Noble House

by James Clavell

  “Oh—then if there’s anything we could do for her …” Casey said.

  “That’s very kind of you,” he said. “You’ll meet her Tuesday. Perhaps we can talk about it then. I’ll say g—”

  The door at the far end of the billiard room swung open and Dunross stood there.

  Gornt smiled and turned his attention back to them. “Good night, Mr. Bartlett—Ciranoush. See you both on Tuesday. Good night, Adryon.” He bowed slightly to them and walked the length of the room and stopped. “Good night, Ian,” he said politely. “Thank you for your hospitality.”

  “’Night,” Dunross said, as politely, and stood aside, a slight smile twisting his lips.

  He watched Gornt walk out of the front door and then turned his attention back to the billiard room. “Almost time for dinner,” he said, his voice calm. And warm. “You must all be starving. I am.”

  “What … what did he want?” Adryon said shakily.

  Dunross came up to her with a smile, gentling her. “Nothing. Nothing important, my pet. Quillan’s mellowing in his old age.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Sure.” He put his arm around her and gave her a little hug. “No need to worry your pretty head.”

  “Has he gone?”

  “Yes.”

  Bartlett started to say something but stopped instantly as he caught Dunross’s eye over Adryon’s head.

  “Yes. Everything’s grand, my darling,” Dunross was saying as he gave her another little hug, and Bartlett saw Adryon gather herself within the warmth. “Nothing to worry about.”

  “Linc was showing me how he played pool and then … It was just so sudden. He was like an apparition.”

  “You could have knocked me down with a feather too when he appeared like the Bad Fairy.” Dunross laughed, then added to Bartlett and Casey, “Quillan goes in for dramatics.” Then to Bartlett alone, “We’ll chat about that after dinner, you and I.”

  “Sure,” Bartlett said, noticing the eyes weren’t smiling.

  The dinner gong sounded. “Ah, thank God!” Dunross said. “Come along, everyone, food at long last. Casey, you’re at my table.” He kept his arm around Adryon, loving her, and guided her out into the light.

  Casey and Bartlett followed.

  Gornt got into the driver’s seat of the black Silver Cloud Rolls that he had parked just outside the Great House. The night was good, though the humidity had increased again. He was very pleased with himself. And now for dinner and Jason Plumm, he thought. Once that bugger’s committed, Ian Dunross’s as good as finished and I own this house and Struan’s and the whole kit and caboodle!

  It couldn’t have been better: first Casey and Ian almost at once, and everything laid out in front of him and in front of her. Then Havergill and Richard Kwang together. Then Bartlett in the billiard room and then Ian himself again.

  Perfect!

  Now Ian’s called, Bartlett’s called, Casey, Havergill, Richard Kwang and so’s Plumm. Ha! If they only knew.

  Everything’s perfect. Except for Adryon. Pity about her, pity that children have to inherit the feuds of the fathers. But that’s life. Joss. Pity she won’t go out into the world and leave Hong Kong, like Annagrey—at least until Ian Dunross and I have settled our differences, finally. Better she’s not here to see him smashed—nor Penelope too. Joss if they’re here, joss if they’re not. I’d like him here when I take possession of his box at the races, the permanent seat on all boards, all the sinecures, the legislature—oh yes. Soon they’ll all be mine. Along with the envy of all Asia.

  He laughed. Yes. And about time. Then all the ghosts will sleep. God curse all ghosts!

  He switched on the ignition and started the engine, enjoying the luxury of real leather and fine wood, the smell rich and exclusive. Then he put the car into gear and swung down the driveway, past the carpark where all the other cars were, down to the huge wrought-iron main gates with the Struan arms entwined. He stopped for passing traffic and caught sight of the Great House in his rear mirror. Tall, vast, the windows ablaze, welcoming.

  Soon I really will own you, he thought. I’ll throw parties there that Asia’s never seen before and never will again. I suppose I should have a hostess.

  What about the American girl?

  He chuckled. “Ah, Ciranoush, what a lovely name,” he said out loud with the same, perfect amount of husky charm that he had used previously. That one’s a pushover, he told himself confidently. You just use old world charm and great wine, light but excellent food and patience—along with the very best of upper-class English, masculine sophistication and no swear words and she’ll fall where and when you want her to. And then, if you choose the correct moment, you can use gutter English and a little judicious roughness, and you’ll unlock all her pent-up passion like no man ever has done.

  If I read her correctly she needs an expert pillowing rather badly. So either Bartlett’s inadequate or they’re really not lovers as the confidential report suggested. Interesting.

  But do you want her? As a toy—perhaps. As a tool—of course. As a hostess no, much too pushy.

  Now the road was clear so he pulled out and went down to the junction and turned left and soon he was on Peak Road going downhill toward Magazine Gap where Plumm’s penthouse apartment was. After dinner with him he was going to a meeting, then to Wanchai, to one of his private apartments and the welcoming embrace of Mona Leung. His pulse quickened at the thought of her violent lovemaking, her barely hidden hatred for him and all quai loh that was ever in perpetual conflict with her love of luxury, the apartment that was on loan to her and the modest amount of money he gave her monthly.

  “Never give ’em enough money,” his father William had told him early on. “Clothes, jewelry, holidays—that’s fine. But not too much money. Control them with dollar bills. And never think they love you for you: They don’t. It’s only your money, only your money and always will be. Just under the surface they’ll despise you, always will. That’s fair enough if you think about it—we’re not Chinese and never will be.”

  “There’s never an exception?”

  “I don’t think so. Not for a quai loh, my son. I don’t think so. Never has been with me and I’ve known a few. Oh she’ll give you her body, her children, even her life, but she’ll always despise you. She has to, she’s Chinese and we’re quai loh!”

  Ayeeyah, Gornt thought. That advice’s proved itself time and time again. And saved me so much anguish. It’ll be good to see the Old Man, he told himself. This year I’ll give him a fine Christmas present: Struan’s.

  He was driving carefully down the left side of the winding road hugging the mountainside, the night good, the surface fine and the traffic light. Normally he would have been chauffeur-driven but tonight he wanted no witnesses to his meeting with Plumm.

  No, he thought. Nor any witnesses when I meet Four Finger Wu. What the hell does that pirate want? Nothing good. Bound to be dangerous. Yes. But during the Korean War Wu did you a very large favor and perhaps now is the time he wants the favor repaid. There’s always a reckoning sooner or later, and that’s fair and that’s Chinese law. You get a present, you give one back a little more valuable. You have a favor done …

  In 1950 when the Chinese Communist armies in Korea were battering and bleeding their way south from the Yalu with monstrous losses, they were desperately short of all strategic supplies and very willing to pay mightily those who could slip through the blockade with the supplies they needed. At that time, Rothwell-Gornt was also in desperate straits because of their huge losses at Shanghai the previous year thanks to the conquest by Mao. So in December of 1950, he and his father had borrowed heavily and secretly bought a huge shipment of penicillin, morphine, sulfanalamides and other medical supplies in the Philippines, avoiding the obligatory export license. These they smuggled onto a hired ocean going junk with one of their trusted crews and sent it to Wampoa, a bleak island in the Pearl River near Canton. Payment was to be in gold on delivery, but en route, i
n the secret backwaters of the Pearl River Estuary, their junk had been intercepted by river pirates favoring Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalists and a ransom demanded. They had no money to ransom the cargo, and if the Nationalists found out that Rothwell-Gornt was dealing with their hated Communist enemy, their own future in Asia was lost forever.

  Through his compradore Gornt had arranged a meeting in Aberdeen Harbor with Four Finger Wu, supposedly one of the biggest smugglers in the Pearl River Estuary.

  “Where ship now?” Four Finger Wu had asked in execrable pidgin English.

  Gornt had told him as best he could, conversing in pidgin, not being able to speak Haklo, Wu’s dialect.

  “Perhaps, perhaps not!” Four Finger Wu smiled. “I phone three day. Nee choh wah password. Three day, heya?”

  On the third day he phoned. “Bad, good, don’t know. Meet two day Aberdeen. Begin Hour of Monkey.” That hour was ten o’clock at night. Chinese split the day into twelve, two-hour segments, each with a name, always in the same sequence, beginning at 4:00 A.M. with the Cock, then at 6:00 A.M. with the Dog, and so on; Boar, Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Monkey, Horse and Sheep.

  At the Hour of the Monkey on Wu’s junk at Aberdeen two days later, he had been given the full payment for his shipment in gold plus an extra 40 percent. A staggering 500 percent profit.

  Four Finger Wu had grinned. “Make better trade than quai loh, never mind. 28,000 taels of gold.” A tael was a little more than an ounce. “Next time me ship. Yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “You buy, me ship, me sell, 40 percent mine, sale price.”

  “Yes.” Gornt had thankfully tried to press a much larger percentage on him this time but Wu had refused.

  “40 percent only, sale price.” But Gornt had understood that now he was in the smuggler’s debt.

  The gold was in five-tael smuggler bars. It was valued at the official rate of $35 U.S. an ounce. But on the black market, smuggled into Indonesia, India or back into China, it was worth two or three times as much … sometimes more. On this one shipment again with Wu’s help, Rothwell-Gornt had made a million and a half U.S. and were on the road to recovery.

  After that there had been three more shipments, immensely profitable to both sides. Then the war had ceased and so had their relationship.

  Never a word since then, Gornt thought. Until the phone call this afternoon.

  “Ah, old friend, can see? Tonight?” Four Finger Wu had said. “Can do? Anytime—I wait. Same place as old days. Yes?”

  So now the favor’s to be returned. Good.

  Gornt switched on the radio. Chopin. He was driving the winding road automatically, his mind on the meetings ahead, the engine almost silent. He slowed for an advancing truck, then swung out and accelerated on the short straight to overtake a slow-moving taxi. Going quite fast now he braked sharply in good time nearing the blind corner, then something seemed to snap in the innards of the engine, his foot sank to the floorboards, his stomach turned over and he went into the hairpin too fast.

  In panic he jammed his foot on the brake again and again but nothing happened, his hands whirling the wheel around. He took the first corner badly, swerving drunkenly as he came out of it onto the wrong side of the road. Fortunately there was nothing coming at him but he overcorrected and lurched for the mountainside, his stomach twisting with nausea, overcorrected again, going very fast now and the next corner leapt at him. Here the grade was steeper, the road more winding and narrow. Again he cornered badly but once through he had a split second to grab the hand brake and this slowed him only a little, the new corner was on him, and he came out of it way out of his lane, oncoming headlights blinding him.

  The taxi skittered in panic to the shoulder and almost went over the side, its horn blaring but he was passed by a fraction of an inch, lurching petrified for the correct side, and then went on down the hill out of control. A moment of straight road and he managed to jerk the gear lever into low as he hurtled into another blind corner, the engine howling now. The sudden slowing would have pitched him through the windshield but for his seat belt, his hands almost frozen to the wheel.

  He got around this corner but again he was out too far and he missed the oncoming car by a millimeter, skidded back to his side once more, swerved, overcorrecting, slowing a little now but there was no letup in the grade or twisting road ahead. He was still going too fast into the new hairpin and coming out of the first part he was too far over. The heavily laden truck grinding up the hill was helpless.

  Panic-stricken he tore the wheel left and just managed to get around the truck with a glancing blow. He tried to jerk the gear lever into reverse but it wouldn’t go, the cogs shrieking in protest. Then, aghast, he saw slow traffic ahead in his lane, oncoming traffic in the other and the road vanish around the next bend. He was lost so he turned left into the mountainside, trying to ricochet and stop that way.

  There was a howl of protesting metal, the back side window shattered and he bounced away. The oncoming car lurched for the far shoulder, its horn blaring. He closed his eyes and braced for the head-on collision but somehow it didn’t happen and he was past and just had enough strength to jerk the wheel hard over again and went into the mountainside. He hit with a glancing blow. The front left fender ripped away. The car ploughed into the shrub and earth, then slammed into a rock outcrop, reared up throwing Gornt aside, but as the car fell back the near-side wheel went into the storm drain and held, and, just before smashing into the paralyzed little Mini ahead, it stopped.

  Gornt weakly pulled himself up. The car was still half upright. Sweat was pouring off him and his heart was pounding. He found it hard to breathe or to think. Traffic both ways was stopped, snarled. He heard some horns hooting impatiently below and above, then hurried footsteps.

  “You all right, old chap?” the stranger asked.

  “Yes, yes I think so. My, my brakes went.” Gornt wiped the sweat off his forehead, trying to get his brain to work. He felt his chest, then moved his feet and there was no pain. “I … the brakes went … I was turning a corner and … and then everything …”

  “Brakes, eh? Not like a Rolls. I thought you were pretending to be Stirling Moss. You were very lucky. I thought you’d had it twenty times. If I were you I’d switch off the engine.”

  “What?” Then Gornt realized the engine was still gently purring and the radio playing so he turned the ignition off and, after a moment, pulled the keys out.

  “Nice car,” the stranger said, “but it’s a right proper mess now. Always liked this model. ’62, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. Yes it is.”

  “You want me to call the police?”

  Gornt made the effort and thought a moment, his pulse still pounding in his ears. Weakly he unsnapped the seat belt. “No. There’s a police station just back up the hill. If you’d give me a lift to there?”

  “Delighted, old chap.” The stranger was short and rotund. He looked around at the other cars and taxis and trucks that were stopped in both directions, their Chinese drivers and Chinese passengers gawking at them from their windows. “Bloody people,” he muttered sourly. “You could be dying in the street and you’d be lucky if they stepped over you.” He opened the door and helped Gornt out.

  “Thanks.” Gornt felt his knees shaking. For a moment he could not dominate his knees and he leaned against the car.

  “You sure you’re all right?”

  “Oh yes. It’s … that frightened me to death!” He looked at the damage, the nose buried into earth and shrub, a huge score down the right side, the car jammed well into the inside curve. “What a bloody mess!”

  “Yes, but it hasn’t telescoped a sausage! You were bloody lucky you were in a good car, old chap.” The stranger let the door swing and it closed with a muted click. “Great workmanship. Well, you can leave it here. No one’s likely to steal it.” The stranger laughed, leading the way to his own car which was parked, its blinker lights on, just behind. “Hop in, won’t take a jiffy
.”

  It was then Gornt remembered the mocking half-smile on Dunross’s face that he had taken for bravado as he left. His mind cleared. Would there have been time for Dunross to tamper … with his knowledge of engines … surely he wouldn’t …?

  “Son of a bitch,” he muttered, aghast.

  “Not to worry, old chap,” the stranger said, as he eased past the wreck, making the turn. “The police’ll make all the arrangements for you.”

  Gornt’s face closed. “Yes. Yes they will.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  10:25 P.M.:

  “Grand dinner, Ian, better than last year’s,” Sir Dunstan Barre said expansively from across the table.

  “Thank you.” Dunross raised his glass politely and took a sip of the fine cognac from the brandy snifter.

  Barre gulped his port then refilled his glass, more florid than usual. “Ate too much, as usual, by God! Eh Phillip? Phillip!”

  “Yes … oh yes … much better …” Phillip Chen muttered.

  “Are you all right, old chap?”

  “Oh yes … it’s just … oh yes.”

  Dunross frowned, then let his eyes rove the other tables, hardly listening to them.

  There were just the three of them now at this round table that had seated twelve comfortably. At the other tables spread across the terraces and lawns, men were lounging over their cognac, port and cigars, or standing in clusters, all the ladies now inside the house. He saw Bartlett standing over near the buffet tables that an hour ago had been groaning under the weight of roast legs of lamb, salads, sides of rare beef, vast hot steak-and-kidney pies, roast potatoes and vegetables of various kinds, and the pastries and cakes and ice cream sculptures. A small army of servants was cleaning away the debris. Bartlett was in deep conversation with Chief Superintendent Roger Crosse and the American Ed Langan. In a little while I’ll deal with him, he told himself grimly—but first Brian Kwok. He looked around. Brian Kwok was not at his table, the one that Adryon had hosted, or at any of the others, so he sat back patiently, sipped his cognac and let himself drift.