Gemini

by Mark Burnell

  'How do you know?'

  Lai hesitated, but only for a second. 'Let us say … this: that one of Cheung's 49s transgressed in a local matter that came to my attention and that my people have questioned him thoroughly.'

  'That sounds painful.'

  'I believe it was.'

  'Look, you don't need me for this. I'm sure you have access to blunter instruments who'd be a lot cheaper.'

  'I want somebody who isn't connected to me. An outsider. And at the same time somebody who – if the connection ever is made – has the requisite reputation. Either way, I need somebody who can put an end to this matter. I need you.'

  Time for Petra to show her true colours. 'Four million US dollars.'

  Lai stiffened. 'Four? We agreed on three.'

  'We didn't agree on anything. Three is what you offered. But four is what it's going to cost.'

  If Lai was angry, it didn't show. After a protracted, contemplative silence, he said, 'Three point five.'

  'This isn't a negotiating tactic. The price is four million. Or put another way, half a Brancusi head.'

  That made him smile. 'I should have made you wait for me in another room, perhaps.'

  As a courtesy, Stephanie returned the smile. 'It wouldn't have made any difference.'

  I could have asked for five or six million. perhaps even ten. He had to agree, which is what I suspected, and which was why I raised the price.

  He leads me out of the room. across the hall, through a gap in the glass and onto the uppermost terrace. Out of dry, cool stillness into breezy, humid heat, yet there isn't a cloud in the sky. Far below us, to our left, is the exclusive Deep Water Bay Golf Club – Lai's local club – while in front of us, at the foot of the hill, stretches Deep Water Bay Beach, a narrow curve of golden sand running parallel to Island Road. It's a beautiful view. An expensive view.

  Again, Lai seems to read my mind. 'This is perhaps the most desirable location in Hong Kong. The other houses around here belong to some of the richest and most powerful people on the island.'

  'It's not hard to see why.'

  'There's more to it than what you can see. The location has excellent feng shui. The houses all look out to sea. As you can appreciate, Deep Water Bay is horseshoe-shaped and the hill that we are on is at the base of that horseshoe. The hills and islands that form the rest of the curve on either side of us are like the arm-rests on an armchair. The hill behind is the back of the chair. It is important that we are half-way up the hill; not too high, not too low. The hill means we have something solid behind us, which is good. Looking directly ahead, we can see out of the mouth of the bay to the open sea beyond. There is nothing in the way. That is also good; it means there are no impediments to progress.'

  The concept of feng shui is alien to me because I've come to associate it with the inane blather of intellectually shallow TV presenters. Gilbert Lai is the first man I've met who regards it as something more significant than a design accessory to lend cheap bathrooms a veneer of class.

  Lai waves a hand over his guests who are on the lowest terrace. 'Why don't you come and meet some of my friends and associates?'

  'Is that a good idea?'

  'With these people, that won't be a problem. And after this we won't meet again.'

  On the lowest terrace there is a large rectangular swimming pool with a dragon at each corner. It's an arrangement I've seen before.

  'The villa in Marrakech – that belongs to you, doesn't it?'

  Surprise makes way for curiosity. He's wondering how I know. Which means his ownership is concealed.

  'It's Savic's villa.'

  But his tone tells the truth: it's Savic's villa nominally.

  I try another angle. 'Why is Mostovoi worth so much to you?'

  'Beyond your personal involvement – for which you are now being generously compensated – does it matter?'

  'I'm just curious. Where's the mutual interest?'

  Lai thinks about this for a moment, then says, 'Global transport.'

  Before I can ask anything else, we've reached the lower terrace and we're among people. But the answer does have a certain synergy: Mostovoi is in aviation and Lai is in shipping.

  The first thing that strikes me about his guests is the number of them who are speaking Russian. Not just the European and Caucasian types, but some of the Orientals too; Mongols, Koreans and Asiatic Russians. Broad and squat with toughness etched into their faces, they might be wearing silk suits or designer casual wear, but they're not fooling anybody. The imported European clothes on their bodies look as out of place as the imported European girls on their arms. I look around and conclude that I'm the only female guest who isn't decoration.

  Julia is a six foot tall Russian, with blonde hair, pale skin and cold, green eyes. She's smoking a Marlboro Light and drinking Krug 85 from a tall glass with a slender stem shaped like a lily. She says she's twenty-five and almost looks it. Which means she's probably still a teenager. Girls in Russia grow up faster.

  'I had to get out of Moscow, you know. My boyfriend … crazy bastard …'

  I can easily imagine her boyfriend. The young firebrand with the most money. The kind of boyfriend who casually hands out Rolexes and black eyes.

  'So you came here?'

  'I was in Berlin.'

  'Ah.'

  'Fucking all kinds of guys. You know how it is.' I'm not offended by her assumption. I'm just disarmed by her bluntness. 'It was good money but … there were too many of them. I wanted to narrow it down, make it simple. Who are you with?'

  'No one.'

  For a second there's hostility, as she wonders if I'm a threat. It's a look I've seen too many times to count. From too many Julias to count.

  A waiter appears at our side, dressed in a white tunic with gold buttons, bottle-green trousers and black slippers. He refills our glasses from a magnum streaming condensation.

  'Who are you with?' I ask Julia.

  She points to the back of a bull-shouldered man in black slacks and an iridescent black silk shirt. He's an ape; the black hair on his scalp is cropped short and continues down the back of his neck towards his shoulders, before disappearing into the collar.

  'Aslan Shardov.'

  'What's his story?'

  'He's political.'

  'Where?'

  'Kazakhstan.'

  'In Astana?'

  'When he has to. But his businesses are mostly in Almaty.'

  Business and politics being indivisible in Kazakhstan.

  'What line of work is he in?'

  'Construction. Transport. Banking.'

  Anything and everything. Which explains why he's political: the wheels of commerce need constant lubrication.

  'What's it like in Almaty?'

  'At first I hated it. After Moscow it was so backward. But I like it now. The mountains are beautiful. We have a large house outside the city. It's quiet.' She takes a drag from her cigarette, blows smoke in my face, then breaks into a grin. 'Of course it helps that we go to Europe so often. I love London and Paris. Berlin's okay, too, but there's always that worry …'

  She lets the sentence die but I know what she's thinking. 'That you're going to run into a familiar face?'

  'Exactly.'

  'And after Shardov?'

  Just as I didn't take offence earlier, so she doesn't now. I'm not being rude. I'm being straightforward. We both know it.

  She shrugs, then looks out to sea. 'Aslan's been good to me. I've got some money. When the time comes … I don't know. Spain, maybe. Or Italy.'

  'Not back to Russia?'

  She shakes her head. 'Every time I think of Russia, I think of all the men who fucked me. I can't separate the two. What about you? How come you're here?'

  I tell her it's business. She giggles. Everyone's there on business, she replies. Not just the men. The women, too. Later I'm introduced to Ivan Simonov, another Muscovite, now based in Hong Kong, working in shipping. He's talking to Dieter Hausmann, from Berlin, now living on Sakh
alin, an oil man. He used to work in Vladivostok.

  I say, 'Do you know Konstantin Komarov?'

  The name rings a bell but he can't quite make the connection.

  I give him a prompt. 'Primorye Air Transport.'

  'Of course. Yes.'

  'You know him?'

  'I know of him. But we've never met. PAT I know. They have contracts with many of the oil and gas companies in the region because they have a reputation for reliability. In the Russian Far East that's more valuable than oil or gas itself.'

  Hausmann introduces me to Zoran Antovic, a Serb from Moscow, a financier. When I ask him who he works for he looks at me as though I'm an idiot. 'Nobody.'

  'You invest your own money?'

  'Always.'

  When he asks me what I do, I say, 'I'm a trouble-shooter.'

  'Who do you work for?'

  Now it's my turn. 'Nobody.'

  He grins, splitting silver stubble with cosmetically enhanced tombstone teeth. And so it goes on for two hours. This peculiar gathering. I meet a sanitation engineer from Krasnoyarsk, a government official from Orumqi, in the western Chinese province of Xinjiang, just a few hundred miles from the Kazakh border, and a Russian army officer based in Novosibirsk. I share a drink with another Serb who sells computers in Berlin and London.

  'What brings you to Hong Kong?'

  'My supplier is located in Fujian.'

  'What kind of computers do you sell?'

  'Any kind you like.'

  'All the brands?'

  'All the brands.'

  'All supplied from Fujian?'

  He raises his glass to me. 'Correct.'

  We both smile at that.

  When I decide to leave, Lai himself escorts me to the BMW X5. 'Have you enjoyed yourself?'

  'You've got an interesting circle of friends.'

  He seems genuinely pleased by this. 'It's what keeps me going. You'll let me know your arrangements for payment?'

  'In a day or two.'

  'Good. And thank you.'

  'Before I go, can I ask you something?'

  'Of course.'

  'I know what you're getting out of our arrangement. But where does Savic fit in?'

  'Milan and I have a bond.'

  'You don't seem like the sentimental type to me.'

  'I'm not. And nor is he. It's a business matter. He needs me more than I need him, so it's in his interest to see this done.'

  'Why does he need you?'

  'Do you know what guanxi is?'

  'No.'

  'Connections. Guanxi is a system of connections. It's the way business is conducted in China and among Chinese communities abroad. Its roots are in our agricultural past. It's a system of favours between families, between friends. It starts in infancy, exists in schools, through marriage, in secret and open societies, it runs through generations. It can be traded or inherited, but never ignored. It grew out of a system and an era where there were no legal controls. In that respect you could describe it as organic. With guanxi you have access to the best enterprises, the best people, the best prices. Without it … well, you have nothing.'

  'And your relationship with Savic allows him to tap into your connections, giving him an advantage denied to most outsiders?'

  'Precisely. Whether it's buying cheap televisions for Belgrade housewives, or sanction-busting petroleum products for a discredited regime.'

  'Presumably it's a two-way street.'

  'Naturally.'

  'So what do you get from him?'

  Lai looks deep into my eyes for several seconds. I'm beginning to think I won't get an answer, when he says, 'I provide connections for him in this part of the world and he provides them for me in Europe.'

  Savic is supposed to be based here, not in Europe. 'What connections?'

  A sly smile spreads across his deformed lips. 'The best imaginable.'

  As the lift rose or descended, so the interior lights altered their colour and brightness to match the ambience of either destination, top or bottom. It reminded Stephanie of Maclise Road. An airlock, the interface between two different environments; from Stephanie to Petra and back to Stephanie again. Or, in this case, from the lobby of the Peninsula, Hong Kong's finest hotel, to Felix, the Philippe Starck restaurant perched on top of it. Given the nature of their business, she didn't think the name of Savic's choice of restaurant was a coincidence.

  A reed-thin waitress in black led her through the dining room to a massive table on a raised dais at the far end. The table was a slab, lit from inside. It glowed milky white, like illuminated marble. Milan Savic was waiting for her, a chunky tumbler in one hand, a cigarette in the other, his weathered face caught in a cone of falling light and rising smoke. He was wearing a dark blue V-neck T-shirt beneath a charcoal suit. It didn't look smart, or casual; it looked wrong.

  Stephanie ordered a glass of sauvignon blanc from a passing waitress, then sat on one of the stools by the glowing slab and looked out of the two-storey wall of glass. Across Victoria Harbour the sparkling skyscrapers of Hong Kong lit up the night sky. Through the opposite window Kowloon glittered all the way to the New Territories.

  Savic said, 'For my money, the best view in the world.'

  It had been late afternoon when she'd returned to the Conrad. Within an hour he'd called to ask if they could meet. At nine he'd sent a car. The driver had been different from the one who'd driven them to Oriental Golf City. Stephanie recognized him from the Magenta House disk that Raymond Chen had given her: the Macanese named Figueiredo.

  'I'm pleased you managed to work out something with Lai.'

  'How much did he pay to get his son back from Felix Cheung?'

  'Three hundred and sixty million Hong Kong dollars.'

  Down the centre of the table there were lots of small glass cups, each containing a candle. Scattered among them were dozens of plastic beads, dark green or clear, like huge emeralds and diamonds. Savic began to play with a dozen of them.

  Not one for small talk, he got straight to the point. 'In my world there are enormous possibilities for a woman like you.'

  'For a woman like me there are possibilities everywhere. I'm never short of offers.'

  He grinned. 'I can imagine. All the same, can I make a suggestion?'

  'If you want, but there's no point. I'll say no.'

  'How can you be so sure?'

  'Look, I came here for Mostovoi. You're lucky that I'm going to let him live. You should leave it at that.'

  'You're getting very well paid.'

  'I'm not being paid to let him live. I'm being paid to work. And to look the other way. Anyway, money isn't the reason I took the job.'

  'No?'

  'No. I'm doing it for his son. I have plenty of money.'

  'You forced Lai higher.'

  'I also have a market value. I don't do discounts. When you hire me you pay a lot but you get what you pay for.'

  'What about Mostovoi?'

  'Until I met you, it was personal. When you said you needed him he became a commodity. I don't feel anything for him.'

  'But you were going to kill him.'

  'Again, that was a business decision. He damaged my reputation. That has a value too.'

  Savic considered this. Then: 'You don't like me, do you?'

  'I don't know you. So I don't feel one way or the other about you.'

  'But you've heard things about me and you don't like them.'

  She was going to qualify her answer, then chose not to. 'Why should I?'

  'Because you have no idea who I am. Or what I've done.'

  'Does it matter? If God exists, neither of us will see Him.'

  The waitress brought Stephanie her glass of wine. Once she'd moved away Savic said, 'You're right. We're the same.'

  She didn't deny it. He raised his glass, she raised hers to meet it. And saw something new. In Chungking Mansions he'd been afraid. At Lan Kwai Pong he'd been tense. In the car to Kai Tak he'd been cautious. Here, his confidence restored, she could see hun
ger.

  His smile was conspiratorial. 'The things they used to say about me when I was alive. Savic, the Balkan butcher. Savic and his Inter Milan monsters. How many commentators were there? And the ones that were there, did they see both sides? Because I'll tell you this: it was war, not ethnic cleansing, or whatever the phrase for this week is. In war the boundaries between right and wrong become blurred. And until you've been at war yourself you don't know. Not the UN, not those parasites in The Hague and certainly not all the tourists from the media. Bastard journalists dropping into our misery for a working holiday, running around getting over-excited in their bullet-proof vests, then back to some fucking Hyatt with room service and CNN. You know what I mean.'

  Stephanie hesitated. Not because of what he said – she recognized most of that was true – or even the force with which he said it, but because of what she was feeling. This was a pitch. A professional seduction handled by an amateur.

  They ate at a table close to the window with the harbour view. Boats were crisscrossing the water, pinprick lights marking them out against the oily darkness.

  After they'd ordered, Savic said, 'Do you know what I do?'

  'I know you used to sell second-hand TVs in Belgrade.'

  'True.'

  'Then you were in illegal oil.'

  'Also true.'

  'But until I found out who Lars Andersen really was, I didn't even know you were alive.'

  'You didn't recognize me in Marrakech?'

  'I'd never seen a picture of you.'

  'So how did you find out I was Lars Andersen?'

  'Like you, I have my sources.'

  He let it drop. 'So?'

  'Narcotics, maybe? The Balkans was always a preferred courier route.'

  'Not just for narcotics.'

  'Tell me.'

  'People.'

  Their starters arrived; for Savic, honey-tempura prawns with Korean chilli and tobiko sauce. Stephanie had seared rare lemon-pepper ahi shimmies. The waitress opened a bottle of Chilean cabernet sauvignon and left it to breathe.

  'People are the perfect commodity. You should understand that. I mean, assassination is a people business too, right? The difference between us is that they pay me for a service but you … you just kill them.'

  He was pleased with himself.

  'Why don't you say that a little louder? I'm not sure they heard you in Beijing.'