Noble House

  “Every important Shanghainese’s equally suspect. Jesus Christ, Brian, you know Chiang Kai-shek was supposed to have given Shanghai to the Green Pang years ago as their exclusive bailiwick if they’d support his northern campaign against the warlords. Isn’t the Green Pang still, more or less, an official Nationalist secret society?”

  Brian Kwok said, “Where’d Tsu-yan make his money, Ian? His first fortune?”

  “I don’t know. You tell me, Brian.”

  “He made it during the Korean War smuggling penicillin, drugs and petrol—mostly penicillin—across the border to the Communists. Before Korea all he owned was a loincloth and a broken-down rickshaw.”

  “That’s all hearsay, Brian.”

  “Struan’s made a fortune too.”

  “Yes. But it would really be very unwise to imply we did it smuggling—publicly or privately,” Dunross said mildly. “Very unwise indeed.”

  “Didn’t you?”

  “Struan’s began with a little smuggling 120-odd years ago, so rumor has it, but it was an honorable profession and never against British law. We’re law-abiding capitalists and China Traders and have been for years.”

  Brian Kwok did not smile. “More hearsay’s that a lot of his penicillin was bad. Very bad.”

  “If it was, if that’s the truth, then please go get him, Brian,” Dunross said coldly. “Personally I think that’s another rumor spread by jealous competitors. If it was true he’d be floating in the bay with the others who tried, or he’d be punished like Bad Powder Wong.” He was referring to a Hong Kong smuggler who had sold a vast quantity of adulterated penicillin over the border during the Korean War and invested his fortune in stocks and land in Hong Kong. Within seven years he was very very rich. Then certain triads of Hong Kong were ordered to balance the books. Every week one member of his family vanished, or died. By drowning, car accident, strangulation, poison or knife. No assailant was ever caught. The killing went on for seventeen months and three weeks and then stopped. Only he and one semi-imbecile infant grandson remained alive. They live today, still holed up in the same vast, once luxurious penthouse apartment with one servant and one cook, in terror, guarded night and day, never going out—knowing that no guards or any amount of money could ever prevent the inexorability of his sentence published in a tiny box in a local Chinese newspaper: Bad Powder Wong will be punished, he and all his generations.

  Brian Kwok said, “We interviewed that sod once, Robert and I.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes. Scary. Every door’s double locked and chained, every window nailed up and boarded over with planks—just spy holes here and there. He hasn’t been out since the killing started. The place stank, my God did it stink! All he does is play Chinese checkers with his grandson and watch television.”

  “And wait,” Armstrong said. “One day they’ll come for both of them. His grandson must be six or seven now.”

  Dunross said, “I think you prove my point. Tsu-yan’s not like him and never was. And what possible use could Tsu-yan have for a few M14’s? If he wanted to, I imagine he could muster half the Nationalist army along with a battalion of tanks.”

  “In Taiwan but not in Hong Kong.”

  “Has Tsu-yan ever been involved with Bartlett?” Armstrong asked. “In your negotiations?”

  “Yes. He was in New York once and in Los Angeles on our behalf. Both times with John Chen. They initialed the agreement between Struan’s and Par-Con Industries which is to be finalized—or abandoned—here this month, and they formally invited Bartlett to Hong Kong on my behalf.”

  Armstrong glanced at his Chinese partner. Then he said, “When was this?”

  “Four months ago. It’s taken that time for both sides to prepare all the details.”

  “John Chen, eh?” Armstrong said. “He certainly could be Noble House Chen.”

  “You know John’s not the type,” Dunross said. “There’s no reason why he should be mixed up in such a ploy. It must be just coincidence.”

  “There’s another curious coincidence,” Brian Kwok said. “Tsu-yan and John Chen both know an American called Banastasio, at least both have been seen in his company. Does that name mean anything?”

  “No. Who’s he?”

  “A big-time gambler and suspected racketeer. He’s also supposed to be closely connected with one of the Cosa Nostra families. Vincenzo Banastasio.”

  Dunross’s eyes narrowed. “You said, ‘seen in his company.’ Who did the seeing?”

  “The FBI.”

  The silence thickened a little.

  Armstrong reached into his pocket for a cigarette.

  Dunross pushed across the silver cigarette box. “Here.”

  “Oh, thanks. No, I won’t—I wasn’t thinking. I’ve stopped for the last couple of weeks. It’s a killer.” Then he added, trying to curb the desire, “The FBI passed the info on to us because Tsu-yan and Mr. John Chen are so prominent here. They asked us to keep an eye on them.”

  Then Dunross suddenly remembered Foxwell’s remark about a prominent capitalist who was a secret Communist that they were watching in Sinclair Towers. Christ, he thought, Tsu-yan’s got a flat there, and so has John Chen. Surely it’s impossible either’d be mixed up with Communists.

  “Of course heroin’s big business,” Armstrong was saying, his voice very hard.

  “What does that mean, Robert?”

  “The drug racket requires huge amounts of money to finance it. That kind of money can only come from banks or bankers, covertly of course. Tsu-yan’s on the board of a number of banks—so’s Mr. Chen.”

  “Robert, you’d better go very slow on that sort of remark,” Dunross grated. “You are drawing very dangerous conclusions without any proof whatsoever. That’s actionable I’d imagine and I won’t have it.”

  “You’re right, sorry. I withdraw the coincidence. Even so, the drug trade’s big business, and it’s here in Hong Kong in abundance, mostly for ultimate U.S. consumption. Somehow I’m going to find out who our nasties are.”

  “That’s commendable. And you’ll have all the help you want from Struan’s and me. I hate the traffic too.”

  “Oh I don’t hate it, tai-pan, or the traffickers. It’s a fact of life. It’s just another business—illegal certainly but still a business. I’ve been given the job of finding out who the tai-pans are. It’s a matter of personal satisfaction, that’s all.”

  “If you want help, just ask.”

  “Thank you.” Armstrong got up wearily. “Before we go there’re a couple more coincidences for you. When Tsu-yan and Noble House Chen were named this morning we thought we’d like to chat with them right away, but shortly after we ambushed the guns Tsu-yan caught the early flight to Taipei. Curious, eh?”

  “He’s back and forth all the time,” Dunross said, his disquiet soaring. Tsu-yan was expected at his party this evening. It would be extraordinary if he did not appear.

  Armstrong nodded. “It seems it was a last-minute decision—no reservation, no ticket, no luggage, just a few extra dollars under the counter and someone was bounced off and him on. He was carrying only a briefcase. Strange, eh?”

  Brian Kwok said, “We haven’t a hope in hell of extraditing him from Taiwan.”

  Dunross studied him then looked back at Armstrong, his eyes steady and the color of sea ice. “You said there were a couple of coincidences. What’s the other?”

  “We can’t find John Chen.”

  “What’re you talking about?”

  “He’s not at home, or at his lady friend’s, or at any of his usual haunts. We’ve been watching him and Tsu-yan off and on for months, ever since the FBI tipped us.”

  The silence gathered. “You’ve checked his boat?” Dunross asked, sure that they had.

  “She’s at her moorings, hasn’t been out since yesterday. His boat-boy hasn’t seen him either.”

  “Golf course?”

  “No, he’s not there,” Armstrong said. “Nor at the racetrack. He wasn’t at the worko
ut, though he was expected, his trainer said. He’s gone, vanished, scarpered.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  11:15 A.M.:

  There was a stunned silence in the boardroom.

  “What’s wrong?” Casey asked. “The figures speak for themselves.”

  The four men around the table looked at her. Andrew Gavallan, Linbar Struan, Jacques deVille and Phillip Chen, all members of the Inner Court.

  Andrew Gavallan was tall and thin and forty-seven. He glanced at the sheaf of papers in front of him. Dew neh loh moh on all women in business, he thought irritably. “Perhaps we should check with Mr. Bartlett,” he said uneasily, still very unsettled that they were expected to deal with a woman.

  “I’ve already told you I have authority in all these areas,” she said, trying to be patient. “I’m treasurer and executive vice-president of Par-Con Industries and empowered to negotiate with you. We confirmed that in writing last month.” Casey held her temper. The meeting had been very heavy going. From their initial shock that she was a woman to their inevitable, overpolite awkwardness, waiting for her to sit, waiting for her to talk, then not sitting until she had asked them to, making small talk, not wanting to get down to business, not wishing to negotiate with her as a person, a business person, at all, saying instead that their wives would be delighted to take her shopping, then gaping because she knew all the intimate details of their projected deal. It was all part of a pattern that, normally, she could deal with. But not today. Jesus, she thought, I’ve got to succeed. I’ve got to get through to them.

  “It’s really quite easy,” she had said initially, trying to clear their awkwardness away, using her standard opening. “Forget that I’m a woman—judge me on my ability. Now, there are three subjects on our agenda: the polyurethane factories, our computer-leasing representation and last, general representation of our petrochemical products, fertilizers, pharmaceutical and sports goods throughout Asia. First let’s sort out the polyurethane factories, the chemical mix supplies and a projected time schedule for the financing.” At once she gave them graphics and prepared documentation, verbally synopsized all the facts, figures and percentages, bank charges and interest charges, simply and very quickly, so that even the slowest brain could grasp the project. And now they were staring at her.

  Andrew Gavallan broke the silence. “That’s … that’s very impressive, my dear.”

  “Actually I’m not your ‘dear,’” she said with a laugh. “I’m very hard-nosed for my corporation.”

  “But mademoiselle,” Jacques deVille said with a suave Gallic charm, “your nose is perfect and not hard at all.”

  “Merci, monsieur,” she replied at once, and added lightly in passable French, “but please may we leave the shape of my nose for the moment and discuss the shape of this deal. It’s better not to mix the two, don’t you think?”

  Another silence.

  Linbar Struan said, “Would you like some coffee?”

  “No thanks, Mr. Struan,” Casey said, being careful to conform to their customs and not to call them by their Christian names too early. “May we zero in on this proposal? It’s the one we sent you last month.… I’ve tried to cover your problems as well as ours.”

  There was another silence. Linbar Struan, thirty-four, very good-looking with sandy hair and blue eyes with a devil-may-care glint to them, persisted, “Are you sure you wouldn’t like coffee? Tea perhaps?”

  “No thanks. Then you accept our proposal as it stands?”

  Phillip Chen coughed and said, “In principle we agree to want to be in business with Par-Con in several areas. The Heads of Agreement indicate that. As to the polyurethane factories …”

  She listened to his generalizations, then once more tried to get to the specifics—the whole reason for this meeting. But the going was very hard and she could feel them squirming. This’s the worst it’s ever been. Perhaps it’s because they’re English, and I’ve never dealt with the English before.

  “Is there anything specific that needs clarifying?” she asked. “If there’s anything you don’t understand …”

  Gavallan said, “We understand very well. You present us with figures which are lopsided. We’re financing the building of the factories. You provide the machines but their cost is amortized over three years which’ll mess up any cash flow and mean no profits for five years at least.”

  “I’m told it is your custom in Hong Kong to amortize the full cost of a building over a three-year period,” she replied equally sharply, glad to be challenged. “We’re just proposing to follow your custom. If you want five—or ten years—you may have them, provided the same applies to the building.”

  “You’re not paying for the machines—they’re on a lease basis and the monthly charge to the joint venture is high.”

  “What’s your bank prime rate today, Mr. Gavallan?”

  They consulted, then told her. She used her pocket slide rule for a few seconds. “At today’s rate you’d save 17,000 HK a week per machine if you take our deal which, over the period we’re talking …” Another quick calculation. “… would jump your end of the profits 32 percent over the best you could do—and we’re talking in millions of dollars.”

  They stared at her in silence.

  Andrew Gavallan cross-questioned her about the figures but she never faltered. Their dislike for her increased.

  Silence.

  She was sure they were fogged by her figures. What else can I say to convince them? she thought, her anxiety growing. Struan’s will make a bundle if they get off their asses, we’ll make a fortune and I’ll get my drop dead money at long last. The foam part of the deal alone will make Struan’s rich and Par-Con nearly $80,000 net a month over the next ten years and Linc said I could have a piece.

  “How much do you want?” he had asked her, just before they had left the States.

  “51 percent,” she had replied with a laugh, “since you’re asking.”

  “3 percent.”

  “Come on, Linc, I need my drop dead money.”

  “Pull off the whole package and you’ve got a stock option of 100,000 Par-Con at four dollars below market.”

  “You’re on. But I want the foam company too,” she had said, holding her breath. “I started it and I want that. 51 percent. For me.”

  “In return for what?”

  “Struan’s.”

  “Done.”

  Casey waited outwardly calm. When she judged the moment correct she said innocently, “Are we agreed then, that our proposal stands as is? We’re fifty-fifty with you, what could be better than that?”

  “I still say you’re not providing 50 percent of the financing of the joint venture,” Andrew Gavallan replied sharply. “You’re providing the machines and materials on a lease carry-back so your risk’s not equivalent to ours.”

  “But that’s for our tax purposes and to lessen the amount of cash outlay, gentlemen. We’re financing from cash flow. The figures add up the same. The fact that we get a depreciation allowance and various rebates is neither here nor there.” Even more innocently, baiting the trap, she added, “We finance in the States, where we’ve the expertise. You finance in Hong Kong where you’re the experts.”

  Quillan Gornt turned back from his office window. “I repeat, we can better any arrangement you can make with Struan’s, Mr. Bartlett. Any arrangement.”

  “You’d go dollar for dollar?”

  “Dollar for dollar.” The Englishman strolled back and sat behind his paperless desk and faced Bartlett again. They were on the top floor of the Rothwell-Gornt Building also fronting Connaught Road and the waterfront. Gornt was a thickset, hard-faced, bearded man, just under six feet, with graying black hair and graying bushy eyebrows and brown eyes. “It’s no secret our companies are very serious rivals, but I assure you we can outbid them and outmatch them, and I’d arrange our side of the financing within the week. We could have a profitable partnership, you and I. I’d suggest we set up a joint company under Hong Kong law—th
e taxes here’re really quite reasonable—15 percent of everything earned in Hong Kong, with the rest of the world free of all taxes.” Gornt smiled. “Better than the U.S.A.”

  “Much better,” Bartlett said. He was sitting in a high-backed leather chair. “Very much better.”

  “Is that why you’re interested in Hong Kong?”

  “One reason.”

  “What’re the others?”

  “There’s no American outfit as big as mine here in strength yet, and there should be. This is the age of the Pacific. But you could benefit from our coming. We’ve a lot of expertise you don’t have and a major say in areas of the U.S. market. On the other hand, Rothwell-Gornt—and Struan’s—have the expertise we lack and a major say in the Asian markets.”

  “How can we cement a relationship?”

  “First I have to find out what Struan’s are after. I started negotiating with them, and I don’t like changing airplanes in mid-ocean.”

  “I can tell you at once what they’re after: profit for them and the hell with anyone else.” Gornt’s smile was hard.

  “The deal we’ve discussed seems very fair.”

  “They’re past masters at appearing to be very fair and putting up a half share, then selling out at their own choosing to skim the profit and yet retain control.”

  “That wouldn’t be possible with us.”

  “They’ve been at it for almost a century and a half. They’ve learned a few tricks by now.”

  “So’ve you.”

  “Of course. But Struan’s is very different from us. We own things and companies—they’re percentagers. They’ve little more than a 5 percent holding in most of their subsidiaries yet they still exercise absolute control by special voting shares, or by making it mandatory in the Articles of Association that their tai-pan’s also tai-pan of the subsidiary with overriding say.”

  “That sounds smart.”

  “It is. And they are. But we’re better and straighter—and our contacts and influence in China and throughout the Pacific Rim, except for the U.S. and Canada, are stronger than theirs and growing stronger every day.”

  “Why?”