Girl Rides the Wind (21 page)

“It’s not as much fun without Connie. When is she coming home?”

“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” Yuki said. “She’ll be back soon… before you know it.” Ethan shepherded the kids outside before Yuki had a chance to compose her face to match her words. Connie
would
be back, she was confident of that much. But what tidings would she bring with her?

“
E
nough
.” The man stood over the table, eyes fixed on the photograph lying in front of him, sealed in a baggie, edges round from wear. “You are only guessing, but I see her father in her. How could I forget those eyes, the cold stare that murdered my wife and son. Take her outside and shoot her,” he barked to the armed men standing just outside the door.

“No, Tammy,” the woman cried, and nobody moved. “You mustn’t. You are better than this.”

“I’ve waited too long, Hsu Qi. You cannot deny me.”

Danko listened dispassionately to this conversation from the opposite corner of the room, as he examined the sword they’d taken off her unconscious body. The mixture of Mandarin, English and Shan-Tai they spoke had grown familiar to him. After more than twenty years, how could he have failed to learn their ways. Tammy had a point, he had to admit it… and the sword was so far out of Marine Corps regs, at least as he remembered them, only someone like David Walker’s daughter would think it worth the trouble.

There were reasons to doubt it, too. Her eyes were more blank than cold, and he couldn’t shake the feeling that she could only have inherited them from George Kane. Was he merely her uncle, or was he really her father? He ran his fingers over the chrysanthemum design at the base of the blade – this was no ordinary sword – and there were other things that troubled him.

“I don’t know, Tammy, your sister…”

“Not another word.” Tammy glowered up at him. “If you prefer, you can cut her head off with that sword, but my mind is made up.”

“It’s just that… the way she dealt with our men… you saw the video. She could have killed the two squads in the woods without breaking a sweat, and when they had her surrounded in the clearing…”

“You said it yourself,” Tammy interrupted. “She reached for the sword. The camera picked it up.”

“Yeah, but she didn’t pull it out. Her hand-to-hand skills are so good, imagine what she could have done if she’d drawn the sword. Do you really think David Walker could have restrained himself like that?”

“So she’s got a little more self-control than her father, that proves nothing.”

“She’s awake now,” the woman said, glancing at a nearby screen. “You should at least talk to her.”

“Fine. We’ll talk to her.”

Danko followed Tammy and his sister through the dimly lit passageway, rough stonewalls echoing on either side. It wasn’t a natural formation, the marks left by the excavating equipment were still visible, and water trickled down the wall on the left. The source of the water had never failed after all these years. When he first found the underground complex – it seemed so long ago now – Danko had guessed that the construction crews must have dug too close to the only fresh water source on the island. At least it hadn’t flooded the place.

Two armed men trotted on ahead to open doors, and were preparing to secure the prisoner’s room, when Tammy pushed past them. It had occurred to Danko that he ought to enter first, though if she was anything like her father or her uncle, whichever one was which, there wouldn’t be much he could do to contain her. The grainy image of her capture flashed before his mind – practically invincible moments earlier, and the glint of some sort of predator in her eyes when she reached over her shoulder for the sword, until the mere sight of her associate captured persuaded her to kneel… and suddenly passive, she gazed up at the moon as their man incapacitated her with the butt-end of a rifle.
She cares about her friend... she even has a friend.
No, such a person cannot have been raised by David Walker.

Tammy had already started yelling at her before Danko could insert himself into the doorway, nudging the guards inside to make room for himself. Hsu Qi’s hair brushed against his arm as she slipped past him, leaving only a vague, floral scent behind. She favored Chinese fashions, especially the sleek dresses he’d learned were called
qipao
or
cheongsam
, the last time he’d tried to buy one for her… the Hong Kong shop-girls explained to him that the style she favored was no longer current. What did he care for fashion trends? He found what he thought she’d like in a consignment shop, and struggled to explain himself in Mandarin to the old shopkeeper, who spoke only Cantonese.

“Who is this woman?” Tammy demanded in apoplectic tones, while he brandished the photograph under her nose. “What is her name?”

At least he’d learned something about interrogation after all these years – don’t ask what you really want to know first. The girl sat in the corner, her eyes closed, back pressed against the stonewall, the only place in the room where the wall wasn’t blocked by a bunk.
Did she even hear him?
After a long moment in which she exhaled slowly, interminably, she opened her eyes and contemplated Tammy – her gaze silenced him – and then Hsu Qi and the guards, and then finally she noticed him. Her eyes fixed him, black as coals, but something else glimmered there, a passion he recognized even in this dim light, that paradoxical mix of pity and ferocity he hadn’t seen in years. Hsu Qi whispered something in her brother’s ear, and he stepped back and handed the photograph to Danko.

“Do you know the people in this picture?” He knelt next to her, in case she spoke too softly for a room that size.

“I don’t know your name,” she said, in formal Mandarin. “Your hair is going gray, but it’s still you, isn’t it? You’re the man in the photo.”

Danko nodded.

“You knew my father.”

“Yes, I think so, if he’s in this photo. Can you point him out to me?”

“That’s him in the middle, standing next to you.”

“Can you tell me who the woman is?”

“That’s Connie. She’s the one who gave me the photograph.”

“How do you know her?”

“Someone sent her to kill me.” The matter-of-fact tone in the girl’s voice seemed oddly appropriate, especially in light of what he remembered about Connie Savaransky. Perhaps people as cold as her can only be handled with as much
sang-froid
as one can muster.

“Do you know who sent her?”

“A man named Meacham.”

Danko turned to look at Tammy and Hsu Qi, and nodded to indicate that she seemed to be speaking truthfully. He knew Meacham, and didn’t doubt that he might have done such a thing, though exactly why he could only guess at. Perhaps it was a final revenge for the loss of his island fortress. He turned back to look at her again.

“You give up information rather easily for a Marine. You are a Marine, aren’t you, Lieutenant Tenno?” He read the name off her uniform tag.

“You are only asking me about my family, not my unit.”

“How can you be George Kane’s daughter if your name is Tenno?”

“That’s my grandmother’s name. My parents thought it best to conceal my parentage… to keep me safe.”

“From Meacham? What possible interest could he have in you?”

The girl closed her eyes and sat in silence for a long moment, as if meditating on her answer.

“Is this question no longer about your family? Is that why you don’t answer?”

“Meacham labored under a dangerous illusion about me.”

“What would that be?” Tammy intruded into the conversation. The girl glanced up at him, and the sorrow in her eyes almost pushed the two of them back.

“He believed that I… that I am not human. He thought I was the product of some hideous experiment.”

Danko had to reach back to steady himself as old rumors and suspicions came flooding back to him. He’d heard of experiments, of efforts to change people genetically, to clone people, and he knew it was just the thing Meacham would have been up to his neck in. What he hadn’t understood was how closely his friend, George, might have been involved.
Could he have allowed his own daughter to be experimented on?
It was inconceivable.

“Why would he have believed such a thing?”

This answer was even longer in coming – he’d clearly touched a nerve – and yet, she seemed to want to tell them.

“Because my grandfather… and my mother…” She had to stop to collect herself. “My grandfather was crazy, his work… he was a geneticist, and he worked with Meacham. My mother worked in his lab, and… it’s all too complicated, but when the Chinese tried to steal his work, and he committed suicide, my father rescued her and they hid as far from Meacham as they could. They were trying to hide me.”

The girl’s story was fascinating – touching on distant memories that he’d suppressed for so long – but it was preposterous, too. Who’d believe it, if they hadn’t known George and his cousin? More importantly, it wouldn’t do anything to satisfy Tammy’s need for revenge.

“What about this other man in the photo, do you know him?”

“That’s my uncle David.” Her eyes flashed as she said this, some mixture of rage and sorrow glinting in them.

“What became of him?” Tammy demanded. “Where is David Walker now?”

“He’s dead.”

“No, you lie.” Tammy shrieked, now at the limit of his self-control. Danko turned to look at him, to see if he could regain some composure.

“Let
Sifu
talk to her,” Hsu Qi pleaded, and after a difficult moment Tammy acquiesced.

“Men like your uncle David don’t die easily,” Danko continued, now looking into her dark eyes again.

“No, they don’t.”

“How do you know he’s dead? Did you see it, or just hear about it?”

“I killed him.” Out of the corner of his eye, Danko noticed Tammy place his hand on one of the bunks to steady himself. This was difficult news for him to hear, but if it was the truth, he needed to hear it.

“Why would you kill your own uncle?”

“He was an evil man, and he came to kill my children.”

“Your children?” Hsu Qi said. “Surely you’re too young to have had children. When did this happen?”

“They’re not really mine. But I’m the one they depend on in this world. David came to destroy my family, my mother and the family we live with. I had no choice. I loved him, but he was an evil man.”

“You loved him?” Hsu Qi stared at her in amazement. “He was a monster.” The girl nodded.

“I know, but after my father died…”

Danko’s mind reeled at this news. He hadn’t realized it before this precise moment, how much he relied on the thought that somewhere in the world, George Kane lived, and that if he needed to, he could search him out, find him, and maybe die next to him.

“… after my father died, David Walker was all that remained, and he looked so much like him. Monstrous as he was, I killed him. What else was there to do? But I still miss him.”

“How did George die?” Danko was surprised to hear the tremor in his own voice. Maybe no one else noticed.

“He died keeping me safe from the first teams Meacham sent after us.”

“What about Meacham? Is he still hunting for you? I mean, it wouldn’t be that hard for someone with his connections to find you in the Corps.”

“I don’t know for sure, but I think David killed him just before he came for me.”

“I don’t believe you,” Tammy said, after regaining some composure. “How could you kill David Walker?”

“I cut him down with his own sword.” Her eyes flashed as she said this.

“With this sword?” Tammy said, holding out the one they’d taken off her body the night before.

“I don’t think so,” Danko said. “This isn’t the sort of collectible Walker went in for. Judging from what’s etched at the base of the blade, I suspect this sword belongs to the Imperial Household.”

“That sword belonged to a friend. It represents a debt, and once I’ve repaid it, I can return it.” She glanced at all three of them, at Danko who knew that if she had a friend and was capable of recognizing a debt, she can’t be like David Walker, and at Hsu Qi and Tammy who searched her face for a different sort of confirmation. “David came to my home with a team of mercenaries, and with the help of a few friends, who occupied his men… I tore the life out of his chest.”

The tone in which she muttered those last few words froze the three of them, so quiet in that room, but blaring in their ears. Danko picked himself up off the floor and turned to Tammy and Hsu Qi to get a reaction, and maybe a judgment.

“You haven’t told me about my friend, the wounded man who arrived with me. Where is he?”

“Your friend is safe,” Tammy said. “My sister has seen to that.”

“And what about you,” she demanded, now standing, with one hand touching his wrist, the hand he held the photograph in. “Who are you, and what are you doing in that picture? How do you know my father?”

Danko wondered what he should tell her? What was safe for her to know? Hsu Qi took the photograph and pressed it into her hands.

“This is important to you, isn’t it?” she said. The girl nodded, and he noticed what he thought was a tear trembling in her eye. “Keep it safe.” Hsu Qi turned to the others and said, “Leave us alone.” When nobody moved, perhaps startled by the request, and concerned for their lady’s safety, she spoke more firmly: “Everybody out… now, except you,
sifu
Danko.”

Once they were alone in the room, Danko closed the door and, at a sign from Hsu Qi, reached up to disconnect the video camera dangling from one of the light fixtures. The women sat on one of the lower bunks together, but since he couldn’t fit his frame into one of those spaces in a seated position, and he didn’t feel comfortable lying down or dangling his legs from an upper bunk, he ended up leaning against a wall. Hsu Qi explained what was safe for the girl to know about who they were.

“Our people, the Shan, have been persecuted for decades by the Burmese junta. Our father organized the first military resistance, before my brother and I were born. But the only way to fund his operations was to take over the drug trade in the Golden Triangle.”

“Khun Sa chased out the smuggling rings and organized the poppy farmers,” Danko added.

“Unfortunately, once he got involved in the drug trade, he was unable to extricate himself from it.”

“He even offered to suppress poppy farming in the Golden Triangle in exchange for US military support,” Danko said. “But the people sent to negotiate the deal used the occasion to try to assassinate him.”