The Chairman's Toys

by Graham Reed

  Having already made a deposit at the bank, I gave the toilet a flush for effect and went to look for the secret agents.

  I found them in the kitchen. Agent Chung had rolled up his sleeves and replaced his suit coat with an apron. He was chopping up bok choy with blinding speed and tossing it into a sizzling wok. The air was fragrant with garlic and sesame. All I could say was, “Wow.”

  He ignored me but Agent Wang retracted his head from Mickey Wu’s wine fridge and nodded. “Chung used to be a chef.” He stood up with a bottle of Pinot Grigio and began rummaging through drawers.

  I pointed to the wine opener mounted on the slate countertop at the far end of the kitchen. “Far be it from me to call anyone unprofessional, but I thought you guys were here to search this place.”

  “After lunch,” Agent Chung grunted.

  Agent Wang gestured for me to grab some wineglasses from the wall-mounted rack beside me. “It’s a beautiful day. Shall we eat outside?”

  “The steamed trout is incredible.” I helped myself to another glass of Mickey Wu’s wine, which was also excellent. We were seated around the table on Mickey Wu’s deck overlooking the ocean. The low angle of the autumn sunshine was almost blinding. “Is that ginger I’m tasting?”

  Agent Chung continued to stare out at the Pacific but I could see that he was smiling. “It is.”

  “So what’s a talented chef like you doing in a mansion like this?”

  “I used to work in a very nice restaurant in Shanghai but it closed down.” Agent Chung shrugged. “I needed a new job. My father and brother are policemen, so I joined the…” he looked at me shyly, “…family business?”

  I gave him a thumbs-up.

  “That is not the whole story,” said Agent Wang. “Chung was not just the chef but also the owner of the restaurant. And it was very popular, very successful. But he refused to pay money to the local Party Secretary, so it was closed down for health violations. All fabricated, of course, but his reputation was ruined.” He glanced at Agent Chung. “After that, no one would hire him as a chef.”

  I looked over at Agent Chung as well but he had resumed staring out at the ocean, his expression unreadable. “Well, I’m glad you still get a chance to spend time in the kitchen, even if it is Mickey Wu’s. Your boss doesn’t mind you doing this? Or does he not know?”

  Agent Wang looked confused. “Our boss?”

  “Li Wei.”

  Agent Chung’s head snapped around. “That man is not our boss.”

  “Whoa, didn’t mean to offend you guys. I thought he was running the show but clearly I made a mistake.” Agent Chung’s comment, and the vehemence with which he delivered it, raised them both in my estimation. I decided to try and have an open mind, assuming the hinges weren’t already rusted shut.

  “We don’t work for him, but Li Wei is a high-ranking member of the Party and does have…a lot of influence,” Agent Wang said carefully.

  “Yeah, I read up on him a bit. Seems like he’s pretty good at getting his name in the news. Particularly when it comes to corruption initiatives.”

  “Anti-corruption,” Agent Chung corrected, scowling. In this, at least, he and Li Wei were on the same page.

  I raised a placating hand. “I know, Operation Fox Hunt is all about you super spies going around nailing corrupt bigwigs…”

  Agent Chung looked confused until Agent Wang provided what I assumed to be an appropriate Mandarin translation.

  “But from what I read, Li Wei was one of the foxes before he became a hunter.”

  The super spies exchanged a look.

  “He was the subject of a corruption probe a number of years ago,” Agent Wang allowed. “But never convicted of anything. Since then, Li Wei has been a vocal proponent of anti-corruption initiatives, including Operation Fox Hunt. Though he has no official connection to it.”

  “You mean he’s not on your list?”

  This elicited a sardonic smile from Agent Chung. “Not at the moment.”

  “So I guess the squeaky wheel isn’t getting greased. Colour me surprised.”

  This time, both of my lunch companions looked mystified. “Forget it,” I said with a dismissive wave. “So if he’s not actually part of Operation Fox Hunt, why is he calling the shots?”

  “It is…unusual for a senior Party member to take such interest in low-level field operations such as ours.”

  Unsatisfied with Agent Wang’s non-answer, I re-framed the question. “Is he here to cover his own ass?”

  He began to translate this into Mandarin but Agent Chung cut him off. “Yes,” he said bitterly.

  “Because Mickey Wu is Nina’s client?”

  “A client of Blue Coast Realty,” Agent Chung corrected. “An agency co-owned by Li Wei and your ex-wife.”

  I opened my mouth then closed it again. This was news to me. I knew that Nina’s uncle had been responsible for referring some of her wealthier clients but she had never mentioned they were partners. No wonder she checked her backbone at the door every time he was in the room.

  “So let me guess: as soon as Li Wei found out that Nina’s client was on your list, he parachuted in to personally bring Mickey Wu to justice, thereby demonstrating to the other Party bigwigs that Li Wei was all about putting the ‘anti’ back into his corruption initiatives.”

  The super spies nodded in unison. “He actually arrived by private jet,” Agent Chung said. “But, yes, the rest of your summation is accurate. Several people on the Ministry’s list are believed to be here in Vancouver. We were working on different targets but the agent responsible for Mickey Wu had apparently made no progress and is now missing. When Li Wei contacted the Ministry to report Mr. Wu’s whereabouts and express personal interest in bringing him to justice, we were reassigned to assist him.”

  I was relieved to hear that Agents Wang and Chung weren’t Li Wei’s flunkies because I was actually starting to like them. It was a hard thing to admit since they were in law enforcement, but I took some solace in the fact that they were going after the power brokers who were rigging the game against the rest of us. Which meant it had to really chafe to be kowtowing to Li Wei while he whitewashed his reputation. I decided to forgive them for being standoffish when we first met.

  It also made me want to help them nail some corrupt bigwigs. Li Wei, ideally. Or at least Mickey Wu. Despite having recently been fired, however, the last thing I wanted was more work. I was having a hard enough time taking care of the job at hand, getting Richard and Dante back.

  “Time to get to work,” said Agent Wang.

  I offered to do the dishes. After all the hospitality Mickey Wu had inadvertently shown me, cleaning up seemed like the right thing to do. Especially if it would prevent Mickey from knowing that I had been in his house again.

  Chapter Forty-five

  When I was finished in the kitchen, I wandered through the house, coming across Agents Chung and Wang hard at work in Mickey’s office. I watched them for a moment, trying to imagine what they might be looking for. Then I remembered I had it in my shoulder bag.

  After ducking out and fetching my bag from the car, I checked to make sure the super spies were still occupied. Agent Chung was performing some kind of delicate operation on a recalcitrant safe and Agent Wang was totally engrossed by what he was doing on or to Mickey Wu’s computer. I doubted he was poking around beaversandbananas.com, but whatever he was into was probably even more invasive than what I had seen on that website.

  I went into Mickey Wu’s bedroom, flopped onto his king-sized pillowtop, and opened the envelope.

  The photos were much more tasteful than the ones I left with Mrs. Bernbaum, notwithstanding the stalker vibe they gave off. I spread them out beside me on the bed. There were several of Mickey Wu and his daughter on various father-daughter outings—having brunch, shopping for clothes, having lunch, coming out of an art gallery, hav
ing dinner (for a guy with such a nice kitchen, he seemed to eat out a lot, but at least he put in the time with his kid). I recognized a couple of local landmarks, so clearly she had come to town to visit him, which might have been how Agent Zhang found out about her. There were also a number of photos of her without Mickey, which must have been taken down at Stanford. In these she was surrounded by fresh-faced, intelligent, optimistic-looking people her own age, many wearing backpacks with plastic bottles like Wendy’s clipped to them. In one she was walking down a sidewalk past a low wall with the words “Graduate School of Business” and “Stanford University” on it.

  In addition to the pictures, there was a sheet of paper stating that her name was Cynthia Chang and provided her address. Zhang Tao had also prepared a detailed log of the girl’s visit to Vancouver in late August, during which she had stayed with Mickey. The final items in the envelope were a copy of her current class schedule and three tuition receipts from Stanford made out to Mickey Wu. Taken together, the photographs and the accompanying documents comprised an excellent roadmap leading right to Mickey Wu’s daughter.

  I looked through the photos again. In the ones with Mickey, Cynthia’s expression was difficult to read—she seemed restrained but not unhappy (the painfully tight-looking ponytail she invariably pulled her hair back into might’ve been partially to blame). Mickey, by contrast, looked more animated than I had ever seen him. Not that we had spent much time together, or under circumstances conducive to warm feelings. But that’s what he emanated when he was with his daughter. Not just affection, but also pride. Which might have something to do with the second set of pictures, the ones taken at Stanford. There, Cynthia seemed totally at ease. In some she was laughing; in others, earnest and thoughtful. In all of them, her gaze was arrestingly intense, her brown eyes shining with a canny intelligence—in this sole aspect she evoked her father almost perfectly. She looked younger than she must be, particularly in the ones where she had loosely braided her hair into long pigtails, though in most she simply let it hang loose.

  In aggregate, the Stanford photos painted a picture of a bright, well-adjusted young woman filled with enthusiasm and very much in her element. I never would have guessed she was the daughter of a sleazebag like Mickey Wu if he hadn’t told me so himself. I couldn’t blame Mickey for wanting to keep Cynthia, and the life she was making for herself at Stanford, hidden and protected from the reach of the Chinese government.

  “What are those?”

  I looked up to find Agent Chung standing in the doorway watching me. “Jeez, you startled me.” I spoke loudly so he could hear me over the bass drum that was suddenly hammering away in my chest. The resulting surge in blood flow made it hard to act casual as I hastily crammed the photos back into envelope. “I guess sneaking up on people is Spycraft 101.”

  Agent Chung said nothing, possibly because he was still waiting for an answer to his question. Apparently, being nosey was also Spycraft 101. “Just some stuff Agent Wang helped me retrieve from a safety-deposit box earlier.”

  “They are not Mickey Wu’s?”

  “Nope.” Which was technically true for the time being. Mickey Wu’s face grinned up at me affectionately as the last photo slid into the envelope.

  Agent Chung studied me for another moment before nodding. “I need to search this room.”

  “You didn’t find what you’re looking for in the office?”

  “Wang has made a copy of the computer hard drive. We may still find something on it. But no, nothing so far.”

  I hopped off the bed and beelined for the door, stepping around Agent Chung as he entered the room.

  “Wait, please.”

  I turned to see Agent Chung pulling a picture out from beneath the pillow I had smooshed up behind my back. A sly smile spread across his features as he examined the photo. “She is very pretty.” He handed me the photo. “But much too young for you.”

  I grabbed the photo of Cynthia wearing a Stanford sweatshirt and stuffed it in my pocket with a laugh. “Middle-aged guy dates girl twenty years younger. Quick, call CNN.”

  Chapter Forty-six

  Once I was alone in the kitchen I pulled the picture of Cynthia out of my pocket and returned it to the envelope with the rest. Then I raided Mickey Wu’s fridge in search of something to replace the guilty feeling in my gut. I would’ve liked to help Agents Wang and Chung but I needed the info on Mickey Wu’s daughter to bargain for the safe return of Richard and Dante. Truth be told, putting her on the board in Mickey Wu’s chess match with the Chinese government didn’t sit right anyway. Maybe Barb’s lecture on parents and kids not suffering for each other’s mistakes (okay, crimes) had hit home after all.

  By the time I had finished my second bowl of Chocolate Cherry Garcia, the super spies were ready to go. Mickey Wu must’ve been doing a good job of keeping his affairs in order because their mood was glum as they conversed in Mandarin. Having nothing I was willing to offer, I silently waited by the front door. Until they seemed to briefly switch to Norwegian. “Wait a minute, what did you just say?”

  Agent Wang looked over me with an expression of faint annoyance. “We are just shop talking.”

  “You mean talking shop,” I said helpfully, if unwisely, as his annoyance ticked up a couple notches. “You just said something that wasn’t Mandarin. I think it might have been Norwegian?”

  He looked perplexed for a moment. “Dimmu Borgir?” he said at last.

  “That’s it, yes. I didn’t peg you guys as heavy metal fans.”

  Agent Wang put his hands on his hips. “What are you talking about?”

  “What are you talking about?” I countered.

  “Mickey Wu’s affairs, I told you.”

  “So he’s the metal fan? Wouldn’t have guess that either.”

  The super spies now looked more interested than confused. “Are you familiar with this corporation?”

  “Unfortunately, yes. But it’s not a corporation. Dimmu Borgir is a symphonic black metal band from Oslo.”

  The super spies reverted to looking more confused than interested.

  “Oslo.” I repeated. “It’s the capital of Norway.” If symphonic black metal was what was troubling them, all I could offer was membership to the club.

  “We know what Oslo is,” Agent Chung snapped. “But this Dimmu Borgir that Mickey Wu owns is not from there.”

  “Mickey Wu owns Dimmu Borgir? Wow, he really is building quite the eclectic empire.” As improbable as it sounded, it would at least explain why The Norwegian was such a fan of Mickey Wu’s.

  “Mickey Wu is a shareholder. But not the majority owner,” Agent Wang said by way of clarification, though it failed to make things any clearer for me.

  The stench of lunacy was all around us now. Eyes narrowed as private suspicions festered on which among us was to blame. I waved an olive branch, hoping to clear the air. “I think you guys might be barking up the wrong tree here. Mickey Wu has been hanging out with a guy who is seriously into that band, but it wouldn’t have anything to do with his business affairs.”

  “We are certain it does. Copies of the incorporation documents and share certificates were in his file cabinet,” Agent Wang replied.

  None of this was making any sense. “Show me.”

  The incorporation documents certainly looked pedantic enough to be genuine. It had been a bit hard to believe when he told me about it back at his grow op, but maybe The Norwegian really was trying to go straight after all. And, most surprising of all, Mickey Wu had apparently invested in the company.

  “Now I get it. Dimmu Borgir, Inc. is a real estate development company.”

  Agent Wang was still reading the Wikipedia page on Dimmu Borgir with an incredulous expression, but Agent Chung was paying close attention. “How can you be certain of this?” he asked.

  I tapped the document. “I know The Norwegian.”

 
Agent Chung looked nonplussed.

  “He’s the other shareholder,” I explained. “And his fondest dream is to build condos.”

  “Dark fortresses,” Agent Wang murmured.

  I glanced at him uncertainly. “I guess you could call them that…particularly if The Norwegian designs them himself.”

  “That is what Dimmu Borgir means,” he elaborated, looking up from the monitor.

  “Ah. That explains why The Norwegian named the company after his favourite band—it works on as many levels as he does. But I don’t think it reveals anything about the corporate ethos. Property development can be a bit of a sleazy racket, I grant you, but it’s not illegal. Sorry, guys.”

  The super spies looked disappointed, and I couldn’t blame them. “What about these other files?” I pulled out a thick one but its contents were in Mandarin.

  “That is a list of assets owned by one of Wu’s companies back in China. We already have all that information. Some of the assets are of suspicious origin, but it doesn’t matter. We need evidence of criminal activities here in Canada.”

  “I thought you guys were after him for what he did back home,” I said as I flipped through the file. Most of the pages were filled with text but there were also photos of a couple of fancy-looking houses on white sand beaches, a mid-sized hotel in Manhattan, and even a yacht I recognized—The Chairman.

  “Yes, but without an extradition treaty in place, Canada will not surrender him to face charges back in China. However, Mickey Wu does not have Canadian citizenship.”

  “So what? He’s here legally, isn’t he?”

  “Of course. But if he commits a crime, your government will revoke his visa and deport him. Which is why we will be taking a close look at the activities of this Dimmu Borgir.”

  “Well, I wish you luck. If it’s any help, I’ve been told that their best album was Death Cult Armageddon.”