He had spent the afternoon teaching Sun Tzu to his senior officers: the final chapter on the employment of secret agents. It was the section of Sun Tzu's work that most soldiers found unpalatable. On the whole they were creatures of directness, like Tolonen. They viewed such methods as a necessary evil, unavoidable yet somehow beneath their dignity. But they were wrong. Sun Tzu had placed the subject at the end of his thirteen-chapter work with good reason. It was the key to all. As Sun Tzu himself had said, the reason an enlightened prince or a wise general triumphed over their enemies whenever they moved—the reason their achievements surpassed those of ordinary men—was foreknowledge. And as Chia Lin had commented many centuries later, "An army without secret agents is like a man without eyes or ears."
So it was. And the more one knew, the more control one could wield over circumstance.
He smiled. Today had been a good day. Months of hard work had paid off. Things had connected, falling into a new shape—a shape that bode well for the future.
The loss of his agents among the Ping Tiao had been a serious setback, and the men he had bought from among their ranks had proved unsatisfactory in almost every respect. He had had barely a glimpse of what the Ping Tiao hierarchy were up to for almost a week now. Until today, that was, when suddenly two very different pieces of information had come to hand.
The first was simply a code word one of his paid agents had stumbled upon: a single Mandarin character, the indentation of which had been left on a notepad Jan Mach had discarded. A character that looked like a house running on four legs. The character yu, the Han word for fish, the symbol of the Ping Tiao. It had meant nothing at first, but then he had thought to try it as an entry code to some of the secret Ping Tiao computer networks he had discovered weeks before but had failed to penetrate.
At the third attempt he found himself in. Yu was a new recruitment campaign; a rallying call; a word passed from lip to ear; a look, perhaps, between two sympathetic to the cause. DeVore had scrolled through quickly, astonished by what he read. If this were true . . .
But of course it was true. It made sense. Mach was unhappy with what was happening in the Ping Tiao. He felt unclean dealing with the likes of T'angs and renegade Majors. What better reason, then, to start up a new movement? A splinter movement that would, in time, prove greater and more effective than the Ping Tiao. A movement that made no deals, no compromises. That movement was Yu.
Yu. The very word was rich with ambivalence, for yu was phonetically identical with the Han word meaning "abundance." It was the very symbol of wealth, and yet tradition had it that when the fish swam up-river in great numbers it was a harbinger of social unrest. Yu was thus the symbol of civil disorder.
And if the file was to be trusted, Yu was already a force to be reckoned with. Not as powerful yet as the Ping Tiao, nor as rich in its resources, yet significant enough to make him change his plans. He would have to deal with Mach. And soon.
The second item had come from Fischer in Alexandria. The message had been brief—a mere minute and three-quarters of scrambled signal—yet it was potentially enough, in its decoded form, to shake the very foundations of the Seven. He leaned forward and ran the film again.
The first thirty seconds were fairly inconclusive. They showed Wang Sau-leyan with his Chancellor, Hung Mien-lo. As Fischer entered, the T'ang turned slightly, disappearing from camera view as the Captain bowed.
"Are they here?" Wang asked, his face returning to view as Fischer came out of his bow.
"Four of them, Chieh Hsia. They've been searched and scanned, together with their gift."
"Good," the T'ang said, turning away, looking excitedly at his Chancellor. "Then bring them in." "Chieh Hsia. . ."
DeVore touched the pad, pausing at that moment. Wang Sau-leyan was still in full view of Fischer's hidden camera, his well-fleshed face split by a grin that revealed unexpectedly fine teeth. He was a gross character, but interesting. For all his sybaritic tendencies, Wang Sau-leyan was sharp, sharper, perhaps, than any among the Seven, barring the young Prince, Li Shai Tung's son Yuan.
He sat back, studying the two men for a time, unhappy that he had not been privy to their conversations before and after this important meeting. It would have been invaluable to know what it was they really wanted from their association with the Ping Tiao. But Fischers quick thinking had at least given him an insight into their apparent reasons.
He let the film run again, watching as it cut to a later moment when Fischer had interrupted the meeting to tell the T'ang about the fire.
The camera caught the six men squarely in its lens—Wang Sau-leyan to the left; Hung Mien-lo just behind him; Gesell, Mach and their two companions to the right. It was an important moment to capture—one that, if need be, could be used against the T'ang of Africa. But equally important was the moment just before Fischer had knocked and thrown the doors open wide, a moment when Wang's voice had boomed out clearly.
"Then you understand, ch'un tzu, that I cannot provide such backing without some sign of your good intentions. The smell of burning wheat, perhaps, or news of a whole crop ruined through the accidental pollution of a water source. I'm sure I don't have to spell it out for you."
DeVore smiled. No, there was no need for Wang Sau-leyan to say anything more. It was clear what he intended. In exchange for funds he would get the Ping Tiao to do his dirty work—to bum the East European Plantations and create havoc with City Europe's food supplies, thus destabilizing Li Shai Tung's City. But would the Ping Tiao take such a radical action? After all, it was their people who would suffer most from the subsequent food shortages. Would they dare risk alienating public opinion so soon after they had regained it?
He knew the answer. They would. Because Mach was quite prepared to see the Ping Tiao discredited. He would be happy to see the Yu step into the gap left by the demise of the Ping Tiao. He was tired of deferring to Gesell. Tired of seeing his advice passed over.
Well, thought DeVore, pausing the film again, perhaps we can use all these tensions—redirect them and control them. But not yet. Not quite yet.
They had broken up their meeting temporarily while the fire was dealt with; but when Fischer returned, the Ping Tiao had already gone. Even so, the final forty seconds of the film provided a fascinating little coda on all that had happened.
Wang Sau-leyan was sitting in the far corner of the room, turning the gift the Ping Tiao had given him, in his hands, studying it. It was the tiny jade sculpture of Kuan Yin that DeVore had given Gesell only the week before.
"It's astonishing," Wang was saying. "Where do you think they stole it?"
Hung Mien-lo, standing several paces away, looked up. "I'm sorry, Chieh Hsia?"
"This." He held the tiny statue up so that it was in clear view of the camera. "It's genuine, I'd say. T'ang Dynasty. Where in hell's name do you think they got their hands on it?"
Hung Mien-lo shrugged, then moved closer to his T'ang, lowering his voice marginally. "More to the point, Chieh Hsia, how do you know that they'll do as you ask?"
Wang Sau-leyan studied the piece a moment longer, then looked back at his Chancellor, smiling. "Because I ask them to do only what is in their own interest." He nodded, then looked across, directly into camera. "Well, Captain Fischer, is it out?"