The Dragon's Tale: A Jack Lauder Thriller

by Clive Hindle

  "Oh shit," Jack shouted as Hung came at him carving geometrical patterns in the air. Chow staggered to his feet again and Jack smashed into him going backwards. He got hold of the Triad boss by the shoulder and hurled him round just as Tall Man Hung struck. The chopper caught K.K. Chow in the top of the shoulder, burying itself deep in the flesh and bone as if he were a side of meat. He howled in anguish and Tall Man Hung fell on top of him, sobbing, "Tung Chu, Tung Chu!"

  Sze started to come round. The other heavy got to the door behind the altar and threw away his chopper so the Police wouldn't catch him with it. Jack grabbed it. It was long, sturdy and sharp, not unlike a marine's cutlass. Tall Man Hung stood up from his prostrate boss and howled in anguish. He turned, a murderous look on his face, and circled his victims slowly, weapon in hand. He laughed as Jack came on guard. He hurled himself at them, sweeping the air in front of him with his long knife but, suddenly, a uniformed figure burst through the tunnel and shouted. Hung turned and seeing the newcomer broke off the attack and faced this new threat. Instinctively Jack threw his weapon to this newcomer, who took it out of the air deftly. Hung rushed at him with the machette whirling above his head. The newcomer, hand turned outwards, took his slash to the flank on the forte and, like lightning, riposted with a cut to the head. Tall Man Hung looked bemused as his scalp began to ooze blood. Only his athleticism had saved him from fatal injury. Quick as a flash the figure resumed on guard and Tall Man Hung attacked again. With a feint to the side, the newcomer pronated the hand and cut upwards underneath Tall Man Hung’s arm. The strike took off at the joint the fingers of his weapon hand. They dropped still twitching to the floor, the cleaver following them.

  "Mother Mary!" Jack exclaimed.

  The weaponless Tall Man Hung's mouth was agape. He looked even more witless a split second later when Jack dropped the wire cage over his shoulders - a perfect fit. Tall Man Hung screamed in the straitjacket. With a cruel smile Diana picked up the machette and slashed him straight down the front of the chest. The thin wire was quickly stained red. Momentarily, she admired her handiwork and was about to strike again when a sudden commotion down the corridor was followed by gunshots.

  Siu Chi was still unconscious. Chow had got to his feet again and, despite his wounded shoulder, he stamped up and down on the microphone as if he believed that would erase the earlier exchange. Jack rushed through to the first entrance and found the switch, which opened the passageway. He returned to find Sze holding his head, looking dazed. "You can't touch me, you can't touch me," he shouted, "I'm General Sze's son."

  "You must be joking, pal," Diana shouted. She went right up to him, in his face, "No way are you going to walk!"

  As if on cue, the RHKP burst in, armed to the teeth and bristling with aggression. Sze tried to smile, ready to bluff it out but Jack wasn’t looking at him. He was looking at their saviour as she removed her helmet. It was Amie Chow.

  CHAPTER 7

  Johnny was nowhere to be seen outside. He’d done a runner as soon as the RHKP arrived. Diana, decent again in her Mandarin gown, led Jack though the carnage. “We don’t want to get involved with this,” she said, “let’s get out of here!”

  Looking back at Amie, his eyes wide open with an unanswered question, he needed no second bidding. They’d done their bit and getting tied up in the Hong Kong Government's red tape didn't appeal in the slightest. They sneaked past police officers rounding up suspects and headed for the street. “Jesus!” Jack exclaimed. The rain was torrential and the wind screamed round the skyscrapers. There wasn’t a taxi to be seen. “Star Ferry!” he added. They ran through the deserted streets of Tsimshatsui, past the Ocean Terminal, until they came to the Star Ferry wharf. The Ferry had been cancelled because of the weather. “Blast!” Jack said. He shaded his eyes and looked out towards the highway and he could see the traffic snarled up on the main thoroughfares as people rushed home before the storm hit the city.

  “Oh no!” Diana said.

  Jack looked at her sharply, “What is it?”

  “Something they said yesterday. I wasn’t properly conscious. I may have been hearing things. But I’m sure they said they were going to kill Philip Chan.”

  “It’s okay, I know of the plan to kill Philip. It’s come from China. It’s going to be all right, the Governor knows. It’s under control.”

  “No, Jack, that’s the point. They’ve brought it forward because Gerry stole those papers. They’re going to do it today.”

  “What!” Jack exclaimed. “There’s not a moment to lose! We may already be too late! We‘ve got to go back!” He turned and looked behind him. They were already a good mile away from the scene of their rescue.

  “Do you know the way back?” she asked. Yet another problem, getting through that maze of streets and assuming the police were still there. But how to get over to Hong Kong side was the problem. None of the red taxis circled the streets, there wasn’t even a pak paai plying for illegal trade. The ferries had stopped running; the channel was a mile in diameter. The sky was a seething maelstrom of storm clouds, glowing black and volcanic red, like an apocryphal vision of the end of the earth.

  “Hey, mister you want ride?” A tiny Chinese boy with a cherubic face and a mouth full of white teeth sculled his sampan into view and waved to the sodden couple on the bank. A couple of drenched passengers sat in the bow of the small vessel as the boy pointed to Hong Kong side.

  Jack didn’t hesitate, “Yes, yes,” he shouted as he rushed to the waterfront.

  “Twenty dollar,” the boy said, the big grin creasing his face as he held the boat just out of reach until the extortionate deal had been done.

  “Done!” Jack said as he rummaged in his pockets.

  “Each!” the boy cried, chancing his luck.

  Jack had only a 100 dollar note. He held it up. “This is yours!” he said in Cantonese, “now bring your sampan alongside!”

  The boy’s eyes lit up in delight and expertly he sculled the vessel into the wharf.

  “Jack!” Diana said anxiously.

  He turned to reassure her. “Been there, done it, several times,” he said, “the only way home after a drunken night on Kowloon side!”

  “Of which there were many in your misspent youth, no doubt?”

  “I had my moments,” He helped her gingerly aboard.

  “I swore I’d never get back in a boat after the Philippines,” she groaned.

  Once they were aboard the youngster stood in the stern and expertly turned his boat back towards Hong Kong island. With an expertise born in the genes he sculled the little boat through the seething current, its occupants clinging on to both sides for dear life. Jack alone stared towards his destination, the others just kept their eyes tight shut and wished the journey was over.

  “Can you put us off near Legco?” Jack asked the juvenile skipper in rough Cantonese. The boy replied that it was no problem and Jack passed him the red note with a wink. Grinning cheerfully the lad pocketed it and headed towards the tall white buildings, which flanked the Hong Kong Legislative Council Chambers.

  Jack looked behind him and the Lion Rock on the border of the New Territories came into view through a rent in the clouds. Turning towards Hong Kong Island, he watched the clouds scud through the sky as if rushing to their doom. Flecks of azure mingled with stratus like white and red smoke in the foreground and in the distance, approaching swiftly, came a denser bank of cumulonimbus, tinged with red on the outside then turning a deeper blue and finally black as, like great ravines cut in the sky, they roared ever closer.

  “Jesus!” Jack exclaimed, not for the first time, as the weather rolled inexorably in. The spinning top and the elongated tail of the storm were now visible. “Twenty minutes to hit,” he said as the boy redoubled his efforts. The current was running them down the channel in the direction of the Legco building and Jack was perhaps the only one on the boat who cared where landfall was made on the Hong Kong side. He ruminated, as the boat rode the high rollers, plying its wa
y in and out of static ships in the Hong Kong channel sea lanes, that the upside of the weather might be that the assassination squad would have had to cancel its plans. The contrary could of course be true. The weather formed the perfect shield for their activities.

  Everyone greeted landfall with a sigh of relief, as the boy helped them all ashore and then, with a wave at Jack, disappeared down towards the old Macao Ferry wharf. People began to take shelter as the storm’s outwinds struck, hurling rubbish and masonry through the streets. Jack and Diana ran through torrential rain towards the Legco building just as an icy blast swept them up. They had a glimpse of a black van parked outside the building then they were both hurled through the air as if by an invisible puppet master and deposited, none the worse for the experience of weightlessness, on the grass of Connaught Square. Jack looked up towards Battery path as the wind’s giant hand plucked two trees from the shrubbery above and flung them towards Queens Road. They smashed into the lion’s couchant of the Hong Kong Bank building.

  “God! Look at that!” Diana cried. Jack followed her pointing finger just as two abandoned taxis, both twenty feet off the ground, rounded the corner of the street and spun down towards Sai Ying Pun in a slow, ghostly dance. They pirouetted like ballerinas round the corner into Des Voeux Road and disappeared. Jack gazed after them wide-eyed wondering how he and had been left unharmed. An eerie stillness had settled on them. There was no noise, not even the sound of the wind; there was no rain, it wasn’t cold, it was just still.

  “Thank God that’s over!” Diana said.

  “Don’t you believe it girl! We’re inside the eye. The worst is yet to come.”

  Seizing the moment of calm before the opposite wall of wind hit them from behind they headed towards the Legislative Council. “He won’t be there, he’ll have gone home!” Diana shouted.

  “Philip won’t have gone home,” Jack replied. “Not with what he’s got to accomplish over the next few days. He’ll have stayed here to get his campaign work finished off. It’s the perfect opportunity for him.”

  “Then we’re either too early or…….” Her words dried up as they saw a number of men emerge from the black van which they had already observed, parked outside the Council offices. Dressed in dark costumes and hooded masks, the men looked like ghosts as they merged into the black weather and sprinted, in regimented fashion, for the stairs of the building.

  “It’s not too late, yet,” Jack said grimly.

  Feet pounding the pavement they followed the ghostly men into the building. Jack stopped in the lift lobby. One lift was moving. It headed upwards and stopped on the 10th floor. “Quick,” Jack said, “they’ve headed for the committee floor. I think he’ll be up on the top floor.”

  Calling one of the lifts they jumped in and the supercharged vehicle hurtled upwards. Coming out on the top floor Jack found he was right. A skeleton crew of the campaign team was still hard at work but most had left before the storm had begun to rage around the building. The four or five hard core veterans left gaped as Jack and Diana, in their sodden, dishevelled state, appeared from the lift and ran down the corridor. A security guard stepped out in front of them and held up a hand.

  “Philip Chan’s office,” Jack gasped, “please take us there quickly.”

  The blue clad official, a handgun obtrusively holstered in his waistband, gazed at them suspiciously and demanded i.d.

  “Do I look like I’m carrying i.d?” Jack shouted, his temper beginning to get the better of him.

  Activity further down the corridor made them look up and Philip hove into view, blinking down the corridor, almost owl-like in his glasses. He recognised Jack despite his forlorn state and shouted out, "Jack! How wonderful to see you intact, my dear friend!” He rushed forward and, to the consternation of his minders, greeted the Englishman like a long lost brother. “And this must be Diana!” he exclaimed as he took her hand. “You are even lovelier than Jack’s portrayal!” he said gallantly.

  Diana didn’t feel too lovely as she stood there in her drenched Mandarin robe but she returned the handshake readily enough.

  “Philip, there’s not a moment to lose,” Jack said, “you’ve got to get out of here now!”

  “My dear chap, what are you talking about?” Philip replied, “if it’s the communist threat, we are in control, there is nothing to worry about.”

  “No,” Jack said, “they’ve brought it forward, because Gerry stole the papers from Chow.” He put his hand on Philip’s shoulder, “I’m sorry, it’s today, they’re in the building, searching the tenth floor as we speak.”

  Briefly, and as calmly as possible, Diana repeated the conversation she had overheard. A frown began to crease Philip’s high forehead. His eyes blazed a fiery defiance. “They’ll be after the disks too,” he hissed, “you haven’t seen them Jack. We have only just managed to crack the code. They’re dynamite. Bank codes for the whole of the Triad organisation in just about every country in the world. We have the lot. The secret numbered accounts, the signatories in each country, even the names of the officials in the Peking Government who are being paid off. There’s more too. Triad plans to control western economies through money-laundering, Red China’s plans for here and Macao. And Taiwan!”

  “Taiwan?”

  “Oh, yes, Jack. Invasion is not far off. Believe me, Taiwan’s annual ninety billion surplus will inject some fire into the communist economy!”

  “Why hasn’t the Government provided you with a bodyguard?” Diana asked.

  “Britton said it wasn’t necessary, now that the plot has been discovered. He believes diplomatic exchanges will result in the withdrawal of the threats.” The face he pulled spoke more eloquently than any verbal denunciation of the wishful thinking of those in Government who had no genuine experience of the Dragon. He rushed his visitors into his room, barking orders to his staff to find them a change of clothing.

  A few minutes later they emerged into Philip’s private chambers, freshly dressed in dry if ill-fitting clothes. Their host spoke fiercely down the phone to the Governor’s aide-de-camp. “The weather is likely to delay any rescue attempt,” he said grimly to his guests as they walked in, “the Ghurka regiment is stationed in the New Territories. An agreement was recently made with China that no British troops would be garrisoned in the city.” He nodded at Jack grimly as if endorsing the latter’s unspoken comment that the manouevre seemed oddly convenient.

  They didn’t have time for any further exchange. Shots from the end of the corridor signalled the arrival of the triad hit squad. Dropping down to their knees the three of them peered out through the glass partitions and studied the corridor. A frightening sight met their eyes. The group of black-robed, masked men had emerged from the stairs and were now firing at will into the computer room. The solitary security guard bravely returned the fire but he was hopelessly outnumbered and his pistol was no match for the semi-automatics wielded by the invaders. He was cut to ribbons in a rain of fire, his body, as the deadly hail struck, performing movements which no dancer could have emulated.

  “This way,” Philip whispered, and he led Jack and Diana towards the rear of his office. They passed out through his secretary’s room into a corridor which ran along the back of the building. “Through here!” This time they went through the fire door and into the hall for the service lifts. Philip was about to press the call button when the door at the top of the hall was flung open and a masked man peered out. Seeing them outside the lift he shouted and then loosed off his automatic in their direction. They had no time to await the elevator’s arrival and took off down the flight of stairs, descending swiftly as if down a corkscrew. Shouts up above told them their pursuers were on to them and gunfire raked the stairs as they ran. A group of the masked men peeled off from the rest and began the pursuit while others awaited the lift. Jack noticed one of the lifts was going up but the other was static on the fifteenth floor. Reaching it he pressed the down button. The lift door opened and they piled into it, sending it i
mmediately to the ground. The lift accelerated away but even so it was an agonising wait as the door opened. Their pursuers could have been standing there, automatics levelled. They weren’t and their lift was only just leaving the top floor. The frantic trio had a head start but the only option was the street. They reached it as the eye of the storm continued to pass over Central District giving no indication of the mayhem in its wake. They rushed across Queens Road and up Battery Path. Fingers of forked lightning suddenly clutched out of the sky for a nearby tree which exploded. The triad gang, half a dozen strong, rushed across the main street to make the bottom of the path. Thunder roared and lightning flashed as the trio rushed up the hill towards the old courthouse. They sheltered momentarily in the lee of its wall while they pondered their next move. The only way out was up and they ran up the hill in the teeth of a howling gale until their lungs were on fire.

  Running through the courtyard of St. John’s Cathedral, Philip pointed to the Peak Tram. “The last lift!” he shouted. The funicular railway up to Mid-Levels and the Peak was about to make its final trip to the residential areas on the high extinct volcano at the Island’s heart. They rushed across Garden Road just as their pursuers emerged in the courtyard of the Anglican Cathedral. Joining the last stragglers from the workplaces of Central and the pleasure palaces of Wan Chai as they crammed into the tram, the trio looked anxiously back behind them until they breathed a sigh of relief as their pursuers pulled up in disgust at missing the tram. One of them got on a short-wave radio.