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One thing, in particular, provoked Wang’s ire. In Jiang Zemin’s speech, delivered in the Convention Centre just a few minutes after midnight, the British were accused of having subjected Hong Kong to more than a century of “vicissitudes.” I remember the Mandarin word he used- cangsang — because it provoked considerable argument among the press corps at the time, not least because nobody was entirely sure of its precise meaning. Had Jiang meant “difficulties” or “problems?” Was “vicissitudes” the correct translation? Had he really intended to insult the British at such a delicate and sensitive moment in their history? But Professor Wang Kaixuan was in no doubt, and the childish slur appalled him. What problems, after all, had Hong Kong suffered under colonial rule? A few riots in the fifties and sixties, all of them engineered by agents of Chairman Mao. By comparison, China in the same period had been decimated by communist rule: millions dead from famine; families torn apart by the insanity of the Cultural Revolution; minority ethnic groups tortured and flung into prison. The hypocrisy was breathtaking.

Towards dawn Wang shut off the television and lay awake on his son’s bed, dreaming of Dapeng Bay as the tune of “Land of Hope and Glory” formed a loop in his mind. He thought of all the lies he had told, and all the truths he had uttered in his extraordinary journey to meet the now departed Patten. What had come over him in those long, crazy weeks? Why had he believed that he had even the slightest chance of fulfilling his quest? He might have drowned. He could have been shot or imprisoned. And yet he had succeeded, in a fashion that he could never have imagined. Western intelligence now given him the opportunity to make sense of his loss and rage. Lenan and Coolidge had allowed Wang Kaixuan the chance to avenge his son’s murder.

One question, however, continued to puzzle him. What had happened to the first of them, the spy from Government House? Wang had warmed to the young graduate of Wadham College Oxford, who had seen through his lies and reacted with genuine horror to the brutalities of Yining and Baren. Why had he never seen him again? What on earth had become of Mr. John Richards?

24

HANDOVER

Young couples break up all the time. It’s an old story. It’s a new story. This one was a little different.

I sensed there was trouble brewing the moment I saw Billy Chen forcing his way through the sweat-and rain-soaked crowds of Lan Kwai Fong. It was about eleven o’clock on the night of the 29th. Imagine a Mardi Gras or New Year’s Eve in a sticky, tropical climate, with thousands of over-excited, emotionally exhausted, inebriated Westerners puking and kissing and laughing and dancing and you’ll have some idea of what it was like to be out in Hong Kong that night. Joe, Isabella, Miles and myself-along with about a dozen other colleagues and hangers-on-were drinking in F-Stop, a long-established bar halfway up Lan Kwai Fong. Joe had left the bar momentarily to buy cigarettes at a nearby convenience store and had been gone about five minutes. The bar was popular with Chinese yuppies but Chen still looked out of place squeezing himself through the bottleneck of customers at the entrance, wearing a pair of cheap jeans, trainers and a dirty white T-shirt. He was sweating profusely and his eyes had a kind of wild, narcotic stare that I can still picture vividly to this day.

At first I couldn’t place him, but when he was about ten feet away I had a vivid recollection that I had met Billy in either Macau or Shenzhen about eighteen months earlier while researching an article for the Sunday Times. What the hell was a Teochiu Triad doing in F-Stop the night before the handover? I had done a line of coke and must confess that my first, somewhat hysterical reaction was that Chen was going to pull out a knife or gun and start slaying random expats as a symbolic act of violence on the eve of wui gwai. He certainly looked capable of causing a serious disturbance. Then I saw that he was looking around for somebody and assumed that he was meeting a girl, or perhaps wanting to have words with the management. Yet that didn’t properly explain the look of urgency on his face, the near-panic which characterized his every gesture. Miles was standing beside me talking to a couple of women from Credit Suisse and I pulled him out of his conversation to let him know what was going on.

“What’s that?” he said.

It was difficult to be heard above the noise of the bar and I had to shout as I repeated myself. “Billy Chen has just walked in.”

“Who the fuck is Billy Chen?”

Looking back, that was the first clue. It didn’t make sense that Miles would forget the name of one of his prize assets. I was about to reply when Chen looked directly at Miles through the ruck of heaving bodies and produced an expression that was as malevolent as any I have ever seen. It was as if the two of them were engaged in a blood feud. I heard Miles mutter: “Oh Jesus Christ” under his breath and then he tried to start a staged conversation with me, as if we were two extras standing at the back of a crowd scene attempting to look normal. “Just act natural, man, just act natural,” he said. “Talk to me, keep talking.” Of course the whole set-up was an elaborate piece of theatre; it was just that Miles and Billy were the only actors among us who knew their lines. Taking hold of my shoulder, Miles twisted me towards the bar, so that we both had had our backs to the room.

“What the fuck is going on?” I asked, and instinctively looked to my right to see what was happening to Isabella. She was standing twenty feet away, squeezed against a wall by a pincer movement of three drunken expats, all of whom seemed to be taking advantage of Joe’s absence from the bar to try to chat her up. To my astonishment, Chen burst through all three of them and grabbed her by the arm. She looked visibly, understandably shocked, but the men must have clocked Chen’s physique and seen the possibility of violence in his vivid, fevered eyes because they made no attempt to intervene, nor to protect Isabella from what was happening. Seeing this, I broke clear of Miles and tried to make my way through the crowd to help her. On a normal night this would have taken no time at all, but with so many people dancing and talking and oblivious to anything but their own enjoyment of the party, it was some time before I could reach her.

“What’s on your mind?” I said to Chen when I got there, and he immediately released his grip. Isabella no longer looked so frightened, and she was clearly relieved that one of her friends had shown up to help her.

“He says he knows Joe,” she said, trying to smile and sound relaxed, but obviously unsettled by what was happening. “He says that Joe has to help him with something.”

I realized immediately that there was a danger of Joe’s cover being blown. I also assumed-as Miles had surely hoped I would-that something had happened between the CIA and the Triads and that Billy was coming to the Brits to help him out.

“This guy doesn’t know Joe,” I replied, intent on salvaging the situation. “Believe me, this guy does not know Joe.”

There was a kind of drunken deliriousness about what was happening, as if the conversation was taking place in a parallel dimension. “You stay out of it,” Chen countered, pointing a finger at me. He had obviously recognized my face. Either that, or Miles had briefed him that I would be in the bar. “I’m looking for her boyfriend,” he said, pointing the same finger at Isabella. “Her boyfriend have to help me. Otherwise we all in trouble.”

“But how can he help you?” Isabella asked. I was relieved to see that she was beginning to act as if the whole thing was a case of mistaken identity.