Cameron, Marc - Tom Clancy's Shadow of the Dragon

More translation, which, Ryan knew full well, was in place to give Zhao time to compose himself between each of Ryan’s questions or statements. He had no trouble with the language.

“There are things,” Ryan said, appealing to the man’s ego, “that are not for the ears of underlings. I give you my word that I will send my people out of the room and speak to you alone. I ask you to do the same. It will keep me from making an error in front of someone and losing face. We can speak as men and keep our honor.”

Ryan knew Zhao was already thinking through the request while the interpreter translated.

Zhao was smart enough to know that Ryan was giving him an out, to keep from losing face himself. Face, in China, was paramount. And ethics tended to hinge more on if one got caught than whether or not the original deed was right or wrong. If Zhao and Ryan spoke in private, neither man could be “caught” and both could retain their face.

“As you wish,” Zhao said at length.

Ryan kept his end of the bargain and shooed everyone out of the Oval, including Mary Pat. Subterfuge was one thing, but his word meant something.

“I am alone,” Zhao said two minutes later.

“Thank you for this, Mr. President,” Ryan said. “Again, I ask your permission to speak freely.”

“By all means.”

Ryan spent the next five minutes going over what he knew about the submarine, conveniently leaving out any mention of Professor Liu. He commended the brave actions of Commander Wan, executive officer of the 880 —and the brave men who remained at the bottom of the sea.

“May I ask how you discovered them?” Zhao said. “As you know, my people were searching an area many miles from there.”

“A fluke,” Ryan said. “A science vessel dropped a test buoy almost on top of them and picked up noises of the accident.”

“A fluke indeed,” Zhao said. “So you were not shadowing the 880 with one of your Virginia -class fast-attacks? As you have said, it seems one was able to respond from quite close.”

“No,” Ryan said. “I wish we had been. We could have started a rescue much sooner.”

“We will handle any rescue,” Zhao said, an air of hostility creeping in, then fading just as quickly.

“And that is the reason I wanted to speak privately,” Ryan said. “My people believe we should try to work with you to rescue your men in hopes of learning more about your technology.”

“That cannot happen—”

“Please,” Ryan said, “hear me out. You have been very open about the advancement in your quiet propulsion systems. I have a copy of your address to the Central Committee on my desk as we speak. Impressive. Seriously. The thing is, Mr. President, I know you want to save your men. I want you to save your men. But I also know that if I try to step in, you will be forced to protect your military secrets. Leaders must make these tough decisions.”

“Mr. President,” Zhao said. “I believe you may be stalling. For all I know, you are even now sending your Navy SEALs to board the 880 .”

“Let me be blunt,” Ryan said. “Having access to your ring propulsion drive would be nice, but it is not an imperative. Of course, we are always refining, learning, investing in new designs, but our submarines are already among the quietest and most deadly in the world. You had no idea our vessel was even there until I told you. In short, Mr. President, I wish you didn’t have this propulsion system, but I don’t need it. And it’s certainly not worth the lives of all your brave submariners to keep it out of our hands.”

“And Commander Wan?”

“We are happy to afford him medical care until he is ready to fly.”

“I would prefer he come aboard the Xue Long as soon as possible.”

“As you wish,” Ryan said. “I want you to be free to rescue your men. To that end, I am pulling my assets out of the area as soon as the commander is safely aboard your vessel.”

“Just like that?” Zhao said.

“Just like that,” Ryan said. “And you may even tell your people you forced me into it. God forbid there is ever a sea battle between our great nations, because many of our finest would die. This is not that time. The men on the 880 have taken no hostile action toward my country. So save them. Please.”

64

Tim Meyer sent an emergency message to Dot, telling her he had to meet.

She told him to call her instead, on the burner he kept hidden in a fake pipe beside the garbage disposal. Most guys who went into law enforcement or counterintelligence wouldn’t know jack shit about installing their own appliances. Meyer sure wouldn’t. If they did ever search his home, they’d look right past it.

“They arrested Gretchen Pack,” he said, feeling light-headed, elated that he’d temporarily escaped the mole hunters.

“That is fortunate,” Dot said. “They will assume she is their only leak.”

“I don’t know about that,” Meyer said. “I still want out. I mean, they’re pretty serious about plugging any holes after your guys killed the people in Albania.”

“I assure you I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Dot said. She was careful that way, always worried that he was wearing a wire or recording their calls.

“Whatever,” Meyer said. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have said that over the line. But listen … Rask, the station chief in Tirana, has gone dark. Disappeared. Did your guys … you know. Him, too?”

“I said I don’t know, so let’s leave it at that. I still look forward to any information you receive on CROSSTIE.”

“Will that be enough to get me out?” Meyer said. “Seriously, I think my days are numbered. They’re still polygraphing people. I’m not so much worried about that. It just means they’re still hunting.”

Dot paused for a long time. Meyer knew she was still there. He could hear her breathing.

“Yes,” she finally said. “Find us CROSSTIE’s identity and we will take care of you as you’ve requested. Also, I am supposed to ask you, have you heard any talk regarding a special submarine propulsion system?”

EIGHT DAYS LATER

Jack Ryan leaned back in his desk chair, fingers interlaced on top of his head. The trip to Alaska had been postponed indefinitely.

The Russians had provided the Chinese a submarine rescue vehicle to get the marooned crew off the 880 . The Mirage drive must have been so badly damaged that they did not try to take it off the vessel. Hours after the rescue, the departing Indiana picked up the sound of an explosion that they presumed to be the destruction of the 880 . PLAN officials announced that Liu Wangshu was in the hospital, recovering slowly. VICAR’s Russian asset in China, however, confirmed that the professor had succumbed to a massive stroke.

“You think it’s possible?”

Dr. Patti Moon thumbed through a file of schematics and line drawings of the Mirage propulsion system as designed by Medina Tohti.

“I’m not that kind of engineer,” Moon said. “But as far as the sound goes, yes, your idea is certainly possible. I can work with the team that manufactures this to make sure it chirps periodically.”

“But nobody could hear it without special equipment?”

“Right,” Moon said. “We can calibrate something, preferably a hard surface instead of a belt—a bearing, tiny flywheel, some piece that seems integral to the design but really is only there for the chirp. To anyone else it would sound like a biologic.”

“Like a whale or one of those farting cod you showed us in our first meeting.”

“Exactly,” Moon said. “We’ll make it happen. This looks like it would be an extremely quiet mechanism. Absent your invisible chirp, I mean. It should be a simple task for our subs to track anything that has this installed. But the Chinese could never know to look or they’d simply track down the noise and fix it.” She closed the file and set it flat on her lap. “I’d think it would be tough to get the plans into their hands, though, without them knowing, I mean.”