The Chairman

You must be very clever to read Chinese.

Oh, I'm just playing it safe.

Who knows? They might win.

Yes, interesting.

We have one like this quite near Moscow, only about, uh...

One-half the size.

It's amazing, Mr. Shertov, how modest you Russians are in private.

That is because we have just learned from our Chinese friends

the value of keeping face in public.

Fortunately, that isn't all you've learned from the Chinese.

We've given this operation the code name "minotaur."

He was the watchdog of the inner secrets, wasn't he?

Precisely so.

Good morning, general.

- I assume it's morning outside, anyway. - Any signal at all?

Plenty of signal... But also plenty of noise.

Our setup is just too damned potent.

We're getting noise from all over the universe.

Don't be discouraged. Half a billion classified federal dollars can't be wrong.

Not to speak of our British contribution...

About £2.10, I should think.

Where is he? Do we have a fix?

About 210 miles south-southwest of Hong Kong.

Let's hear the bad news.

Uh, good afternoon.

Though I guess it's "good morning" to you fellows.

You're listening, I sincerely hope.

I'd be upset if you weren't.

Now, there's not much to report.

Uh, I assume I'm being watched.

I'm certainly taking every precaution to see that I am.

Coming into China openly this way, via Hong Kong

with an American passport stamped "not valid for China,"

it's hard on the nerves.

I think it would be more restful to drop in by parachute.

Just getting the peaks, the points of high energy.

The dentalizations... d's, t's, et cetera.

You made a suggestion at our last conference.

Yes. Fill in the gaps with uniform white noise.

- Nobody thought much of the idea. - Including me. But let's try it.

The, uh, stewardess

is being very, very attentive.

Which may signify a great deal

or it may simply signify that I'm a very attractive fellow.

Hong Kong is rather crowded this time of year.

I hope you have a dinner reservation.

I'm booked into the King Edward.

- Is that all right with you? - Very famous hotel.

Very British, but very good.

General.

Congratulations.

Oh. Thank you.

This is Dr. Hathaway in London.

Washington? Yes.

Hello, Mr. vice president.

How are you, sir? Yes, I'm calling from London.

Something rather disturbing has come up.

I've had a letter from professor Soong Li.

He's an old colleague and teacher of mine.

We're in the same field.

He went back to China about 10 years ago

and I haven't heard from him since.

Now he writes, telling me that it'll be impossible for me to visit him,

which is peculiar because I made no such request.

All right then. I'll wait to hear from the embassy.

Dr. Hathaway? Would you come with me, please?

I'm Susan Wright, the ambassador's secretary.

He'd like you to take up your problem with the military attaché.

Is that all right?

Suppose I don't have much choice.

Well, Shelby.

No matter how I try, I end up talking to you.

It wasn't my choice, believe me.

Still, I've got nothing against you personally.

- You're a brilliant man. - Thank you.

You're just the wrong brilliant man for this job.

What job? I've got a job.

I know all about it.

You've renewed for another year.

Very attractive woman.

Then I suppose you saw my letter from professor Soong.

- It was shuttled across my desk. - Well, what did you find?

A good grade of rice paper, made in shantung.

A letter after 10 years of silence, general, means something.

Could be. Squares with the Russian information,

which is generally reliable and generally too late.

So they can play their game. Both sides against the middle.

Shelby, I want this understood. I'm out of the game. Out.

My orders are to change your mind.

Oh, Dr. Hathaway.

Shertov. Alexander Shertov.

Well, Shertov.

The last time I saw you was at a cocktail party in Warsaw.

You were then introduced to me

as lieutenant general in the Soviet tank corps.

Correct. I have since been promoted to agricultural adviser.

General Shertov has some disagreeable film he wants to show us.

Yes. Taken by some friends on holiday...

In China.

But now, Dr. Hathaway, watch the top of the picture.

What do you think is this?

- Wheat? - Growing in the midst

of hot, wet, tropical Chinese jungle.

Now we are going to see some pictures

taken in the former country of Tibet.

We found a farm, a pineapple farm.

Pineapples, Dr. Hathaway, growing in ice and snow

at an altitude of 17,600 feet.

Obviously the Chinese are developing an enzyme,

some sort of growth regulator

that completely erases the effect of climate.

They can grow any crops anywhere, in any season.

The Chinese can simply hold out this little, magic gem

and the undeveloped countries...

Asia, Africa, south America,

90-percent starving, 90-percent peasant...

Will crawl all the way to Peking to get it.

Hathaway, all we want is a good sample of that enzyme.

Yeah, sure. Why not? It's all so easy.

Walk into China, mouthful of international goodwill,

locate the laboratory, grab the goodies and out,

fast guns blazing in both hands.

I've got a simple alternative. Name my two kids Chinese.

Look, general, we want the molecular structure.

That's perfectly true.

But it's in three dimensions. Just a little bit complicated.

A single molecule of that enzyme

may have as few as 3,000 atoms

or as many as 400,000.

That can't be memorized. Not even by myself.

That's just as true for your Chinese professor as it is for you.

He has to have it down in black and white...

On paper, on film, whatever...

And our instructions are to get it, any way we can.

I'm sorry. I could do it three years ago.

- I can't anymore. - Good.

I've seen your memorandum.

You disagree with our far east policy.

Well, so do I. I'm a bigoted, narrow, America-first patriot,

so we're on different sides of the same stalemate.

Well, there is something else, something you don't know.

Is that possible?

I lost my wife three years ago.

I read the entry in your record. These things happen.

Oh, no, no. You can't put this on a piece of microfilm.

She was killed in an accident.

I was driving. She was dead in five minutes.

Those five minutes made me twice as old as I was,

but I came out of it with a pathological respect for life.

I can't undertake any job that might oblige me to kill.

Good. We agree. You're the wrong man.

Oh, incidentally, you have an appointment call in three...

No, two minutes with the President of the United States.

Do you want me to call it off?

Bourbon?

Scotch.

Dr. Hathaway.

I didn't vote for him, but I had to admit that he just possibly might be right.

And yet, all he said was, "Dr. Hathaway, sir,

I wouldn't be talking, and you wouldn't be listening

if this were not a job of the most urgent and terrifying importance."

After that, I thanked him.

I hung up and found that I'd forgotten to say no.

So, here I am, general.

Treat me gently. I'm a little more sensitive than I used to be.

Look, Hathaway, this is not a friendly job.

Russia's helping us, up to a point.

China's a lot simpler. China just doesn't like us.

However, you may get lucky and they won't let you in.

But if they do, it's because they need you, and pretty desperately.

Apparently, they process a whole square mile of a Chinese weed,

and all they get is enough crystals to cover the tip of my thumb.

So they need some simple way of constructing their enzyme

out of common materials, and that's your business, isn't it?

I assume they didn't give you the prize for political idiocy.

No, you're the expert they need.

So I must tell you this:

There's a good chance you'll never get out.

However, we've got a remedy for that too.

- What's that? - Aspirin.

And this is our current q-23 transmitter.

Made of plastic. Same density as human flesh.

Therefore it should be quite impossible to detect.

Meanwhile, anything you say and also anything said to you

will be transmitted to London.

Beautiful. In other words, I'm a walking bug.

However, you have an effective range of only 110 miles,

so you've gotta be picked up, scrambled and rebroadcast.

Two weeks before you go, we're gonna put a satellite in the sky over China.

The ingenuity of man... A little lower than the angels.

Where's this thing go? In my belt? Shoes? Sunglasses?

No, it's to be implanted... In the mastoid sinus of your skull.

- What? - Good. You wanna quit?

I'd be stupid if I didn't.

I'm stupid.

Dear Dr. Hathaway, you have my profound sympathy.

I know. It's an international trap.

My government or your government

may decide at some moment to change sides.

- End of Hathaway. - You want my personal advice?