Brother Fish (118 page)

‘Countess, she gonna want to know who is her mama jus' the same I want to know who is my mama. That don't evah go away. That a hunger inside yo' heart. I ain't never gonna find my mama to sat-is-fy my hungry heart, but you can try to find yo' daughter.' He paused and looked at her almost angrily, and then demanded, ‘Yoh gonna try to do that, or yo' gonna wake every mornin' 'til yoh die, like yoh jus' said?'

By not comforting or reassuring her but by taking her daughter's point of view, Jimmy had hit the jackpot – it was precisely the right aggressive approach. Nicole looked at Jimmy, then with her eyes downcast she whispered, ‘Yes.' That was all. Just the one little word, but it had taken forty-two years to say.

She rose from her wicker chair. ‘I shan't be long,' she said quietly, visibly upset, and disappeared into the cottage. We looked at each other. ‘Well done, mate,' I said quietly to Jimmy.

‘She's terribly upset,' Wendy cried. ‘I must go in to comfort her!'

‘No! Leave her be,' Jimmy said firmly. ‘Dis thing she gotta cry out alone.'

Wendy sat down reluctantly, and for a moment I thought to encourage her to go in after the Countess. But then I realised Jimmy wasn't being bossy. In order to say what he'd said, he'd had to reveal a sadness and longing within himself I'd never seen before. He wasn't being harsh – instead he was being sensitive to Nicole's feelings.

She appeared half an hour later and we could see she'd tried to conceal the effects of her tears by applying a little make-up. She carried a wooden box about twelve inches long, four inches deep and six inches wide, and placed it on the table among the afternoon-tea clutter. It was made of a light-coloured wood with the head of a dragon carved into the lid. It was the first time we'd ever seen the dragon box.

‘Open it, Jack,' she instructed, and I did as she asked. Inside, it was lined with red satin, upon which a thick blonde plait lay, running the length of the box and then almost all the way back again. It was nearly two feet long and looked as if it had been washed and brushed only moments before to a lovely sheen. Jimmy and Wendy rose to stand behind my chair. Nicole lifted the plait from the box. ‘I washed and brushed it and then replaited it only a week ago. I do so from time to time, though I can't imagine why – I always end up crying my eyes out.' Where the plait had lain was a small folded card with the top section of a broken seal of red sealing wax resting on the edge and at the centre of the top fold.

‘May I?' I asked, while Wendy held the magnificent plait of hair. Nicole nodded and I lifted the card out and opened it to see a line of Chinese characters across the centre.

I knew, of course, what they said: ‘
The good joss will return in one generation
.' ‘Will we be taking the dragon box back to Hong Kong with us?' I asked.

Nicole smiled. ‘I feel rather foolish saying this, but I'd feel safer if we did. If ever we can return it, I think that might mean something to me.'

At Kai Tak Airport we were met by a chauffeur driving a Rolls Royce and taken to the Mandarin on Hong Kong Island, at the time a pleasing blend of modern luxury and traditional elegance. We each had a suite that came with its own butler and maid. Even though we were doing pretty well and money was no longer a problem, I remember feeling a little out of place. You never quite forget where you come from, and shaking the poor boy out of your head isn't all that easy to do.

When we arrived at our suite the butler asked if he could unpack our suitcases. After freshening up following the long flight I came out of one of the two bathrooms (Wendy had her own) to find my shoes had been polished, my slacks ironed and the creases ironed out of a recently unpacked shirt. The shirt, socks and underpants I had been wearing had been taken away to be laundered, and a new set lay neatly folded on the bed with a shoehorn, for godsake, placed beside my socks.

We all travelled for Ogoya a fair bit and, now that we could afford it, stayed in good pubs wherever we found ourselves in the world. But the Mandarin was something else. Nicole claimed that although the hotel was comparatively modern, its service felt very similar to that of the Cathay Hotel Sir Victor had built in Shanghai, and she felt very much at home. She was soon chatting away in Cantonese with all the staff and didn't look a bit frightened now she was here, although Wendy, who'd sat beside her on the plane, said she'd been rather quiet. In a way, considering what had taken place the last time she'd been in Hong Kong, so far this was somewhat of a triumphant return.

It wasn't going to be too difficult to get to the local fish importers, as the Australian Trade Commission official had set us up with several appointments. The problem was going to be getting to the right Triad family as part of our other mission to find Nicole's daughter. It wasn't as if we could simply pick up the telephone directory and look up Yu Ya-ching. There might be a hundred such names, but Big Boss Yu's would not be among them. There was only one way to contact a Triad boss, and a rather frightening one at that. If we could get a message to him it would have to be delivered by unseen hand, and if a meeting was arranged it would be at a place and time nominated by the recipient.

We'd had two photographs taken of the dragon box, one showing the carved dragon's head and another showing the open box with the plait of hair inside. A separate photograph captured the original note with the calligraphy. Nicole purchased some bright-yellow parchment and had one sheet fashioned into an envelope of sufficient size to take her message and the three photographs. She'd had a chop made – that is, a seal – from a small block of polished granite about half the width and slightly taller than a matchbox, with one end containing the carved seal. Its design was a replica of a simple plait lying within a circle, cut into the granite so that when hot-waxed and stamped the design showed in relief.

With a message as confidential as this Nicole dared not take the contents of the letter to a calligrapher, and knew she needed to write it with her own hand and that this must be apparent to the receiver. She spent almost three days composing and preparing the note and used up a couple of dozen sheets of parchment in the process, burning each of her mistakes in the bathroom basin and washing the remains down the drain.

The message had to be carefully thought out so that it contained not the slightest threat and, at the same time, made it worthwhile for the recipient to respond. This was not an easy task – deception is the mainstay of the Triad secret society, and a message correctly phrased requires a deep knowledge of the culture of the brotherhood. Even Nicole was not familiar with this secret protocol, so she simply had to use the language of respect familiar to the Chinese in the context of such a letter. It was her very lack of deception that she was counting on. Her message was therefore simple, direct and unique.

My Lord, may the recipient of this message be blessed with many sons to honour and magnify his name. May he be blessed with a long and illustrious life, his luck remain golden and his clan prosper above all others. If the Lord Yu Ya-ching has not departed to take his place in the palace of his forefathers then this message is intended for his eyes alone. If by the grace of all Gods he now resides in the Western Heaven, then this dispatch is addressed with the highest respect to his eldest living son or he who wears the robes of dragonhead.

The reader does me great honour and receives my humble gratitude for deigning to receive it. I am known by the name Lily No Gin, and it has fallen upon my unworthy shoulders to return dutifully the dragon box according to the two sacred prophecies:

‘It is good for now but it will sail away across the seas and return again later to his dragonhead.'

‘The good joss will return in one generation.'

Destiny also allows me to humbly offer great good fortune to the esteemed family of Yu Ya-ching of far greater magnitude than that of the propitious venture of Double Golden Boy raisins.

In return I ask only moments of your precious time, and to be allowed one question. May all Gods bear witness that the information I seek can in no way compromise or disturb the peaceful virtues of the clan Ching, but only enhance its immortal name.

I swear upon the name of my lineage that this message will remain only between the sender and the receiver. I will come to the place, and at the time, of your choosing to seal this covenant for all time.

I may be contacted at the Mandarin Hotel by the name Miss Nicole Lenoir-Jourdan.

Lily No Gin

The next challenge was to deliver the message by ‘unseen hand'. This was done by attempting to find an establishment frequented by Big Boss Yu, or his family, or one that was popular with his white paper fan or the golden sash, his Triad general. We had nothing to go on except that, status being important, a Triad boss would need to be seen in the most exclusive and expensive public venues. As wealthy Chinese invariably eat out, the logical choice was a restaurant. We made several inquiries about the names of the most exclusive and expensive restaurants in Hong Kong under the pretence of taking a wealthy, conservative Chinese businessman to dinner. We finally selected the Golden Phoenix, a millionaires' ‘club' with a restaurant appropriately named Great Shanghai. We were told that, given two days' notice, it would serve any dish available in China. Some years later when we travelled frequently to Hong Kong on business, we discovered that in the restaurant's private dining room ‘forbidden species' were served at a banquet if the diners were of sufficient importance and the host was known to the establishment. Furthermore, far from forbidden love was available for the after-dinner gratification of guests from Hong Kong's most beautiful, accomplished and expensive escorts.