a word, didn’t have to. Even the surf pounding on the rocks below seemed to be saying, ‘I told you so.’

‘I congratulate you, Mr Prime Minister,’ Shunin muttered.

‘Not necessary, Mr President. We need ideas, not applause. What do you suggest?’

The Russian considered the question, chewing a mouthful of whisky. ‘Dinner,’ he finally responded, draining the rest of his glass. ‘Let us build our strength while we
decide what sort of message we should deliver to Khan Mao and his Golden Horde.’

For the briefest moment D’Arby closed his eyes and offered a silent prayer of thanks, then rose to his feet. He was about to lead the way, yet Shunin was already ahead of him, striding out of the room, intent on getting on with business. He didn’t need the Englishman’s permission for dinner, or for anything else, come to that.

As his footsteps echoed from the far side of the door, it was clear to everyone that it wasn’t only the world outside these walls that was changing. A change of pace had overtaken them, too, and a change of direction. Up to that point they’d been sitting back, uncertain, unconvinced, except for D’Arby, but now they were heading off on the front foot, behind Shunin, who was leading them not just off to dinner but all the way to the Forbidden City, if if that were to be necessary. And Harry, for one, didn’t care for this. He didn’t know Shunin, couldn’t trust him, not a Russian. Snow on his boots, ice in his heart. And bloody rude.

The group descended the broad staircase, constructed from ancient oak with huge thistles carved deep into the newel posts. The treads creaked comfortably in greeting as they made their way, and from somewhere down below came the compelling aroma of their dinner, but Harry was distracted. He tugged at D’Arby’s sleeve, holding him back from the others.

‘What’s going on, Mark? I feel as if you’ve been playing with us all.’

For a moment the Prime Minister seemed ready to protest his ignorance, but one glance into Harry’s eyes told him that it would be pointless. He stopped, allowing the others to continue until they were too far away to hear. ‘I see you haven’t figured out the game.’

‘The game?’

‘We’re in a hole, Harry, one that’s too deep for me. The game is to get out of it but there’s no easy or clean way to do that, not on our own. We need these people, need them desperately, but they are the ones who will have to take charge, make it their own. They won’t follow us. It’s been years since we British have been in charge of anything on the international scene, even a game of cricket, so we let them take the lead, while we follow behind.’

‘To where, Mark?’

‘To wherever it takes us.’ The words came very slowly.

‘I’m not sure I understand.’

‘Look, Harry, if they think it’s their game they’ll play it to the hilt, no half-measures, take their fair share of the blame for the consequences. If that means I’ve got to act the chinless Englishman who gets dragged behind the big guys, it’s a small price to pay. By the time this game is finished, I’ve a suspicion we’ll be needing some very big guys to hide behind.’

D’Arby could see the understanding beginning to coalesce in Harry’s eyes. ‘Come on,’ he urged, brightening, ‘we can’t afford to miss Flora’s feast.’ He bounded off down the stairs, trying to catch the others.

Below him, Nipper was striking the gong, demanding his presence for dinner, yet his Prime Minister’s words were still ringing like alarm bells in his ears. ‘
Wherever it takes us
.’ Suddenly Harry discovered he had lost his appetite.

Late Friday evening. Northern Persian Gulf.

The Room of Many Miracles was by no means a unique operation. It was responsible for a vital coordinating function, but the seeds of cyber war were scattered far and wide, in institutions and facilities located in many different theatres. What happened next originated in one of these other locations.

It was a standard watch for those on board the USS
Reuben James
–or, at least, as standard as any watch could be in the controversial waters of this part of the world, where the territorial waters of Iraq bump up against those of Iran. Always a hot spot, made worse by ongoing disputes about boundaries and navigation rights and the wretchedly shallow waters, but those factors weren’t a problem for the
Reuben James
, which had an IBMS (integrated bridge-management system) that formed the frigate’s eyes and brought together all the navigational information pumped out by its radars, the gyro, and the GPS gear. That didn’t mean to say that ships didn’t have to take care, for in this part of the world the coastline was flat, so the radar systems gave off an indistinct picture, which meant that all the more reliance was placed on
the GPS. Still, that gave the ship’s position to within a metre, so there couldn’t be a problem–and you didn’t want a problem in these waters, not with Iranian gunboats buzzing around like horse flies.

The
Reuben James
had a crew of more than two hundred officers and men and was four hundred and fifty feet in length–not the biggest US vessel, but it packed a ferocious punch with its missiles, 76mm cannon, helicopters, torpedoes and other armaments. A proud example of American naval might. Until it gave a sudden lurch which threw many of those on board off their feet and even sent the officer of the deck sprawling on the bridge, chipping a tooth. By the time he regained his feet, the ship had come to a halt and was beginning to list. The USS
Reuben James
had run aground. Alarms began to beep, ring and wail, hornets swarming around his head. The officer gazed in horror at the IBMS display, trying to see what could have gone wrong, for it showed the nearest sandbank more than two miles away. He felt sick, this was the end of his career, but he was a professional, he knew the drill. He turned to the boatswain’s mate, but had to spit into his hand before he could find his voice. ‘Boatswain,’–the voice dried, he hawked again–‘sound general quarters.’

Immediately another alarm began to penetrate throughout the ship.

Mechanically, his hand reached for the intercom. ‘All hands man your battle stations! This is not a drill. I repeat: this is not a drill!’

And not a dream.

He was about to summon the captain to the bridge when the door burst open and his commanding officer was there, face flushed with horror. ‘This could not happen.
Not happen!
’ he shouted.

The officer of the deck found himself unable to do anything but point feebly at the displays. The computers of the IBMS still showed the ship clearly in the main channel, miles from any trouble, not stuck on a sandbank that was inside waters belonging to the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Dinner, Friday. Castle Lorne.

The dining hall had been impressive at lunch but now, set for dinner, it was magnificent. As the light of the day began to fade, its theme was taken up by candles that flickered from the walls, picking out every stone and granite muscle. The oils in their gilded frames appeared like windows into an earlier, more heroic world, one that was inhabited by derring-do clansmen and wild-eyed stags. The hall was large but its atmosphere was intimate and its table brimming with surprise. Flora and Nipper served the fare, all of it fresh and none that had come far. Succulent scallops, shrimp, white crab and prawns nearly as large as the lobsters. A little mayonnaise, a pot of melted butter and a fresh, uncomplicated wine from somewhere along the Loire, although Shunin chose to stick with the whisky. The atmosphere was intense, almost timeless, and the silver sparkled in the candlelight, just as it would have done three hundred years before when Scotland had its own kings.

‘I’ll be leaving you all to your dinner, then,’ Flora said when she had made one final check that all their requirements were satisfied. ‘I’ll be sending Nipper up from time to time to see to your wants, while I’m away to the kitchen to take care of your venison.’

For a little while after she left they engaged in small talk, but Shunin was desperately poor at the game and none of their hearts were in it. The seafood was delicious, but D’Arby could only toy with it. Soon he was cleaning his hands in a finger bowl, wiping them with elaborate, almost over-zealous care before bringing the others back to their point. ‘So, Mr President,’ he said, turning to the Russian, ‘you suggested we talk to Mao.’

‘Did I?’

‘Send him a message. That’s what you said.’

‘One he can’t ignore,’ Shunin muttered, biting messily into the soft flesh of a lobster.

‘What did you have in mind?’ Blythe Edwards asked.

‘One with a clear point, Madam President. Preferably driven home with an ice pick.’

‘You mean an ultimatum?’ Washington asked, examining a prawn. He hadn’t bothered with the lobster; it seemed too messy, and too much like hard work.

Wearily, Shunin raised his eyes from his plate. ‘And give him the chance to tell us how we can dance our way to Hell? What would be the point?’

‘We must try to reason with him,’ Blythe insisted.

‘But Mao is not a reasonable man.’ Shunin sucked
his fingers before wiping them on his napkin. ‘You want a solution? Then you must get rid of him.’

‘Get rid…? But even if we could, what sort of message would that be?’

‘A most effective one,’ Shunin said.

She shook her head, not in contradiction but in confusion. ‘I’m not sure I can accept that. There are rules, laws. We mustn’t forget the hand of history is on our shoulders.’

‘Nor must we forget that Mao’s hand is at our throats,’ Shunin added drily.

‘So what are you suggesting, Papasha?’ Konev asked.

‘I repeat,’ Shunin replied, in a manner that suggested he wasn’t used to repeating himself, ‘there is only one way to persuade Mao, and that’s to get rid of him.’ He picked at a sliver of lobster flesh he had found attached to his thumb. ‘Permanently.’

Suddenly D’Arby, who had been uncharacteristically quiet, began to splutter in disbelief. ‘Assassination? That’s comic-book stuff, Mr President. That sort of thing just doesn’t happen, not in civilized countries.’

‘Depends on your definition of civilized,’ Washington interjected. ‘The Chinese claim thousands of years of civilization, and every one of them has been marked by butchery.’

Much like the Russians, Harry thought, although they couldn’t claim their version of civilization went back anything like so far. And what had the British and Americans between them achieved in Iraq, apart from
leaving the Iraqi leader dangling crook-necked on the end of a rope? Sometimes the definition of civilization seemed to have indistinct and very grubby edges.

‘Prime Minister,’ Shunin said, ‘you have brought me to this place, and to this point. I didn’t seek it, but you insisted. You can’t now pretend to be elsewhere.’

‘But you’re talking…butchery,’ D’Arby protested.

‘Not butchery,’ Washington corrected, joining in. ‘A little judicious carving.
Let’s carve him as a dish fit for the gods
. Shakespeare. He was British, I seem to remember.’

‘We need more than an ancient cliché to justify what you’re suggesting,’ D’Arby bit back, rustling in discontent, yet Harry had the suspicion that this was all part of D’Arby’s game, egging the arrogant American on. Now the Prime Minister was looking at Blythe, wanting to test her opinion. Harry sensed from her frown that she was still undecided.

‘Where’s the law in all this?’ she asked softly.

‘The law?’ Shunin shrugged. ‘The law of survival. What more is needed?’

‘But assassination. Deliberate assassination,’ she continued. ‘That can never be a legitimate weapon.’

The Russian’s dark eyes danced in mockery. ‘Forgive me, Madam President, but how many times did you Americans try to kill Castro? And wasn’t it you who sent bombers after Gaddafi? There was Saddam, of course. And Diem in South Vietnam, butchered in the back of a van, even though he was your ally. Not to mention Allende and all those Africans.’

All before her time, of course, but it would have been a feeble excuse to offer. She didn’t bother, settling back in silence.

‘Think about it as a pre-emptive strike. A judicial assassination,’ Konev suggested. ‘One blow and we can wash our hands of the swine.’

‘You’ll never be able to do that.’ It was a new voice. Harry’s. They all looked at him in some surprise.

‘Ah, Mr Jones. I’m glad you could join us,’ Shunin said. ‘And what is it, precisely, we will not be able to do?’

‘Wash your hands and be clean.’

‘You are something of an expert in this field?’

Harry used no words; his stare said it all.

He had killed, of course, that was part of Harry’s job, as a soldier. And not always from an anonymous distance. Sometimes you had to look the poor heathen in the eyes. Like Michael Burnside. Yes, he’d even known the poor bastard’s name.

That time in Northern Ireland, the time of the great flap. Late 80s. The dirty war at its height. His commanding officer told him the story. Burnside was a civvy clerk at headquarters, loyal, likeable, trusted, the man who inputted all the most sensitive security data into the computer system–data like the names and backgrounds of every single one of the informers on their list. And something had turned the data clerk–they didn’t find out until later that he’d discovered a
British soldier screwing his wife, and those Northern Irish Prods weren’t the forgiving type. Burnside couldn’t forgive, and neither could he forget. It tortured him, and he had wanted to fight back, to hurt them as much as he had been hurt. So he had agreed to switch sides, provide the IRA with the details of everyone on that security list–not make a copy, nothing that anyone could find in his pocket and lock him up for, but stored in his mind. He was a man who enjoyed memory games, so he had sat patiently and memorized the entire list, every single man, woman and teenage snitch the British had. A hundred lives, all about to be lost because of one undersexed misfit.

In telling him all this, Harry’s commanding officer knew what he was asking him to do. Not that he said so in as many words, everything was deeply deniable, but the British army was in a hole and Harry was just the sort of man who might dig them out.

Mavericks make up their own mind, and sometimes they make their own law, too. For Harry it wasn’t so much a matter of right against wrong, because he had enough understanding of what the British had been up to in Northern Ireland to know they had no exclusive claim on virtue. But he knew just how many names were on that list, how many families were wrapped up in it, how many lives would be destroyed if the list was exposed. So many lives, matched against one.

He went to the address of the clerk, a terraced house in the Shankill area of west Belfast. Harry knew the
wife had left and there were no children. That made it easier. He followed Burnside across a patch of waste ground to the pub, where he watched the man, sitting alone, morose, no eye contact with others, ignoring their casual greetings, trying to disappear beneath the varnish of his booth before finishing his drink and rising to make his solitary way home once more. A pathetic figure, the sort of guy Harry imagined was never happier than when filling his evenings with a pub quiz, using that blotting-paper mind of his to show others that he wasn’t just as wimp. And yet this no one was someone, someone who had a right to his life, as dull as it might be. And yet, and yet others had a right to their lives, too, and, in Northern Ireland, life and death was sometimes a zero-sum game.

Harry intercepted him on the waste ground. Burnside stopped as soon as he saw Harry on the path ahead.

‘Hello, Michael,’ Harry said.

‘What do you want?’ Burnside demanded, but Harry was close enough to see that in his eyes he already knew. There was no room for untidy ends, not on the Shankill.

‘I’m sorry, Michael.’

And Harry shot him twice. Head shots. No suffering.

It had seemed the right thing to do, even the righteous thing to do, to save so many. Yet it had cost Harry a part of his soul.

And now D’Arby and the rest were staring at him in the candlelight.

‘You do this,’ Harry said softly, ‘and you will wake up feeling a little dirty, every day. You’ll spend the rest of your life trying to wash it off your hands, Mr Konev, but no matter how hard you scrub, you won’t succeed.’

‘Are you suggesting it would be wrong?’ Shunin asked.

There was a silence, interrupted only by the sputtering of a candle.

‘It’s not my decision to take, Mr President.’

The twist of contempt had barely begun to flare in the Russian’s eye before Harry extinguished it.

‘But I’ll not use that as a reason to duck your question. If getting rid of Mao could save my country, I’d do it myself.’

‘Ah, a patriot,’ Shunin observed quietly.

‘A soldier, Mr President. I was once a soldier. It was as a soldier that I met my first Russian.’

‘Where?’

‘Afghanistan.’

They were like two medieval knights sizing each other up, and for the first time Shunin allowed himself to show a little emotion. No one came back from Afghanistan without having first struggled to the other side of Hell. He offered a slight nod of the head. Harry took it as a warning that Shunin would never again underestimate him.

‘Now, perhaps, I understand why your Prime Minister brought you, Mr Jones.’ He moved the tips of his fingers together. ‘Did he live, your Russian?’

‘He was alive when I left him.’

‘Then may his good fortune follow us all.’

‘With the exception of Mao,’ D’Arby added, taking his cue to bring an end to their personal joust.

‘In any event, I don’t think we need to worry too much about getting our hands dirty, do we?’ Shunin growled. ‘It seems that Mao has a substantial lead on us in that department.’

The Russian had the moment, and he used it. ‘So, Madam President, Mr Prime Minister–the proposal is that we rid ourselves of this menace.’ He left the thought to hover between them. ‘Does either of you disagree?’

No one moved. Even the candles froze.

‘Do you believe there can be any other solution?’ he added quietly.

Silence.

Then Blythe began slowly shaking her head, she hadn’t yet caught up with the rest of them. It was Washington who, in his own idiosyncratic style, came to his President’s rescue.

‘Pointless,’ the American said drily. ‘Even if you could find a means of getting to him, it would be a waste of time.’

‘What on earth are you talking about?’ D’Arby snapped, not bothering to disguise his irritation.

‘Oh, I have no ethical problem with the elimination of Mao, not at all,’ he responded, pronouncing the name as if the Chinese leader were salad dressing.
‘Justice requires he come to a sticky end. But let’s think it through. The problem with China isn’t one man, it’s the entire system. We get rid of Mao, but nothing will change. The system will go marching on, millions and millions of little yellow worker ants ready to take over the world. Take just one of them out? Totally pointless.’

It was as though a hand grenade had been tossed into the room and was slowly rolling across the table. They sat transfixed by his words.

‘What are you implying, Marcus?’ Blythe demanded softly.

‘We go the whole hog.’

‘Are you being deliberately contrary?’ D’Arby snapped.

Washington’s expression glowed with contempt.

It was Nipper who broke the moment, bouncing into the room, his arrival announcing that Flora was on her way and their dinner was ready to change course. Blythe looked at her plate; it had scarcely been touched and she had no appetite. She put her napkin to one side. ‘If you don’t mind,’ she said, ‘I’ll pass on the rest of dinner. I’d like to reflect on things for a while. We can pick the discussion up in the morning.’

D’Arby sprang to his feet, helping draw back her chair, and the others rose in their places. Shunin was last, his movements as always considered, almost defiant. From the doorway Flora set her jaw in discontent as she saw her carefully planned meal being cast into
disarray. As Blythe departed, Shunin helped himself to another drink, Konev sat silent, his face taut and grim, while Washington leaned against the mantle, staring into the hearth and quarrelling with the ashes.

When Harry looked at D’Arby, he expected to find the expression of a man who had been pushed too far. Instead he thought he saw the flicker of a smile. This was still his game. And in that instant, Harry knew he could no longer trust him.

The early hours of Saturday morning. Shanjing.

‘We must stop,’ Li Changchun announced, his voice frail with fatigue.

‘Never!’ Fu insisted.

‘Minister, we must rest.’

‘But we have almost finished.’

‘Almost finished, yes. So now it becomes even more important that the task be completed accurately, not by those who are so exhausted that they cannot tell the difference between computer code and a child’s puzzle.’