FEARLESS FINN'S MURDEROUS ADVENTURE (7 page)

As soon as they were out of range, Gerry shot out his hand in greeting. He gave me a firm grip, which I sense could’ve been a good deal stronger if he wanted it to be.

“I think Uncle Sui’s just displayed an unusual diplomatic gesture…giving the two
gweilos
, that’s you and me, the chance to get acquainted. Don’t expect to see that kinda tact on a regular basis, that ain’t his style. Him and me, we’ve got what you might call a
working relationship
. I do the work and he keeps the money. It ain’t as bad as it sounds. Me and my pal Nico, you’ll get to meet him later, we do good under Uncle’s wing. Here they are, coming back. I’ll fill you in on the fairy later. OK Finn?”

These Oriental shenanigans are too much for my poor addled head. I can’t string a sensible sentence together, and it’s all I can manage just to stay awake. My three days’ partying with the Kurdish fighters I’d befriended are taking their toll. My eyelids are taking on a life of their own…they just want to shut up shop and sleep. Of course, I’m not sure whether this is due to seventy-two hours’ partying Kurdish-warrior-style, jet lag, the astonishment at my accommodation, delight at being eight thousand kilometres away from the police that are chasing me, or my present company. Whatever it is, I can’t rehearse what I’m about to say in my head before opening my mouth – like I normally do. So I just nodded, grinned and said nothing.

I got a closer look at Mister Sui Wong-Li, aka Uncle Sui, in the lift on the way up to the restaurant on the twenty-fourth floor. He’s about five feet eight inches tall with black, expressionless eyes and a military haircut; he’s so thin that his skin stretches tightly over his high cheekbones. He’s wearing a black silk suit with a matching tie and a brilliant white shirt. When he raised his hand to gesture me out of the lift I noticed the nail on his pinkie finger is long, sharp and varnished.

We were met in the lobby by the restaurant manager, and he escorted us inside. Our table is laid with gold and silver lacquered plates and ivory chopsticks tipped with gold; the starched linen napkins are folded into storks.

The head chef entered the dining room dressed in freshly laundered whites. He approached our table and gave Uncle Sui something between a long nod and a short bow, and he pretty much ignored the rest of us. Before he returned to the kitchen his eyes may’ve hovered for a moment over Eddie, but I couldn’t swear to it.

For a minute or so we sat staring at each other around the table, and not a word was spoken.
Feck this for a game of auld soldiers
, I thought. At the risk of offending my host, I reached across the table and stuck out my hand to Gerry.

“Finn Flynn, Irishman,” I said, like we’ve not spoken before.

Gerry followed suit and stuck out his hand. “Hi. Gerry Gant, American.”

I glanced over at Uncle Sui just in time to catch a perceptive grin cross his face. Our charade hasn’t fooled him for a moment. I’m pretty sure he knows the affable Gerry wouldn’t have been able to resist saying hi when he feigned needing to piss back in the bar. Still, if they want to play inscrutable pan-Pacific head games, that’s up to them.

Five minutes passed without an order being taken, and then a covey of waiters arrived at the table. They have an assortment of dishes, and a magnum of Cristal Champagne in a gold and silver ice bucket.

“Do you have still Tipperary Water?” I asked the sommelier. A bottle arrived moments later in its own miniature ice bucket.

The Peking duck with wafer-thin pancakes, spring onions and plum sauce was delicious. I ate my fill of duck and drank every drop of my water; I rarely leave anything behind on a plate or in a glass. Uncle Sui, Eddie and Gerry only picked at the food on their plates, and the magnum of Cristal remains untouched.

“Your accommodation, is it suitable? Good?” asked Uncle Sui, while looking directly across the table at me for the first time since we sat down. He didn’t wait for an answer, or maybe it’s that he answered his own question.

“Finn Flynn stays here as my guest. The hotel, they understand this?” This question was addressed to Limp-wristed Eddie, and he answered in a Chinese dialect I’ve never heard before. “English, speak English. Don’t be rude to our guests,” Uncle barked at Eddie, with a withering glare.

“Oh yes, yes, the hotel, they understand,” grovelled Eddie, ignoring Uncle Sui’s rebuking like a whipped puppy dog.

No bill has been presented, but that exchange seems to have concluded our lunch. The manager and head chef reappeared to enquire if we’ve enjoyed our meal…even though they can see the untouched plates of food and the unopened bottle of expensive Champagne still standing in the ice bucket. They didn’t seem to notice that I’d eaten all before me, and drank my water. Uncle Sui permitted a faint, fleeting smile to cross his lips, which appears to have satisfied them.

The restaurant manager accompanied us in the lift down to the lobby. As Uncle Sui walked towards the exit he was discreetly surrounded by six immaculately groomed, athletic-looking young men who appeared out of nowhere. He didn’t look back, and there was no gesture of farewell.

Gerry and I lounged on the comfortable couches that litter the lobby of the Mandarin Oriental, Hong Kong. Seeing Uncle Sui leave, I thought to meself:
there’s a pleasant old gentleman, possibly lacking a little in the subtleties of European manners, but agreeable enough
….

“So Finn, you look bushed pal, but could you stay awake long enough for a little get-together talk? Could you, buddy?” Gerry asked.

“Sorry Gerry. I’m whacked
mo chara
. Later, OK?”

“Get some shut-eye Finn. Uncle wants me to kinda look out for you, one
gweilo
to another. You know? We’ll have plenty of time to cover the bases later, but for now, ciao!”

So, he confirmed it…kind of. Gerry’s Italian American, not Israeli.

I have one thing to do before hitting that huge bed – or
ollmhór leaba
in my adopted mother tongue – upstairs in my suite.…Gary Cooke, an art student I knew back in the Brighton days, has a brother working as a newspaper reporter in Hong Kong. Gary gave me his brother’s home phone number and told me to be sure to ring him. I decided to give it a try, to see if I can rustle up some contacts of my own. I’m a touch wary about the contacts I’ve just met – too much too soon, if you get my meaning. I rang the number but there’s no answer; I suppose he’s out at work.

I slipped between the sheets of my giant bed and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

MACAU

I’m relieved that
Finn Flynn wasn’t up for the get-to-know-you powwow I suggested. I have urgent business to attend to in Macau.

A Ruskie cruise ship arrived today for a three-day stopover, and that means suckers. Some of the passengers will be looking for passports and other papers to get them eternally-the-fuck-out-of-Mother Russia, so they can live in some asshole place like Liechtenstein – where no one will ask how come they’re so goddamn rich. I have to get to these
idioti
before someone else picks them off…seeing as I don’t have a monopoly on hokey passports. I could have if I’d included Uncle Sui in this little sideline, but I didn’t. I’m flying solo on this scam.

I headed straight to the ship from the heliport, climbed the gangway and joined the better-dressed passengers in the Premier Lounge. Before the night was over I bagged myself a couple of university professors, an oilman and two ‘exotic entertainers’…all looking for Irish passports and driver’s licenses.

My Australian competition got to the cruise liner earlier in the day, masquerading as a bespoke tailor. He had more time to rustle up chumps, so I’m sure did even better than me. But unlike me, he’s stuck with the fake US dollars.

With my overnight business on the ship
finito
, I walked along the bund as far as the Pousada de São Tiago Hotel. It’s a seventeenth century stone fort that’s been converted into a hotel; when I’m in Macau I like to have breakfast on the veranda, overlooking the harbour. The Pousada de São Tiago specialises in my favourite king-sized sardines, which happen to be the cheapest dish on the menu, but I’d happily pay ten times more.

Anyway, I want to enjoy a breakfast that reminds me of better times in the bosom of my family. I ordered king-sized sardines baked in sea salt, served with freshly baked bread and olives. The taste, the smell of the freshly baked bread, the olives – it all takes me right back to when I was a kid at Chesapeake Bay during the long summer vacations. I’d be eating baked crab, clams and mussels boiled in salty water, watching Poppa play pinochle with his younger brother, my Uncle Angelo. Poppa always let Angelo win at the cards.

———

I was in a goddamn hurry when I left the United States. I flew to Macau, which is off the southern coast of the PRC. The whole archipelago is governed by Portugal, under a lease that doesn’t run out until 1999. Till then, it’s a wild town – like Las Vegas and Atlantic City in the old days.

I knew before I got here that I’d hook-up with my buddy Nico. He’d sent me a cockamamie seaside picture postcard, care of my sister’s girlfriend up in Toronto, Canada – so the feds wouldn’t see it before I did. Like always, Nico was hustling a good living out of the casinos, except this time it was a long way away from the
good ole US of A
.

Nico is Head of Security at the Lisbon Casino and Hotel. That’s a hoot right there – talk about turning the poacher into the gamekeeper! Nico knows more ways to rip-off a casino than Lucky Luciano, and he sure knew a few, as everyone knows now.

Of course, maybe the Chinese casino owners weren’t so stupid in hiring Nico.
Chi meglio individuare un shyster che un shyster
?…And me. When Nico asked the big boss to give me a job, the guy looked me over for a good ten seconds before he said a word.

“OK, Gerry…it is Gerry, yes? You can be a marker. You know what a marker is?”

“I sure do, and thanks for the chance.”

“We’ll see.”

It was the shortest job interview I ever had. No…that was the only job interview I ever had.

Permettetemi di dirvi
…it’s a cakewalk picking out the high rollers getting off their shiny-white cruisers, or dropping out of the sky in their private helicopters. And getting them sauced up with free booze…no problema. Like Uncle Angelo always says,
rich people love getting something for nothing
. Then, when they’re lit up – like good little rich folks – they take the elevator down from the penthouse and walk right into the hotel casino. I get two per cent commission on anything over the first twenty thousand they lose. It’s a living, and it leaves me with free time to work on my own scams.

Nico and me like to make a few quick bucks whenever we can, so we help out gamblers down on their luck. We give them loans against their gold watches, diamond rings, or the keys to their cars parked back at the Sheung Wan Terminal on Hong Kong Island.

One of Nico’s ideas was real simple, and pretty easy money. He picks out the big winners at the casino teller’s window, and then we get them grabbed before they make it back to their hotel, or the ferry, or the heliport. Most of the time these schmucks still have their chips or cash with them, so we just help ourselves and let them on their way…with a warning to stay away from the police.

Sometimes we run into smart gamblers who stash their winnings in a night safe, where it can’t be got at until the bank opens in the morning. Nico rents a place near the casino for when we grab a smart gambler. We only hold the marks in the apartment for as long as we have to, which is until the bank opens. Of course, they have to volunteer to part with their winnings, or our hired help beats the shit out of them just enough to encourage them to volunteer their winnings. Anyway, in these situations we send out for a little something to eat and drink, maybe even play a few games of cards to pass the time – all real civilised. But lucky for us, there aren’t too many smart gamblers.

It was while we were pulling one of these grab and gruel jobs that I first met Uncle Sui. Me and Nico fucked-up and grabbed one of Uncle’s acquaintances, a smart gambler who’d deposited his hefty winnings in the bank’s night safe. Intending to persuade the lucky winner to part with his winnings, we weren’t back in the apartment ten minutes before the door crashed in on top of us. Six fucking enormous Chinese guys rushed in, pinned us to the floor and stuck knives at our throats before tying our hands behind our backs.

The big winner started screaming bloody murder at me and Nico, but the head Chinese guy pushed him into an armchair and told him to
shut the fuck up
in English. Then the head guy made a call on his cell and talked to someone in Cantonese. By the time he finished the call they’d pulled pillowcases over our heads.

Four goons lifted me and Nico to our feet, shoved us out of the apartment into the elevator, and then tossed us into the backseat of a car. It kind of reminded me of the old days, except this time we were the ones getting pushed around. Two of the Chinese guys squeezed into the back seat of the car, one on each side of us, and we drove for say ten minutes.