"I'll drink to that," Jerry said, giving him a determined look. "You want to hit the Embassy in the morning?"
"Yeah. Check on the reception and see what kind of words of wisdom they might have for us."
"Think they'll be less pompous than our old buddy, Vanderpool?"
"I damn sure hope so. The troops in the field are usually more practical-minded than the generals at headquarters." After he had said it, he realized he could be talking about himself. From the standpoint of Worldwide Communications and the Amber Group, he was one of the generals.
Jerry picked up on it with a grin. "Is that the voice of experience?"
"I asked for that, didn't I?" Burke said with a frown.
"No offense meant," Jerry said, sobering.
Burke's look softened. "None taken. Hopefully I haven't been a general long enough to lose the common touch." Then a big yawn caught him suddenly, and he reached a hand up to cover his mouth. "I'd better get on up to my room. This wine'll have me so relaxed I'll go to sleep on the table. See you in the morning."
Back in his room, Burke put in a call to Falls Church. Lori was just getting started with breakfast.
"How do you feel?" he asked.
"My problem at the moment is I dropped an egg on the kitchen floor, and these two animated spirits kicking around inside aren't making the cleanup too easy. Plus it's too quiet. You should have left me a tape. One with a few good shouts, like, 'What happened to my blue-checked shirt?' Or, 'Did you wash my black socks?' Or, 'What time are we having dinner tonight?'"
Was she joking, or did he usually sound that demanding? "I'll have to remember that next time," he said.
"Did you tell everybody I'd be a helpless waif after you left?"
Boy, was she ever on his case. "What do you mean?"
"Nate called last night, anxious as an old maid. Wanted to know if I needed anything."
"He knows how concerned I was about leaving you at this particular point. You ought to appreciate his thoughtfulness."
"Oh, I do," she said, her voice a bit too flippant.
"Look, I'm tired as hell, Lori." He gave in to the fatigue he'd been fighting off the past hour or so. "It was a damned long flight. Don't give me a hard time, okay? I called to see how you and the twins were doing. I'm sorry if it upset you."
He could hear the tears in her voice as she mumbled, "Who's upset?"
He regretted immediately having said it but was past thinking clearly enough to know how to rectify it. "I guess I'd better get to bed," he said. "Tomorrow's going to be a busy day. I'll call you later when we're both in a better mood."
He didn't waste any time getting to bed, but after he had pulled up the covers, it took awhile for him to doze off. It disturbed him that they had hung up on a sour note. Whenever they had argued before, they had always made up before going to sleep. Now they were half a world apart, and he was too bushed to try and figure out what had gone wrong.
Chapter 22
A discordant din of traffic noises, accompanied by the foul aroma of diesel exhaust being belched from green and white buses, welcomed Burke and Jerry to Monday morning in downtown Seoul. The sidewalks bustled with people scurrying about like penguins on an Antarctic beach. Most were well dressed in Western style. They seemed to be propelled along by a chilling breeze that gusted beneath a leaden November sky. Burke and Jerry left the Chosun armed with directions supplied by the hotel information desk. They headed down the stairs into a pedestrian underpass beneath the broad boulevard that flanked the City Hall. Small shops and vendors selling everything from food to footwear lined the underground passageway. They soon emerged at the entrance that would take them over to Taepyong-ro. After several minutes of brisk walking, they came to two almost identical buildings. Fluttering outside the first was a large American flag, marking it as the U.S. Embassy. The second building housed the Ministry of Culture and Information.
At the Embassy, they were told Ambassador Shearing would be involved in a meeting for the next hour or so. He was expecting their arrival, however, having been alerted by the senior undersecretary. He had left instructions for them to see his cultural attaché. They were directed to a small, sparely furnished office where they found a towering young black man with short-cropped hair. He appeared all arms and legs when he stood to greet them. The attaché leaned forward and reached a long arm across the desk, leaving the impression he could have bent over a little farther and tied Burke's shoes.
As they shook hands, he smiled warmly and said in a deep baritone, "I'm Damon Mansfield. Make yourselves at home." He gestured toward the chairs beyond his desk. "Welcome to the Land of the Morning Calm. What can I do for you?"
Burke eyed him for a moment, a questioning frown on his face. "The Damon Mansfield?"
The diplomat asked with feigned innocence, "Which one would that be?"
"Demon Damon, All American, Georgetown?"
He nodded. "You must be an alumnus. I never played in the NBA, you know."
"Bum knee, wasn't it?" Burke said.
"Right. I was in a car accident. Did you graduate from Georgetown?"
"No, I went to GWU. I was up in Alaska when you were playing, though. In the winter time, there wasn't much to do but watch TV or listen to tapes. One of the channels carried the Georgetown games. As I recall, you were a holy terror."
Mansfield touched a long, slender cautioning finger to his lips. "Don't let Ambassador Shearing hear you say that. He thinks I'm a model of diplomatic decorum." When he sat back in his chair, his head was still high enough that he could have been a small man standing. A frown slowly clouded his face. "If you were thinking about the infamous fighting affair, take it from me, it was greatly overblown by the media. The guy I hit had been taking cheap shots all night. When he finally gouged an elbow in my stomach, I let him have it with a right cross. The ref missed the elbow, but he sure caught my act."
Burke remembered. Mansfield was thrown out of the game, and the press clamored for his suspension. The coach benched him for one game, knowing he had been provoked. "That wasn't really what I had in mind. What I remember was your performance under the basket. When push came to shove, you didn't take a back seat to anybody."
Mansfield's smile returned as he looked across at Jerry Chan, who had said nothing. "I'll bet you don't remember me at all, do you?"
Jerry grinned. "Afraid not. When you were playing basketball, I was probably trudging through the tall grass of Southeast Asia. I was with the DEA back then."
Mansfield considered him with renewed interest. "A drug enforcement agent? That's an interesting background for a public relations man."
"I had the same experience as you. A little accident changed the course of my career. What can you tell us about the current state of Korean-American relations? In Washington, Mr. Vanderpool told us you folks would have the latest word."
Damon Mansfield turned in his chair and stared out the window at the glut of traffic moving slowly along Sejong-ro. "The state of relations between the two countries is about like that traffic out there. Bogged down for no reason I can discern but Oriental intransigence. How much do you know about the new government of President Kwak?"
"Not a lot," Burke confessed. "We know the Democratic Unity Party espoused re-unification with the North, and a so-called reduction of foreign influence. From what we've heard, I gather they're trying to shift their foreign trade and development emphasis from a U.S. orientation to more reliance on Europe."