by Ian Hamilton
“I don’t know whether I feel pleased or offended by that.”
“Please don’t tell him I told you.”
“Why not?”
The older woman looked towards the living room, and Ava turned to see if Xu was there. He wasn’t. Still, Auntie lowered her voice as she said, “He doesn’t share his thoughts very often, or very easily. I wouldn’t want him to think I repeat what he says.”
“I won’t say a word.”
“Thank you. And now maybe you should join him in the garden. He likes to go there in the morning, while the air is still fresh.”
The car was still in the courtyard, the driver seated behind the wheel. Suen was standing at the entrance to the yard, looking both ways down the lane. Xu sat by the pond on a wooden chair. An empty one was next to it.
“Ava, come,” he said, pointing to the seat.
She walked towards him, then stopped short, looking down into the pond. Four giant goldfish were snapping at food pellets that dotted the water’s surface.
“My horoscope for this year said that fish will bring me luck but that I need an even number of them,” Xu said.
“I wouldn’t have thought of you as superstitious.”
“Why tempt fate, especially when it costs so little to keep it appeased?”
Ava reached into her bag and took out the paper with the Wuhan banking information. “Here — this is where the money should be transferred.”
“I will look after it today. Now please sit.”
The empty chair was directly across from Xu. She turned it slightly so she could watch the fish.
“I was thinking about Fanling, about Uncle’s funeral,” he said.
“It was a wonderful tribute to him that so many came.”
“That is true, and you earned tremendous respect for the way you organized it and for how you conducted yourself. The most senior Triads were particularly pleased when you took time at the funeral dinner to thank them individually for coming, and for their contributions. Not everyone is willing to acknowledge them so publicly.”
“I’m not naive enough to think it really meant that much to them.”
“No, perhaps not,” Xu said, staring at her. “But maybe Auntie is right, and you do need to learn how to accept a compliment.”
Ava avoided his eyes. “I sense that you’re trying to make a point that has nothing to do with my modesty.”
He lit a cigarette, inhaled deeply, and turned his head to blow the smoke away from her. “Do you remember the short conversation we had in Fanling, while we were walking back from the cemetery?”
“Only vaguely. I was quite caught up in grief.”
“I see. I was hoping I would not have to explain myself quite so thoroughly again.”
“Sorry.”
“No matter. It is important enough to bear repeating.”
“If this has to do with business, I have to say I would prefer that May Ling also hear what you have to say.”
“It is a different business.”
“I have only one business.”
He inhaled, and this time the smoke swirled around their heads. “In Fanling I started to tell you that I am engaged in a project that is very complicated and has far-reaching implications, some of which could be dangerous. Well, it has become more complicated since Fanling.”
“And dangerous?”
“I think so.”
“What is this project?”
“I want to become chairman of all the Triad societies,” he said. His face was impassive. Then his hand went to his mouth and the cigarette slid between his lips. She saw traces of dried saliva in the corners of his mouth. Was he nervous?
“I would hardly call that a project.”
“Call it what you want.”
“And Uncle was involved in this plan?”
“The idea was his. I began to warm to it only after several months of talking and thinking.”
“Uncle told me about his life in Wuhan and how he came to Hong Kong, but he never spoke to me in any detail about his Triad years. I did hear him referred to as a Dragon Head, and Sonny once mentioned that Uncle had been chairman of the societies for consecutive terms. That’s the extent of my knowledge, so I’m not sure what I could possibly contribute to any discussion about Triads or the chairmanship.”
“Yes, Uncle was a Dragon Head or Mountain Master or Mountain Lord or whatever title you want to use for the gang leader . . . we still cling to those old names. He started out as a forty-niner — a regular gang member — and worked his way up. He was a White Paper Fan — an administrator — for a while, and then he was a Vanguard and actually ran operations. He obviously excelled, because he was quite young when he became a Dragon Head.”
“Those titles mean nothing to me.”
“There is no reason why they should. Did Sonny say anything other than that Uncle was chairman?”
“He said that during Uncle’s terms the gangs were at peace with one another. When his last term ended, infighting erupted again.”
“And that caused him considerable pain.”
“Why were they fighting among themselves?”
“There are eighteen major gangs in Asia. Some are concentrated in and control one city, such as Yan Yee Tong in Shanghai and Li’s gang in Guangzhou. Some cities, like Hong Kong, are split among several gangs. Then there are gangs that have branches or affiliations all over Asia and in Europe and North America. When you add them up, there are about one hundred different groups. It is a very large, complex structure without any real central core. Disputes are inevitable, in the same way that regular businesses go at each other over sales territories and market share.”
“If it’s normal behaviour, why worry about it?”
He tossed the cigarette butt into the pond. One of the fish swam to it and then left it to float. “The Triads cannot keep following that path.”
“This sounds like the discussion we had last night.”
“Taken to the next level, and then past it.”
“If you secure a future for Yan Yee Tong, why should you care about anyone else?”
“Because we cannot be separated quite so easily from the rest of that world. I spoke about the government and its ability to shut us down whenever it chooses. Well, right now we have less to fear from the government than we do from our fellow Triads. In fact, the same is true for every society — we spend more time defending ourselves from our brothers than we do from the police or the authorities. Everyone wants to expand their business, and the easiest way to do that is to grab someone else’s. Sometimes there are direct attacks — they have tried to kill some of my people, and the plant where we make the iPhones has been bombed and the workers threatened.
“Other times they are more subtle. I had a phone call from one of the Hong Kong gangs wanting to know if they could invest in the factory, offering me in exchange secure and guaranteed access to their markets. I already sell into those markets, so what they were really doing was threatening to cut me out of them. I declined, because the moment I let them in they would learn the business and then copy it and cannibalize it. They went away unhappy but I kept the market, because they need my products and because they have not yet been able to put us out of business.”
“The danger of making knockoffs.”
He smiled. “I do see the irony, of course, but if things keep going the way they are, I know that eventually we will hurt each other’s businesses, and that can only lead to more violence among the gangs. And when inter-society conflict becomes a visible public menace, we will give the authorities no other choice but to come after us.”
“You make it sound as if the societies are determined to self-destruct.”
“They do not think about it that way, but then they rarely think much past next week. That is the problem — this intense focus they have on
the now instead of trying to create a structure that will be sustainable into the future.”
“And you’re the man who can lead them into the future?”
“Maybe, maybe not, but I am prepared to try.”
“For reasons . . .”
“That are primarily in my own self-interest.”
“Yes, it does sound that way to me.”
“That does not mean that the end result cannot benefit everyone.”
They heard a commotion in the laneway, the sounds of men yelling. Ava looked towards the gate and saw that Suen had moved out into the lane. He stood with his legs far apart, his shoulders squared, as if ready for a challenge. The noise stilled. Suen turned and walked back to the gate without looking in Xu’s direction.
“I think I should go back to the hotel,” Ava said.
“I am going to run for chairman,” Xu said.
“So you’ve said.”
“The election will be in six days.”
“Good luck.”
“It is rather fortunate — or maybe the right word is fortuitous — that you are in Shanghai right now. It gives me an opportunity to discuss it with you.”
“I don’t see how I could contribute anything useful.”
“Let me be the judge of that,” he said, taking a cigarette from the package.
He bent at the waist and leaned towards Ava, his head down, the unlit cigarette held between his fingers like a small spear. All she could see was the top of his head, but then it rose and his eyes caught hers. For a second she had a memory of the picture she had placed by Uncle’s coffin: him as a young man sitting in a chair with his legs crossed, an unlit cigarette dangling between his fingers and his eyes locked onto whoever was taking the photo.
“I owe you my life,” Ava said.
“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I told you in Fanling that I sent my men to Borneo to rescue you for reasons that were incidental to your situation. Because of that I will not accept any obligation on your part.”
“You said you did it for Uncle, and he wanted it done for me, and in that there is a connection that I can’t deny.”
“Yes, I did it for Uncle, but equally true is that I needed to send a message to my brothers in places such as Hong Kong and Guangzhou. You were taken only a few weeks after the bomb went off at my factory. There was a suspicion, I heard through my colleagues, that I was not tough enough to safeguard my interests. The bomb was a test, and I knew others would be coming. I did not want to go to war, but I had to send them a message that I am entirely capable of doing whatever is necessary to protect myself. That idiot Wan in Borneo gave me the chance.”
“I do remember you telling me that in Fanling.”
“To get you back, all I had to do was make a phone call. Instead I put Suen and Lop, who is my Red Pole — do you know what that is?”
“Unfortunately I do. I had a run-in with one in Macau. He was an enforcer, what Uncle called ‘the sharp end of the stick.’”
“That is accurate, although I prefer to think of Lop as my minister of defence. Anyway, I put him and Suen and twenty of my men on a private jet and sent them to Kota Kinabalu with instructions to destroy Wan’s gang. We killed twelve of them. Wan had no formal alliances with any of the Hong Kong or mainland gangs, and only a slight attachment to one in Kuala Lumpur. Before my men left Shanghai, I called Kuala Lumpur and told the Dragon Head there what I planned to do. I told him not to warn Wan and not to interfere in any way or I would send another plane to KL.
“When we were finished in Kinabalu, I called him and thanked him for his neutrality. He asked me why we had to kill so many men. I told him that you were Uncle’s granddaughter and that we were related almost by blood. I told him that this was how I would react every time anyone or anything close to me was threatened. I knew the Dragon Head belonged to the 14K gang and that he would talk to his 14K colleagues in Hong Kong. That is when the harassment stopped. And that is when the friendly phone calls started.”
“People doing the right things for the wrong reasons, and on more levels than one,” Ava said.
“Yes, Uncle’s favourite saying, and one of the truest things I have ever heard. It is my maxim.”
“And mine.”
“So now we are bound by Uncle and by a philosophy. Does this mean you will make yourself available to me?”
“Again, I’m not sure how I could be of help, and —”
“I said let me be the judge of that.”
“But I know nothing about this election, and my understanding from Uncle is that the chairmanship is mainly an honorary position.”
“Mainly is the key word. There is power attached to it, but it can be used only in certain circumstances. I find myself on the edge of some of those circumstances.”
“How does the vote work?”
“The heads of the eighteen major gangs in Asia will meet in Hong Kong to vote for the chairman. Each gang has one vote and every vote is equal. To succeed, I need a simple majority. Right now I have one opponent: Li, from Guangzhou. Li is no friend of mine, but that aside, he sees himself as our elder statesman and thinks the chairmanship should be his by right. The vote will be close — how close I’m not exactly sure; my colleagues tend to be noncommittal. They whisper words of encouragement without actually telling me how they are going to vote. So I am treating it as if I have to find nine more votes to add to mine.”
“Why are you a better man for the position than Li?”
The question seemed to catch Xu off guard. Ava was sure that was because it came from her, not because he didn’t have an answer.
“Li is yesterday’s man. His only interest is in supporting the status quo, and his definition of that is keeping the old businesses intact and letting gangs grab what they can from each other,” he said slowly. “It was Uncle’s opinion that the position is what each man brings to it. If I win the vote, it will be because I have convinced the others that the vision I have for the future is the correct one. It will then fall on me to implement that vision, and I will have ready-made allies to support me.”
“And what is this vision?”
“We must act in a unified way. We need to develop businesses that governments will . . . if not support, then at least be able to ignore. It is the best chance we have to make the future sustainable for our people.”
“And you think I have a role in this?”
“I need an objective set of ears, a subtle mind, and an honest tongue.”
Ava grimaced in disbelief. “Your flattery is overwhelming,” she said.
Xu smiled and reached out to Ava, his hand resting lightly on her knee. “In all seriousness, I may need help to bring these men to my side. Uncle said he knew no one who could read people as well as you, and that once you had some understanding of them, you could find the means to persuade them to do as you wanted. Let me consult with you, let me use your talents.”
Ava closed her eyes and tilted her head back. How real is any of this? she thought. “Why should I be the recipient of so much trust? You have men here who would die for you,” she said.
He turned his head. “It is true that I have men like Suen and Lop who are completely loyal, but they have no sense of strategy, no ability to negotiate without a gun in their hands, no subtlety. I do have men who are smarter, but their primary loyalty is to themselves and their own ambitions.”
Ava looked at him. His head was turned to one side, his eyes averted and slightly hooded. He looked like a man in pain.
“I will take your phone calls and I will listen to whatever you want to discuss, but beyond that I can’t make any promises.”
“Thank you. I could not ask for — and did not expect — anything more.”
Ava stood. “I feel like going for a walk. I need to clear my head, and it would be a shame to be here and not see some of the neighbourhood.”
“You will need a map. Suen has one he can give you.”
“Thanks.”
“Before you go, there is one more thing I would like to say. I was reluctant to mention it until we had concluded our discussion about the chairmanship.”
“Why?”
“It might have coloured your response.”
“Again, why?”
Xu rose to his feet, took a step towards Ava, and reached for her hand. “For as long as I knew Uncle, he was the calmest and the most collected man in any situation. I saw him truly emotional only twice. The last time was when you were kidnapped in Borneo,” he said.
“And the first time?”
“When he urged me to run for the chairmanship.”
“Why would that generate so much emotion?”
Xu squeezed her hand gently. “He felt he had failed as chairman. He saw the future then the same way I see it now, but he was not able to bring about change. I told him that the economics of those times were different and that back then there was no compelling reason for the gangs to change. He saw my logic but it did not seem to ease the depth of his regrets. He said that the Triads had been the only way for him and men like my father to escape poverty, and like my father he saw it as a brotherhood, as his family. He wanted to protect it. He wanted to ensure that it had a future. He passed that obligation on to me.”
“I understand,” Ava said softly.
“Ava, with your help, I am determined to fulfill his legacy.”
( 13 )
Ava left Xu’s house on foot, with a map in her pocket on which Suen had drawn the route back to her hotel. He had argued with her quite forcibly when she said she wanted to walk, but she was even more insistent.
Her desire to clear her head was now more intense than when she had first told Xu she needed to take a walk. His parting words had shaken her. In her mind, Uncle was forever calm and collected. Even when she confronted him in hospital and he confessed to the existence of cancer and his imminent death, he had done so in the most matter-of-fact manner. The thought of his being overcome by emotion was hard for her to grasp.
But she didn’t doubt Xu. His words had triggered a memory of Sonny telling her how Uncle’s strength and composure had left him when he found out she had been kidnapped and would almost certainly die. She was glad she hadn’t seen him so vulnerable. She wanted to think of him as the wise, cool, and consoling man who had come to her in her dream the night before, the one who had nudged her to work with Xu. He had done that, hadn’t he? She recalled the last fragment of the dream, when Uncle had been so mysterious about the help Xu needed. Could it have been about the chairmanship? Was Uncle asking her to do this for him? Maybe Xu wasn’t the only one who wanted that legacy fulfilled. She felt a chill on her neck and shivered. She’d do what she could, limited though that might be.