War of Eagles

FORTY-EIGHT

Hood was not surprised by what Anita told him. He would not miss Chou Shin. The man was a hard-line ideologue who kept China anchored to its backward, isolationist past. Whose agents had helped to endanger his Op-Center field team in Botswana when they tracked a kidnapped priest.

But assassination, if that’s what had happened, was not a policy that Paul Hood endorsed. It was the last and ultimately least effective resort of desperate megalomaniacs. If they did not have the support to accomplish what they wanted through legitimate means, murder was a short-term solution.

“Do you need help with something?” Hood asked the prime minister through his daughter.

“I am concerned about Tam Li,” Le Kwan Po replied. “Your own friend the general might have some thoughts. Perhaps you have your own sources.”

Ordinarily, Hood would be suspicious of a Chinese leader who asked for help from American intelligence. Though the presidential envoy did not entirely trust the man, he believed in him. Le Kwan Po had been caught between two strong polar forces. One of them had just been eliminated. He was clearly looking to restabilize himself and perhaps his nation.

“I will call him when we land,” Hood promised. He did not want to contact him while they were in flight. Rodgers was probably with the marines. The pilots might be able to track his call using the sophisticated electronics of the aircraft. He did not want to give them that opportunity. “In the interim there is someone else who might have some insights,” he said.

Hood called Liz Gordon. The Op-Center psychologist had just gotten home and was feeding her cat.

“Paul Hood,” she said flatly. “I didn’t expect to hear from you again.”

“Frankly, I didn’t expect to be calling,” he fired back.

As a rule, Hood had not been a booster of psychiatry or profiling. He still was not sure it deserved the validity and effort law enforcement gave it. Occasionally, however, it offered useful insights.

Gordon snickered. “Touché. What can I do for you?”

“Has Bob kept you abreast of the situation in China?”

“I read his summary before leaving,” she said.

“There’s been a new development,” Hood said. “The nonmilitary individual was eliminated, apparently by his rival.”

“The man who was hit in Charleston and Taipei struck back,” she said.

“Right.”

Hood knew that Liz would understand his shorthand. There were English-speakers on board the aircraft. The engines were loud but not that loud. Some of them might overhear.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” she said.

“Why?”

“Soldiers are not diplomats. They run out of words and patience faster than other people,” Liz told him. “Where did this happen?”

“At a base in the east.”

“Isn’t this his rocket being launched?” Liz asked.

“Yes.”

“Why isn’t he there?”

“The big man says he is staying at home to oversee the investigation,” Hood told her. “Perhaps he is concerned that the deceased succeeded in his alleged plot to boobytrap the mission.”

“Why wouldn’t he tell that to the PM?” she asked. “If he was responsible for this incident at the base, there is sure to be an inquiry. He will be a likely suspect. Information about a plot against the mission would give our man a reason for having acted the way he did.”

She had a point.

“Do we even know why the deceased went there?” Liz asked.

“No.”

“People tend to confront other people face-to-face for one of two reasons,” Liz said. “Either they are flat-out nuts, or they have a virtuous cause and strength of numbers behind them. Was this man crazy?”

“Not at all,” Hood said.

“Then he must have known something, or had something that he wanted to present to his rival. That’s the information you should be looking for, information that may have been worth killing for.”

“Mr. Hood!” Anita said urgently.

Hood looked over. She was pointing to her father’s laptop. He nodded and held up a finger.

“Liz, this has been helpful. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

“Are you doing okay?” he added as an afterthought.

“Just peachy,” she replied. “Go. We’ll talk later.”

“Thanks again,” he said.

He folded away his cell phone as Anita typed a translation on the laptop. When she was finished, she handed the device to Hood. It was an incomplete E-mail from Guoanbu Director Chou. It had been sent around the time of the explosion. It read:

I have come to Zhuhai to question Tam Li about a deployment being carried out under his command. It is a response to Taiwan’s standard fielding of a non-aggressive military force for one of our launches. I believe the general plans to attack the enemy with overwhelming firepower. He is holding us on the tarmac, not permitting us to contact