The Princeling of Nanjing

by Ian Hamilton

  Ava followed Hung Hing Road past the Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club and the Noonday Gun, which had been fired every day at noon for more than 150 years. If she had kept going she would have encountered the Causeway Bay Typhoon Shelter, where sampans, filled with families who had never known what it was like to live on land, still moored. But she stopped short of the park, turned, and headed back to the hotel the same way she’d come.

  She figured she had run about fifteen kilometres in less than an hour and a half. Whatever residual physical kinks remained from the flight had disappeared, and her mind felt clear and focused.

  Back in her room, she went directly to her computer. Feng had been busy. His message had four attachments. Here’s the info on AKG. I perused it myself. There’s some serious shit going on here. I just hope you can do something with it, he wrote.

  She took her time reading through the attachments and then went back and read them again, this time making notes. When she was finished, she looked at the chart she’d drawn the night before. None of the assumptions she’d made were wrong. In fact, if anything, she’d under­estimated just how deeply enmeshed the Tsai family companies were with one another.

  And then there was the money.

  As significant as the monthly payments were that Xu and others were making into Evergreen, Hallmark, and Gold Star, they looked minuscule compared to the amount of money being deposited into AKG. And Ava guessed that if she ever got her hands on more detailed banking information for New Age and Mother of Pearl she’d find a similar pattern.

  Over the past five years the AKG deposits came to more than $400 million. A steady inflow came from Evergreen and Hallmark, but those amounts were dwarfed by two huge deposits.

  Four years ago, Patriot General Insurance had sent a single wire transfer of more than $105 million to the account. Three weeks later, AKG sent the exact same amount to Mother of Pearl Investments. That money, Ava was certain, had been for the purchase of Jiangsu Trust and Insurance.

  A year later, the bank records showed that California Asian Trust had wire-transferred $120 million to AKG. Less than thirty days after the money reached the account, AKG sent the exact same amount to New Age Capital. Ava was certain that the money had been used in the Kitchen Giant acquisition.

  Despite her opinion about where the monies had ended up, there were some obvious gaps in the paper trails. The most glaring was that she didn’t have access to the Mother of Pearl or New Age bank accounts, and she knew that unless she could confirm the transactions, her conclusions were just speculation.

  She paused and then reached for the phone. She tried May Ling’s cellphone first, but it went directly to voicemail. Then she called May’s private office line.

  “Can you talk?” Ava asked when May answered.

  “Yes, I’m alone.”

  “Are you getting your problems sorted?”

  “Bit by bit. How about you?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “It’s not like you to be so uncertain.”

  “Well, the Tsai family — the entire extended family, as it turns out — is frustrating me and fascinating me at the same time.”

  “So you obviously have more information than you started with.”

  “Yes, and that’s one reason I’m struggling.”

  “Why?”

  “I’ve got almost too much. There are tens of companies from all over the world paying money into about a dozen companies that the family controls, and when you toss in all the banks, all the inter-company transfers, and some foreign partners who might be subsidiaries of larger corporations, it does get complicated.”

  “But everything ends up with the Tsais?”

  “Well, the Tsais and the Wus and the Yings and some other in-laws.”

  “Who are the Wus?”

  “Wu Wai Wai is Tsai Lian’s sister.”

  “I see, and the Yings? Are you saying Ying Fa is involved as well?”

  “His daughter Ying Jie and her husband are major players, but what I don’t know is if they’re being directed by her father or by Tsai Lian.”

  “Tsai Lian heads the family,” May said abruptly. “If the Yings are involved, it’s because he’s approved it.”

  “You’re certain?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “That does add some clarity.”

  “Have you found anything that directly links Tsai Lian to any of the companies?”

  “Only his entire family.”

  “Even if that came out, he would claim that they were acting on their own as independent businesspeople.”

  “I know.”

  “How much money do you think they’ve accumulated?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “You must have some idea.”

  Ava looked down at her notebook. “A billion for sure, and maybe as much as two or three billion.”

  “Good god.”

  “And I haven’t stopped looking yet. Who knows what else I’ll find. I have a meeting scheduled with Brenda Burgess and her team this afternoon, and they may have more information to throw at me.”

  “Did Brenda grill you about why you are looking at the Tsais?”

  “No.”

  “She may.”

  “I can handle it.”

  “Ava, don’t be defensive with her,” May said. “She and Richard know how to keep a confidence, and they’re both incredibly smart and connected. She may be more help than you can imagine.”

  “There are a lot of people involved already, although I’ve managed to maintain what I think is sufficient control.”

  “Well, it is a big project. We’re talking about the governor of the richest province in China, his large family, dozens of companies, and billions of dollars.”

  “All the more reason to try to keep it close.”

  “That’s going to be impossible if you want to bring down the Tsai family.”

  “May, that’s never been my objective,” Ava said sharply. “All I want to do is get them to back off on their demands to Xu.”

  “I know, but I’ve been thinking that you may not be able to achieve one without the other.”

  Ava hesitated, taken aback by May’s comment. “Well, I’m going to try,” she finally said. “This doesn’t have to be an all-or-nothing situation.”

  “Assuming you’re right, you still need leverage. What do you have?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “You have no idea at all?”

  “There’s one lead that has some promise and another that could work out,” Ava said slowly. “But I haven’t wrapped my head around either of them sufficiently. I’m still in data- gathering mode. Hopefully by the end of the day, I’ll be able to sit back and take some time to digest it all.”

  “Let me know when you think you’re ready to act,” May said.

  “Are you worried about fallout in Wuhan?”

  “No, I’m worried about you and Xu.”

  Ava paused, a question about Xu buzzing in her head. She left it there. “I’ll let you know, assuming there is anything to know. It may all come to nothing.”

  “Knowing you, I don’t believe that’s possible.”

  “I think you mean that as a compliment, so I’ll say thank you.”

  “I did, and you’re welcome,” May said. “Now, what’s up with Lane Crawford? I haven’t had a chance to talk to any of the girls today.”

  “Chi-Tze, Gillian, and Clark have a conference call scheduled for some time today with Laura and, I presume, Carrie Song. It’s all sounding very positive.”

  “No Amanda?”

  “She thinks it’s best for the Shanghai team to handle it. She thinks our job is done, and now it’s up to them to close the deal and start putting together an implementation plan.”

  “For someone so young, she seems very
secure. When I was that age, I would have been afraid to let anyone else negotiate something that important without my involvement.”

  “When you’re given responsibility, you have to learn to handle it or you sink. From my first day working with Uncle, he insisted that I make decisions on my own. I was always afraid of disappointing him, and that made me work that much harder. I think we’ll see the same reaction from Shanghai. They’ll do everything possible to make this company a success, and I think Amanda understands that very well.”

  “Yes, they do want her approval. And she wants ours. The question is, who is our higher power?”

  “I’m afraid of Suki Chan,” Ava said with a laugh.

  “Who isn’t?” May said. “There is something so incredibly fierce about such naked ambition and drive.”

  “Speaking of naked, I came back from a run ages ago and haven’t showered yet. I’ll be in touch, okay?”

  Ava took her time in the bathroom. She had thought about calling her father and asking him to meet her for dim sum, but she wasn’t sure she would be good company. She also didn’t want to get into a discussion about her mother. She was beginning to really worry about her and she didn’t want Marcus Lee to see her concern. Though she had spent very little actual time with her father, he had an uncanny ability to see right into her heart.

  She left the room with her notebook in her Chanel bag and went to the Man Wah restaurant on the twenty-fifth floor. It was past lunch and the crowd had thinned. She got a table by a window overlooking Victoria Harbour. As the waiter poured jasmine tea, Ava set her notebook and phone on the table. After a quick glance at a menu she almost knew from memory, she ordered hot and sour soup, Alaska king crab dumplings, beef tenderloin puffs with black pepper sauce, and mushroom dumplings with black truffles.

  As she waited for her order, she looked out onto the harbour. As always, it was busy with ferries, sailboats and powerboats, and freighters winding their way in and out of the harbour and across the bay. She even saw a junk and a couple of sampans. The British had wanted Hong Kong for its harbour and acquired the territory through cession in 1842. They took complete control of it in 1860, when Kowloon was also ceded to them. Since then, everything around the harbour had obviously changed in ways beyond anyone’s imagination, but the harbour itself was almost timeless. When people went to sea, they still went in ships, and the basic laws of navigation hadn’t changed. If she could blot out the wall of skyscrapers, she could almost see in the waters the Hong Kong of 150 years ago.

  Her phone rang as the bowl of hot and sour soup was placed in front of her. She hesitated to answer, but saw it was Amanda calling.

  “Hey,” she said.

  “Where are you?”

  “In Man Wah.”

  “Michael wanted to take you there tonight.”

  “I’m having dim sum. I don’t mind returning for dinner,” Ava said. “Is that the reason you’re calling?”

  “Partially, but not really. I just heard from Chi-Tze.”

  “About Lane Crawford?”

  “Yes, they just got off the phone with them about half an hour ago.”

  “Was it good news?”

  “They said they want to bring in three looks,” Amanda said. “That means three different design concepts executed as trousers, jackets, blouses, skirts, and coats. So about fifteen pieces in total.”

  “The fact that they want to take three is terrific. How many stores are they giving us?”

  “All of Lane Crawford and half of Joyce.”

  “That’s wonderful.”

  “Not entirely. There are a few requests attached to their offer.”

  “Requests or conditions?”

  “They’re framed as requests, but we’re treating them like conditions.”

  “Like?”

  “They want an exclusive for six months — starting after they get the first shipment — in Hong Kong and a long list of major cities in China.”

  “What do the girls and Clark think about that?”

  “They’re okay with Hong Kong, but they don’t want to give up China. We’ve had a lot of interest from some mainland retailers and real estate operators. They’re afraid that if we don’t move fast, those retailers will lose interest and move on.”

  “May Ling will probably feel that way as well. She brought a lot of contacts with her and I’m quite sure she doesn’t want to put them off. It would also seem rather rude to ask them to come to Shanghai and then tell them we’ve decided not to do business with them.”

  “I’m thinking that we could offer Hong Kong, Kowloon, the New Territories, and Macau as exclusive territory, and maybe extend it for a year instead of six months.”

  “I like that approach. Those are Lane Crawford’s strongest markets.”

  “They’ve also made some marketing and merchandising requests that could add up to a lot of money,” Amanda said.

  “Such as?”

  “At least one dedicated salesperson in every store that carries the PÖ line. Financial support for the catalogues and advertising that feature PÖ. They’d also like us to create our own advertising and marketing program to support their efforts. They want to have splashy in-store launches. And they want us to put a structured discount program in place in case our products don’t sell that well.”

  “All things we expected, yes?”

  “Yes, only bigger and more expensive.”

  “What do Gillian and Chi-Tze say about it?”

  “They’re for it.”

  “And you?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Then why are we talking about it? You and the girls can make the decision on your own.”

  “I know that, and so do they. But given the Carrie Song connection, we all feel it’s best to keep you well informed. I’m sure once we’re past the early stages that will pass.”

  Ava drew a deep breath. “It’s exciting, isn’t it?”

  “It sure is.”

  “When you talk to Shanghai, tell them how proud we are of the work they’ve done. My connection wouldn’t mean a thing if Clark’s clothes were less than brilliant.”

  “I’ll tell them.”

  “And how about May Ling — does she know?”

  “Chi-Tze was calling her as I was phoning you. In fact, I just got a text from Chi-Tze,” Amanda said, and then paused. “May said almost exactly the same things you did.”

  “So now it’s up to Lane Crawford.”

  “The girls will be onto them today.”

  “I’m going to be in a meeting with the lawyers most of the afternoon,” Ava said. “You and I can discuss it over dinner tonight.”

  “Seven?”

  “Perfect.”

  “Man Wah?”

  “Also perfect.”

  “Great. Michael has already made a reservation.”

  “Just the three of us, right?”

  “Ava, Michael would never invite Marcus without consulting you.”

  “I thought so, but I still needed to ask.”

  ( 22 )

  At a quarter to three, Ava left the Mandarin Oriental and began the short climb to Bond Street and the offices of Burgess and Bowlby. She reached the lobby at almost exactly three and was led directly to the same boardroom she’d occupied the day before.

  Brenda Burgess and Vanessa Ogg sat with their backs to the window, a stack of files in front of them. They both rose and walked around the table to shake Ava’s hand.

  “You’ve been busy,” Ava said.

  “There’s a lot that’s kept us busy,” Brenda said.

  “I’ve been doing some more looking on my own,” Ava said. “I have some names to add to the chart I gave you yesterday.”

  Vanessa glanced sideways at her boss, and Ava thought she detected some uncertainty in her manner.

  “B
efore you do that, would you object if we talked this through a bit?” Brenda said.

  “Talked what through?”

  “This project.”

  “I thought I made it clear yesterday that I don’t want to do that,” Ava said.

  “It’s true that you did, but as Vanessa and the Beijing lawyers dug into the companies whose names you provided, it quickly became evident that your project is bigger than we anticipated, and possibly far more sensitive.”

  “I’m not surprised that it expanded in size,” Ava said. “But I have no idea why you refer to it as sensitive.”

  “Vanessa, why don’t you explain,” Brenda said.

  Vanessa opened the file in front of her. “We briefed the Beijing firm as soon as you left yesterday, and they went right to work. I had two interns start from this end. There was some duplication of effort, which I expected, but I thought it would help us cross-reference and confirm the information we found.”

  “That makes sense,” Ava said.

  “The incorporated companies left a paper trail, but in some cases the shareholder structure was vague, so we tried to go deeper. We made phone calls to other law firms, to some individuals, and to some banks. That’s when it became sensitive.”

  “They wouldn’t talk to you?”

  “Not all of them refused, and some were actually forthcoming at first, but then around noon today all co-­operation ended,” Vanessa said. “When our trainees and the Beijing firm followed up on some calls they’d made earlier, they were told rather bluntly that no further information would be provided. They were then asked who they were working for and if we had any links to a bank called Toronto Commonwealth.”

  “Given your Canadian roots, we thought this might involve you,” Brenda said.

  “Shit,” Ava said.

  “So you know the bank.”

  “I had them do some bank-to-bank inquiries.”

  “How productive was it?”

  “Quite.”

  “It was also disruptive.”

  “Evidently.”

  “Well, it put at least a temporary end to the work you wanted us to do, but we are prepared to share with you the information we did manage to acquire,” Brenda said. “But before we do, I have a question to ask.”