by Mike Coony
“So, you should understand my knowledge of your organisation back in Ireland, Finn. We are aware that they have assisted a Welsh man who has been buying Class B drugs in Thailand, and shipping them in musical equipment to California through a DEA undercover operative. The Welsh man has also been sending tonnes of Pakistani hashish to Europe via Ireland. This is with the assistance of the IRA, even though they claim the man acts without their knowledge or agreement. You and I both know, Finn Flynn, that without the agreement of your leaders, he would be prevented from operating in Ireland.”
I swallowed a large mouthful of wine and poked at the lobster shell on the plate before me. I’m playing for time…time I expect I don’t have. Uncle Sui wants an answer to his earlier question about the heroin. Whether it was a question or a warning is no matter, I have a pretty good idea what my answer better be.
The waiter returned to clear our plates and deliver the desserts. Before swallowing the last spoonful of my crème brûlée, I agreed to hold off on the heroin shipment for six months. That seems to satisfy Uncle Sui…for the time being anyway.
Unlike the arrangement in the Mandarin Oriental, the bill is presented here. Uncle Sui took three thousand-dollar notes from his wallet and dropped them on the waiter’s silver tray.
———
The piercing clang of a brass bell warned me just in time, saving me from walking under the steel wheels of a Victorian tram. The driver’s a cheerful cove; he saluted me with his can of Red Bull tonic drink and yelled something in Cantonese, which I think I recognise as ‘crazy gweilo!’
Feeling a bit shaken by the near miss, I stepped well back on the pavement and let a few taxi cabs pass. I dashed across Queen’s Road to safety, taking refuge amidst the chattering Filipinos in Statue Square. Speaking their native Tagalog, they sound like a flock of song birds preparing to take off on an annual migration.
Johnny Sparrow comes to mind as I rest on the plinth of the Cenotaph. Johnny Sparrow is related to Britain’s Queen Mother through the Bowes family of Scotland, and this family tie has given him access to the banking and political elite – and a glorious young wife. It’s almost three thirty p.m., and Johnny will soon be on his way from Jardine Fleming Merchant Bank to tiffin at the Hong Kong Club. A man of regular habits formed during his fagging days at Marlborough College – the fancy public school in Wiltshire, England – Johnny can be relied upon never to miss tiffin. Of course, the only constituents of Johnny’s tiffin are large measures of single malt Scotch whiskey.
And what about my own alcohol intake during lunch? Uncle Sui knows that I drink very little, yet he ordered me a very expensive bottle of French wine. My near miss with the tram could be attributed to the wine, and agreeing to defer the heroin shipment was probably down to the drink as well…as much as any other reason.
I see Johnny emerging from his chauffeur-driven limousine, never mind that the offices of Jardine Fleming are only a stone’s throw from the Hong Kong Club. As I took the couple of steps to the entrance of the club I couldn’t miss Johnny’s refrain. “Flynn, dear boy, do come along in for a touch of tiffin…and perchance a snort or two.”
Johnny enjoys using a Dickensian turn of phrase by way of the British Raj. And you can expect him to quote his hero, Mister Micawber, at the drop of a hat. He regaled me with a few lines as we walked into the club: “‘My dear young friend…I am older than you; a man of some experience in life, and – and of some experience, in short, in difficulties, generally speaking. At present, and until something turns up (which I am, I may say, hourly expecting), I have nothing to bestow but advice….’”
Despite Johnny’s protests we didn’t go to the Members’ Bar, but made our way downstairs to the Bowling Alley Bar. I insisted on a pot of Victoria blend tea, rather than malt whiskey, which in Johnny’s case is a ‘whisky’, due again to his Scottish ancestry. Only the Americans have adopted the Irish habit of inserting an ‘e’ in whiskey. I don’t know why we do it. Perhaps it makes it easier for the tongue to roll around when you’ve drunk more whisk-e-e-e-y than you should. Besides, we blame the Chinese – they invented the drink.
28
HONG KONG and LANTAU ISLAND
I left Johnny Sparrow in the Hong Kong Club around seven forty-five p.m., walked across to Queen’s Road and hailed a taxi. Outside the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank I spot a boating party heading towards Queen’s Pier. They’re carrying the usual cooler packs and bags full of snacks and nibbles – to sustain them until they reach the restaurants on Lamma Island, Cheung Chau, or wherever they’re heading.
Seeing them makes me realise that it’s about time I organise a boat party. If I’m going to play the Hong Kong game according to the rules, I should repay everyone for all the boat parties I’ve been to…and all those I tagged along to with mutual friends.
I stepped out of the lift and into the foyer of the penthouse; according to the Rolex Submariner watch I recently treated meself to, it’s two minutes past eight. Feeling that all is well with the world, I skipped up the stairs to the lounge and found Susie sitting naked at the baby grand piano, playing Chopin with two fingers, naturally.
“Good evening my dear…do please continue,” I suggested, in my best 1920s’ movie idol accent. “I think I’ll join you…if you don’t mind, my dear,” I said, while slipping off my blazer and kicking off my shoes.
Susie abandoned her pianoforte recital before I managed to step out of my trousers. With a leap that would put any member of the corps de ballet to shame, she’s away from the piano. She loosened my favourite Hermes tie, and stripped me of my Sam the Tailor Sea Island cotton shirt. When I was naked, she led me to the roof and into the bubbling Jacuzzi.
Afterwards – relaxing on the double divan sun lounger that arrived only yesterday from Lane Crawford in Causeway Bay – I told Susie that I want to organise a boat party. I explained that I want to combine it with entering a team in the Frog and Toad Mud Olympics I’ve heard so much about.
Our party planning was going along fine, and she nodded at every name I suggested for the guest list…until I came to Paul Wills. When I told her to invite Paul she just lost the plot and began to giggle uncontrollably. She can’t make me understand what she’s saying.
“Susie, come on love, what’s so funny?” I finally had to ask her.
“You can’t be serious…it’s more than I can bear…the thought of dapper Paul Wills sliding about in a field of stinking, slimy night soil in his Dunhill shorts and his Ralph Lauren Polo shirt! It’s more than the mind can comprehend…that’s all Finn, my dear sweetie, that’s all….Apart from which, I think it’s a super, terrific idea. I might have some suggestions of my own for the guest list…but can we forget about it for the moment and slip back into that lovely bubbly Jacuzzi, can we?” she said, between fits of giggles.
———
I took a taxi to the Aberdeen Marina Club and accompanied my first dozen guests on to the motor cruiser for the boat party. They’re a mix of couples I’ve met in Plume’s and people I’ve met while I was a guest at one party or another. We boarded the yacht from the floating jetty and, with drinks in hand, set out for Central.
Susie’s waiting at Queen’s Pier with the remainder of the party, including Paul Wills and his two mystery guests. I’m delighted to see that Roger Wynne, the head concierge from the Island Shangri-La, and his gorgeous wife Helen are amongst those waiting to board the cruiser. Roger was a last-minute addition to the group. Apart from seeing him at the Island Shangri-La, and a couple of quick hellos and goodbyes in Pomeroy’s Wine Bar in Pacific Place, we’ve never really met socially. But anyone who’s stood up to the Kray twins is my kind of man, and I want the chance to get to know him better.
When everyone was on board I gave the coxswain the thumbs up, and he gunned the twin engines of the Bertram triple-decker cruiser. We shot through Victoria Harbour in the direction of the South China Sea, with Kowloon on our starboard side and Green Island off to port.
Intrigued to know who Pa
ul’s little mystery guest is, I climbed up to the top deck and knelt down beside her. She has shiny black hair tied in a pony-tail, a Minnie Mouse T-shirt, flowery shorts, and the face of an angel.
“Now, tell me sweetie, where did you spring from?”
“My daddy and mummy brought me. There they are, down there,” she whispered, pointing towards Paul Wills. He’s with a stunning Asian girl I think could be Malay or Singaporean. But the look of pride on Paul’s face when he looked up at his daughter guarantees that, whatever the story is, I won’t be using it to get one over on him…seeing that the girl he’s with isn’t his wife.
Paul sprang up the steps to the top deck; he’s dressed just as Susie predicted, but with the addition of white Gucci deck shoes. He cuddled his daughter as she pointed out the ships we’d been looking at. He told her that the Russian cargo ship is spying on the American aircraft carrier, and the Chinese junk with all the antennae on its cabin roof is watching both of them.
Paul tried to tell me about the situation with his daughter and her mother.
“It’s none of my business Paul. And don’t worry, I’ll ask Susie to say nothing to your wife,” I said, as I waved away his attempts at an explanation.
“Thanks Finn.”
“By the way, your daughter is terrific, and her mother’s a stunner. But tell me this…have you any news of the investigations into insider trading?”
“Yes Finn, I do…it’s not good news. Sorry, but it looks like the stockbroker you’re using is cooperating with the Securities and Commodities investigations. Having said that, I can’t be sure if your trades are included in the investigations.”
“Thanks for letting me know Paul. But no need to panic…I’ll have a word and sort it out. OK?”
Now I understand the full meaning of Uncle Sui’s warning. It looks like an effeminate stockbroker needs to learn a lesson, and I know the very man to teach it to him. I decided there and then to call Mac when we get back. He has to get on a flight to Hong Kong before the broker makes the mistake of mentioning my name to the investigators – which, I pray, he hasn’t done already.
Some of the guests are gathered around Susie on the main deck. I notice that she’s changed into an emerald-green bikini. I like to think that the choice of colour is for my benefit – to signal that she’s with me now – or maybe it’s just because the colour suits her.
As we passed between Peng Chau and Lantau I spotted a group of girls on the sea end of the Discovery Bay pier on Lantau Island. They’re waving towels at us, and yelling what I think is ‘Frog and Toad’.
I told the coxswain to steer towards them. As we motored over to the girls they removed their tops to egg us on. Even our Chinese crew – who are not usually attracted by white girls’ big bare breasts – pointed out the impromptu performance. The girls are Australians and New Zealanders, and they want a lift to the Frog and Toad.
“Right girls! We’ll take you to the Frog and Toad on the condition that you join our Mud Olympics team!” I yelled from the deck of the cruiser.
“No prob ya pommy bastard!”
“We’ll give it a burl!”
They climbed aboard the boat and we cruised around the next headland to the Frog and Toad. Fortunately for us, no one told the girls that they could’ve walked there in twenty minutes.
When we got to Nim Shue Wan Bay it was already awash with junks, sampans, yachts and gin palaces like the cruiser I hired. Our coxswain told me that the water around the rickety Frog and Toad jetty is too shallow to moor and offload my guests. We can use the two speedboats on board to ferry sixteen people to the jetty, and the coxswain suggested that if I promise the boat boys on some of the moored junks a case of cold Tsingtao beer they’ll ferry the remainder of my guests. He was right, and they did.
The owner of the Frog and Toad is a fellah called Joe. He’s a Chinese cannabis-smoking, spirit-drinking, coke-snorting hippie – one hell of a man by all accounts. He transformed an old village house into the Frog and Toad Bar and Restaurant twelve years ago.
To get to the Frog and Toad you follow a narrow path that Joe built whilst under the influence of LSD. The path wends its way through plots of pak choi and other Chinese vegetables. And the vegetable plots are liberally covered in foul-smelling night soil – courtesy of the villagers’ chamber pots.
As we neared the bar we could hear rock music belting out from speakers mounted in banana trees. Most of the vegetables from the plots closest to the bar have already been harvested, as this is the area set aside for the Mud Olympics. Water hoses trailing into the plots are transforming the already muddy arena into a quagmire of slithering, oozing, foul-smelling sludge. The games aren’t due to start until sometime later in the afternoon when, presumably, everyone will be too pissed to worry about sliding around in a disgusting field of merde. I personally think the French word is better than shite.
Our party made its way on to the roof of the Frog and Toad, where more speakers are piled on stacks of beer crates. Joe has tables and seating set up for twenty-five, and from nowhere he produced another trestle table and eight plastic chairs to accommodate our antipodean guests – who are now treating everyone to synchronised flashes of their breasts.
The people below us look like they could be regional council officials out with their families on a family bonding day. They’re practically sitting in the oozing, obnoxious field of night soil. That’ll teach them to arrive late, I thought. And I can tell – it’s going to be a family day out they’ll not forget.
Joe cleverly allows plenty of time for drinking and dining before the games. He’s known for the barbecued spare ribs he serves with a secret, and dangerously delicious, sauce. According to Susie, and others in our party, Joe is often asked to reveal the recipe of the secret sauce, but he always refuses – even under threat of his cocaine supply being cut off. That threat came from a boat load of off-duty expat senior officers of the Royal Hong Kong Police. They were under orders from their wives to get the recipe or forget about ‘bedroom Olympics’ for the foreseeable future. I must admit, once I chewed on one of Joe’s spare ribs, I had to agree with the coppers’ wives…the recipe is worth risking it all for. But Joe wouldn’t crumble, the husbands didn’t get the recipe, and Joe’s secret remains a secret.
I went down to the bar with Joe and formally registered our team as ‘Bodacious Bodies’. My party was on their third round of jugs of Carlsberg Lager by the time I returned to the roof. The jugs hold seven pints each, and the girls from Down Under have already skulled five jugs. When I told the team our official name, the Aussies and Kiwis celebrated with another united flash of their bare breasts. Their display is a little less synchronised this time, but no less appreciated by the crowd.
I caught Roger Wynne’s attention and signalled him to follow me to the back of the building. When I went down to register the team name I’d found a spot of flat pampas grass under a copse of banana trees that gives shelter from the blazing sunshine. There’s less of a pong from the night soil, and the spot has great views of the roof-terrace, the mud plots and the boats bobbing in the harbour.
The Mud Olympics haven’t even started, but things are getting rowdy. So I asked Susie to keep an eye on Paul’s little girl before I went down to talk with Roger.
On the scribbled list of events by the bar, I see that Bodacious Bodies is to do battle –on the cross beam, slippery pole and see-saw – against a team called Flankers and Bankers. We haven’t yet reached the field of battle, but I assume they’re rugby players and bankers. And as you’d expect, the B in bankers has been scratched out and replaced by a crudely drawn W.
I looked up towards the roof to see Roger checking that his wife Helen has a drink. He gave her a quick kiss and made his way to where I’m sitting.
———
I made sure Helen has everything she needs, and then I went downstairs to find Finn Flynn. He’s sitting on a three-legged stool throwing green banana leaves on a smoky fire between two concrete blocks; the smoke
is to keep the mosquitoes at bay. Finn stood up from his fire, turned, and shook my hand with a firm grip. I think he could’ve squeezed much harder but, unlike so many strong men, he doesn’t need to show off his strength.
He offered me a cold San Miguel, but he’s drinking a bottle of spring water. When I offered him refreshments at the hotel he asked for tea, but I know he isn’t a teetotaller – I’ve just seen him sipping a lager. I suppose he’s just a disciplined, careful man who knows when he’s had enough.
“Roger…may I call you Roger? Mister Wynne seems too formal when faced with the prospect of sliding around together in a field of stinking shite.”
“Yes Finn, feel free…and I’d forgotten we’re supposed to go romping in the shit. Thanks for reminding me.”
“My pleasure Roger!”
For five minutes or so we chatted about this and that and nothing special. I can tell that he has something on his mind, and Finn Flynn strikes me as a man who prefers to come straight out and say what’s on his mind. All the same, I do appreciate his self-restraint for my benefit. But when he got to what he wanted to say, it came right from the hip.
“Roger, you’ve seen me in company with Uncle Sui a couple of times now. He speaks very highly of you. I was intrigued when he told me you faced down the Kray twins when you were working in London. He also said you haven’t let any Triad, including his, get a foot in the door of your hotel here…and they all admire you for it.”
“I was born in Stepney, and I came up the hard way Finn. Don’t be fooled by this accent of mine…I’m cockney through and through. I was fucked if I’d let some East End hoods trample on everything I’d achieved. I got there by humping cases twice my size when I was working my way up the greasy pole of the hotel industry. Back then, I was the youngest concierge in a London five-star hotel. I’d already met Helen, she was working at the Savoy Hotel for Gaud’s sake, and we were living together. She is real class see, the genuine thing…and she’d fallen for me, a wide boy from Stepney Marshes. No one was going to knock me off that perch. No one. And, as for the Hong Kong Triads…they’re nothing new to this boy. Remember, London’s full of Triads trying it on with the big hotels, and I’d seen them off long before I’d seen off the Kray boys.”