Robin Cook 1990 - Vital Signs

by Vital Signs(lit)

  Williams?" she asked.

  "I am," Tristan said.

  "I am to extend apologies from Mr. Yip," she said.

  "He was unable to make your morning meeting. But if you would please go to the old Stanley Restaurant, he will be happy to see you."

  "When?" Tristan asked.

  "That is all I know," the woman said. She bowed and hurried off with a shuffling gait.

  Tristan looked at Marissa.

  "What does that mean?"

  "I guess the man in the white suit is Mr. Yip."

  "But when are we to go to the Stanley Restaurant?" Tristan asked.

  "And where is it?"

  "I would assume we should go directly," Marissa said.

  "As for where, let's ask Bentley."

  They descended in the peak tram. Bentley was waiting in the armored Mercedes by the time they got down. Marissa and Tristan piled into the backseat. Tristan asked Bentley if he'd ever heard of a restaurant called Stanley's.

  "I have indeed, sir," Bentley said.

  "Where is it?" Tristan asked.

  "Why, it's in Stanley, sir," Bentley said.

  Tristan slid back in the seat.

  "Okay, Bentley," Tristan said, Let go to Stanley."

  To Marissa's chagrin, the first leg of the trip was through another tunnel that was over two miles long. Until the experience of riding in the trunk of the car, she'd never known she'd disliked tunnels.

  Thankfully the traffic moved relatively swiftly; although this Aberdeen Tunnel was longer than the Cross Harbor, the car went through it significantly quicker. When they emerged, the landscape had transformed from the urban sprawl of Kowloon and Central to an almost rural beauty. The beaches were rimmed with bright sand and the water was the emerald green Marissa had seen from the jet on their arrival from Brisbane.

  As they motored along the attractive coastline toward Stanley, Tristan slid forward again.

  "Bentley," he asked, "have you ever heard of a man by the name of Mr. Yip?"

  "That is a common Chinese name," Bentley said.

  "When we met this Mr. Yip he was wearing a rather distinctive suit," Tristan said.

  "It was white silk."

  Bentley turned to look at Tristan. The car did a little fishtail as he quickly redirected his attention to the road.

  "You met a Mr. Yip in a white suit?" Bentley asked.

  "Yes," Tristan said.

  "Is that surprising?"

  "There is only one Mr. Yip that I know who wears white suits," Bentley said, "and he is an enforcer."

  "You'll have to explain," Tristan said.

  "He is a 426," Bentley said.

  "That means he's a red poll, which is an executioner for a triad. The executioner carries out all the triad's dirty work, no matter the activity: loan-sharking, prostitution, gambling, smuggling, anything like that."

  Tristan looked back at Marissa to see if she'd heard what Bentley had to say. She rolled her eyes. She'd heard.

  "We are going to the Stanley Restaurant to meet this Mr.

  Yip," Tristan said.

  Bentley braked and pulled over to the side of the road. He put the car in Park and turned off the ignition. Then he turned around to look directly at Tristan.

  "We have to talk," he said.

  For the next fifteen minutes, Tristan and Bentley renegotiated Bentley's hourly rate. Going to a meeting with Mr. Yip was not something covered by his basic fee. Once the deal was settled,

  Bentley started the car, and they again pulled out into the road.

  "Do you know which triad Mr. Yip is with?" Tristan asked.

  "I'm not supposed to talk specifically about the triads," Bentley said.

  "Okay," Tristan said agreeably.

  "I'll name the triad I think he's with and you nod. How's that?"

  Bentley considered for a moment, then agreed.

  "Wing Sin," Tristan said.

  Bentley nodded.

  Tristan sat back.

  "Well," he said.

  "That confirms our suspicions.

  Obviously Mr. Yip knows what we want to know. The question is whether he plans to tell us or not."

  "This whole business has an unnerving way of escalating," Marissa said.

  "Mr. Yip scared me the first time we met him. Now that I know who he is, I'm even more frightened."

  "There's still time to change our minds," Tristan said.

  Marissa shook her head.

  "We've come this far," she said.

  "I'm not giving up now."

  Stanley turned out to be an attractive, modern suburban town built on a peninsula with broad sandy beaches on either side. The vista out over the emerald sea was magnificent. The buildings themselves were less impressive, most being four-story, unimaginative, white concrete affairs.

  Bentley pulled into a parking area along the shore line, then nosed the car around so that it was pointing out into the street.

  He turned off the engine and nodded toward the building to the right.

  "That's Stanley Restaurant," he said.

  Marissa and Tristan inspected the restaurant. From the outside it was as nondescript as the other buildings in the town.

  "You ready?" Tristan said.

  Marissa nodded.

  "As ready as I'll ever be."

  Bentley got out of the car and opened the rear door. Marissa and Tristan stepped out into the bright sunlight. Before they could take a step, doors opened on a number of other nearby cars, and a half dozen Chinese men got out. They were all dressed in business suits. Marissa and Tristan recognized three of them.

  They were the men who'd kidnapped them the day before.

  At first, Bentley reached for his gun, but he quickly reconsidered.

  Several of the men had machine pistols in plain sight.

  Thinking that her worst fears had materialized, Marissa froze in her tracks. She was amazed at the cool nonchalance the men exhibited in brandishing such firearms in public.

  "Please remain where you are," one man said as he strode forward. He reached into Bentley's jacket and withdrew his pistol.

  Then he spoke to Bentley in Cantonese. Bentley turned and got back into the Mercedes.

  Turning his attention to Marissa and Tristan, he frisked them for weapons. Not finding any, he nodded toward the restaurant.

  Marissa and Tristan started walking.

  "Certainly helpful we brought Bentley," Tristan said.

  "Nice to know my money was so well spent."

  "They always seem to be a step ahead of us," Marissa said.

  The interior of the restaurant was simple but elegant, with antique-style wooden tables and peach-colored walls. Since it was still before twelve, there were no customers. Waiters were arranging the flatware and polishing the crystal.

  A French maitre d' in a tuxedo welcomed them and was about to ask them if they had a reservation when he recognized their escorts. Immediately he bowed and showed them to a small separate dining room one flight up.

  Mr. Yip was sitting at a table. In front of him was his large ledger book as well as a cup of tea. He was dressed as before in a spotless white silk suit, Their escort spoke to Mr. Yip in Cantonese. Mr. Yip listened while he studied Marissa's and Tristan's faces. When his henchman had finished, he closed his ledger book and leaned forward on it with his elbows.

  "You have insulted me by bringing an armed guard," he said.

  "No insult was intended," Tristan said with an uneasy smile.

  "We had an unfortunate incident yesterday. Someone tried to kill

  US."

  "Where?" Mr. Yip asked.

  "At the Peninsula Hotel," Tristan answered.

  Mr. Yip gazed up at the man who'd brought Marissa and Tristan in to see him. The man nodded, apparently confirming the story. Mr. Yip looked back at Marissa and Tristan and shrugged.

  "Attempted assassinations are not so uncommon," he said.

  "It's the price of doing certain business in Hong Kong.

  There ha
ve been any number of attempts on my life."

  "It is not something we are accustomed to," Marissa said.

  "Regardless," Mr. Yip said, "it was a mistake to bring a guard to a meeting with me. Besides, he could not have protected you."

  "We are foreigners," Marissa said.

  "We don't know the rules."

  "I will forgive you this time," Mr. Yip said.

  "Did you bring the money?"

  "Too right, mate," Tristan said.

  "But how about our information first?"

  Mr. Yip smiled and shook his head in amazement.

  "Please, Mr. Williams," he said.

  "Do not trouble or irritate me any more than you already have. And don't call me 'mate."

  "Righto," Tristan said.

  "I suppose our bargaining position is a bit weak." He dug into his pocket and pulled out a hotel envelope in which he'd put ten thousand Hong Kong dollars. He handed it to Mr. Yip.

  "For your entertainment expenses." He smiled.

  Mr. Yip took the envelope.

  "You are learning our Hong Kong business practices quickly," he said. He tore open the envelope and flipped through the money. Then he slipped the money into his jacket pocket.

  "I have learned that the Wing Sin are doing business with an Australian company called Fertility, Limited," Mr. Yip said.

  "They have been bringing out pairs of Chinese men from the People's Republic for several years, about every two months. The Wing Sin have been arranging transportation from a pickup on the Pearl River north of Zhuhai to Aberdeen. From there they take them to Kai Tac and put them on planes for Brisbane. It has been a comfortable, profitable business relationship: not overwhelningly so, but it is adequate."

  "Who are these men?" Tristan asked.

  Mr. Yip shrugged.

  "I don't know and I don't care. It was the same with the students from Tiananmen Square. We didn't care who they were. We just wanted to be paid for their transport."

  "Why are they being smuggled out of the PRO." Tristan asked.

  "No idea," Mr. Yip said.

  "It is not important for the Wing Sin."

  Tristan threw up his hands in frustration.

  "You haven't told us anything that we didn't know before," he complained.

  Marissa shifted uneasily. She was afraid Tristan would irritate the man.

  "I agreed to make inquiries," Mr. Yip said.

  "And indeed I did.

  Perhaps to mitigate your chagrin I can offer one additional service.

  Perhaps you would find it beneficial to visit the captain of the junk who does the actual pickup."

  Marissa could tell Tristan was livid. She was terrified he might do something to jeopardize their safety. She hoped he would be interested in Mr. Yip's offer. She knew she was. Maybe the captain could provide the information they were looking for.

  Tristan caught her eye.

  "What do you think?" he asked.

  "You interested?"

  Marissa nodded.

  "Okay," Tristan told Mr. Yip.

  "We'll give it a go. How do we find this captain?"

  "He's in Aberdeen," Mr. Yip said.

  "I'll have one of my business associates show you the way." Mr. Yip then gave their escort instructions in rapid Cantonese.

  "I was so afraid you were about to do something silly in there," Marissa said.

  "That rat bag cheated us," Tristan said indignantly.

  "That hoon poofter took our money and gave us a bunch of claptrap."

  "Sometimes I wonder if you speak English," Marissa said.

  They were back in the armored Mercedes with Bentley at the wheel. They were following a comparably armored Mercedes that was leading them to the captain Mr. Yip had mentioned.

  Bentley was quiet, humiliated by the episode in the Stanley Restaurant parking lot.

  "This junk captain better have something interesting to say," Tristan warned.

  "Or you'll do what?" Marissa questioned.

  "Get the Wing Sin after us as well as our friend from Female Care Australia? Please, Tristan, try to remember who we're dealing with."

  "I suppose you're right," he said morosely.

  As they drove into Aberdeen, both Marissa and Tristan forgot their concerns for the moment. The town was extraordinary. The enormous harbor was choked with thousands of sampans and junks of all sizes lashed together to create an enormous floating slum. In the middle of the squalor were several huge floating restaurants gaudily decorated in crimson and gold.

  "How many people live out there on those boats?" Marissa I questioned.

  "About twenty thousand," Bentley said.

  "And some of them rarely step onshore. But they are being relocated by the government."

  "And no plumbing," Tristan said with disgust.

  "Probably not a proper dun ny in the lot. Can you imagine the E. coli count in the water?"

  When they got into the town proper, they saw a number of jewelry stores and banks. Aberdeen, it was clear, was a city of haves and have-nots.

  "It's from smuggling," Bentley said in response to a question from Tristan.

  "Aberdeen was the center of smuggling and piracy long before Hong Kong existed. Of course it wasn't called Aberdeen then."

  Near the Ap Lei Chou Bridge, the lead Mercedes pulled over to a sampan dockage. Mr. Yip's henchmen got out. Bentley pulled into a parking area. By the time Marissa, Tristan, and Bentley got to the quay, the man had secured a motorized sampan.

  The small diesel engine was chugging and sending off puffs of black smoke from its exhaust.

  Everyone climbed on board. The sampan operator pushed off and they motored out into the turbid water.

  "Hope this boat doesn't capsize," Tristan said.

  "One dunk in this water and we'd all die."

  At that very moment they saw a group of young children dive off a nearby junk. Frolicking in the water, they squealed with delight.

  "My word," Tristan said.

  "Those kids must have impressive immune systems!"

  "Who are these people?" Marissa asked, even more amazed at the floating city from close up. Entire families were in evidence, with clothes hung in rigging to dry.

  "Mostly the Tanka," Bentley said with a touch of derision in his voice.

  "They and their ancestors have been living on the sea for centuries."

  "I take it you are not a Tanka?" Tristan said.

  Bentley laughed as if Tristan were comparing him to some subhuman race.

  "I'm Cantonese," he said proudly.

  "A little prejudice in the Heavenly Kingdom?" Tristan quipped.

  Mr. Yip's associate directed the sampan operator up a row of junks then alongside one of the larger ones. When the sampan stopped they were abreast of an opening at about chest height. A powerfully built Chinese man suddenly appeared and glared down at them. He had a scraggly goatee and wore his black hair in an old-fashioned braid. He was wearing a quilted vest. His pants were loose but short, coming only as far as his calves. On his feet were leather thongs.

  Standing with his legs spread apart and his hands on his hips, he cut an imposing figure. With a deep, gravelly voice, he spoke in animated Chinese. Bentley said he was speaking Tanka.

  Mr. Yip's henchman launched into an animated discussion with the man. Both sides seemed angry. Marissa and Tristan began to feel nervous. In the middle of the debate, a doll-faced, wide-eyed child of about three suddenly appeared, staring down at the strangers from between her father's solid legs.

  "They are having some disagreement about money," Bentley explained.

  "It doesn't involve us."

  Marissa and Tristan felt relieved. They took the opportunity to examine the captain's boat. It was about forty feet long with a beam of approximately eighteen feet. The wood was an oiled tropical hardwood, giving the craft a honey color. The deck was in three levels with a poop at the stern. Just forward of midships was a mast that rose up about twenty feet.