Noble House

by James Clavell

  “Thanks Andrew, but, er, may I have another beer?” It arrived instantly. “So Casey’d come to see me. After she’d told it, almost like she’s told it now, I said, One thing, Casey, Hed-Opticals grossed less than 300,000-odd last year. What’s it going to do this year?”

  “‘Zero,’ she said with that smile of hers. ‘I’m Hed-Opticals’ total asset. In fact, I’m all there is.’

  “‘Then what’s the use of my merging with zero—I’ve got enough problems of my own.’

  “‘I know how to take Randolf Opticals to the cleaners.’

  “‘How?’

  “‘22 percent of Randolf’s is owned by three men—all of whom despise Toffer. With 22 percent you could get control. I know how you could get their proxies, and most of all, I know the weakness of Toffer.’

  “‘What’s that?’

  “‘Vanity, and he’s a megalomaniac, but most of all he’s stupid.’

  “‘He can’t be stupid and run that company.’

  “‘Perhaps he wasn’t once, but now he is. He’s ready to be taken.’

  “‘And what do you want out of this, Casey?’

  “‘Toffer’s head—I want to do the firing.’

  “‘What else?’

  “‘If I succeed in showing you how … if we succeed in taking over Randolf Opticals, say within six months, I’d like … I’d like a one-year deal with you, to be extended to seven, at a salary you think is commensurate with my ability, as your executive vice-president in charge of acquisitions. But I’d want it as a person, not as a woman, just as an equal person to you. You’re the boss of course, but I’m to be equal as a man would be equal, as an individual … if I deliver.’”

  Bartlett grinned and sipped his beer. “I said, okay you’ve got a deal. I thought, what’ve I got to lose—me with my lousy three-quarter million and her with her nothing zero balance for Randolf Opticals in six months, now that’s one helluva steal. So we shook, man to woman.” Bartlett laughed. “First time I’d ever made a deal with a woman, just like that—and I’ve never regretted it.”

  “Thanks, Linc,” Casey said softly, and every one of them was envious.

  And what happened after you fired Toffer, Dunross was thinking with all the others. Is that when you two began?

  “The takeover,” he said to Bartlett. “It was smooth?”

  “Messy, but we got blooded and the lessons I learned, we learned, paid off a thousand percent. In five months we’d control. Casey and I had conquered a company 53½ times our size. At D-hour minus one I was down to minus 4 million dollars in the bank and goddamn near in jail, but the next hour I’d control. Man, that was a battle and a half. In a month and a half we’d reorganized it and now Par-Con’s Randolf Division grosses $150 million yearly and the stock’s way up. It was a classic blitzkrieg and set the pattern for Par-Con Industries.”

  “And this George Toffer, Casey? How did you fire him?”

  Casey took her tawny eyes off Linc and turned them on Dunross and he thought, Christ I’d like to possess you.

  Casey said, “The hour we got control I—” She stopped as the single phone rang and there was a sudden tension in the room. Everyone, even the waiters, immediately switched their total attention to the phone—except Bartlett. The color had drained out of Gavallan’s face and deVille’s. “What’s the matter?” Casey asked.

  Dunross broke the silence. “It’s one of our house rules. No phone calls are put through during lunch unless it’s an emergency—a personal emergency—for one of us.”

  They watched Lim put down the coffee tray. It seemed to take him forever to walk across the room and pick up the phone. They all had wives and children and families and they all wondered what death or what disaster and please God, let the call be for someone else, remembering the last time the phone had rung, two days ago. For Jacques. Then another time last month, for Gavallan, his mother was dying. They had all had calls, over the years. All bad.

  Andrew Gavallan was sure the call was for him. His wife, Kathren, Dunross’s sister, was at the hospital for the results of exhaustive tests—she had been sick for weeks for no apparent reason. Jesus Christ, he thought, get hold of yourself, conscious of others watching him.

  “Weyyyy?” Lim listened a moment. He turned and offered the phone. “It’s for you, tai-pan.”

  The others breathed again and watched Dunross. His walk was tall.

  “Hello? … Oh hel—What? … No … no, I’ll be right there.… No, don’t do anything, I’ll be right there.” They saw his shock as he replaced the phone in the dead silence. After a pause he said, “Andrew, tell Claudia to postpone my afternoon board meetings. You and Jacques continue with Casey. That was Phillip. I’m afraid poor John Chen’s been kidnapped.” He left.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  2:35 P.M.:

  Dunross got out of his car and hurried through the open door of the vast, Chinese-style mansion that was set high on the mountain crest called Struan’s Lookout. He passed a glazed servant who closed the door after him, and went into the living room. The living room was Victorian and gaudy and overstuffed with bric-a-brac and ill-matched furniture.

  “Hello, Phillip,” he said. “I’m so sorry. Poor John! Where’s the letter?”

  “Here.” Phillip picked it up from the sofa as he got up. “But first look at that.” He pointed at a crumpled cardboard shoebox on a marble table beside the fireplace.

  As Dunross crossed the room he noticed Dianne, Phillip Chen’s wife, sitting in a high-backed chair in a far corner. “Oh, hello, Dianne, sorry about this,” he said again.

  She shrugged impassively. “Joss, tai-pan.” She was fifty-two, Eurasian, Phillip Chen’s second wife, an attractive, bejeweled matron who wore a dark brown chong-sam, a priceless jade bead necklace and a four-carat diamond ring—amid many other rings. “Yes, joss,” she repeated.

  Dunross nodded, disliking her a little more than usual. He peered down at the contents of the box without touching them. Among loose, crumpled newspaper he saw a fountain pen that he recognized as John Chen’s, a driving license, some keys on a key ring, a letter addressed to John Chen, 14A Sinclair Towers, and a small plastic bag with a piece of cloth half-stuffed into it. With a pen that he took out of his pocket he flipped open the cover of the driving license. John Chen.

  “Open the plastic bag,” Phillip said.

  “No. I might mess up any fingerprints that’re on it,” Dunross said, feeling stupid but saying it anyway.

  “Oh—I’d forgotten about that. Damn. Of course, fingerprints! Mine are … I opened it of course. Mine must be all over it—all over everything.”

  “What’s in it?”

  “It’s—” Phillip Chen came over and before Dunross could stop him pulled the cloth out of the plastic, without touching the plastic again. “You can’t have fingerprints on cloth, can you? Look!” The cloth contained most of a severed human ear, the cut clean and sharp and not jagged.

  Dunross cursed softly. “How did the box arrive?” he asked.

  “It was hand delivered.” Phillip Chen shakily rewrapped the ear and put it back in the box. “I just … I just opened the parcel as anyone would. It was hand delivered half an hour or so ago.”

  “By whom?”

  “We don’t know. He was just a youth, the servant said. A youth on a motor scooter. She didn’t recognize him or take any number. We get lots of parcels delivered. It was nothing out of the ordinary—except the ‘Mr. Phillip Chen, a matter of great importance, to open personally,’ on the outside of the package, which she didn’t notice at once. By the time I’d opened it and read the letter … it was just a youth who said, ‘Parcel for Mr. Phillip Chen,’ and went away.”

  “Have you called the police?”

  “No, tai-pan, you said to do nothing.”

  Dunross went to the phone. “Have you got hold of John’s wife yet?”

  Dianne said at once, “Why should Phillip bear bad tidings to her? She’ll throw a temperament that will raise the roof t
iles never mind. Call Barbara? Oh dear no, tai-pan, not … not until we’ve informed the police. They should tell her. They know how to do these things.”

  Dunross’s disgust increased. “You’d better get her here quickly.” He dialed police headquarters and asked for Armstrong. He was not available. Dunross left his name then asked for Brian Kwok.

  “Yes tai-pan?”

  “Brian, can you come over here right away? I’m at Phillip Chen’s house up on Struan’s Lookout. John Chen’s been kidnapped.” He told him about the contents of the box.

  There was a shocked silence, then Brian Kwok said, “I’ll be there right away. Don’t touch anything and don’t let him talk to anyone.”

  “All right.”

  Dunross put the phone down. “Now give me the letter, Phillip.” He handled it carefully, holding it by the edges. The Chinese characters were clearly written but not by a well-educated person. He read it slowly, knowing most of the characters:

  Mr. Phillip Chen, I beg to inform you that I am badly in need of 500,000 Hong Kong currency and I hereby consult you about it. You are so wealthy that this is like plucking one hair from nine oxen. Being afraid that you might refuse I therefore have no alternative but to hold your son hostage. By doing so there is not a fear of your refusal. I hope you will think it over carefully thrice and take it into serious consideration. It is up to you whether you report to the police or not. I send herewith some articles which your son uses every day as proof of the situation your son is in. Also sent is a little bit of your son’s ear. You should realize the mercilessness and cruelty of my actions. If you smoothly pay the money the safety of your son will be ensured. Written by the Werewolf.

  Dunross motioned at the box. “Sorry, but do you recognize the, er … that?”

  Phillip Chen laughed nervously and so did his wife. “Do you, Ian? You’ve known John all your life. That’s … how does one recognize something like that, heya?”

  “Does anyone else know about this?”

  “No, except the servants of course, and Shitee T’Chung and some friends who were lunching with me here. They … they were here when the parcel arrived. They, yes, they were here. They left just before you arrived.”

  Dianne Chen shifted in her chair and said what Dunross was thinking. “So of course it will be all over Hong Kong by evening!”

  “Yes. And banner headlines by dawn.” Dunross tried to collate the multitude of questions and answers flooding his mind. “The press’ll pick up about the, er, ear and the ‘Werewolf’ and make it a field day.”

  “Yes. Yes they will.” Phillip Chen remembered what Shitee T’Chung had said the moment they had all read the letter. “Don’t pay the ransom for at least a week, Phillip old friend, and you’ll be world famous! Ayeeyah, fancy, a piece of his ear and Werewolf! Eeeee, you’ll be world famous!”

  “Perhaps it’s not his ear at all and a trick,” Phillip Chen said hopefully.

  “Yes.” If it is John’s ear, Dunross thought, greatly perturbed, and if they’ve sent it on the first day before any negotiation or anything, I’ll bet the poor sod’s already dead. “No point in hurting him like that,” he said. “Of course you’ll pay.”

  “Of course. It’s lucky we’re not in Singapore, isn’t it?”

  “Yes.” By law in Singapore now, the moment anyone was kidnapped all bank accounts of the family were frozen to prevent payment to the kidnappers. Kidnapping had become endemic there with almost no arrests, Chinese preferring to pay quickly and quietly and say nothing to the police. “What a bastard! Poor old John.”

  Phillip said, “Would you like some tea—or a drink? Are you hungry?”

  “No thanks. I’ll wait until Brian Kwok gets here then I’ll be off.” Dunross looked at the box and at the keys. He had seen the key ring many times. “The safety deposit key’s missing,” he said.

  “What key?” Dianne Chen asked.

  “John always had a deposit box key on his ring.”

  She did not move from her chair. “And it’s not there now?”

  “No.”

  “Perhaps you’re mistaken. That he always had it on the ring.”

  Dunross looked at her and then at Phillip Chen. They both stared back at him. Well, he thought, if the crooks didn’t take it, now Phillip or Dianne have, and if I were them I’d do the same. God knows what might be in such a box. “Perhaps I’m mistaken,” he said levelly.

  “Tea, tai-pan?” Dianne asked, and he saw the shadow of a smile in the back of her eyes.

  “Yes, I think I will,” he said, knowing they had taken the key.

  She got up and ordered tea loudly and sat down again. “Eeee, I wish they’d hurry up … the police.”

  Phillip was looking out of the window at the parched garden. “I wish it would rain.”

  “I wonder how much it’ll cost to get John back,” she muttered.

  After a pause, Dunross said, “Does it matter?”

  “Of course it matters,” Dianne said at once. “Really, tai-pan!”

  “Oh yes,” Phillip Chen echoed. “$500,000! Ayeeyah, $500,000—that’s a fortune. Damn triads! Well, if they ask five I can settle for $150,000. Thank God they didn’t ask a million!” His eyebrows soared and his face became more ashen. “Dew neh loh moh on all kidnappers. They should get the chop—all of them.”

  “Yes,” Dianne said. “Filthy triads. The police should be more clever! More sharp and more clever and protect us better.”

  “Now that’s not fair,” Dunross said sharply. “There hasn’t been a major kidnapping in Hong Kong for years and it happens every month in Singapore! Crime’s fantastically low here—our police do a grand job—grand.”

  “Huh,” Dianne sniffed. “They’re all corrupt. Why else be a policeman if it’s not to get rich? I don’t trust any of them.… We know, oh yes we know. As to kidnapping, huh, the last one was six years ago. It was my third cousin, Fu San Sung—the family had to pay $600,000 to get him back safely.… It nearly bankrupted them.”

  “Ha!” Phillip Chen scoffed. “Bankrupt Hummingbird Sung? Impossible!” Hummingbird Sung was a very wealthy Shanghainese shipowner in his fifties with a sharp nose—long for a Chinese. He was nicknamed Hummingbird Sung because he was always darting from dance hall to dance hall, from flower to flower, in Singapore, Bangkok and Taipei, Hong Kong, dipping his manhood into a myriad of ladies’ honey pots, the rumor being it wasn’t his manhood because he enjoyed cunnilingus.

  “The police got most of the money back if I remember rightly, and sent the criminals to jail for twenty years.”

  “Yes, tai-pan, they did. But it took them months and months. And I wouldn’t mind betting one or two of the police knew more than they said.”

  “Absolute nonsense!” Dunross said. “You’ve no cause to believe anything like that! None.”

  “Quite right!” Phillip Chen said irritably. “They caught them, Dianne.” She looked at him. At once he changed his tone. “Of course, dear, some police may be corrupt but we’re very lucky here, very lucky. I suppose I wouldn’t mind so much about, about John—it’s only a matter of ransom and as a family we’ve been very lucky so far—I wouldn’t mind except for … for that.” He motioned at the box disgustedly. “Terrible! And totally uncivilized.”

  “Yes,” Dunross said, and wondered if it wasn’t John Chen’s ear, whose was it—where do you get an ear from? He almost laughed at the ridiculousness of his questions. Then he put his mind back to pondering if the kidnapping was somehow tied in with Tsu-yan and the guns and Bartlett. It’s not like a Chinese to mutilate a victim. No, and certainly not so soon. Kidnapping’s an ancient Chinese art and the rules have always been clear: pay and keep silent and no problem, delay and talk and many problems.

  He stared out of the window at the gardens and at the vast northern panorama of city and seascape below. Ships and junks and sampans dotted the azure sea. There was a fine sky above and no promise of rain weather, the summer monsoon steady from the southwest and he wondered absently wha
t the clippers had looked like as they sailed before the wind or beat up against the winds in his ancestors’ time. Dirk Struan had always had a secret lookout atop the mountain above. There the man could see south and east and west and the great Sheung Sz Mun Channel which approached Hong Kong from the south—the only path inward bound for ships from home, from England. From Struan’s Lookout, the man could secretly spot the incoming mail ship and secretly signal below. Then the tai-pan would dispatch a fast cutter to get the mails first, to have a few hours leeway over his rivals, the few hours perhaps meaning the trading difference between fortune and bankruptcy—so vast the time from home. Not like today with instant communication, Dunross thought. We’re lucky—we don’t have to wait almost two years for a reply like Dirk did. Christ, what a man he must have been.

  I must not fail with Bartlett. I must have those 20 million.

  “The deal looks very good, tai-pan,” Phillip Chen said as though reading his mind.

  “Yes. Yes it is.”

  “If they really put up cash we’ll all make a fortune and it’ll be h’eung yau for the Noble House,” he added with a beam.

  Dunross’s smile was again sardonic. H’eung yau meant “fragrant grease” and normally referred to the money, the payoff, the squeeze, that was paid by all Chinese restaurants, most businesses, all gambling games, all dance halls, all ladies of easy virtue, to triads, some form of triad, throughout the world.

  “I still find it staggering that h’eung yau’s paid wherever a Chinese is in business.”

  “Really, tai-pan,” Dianne said as though he were a child. “How can any business exist without protection? You expect to pay, naturally, so you pay never mind. Everyone gives h’eung yau—some form of h’eung yau.” Her jade beads clicked as she shifted in her chair, her eyes dark in the whiteness of her face—so highly prized among Chinese. “But the Bartlett deal, tai-pan, do you think the Bartlett deal will go through?”

  Dunross watched her. Ah Dianne, he told himself, you know every important detail that Phillip knows about his business and my business, and a lot Phillip would weep with fury if he knew you knew. So you know Struan’s could be in very great trouble if there’s no Bartlett deal, but if the deal is consummated then our stock will skyrocket and we’ll be rich again—and so will you be, if you can get in early enough, to buy early enough.