CARROT FRITTER WITH YOGURT SAUCE
Squeeze all the water out of grated zucchini and carrots, and mix them with chopped scallions, parsley, dill, and garlic. Add flour and egg to make a wet paste, and season. Form a large spoonful of the mixture into a ball and press a pitted brine-soaked olive (Kalamata, Picholine, or Ni?oise) into the center. Slightly flatten the fritter in a pan and fry in olive oil until golden brown. Serve hot with yogurt sauce (stir pureed garlic, red wine vinegar, and olive oil into yogurt).
23
A Bit of Groan and Grunt
That is how Simon Benford sent Nathaniel Nash to the Orient. At first, Nate thought the temporary assignment was, besides a blessed reprieve, a form of geographical exile to keep him separated from Dominika. But the next day, when he went with analyst Lucius Westfall to meet Elwood Holder, the Chief of China Operations, and they were briefed on what had happened in Hong Kong, he knew there was a real clambake on, an opportunity so astronomically lucrative that even Benford later agreed that the counterintelligence risks of operating inside Chinese territory were outweighed by the potential gains.
Holder was a thirty-five-year veteran of China Ops, a plank owner, a daaih ban, an esteemed taipan, one of the Agency’s original China hands who spoke fluent Mandarin and wrote both simplified and traditional Chinese with pen or brush. His office walls were decorated with rice-paper banners covered in spidery flowing logograms that Holder himself had painted. Lucius admired a particularly elaborate scroll.
“Sun Tzu, fifth century BC,” said Holder, running his finger down the paper. “In all military affairs, none is more valuable than the spy, none should be more liberally rewarded than the spy, and none should work with greater secrecy than the spy.” He returned to his desk, sat down, and leaned back in his chair.
“Which one of you is Nash?”
Nate nodded.
Holder looked at Westfall. “And you’re Benford’s new PA, from the DI? Good luck with that, and welcome to the Ops Directorate. You’ll note General Tzu did not say ‘In all military affairs, none is more valuable than the analyst’ but at least you’re working with the Dark Prince now.” Lucius said nothing; he was getting used to the jockstrap patois in this side of the building.
Holder was short and stocky with thinning sandy hair and merry blue eyes behind octagonal wire-rimmed glasses, eyes that missed nothing and stopped twinkling when he started talking about taking scalps—recruiting human sources—something he had frequently done around the world, from the Taiwan Straits to the Tiber. Holder’s fabled recruitment in 1985 was of a thirty-year-old telephone technician in the secretariat of the Communist Party of China. In exchange for VCR tapes of all thirty-one Elvis Presley films and a signed photograph of Ann-Margret, he identified the junction box in Beijing serving the Zhuan xian, the encrypted internal telephone system of the 12th Central Politburo. This resulted in the bugging of the line, which produced a stream of astounding code-word intelligence for thirty-six months.
“Hong Kong Station’s been burning up the wires for a week, a dozen immediate restricted-handling cables,” said Holder. “COS Hong Kong is an old whore, a top pro, knows China like the back of his hand, name’s Barnabus Burns. By the way, do not, ever, call him ‘Barn’ for short; he hates the nickname Barn Burns.
“The local Hong Kong ASIS rep, the Australian Secret Intelligence Service, called on Burns and made an urgent proposal for a joint op. Seems they’ve been looking for six months at a high-ranking general in the PLA, People’s Liberation Army, a zhong jiang, a middle general, equivalent to lieutenant general. This Chinese general, name’s Tan Furen, comes from Guangzhou in the south. But he’s a big noise in the Zhōngguó Rénmín Jiěfàngjūn Huǒjiànjūn, the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force—PLARF for short—a top intelligence target for years. The PLARF owns all Chinese land-based and submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and maintains their nukes, the whole deal.” Holder read from a black-striped folder.
“The Aussies to their delight discovered that General Tan likes to gamble in the casinos of Macao; he’s addicted,” said Holder. “There’s widespread corruption in the PLA. You get general’s rank by shelling out five hundred thousand dollars, and once they pin on your stars you stand to make three times that from skimming contracts and from kickbacks. They’re all dirty as hell.” He rubbed his hands together, as if he were smelling hot-and-sour soup on the stove.
“Tan secretly has been gambling with—and losing—official army funds. The Aussies figure he’s a million dollars in the hole. Beijing finds out, they’ll stand him against a wall and shoot him.”
“How do they know how much he’s lost?” said Westfall.
“ASIS is a small service, but aggressive. They have ears in all the casinos. Gaming in Macao is bigger than in Vegas, and they have it covered. They say Tan is scared to death and desperate, and they want us to bankroll the pitch. We give the general the cash to replenish his cash box, and he starts reporting to us on the PLARF.”
“And we share the take,” said Nate. “That’s a lot of money; he worth it?”
“We’d pay twice that. The Chinese say an ding zi, to push a nail, to recruit a source inside their rocket forces. Real strategic intel.”
“Will he go for it?” said Nate. Holder nodded.
“It’s start spying or get the chop. But there’s a problem. ASIS says the general is a real chicom, a diehard, a true believer. He won’t accept if the pitch comes from the West, especially the United States. It’s complicated, all wrapped up in miàn zi, loss of face, reputation, shame.”
“Seems like he’s not in a position to be picky,” said Westfall.
“You’d think so, but I’ve seen them walk away over saving face, even if it means they go to prison later,” said Holder. “Lost a few good recruitments myself by trying to muscle them, believe me.”
“So how do we sugarcoat it?” said Nate.
Holder pointed at him. “That’s where you come in. Benford volunteered you,” he said. So Benford already had me scoped for the job while he talked about redemption, thought Nate. He smiled to himself.
“We ran traces based on ASIS info,” said Holder. “General Tan was a military attaché in Moscow in the nineties,” said Holder. “He speaks some Russian and likes Russians—there’s a faction in the PLA that still buys into the Sino-Russian friendship bullshit, and he’s one of them.”
“What am I hearing?” said Nate. “A false flag?”
“That’s right,” said Holder. “You pitch Tan in Macao as a friendly SVR officer offering to discreetly help out an ally in exchange for PLARF secrets. The Aussies don’t have a fluent Russian speaker who could pull this off. Benford tells me you speak like a native.” Nate flashed back to when he had played a Russian reports officer with Dominika—it had been her idea—with an Iranian scientist in Vienna. A million years ago.
“I speak it pretty well,” said Nate.
“You gotta speak it better than pretty fucking well,” said Holder. “General Tan smells CIA and he’s out the window. MSS calls it dǎ cǎo jīng shé, beating the grass and startling the snake, telegraphing your intent. We want to avoid that.”
“I’ll try my best,” said Nate. “Is ASIS cool with me making the pitch?”
“COS floated the idea to ASIS of using you as a Russian and they liked it,” said Holder, smiling. “We hide the Western hand, Tan saves face, and we bag a sensitive source inside the PLARF. Epic once-in-a-decade recruitment.” He loves this Wilderness-of-Mirrors shit as much as Benford, thought Nate.