The Chinese Assassin by Anthony Grey

power because they detested or loved the slant of another’s eyes! Much had changed for the better in the lives of the ordinary people. But it was a precarious change. The great unknowing masses were still helpless prey to the caprices of the secret court of the modem Son of Heaven, Mao Tse-tung.
    These desolate thoughts whirled in my head like a thousand blind bats, driving me towards a black brink of hopelessness. But the realisation that perhaps Marshall Lin might be suffering a worse brainstorm of despair sent me dashing suddenly from my room to the house where he was quartered.
    Yeh Chun attempted to prevent me entering. She said he had retired to a darkened room in seclusion and had given strict instructions to allow entry to no one. In my panic I forced my way roughly past her and broke down the door of his retreat.
    The curtains bad been drawn across the windows and the room was in darkness. In the gloom I saw Marshall Lin slumped over his desk with metal spikes jutting from his head. I ran forward with a cry. He had already taken his life with the aid of some terrible crown of torture1 I was convinced. But as I approached he raised his head slowly and stared at me.
    He had tied a cloth band tightly round his forehead from which several thin spikes of wood and metal protruded. With a flood of relief I recognised the ancient brain-strengthening device of old China which I had seen him use only once before at a period of great stress during the Korean War. In his despair he had fallen back on his traditional belief that wood, metal and cloth, applied to the head under pressure, can have a curative effect. I reached out and gripped his thin shoulder in a gesture of encouragement. But he didn’t move or respond. Then I saw the revolver lying on the desk beside him—that same silver gun given to him by Stalin. He continued to stare blankly in front of him and I picked up the weapon quickly an d locked it away in. a drawer. I closed the door, then returned to sit down by the desk in the semi-darkness. For a long time we sat together in silence.
    When finally he spoke, his voice was hollow and lifeless. ‘The enemy have opened their mouth. Either they swallow us up, or we swallow them. There is no other way.’
    I placed my hands on his arm, cautioning him to silence. ‘The room will almost certainly be monitored,’ I whispered.
    He didn’t seem to hear me. In the pale light filtering through the curtains I could see the wood and metal spikes still sticking out all around the crown of his h ead. ‘This is a life and death struggle now. He’s using his old tactics of winning over one group and striking at another. Today he woos A and strikes at B. Tomorrow he will woo B and strike at A. Today he talks sweetly to those whom h e wishes to win over, but tomorrow he charges them with non - existent offences and condemns them to death. A man can be his guest one day but his prisoner the next.’
    His voice trailed off and I put my fingers to my lips and motioned him again to silence. But be ignored me, still staring wide-eyed into the empty darkness. ‘Has anyone promoted by him escaped a political death sentence later? Has any political force been able to co-operate with him from beginning to end?’
    He paused and I could see him shaking his head mutely in answer to his own questions. ‘We’ve all closed our eyes so long to the truth, but his secretaries have all been arrested or committed suicide. All his confidants have been sent to prison.’ His voice broke with bitterness. ‘Even a son begotten by him was driven insane,’
    I rose from my chair and began pacing back and forth across the room in my anxiety that he should say nothing more that could later be used against us. But Marshall Lin seemed oblivious to good sense and his voice ram bl ed on. ‘He takes a strange delight in m altreating others, doesn’t he? His philosophy is extremism. Once he thinks someone is his enemy he will blame all evil deeds on