Typhoon

44

“Where is your wife?”

The whispered voice of Ablimit Celil was audible above the screams and gunfire of an American disaster movie. He had taken the vacant seat beside Miles Coolidge at the far end of row Q, entering the cinema shortly after the film had begun.

“She couldn’t make it,” Miles replied. “Women’s troubles.”

He enjoyed taunting Ablimit’s religious beliefs, sexualizing women in his company, occasionally referring to his own agnosticism. He wasn’t going to be dictated to by a fanatic. Miles needed Celil, certainly, but Celil also needed Mike. Without American money and American explosives, he was just another two-bit saboteur.

“You wanted to talk.”

Miles had not yet looked at his agent. Three rows ahead of them, a man wearing a baseball cap was making his way through a tub of ice cream and laughing at a snatch of dialogue on screen. Had he turned around, he would have been met by the incongruous sight of two overweight middle-aged men, one with a thick beard, the other clean shaven, leaning towards one another like lovers in the back row. A vivid montage of flickering light reflected in the blackened eyes of Miles Coolidge and Ablimit Celil as they spoke reverently and quietly, like mourners at a funeral.

“How are you doing?”

“We are fine,” Celil replied. “But we must have more money.”

“So what else is new? Patience, for Christ’s sake.”

“Ansary has been ill. He does not work. He questions the direction we are taking.”

“I saw him last week. Ate a good dinner at Kala Kuer. He looked fine to me.”

Miles popped a single kernel of popcorn into his mouth, allowing it to melt on his tongue.

“I mean he is anxious for action. We all are. We wonder why we are waiting.”

Celil was speaking quickly, in Mandarin, and the whisper of his voice was almost lost amid the wail and crash of an action sequence. The film appalled him, the violence and the blasphemies. He tried not to look at the screen.

“I’ve been working up some possible targets,” Miles said, passing a package across the armrest. Celil placed it on his lap, straining to listen. “Factories. State-owned banks. A Sichuan restaurant in Pudong. I don’t want Americans hit, I don’t want Europeans. We’ve suffered enough.” Not much came back from Celil by way of a reaction, just a blank stare into the middle distance. “I want you to think about switching jobs. Leave Abdul at his factory, but Ansary can take a job washing dishes at the restaurant. I can get you security passes for the banks, access all areas. We have a lot of time.”

Celil sniffed violently. The American’s ignorance of Chinese affairs was still breathtaking to him. “This is not easy for Uighurs,” he said. “We cannot just walk into jobs in such places.”

“It’s all in the file,” Miles replied.

His apparent ignorance was, in fact, a front. After a recent meeting with his contact at the Pentagon, Miles had been persuaded that any successful attack in Shanghai would only strengthen Chinese resolve to protect the Games of 2008. There was also the added, obvious risk of losing the cell entirely. Every Uighur within a hundred miles of Puxi would be arrested and interrogated in the wake of a co-ordinated terrorist strike. Washington therefore had no intention of green-lighting an operation for the forthcoming summer. The information Miles had passed to Celil in the envelope was sketchy, at best; if the members of the cell succeeded in securing the positions he had described, Miles would simply pull them at the last minute, citing intelligence indicating that the operation was blown. He had also slipped fifteen thousand American dollars into the package, which would be more than enough to buy off Celil’s frustrations for several more months. Beijing was now the sole target. Both parties would eventually get what they wanted: the Uighur cause on a global stage; carnage to overshadow China’s precious Olympic Games.

“How are the others?” Miles asked. “How are Abdul and Memet?”

The audience suddenly burst into laughter. Miles looked up at the screen. A character appeared to have fallen over accidentally and was attempting to stand up. The Chinese love a pratfall.

“Memet I never see. Abdul also. It is the way we want it, the way we have always operated. I only know about Ansary because I visit his restaurant and they tell me he is sick. It is too dangerous to be seen with them. We want action. We want to hit the Chinese. We are tired of waiting.”

“And action’s what you’ll get.” Miles was irritated by these repeated calls for progress. The cell’s bloodlust was entirely of Celil’s making; he had brought a new fanaticism to their work. At the high tide of TYPHOON, there had been no undercurrent of religious fervour. The men had regarded themselves as soldiers, fighting for a just cause. Now stalwarts such as Tursun and Bary were no better than the maniacs of Baghdad and Atocha. “You just have to trust me,” he said. “You have to listen.”

“I will listen,” Celil replied.

A hiss went up from somewhere in the cinema. Their conversation had gone on too long. “You’d better get going,” Miles whispered. “Read the file.”

Celil placed the package in a plastic bag and walked out of the cinema. The lobby was empty and he was soon in the main atrium of the mall, descending by lift to the ground floor.

Each of his visits to Paradise City was now of vital importance to the cell. Why? Because they were indeed under new instructions, just as Wang had disclosed. Celil’s apparent obeisance in the presence of Miles Coolidge had been an act; the Americans were yesterday’s men. By allying the Uighur cause to the ISI, Celil had guaranteed frequent and effective action on the ground.

I don’t want Americans hit, I don’t want Europeans. We’ve suffered enough. Wasn’t that just like the hypocrisy of the West? They wreak havoc in foreign lands and then make efforts only to protect themselves. For too long, Ablimit had allowed himself to be blinded by American promises that had never borne fruit. The CIA had aided the cause of Uighur separatism not because they believed in the right of his Muslim brothers to live in their own land, free of Han oppression, but because they coveted yet more oil, yet more gas, to fuel their bankrupt economy.

He looked around him. He looked at the mall. Ablimit Celil saw the evidence of another defunct culture, a China imitative of all that was worst in the West. He thought ahead to the glorious release of 6/11, and was never more certain that he had taken the correct decision.