Just minutes later Tu Van Duc marched down a third-floor hallway, flanked by two of his bodyguards. Perspiration hung on Tu’s face; his head was tilted forward with intensity, and his footsteps matched the urgent look in his eyes.
A middle-aged man sat in a chair at the end of the hall, just outside a closed door. A snub-nosed revolver in a shoulder holster hung under his arm. As soon as he saw Captain Tu, he rose.
“Chao buoi sang.” Good morning.
Tu passed him by with only a distracted nod as he opened the door himself.
On the other side of the door, Chinese dissident Fan Jiang sat at a desk against a wall, his fingers tapping on a computer keyboard in a blur. The room around him had been a small office, but now it was set up like a bedroom in a college dorm. In front of him was a cup of tea and a bag of hard candy. He wore headphones and a white warm-up jacket with blue jeans, and he looked much more like a bored young college student working on a term paper than an escaped dissident on the run from the military and intelligence arms of a world power.
The only other person in the room was a young female interpreter, brought in to help him with translations on the Vietnamese government computer networks. When she saw Tu Van Duc, however, she stood, bowed, and left.
Fan himself bowed, but he did not get up.
Tu said, “I need to talk to you.”
Fan clearly recognized the expression of concern on the man’s face. “You were not happy with the progress I made last night? Those were the latest files from the Interior Ministry. I thought you would like the news that there are no imminent police operations in the works against your businesses in Hue.”
“Your work product has been impressive. There is no problem there.”
“Good,” Fan replied with another subservient bow.
Tu said, “There has been a second attack on the ship that brought you here. Near the same place as before in Hong Kong.”
Fan looked down to his hands. “I see. Is everyone okay?”
“No, they are not. Not at all. The ship was boarded and there was a battle on land, as well. Seven of my employees and all the ship’s crew are dead. Fourteen men! Several Triads are dead, as well.”
Fan spoke softly. A true sadness in his voice. “The attackers… they were from the mainland?”
“We do not know. A Westerner fought against my men at a bar at the same time of the attack, so we are assuming the attackers on the ship were Western, as well.”
Fan slumped over and put his head in his hands. It took him a while to speak. “I don’t know what is happening. I knew the PLA would hunt for me, but I didn’t know they would come into Hong Kong in force. I thought they’d just order the Hong Kong police to look for me.” He raised his head quickly. “This is terrible. I am so sorry.”
Tu stepped over to Fan. “Everyone wants to know what you know. Everyone wants to get their hands on your skills.” He patted the younger man on the back. “You are not safe here. It is no secret to many that this building is where the Wild Tigers operate. We are going to move you to a secret location out of town. The Internet works fine there, but the accommodations won’t be as comfortable as living in the middle of Saigon.”
“I will do whatever you ask. As I told you, I work for you for the next month, and then I will move on.”
Tu Van Duc did not reply. Fan waited for some agreement to what he said, but instead the Vietnamese man turned and left the room without another word.
The interpreter returned and took her seat again next to Fan Jiang.
Fan stared at the screen in front of him. At first he was thinking about the loss of life that he had caused. Soon, however, his mind shifted to a new topic. He tried to figure out how he was going to get to Taiwan, because he was pretty sure the Wild Tigers weren’t going to let him leave Vietnam for a very long time.
Court Gentry had begun his long day in Hong Kong at his overnight hotel in the Central District, waking at eight thirty in the morning after getting less than four hours of sleep. He called Dai as he left the building and walked to a bus stop, and argued with the Chinese colonel while on a bus heading north to his room in Mongkok. Dai’s original plan had been to fly Court along with his own force of men into Vietnam on a private aircraft, but the American refused to travel with the Chinese, citing his need to operate alone to reduce chances for compromise. When Court told Dai he would just have to find his own way into the country, Dai balked, saying he didn’t have time for Court to stow away on a container ship.
He told Court he’d come up with another plan, and to call him back in an hour.
Two hours after their first call, one of Dai’s men met Court on a double-decker bus in Hong Kong’s Wong Tai Sin District, and he passed him a small leather folio. Inside, Court found a Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Residency Identity smart card and an SAR passport to match, along with other ID, plus a thick wad of Vietnamese dong currency with a note telling him the total value was 1,439 U.S. dollars.
The name on the documents was Robert James, which sounded a bit lazy to Court, but the docs looked authentic enough. When Court looked at the picture used for both, however, he felt an icy chill run up his spine.
The photo was five years old, and it was authentic. This was the same picture the CIA had passed around the world in their hunt for him. A hunt now still officially in effect but unofficially suspended.
In the picture he wore wire-framed glasses and a blue blazer over a button-down shirt. He’d needed the shot for some Agency assignment when he’d had to fly commercial, unaware this would be the most recent shot of him available on the day he was burned by CIA and a termination order went out on him.
Court imagined all of the intelligence agencies of the world — from Sweden to Burkina Faso — had this picture, so it was no great surprise to see it in the hands of the Chinese. Still, the concept of using this same photo on a form of identification for an international flight almost made his head explode.
He called Dai angrily, demanding to know why they were setting him up for arrest in Vietnam, but Dai insisted the Vietnamese did not have the picture. Court had no idea for sure, and not a clue how Dai could know this, and he sure didn’t like the tradecraft of walking around with this well-known and long-burned photo.
Still furious, he went himself to a pharmacy in Hong Kong and had his own passport photos shot. He was still the same person as in his official CIA photo, though five years older, but he knew the Vietnamese did not use sophisticated software in their customs process that would identify him, and this would decrease the chance his passport would raise any flags.
Dai’s document people had to redo the papers, and the snafu with the photo added two and a half hours to his delay getting to Vietnam, but he used the time wisely. He picked up luggage and clothing for his cover, along with another remote camera, a new flashlight, and several other electronic gadgets, all of which he left in their original packaging. He then made his own way to Hong Kong International Airport, arriving just after two thirty.
His flight was so smooth that he slept through most of it, and he arrived at Tan Son Nhat International Airport at six thirty p.m. He deplaned with the rest of the passengers and then breezed through customs.
Traveling into Vietnam under dirty docs from the Chinese intelligence services might have been harder for Court if he looked in any way Chinese, but there were tens of thousands of white Westerners who had stayed in Hong Kong and accepted official SAR residency after the British officially relinquished governance, and Vietnam had no reason to believe any of them were working for the Chinese mainland intelligence services. No, they were bankers, businessmen, salesmen, and the like, and Court saw from his papers that he was entering Vietnam under the cover of a small-business services company.