Carl Hiaasen - A Death in China

Someone tapped on the door.

"More tea?"

"No, thank you," Stratton said, surprised at the sound of hard-learned English.

"Can you tell me when we're leaving?"

The door opened. "Now," said the man in the Mao cap. He pointed a Russian-made pistol at Stratton's face. The American raised his arms. Liao followed Deng through the door.

The three men stood awkwardly together in the small compartment, Stratton awaiting directions. He could not believe they would shoot him on a crowded morning train.

"Where to?" he asked after a few moments.

"Off train," Deng said, but he didn't move.

"Nose broke," Liao said with a perceptive sneer. He pointed at Stratton's face.

"Yeah, well, I'm sorry about your pet snake," Stratton muttered.

Deng lowered the pistol from Stratton's head and held it at waist level, trained on the American's midsection.

"I'll go quietly, don't worry," Stratton said. The Chinese traded glances. "How long are we going to stand here?" Stratton asked.

"Go now," said Deng, pulling the trigger.

The bullet lifted Tom Stratton and propelled him backward into the wall of the compartment. His head cracked against a steel bunk and he rag-dolled forward into a heap on the floor. Day became night. The Chinese demons screamed in Stratton's ears until his mind went limp and cold in a terrible sleep.

"We've got a pair of nasty little problems on our hands, don't we?" The station chief drummed his pudgy gray fingers on the desk. He let out a sigh of disgust.

"Wang Bin and Stratton."

Linda Greer was reading a file. She wore glasses, forcing herself to fix on the words. She fought off despair.

"Why did the deputy minister want your friend out of the country so badly? Think of it: We tell him quite politely that Mr. Stratton will not be accompanying his brother's body back to the United States-and what does he do? He sends a couple of goons to the hotel. Why?" The station chief did not wait to hear any theories. "Because he knows. Linda, somehow Wang Bin got hold of Stratton's service record. He knows about Man-ling."

Linda shook her head slowly and set the file on the desk. "It's more than that.

It's got to be."

"Damn, the coffee's cold already. Why does it have to be more than that?"

"Suppose Wang Bin knows about Stratton's brief incursion back in 1971," Linda began. "Wouldn't it be easier, and more effective, to make a formal request: 'This man is an undesirable and we would like him to leave China at once'? A sticky little deportation problem, nothing more. We've handled stuff like that in the past. Now this," she said, motioning toward the file, "is pretty clumsy, sir. Chasing Stratton all over the city with a goddamn Red Flag, then trying to run him over in the street… that's not the style of this bureaucracy, sir. It's too messy. Reckless. Something like that might happen in Moscow-"

"In a blue moon!" the station chief huffed.

"-but never in Peking. The police or the PLA could have captured Stratton in a matter of minutes."

The phone rang once. The station chief spoke briefly and hung up. "So what are you saying, Linda? That this was a private matter between Wang and Stratton? An informal abduction?"

"Something's going on, and it's damn sure not just a matter of honor. My guess is that Wang Bin sent those two clowns to grab Stratton, not to kill him. But when it looked as if he would get away, they panicked and tried to run him down."

"Now one is dead and the other's a cabbage. Jesus!" The station chief grunted as he flipped through his copy of the file. "And our Mr. Stratton is missing in action. What a fiasco!"

Linda Greer said nothing. The possibilities were too depressing.

The station chief looked up and asked, "Think they caught up with him at Xian?"

"Yes."

"Me, too. Think he's dead?"

"Probably. We had someone interview some of the other Americans on that tour.

They saw Stratton at the hotel yesterday morning, but he didn't stay with the group."

"Naturally."

"He left with two Chinese, a young woman and a man."

"And?"

Linda took off her glasses and folded them. "This morning, when one of the Americans went to Stratton's hotel room, he was gone. Gone without a trace. The woman who discovered him missing is the same one who gave us the story about the snake."

The station chief smiled slightly, remembering the bland entry in the file, rated "very reliable."

"Ah, that would be the busybody Mrs. Dempsey. She also found the Chinese in Stratton's room. Just tidying up, I suppose. What kind of snake?

"She didn't know," Linda said. "By the time our people got there, the room was clean. There was a little blood on the floor, though. Most of it had been scrubbed away-"

"Was there enough to-"

"Yes. O positive. Same as Tom's." Linda Greer felt very tired. She wanted to go back to her apartment and soak in the bathtub. She wanted to cry.

"Oh dear," the station chief muttered. He gazed out the window; the setting sun painted the tiled roofs of Peking a burned yellow and turned the haze into a pale lemon curtain.

"I took the liberty of filing formal inquiries with China Travel, the tourism bureau, and the others… I don't expect to hear anything, but at least we're on the record as far as procedure goes."

"Yes," the station chief said. "Good thinking. Let's meet again tomorrow.

Noonish. In the meantime, say nothing to Powell. I'm sure he's picked up whispers about that insane goddamn bicycle chase, so just tell him we're checking it out."

Linda Greer collected her purse and briefcase, and headed for the door.

The station chief cleared his throat. "Linda," he called in a softer voice. "I'm sorry about Stratton."

"Thanks."

"What do you suppose he was after?"

"I haven't the slightest idea," she replied truthfully.

For three days the freight train creaked south through plains and farmland, skirting the rugged mountain ranges that rule China's interior. The trip was hot, the train old and plodding, led by a spanking new steam locomotive.

Tom Stratton lay in a boxcar that smelled of ammonia and cow manure. His arms and legs were trussed, and a burlap sack had been tied loosely over his head and upper torso. A dirty wad of gauze had been tightly taped over the nearly circular wound in his thigh. Deng's aim had been perfect; the small-caliber bullet had missed Stratton's hip bone and passed harmlessly through the fat of his upper leg. The blow on the head that had come with the fall had been a bonus for Deng and his partner; it had then been a simple matter to explain the unconscious American tourist being carried off the train in Xian. He had fallen in the compartment and badly cut his leg. He needed medical attention immediately.

Tom Stratton woke hours later to the clanging of rails, the lurching of the boxcar, and the tickle of a small animal scampering across the sack that cloaked his head. It was night. His thigh ached painfully. Stratton guessed that his bunkmate was probably a rat, and he rolled over to frighten it away. His head twirled and his ears rang as he moved; undoubtedly he had been sedated. He lay still and inhaled vigorously, the burlap puckering at his mouth with each breath. The stale air was heavy with musk, but in it there was a sweet tinge of wheat and maize. Stratton's stomach growled in recognition.

Eventually, he squirmed into a sitting position, propped up against a sack of what smelled like potatoes.

It was a small moral victory. Sitting up, Stratton felt a little less helpless.

He wondered why they hadn't just killed him. No esoteric stuff-cobras and the like-just a good old-fashioned bullet in the brain. He felt slightly nauseous but resolved not to throw up in the sack. As the hours passed and his body cried for water, Stratton began to pray that they would not leave him there to die in a vegetable car with a horde of hungry goddamn rats.