She washed her hands again and again in the basin, like a doctor going into surgery, and then she held them out in front of her, allowing the water to drip slowly off them. She looked at everyone and then at her own hands. Then she kissed them and said, ‘Today you’ve got to do me credit!’ Then one step at a time she slowly climbed the stairs and sat on the dais in the Calculations Room. I raised my head and let out a deep breath, then calmly watched as she soberly put her hands down on the abacus. The moment she touched the smooth and delicate abacus beads, her hands seemed to take on a life of their own, seemingly moving entirely of their own volition. As the sound of ‘ping, ping, pang, pang’ assaulted my ears, I couldn’t stand it one second longer and I went out to stand in the corridor, leaning my head against the wall, praying silently as I waited for the final result of the calculations.

It was only about twenty minutes or so, but during that time I suffered agonies. Cold sweat and hot broke out on my forehead, on the palms of my hands, my feet … my hair was standing on end. The terror absolutely exhausted me. But it was all already over, and suddenly the most amazing roar broke out from inside the room:

‘Zero!’

‘We’ve done it!’

‘We’ve done it …’

I opened my eyes but tears were blurring my vision. I rushed into the room and saw everyone coming to hug me and Huang Yiyi, crying with happiness …

26

Huang Yiyi’s achievement in cracking RECOVERY was so great it’s hard to know where to start when describing it. After we broke RECOVERY, headquarters was able to round up most of the Taiwanese and American special agents working on the Mainland, as one after the other they blew their cover. People said that at that time Chiang Kai-shek was absolutely set on his plan to ‘Recover the Mainland’, to the point where there was even talk of celebrating his birthday in Nanjing, but that in the end they didn’t do anything simply because we broke RECOVERY. We got rid of Chiang Kai-shek’s eyes and ears on the Mainland, making him blind and deaf overnight! A blind man can’t even walk along the road with any ease, so how would he be rash enough to launch some stupid military operation from the other side of the Straits? The fact that we cracked RECOVERY didn’t just prevent a major operation by special agents, it preserved the security of our country and the peace of its people!