Should I tell you now that you're my maijai?

When Orlanda was thirteen her Shanghainese mother had come to see him. "Times are very hard, Lord, our debts to the company are huge and your patience and kindness overwhelm us."

"Times are bad for everyone," he had told her.

"Unfortunately, since last week, my husband's department no longer exists. At the end of the month he is to leave, after seventeen years of service, and we cannot pay our debts to you."

"Eduardo Ramos is a good man and will easily find a new and better position."

"Yin Asian ship ta," she had said: We lose much because of a small thing.

"Joss," he had said, hoping the trap was sprung and all the seeds he had sown would, at long last, bear fruit.

"Joss," she had agreed. "But there is Orlanda."

"What about Orlanda?"

"Perhaps she could be a mai jai. " A maijai was a daughter given by a debtor to a creditor forever, in settlement for debts that could not otherwise be paid to be brought up as the creditor wished, or used or given away as the creditor wished. It was an ancient Chinese custom, and quite legal.

Gornt remembered the glow he had felt. The negotiations had taken several weeks. Gornt agreed to cancel Ramos's debts the debts that Gornt had so carefully encouraged, agreed to reinstate Ramos, giving the man a modest guaranteed pension and help in setting up in Portugal, and to pay for Orlanda's schooling in America. In return the Ramoses guaranteed to provide Orlanda to him, virgin and suitably enamored, on or before her eighteenth birthday. There would be no refusal. "This, by all the gods, will be a perpetual secret between us. I think, too, it would be equally better to keep it secret from her, Lord, forever. But we know and she will know where her rice bowl lies."

Gornt beamed. The good years were worth all the patience and planning and the little money involved. Everyone gained, he told himself, and there is enjoyment yet to come.

Yes, he thought and concentrated on Beauty of the Snow. "Life is very good," he said, fondling her.

"I am happy you're happy, Honored Sir. I am happy too. Your shower was a gift of the gods. I washed my hair, everything." She smiled. "If you don't want me to play the prank yet on your friends, would you care to pillow?"

"Yes," he said, delighted as always by the forthrightness of a Chinese pillow partner. His father had explained it early: "You give them money, they give you their youth, the Clouds and the Rain and entertain you. In Asia it's a fair and honorable exchange. The more their youth, the more the laughter and gratification, the more you must pay. That's the bargain, but don't expect romance or real tears that's not part of their commitment. Just temporary entertain- ment and pillowing. Don't abuse the fairness!"

Happily Gornt took off his clothes and lay beside her. She ran her hands over his chest, the hair dark, muscles sleek, and began. Soon she was making the small noises of passion, encouraging him. And though she had been told by the mama-san that this quad lob was different and there was no need to pretend, instinctively she was remembering the first rule of being a pillow partner to strangers: "Never let your body become involved with a customer for then you cannot perform with taste or daring. Never forget when with a quad loin, you must always pretend to enjoy him greatly, always pretend to achieve the Clouds and the Rain, otherwise he'll consider that somehow it's an affront to his masculinity. Thai lob are uncivilized and will never understand that the yin cannot be bought and that your gift of coupling is for the customer's enjoyment solely."

When Gornt was finished and his heart had slowed, Beauty of the Snow got out of bed and went to the bathroom and showered again, singing happily. In euphoria he rested and put his hands under his head. Soon.she came back with a towel. "Thank you," he said and dried himself and she slid in beside him once more.

"Oh I feel so clean and marvelous. Shall we pillow again?"

"Not now, Beauty of the Snow. Now you can rest and I will let my mind wander. You have settled the yang very favorably. I will inform the mama-san."

"Thank you," she said politely. "I would like you as my special customer."

He nodded, pleasured by her and her warmth and sensuousness. When would it be best for her to come on deck? he asked himself again, quite confident that Bartlett and Orlanda would be there now and not in bed as a civilized person would be.

A chuckle went through him.

There was a porthole beside the bed and he could see the lights of Kowloon in the distance, Kowloon and the dockyard of Kowloon. The engines throbbed sweetly, and in a moment he got out of the bed and went to the cupboard. In it were some very expensive nightdresses and underthings and multicolored robes and rich lounging housecoats that he had bought for Orlanda. It amused him to keep them for others to wear.

"Make yourself very pretty and put this on." He gave her a yellow silk, floor-length chong-sam that had been one of Orlanda's favorites. "Wear nothing underneath."

"Yes, certainly. Oh, how beautiful it is!"

He began to dress. "If my prank works you may keep it, as a bonus," he said.

"Ohl Oh, then everything will be as you wish," she said fervently, her open avarice making him laugh.

"We're going to drop my passengers Hong Kong side first." He pointed out of the porthole. "You see that big freighter, the one tied up at the wharf with the Hammer and Sickle flag?"

"Ah yes, Lord. The ship of ill-omen? I see it now!"

"When we are broadside please come on deck."

"I understand. What should I say?"

"Nothing. Just smile sweetly at the man and the woman, then at me and come below again and wait for me here."

Beauty of the Snow laughed. "Is that all?"

"Yes, just be sweet and beautiful and smile particularly at the woman."

"Ahl Am I to like her or hate her?" she asked at once.

"Neither," he said, impressed with her shrewdness, ecstatically aware that they would both loathe each other on sight.

In the privacy of his cabin aboard the Sovetsky Iyanov, Captain Gregor Suslev finished encoding the urgent message, then sipped some vodka, rechecking the cable. "Haney to Center. Arthur reports the files may be counterfeit. His friend will supply me with copies tonight. Delighted to report Arthur's friend also intercepted the carrier information. Recommend he be given an immediate bonus. I have had extra copies sent by mail to Bangkok for the pouch, also London and Berlin for safety."

Satisfied, he put the code books back into the safe and locked it, then picked up the phone. "Send me the duty signalman. And the first officer." He unbolted the cabin door then went back and stared out the porthole at the carrier across the harbor, then saw the passing pleasure cruiser. He recognized the Ma Witch Idly he picked up his binoculars and focused. He saw Gornt on the aft deck, a girl and another man with his back toward him sitting around a table. His high-powered lenses raked the ship and his envy soared. That bastard knows how to live, he thought. What a beautyl If only I could have one such as her on the Caspian, berthed at Baku! Not so much to pray for, he told himself, watching the Sea Witc/, pass, not after so much service, so profitable to the cause. Many commissars do semor ones.

Again his glasses centered the group. Another girl came up from below, an Asian beauty, and then there was a polite knock on his door.

"Evening, Comrade Captain," the signalman said. He accepted the message and signed for it.

"Send it at once."

"Yes sir."

The first officer arrived. Vassili Boradinov was a tough, goodlooking man in his thirties, captain, KGB, graduate of the espionage department of Vladivostok University with a master mariner's ticket. "Yes, Comrade Captain?"

Suslev handed him a decoded cable from the pile on his desk. It read: "First Officer Vassili Boradinov will assume Dimitri Metkin's duties as commissar of the Ivanov but Captain Suslev will be in complete command on all levels until alternate arrangements are made."

"Congratulations," he said.

Boradinov beamed. "Yes sir. Thank you. What do you want me to do?"

Suslev held up the key to the safe. "If I fail to contact you or return by midnight tomorrow, open the safe. Instructions are in the package marked 'Emergency One.' They will tell you how to prm ceed. Nexta" He handed him a sealed envelope. "This gives two phone numbers where I can be reached. Open it only in an anergency."

"Very well." Sweat beaded the younger man's face.

"No need to worry. You're perfectly capable of taking command."

"I hope that will not be necessary."

Gregor Suslev laughed. "So do I, my young friend. Please sit down." He poured two vodkas. "You deserve the promotion."

"Thank you." Boradinov hesitated. "What happened to Metkin?"

"The first thing is he made a stupid and unnecessary mistake. Next, he was betrayed. Or he betrayed himself. Or the god-cursed SI tailed him and caught him. Or the CIA pegged him. Whatever happened, the poor fool should never have exceeded his authority and put himself into such danger. Stupid to risk himself, to say nothing of our whole security. Stupid!"

The first officer shifted nervously in his chair. "What's our plan?"

"To deny everything. And to do nothing for the moment. We're due to sail on Tuesday at midnight; we keep to that plan."

Boradinov looked out of the porthole at the carrier, his face tight. "Pity. That material could have jumped us forward a quantum."

"What material?" Suslev asked, his eyes narrowing.

"Didn't you know, sir? Before Dimitri left, the poor fellow whispered he'd heard that this time we were to get some incredible information a copy of the guidance system and a copy of their armament manifest, including atomic~that's why he was going himself. It was too important to trust to an ordinary courier. I must tell you I volunteered to go in his place."

Suslev covered his shock that Metkin had confided in anyone. "Where did he hear that?"

The other man shrugged. "He didn't say. I presume the American sailor told him when Dimitri took the call at the phone box to arrange the drop." He wiped a bead of sweat away. "They'll break him, won't they?"

"Oh yes," Suslev said thinly, wanting his subordinate suitably indoctrinated. "They can break anyone. That's why we have to be prepared." He fingered the slight bulge of the poison capsule in the point of his lapel and Boradinov shuddered. "Better to have it quickly."

"Bastards" They must have been tipped to capture him before he did it. Terrible. They're all animals."

"Dida did Dimitri say anything else? Before he left?"

"No, just that he hoped we'd all get a few weeks' leave he wanted to visit his family in his beloved Crimea."

Satisfied that he was covered, Suslev shrugged. "A great pity. I liked him very much."

"Yes. Such a shame when he was due to retire so soon. He was a good man even though he made such a mistake. What will they do to him?"

Suslev considered showing Boradinov one of the other decoded cables on his desk that said in part: "a Advise Arthur that, following his request for a Priority One on the traitor Metkin, an immediate intercept was ordered for Bombay." No need to give away that information, he thought. The less Boradinov knows the better. "He'll just vanish until we catch a bigger fish of theirs to use as an exchange. The KGB looks after their own," he added piously, not believing it, knowing that the younger man did not believe it either, but the saying of it was obligatory and policy.

They'd have to exchange me, he thought, very satisfied. Yes, and very quickly. I know too many secrets. They're my only protection. If it wasn't for what I know they'd order a Priority One on me as fast as they did on Metkin. So would I if I was them. Would I have bit my lapel as that stupid turd should have done?

A shudder went through him. I don't know.

He sipped his vodka. It tasted very good to him. I don't want to die. This life is too good.

"You're going ashore again, Comrade Captain7"

"Yes." Suslev concentrated. He handed the younger man a note he had typed and signed. "You're in command now. Here's your authority post it on the bridge."

"Thank you. Tomorr " Boradinov stopped as the ship's intercom came on and the urgent voice said rapidly: "This's the bridgel There're two police cars converging on the main gangway filled with policea" Both Suslev and Boradinov blanched. "a about a dozen of them. What should we do? Stop them, repel them, what do we do?"

Suslev jerked the sending switch on. "Do nothing!" He hesitated then switched on the ship's intercom. "All hands: Emergency, Red Onea" This order meant: "Hostile visitors are coming aboard. Radio and radar rooms: arm destructs on all secret equipment." He switched the sender offend hissed at Boradinov, "Go on deck, down the gangway, greet them, delay for five minutes then incite the leaders aboard, only them if you can. Go on!"

"Surely they daren't come aboard to sear"

"Intercept them nowt"

Boradinov rushed out. Once alone Suslev armed the secret de- struct on his safe. If anyone but him tried to open it now its incendiary napalm would obliterate everything.

He tried to put his panicked mind at ease. Think! Is everything covered against a sudden search? Yes. Yes we've done the Red One drill a dozen times. But God curse Roger Crosse and Arthur! Why the devil didn't we get a warning? Was Arthur caught? Or Roger? Kristos, let it not be Roger! What ab His eyes caught the pile of coded and decoded cables. Frantically he scooped them into an ashtray, cursing himself for not doing it earlier, not knowing if there was enough time now. He found his lighter. His fingers were trembling. The lighter flamed as the intercom crackled on: "Two mentre coming aboard with Boradinov, two men, the restore staying below."

"All right, but delay them. I'll come on deck." Suslev doused the flame with a curse and stuffed the cables in his pocket. He grabbed a half-empty vodka bottle, took a deep breath, put a broad beam on his face and went on deck. "Ah, welcome aboard! What's the trouble, eh?" he said, a slight slur now in his voice, keeping up his well-known cover. "One of our sailors has himself in trouble, Superintendent Armstrong?"

"This is Mr. Sun. May we have a word with you?" Armstrong said.

"Of course, of course!" Suslev said with a forced joviality he did not feel. He had never seen the Chinese before. He examined the cold-eyed, sallow, hate-filled face. "Follow me please," he said, then added in Russian to Boradinov who spoke perfect English, "You too," then again to Armstrong with continuing forced good humor, "Who's going to win the fifth race, Superintendent?"

"I wish I knew, sir."

Suslev led the way to the small wardroom that adjoined his cabin. "Sit down, sit down. Can I offer you tea or vodka? Orderly, bring tea and vodka!"

They came quickly. Expansively Suslev poured vodka even though the two policemen refused politely. "Prosit, " he said and laughed jovially. "Now what's the trouble?"

"It seems that one of your crew is engaged in espionage against Her Majesty's Government," Armstrong said politely.

"Impossible, tovarich! Why joke with me, eh?"

"We've caught one. Her Majesty's Government is really quite upset."

"This is a peaceful freighter, trading. You've known us for years. Your Superintendent Crosse has watched us for years. We don't deal in espionage."

"How many of your crew are ashore, sir?"

"Six. Now listen, I don't want any trouble. I've had enough cursed trouble this voyage already with one of my innocent seamen murdered by unkn"

"Ah yes, the late Major Yuri Bakyan of the KGB. Very unfortu- nate."

Suslev pretended sullen anger. "His name was Voranski. I know nothing of this major you talk about. I know nothing about that, nothing."

"Of course. Now, sir, when are your sailors back from shore leave?"

"Tomorrow, at dusk."

"Where are they staying?"

Suslev laughed. "They're ashore, on leave. Where else should they be but with a girl or in a bar? With a girl, eh, happily, eh?"

"Not all of them are," Armstrong said coldly. "At least one is very miserable right now."

Suslev watched him, glad that he knew Metkin was gone forever and they could not bluff him. "Come now, Superintendent, I know nothing about any espionage."

Armstrong put the eight-by-ten photos on the table. They showed Metkin going into the restaurant, then under guard, then being hustled into the Black Maria, then a mug shot of him, terror in the face.

"Kristost" Suslev gasped, a consummate actor. "Dimitri? It's impossible! It's another false arrest! I will have my gov"