“Someone’s had to. Freddie’s incapable. Megan doesn’t want to. You’re not here. And I don’t trust Panda.”
“Anything else you’ve done on our behalf?”
“Booked us all return flights to London.”
“That should calm Gudrun’s nerves. We thought this trip might be open-ended.”
“Let’s not count our chickens. China’s red tape says we must have a departure date. And the visa is limited to thirty days. But once they have Freddie in their clutches I’ll bet all that can change if it suits them.”
“Any more on why we’re going to Kunming?”
“Only that it’s the nearest big town to the ‘Academy’, as they call it.”
“What sort of Academy?”
“According to Freddie it’s a place packed with computers. Whether that’s his imagination or something he’s got from Panda I’ve no idea.”
“The place can’t just be a cyber heaven,” I said. “There must also be some interesting scenery; food; temples. Maybe even proper pandas.”
I was determined to look on the bright side. For all three of us - Freddie, Alexei and me - it was a time for change. A new life. An expenses-paid trip to exotic China. Enjoy it!
26
HONG KONG. APRIL
Our first view of Hong Kong was disappointing. I’d been looking forward to the classic images of the harbour from the Peak; instead we found low cloud and a steady drizzle. Grey high-rises cut off in their prime are not the most inspiring of scenery. Only the temperature, well into the twenties, was running true to form.
Actually, I was almost past caring about the scenery, because Stockmann’s munificence had not extended to business class, so I was badly in need of a bed. Eastbound flights are always overnight, it was now tomorrow and I’d barely slept. Unlike Freddie, who’d spent the first few hours eating and playing computer games on Cathay’s in-flight screen, before making himself a cosy headrest up against the fuselage - he was in seat A. For the next seven hours he remained comatose. I don’t even recall him scrambling past us to go to the loo.
Yes, Freddie Ricketts, the reason for our journey, whom I’d now met all of three times. He seemed a pleasant enough lad, nearly six foot tall, well built, but starting to run to flab as lack of exercise took its toll. His dark brown hair was parted exactly down the middle, an unruly mop that fell down symmetrically over each ear. Personal appearance and hygiene were not Freddie’s forte, his vintage trainers having been kicked off soon after departure, treating us to an interesting mix of aromas to go with Cathay’s pork chop suey.
As commander-in-chief of our China campaign, Alexei had researched and booked our Hong Kong hotel, eventually settling on the Intercontinental on Kowloon waterfront: good reviews, fantastic views, had been her verdict. Initially, I couldn’t have cared less about either, a nice soft pillow being my overriding concern. Plus my usual nice soft woman, although neither Alexei nor I were in a fit state for any boudoir antics. We parked Freddie by himself in the next room, then crashed.
In an effort to overcome some of the eight hour time change I’d decreed we did not sleep too long, but meet at six; that’s six in the evening. This we managed, still slightly groggy but at least partially rested. Time to test the wonders of Hong Kong.
The three of us wandered out of the Intercontinental, slightly bemused, onto the waterfront.
“Wow!” exclaimed Freddie.
With Hong Kong Island across the harbour starting to light up, I had to agree. During our snooze the cloud had lifted and the rain stopped. Although the overcast still clipped the top of the Peak, it was almost brochure conditions. A red-sailed junk, full of revellers, slid past in front of us. Definitely a ‘Wow’ scene.
But this was not what had caught the attention of our boy, who was standing, open-mouthed, in front of a still-life vignette of a movie set: on the left a cameraman, his weapon on a tripod, recording the latest ‘take’, on the right, in a chair with a megaphone in his hand, was the director. We had chanced upon the ‘Avenue of Stars’, Hong Kong’s homage to its movie industry.
It had barely registered with me that Hong Kong had a movie industry, but Freddie was clearly an aficionado. In rapture, he moved along the promenade.
“Wow!” In front of Bruce Lee.
“Wow!” Jackie Chan.
It was the first time I’d witnessed Freddie’s total commitment to some strange cause, everything else locked out. In this case Hong Kong’s magnificent harbour was of absolutely no interest. I lost count of his “Wows” and the stars to which they were directed.
Eventually, I managed to persuade him we needed feeding. Our previous meal, Cathay’s economy class breakfast, had been frugal and many eons back. My tummy was rumbling in protest. Heading inland, we found a suitable eatery in the rabbit-warren of streets off Nathan road. Accepted the waiter’s advice for food and ordered three San Mig beers to replace lost fluid. Started discussing possibilities for the rest of our stay.
It soon became clear there was an irreconcilable difference of opinion. Alexei and I had studied the travel guides and made out our personal wish lists: up the Peak if the weather improved; a harbour trip; Lantau island Buddha; maybe Aberdeen harbour. We were relaxed and ready to compromise as long as we saw a few of HK’s famous features.
Freddie was also relaxed. He didn’t argue, merely told us he would be going to the cinema. We could do as we liked, but he would be spending his time in a darkened room watching Chinese characters leaping across a silver screen - although he didn’t put it quite like that. He’d been bewitched by The Avenue of Stars
With any normal sort of guy I would have let him do his own thing, with our blessing. But this was not any normal sort of guy. At least, that’s what we’d been told and we’d not been with him long enough to guess how any abnormalities might play out. His mother would have known, but she was not here. Alexei and I were.
If we managed to ‘lose’ Ricketts, the sole reason we were on this trip, I dreaded to think what his mother would say. Or, more to the point, how Gudrun, who was funding us, would react. In her fury, she might try to rip all the flesh from my back - although her first attempt was not something I’d told Alexei about. But was there any earthly reason why Ricketts should go AWOL? He might be a little strange, but this was a grown man with a tongue in his head, in a city full of English speakers. Arm him with a hotel card, city map and plenty of cash: what could go wrong?
Later, in the privacy of our room, Alexei and I talked the problem to death. In the end we decided there was no way we’d spend our first visit to one of the world’s most iconic locations watching foreign film stars do strange things to each other in a language we did not understand. We’d cross our fingers and hope for the best.
The finger crossing must have worked. Each morning of our two day stay we met Freddie for breakfast, made sure he was okay, checked his movie programme and sent him on his way. On day one Alexei and I explored HK Island. On day two we took the metro to Lantau, then the cable car up to the Great Buddha. In the evenings we’d meet up again with Freddie for dinner. Our queries about whether he’d enjoyed the films were greeted with laconic, “Yea, they were great.” “Wow and “Great” were his default expressions. He seemed happy enough, although it was difficult to tell. Freddie was not one to let strangers into his private world.
The important thing was we did not lose Mr Ricketts. It was still a complete party of three that set off on the next stage. To Kunming. And our meeting with Panda.
27
KUNMING. APRIL
Wildlife pandas are cuddly creatures with black eyes and ears on a white background. Our human Panda had rimless spectacled eyes on an Asian male background and was brandishing a board with the slogan ‘Ricketts and party’. He was just short of middle-age and normal size for a local, thus quite small by western standards. He might have seemed cuddly but for the fact that his round and apparently innocent face reminded me of photos I’d seen of Hitler’s Gestapo chief, H
einrich Himmler. I realised this was an uncharitable first impression of a man I was predisposed to be suspicious of, so maybe I would eventually grow to love him.
He greeted us in good English, albeit with a curious lilt that suggested his teacher might have come from Belfast. All very friendly, please to follow him to our waiting limousine. Which he proceeded to drive into town, Freddie in front with him, Alexei and me, the minders, in the back.
He suggested we call him ‘Jonny’, a name he said he used when dealing with westerners, his family one being too difficult for us. Freddie ignored this and continued to call him Panda, which set the tone for Alexei and me. Panda he remained for the duration.
As he drove, Panda kept up a running commentary: on China, Kunming, the programme for our visit, delight we were honouring his country with our presence. Everything the perfect tour guide could throw at us. At first this made me nervous because he kept half turning round to deliver these verbal gems and the traffic was heavy. I felt he should be giving chauffeuring his full attention. However, everything progressed smoothly, we came nowhere near crashing and eventually I relaxed. The roads were excellent, the driving disciplined.
It took me a few days to realise this was a country that had moved from almost the Middle Ages to ultra-modern in less than a generation. When Chairman Mao died in the late seventies, China lacked almost everything that made life worth living. As we drove into town that day I could see that in some ways they had now overtaken us. Kunming’s population was apparently about seven million, nearly as big as London, yet until recently I’d never heard of it. In the league of Chinese cities it didn’t even rate amongst the top twenty. Not only was this place huge, it looked prosperous and obviously worked.
After half an hour we drew up in front of a high-rise of blue glass: Sofitel. Panda told us he had arranged for us to have a couple of nights here, to recover and see the sights before moving on.
“Moving on to where?” I asked
“The Academy.”
“Which is where?”
“Near a place called Dali. A bit of old China. You’ll love it.”
“How do we get there?”
“I take you. It’s quite a long drive, about six hours with comfort stops, which is why we’re not going straight off tomorrow. Also I wish to show you Kunming. So I leave you now. To enjoy the hotel. I meet you tomorrow at nine in the lobby. Okay?”
We nodded our agreement. Panda drove off, leaving us to check in. Adjoining rooms on floor 41. This time I was determined not to let Freddie slope off on his own, so I said, “We’ll give you a knock in half an hour. Perhaps have a drink in the bar. Get to know each other better.”
“Okay. Fine.” Amiable, if distant.
As we unpacked, I said to Alexei, “Don’t think I’m getting through to him.”
“Doubt if anyone does. Not even his mother. Although she must have a much better idea what she’s up against.”
“I wasn’t too happy letting him off on his own in Hong Kong. Here we can’t afford such a luxury.”
“From tomorrow Panda will be looking after him,” she pointed out. “No longer our responsibility.”
“Indirectly he still will be. I don’t trust Panda. What if he sets up our nightmare scenario? Persuades Freddie to stay in China?”
“Cross that bridge if we come to it. Which I don’t think we will. In any case, we’ll know where he’s staying...”
“The Academy?”
“That’s what Panda said. If anything is due to change, he’ll have to tell us. Gudrun can’t expect us to sit on Freddie’s tail the whole time, so we should be able to afford some relaxation. See some of the country.”
I thought Alexei was being too complacent, so I said, “Have you looked at a map? Seen where we are?”
“Vaguely...”
“We’re out in the sticks...”
“Does this look like ‘the sticks’?”
She had a point. The view from our bedroom was spectacular, a gleaming metropolis with what I later learned was Sleeping Beauty Mountain in the background.
“In the context of the most populous country on earth this is pretty much the sticks,” I insisted. “We’re in Yunnan province, which is squeezed into the bottom left hand corner. Between Vietnam and Laos to the south and Myanmar... Burma... whatever they now call it in the west. In a couple of days we’ll really be in the back of beyond because Panda’s six hour drive must put us on the doorstep of Burma. What the hell are they doing sticking their ‘Academy’ in such a God-forsaken spot? What’s wrong with Beijing? Or Shanghai? I don’t like it one little bit.”
“I think you’re being paranoid.”
“I hope you’re right.”
Alexei and I were still not seeing exactly eye-to-eye when we knocked on Freddie’s door a few minutes later. Although China generally goes for casual dress, Alexei, as Freddie’s surrogate mother, had suggested he put on something slightly better than the filthy old trainers and jeans he had been wearing since leaving London. I was beginning to learn that Freddie did much as he was told, except when in the grip of one of his obsessions and the figure that now greeted us was quite presentable: a pair of brown loafers, grey trousers and blue shirt with thin white stripes. Some of it looked as though it might even have been recently laundered.
“How do I look?”
Alexei smiled, relieved. “Most handsome.”
She was right. His face appeared to have met with some water, his hair with a comb. That central parting gave him a symmetrical appearance, the man himself identical to his mirror image. Freddie looked perfectly normal. In fact, should we not be using the word ‘normal’ anyway? Asperger’s is a broad and hazy spectrum, every example unique. Just as every human is unique. Freddie was slightly strange, certainly, but how different is ‘different’?
“Just been talking to Cobber,” he announced, as we moved towards the elevators.
I pressed the ‘Up’ button. The bar was on the 50th floor.
“Cobber?” This, of course, was his pet cat, which was still presumably in Streatham. And we were in China.
“They have great wi-fi here and I’ve just been on FaceTime. Spoke to Cobber. I’m sure he recognised me.”
“Was your mother okay?” I asked, in an attempt to get our priorities right.
“Mum...? Oh, yea. Seemed fine. Said she’d been feeding Cobber regular.”
I was trying to dream up a snappy response when the elevator arrived; zoomed us up to floor 50 and the Parisian Voyage Bar. As we got out, I realised Alexei was right. I would have to revise my judgement of being ‘out in the sticks’. Spread out beneath us was Kunming city, lights twinkling as daylight faded in an orange glow behind Sleeping Beauty Mountain. If this was a provincial backwater, my mind boggled at what the real stuff must be like.
We ordered beers for the men, a Martini for Alexei. Sat back and continued to be dazzled by the view. Eventually, Alexei found her tongue.
“Well, Freddie, how’s it going?”
“Yea... great. Be even better when we get to the Academy.”
“Has Panda told you anything about the place?”
“Only that it has some of the most up-to-date stuff in the world.”
“Why choose Dali?” I asked. “Somewhere like Beijing or Shanghai would seem more sensible.”
Freddie shrugged. “Don’t see why. I’ve always worked from home. Anywhere will do. Anywhere with good connections.”
He was right of course. I was the dinosaur, still wedded to the quaint notion that the workplace had to be somewhere specific. One could now run a business from a shack on a beach, provided, as Freddie pointed out, you had a fast and reliable link to the outside world.
I was still uneasy. Panda had called the place they were taking Freddie the ‘Academy’, but according to Gudrun it was a cyber spy centre. What was the truth? In a city we might have been able to exert some degree of control over our young genius, but in the wilds of Yunnan...?
“We have one mor
e day to play tourists before our work starts,” Alexei pointed out. “And I’m going to enjoy it.”
It sounded as though she was trying to convince herself.
Freddie’s, “Yea... sure... great,” also came across as the flat acceptance of a chore, his ‘great’ merely parroting the word he used for almost any response.
I too was infected with the desire to get on with it. Once we’d seen what this ‘Academy’ was like, got to know Panda better and assessed our options, we might be able to relax.
28
DALI. APRIL
During our day of sightseeing in Kunming we’d played the dutiful tourists. Gone boating in Green Lake Park; visited a couple of temples; driven round this super-modern city; finally enjoyed a communal Chinese dinner with our guide, Panda.
Yes, Panda... it had been our first full day with him and I couldn’t shake off his physical resemblance to the Nazi Gestapo chief, Himmler. It was nonsense, of course. Himmler had been German, Panda was Chinese. But both had the same round, bland, bespectacled face, apparently harmless, and yet...?
This was absurd! I had to stop it. Panda was an ordinary guy, doing his best to show us around. If he was a trifle too solicitous, too protective, that was only to be expected. We were strangers in a foreign land and probably needed some protection. Nonetheless, it was with a sense of relief - a sense that the serious business was about to start - that next day we checked out of our hotel, piled ourselves and belongings into Panda’s limo, and headed west.
After the pleasant temperature and scattered fluffy clouds of the previous day, the weather had turned Wagnerian, with low cloud and the promise of rain; like our arrival into Hong Kong, only more threatening. Panda assured us this was merely a blip, adding the usual guide book mantra that we were now in a sub-tropical paradise: ‘a land of eternal spring’. Before leaving home I’d looked up the statistics, which showed that it was also pretty wet - much wetter than London. Admittedly most of that rain came in summer, but even now, in spring, we could expect our share of showers.
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