The Mandarin Code (18 page)

Canberra

Tears streamed down Catriona Bailey's pallid face as she looked at the empty plastic cup resting in her trembling hand. It had taken all of her formidable willpower to lift it to her mouth and drink.

It was a liberation. After twenty months on life support Bailey had been unshackled: from the ventilator that kept her lungs pumping; the catheters that drove her circulatory system; and the oxygen that flowed through the tracheotomy in her throat.

She was propped upright in her hospital bed, drinking alone and unassisted. That simple act had been a daydream just a few weeks ago. She put down her cup and slowly practised flexing and unflexing her fingers.

The slightest of movements made her feel powerful, alive.

Bailey recalled the moment she had awoken in hospital after her stroke. It was so horrifying she'd thought she was having a nightmare. She could hear the doctors, nurses and visitors come and go from her room, could feel the weight of her body on the bed, the sheets that covered her and the tubes that cut into her. But she could not move, see or speak.

When I realised it wasn't a dream I thought I would go mad.

She'd heard the whispered conversations, the doctors who'd measured her life in days and discussed harvesting her organs. And the sound of that hated voice. Martin Toohey. Visiting with a posse of his gormless ministers.

She would never forget the poisonous words he'd uttered when they were alone – ‘You selfish bitch.'

That's when she'd decided to fight. To recover. To rise and destroy him. The thought of revenge had given her the will to live.

The first miracle had occurred only days after that encounter when the Melbourne specialist had removed the gauze from her eyes and realised that she could see and was alert. The simple act of being able to blink her eyes meant Bailey could communicate.

The second miracle was the technology that could turn her eye movements into words on a computer screen and transmit them around the world. That meant she could work and continue her love affair with the public.

My people.

Bailey had lived out every moment of her life in public. She maintained an almost continuous Twitter stream. But only the very observant among her two million followers would have noted that recently she had stopped talking about every minute change in her condition.

And as her health rapidly improved, she'd restricted visiting access to just her chief of staff.

When I return no one will see me coming.

‘Eight thousand fucking words!' Brendan Ryan shook his head as he scrolled through line after line of the pedestrian prose that marched off the
Guardian'
s online features page. The typically pseudo-intellectual babble carried the byline ‘Catriona Bailey' and the headline:
TOOHEY CAN BRING PEACE IN THE PACIFIC
.

It began, as articles by Bailey almost always did, by quoting herself. ‘In 2008 I coined the term “the age of non-polarity” to describe a world dominated not by one or two states but by dozens of actors'.

It then rambled on through bloated sentences of tortured syntax, each stuffed with academic and Biblical references, historical analogies and a dozen more verbal selfies before it got to the point.

We live in a dangerous time where the two largest actors on the world stage are locked in a rapidly escalating battle over who will build the international frameworks of the twenty-first century, frameworks that will replace the settlements struck and maintained by the United States after the Second World War. Both China and the United States are wrestling for the pen with which to write those settlements. I fear they might see the sword as being mightier.

Another thousand mind-numbing words on, Bailey stirred Australia into her witch's brew of an argument.

Australia can use its privileged place as one of the United States' oldest allies and China's most reliable energy supplier to broker peace between the behemoths of the world stage by leveraging its role as a creative middle power.

Then came the
coup de grâce
, the point Bailey knew would run in the news and cause maximum grief.

On my advice, Prime Minister Martin Toohey has been masterful in ensuring Australia does not get trapped into taking sides in the East China Sea islands dispute. But he can, and must, take a larger role. He must use our middle power status to immediately engage in shuttle diplomacy between the major powers to bring about an enduring peace and an agreed international framework in the Pacific. Or a ‘Pax Pacifica', as I like to call it.

As a political professional Ryan had a grudging admiration for Bailey. She was an evil genius. She knew her ‘shuttle diplomacy' line would be parroted by the media the next time Martin Toohey stuck his head up for a press conference. Like all of Bailey's advice it sounded reasonable but it was designed to put Toohey in an impossible position. If he demurred he would be portrayed as missing an opportunity for peace. But if he was mad enough to agree it meant he would be out of the country for weeks on end during an election year. And that would cruel the minute chance he had of winning the poll.

Who am I kidding, he might as well go. Jesus Christ couldn't raise this party from the dead.

Ryan had orchestrated the coup that snatched the prime minister's mantle from Bailey and he was still proud of it as a clinically brilliant political assassination. But he had been very disappointed in Toohey. He was a decent man but the public saw him as a devious back-stabber. Far worse in Ryan's eyes was that Toohey liked grand, expensive, centralised social planning. That cost money the Treasury didn't have and so he racked up debt and cut deeply into other areas, particularly Defence.

Ryan had plotted to bring down the former Defence Minister and left-wing fool, Bruce Paxton, in an effort to try to stop cuts that he believed were a threat to national security. But it had been futile. The Prime Minister was determined to bribe his way back to power and Defence was simply a cash cow to be milked.

Maybe losing the election was the best thing that could happen? What Ryan didn't want was to lose so badly that political recovery would take a generation.

He scrabbled in his desk drawer for a bar of chocolate as he tried to conjure a plan that would keep his party viable.

I'd back anyone against Toohey now as long as they could save some furniture.

‘Minister?' His personal assistant was at the door.

‘Yup.'

‘The Prime Minister's chief of staff is here.'

The familiar stocky frame of George Papadakis ambled into the office and sat down with a thud. As usual he was carrying the weight of the nation.

‘Do you have any Scotch?' Papadakis asked theatrically.

‘George, it's barely lunchtime.'

‘Heroin then. I've just come from a meeting with the Chinese Ambassador and can't face any more green tea. And I need something to dull the pain of trying to keep this shambles of a show on the road.'

Ryan liked Papadakis and didn't envy his job but he was disappointed that this member of Labor's Right and old-school Treasury hard-head hadn't managed to rein in his profligate boss.

‘I've got headaches of my own, mate. ERC wants more cash from Defence and we're down to the bone. As I've said many, many times I'm now concerned that we are compromising national security and—'

Papadakis held up his hand.

‘Brendan, I know. I've heard your complaints many times and I have said, many times, that everyone has to take a hit. And you know that the mental health plan is close to the PM's heart and probably our only hope of victory at the election.'

Ryan had known he'd get no joy from Papadakis but simply wanted to underline his growing concerns.

‘So mate, apart from liquor and hard drugs, what's on your mind?'

‘It's your political brain I need. You know how much the PM values your judgement, you're one of his trusted few. These leaks are killing us, Brendan. We expect them from the party, even Cabinet, but we're now being white-anted by someone in the intelligence community. The leak from the NSC is intolerable.'

Ryan rocked back in his chair and swung round to face the window.

‘George, you know as well as I do that leaks are one of the symptoms of a government in decline. Leaks from the administration are as good as a death knock. If we can change our fortunes, then we might get back some semblance of order.'

Papadakis checked his watch and started to rise from his chair.

‘I know. I just needed the walk. And a shoulder to cry on. Thanks Brendan.'

‘Hey, have you seen the
Guardian
feature by Bailey?'

Papadakis slumped back in his seat and groaned.

‘No. What does the Zombie Queen want now?'

‘She says Toohey should engage in shuttle diplomacy to ensure world peace.'

Papadakis was massaging his temples as he got up.

‘Cocaine, that's what I need. I'll go find someone in the NSW Right. One of them's bound to be a dealer.'

Canberra

In the distance, the mountains were a tapestry of green and violet. The Brindabellas were majestic under a sky of startling blue broken by tufts of cotton white skating across the city horizons.

From the top of Red Hill, Bruce Paxton soaked up the capital's western sprawl. Suburban estates straight off the Masterton assembly line were baking in the late afternoon sun, replacing pine plantations bulldozed to make way for Canberra's growing population.

The city was greener than he'd expected after this summer from hell. Arterial roads carried loads of post-school children and harried mums, high-vis tradies and brow-beaten cabbies. But the byways wove in and out of the land's natural contours and suburbs vanished beneath the rising green of trees.

‘Can you believe that a lot of Australians hate this place?' Paxton turned to Weng Meihui, also transfixed by the view.

‘In my city there are few trees and the sky is black with smog,' she said. ‘I love the space and the clarity of the air here.'

They walked the few metres to the bar, thirsty for a drink and conversation.

She is ageless.

Paxton wrapped his right hand around a chilled glass of white and glanced at her face. A nervous smile.

Why has she come back into my life? Now? After all this time?

The MP was cautious. He wanted to play it cool, despite himself. It had all seemed so convenient, that she would arrive. Unannounced, but not unwelcome.

His first instinct had been ‘This means trouble'. But now, as evening fell, the memories came flooding back. Of nights wrapped in her tantalising, impossible embrace. His Chinese temptress.

She teased him with a smile. ‘What are you thinking, Bruce?'

‘Well, don't mock me, but there's a line from a song I just love, by a bloke called Eric Clapton. Bit of a guitar god. Anyway, he sang about a woman looking “wonderful tonight”. And . . .'

She leaned over and gently took his hands.

‘Why don't you fix the bill?'

The key turned and the door to his apartment opened. His flatmates – two Labor comrades from South Australia – were both out and he'd taken the precaution of doing a bit of cleaning up.

‘So, here it is, the castle. Not much, but I like it. And the TA – travel allowance – covers the rent.'

She sensed his apprehension, and gently stroked his arm. ‘Just relax,' she reassured him.

He bent to the CD player and flicked through a messy pile.

Jesus, fucking Nirvana?!

He chose a Michael Bublé compilation instead. Personally he couldn't stand the smug Canadian crooner but women, he was told, loved him. A soft-flow tune played, something about a woman making him feel young.

Now, that's appropriate.

He turned and leaned into her tight body, hungrily meeting her lips, that familiar scent of musk and milk.

‘It's been a—'

‘Shhhh.' She cut him off as her fingers skilfully played with a row of buttons, releasing his shirt and easing it to the floor.

He stood in his singlet, arms crossed self-consciously.

‘And off with that, too.'

Her small and nimble fingers reached firmly beneath the hem of the singlet, and she pulled it up so insistently that he had no choice but to raise his arms above his head.

The cloth covering his eyes, he started with sweet surprise as he felt her soft, warm lips press again upon his own rougher mouth. She kissed him long and lusciously, and he luxuriated in her familiar yet exotic scent. Finally she released him, and he quickly shed his remaining clothes, all body consciousness lost as he urgently drew her to him.

Kissing all the while, he unzipped her high-collared dress and allowed the silken sheath to fall to the floor. They tumbled together onto the bed, hands eager upon one another. Hovering above her, he admired the taut lines of her body, tracing an ardent line from her lips, down between her exquisite breasts and onto the silken small of her stomach.