Shanghai in 1904 was not a city; it was a fractured kingdom, a glittering, corrupt mosaic of competing ambitions. In the grand European-style buildings of the Bund, Western merchants and diplomats conducted their business under the protection of their own laws and their own gunboats, carving up the wealth of China. In the sprawling, labyrinthine Chinese city, ancient secret societies and powerful gangs waged their own wars for control of the opium dens, the gambling houses, and the docks. It was a city of a thousand secrets, a place where loyalties were as fluid and murky as the waters of the Huangpu River. It was the perfect chessboard for a man like Yuan Shikai.
He had arrived from Mukden under the guise of "supervising wartime shipping logistics," a plausible pretext that masked a desperate reality. He was a man caught in an impossible vise. His public sacrifice of his own agents had thrown the bloodhound Shen Ke off his immediate trail, but it had been a costly move, weakening his network and shaking the loyalty of his remaining men. Now, the pressure from his other masters was becoming unbearable. The British were demanding results, proof that their asset could deliver on his promises. And the Germans, his new, unwitting benefactors, were demanding his full cooperation in facilitating the very shipments of war materiel the British were ordering him to stop. He was a triple agent, juggling knives in a hurricane, and he knew that a single slip would be fatal.
His own intelligence network, what remained of it, had confirmed the imminent arrival of the first, critical German shipment. It was a masterpiece of clandestine logistics. The cargo was not on a German vessel, which would have been an obvious target. It was being carried on a fast, neutral-flagged American freighter, the S.S. Ohioan, a ship chartered by a discreet Hamburg-based trading company that was, in reality, a front for Krupp Heavy Industries. The ship's manifest listed its cargo as "agricultural machinery" and "industrial chemicals for textile production." In reality, its hold contained precision machine tools capable of manufacturing modern artillery breechblocks, and several heavily guarded crates of chemical precursors—the very ingredients Dr. Chen Linwei needed for her supernatural weapons program, and the ingredients Meng Tian needed to brew more of his "yellow wind."
The British could not legally intercept a neutral American ship in a neutral port. They needed Yuan to create a pretext, an incident that would allow them to act without triggering a war with the United States.
As if his situation were not precarious enough, a new player arrived on the board. Spymaster Shen Ke, having hit a wall of forged documents and feigned loyalty in Mukden, had shifted his strategy. He knew Yuan was too clever, too insulated, to be caught by direct surveillance of his person. So, he had decided to watch what Yuan's vast network did. Suspecting a link between the death of the Emperor's envoy and Yuan's foreign contacts, Shen Ke had come to Shanghai, the undisputed hub of all foreign intelligence and shipping in China. He would not watch Yuan. He would watch the city, waiting for the serpent to make its move.
Yuan Shikai, his back against the wall, his world contracting around him, knew he could not afford to wait. He had to act. He devised a plan of breathtaking audacity, a gambit designed to kill three birds with one stone. He would sabotage the German shipment, thus satisfying his furious British handlers. He would do it in a way that would make him look like a vigilant, loyal patriot in the eyes of the ever-watchful Shen Ke. And, in the midst of the chaos, he would secretly manage to steal the most valuable portion of the cargo for himself, a prize he could use for his own future ambitions.
He sent a single, coded message, activating a deep-cover cell he had cultivated for years within the dark, violent heart of Shanghai's underworld: the Green Gang. They were the most powerful and ruthless criminal organization in the city, controlling the docks, the unions, and the river traffic. Their leader, a brutal but cunning man known as "Big-Eared" Du, owed Yuan a life debt. Now, Yuan was calling it in.
The night the S.S. Ohioan was scheduled to unload its cargo was thick and moonless, the air heavy with the smells of coal smoke, river mud, and night-soil. The freighter was anchored mid-stream in the Huangpu River, its cargo being transferred onto a series of flat-bottomed barges for the journey upriver. The entire operation was overseen by a team of grim-faced German security men, their Mauser pistols bulging under their coats.
The river, usually a chaotic highway of sampans and junks, was eerily quiet. But in the darkness, three separate, hostile forces were converging on the unsuspecting barges, each unaware of the others' presence.
Yuan Shikai's move came first. A dozen long, narrow boats, filled with silent, black-clad men, shot out from the shadows of the Pudong wharves. They were Green Gang thugs, armed with hatchets, pistols, and a terrifying ferocity. They swarmed the barges, and the night erupted into a chaotic, brutal firefight. The Germans, caught by surprise, fought back with disciplined courage, but they were overwhelmed by the sheer, savage numbers of the gang. The raid was a perfect piece of theater, looking for all the world like a common, if unusually bold, act of river piracy.
But the Green Gang's true objective was not simple theft. Under the cover of the chaotic, bloody battle, a smaller, elite team of Yuan's own men, disguised as gangsters, located the specific, pre-identified crates they had been sent for. They contained the priceless chemical precursors. These crates were swiftly and silently transferred to one of their own boats, which then melted back into the darkness. Meanwhile, the rest of the gang planted canvas satchels filled with dynamite amongst the remaining cargo of heavy machinery, their fuses lit and sputtering.
At the same moment, Shen Ke made his move. He had received an anonymous tip—planted, of course, by one of Yuan's agents—warning of a major pirate attack on the docks that night. He had not come to stop it. He had come to observe, to see who was truly behind such a well-organized raid. His own agents, elite operatives from the Eastern Depot, moved like shadows along the waterfront, their goal not to join the fight, but to capture one of the "pirates" alive for interrogation.
And out on the river, a third boat, a small, unmarked steam launch with its lights extinguished, bobbed in the darkness. Onboard were Mr. Finch and two other British naval intelligence officers. They were here to witness the outcome of the operation their gold had paid for, the tangible proof of their asset's worth. The chaos was far greater than they had anticipated, and as stray bullets began to splash in the water around them, their small boat was forced to pull back, its occupants cursing the unpredictable violence of their Chinese allies.
The three-way shadow war collided in a symphony of anarchy on the dark river. In the middle of the firefight between the Germans and the Green Gang, Shen Ke's agents moved in, trying to isolate and capture one of the gangsters. The battle became a confused, multi-sided melee.
Just as Shen Ke's men managed to corner one of the Green Gang lieutenants, the dynamite on the barges went off. A series of massive, fiery explosions ripped through the night, a chain of brilliant orange fireballs that lit up the entire waterfront. The barges, along with the priceless Krupp machine tools they carried, were blown to smithereens, their flaming wreckage sinking into the murky depths of the Huangpu.
From a private room in a high-end hotel on the Bund, Yuan Shikai watched the explosions through a telescope. He allowed himself a small, cold smile. It was perfect. The German shipment was destroyed, which would appease the British. The whole affair looked like a tragic but understandable act of piracy, giving him a perfect alibi. And, most importantly, the small boat carrying his stolen chemical precursors was already safely hidden away in a secret warehouse. He had done it. He had juggled the knives and survived.
Or so he thought.
In the chaotic aftermath of the explosions, Shen Ke stood on a dark, deserted pier. Before him lay the body of the Green Gang lieutenant his men had captured. The man had been mortally wounded in the crossfire, a piece of shrapnel from the explosion buried in his chest. A doctor was trying frantically to save him, but it was hopeless. The man was dying.
Shen Ke knelt beside him. His face was calm, his voice a soft, almost gentle whisper. "You are a brave man," he said. "You are dying for your brothers. But your leader has betrayed you. He sent you here to die for his own profit. Tell me his name. Tell me who hired you for this night's work. And I will see that your family is cared for, for the rest of their days. I swear it on the Emperor's name."
The dying gangster, his breath coming in ragged, bloody gasps, looked up into the Spymaster's dark, fathomless eyes. He saw not a threat, but a strange kind of promise. With his last, fading breath, he gasped a single name. A name that meant nothing to the other agents in the room.
But to Shen Ke, it meant everything. It was the name of the gang leader who had recruited this man. A man Shen Ke's own files identified as a former army officer, discharged for corruption, who was now a high-ranking, trusted lieutenant in Minister-President Yuan Shikai's personal security network in Mukden.
The trail was no longer cold. The serpent had finally, carelessly, shown its face. The net was closing.