The Mandarin Code (24 page)

‘You are kind.' Weng turned to face him and smiled. ‘But I am getting old and the light in this country does me no favours. Soon my country won't have any use for me.'

‘You are being too hard on yourself.' He clumsily reached out to grasp her hands.

‘Don't.' She pulled away, feeling nothing for him, surprised at the cold slap of her voice.

His face hardened.

‘As you wish, Ms Weng.'

She rose from her chair and looked down as she walked past him to the bathroom.

‘Please, Ambassador, close the door on the way out.'

Sydney

The dashboard lights of the Mercedes SLK softly lit Elizabeth Scott's face as she negotiated the sweep left onto Manly Road. It was late and the call, though unexpected, had been welcome. They'd arranged to meet in a carpark near Orso Restaurant, just off the Spit Bridge and a short drive from her Manly home.

Scott had come close to quitting Parliament after being dumped as Opposition leader eighteen months earlier. Her husband had begged her to return to business, where she had made her fortune.

But Scott could not bear admitting failure. She believed she still had plenty to offer and was the best person to lead the Liberal Party, which was being dragged hard to the right by the odious Emily Brooks.

Redemption in the mainstream had come slowly for Scott, though she'd found to her surprise that she'd been quickly taken up by the luvvies of the Left, who saw her as the civilised face of conservative politics. These were the same people, of course, who had pilloried her every move when she'd actually led the Liberal Party.

What had really liberated her was being on the backbench. Better still, her willingness to act as a commentator on her party and leader had put her in high demand with the media. Now, eighteen months after her demise, opinion polls showed she was among the most recognised and popular politicians in the nation.

Scott had learned brutal lessons about politics and she did not intend to play fair. She would exploit her wealth and had engaged a private investigator to comb through her rival's life.

Now the PI claimed to have hit paydirt.

Crossing the bridge, Scott turned left onto Parriwi Rd and into the carpark. She pulled up her convertible alongside a smart-looking Ford.

Thank God someone still buys Australian.

A middle-aged man limped from the car. His demeanour and clothing bore the unmistakable stamp of the ex-copper. He opened the passenger's door of the Mercedes and climbed in.

‘Very nice set of wheels. I'm obviously not charging you enough.'

‘Hah!' Scott wasn't in the mood for small talk. ‘What do you have for me?'

‘Gold. Pure unadulterated gold.'

‘Photos?'

‘Better. Video.'

‘What? How did you . . .? No, don't tell me how. Just tell me what.'

‘I'll tell ya, love. I saw some strange shit in my time at Vice down the Cross but this makes
Underbelly
look like an episode of
Lassie
.'

Canberra

‘Welcome to the best Japanese restaurant in Canberra, Harry; great to see you.'

Akito Mori's familiar shape framed the doorway. He was officially listed as the counsellor for public affairs at the Japanese embassy but Dunkley suspected he was the station chief for Japan's spy agency, the Cabinet Intelligence and Research Office, or Naicho.

‘Akito, nice to see you too. Sorry I'm late. I hope you got my messages.'

‘Don't mention it, just make sure you sign the visitors' book. That is the one thing His Excellency cares about.'

The book lay open on a table in the entrance hall of the Ambassador's residence. Harry had inscribed his name in it many times. He had become firm friends with the previous Ambassador when the two had conspired on a series of stories that had infuriated Catriona Bailey during her first trip overseas in 2008.

Ambassador Satoki Tenaka was waiting in the informal dining room, a glass of champagne in his hand. Dunkley smiled as he greeted the diplomat.

‘Apologies, Your Excellency, I was held up at work.'

‘Harry, you know it's Satoki.' The Ambassador bowed his head slightly as they shook hands. ‘If you keep calling me Your Excellency, I will fear you have forgotten my name.'

Tenaka was of middle height and the flecks of grey in the thick hair framing his boyish face were the only hint of his more than sixty years. Like his predecessor, Tenaka had a storyteller's capacity to make the complexity of the world understandable. Dunkley looked forward to these dinners because he always learned something useful.

After several minutes of chatter about family and work, Dunkley asked Tenaka to revisit a story he had told before, from his years as a junior diplomat in Singapore. The journalist wanted to have the history of China's rise clear in his head.

‘The Chinese were fascinated by Singapore in the late '80s and early '90s and there were many delegations from Beijing,' Tenaka said. ‘Deng Xiaoping was contemplating how to manage the growth of China. In Singapore he saw a state that had everything he wanted: one-party rule; no effective opposition; and, apparently, little corruption. But most important was the social harmony that was ensured because the people were wealthy. And that was the bargain he decided to strike with the Chinese people: “We will make you rich and you will obey us”.'

The Ambassador had exchanged his champagne for sake and he swallowed a mouthful from a delicate cup.

‘So far it has worked, but the Chinese are always wary of their people. They know they are one mistake away from internal unrest. So they need an external enemy to ensure the people focus their anger outwards.'

‘And although we focus on the rhetoric aimed at the US or Australia,' Dunkley said, ‘Japan is the country China has its major grievance with.'

Tenaka put down his cup.

‘We fought two wars in fifty years between 1894 and 1945,' he said. ‘In the first we humiliated the Qing Dynasty and became the major power in Asia.'

The Ambassador took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes, as if he was recalling a personal, painful memory.

‘The second war was from 1937 to 1945. We occupied China and . . . many terrible things happen in war. Some in China think the Americans ended the battle too soon and that China's war with Japan is not settled. There is an anti-Japanese museum in Beijing and although we have apologised many, many times for the . . . excesses . . . it will never be enough for some.'

Dunkley had more than a little sympathy for China's anger. He had been horrified by what he had read about the Japanese occupation and the pictures of countless corpses.

‘Perhaps as many as twenty million Chinese died.' Dunkley knew he was treading on sensitive ground.

Tenaka put his rimless glasses back on and met Dunkley's gaze.

‘As I said, war is a terrible thing. More than two million of my people died in the Second World War. Over 200,000 died when the two atomic bombs were dropped. But America would argue that they ended a war that would have claimed many more lives. Was what they did right, Harry Dunkley?'

That was a question Dunkley had contemplated many times: can brutality be justified for a greater good? He had no answer, just more questions.

‘So is it just history that's driving this new nationalistic push from Beijing?' he asked.

‘No. A large part of it is driven by economic concerns. China's growth is slowing. If the people do not feel the benefits of growth they will see only its costs, like huge damage to the environment and displacement. And they will become restless. Then there is the direct competition between our two nations for energy.'

Tenaka motioned that the journalist should stir some more wasabi into his soy sauce to go with his sashimi, but Dunkley declined. Tenaka shrugged.

‘So this new leadership embodies three things: a real and deep sense of grievance expressed as a determination to retake China's role as the centre of the world; and, on an immediate practical level, maintaining a reliable energy supply and ensuring its people are controlled and directed.'

Dunkley had spent enough hours at the Japanese Ambassador's table to know that the ill-will between China and Japan wasn't a one-way street. Japan's foreign policy was aimed at getting the US to use its power to box China in and restrain its growth.

‘But Japan has its own grievances with China, doesn't it, Satoki?'

‘Japan is only eight hundred kilometres from China. We can feel it. Its rubbish washes up on our shores; its pollution stains our skies. We have economic problems of our own and our key concern is also energy. Since Fukushima, things have got much worse. We have to import 75 per cent of our fuel. So we need secure suppliers, like Australia, and we need secure trade routes. Those routes run through the East China Sea. A rapacious China threatens all that. Never forget, there are two powers in East Asia, Harry, and they are rivals.'

As usual, Mori had deferred to his boss and remained silent for much of the meal. He finally spoke.

‘Things are very bad in the East China Sea, very bad. China is testing us. And we have the views of our own people to consider. We cannot be seen to retreat from Japanese land – it would bring down the government.'

Dunkley didn't doubt it. Tenaka dabbed his mouth with his napkin and pointed to a world globe on the mantelpiece that showed Japan and China facing outwards.

‘And, thanks to the internet, the front line in this conflict is the whole world, as you point out in your many fine articles. But to be frank we are very disappointed with the response of your government both to the provocations we have suffered over the Senkakus and the virtual attacks on your own homeland. We wonder if China's wealth is blinding Australia's government to the very real and present dangers.'

Mori lowered his voice. ‘The battle in Australia isn't confined to the internet. We were most interested in the pictures you published after the union raid on the new embassy. Do you remember this man?'

He handed over an enlarged version of the picture Dunkley had asked his snapper to take of the be-suited man inside the construction site.

‘Yes, I remember him. He clearly wasn't mixing concrete. And he scarpered when I tried to front him.'

‘We know him. He is attached to the Communist Party's Commission for Discipline Inspection. It is a secretive internal investigation unit that interrogates and disciplines party members. It operates independently of the police and is known for its brutality. This man is a Communist Party stormtrooper, Harry. His only role is as a torturer and a killer. So why is he here in Canberra?'

Harry looked long and hard at the picture.

‘I have no idea.'

‘Well,' Tenaka said, ‘as you say. He's not here mixing concrete.'

It was very late when the Ambassador saw Dunkley out. Tenaka motioned to the visitors' book as they walked through the entrance hall to the front steps.

‘Did you sign my book?'

‘Yes, Your Excellency.'

The two men laughed and as they shook hands Dunkley had one final question for the Ambassador.

‘Will there be a war?'

‘We hope not, Harry. But we are planning for it.'