The Asian Mantrap

Seven

A man can push himself just so far. Hawk wouldn’t subscribe to that. He likes to think that AXE agents have few physical shortcomings and unlimited human endurance. I would be a complete disappointment to him right now. After countless hours on the job, I’d had enough for one day.

Mine had started early and been prolonged by the transcontinental trip. My empty stomach growled. I glanced at my watch. It was nearly eleven o’clock Washington time. A long day behind me, and much of it wasted.

Gloria Grimes had told me that I was as much as ten thousand miles behind Keith Martin. He could be anywhere. Quantas had routes covering the entire Far East. Japan and Australia were the northern and southern extremes of its widespread system.

This was one time when I wasn’t hesitant about going back to Hawk for guidance.

I felt a little badly about the way I had treated Gloria. There wasn’t a better way, really, to get the information from her in a hurry. She was an important link to Martin, although I was certain that she was only peripherally involved. I doubted if she understood why Martin used her house as a sanctuary to cover his trail.

Nothing had been learned to indicate how organized the conspiracy to help Martin was. It hardly mattered anymore. I had to assume that Layton and Wyler would want to know if anyone had gotten as close to Martin as Gloria Grimes. If it was important for them to know, she would tell them of my visit. When she did, the information would not bother them. I was a nuisance, but now so far behind Martin that catch up was impossible. Hawk might even consider it unnecessary. Whatever Martin’s intentions were a week ago, he had probably fulfilled them and was on his way back. Based on what I had learned, Hawk would probably tell me to pack it in and come home too. I had to let him know.

I used the first public phone booth I could find. I placed the collect call to Hawk’s unlisted home telephone number. He was going to be displeased that I was calling so late. He valued his sleep and began it no later than ten-thirty.

Hawk was displeased all right, but because I had waited so long to report. He didn’t even let me talk.

“Nick, we’ve been had,” he began with the same opening I had in mind. “I can’t talk to you on an open line like this. How soon can you get to the pit at Fort Mason?”

“Thirty minutes.”

“Make it twenty. I’ll be waiting on the line, holding until you get there.” He hung up without a goodbye, leaving me with my mouth open.

The pit is a secure communications center manned by a select contingent of cryptographic experts from the National Security Agency. They operate and maintain highly sophisticated, ground-to-satellite transmissions which carry the bulk of United States coded diplomatic messages to embassies around the world. Additionally, the highest priority, scrambled voice traffic is accomodated. Duplicate facilities exist on the east coast, on Okinawa, and at a very secure base on the island of Crete. Fort Mason had direct channels to Washington which Hawk would not hesitate to commandeer. He also wouldn’t send me to the pit unless something like an impending natural disaster was about to take place.

There was no way I was going to be speaking to Hawk from Fort Mason in twenty minutes. I took five to pick up three spongy-bunned hamburgers and a chocolate shake at a fast-food drive-in. I ate and listened to the news on the car radio while driving back across the Bay Bridge. The evening broadcast carried items relating to the United Nations, new hopes for peace in the Middle East and South Africa, a new offshore oil find near Madagascar, and depressing economic trends in Europe. The local sports announcer had some interesting observations on the future of the Oakland A’s.

Once in the city, I drove west on Eddy Street to Van Ness, then stayed on it all the way to Fort Mason. The last part was all downhill.

One thing about the military, they don’t want anyone to get lost. There were guideposts on every corner pointing to various buildings. Every building was identified by a number and a sign. I had no problem locating the Officers’ Mess and the parking lot beside it. The break in the shrubbery leading to the concealed path was a little harder to find. The bushes had thickened since the last time I had squeezed through them.

I followed the bare path which led downward behind the Officers’ Club to a low building constructed entirely of cinder block. Light coming from windows high up under the eaves of the flat roof illuminated clearly the reinforcing wire imbedded in the thick glass. The Spanish-style, iron-bar grills in front of the windows were not there just for decoration.

I walked past two sets of recessed, flush-metal double doors until I came to a single steel door with an amber light overhead. I pushed a concave button below a placard which read: Press for Entry. Nothing happened. I pushed again. A voice reached me, coming out of a small, louvered grill set in the steel door casing. “Step inside and face to the right.” The scratchy, metallic words sounded like a recording.

The steel door slid to one side. It had to be moved by some mechanical means; the door was solid steel at least eight inches thick. I moved inside onto a metal plate that fit flush with the floor. The outer door closed behind me. I was left in a boxlike entry way, sealed off ahead of me by another steel door. When I looked to the right I saw a wall studded with regularly-spaced apertures which I knew contained multifrequency sensors.

The platform on which I stood rotated slowly until I had been turned a full ninety degrees. A drawer, similar to those used at drive-in banking windows, slid out of the wall in front of me. “Remove your gun, strapped-on knife, and the spherical object concealed between your legs and deposit them in the receptacle. Mr. Hawk’s call has been routed to Room W. Third door on the left.” This voice was definitely human, but it had no warmth.

I placed my weapons in the extended drawer. The drawer closed immediately. Then the steel door I first faced opened to admit me to a tile-lined corridor. I passed by two inner doors that failed to hold back a constant clattering noise and the smell of ozone. The entire building hummed serenely as though it was sitting on top of a tremendous power plant. Room W appeared at be part of an electronic laboratory. Oscilloscopes, along with panels mosaicked with blinking multicolored lights, offered a dazzling display. The bank of consoles against one wall containing spinning, jerking reels of wide magnetic tape were producing enough heat to make the large, air-conditioned room uncomfortably warm.

Of the three telephones waiting on the top of the centrally situated executive desk, only the green one was off the hook. I sat down at the desk and picked up the phone. “This is Carter, sir.” I held the receiver an inch away from my ear, waiting for the explosion.

None came. Hawk spoke in a calm, quiet voice. “What have you uncovered?” That was typical Hawk. He was interested only in bottom line facts.

In the simplest terms, I related that Gloria Grimes, once Gloria Parker of the films and now an MIA wife in San Rafael, had told me that Keith Martin’s last known address was some Quantas Airways flight headed west. I heard a muffled obscenity come over the line. Then I heard Hawk’s voice continue, but he wasn’t speaking to me. He had someone else with him which meant that Hawk had left his house. He wouldn’t do that unless he was part of an extended night session called to deal with a crisis condition. When he came back on, Hawk surprised me with a compliment. “You’ve done well, Nick. Now we’re pretty sure where we stand.”

It sounded as though Hawk had assembled enough information at his end to settle the matter. I expected him to tell me to cash in my chips and come home. Instead, he engaged me in conversation. “Did you know that Dinh Ba Thi, the Vietnamese ambassador to the United Nations, has left for Hanoi?”

I remembered. “I heard it mentioned on the radio a short time ago. He’s the one our government expelled once for spying.”

“Good memory, Nick. Only this time he’s going back because of the sudden death of Ban Lok Huong, Hanoi’s Minister of Security.”

“I didn’t hear that,” I admitted.

“Huong died this morning. An immediate news blackout followed the official announcement. Naturally, it was important for us to know why. Huong was no obscure personality. We’ve had a tag on him for a long time. During the war he was a general in charge of the interrogation and processing center through which all American prisoners of war passed before being shunted out to regular prison camps. A lot of U.S. servicemen never left his place alive.” Hawk wasn’t making idle talk; he was leading up to something.

“Keith Martin could attest to that,” I said, letting Hawk know I was keeping in step.

“After the war, Huong, like many senior Viet Cong officers, became a top government official and rates a state funeral,” Hawk went on. “That’s all in the file. None of it warrants having a lid put on. We had to use some unorthodox sources to find out, but now we have some idea why. Ban Lok Huong didn’t die a natural death. He was assassinated. Not only him, but his wife and two unidentified persons who were dinner guests in Huong’s villa. A virtual slaughter, vicious and unwarranted.”

Those last words were strange ones coming from a man who allowed AXE agents to use drastic measures as last resort actions.

I realized that governments like the one in Hanoi would be reluctant to admit to having dissidents capable of resorting to violence and murder. It was sensitive to world opinion. One would expect it to exercise censorship on a disturbing event. I voiced an opinion: “They’ll never give up until they find the killer.”

“Which is precisely the cause for our concern,” Hawk said in a grave, low-toned voice. “Hold on a minute.”

I waited again. I heard at least two other voices speaking in the background. Their words were unintelligible. The tempo of their speech was rapid. I looked at my watch. God, what a long day. I figured it wasn’t over yet. If Hawk was going to recall me, he’d have told me before this.

“Nick?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Here’s what we’ve got. It isn’t pretty, but it’s something we have to face. Your turning up names — Layton, Wyler and Grimes — in connection with Martin gave us the key. A lot more checking and rechecking has to be done, but what you’ve steered us onto is a strange set of bedfellows. We know all about Martin and how he is almost revered by some Vietnam vets. Layton is one. He was in Hue with Martin during the tank crew rescue action that resulted in Martin’s capture. The man Wyler was a POW along with Martin and Gloria Grimes has been a fanatic on the MIA issue.

“All of them have something in common — deep-seated emotions about the war and an underlying hatred of the Vietnamese for treatment meted out to American prisoners. We have some tenuous information that indicates this unreasonable bitterness has been fomenting. It’s now reached the point of eruption. We are seeing evidence of an active, private vendetta against certain North Vietnamese who, according to Martin and men who think as he does, ignored and exceeded basic human precepts in their humiliation, torture, and murder of U.S. prisoners of war.”

“Hold on now,” I interrupted. “You’re telling me that this Ban Lok Huong, sitting there snug in his house in Hanoi, was the victim of an assassination plot masterminded by Keith Martin?”

“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” Hawk answered. “And I’ll tell you why. Ban Lok Huong wasn’t the first — just the most important one so far. The night before Huong was killed, a minor bureaucrat — the administrator of a state hospital who, during the war, provided so-called medical care at the infamous ‘Hanoi Hilton’ — was chopped down with the same kind of Soviet Lekoyev 9 mm. machine pistol used to blow away Minister Huong.”

I knew the weapon. The Russians had supplied them in quantity to the Viet Cong. A number of them had been brought home as souvenirs by returning GIs. Three hundred dollars buys one on the streets of Baltimore if you know where to go. I wondered where Hawk was getting his information, but knew better than to ask. He implied a probable source during his next statement.

“We’re still digging in on this, but you’d best know that I’m now reporting directly to the president and no one else. General Jarrett and Secretary of State Ellsworth are the only other privileged ones. The chief is extra nervous about this. If Keith Martin is responsible for running an undercover murder operation in Hanoi and his connection with it is discovered, the global repercussion would be earthshaking. The president can’t disown him now; that would only focus attention on a situation that must be corrected at once and without fanfare.”

“Hasn’t Layton cleared the air?” I assumed the man who had rifled my pockets at Dulles airport had been questioned.

Hawk coughed lightly. “He’s evaded us... gone underground... disappeared along with Wyler. An order has been issued to the Marin County sheriff to pick up the Grimes woman on an open warrant. He should be knocking on her door even while we’re talking now. Taking her into custody guarantees she will remain incommunicado. We’ve got our butts in a real tight crack this time, Nick.”

In this case, I didn’t consider it an honor to be part of the collective “we” that included the president of the United States. “What’s next?” I asked.

“Some fast footwork back here to start with. The drill I’ve set up will give us a computer readout of the names of North Vietnamese who are potential targets. Not just those in Hanoi — I mean any who were directly associated with American POWs. There are two still in the U.N. delegation in New York. Five live in Paris. Others are scattered around. In a very discreet and indirect manner through third parties, we’re going to have them alerted. In a few cases we’ll be providing protection although the subjects won’t be aware of it. We don’t want an epidemic of North Vietnamese assassinations traced back to the White House. The best way to stop the tentacles of an octopus is to paralyze its brain. We’ve got to get to Martin wherever he is.”

I knew that by now Hawk had already tapped my best lead. “What did Quantas come up with?” I asked.

“His name wasn’t on any San Francisco departing flight manifests. Naturally, he’d use a phoney. We’re going to have to do it the hard way. That’s been put in motion.”

“So I just stand by?”

“For the moment, Nick.” He paused to choose his words. When Hawk does that, I generally don’t like what I’m going to hear. He didn’t disappoint me. “This effort we’re mounting back here is still badly disorganized. For a couple of reasons, I’m going to make some adjustments you may not like.” He was telling me in advance that he didn’t want to hear any protests.

“I’m listening.”

“With Layton and Wyler unaccounted for, I’m a little concerned. Some of their friends out there may look you up. Treat them gently if they do. To guard against any unexpected confrontations that might come at you from your blind side, I’ve arranged for some backup... a real pro who’s been helpful on a part-time basis in the past. Hold on again.”

Hawk knew I had strong feelings about being teamed up with anyone. I worked best by myself and Hawk generally kept it that way. I wanted to discuss this development further.

The wait was a short one. The voice that came back on the line wasn’t Hawk’s. It was female. The lazy southern drawl reminded me of Ginger Bateman. “Mr. Hawk was called upstairs to the Oval Office, suh. He asked me to tell you — let’s see now — oh, yes, it’s heah on this card. An odd name. Chinese, I think.” After pausing, she said, “Wee Low Kiang. Black hair, brown eyes, five feet eleven inches, age twenty-eight—”

“That’s fine,” I interrupted. “I’ll hold on until Mr. Hawk comes back.”

“Oh, he said you shouldn’t wait. Ah’m supposed to tell you that you’ll be met at your hotel. Did Ah get that straight? You were going back to a hotel?”

“What else?”

“Graduate of UCLA in Physical Educa—”

“Forget the card!” I snapped. “What did Mr. Hawk say?”

The magnolia-and-peaches voice took on a sharper tone. “If Ah remember correctly, suh, the only other thing he said was ‘Tell him good night.’ ”