The man was shop-watching again. Come along, little fish.The man was acting just like a trout. He made several passes and went away and came back but always very carefully and without attracting attention. At last he went into the open-faced restaurant and sat down and ordered a beer. Armstrong sighed again, happy now.It seemed to take the man an interminable time before he, too, got up, asked where the toilet was, walked through the few diners and went under the bead curtain. In time he reappeared and went for his table. At once the four coolie diners fell on him from behind, pinioning his arms and holding him helpless, while another strapped a stiff high collar around his neck. Other diners, real customers, and not undercover SI police, gaped, one dropped his chopsticks, a couple fled and the others froze.Armstrong got up from his stool leisurely and walked over. He saw the tough-looking Chinese behind the counter take off his apron. "Shut up, you bastard," the fellow said in Russian to the man who cursed and struggled impotently. "Evening, Superintendent," he added to Armstrong with a sly grin. His name was Malcolm Sun, he was a senior agent, SI, and ranking Chinese on this 16/2. It was he who had organized the intercept and had paid off the cook who usually worked this shift and had taken his place."Evening, Malcolm. You did very well." Armstrong turned his attention to the enemy agent. "What's your name?" he asked pleasantly."Who you? Let me go… let go!" the man said in heavily accented English."All yours, Malcolm," Armstrong said.At once, Sun said in Russian, "Listen you mother-eater, we know you're off the Ivanov, we know you're a courier and you've just picked up a drop from the American off the nuclear carrier. We've already got the bastard in custody and you'd bet—""Lies! You've made a mistake," the man blustered in Russian. "1 know nothing of any American. Let me go!""What's your name?""You've made a mistake. Let me go!" A crowd of gaping, gawking onlookers was now surrounding the store.Malcolm Sun turned to Armstrong. "He's a ripe one, sir. Doesn't understand very good Russian. I'm afraid we'll have to take him in," he said with a twisted smile."Sergeant, get the Black Maria.""Yes sir." Another agent went off quickly as Armstrong went closer. The Russian was gray-haired, a squat man with small, angry eyes. He was held perfectly with no chance of escape and no chance to put a hand into a pocket or into his mouth to destroy evidence, or himself.Armstrong searched him expertly. No manual or roll of film. "Where did you put it?" he asked."I no understand!"The man's hatred did not bother Armstrong. He bore him no malice, the man was just a target who had been trapped. I wonder who shopped this poor bugger who's frightened to death, rightly, who's now ruined with the KGB and with his own people forever and might as well be a dead man. I wonder why it's our coup and not old Rosemont's and his CIA boys? How is it we're the ones who knew about the drop and not the Yanks? How is it Crosse got to know about this? All Crosse had told him was the where and the how and that the drop was going to be made by a sailor from the carrier and intercepted by someone off the Ivanov."You're in charge, Robert, and please, don't make a balls up.""I won't. But please get someone else for Brian K—""For the last time, Robert, you're doing the Kwok interrogation and you're seconded to SI until I release you. And if you bitch once more I'll have you out of the force, out of Hong Kong, out of your pension and I hardly need remind you Si's reach is very long. I doubt if you'd work again, unless you go criminal, and then God help you. Is that finally clear?""Yes sir.""Good. Brian will be ready for you at six tomorrow morning."Armstrong shivered. How impossibly lucky we were to catch him! If Spectacles Wu hadn't come from Ning-tok—-if the old amah hadn't talked to the Werewolf—if the run on the bank—Christ, so many ifs. But then that's how you catch a fish, a big fish. Pure, bloody, unadulterated luck most times. Jesus Christ, Brian Kwok! You poor bugger!He shivered again."You all right, sir?" Malcolm Sun asked."Yes." Armstrong looked back at the Russian. "Where did you put the film, the roll of film?"The man stared back at him defiantly. "Don't understand!"Armstrong sighed. "You do, too well." The big black van came through the gawking crowd and stopped. More Sis got out. "Put him in and don't let go of him," Armstrong said to those holding him. The crowd watched and chattered and jeered as the man was frog-marched into the van. Armstrong and Sun got in after him and closed the door."Off you go, driver," Armstrong ordered."Yes sir." The driver let in his clutch easing through the crowds and joined the snarled traffic heading for Central HQ."All right, Malcolm. You can begin."The Chinese agent took out a razor-sharp knife. The Soviet man blanched."What's your name?" Armstrong asked, sitting on a bench opposite him.Malcolm Sun repeated the question in Russian."D . . . Dimitri Metkin," the man muttered, still held viselike by the four men and unable to move a finger or a toe. "Seaman, first class.""Liar," Armstrong said easily. "Go ahead, Malcolm."Malcolm Sun put the knife under the man's left eye and the man almost fainted. "That comes later, spy," Sun said in Russian with a chilling smile. Expertly, with a deliberate malevolent viciousness, Sun rapidly sliced the raincoat away. Armstrong searched it very carefully as Sun used the knife deftly to cut away the man's seaman's jersey and the rest of his clothes until he was naked. The knife had not cut or even nicked him once. A careful search and re-search revealed nothing. Nor his shoes, the heels or the soles."Unless it's a microdot transfer and we've missed it so far, it must be in him," Armstrong said.At once the men holding the Russian bent him over and Sun got out the surgical gloves and surgical salve and probed deeply. The man flinched and moaned and tears of pain seeped from his eyes."Dew neh loh moh," Sun said happily. His fingers drew out a small tube of cellophane wrapping."Don't let go of him!" Armstrong rapped.When he was sure the man was secure he peered at the cylindrical package. Inside he could see the double-ended circles of a film cartridge. "Looks like a Minolta," he said absently.Using some tissues he wrapped the cellophane carefully and sat down opposite the man again. "Mr. Metkin, you're charged under the Official Secrets Act for taking part in an espionage act against Her Majesty's Government and her allies. Anything you say will be taken down and used in evidence against you. Now, sir," he continued gently, "you're caught. We're all Special Intelligence and not subject to normal laws, any more than your own KGB is. We don't want to hurt you but we can hold you forever if we want, in solitary if we want. We would like a little cooperation. Just the answers to a few questions. If you refuse we will extract the information we require. We use a lot of your KGB techniques and we can, sometimes, go a little better." He saw a flash of terror behind the man's eyes but something told him this man would be hard to crack."What's your real name? Your official KGB name?"The man stared at him."What's your KGB rank?"The man still stared.Armstrong sighed. "I can let my Chinese friends have at you, old chum, if you prefer. They really don't like you at all. Your Soviet armies ran all over Malcolm Sun's village in Manchuria and wiped it out and his family. Sorry, but I really must have your official KGB name, your rank on the Sovetsky Ivanov and official position."Another hostile silence.