The Ghost Shift (22 page)

“And if they do, you send in the tanks.”

The man snaps at him. “China is still finding its way. It is changing, but the Party cannot risk chaos.”

“How will the Party deal with this?”

“That is not your affair. It will be handled.”

“What about these two?”

“There are facilities to care for them.”

Lockhart laughs bitterly. The man is quite convincing in his way, but he knows what his country’s orphanages are like. Kids there can scream for food or attention and not be helped for days, like the twins
across the courtyard. They will lie in their own dirt, two abandoned girls.

“You’ll put them in a Social Welfare Institute? You might as well throw them in the garbage.”

“You know about it, do you?”

“I’ve done some research.”

The man smiles. “Ah, your wife. She made inquiries, I believe. Why would a child receive better care from the wife of a CIA spy who bribes and corrupts and is a party to bloodshed, than from the Chinese people?”

Lockhart has heard enough from this self-righteous apparatchik who cares nothing for love and humanity, only for the rule of the Party, at whatever cost in lives. Margot would have made a better mother than anyone he can think of, if nature hadn’t denied her.

“Because she’d love her, not treat her as propaganda.”

“They will have a better life here than they would in America,” the man says, stepping on his cigarette.

The baby has worn herself out and is drifting off to sleep in her cot, by her sister. Lockhart looks at the pair, abandoned in a hutong in Beijing, in a country in turmoil, with their mother dead.

“You want to bet?”

Lockhart drove south on Interstate 280, taking the curves south through the hills toward San Jose. He usually felt at peace on this road, savoring the journey to Silicon Valley with the window down and the sun shining, free of the San Francisco fog. Today, he was weary and despairing.

He’d killed Lizzie, or he’d let her die. In his mind, it made no difference. It had been his role to protect her, and he had utterly failed. The truth was, he’d admired what she had wanted to do. He’d made a halfhearted effort to dissuade her, but they had both known his heart wasn’t in it. She’d told him he would have done the same in her place and he’d thought:
You are my daughter.
He had worried about her, but deep down, he’d thought of her like himself—that she was charmed.

He had won her in a bet and lost her recklessly.
Don’t be so cocky. Luck won’t always be on your side
, Sedgwick had warned him years ago, but he’d laughed about it afterward. His talent was to make things work, even if there were bumps along the way. That was why they put him in the field, no matter how much they frowned on him. No one was better at improvising when the book didn’t say what to do next. It had worked for him all his life, in Beijing, Kenya, Vietnam.

He’d thought she was the same.

All this time later, he didn’t know which one Lizzie had been—the one who had slept or the one who had been crying. When Lang had grasped what Lockhart meant, he’d shaken his head, disgusted at the idea. But it was hard to dismiss. They had been alone, beyond the reach of the law. Lang’s task was to cover up the crime, and this was
as good a way as any. Lockhart had struck him where he was most vulnerable—his pride. They would be sent to an orphanage as far away from Beijing as possible, down in the south, Lang said. Your wife will receive a call.

For years, Lockhart did not doubt that he’d won his bet, even if he had nobody to tell. Lizzie had had the best life a child could want. She’d won the lottery of life, from a Chinese orphanage to a U.S. suburb. He had sometimes wondered what had happened to her twin, feeling a twinge of guilt that she lacked the opportunities Lizzie had. But that had been the deal and, as China grew and became wealthier, he stopped worrying. Lizzie knew a girl at school who’d been adopted from Guangxi, and Lockhart heard that things were getting better there.

Now he’d lost everything. His life no longer felt like a series of lucky events, but stations on the way to an inevitable tragedy. The affair was over, and he would never go back.

He looped slowly through the Los Altos Hills, descending on the far side toward San Jose. At Sunnyvale, he left the freeway and navigated a maze of roads, lined with red-roofed houses, each standing on a plot like a Monopoly piece. The sun was high in the sky, behind a streak of cloud. As he crossed an empty highway, the Poppy campus stretched out before him. The image stamped on millions of phones stood by one corner of the road—a gold-leafed statue of a poppy flower.

He knew the story. Henry Martin had been a brilliant, rebellious kid who’d abandoned Stanford in his junior year to take off around the world. In India, studying Hinduism, he’d met a guru who achieved a higher state of consciousness by smoking opium. Martin had become a disciple and, when he returned to Palo Alto, had named his startup after the poppy seed. That was the legend. Officially, Poppy’s name referenced the golden Californian poppy, a far more innocuous flower.

He was greeted at the gate by the first of the eager black-uniformed helpers who swarmed the campus, doubling as assistants and concierges. The young man gave him a pass for Building Seven, halfway around the circle on which the low offices were set, and waved him on
his way. Others appeared inside the entrance to guide him up the walnut stairs to Martin’s office, where an assistant fetched chilled water. He was on a mezzanine with glass panels looking out over rows of employees sitting at screens, busy designing software for the next product launch.

“Tom!”

Lockhart jumped. Martin was striding toward him, waving. Another assistant walked by him, trying to draw his attention to a piece of paper. Martin took it from her and ripped it in half.

“I hate this stuff, I’ve told you that.” Then his face turned solemn as he approached. “Tom. I’m so sorry for your loss. Let’s talk, man.”

Poppy’s founder was six feet four and two hundred pounds, with collar-length graying hair. Everyone else was draped in black, but he wore a gingham suit and vest with a pink tie, like a giant toddler. He put an arm around Lockhart as he led him into an office, then pulled two leather Mies van der Rohe chairs to face each other. Martin squeezed himself into one and sat with his head in his hands, his fingers laced through his hair.

“Tom, I can’t even imagine. I’m so sorry, man. I feel terrible. Can I help in any way?”

Lockhart felt like Mr. Wu, being offered a payoff by Martin to keep his mouth shut about his lost daughter.

“Thank you, Henry, but no.”

“Listen, Tom.” Martin stared at him earnestly. “When this is over, you have to set aside time for yourself. I don’t know if you’re a man of faith, but find someone to talk to. You need closure.”

“Thanks for the advice.” Lockhart ached to leave. He could not bear to listen to Martin’s attempt at therapy. “I came to say goodbye, Henry. You’ll understand that I can’t do any more for you.”

Martin looked puzzled. “But you have to. Don’t you see? You can’t walk away now; you have to carry on. She’d want you to.”

Lockhart stood, his temper flaring. “You have no idea what Lizzie would want. You didn’t know her.”

Martin heaved out of his chair and put a hand on Lockhart’s shoulder, restraining him. “There’s something you don’t know, Tom. We’ve found a new one. Come on, I’ll show you.”

On the other side of the engineering floor, Martin waved a hand at a panel and the door slid back, revealing a room. “Neat, huh? Here, look,” he said, holding up his watch.

“There’s a chip inside. It saves having to keep an identity card clipped to you. The world’s moving toward wearables. It’s going to be a great business.” He looked carefree as he talked, as if he’d already forgotten Lizzie.

The room was flooded with light from floor-to-ceiling windows. Five designers sat at a trestle table, working silently at laptops. White objects were being extruded from a row of 3D printers along one wall. Martin opened a panel and pulled out a tablet. It was silver, with the poppy emblem in gold—the latest model.

“Time for a break, gentlemen,” Martin said. The designers rose silently as one and filed out.

When they had gone, Martin put the tablet on the table and walked around it, his face reddening. He picked up an object from a 3D printer and flung in on the floor, then kicked it across the floor, as if reacting to a silent provocation. His mood had changed again, like the weather.

“This is so
fucking
unfair. We’re being killed, Tom. There’s a piece in the
Times
every day about how badly we treat the workers, and they’re not ours. We can’t even get inside to find out what’s going on. We send you, and look what happens.”

Lockhart squeezed one hand into a fist to keep himself under control. He badly wanted to leave. “You’re quite safe, Henry.”

Martin’s shoulders drooped. “Hell, I’m sorry. Forget what I said, will you? I’m sick and tired of it. I feel for all those kids, not just her. You’re the only person who can stop it.”

“I can give you other names. It’s over for me.”

Martin shook his head and slid the silver tablet across the table at him. “I told you. You can’t go.”

Lockhart lifted the tablet and pressed the start button. The black screen lit up in silver and white and a Poppy shimmered in the middle as the software loaded. “It’s like the others?” he asked.

“One difference. You’ll see.”

He watched as the poppy dissolved and a set of icons filled the
screen, each with a title. Instead of the Mandarin characters he’d expected, they were in English. He tapped an application and the dome of the Capitol appeared. It was the Yahoo weather app for Washington, D.C.

“Whose is this?”

“It was ordered by a young woman for her boyfriend’s birthday. She thought it would be a nice present, so she bought one online. She was right. It’s the most amazing device. This came off the line at Long Tan, got loaded on a ship at Shenzhen, across the Pacific into Los Angeles. FedEx to Indianapolis, then BWI. Loaded on a truck to Washington and a van to Dupont Circle. He was delighted, until a guy from Langley came to the door.”

“How did he know?”

“We told him. He’s an old friend of yours, says he’s looking forward to seeing you. I couldn’t let you go, even if I wanted to.”

“Who was the birthday boy?”

“Works in the West Wing, with the National Security Adviser. He was intending to take his present to work. This isn’t only our problem anymore, Tom. It’s out of my hands.”

Mei left the Metro at Friendship Heights and walked up Western Avenue. Drifting clouds sheltered the sun, and the breeze was cool on her face. She’d used Yao’s illicit dollars for a flight from Hong Kong to Washington, changing in Chicago, and booked a cheap hotel off Connecticut Avenue. Now, for the first time in days, the muscle ache in her shoulders had eased. For the moment, she’d escaped the humidity and terror of Guangdong.

This was how freedom felt.

She’d never been to the United States, although it was common among her university friends. The older generation were lost in wonder at how easily people of her age traveled. One graduate of Sun Yat-sen had gone to study at Georgetown, others to Yale and Stanford. Their wealthy parents had paid the fees without blinking—nothing was too much for one child. But Mei had fought so hard to get what she wanted that she would not do anything to risk it. Let others travel the world and return to jobs that had been saved for them. She didn’t have that luxury.

Walking off at Reagan National, she’d been met by nothing but an anonymous terminal with a few outlets—Starbucks, Hudson News. The other passengers had hurried past to get through immigration quickly, but she had lingered on the walkway, preparing herself for examination. Lizzie’s passport put her in the fast line with the U.S. citizens, leaving the Chinese to wait. The immigration officer, a Latino with a shining pin on his uniform, scanned the passport quickly.