By August 1971, Mao's distrust of Lin Biao was reaching the breaking point. Xie Jingyi, the deputy director of the revolutionary committee in control of Qinghua University, had told him about a secret spy organization that Lin's son, Lin Liguo, had set up in the air force. Consisting of several units, code-named “the joint fleet,” the “Shanghai small group,” and the “instruction guidance brigade,” the underground groups were conspiring to take power from Mao. Xie Jingyi's husband, Xiao Su, an officer on the staff of the air force headquarters, was warning Mao to be careful. The Chairman needed to shore up his own support in the military.

Lin Biao's personnel appointments had been made largely at the center. Most of his supporters were in Beijing. Mao thought the loyalty of the regional and provincial-level military commanders still rested with him. “I don't think the regional commanders will side with Lin Biao,” he told me. “The People's Liberation Army won't rebel against me, will it? Anyway, if they don't want my leadership, I'll go back to Jinggangshan and start another guerrilla war.”

On August 14, he decided to make sure of the regional commanders' support.

We left in his special train that day, heading south and stopping at Wuhan, Changsha, Nanchang, Hangzhou, and Shanghai, meeting secretly with party, government, and military leaders. Mao's message to all the groups was the same: At the Lushan conference, someone had been in a big hurry to take over as chairman of the republic. That person was trying to split the party and grab power for himself. The problem had still not been solved.

Mao never attacked Lin Biao by name, but the object of his accusations was unmistakable. It was well known that Mao did not like Lin's grab for power, and he had become overtly suspicious of the cult of personality Lin was pushing with such apparent enthusiasm. “There is someone who says genius appears in the world only once in several hundred years, and in China such genius has not come along in several thousand,” Mao quipped. “This does not accord with reality. There is somebody who says he wants to support me, elevate me, but what he really has in mind is supporting himself, elevating himself.” The “somebody” was obviously Lin Biao.

Mao was suspicious, too, of the power Ye Qun had over her husband. “I have never approved of the idea of letting one's wife be in charge of one's office,” he said. “But Ye Qun is in charge of Lin Biao's office. Huang Yongsheng, Wu Faxian, Li Zuopeng, and Qiu Huizuo all have to go through her to get to Lin Biao. A person should depend on himself to do his work—reading and commenting on documents. Don't depend on secretaries. Don't give secretaries a lot of power.”

There was urgency in his words. This was not only a power struggle but an attempt to do away with Mao's leadership and tear the party asunder. He held Lin Biao responsible. But he was still willing to compromise, to rely on “education” rather than force to reunite the party—“curing the illness to save the patient,” he called it. “We should try to save Lin Biao. No matter who makes mistakes, we cannot disregard the necessity of unity. It doesn't look good. After I return to Beijing, I'll look up Lin Biao and his followers and ask for a talk. If they don't look for me, I'll look for them. We may be able to salvage some of them, but not others?…”

We were away from Beijing for almost a month, arriving at the special train station in Beijing's Fengtai county at dusk on September 12, 1971. Before returning to Zhongnanhai, Mao met with the leaders of Beijing municipality and the Beijing Military Region, reiterating his concerns about Lin Biao. We arrived at Zhongnanhai at about eight in the evening. There was no particular urgency about his talks in Beijing and nothing untoward about his return.

I was still in Mao's residence at the swimming pool, helping with the details of unpacking, when Wang Dongxing received a phone call from Beidaihe. It was a little after ten at night.

The call was from Zhang Hong, a deputy commander of the Central Garrison Corps. Zhang had just received an urgent communication from Lin Biao's daughter, Lin Liheng, whom we called by her familiar name, Lin Doudou. Ye Qun and Lin Liguo had kidnapped Lin Biao and were forcing him to flee.