cicada

Chapter 1041 Being Tracked

The next morning.

Zuo Zhong walked out of the hotel slowly, stood in front of the door, looked left and right, raised his foot, crossed the road and walked unhurriedly in one direction.

At this time, it was already November 1939. In the subtropical port city, the temperature was maintained at around 11 degrees Celsius, and the climate was still pleasant.

Walking on the bustling streets, listening to dialects from all over the Republic of China, he seemed to have returned to Jinling or Shanghai before the war.

While admiring the various scenes of the city in the port city, Zuo Zhong used various small methods to observe behind him and the surrounding area, and slowly approached the dead mailbox that communicated with Dong Qiang.

Dead mailbox.

As the name suggests, it refers to the unmanned handover point in intelligence activities, which is mainly used for information transmission between intelligence personnel and informants, and can also be used for receiving funds and equipment supplies.

It can also be used as a place to obtain instructions and hideouts when encountering unexpected problems. For example, it is agreed that in the event of an accident, the address of the safe house will be placed in a dead mailbox.

This kind of dead mailbox can only be used once. After setting it, it will enter a silent state. Once it is enabled, it will be completely invalid.

In addition, agents will deliberately set up some fake dead mailboxes during intelligence activities to confuse the enemy or serve as an early warning.

In this way, the rapid transfer of intelligence can be achieved, and the current handover method can be avoided, which is naturally very popular with the intelligence agencies of various countries.

Military command is no exception, which can minimize risks and human resources, and is especially suitable for long-term latent intelligence personnel.

As an independent mole, Dongqiang does not have direct contact with Gangcheng Station, and his daily activities are all completed by the dead mailbox, and only one subordinate traffic officer is responsible for sending and receiving information.

After Zuo Zhong arrived in Hong Kong City, he immediately activated the backup dead mailbox to meet the needs of contacting Dong Qiang during his stay in Hong Kong.

Although this is not under the control of the Japanese, the political department of the British is not vegetarian, and the risk of directly using the telephone to communicate is very high.

On the way to the dead mailbox, he secretly carried out anti-tracking operations, and made sure that there were no stalkers around, and then walked towards the Star Ferry Pier in Central.

This pier undertakes the cross-sea ferry business from Hong Kong Island to the Kowloon Peninsula, and a large number of passengers travel between the two places every day.

After buying a ticket at the pier, Zuo Zhong boarded the boat and found a seat at random, and sat down, his eyes glanced at the passengers in the cabin, and then turned his head to look at the calm sea.

Generally speaking, dead mailboxes can be divided into three types: fixed, movable, and portable.

Stationary is the most commonly used type and is often a specific location.

For example, a real mailbox, a rental house or a public telephone booth, a toilet water tank in a hotel, a small tree hole under a big tree in a park, behind a tombstone in a tomb in the suburbs, in the gap behind the mirror in a public toilet, or under a seat in a public place , trash cans that won't be pulled away by cleaners for a few hours, etc.

It's just that this kind of dead mailbox has a certain risk of exposure, and the risk does not come from people. The ubiquitous animals will bring unexpected troubles to intelligence personnel.

Later generations have a true story:

The Fourth Bureau of the Red Russian General Staff, that is, the GRU, set up a dead letter box in a tree hole in a park in downtown Washington for information transmission.

Every day during the lunch break, a spy lurking in a certain palace in the United States would throw a file bag containing confidential documents into a tree hole.

After he left, Red Russia's agents would take the documents, and then make a secret photo copy in a nearby car, and then send the documents back to the tree hole, and the spies just retrieved the documents.

Such unnoticed intelligence transmission activities have continued for many years, and the US anti-espionage agencies have never discovered it, and the status of the mole is getting higher and higher.

Once, when the Red Russian agents were about to pick up the documents, they suddenly found a blank piece of paper falling in the air. When they picked it up, they found that it had the imprint of "Top Secret".

The agent looked up and saw dozens of sheets of paper flying above his head. It turned out that the squirrels in the park who were preparing to spend the winter lived in this tree hole with a "dead letter box". Torn to shreds...

The Red Russian agent was frightened, and hurried to pick up the fragments of the document. Tragically, an American policeman ran over after seeing this. It is estimated that the Red Russian agent wanted to die at the time, and was too scared to move.

Then, a dramatic scene appeared. Instead of arresting the man, the policeman bent down to help the Red Russian agent pick up the documents.

——The other party took the Red Russian agent as a staff member of a certain palace, and came here to flatter Ma P.

There are many mountains and forests near Hong Kong City, and there are various small animals in the city, so this type of dead mailbox is not suitable for Zuo Zhong and Dong Qiang.

As for the portable dead letter box.

It is to use portable and easily discarded items and containers as carriers to transmit information, such as empty cans, empty wine bottles, empty cigarette cases or empty cartons, or even a special stone.

Intelligence agents usually leave them in places where ordinary people can see them, but they don't arouse any interest, such as roadsides and grass.

It's just that it's not suitable for a port city with a very high population density. If Dongqiang throws something on the ground, it will be picked up by refugees in less than half a minute.

Therefore, there is no best way, only the most suitable way. Intelligence joints should be adapted to local conditions and cannot be copied mechanically.

The mobile dead letter box refers to putting information in the corner of a certain seat on a specific bus, ship, plane, train or subway.

This is the dead mailbox that Zuo Zhong and Dong Qiang communicated with. The Star Ferry has the most traffic, so it is safer to release or retrieve information.

However, after Zuo Zhong inspected the surrounding situation, he found that there were two suspicious passengers on the ship. The other passengers were either resting with their eyes closed or enjoying the scenery, but the attention of these two people was on other people┴.

Dongqiang has a problem?
No, if the other party has a problem, it is not two people.

After scanning the two suspicious people looking around, Zuo Zhong walked out of the cabin to the stern, took out a cigarette, lit it and took two puffs.

When the cigarette was half smoked, seeing that the ship was about to reach the Tsim Sha Tsui pier, he put the cigarette butt halfway on a pile of canvas, and then walked back to the cabin as if nothing had happened.

Not long after, the cigarette butt burned slowly to the tail, the high temperature ignited the engine oil on the canvas, and an inconspicuous blue smoke slowly rose.

"Well, fire candle! (Not good, it's on fire)"

Someone suddenly yelled in Cantonese, and the passengers in the cabin got up one after another. When they saw the fire at the stern, they panicked and ran towards the bow desperately.

Facing the flood of passengers, the two suspicious persons were quickly squeezed out by the chaotic crowd and lost their observation vision.

The left was mixed in, and when passing the wooden box where the lifebuoy was suspended, his right hand quickly touched the bottom of the wooden box, and then mixed in with the passengers.

At this time, the passenger ship docked, and several Chinese staff members carried water hoses and poured water on the flames, and the panicked passengers dispersed.

Zuo Zhong walked behind a fat passenger, dodged left and right, left the Tsim Sha Tsui pier smoothly, and easily got rid of two suspicious people.

two hours later.

In the Western District of Hong Kong Island, in a photo studio opened by an American, Zuo Zhong, who rented a darkroom for a lot of money, walked out of the shop slowly.

There was no way, it was inconvenient not to do anything on his own territory, and only foreigners had the equipment for developing microfilm, so he could only take one risk.

But Americans have an advantage, as long as the money is sufficient, the other party is willing to provide all legal or illegal services┴, just two words-dedication.

After a few laps in the alley near the photo studio, Zuo Zhong returned to the hotel, walked into the room and turned on the desk lamp, took out a magnifying glass and looked at a stack of photos.

The first thing I saw was a shift schedule.

Whether it is the name of the cruise ship, the place of departure, or the estimated time of arrival, it is the same as the schedule provided by Chao Hou, without any omissions or mistakes.

Seeing this, Zuo Zhong nodded slightly, which meant that Chao Hou and Dong Qiang were reliable for the time being and had not betrayed the army and the government, so the following actions can be used with confidence.

Next, a piece of paper with words appeared in the photo, the content on it made Zuo Zhong startled, his eyes fixed on the line of words.

"The inspector of the Shanghai International Settlement, Kuang Fu'an, came to Hong Kong to look for relatives. He passed the Sheung Wan Ferry Terminal. His identity and motives were suspicious, and he was followed by others. Equator."

Kwong Fuan also came to Hong Kong City?

For this person, Zuo Zhong felt a little familiar when they first met, until the time he cooperated with the underground party to rescue the martyr's orphan "Xiao Bao" from Shanghai, he discovered something.

That day in the reeds, he and Gui Youguang wiped out the traitors who came to hunt them down, "Xiaobao"'s father suddenly appeared and said thank you.

If he heard and read correctly, Kuang Fuan's voice and body shape were surprisingly similar to the captain of the red team.

This is interesting, the inspector in the concession may be an operative of the underground party, the British have lost their eyes this time.

In addition, on the "Yankee", he once received a secret message from Old K. In that message, the other party expressed the hope that "Tiu Chan" could provide information on the activities of the military commander in Hong Kong City.

When the two are combined, the possibility of Kuang Fuan being an underground party rises sharply.

It seems that the underground party also got the information that Yan Baichuan was negotiating peace with the Japanese, so they sent the most elite red team leader, and even activated "Tiu Chan".

If the situation was not serious, the opponent would never have played these two "trump cards".

It is understandable that Northwest and Yan are neighbors. Once the Japanese colluded with the Jin army, Northwest would bear the brunt.

After rubbing the photos for a while, Zuo Zhong destroyed the photos as usual, sat there thinking for a while, got up and went to the next door to call Gui Youguang to give him an order.

"Youguang, leave the hotel separately and go to Sheung Wan pier, make up for investigation, familiarize yourself with the surrounding terrain, and formulate a tracking plan.

It should be noted that there is a gap between the abilities of the members of the Gangcheng station and the brothers in the headquarters, and you need to prepare several contingency plans. "

"clear."

Gui Youguang nodded, he was an expert in action, he didn't ask unnecessary questions, and immediately turned around to prepare.

Watching the big bald head walk away, Zuo Zhong changed a set of clothes, walked out of the hotel again and moved towards the Sheung Wan pier, and bought some camouflage supplies at the shops along the way.

When he reappeared, he had already been labeled Rendanhu, put on glasses, and came to the ticket office at the pier dressed as a Japanese, and the language he used was changed to English with a Japanese flavor.

After learning that there was no vacant seat on the cruise ship heading to Tokyo, Zuo Zhong left the ticket office and walked into a theater to find a place to sit down, silently playing to the beat of the Cantonese opera on stage.

After a long time, he took out a few banknotes and put them on the table, got into the alley, turned left and right to a remote place, suddenly stopped, and asked behind him in a hoarse voice.

"Friend, you have been with me for so long, why don't you come out and meet?"

(End of this chapter)