The Goddess of Yantai

by Ian Hamilton

  “You worked with Lau Lau?”

  “Once, years ago, towards the end of his successful run. He was already starting to fray at the edges. You could see he was going to have problems if he didn’t start looking after himself.”

  “And your brother worked with him?”

  “He was AD on a film when they were both struggling. The film was shit.”

  “When was the last time your brother saw him?”

  “A few months before he died.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Lok told me he’d met him.”

  “What brought them together?”

  “I don’t know. It could have been by chance; they did hang out in some of the same circles,” Bai said, and then leaned forward and pointed. “My building is over there on the right,” he said to the driver.

  Ava looked out the window at streets lined with high-rises. The area reminded her of the worst of Hong Kong and Shanghai. It was like being in a concrete tunnel, except that overhead, somewhere behind a shroud of grey cloud, there was sky. Bai’s building was about thirty storeys high and dotted with windows that weren’t much bigger than portholes.

  The taxi pulled up in front. Ava paid the fare and followed Bai inside. The lobby had a beige tile floor and green walls and was completely bare of furnishings. There were only two elevators to service the entire building, and a group of about ten people stood waiting for one.

  “I’m on the sixth floor. It’s usually faster to take the stairs,” Bai said.

  “Let’s go,” Ava said.

  The stairwell was clean and smelled of disinfectant. Ava followed Bai, thinking as she went about the contrast between Fai’s little house, the courtyard, and the hutong, and the monstrosities built by the Chinese government.

  They exited the stairwell and Bai led her to the end of a hallway that had the same tile and green walls as the lobby. Most of the apartments had an extra metal gate fronting their door. It was something Ava was accustomed to seeing in Hong Kong; she knew that the brightly adorned gates were as much about expressing individuality as they were about security.

  Bai didn’t have a gate, but when he opened the door to his apartment, his individuality almost screamed at her. Photos and paintings of naked men covered every inch of wall, and a coffee table and two end tables supported various sculpted renditions of penises and complete male genitals. Ava now understood why Bai had been reluctant to have her visit his apartment.

  “I’m gay,” he said, his face turning slightly red.

  “So am I,” said Ava.

  “Really?”

  “Yes, and I’ve seen more explicit art than this, so don’t think I’m shocked.”

  “Male art?”

  “I was invited to the villa of Dominic Ventola in Italy — he owns VLG. Some of the artwork he has can only be described as raw. I think yours is in better taste.”

  “Thank you,” Bai said. “Now let me get those boxes from the bedroom. You can take the art off the coffee table so I can put them there.”

  When he left, Ava gingerly picked up a sculpture of a large erect penis and laid it on the leather sofa. It was the first time she’d put her hand on a penis. Even in the abstract she found it unpleasant.

  “Here is the box with the films and disks,” Bai said, placing it on the table. “I’ll get the other one.”

  The box top was folded shut. Ava opened it and saw a layer of DVDs covering what looked like at least ten reels of film. The DVDs were in plain boxes. Most of the reels had stickers with titles written across them.

  Bai put the second box next to the first. This time the DVDs sat on top of a couple more reels that were without titles, plus several bundles of envelopes and paper held in place by rubber bands.

  Ava read the titles aloud.

  “Those are all movies he worked on,” Bai said.

  “What about the disks and reels with nothing to identify them?”

  “I have no idea what they are.”

  “You never looked?”

  “I told you I didn’t.”

  “I’d like to see what’s on them.”

  “Does this have to do with your client?”

  “Possibly.”

  “There’s a lot of material.”

  “Can I take it with me?” Ava said.

  “All of it?”

  “Yes, to be safe. Those titles might not match what’s on the reels.”

  “I’m not sure I want you to do that.”

  “These boxes have been sitting on the floor of your closet for three years.”

  “But they’re all I have left of my brother.”

  Ava reached into her bag and took out money. “Here’s the ten thousand I promised,” she said. “And here is another twenty thousand. Keep the twenty as a deposit. When I bring back the boxes, you can keep ten and return the rest to me.”

  “What if you keep the boxes?”

  “Then you can keep the whole twenty thousand.”

  “I have a feeling that they could be worth a lot more than that.”

  “If I decide to keep the boxes, we’ll have a separate discussion about their value,” Ava said. “I’ll give you my phone number and my office address in Hong Kong. You’ll be able to find me if you have to — but you won’t, because I don’t do business that way.”

  “Are you always this persuasive?”

  “I’ve found that nothing persuades better than money, and if this works out properly, you could make a lot more.”

  He put the thirty thousand on top of the coffee table. “Let me help you carry the boxes downstairs,” he said.

  ( 31 )

  Ava called Fai as soon as the taxi had pulled away from Bai Jing’s apartment building. “I’m in Tongzhou. It took me an hour to get here from the hotel, but now I’m headed into rush hour, so I don’t know when I’ll get home.”

  “What are you doing there? I thought you were meeting at the Kempinski.”

  “I did, and then we came here to his apartment. I’m leaving with two boxes of films, disks, and paperwork that we need to go through,” Ava said. “They were left to Jing by Lok, and if I believe everything I’ve been told, they represent his entire estate and legacy.”

  “Good god. How did you manage to persuade him to give them to you?”

  “I used my considerable charm and then sweetened it with money.”

  “How much? I want to pay you back.”

  “Never mind about that right now. What we need to focus on is the contents of these boxes.”

  “Is my video in one?”

  “I don’t know what’s on any of the films or disks. That’s why we need to look at them all,” Ava said. “The disks aren’t labelled, so god knows what they contain. Most of the reels are marked, and it seems they might be legitimate films he was involved in. Do you have any equipment that would allow us to play the films?”

  “Are they on reels?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t have anything.”

  “So, what can we do?”

  “Once I see what we’re dealing with, I’ll find a film editor. They all have systems at home or have access to one.”

  “Okay. In the meantime, plan on spending the evening at the house.”

  “What do you want to do about dinner?”

  “We’ll eat in. Is there any congee left?”

  “Yes.”

  “Considering that what we’ll be watching might turn our stomachs, congee seems perfect.”

  “I’ll start heating it,” Fai said, and then paused. “Ava, I know you don’t like to make assumptions, but getting those boxes has to be a good thing, yes?”

  “It has that potential,” Ava said, not wanting to speculate on the usefulness of what they might find, despite knowing that Fai wanted to hear something mo
re positive. “Look, I’ll call you when I get near the hutong. I can’t carry both boxes myself, so you should meet me at the entrance.”

  “Yes, boss,” Fai said, laughing.

  Ava smiled as she ended the call. Whatever pressure Fai was under, she wasn’t letting it affect their personal relationship. Ava wasn’t sure she herself could handle that amount of strain and maintain a positive perspective. Thinking of perspective, she looked out the cab window and saw darkness settling. Then, as if to accentuate how dreary it was outside, it began to rain. The Beijing winter was starting to wear on her. It was so cold, so wet, so gloomy, and the air was so foul that even the coldest, snowiest day in Toronto seemed more appealing. What’s the weather like at home now? she thought. She picked up her phone to check and then saw an incoming call from a familiar number.

  “Xu, how are you?” she said.

  “I’m well enough, and you? Are things still settled on the Pang Fai front?”

  “All is quiet with Mo, but another problem has raised its ugly head.”

  “Do you need help with it?”

  “There’s not much anyone can do at the moment, but if I need help, I’ll call.”

  “And this problem is in Beijing?”

  “Yes. Why do you ask me that?”

  “I was hoping you’d be available to go to Hong Kong.”

  “What’s going on there?” Ava asked, surprised at the request.

  “Lop is still feeling a bit paranoid about Sammy Wing. He’s found out that while he was in Beijing with you, Sammy was in Sha Tin. He has a nephew there who just took over one of the gangs, and Lop’s convinced that Sammy is conspiring with him.”

  “To do what?”

  “Take back control of Wanchai.”

  “Do you really take that idea seriously?”

  “No, but Lop is like a dog with a big soup bone — he can’t stop chewing. My fear is that he might create a problem where there isn’t one.”

  “Can’t you intervene?”

  “I can’t tell Lop to stop worrying. I can’t tell Sammy not to talk to his nephew. And, as chairman of the Triad Societies, I can’t step in between Wanchai and Sha Tin when there’s no cause, and when we’re still pretending that Sammy runs Wanchai.”

  “What did you want me to do in Hong Kong?”

  “You have no official standing with any of the parties, but you know your way around the city and you’ve got some great contacts in men like Sonny, Andy, and Carlo. You also know Sammy better than most of us, and he has tremendous respect for you.”

  “Xu, he tried to have me killed — twice.”

  “But he failed, and you made him pay for it. He’s a man who respects strength.”

  “Even so, I’m hardly in a position to browbeat Sammy.”

  “That’s not something I’d ask you to do,” Xu said. “I thought you could put out some feelers and try to ascertain whether Lop’s concerns have any basis. You’d be able to get a better reading if you were in Hong Kong, and I thought if you invited Sammy to dinner it wouldn’t seem threatening or strange.”

  “Is there real urgency to this?”

  “Not really, except the sooner I can calm Lop, the better I’ll feel.”

  “I was planning to go to Hong Kong after I finish here,” Ava said. “The problem is that I have no timetable. I could be here another four or five days. Can you wait that long?”

  “I guess so,” Xu said.

  Ava felt a touch of disappointment at his response and reacted to it. “What I can do right now is ask Sonny to poke around. I’ll leave it to him if he wants to involve anyone else. I’ll tell him only what he needs to know — although it doesn’t matter how much I tell him, because no one is more loyal and discreet.”

  “I have no worries about Sonny.”

  “Then that’s the plan,” she said. “I’ll get to Hong Kong as soon as I can. In the meantime we’ll have Sonny gathering information.”

  “Thanks. I’m quite sure it will amount to nothing, but why take the chance.”

  “Exactly, and spending a bit of time in Hong Kong isn’t a sacrifice. I’ll get to see Amanda and some of my family, and May Ling will probably fly in from Wuhan.”

  “Will you take Pang Fai with you?”

  “Yes, if she’ll come.”

  “I wish I could join you, but there’s too much going on here.”

  “Well, we’ll find a time and place to get together before too long,” Ava said, and then was thrown forward as the taxi came to a sudden sliding stop before starting to move again. “That’s assuming I survive this taxi ride.”

  “Make sure you do,” Xu said. “Now I’d better go. Call me if Sonny unearths anything.”

  Ava ended the call. “How close are we to my hutong?” she asked the driver.

  “Ten minutes or so.”

  Ava called Fai and, when she answered, said, “I’m ten minutes away. It’s raining, so I think you should bring an umbrella with you.”

  “See you in ten,” Fai said. “The congee is on the stove.”

  The taxi slowed, but Ava could see some familiar landmarks and knew his ten-minute estimate wasn’t far off. She thought about calling Sonny but her mind was drawn back to the boxes. There wasn’t much he could do that night anyway, and Hong Kong would still be there in the morning.

  ( 32 )

  They sat in the kitchen over bowls of congee. Fai had opened a bottle of Chardonnay; as incongruous as the wine seemed as a partner for rice porridge, the mood made it seem perfect.

  The boxes were waiting in the living room and weighing on their minds. “I think it would be more efficient if we divided the work,” Ava said finally.

  “How?”

  “Why don’t you work your way through the disks while I look at Bai’s paperwork.”

  “What am I looking for on the disks?”

  “We need to know exactly what’s on them. When you’ve got one figured out, make a note of it and mark the disk and the box so we have a record,” Ava said. “I imagine you might see more displays of private sex, but what’s most important is the participants. Try to identify as many of them as you can.”

  “Why is that important?”

  “You may not be the only person being blackmailed. If other people have the same problem, we could find some new leads.”

  “Do you really think they’re blackmailing more than one person?”

  “Maybe not at this exact moment, but who knows what went on in the past. These disks have been around for years.”

  “What do you expect to find in Bai’s papers?” Fai asked, clearing the bowls from the table.

  “I have no idea. I took a quick look inside the box when I was with Jing, but truthfully it looked like a jumble of this and that.”

  Fai shook her head. “Well then, let’s get started. But I’m going to need more wine to get through this.”

  “Take the bottle with you,” Ava said as she stood up.

  They walked into the living room, where the boxes sat on the floor near the television. Ava opened them both and took out several bundles of papers that weren’t organized in any discernible way. Fai took a black marker and a sheet of paper from a table drawer and then turned on the television and the DVD player.

  “I’m not looking forward to this,” Fai said. “And I hope you’ll understand when I say I hope I don’t recognize anyone.”

  “It’s something you’ll only have to do once.”

  “Do I have to watch them till the end?”

  “I think its best,” Ava said. “There could be multiple scenes on each disk. We need to be sure of what we have.”

  “This is going to take hours — but that isn’t a complaint. I’m grateful that we have something to work with,” Fai said, picking a disk from a box.

  “And who knows what we’ll find,” Ava s
aid, taking more bundles of paper and sticking them under her arm.

  “Where are you going with those?”

  “I’m going to use the kitchen table,” Ava said, leaving the living room.

  The table was bare, and Ava piled the paper at the point farthest from her seat. She took the bundle on top and quickly leafed through it. It was a hodgepodge of bills, receipts, bank statements, letters, contracts, and random pieces of paper. She checked the dates on those that had them. Most were five or six years old. What the hell, she thought, and decided to sort them by type. Five minutes later she had six neater stacks in front of her, and then she reached for another bundle. It took her an hour to finish sorting, but she knew she still couldn’t make sense of any of it the way it was so randomly piled. She picked up the stack of receipts and organized them by date from the oldest to the most recent — which was just over three years ago, only weeks or maybe months before he’d died. Then she repeated the process until all six stacks were in chronological order.

  “Ava,” Fai said from the kitchen entrance.

  “What is it?” Ava said, startled as her concentration was broken.

  “I’ve watched five of the disks.”

  “Already?”

  “I think he edited them. All the foreplay and anything romantic or tender has been taken out. They’re all about graphic sex in as many forms as you can imagine. They’re short, but certainly to the point.”

  “Have you recognized anyone?”

  “I just did, which is why I’m standing here,” Fai said. “It’s Lau Lau with a young man, maybe even a boy. What’s strange is that it’s just a snippet, just ten or twenty seconds tacked onto the end of a disk that featured another man with a woman.”

  “But there’s enough that you’re certain it’s him?”

  “It’s him.”

  “You look upset.”