Tell Me No Lies Read online

  Yi dropped two sugar cubes and a twist of lemon into his tea. He showed no surprise when Catlin did the same. Using lemon peel rather than juice was customary in the part of Indochina where Catlin had once worked. It was the Asian way of coming to terms with the brutally strong tea that the English preferred. Although Catlin didn't brew his tea until it was the color and consistency of tar, the acquired taste for lemon's piquancy remained.

  "Your English is very good," Catlin said matter-of-factly. Despite the odd tonality and staccato delivery that were quintessentially Chinese, Yi's words were easily understood. Nor did he employ the euphemisms, honorifics and circumlocutions that many Chinese used when speaking a second language. There was an unusual flavor to Yi's speech, though. He had an elusive accent and a turn of phrase that was more British or Canadian than American. And yet there was definitely an American flavor to Yi's English, too. Perhaps he had had teachers from more than one country. "Did you attend school in Vancouver before the revolution?"

  "Your Chinese is very good, I am told," retorted Yi. "Did you attend school in Beijing?"

  "No." Catlin smiled slightly at Yi's riposte. "Not even when it was still called Peking."

  "Did you kill many Chinese?" asked Yi without warning. It was an interrogator's trick – the unexpected, deadly question dropped in the midst of neutral chatter.

  "Did you spend much time torturing English-speaking prisoners in North Korea?" countered Catlin, his tone uninflected.

  Yi and Catlin exchanged impassive stares while tea steamed upward between them like dragon's breath.

  "An unhappy past," said Yi finally, touching the fragile rim of the teacup with sensitive fingertips. "It is our duty to see that our governments do not repeat past errors of fear and greed.

  "Are we on the verge of doing that?" asked Catlin. "Repeating past errors?"

  There was a metallic click, the hiss of flame, then another click as Yi closed the lighter. "Yes."

  Catlin was silent for a long time, weighing the urgency that must be driving the outwardly calm Chinese official sitting across from him and sipping tea. Yi's bluntness was unusual in the extreme. The Chinese people had lived under gradations of tyranny and despotism for thousands of years. Such governments taught people a hundred ways to say yes and none to say no. Indirection and lying were the very arts of survival, as though the people themselves had to live undercover in their own land. The modern age had been no kinder to the Chinese. First the West humiliated them, then followed the horrors of civil war and a political fervor indistinguishable from religious ecstasy.

  Unfortunately, ecstasy made lousy economics. Twenty million Chinese starved while Mao found his feet as a leader.

  When his feet began slipping again, millions more Chinese were uprooted, displaced and disgraced in the Cultural Revolution. Ecstasy continued to make lousy economics. When the fervor burned to ash, the survivors blinked and looked around. The specter of fiscal ruin blinked and looked back. Deng Xiaoping stepped into leadership, bringing with him very delicate murmurings of rewards based on work rather than need.

  Capitalism, in a word.

  The word was never used except by enemies of Deng Xiaoping. The flirtation with capitalist heresy continued, encouraged by the sudden spurt in output from farm plots "owned" by peasant families. The courtship broadened as American and Canadian business advisers were invited to the People's Republic to teach the fine art of making money while paying lip service to the spinning ghost of Mao. With each new factory, with each new commune in which peasants earned profits as well as food for their cooking pots, the relationship between the U.S. and the People's Republic deepened into one that had the potential for becoming a fine and enduring marriage of mutual interests: China's entry into the twentieth century's technological sweepstakes; and the West's entry into a market that comprised one-quarter of the population of earth.

  There was no public announcement of connubial bliss between America and China, simply a gradual withdrawal of running-dogs-of-capitalism rhetoric. Chinese Communists sat down to dinner with Western capitalists, and all participants used long spoons, for wise men knew there was no other way to sup with the Devil from a communal pot. It was an interesting meal all around, one that gave promise of fattening the participants.

  "Who's pissing in the soup?" asked Catlin.

  Yi looked utterly blank. "Please?" he asked, jarred from his nearly perfect command of English.

  "An idiom," said Catlin with a hard smile. "It means to ruin things for everyone, including yourself."

  "Ah! So! Pissing in the soup." Yi grinned. "Very good. Thank you. That I will remember.''

  Catlin had no doubt Yi would remember. At an age when most Americans were embracing the precarious salvation of Social Security, Yi was still expanding his own grasp of the increasingly complex world around him.

  "I do not know who is pissing in the soup. Ah! I do know that piss is present in my bowl. The smell is very bright."

  "Strong," Catlin said automatically.

  "Strong. Ah." Yi murmured an apology. "It has been many years since I speak English with an American. Very difficult."

  "You speak better English than nine-tenths of the natives do," said Catlin quietly, "but if it tires you, we could try Mandarin, French or Cantonese instead."

  "Or Vietnamese?" asked Yi, his voice bland and his eyes impenetrable.

  "Or Vietnamese," agreed Catlin, not bothering to conceal his background for the simple reason that if Yi knew he was Rousseau. Yi knew that Catlin spoke Vietnamese as well as the other languages. It had been his gift for languages that had gotten him into covert operations in the first place. Not for the first time in his life, Catlin was grateful that his mother was French, rather than, say, Russian. Siberia was not a place that intrigued him. He would take Saigon's steamy heat any day.

  Catlin took a sip of his tea, giving Yi a chance to gather his thoughts. It was the type of politeness that Chinese expected and rarely received from people raised in Western cultures. Yi noted the gesture and felt himself warming slightly toward the man who had once been China's foe, and might become so again if the Four Modernizations of Deng Xiaoping were undermined by enemies within and without the country.

  Yi discarded a glowing stub of tobacco, lit a new cigarette and began to speak in staccato phrases about modern treachery and ancient Chinese bronzes. It was clear that he was once more in control of himself and the English language.

  "Did you know that there is buried at Xi'an a bronze army that surpasses in artistry the famous terra cotta army of Emperor Qin Shih-huang-di?" asked Yi.

  "I've heard a few rumors." What Catlin didn't say was that even though Rousseau's "death" had forced him to stop collecting bronzes, he still collected information from many of the old sources. "I didn't know that you had started excavations."

  "We have not. We sank trial shafts to discover the extent and content of the find, then sealed the shafts."

  "Why?"

  "We should not gulp knowledge like starving dogs at their first meal," said Yi.

  Catlin smiled cynically. "And then there's the fact that when the public tires of one archaeological circus, there will be a new one to take its place," Catlin said. "Handled correctly, the finds at Xi'an will be a balm to China's wounded pride for decades to come. All the world will look at the People's Republic in continually renewed wonder at Qin's accomplishments. China will be seen as the center of the civilized universe." Catlin took a sip of tea and continued, "By the time you've milked the finds at Xi'an, the People's Republic might have managed to pull its science and technology into the twentieth century. With that achieved, you can forget the humiliations of the nineteenth century and take your place as first among equals in the councils of the powerful. Once again, you will have great face in the world."

  Yi swallowed smoke and said nothing for a moment. "You should have been born Chinese. Ah! Without doubt, you would have been one of our great Legalists."

&nbs
p; Catlin laughed softly at the double-edged compliment. When it came to pragmatism, the Chinese Legalists could have given lessons to Genghis Khan and Machiavelli combined. In silence Catlin waited for Yi to continue, sensing that whatever was said next would cost Yi some of his precious store of face.

  "It has come to me that some of Qin's bronze army have found their way from darkness to light," said Yi. "American light. Have you heard this?"

  "No, but it wouldn't surprise me. If the bronzes have half the quality of the terra cotta, collectors would quite literally kill for them."

  "The bronzes are – " Yi's voice dropped. "There are no words," he said softly. "No words." He drew in smoke sharply. "Xi'an is the soul of China. I believe someone is selling it to America." Yi looked narrowly at the big black-haired man sitting so easily across the hearth from him, like a dragon at rest, confident of his own power. But there was no peace in those amber eyes, only intelligence. "Can you imagine what would happen if Deng's enemies could point to a looted Xi'an and say, 'See what capitalism does? It blackens the face of China! They treat us as lackeys and dogs. We have no face!'''

  Catlin set down his cup very carefully. He could imagine all too easily how an illicit traffic in Qin bronzes could be used in the lethal internal propaganda battles that characterized political disputes in the People's Republic of China. Deng's careful, discreet, determined courtship of a non-Communist economy would be the first casualty. Deng himself would be the second. America's hope of peaceful relations with China would be the third. It was extremely doubtful that the next Chinese leader would be open to anything but hostility with the West.

  "You said that you thought Qin bronzes were being smuggled out. Aren't you certain?" asked Catlin.

  The cigarette burned brightly, then dulled. Yi brushed a fallen ash onto the floor. "No. Grave robbers could be at work even as we speak and we would not know until the time came to excavate and we discovered that thieves had preceded us. Mount Li is huge. It is impossible to guard everywhere against tunnels dug in the night and concealed in the day. Ah!" Yi sucked in smoke with a harsh sound. "I have seen no evidence of stolen bronzes. I have heard only rumors."

  Catlin was quiet for a long time. Then he took a final sip of tea, swirled the residue in a dark spiral and set the cup aside.

  "There are several possibilities," said Catlin, his words clipped. "One: Qin bronzes are being stolen and sold in America. Two: Qin forgeries are being sold in America. Three: rumors are being sold in China. If number one is correct, then obviously someone in the Chinese government is involved. Someone very high up in the bureaucracy of Xi'an. You, perhaps. If not you, then someone you trust. The betrayal wouldn't stop there, either. It would go all the way to Beijing. Theft of a chariot, charioteer and horses simply would not be possible without the complicity of powerful people within China's government."

  Yi waited, watching Catlin through an expanding spiral of smoke.

  "If forgeries are being sold," continued Catlin, "government officials may or may not be involved. It wouldn't matter. Face is not lost over the sale of forgeries." He paused, smiling thinly. "Except by the buyers, of course. But that isn't the PRC's problem, is it?"

  Yi's cigarette glowed and dulled again, quickly, like a heartbeat.

  "Number three is more tricky," said Catlin neutrally. "Rumors can undermine governments faster than any truth, no matter how damning. It's the old saw about not being able to disprove a negative. You can't prove that bronzes have not been stolen and sold. As you said, Mount Li is huge."

  Yi nodded curtly.

  "So the odds are against you two to one," Catlin pointed out calmly. "If there are real Qin bronzes being sold in the U.S. the prodevelopment forces in China lose to the Maoists, and so do you. If there are rumors of such sales, you still lose, because you can't prove that the rumors aren't true." Catlin shrugged. "Unless you can find Qin bronzes in America and prove that they're forgeries, you're shit out of Suck, my friend. The Maoists will hang your ass so high you'll think you're Peking duck."

  Chapter 2

  Lindsay Danner sat in her office, seeing nothing of the exquisite Oriental teak desk with its Chinese lacquer pen boxes and an appointment calendar graced by elegant calligraphy. Lindsay's eyes were fixed on her hands, but it was the past that she was seeing, voices and scenes that would never come again, times and people gone as surely as yesterday's sunlight.

  Yet the nightmare would not go into the past where it belonged. The nightmare not only endured, it grew stronger, feeding on the irrational sadness that had all but overwhelmed Lindsay at her mother's recent death. There was no need for such grief. Her mother had died quickly, painlessly, cherished by the people she had loved more than she had loved anything except God.

  Nor was there need for the nightmare that came more and more frequently, claiming the dark hours after midnight, making Lindsay twist and turn helplessly while a faceless Chinese man pursued her through a world that was black and silver and red, blood red, her hands warm and sticky and she was screaming, screaming.

  No! Lindsay told herself harshly, clenching a gold pen in her fist. I'm not a child anymore. If I wake up screaming, no one Witt come and comfort me and tell me that it's all right and that – what? What did I want my mother to tell me? What was the question I never found the courage to ask and ask and ask until it was answered?

  In the next instant Lindsay shivered, feeling as though the nightmare were turning over inside her, sliding up from the black well of the past.

  Whatever the question was, it doesn't matter anymore. It's too late. Somehow I always thought that the next time I saw mother I would have the courage to ask. But she's dead now. There's no one left who even knows what it was like in China then. It's as though it never happened.

  But it did happen. Ask the nightmares.

  "Miss Lindsay Danner?"

  The voice was unusual in that, though polite, it held an underlying command. Lindsay's head jerked up. A man stood in the doorway of her office. Automatically she summed him up: medium height, blue eyes, pale skin, a few years older than her own thirty years. He was dressed in the manner of Washington, D.C. professionals, with conservative clothing conservatively cut. In a city where politics and rumor ruled supreme, most professionals left stylish dressing to their less vulnerable counterparts in Manhattan or L.A.

  "May I help you?" asked Lindsay, her voice neutral, controlled, belonging to the curator of Ancient Chinese Bronzes for the Museum of the Asias rather than to a vaguely frightened, grieving daughter. Discreetly Lindsay checked her calendar. For the past three days she had been in Vancouver, British Columbia, appraising a minor collection of early Chou bronzes. No names had been penciled onto her appointment calendar during her absence.

  "Steve White assured me that you would be able to solve a little problem we have," said the man.

  Lindsay registered the first-name familiarity of her visitor with Mr. L. Stephen White, director of the Museum of the Asias – and not incidentally, a man of considerable inherited wealth and arrogance.

  "I'll be glad to help Mr. White in any way I can," Lindsay said dryly. "He is, after all, my boss. Please sit down Mr. – "

  The man closed the door behind him and walked over to the massively elegant teak desk that dominated the room.

  Lindsay noted the firmly closed door with a sharpening of curiosity. After a childhood in politically torn China, and an adulthood that had included going down dark streets to appraise objects d'art of dubious provenance, Lindsay recognized a naked bid for secrecy when she saw it.

  She would have been worried about the possibility of robbery if it weren't for the fact that all the museum's items were meticulously photographed and cataloged, making their resale through normal channels both unlikely and unprofitable. Nor could the contents of the museum be looted and melted down as had too many of Mexico's and South America's pre-Columbian artifacts, a looting that had begun with the Conquistadores and continued unabated to modern
times. Much to modern grave robbers' disappointment, ancient Chinese artisans had used little gold and silver in their creations.

  That didn't mean Lindsay couldn't recognize gold when it was dangled under her nose. The shield her visitor held out to her was of the expensive, gold-plated, blue-enameled variety that only the FBI carried. Lindsay looked from the gleaming metal to the polite, professionally assured face watching her from across her desk.

  "Special Agent Terry O'Donnel," said the man. Then, in case Lindsay hadn't noticed, he added, "Federal Bureau of Investigation."

  The smooth, top-quality leather folder closed over the shield as it was returned to the agent's dark blue suit coat pocket.

  "Sit down," offered Lindsay, hoping her sudden curiosity wasn't too obvious. "Will you be here long enough for coffee?"

  "We were hoping," said the agent, "that you would come with me to the Hoover Building." He smiled suddenly, turning on the Irish charm. "The coffee there isn't great, but it's free."

  "Is Mr. White part of the 'we' you mentioned?" asked Lindsay.

  "Indirectly."

  Lindsay gave the agent a measuring look. Some people hated modern art or rock music or nuclear power plants. She hated evasions, euphemisms and prevarications. Lies. In a profession where many of the artifacts had been looted in one way or another, at one time or another, Lindsay's absolute refusal to deal on the lucrative, pervasive "double market" was rare.

  "How indirectly?" she asked bluntly.

  Terry O'Donnel reassessed the slender, bronze-haired woman in a single glance. He decided that the elegant lines of Lindsay's face and the generous curves of her mouth concealed an unusual intelligence and will. If he doubted it, all he had to do was look into the cool, assessing clarity of her very dark blue eyes. Abruptly he decided to change his approach.