Within the MSS, Poisonfeather was the code name for the theory that a series of well-documented leaks to the Americans was, in fact, the work of a mole within the Politburo itself. The theory had been rejected initially for political reasons but also because it lacked a shred of hard evidence. However, an influential cadre within the MSS had stubbornly championed the theory over the last eighteen months, and it was gaining traction within the organization.
Hence Zhi’s obsession with being the one to unmask the traitor. Fa himself thought it highly improbable and considered Poisonfeather an apt name for the Politburo’s hypothetical mole. After all, the Poisonfeather bird was an extinct and likely mythological bird that had supposedly populated southern China until the thirteenth century. Whereas the Politburo’s Poisonfeather bird had come into existence only in 2009. Fa chuckled at his own joke. It was as unlikely as it was . . .
The thought withered as he looked down at Charles Merrick’s magazine cover and felt the chill that sometimes accompanies insight. He did the math, trying to see how closely the chronology matched, oblivious to Zhi’s secretary.
“Fa? Fa!”
He finally heard her calling his name. “Yes?”
“He has ten minutes on Wednesday. At two.”
Fa no longer wanted an appointment with Zhi. If Merrick’s remarks really implied what he now suspected, then Zhi would take credit for it. For the honor to be his, Fa would need Merrick himself.
What would the old Guo Fa have done? Either take back your life, or you really are a worthless cupcake.
“On second thought,” he told the secretary, “I’ll just put it in an e-mail. I don’t want to waste his time.”
“What about my time? This is an embassy, Fa. I have work to do.”
But Fa was already gone.
Fa’s only friend at the embassy, or rather the only person who remained friendly toward him, was his de facto boss—Wen Bai, the agricultural minister. Wen Bai was either immune or oblivious, Fa wasn’t sure which, to Zhi’s political clout, and as long as Fa got his work done, Bai didn’t meddle in his affairs. He was a plump, congenial man with thick bifocals from another era. Fa found him in his office. His door was, quite literally, always open.
“Fa! Hello there.”
The two men made small talk for a few minutes.
“So what can I do for you?”
“I’m thinking about getting out of town for a few days.”
“Oh, that sounds nice. What about your report?”
“Check your inbox.”
“Oh, very good,” Bai said, reaching for his mouse. “Well, have a good trip, my friend. Where are you headed this time?”
Fa smiled. “I was thinking West Virginia.”
“Big fish?”
“With any luck.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Gibson spent two days lying to himself.
He owed the judge that much, since he’d looked him square in the eye and promised not to get involved. A few days of make-believe, pretending that he could live with it. Live with the memory of Hammond Birk cowering in that trailer doorway like a beaten dog. Knowing that the judge would die in that trailer. The man who had saved his life, pushed him to make something of himself, a voice of compassion and wisdom in a chaotic storm, would live out his days in neglect and squalor.
No, he couldn’t live with it.
He’d meant what he’d said to Birk and Swonger—he doubted he could succeed where the Justice Department had failed, but he had to know for certain. So in the middle of the second night, he roused himself from bed and started a file on Charles Merrick. Gibson didn’t know a thing about him, but the man had a name and a past—the only two things Gibson needed. Unlike the anonymous cowards who had snatched the Spectrum Protection job away. Perhaps it was precisely because Gibson’s own problems seemed insurmountable that Charles Merrick quickly became a stand-in for all of Gibson’s fury.
So he did what he always did when contemplating a hack—he crawled into Charles Merrick’s life. Merrick’s celebrity made it easier than it might otherwise have been. Libraries could be filled with all that had been written about Charles Merrick, and Gibson immersed himself in the minutiae of the man’s life: pulling key words and phrases, compiling lists of biographical details, sifting through the data for the patterns and habits that defined Charles Merrick. Two books told the story of Merrick’s financial downfall, and Gibson picked the better reviewed: A Shark in Shark’s Clothing: The Rise and Fall of Merrick Capital. He wasn’t sure what else it would tell him, because the man’s life had been completely documented online and in the press, but it paid to be thorough. Piece by piece, Gibson built a time line and picture of the man’s life. By the end of the week, he knew Charles Merrick’s life backward and forward.
Perhaps what he ought to be doing was finding a job. That’s what the judge would have wanted Gibson to do. But it simply was not in him. Like a runner who’d finished a grueling marathon, only to discover the finish line had been moved farther down the road, he didn’t have the will to start the race again. He was exhausted, and besides, what was the point? Even if he landed another job, they would just snatch it from him like they had the Spectrum Protection job. Whoever they were.
He rationalized his decision by telling himself that Merrick was a small job, if it was anything at all—a few weeks at the outside. That it was something he needed to do for the judge. But the truth was that once the familiar adrenaline burn took hold, his vision became increasingly narrow and myopic. The world beyond Charles Merrick lost its ability to command his attention. Even his daughter’s name, which could always galvanize him to action, had no effect. He was ashamed that it didn’t, but even the shame couldn’t deter him. Not now.
Gibson looked up at Merrick’s magazine cover taped to the wall above his makeshift desk and smiled. In the last twenty-four hours, a detail from the Finance magazine interview had begun to bother him. Gibson nearly dismissed it as nothing until YouTube finally connected the dots.
Prior to his arrest, Merrick had been in demand as a public speaker, and Gibson found an entire YouTube channel devoted to his speeches. The man was electric in front of an audience, charismatic and cocksure. He would have thrived in politics. And like a politician, Merrick tended to give variations on the same speech. Gibson watched several of them, hoping to get a read on his personality. Midway through the third, he reached for the magazine and flipped to the end of the interview. Rewinding the speech, he listened to Merrick reiterate his motto about pennies being the new million. Almost. There was one key difference. Gibson clicked through several different speeches—same difference in each one between his lectures and the Finance article. He reread the line in the interview. It was a small thing, possibly a typo. A small discrepancy that might be nothing or might mean that Charles Merrick’s money wasn’t in the proverbial Swiss vault. If Gibson’s hunch was right, Merrick had remained in close control of his fortune from prison. That required a network of some kind. And networks were always vulnerable.