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By Root 4198 0

grandson Hong Kong was obviously in trouble, for he was ill at ease, nervous and irritable. Nyuk Tsin guessed that he was having difficulty meeting payments on the various ventures into which she had goaded him, and she was sorry that it was he who had to bear the burden of these trying days and not she. Therefore, when the mammoth dinner at Asia's ended, the little old lady told the women about her that she wanted to talk with Hong Kong, and after she was taken home and had examined her body for leprosy, and had inspected her big disgraceful feet, she appeared in a black gown with buttons down the right side and asked in Hakka, "Hong Kong, are things so very bad?"

"Wu Chow's Auntie, the detectives are back again," he explained.

"But you don't know whether that means good or bad," she observed.

"Detectives are never good," he assured her.

"How do you know they're back?"

"Kamejiro Sakagawa said they were digging into his land deal again. They were also asking sly questions at Australia's."

"How are we fixed for taxes and mortgage payments?" she asked.

This was the one bright spot, and he said with some relief, "Not too bad. With the money we saved last year we're out of trouble."

"Then we'll be prudent and wait," she advised. "If someone wants to hurt you, Hong Kong, keep him off balance. Make him take the first step toward you, for then you can watch him coming and take precautions."

Four days later the first step came, in the person of a husky, quiet-spoken Irishman from Boston with huge, bushy-black eyebrows, who said that his name was McLafferty and who appeared in Hong Kong's office asking idle questions about real estate, and from the assured manner in which the visitor behaved, Hong Kong deduced: "This one has the detective reports in his pocket. He knows."

Not much happened that first day. Hong Kong probed: "You looking for a hotel site? You got something else in mind?"

"What hotel sites have you?" Mr. McLafferty parried, but it was obvious that he wasn't interested. "I'll be back," he said.

As soon as he was gone, Hong Kong started half a dozen Kees on his trail, but all they turned up was that he really was Mr. McLafferty and he was a lawyer from Boston, stopping at the Lagoon. Hong Kong took this information to his grandmother, and they carefully weighed the various possibilities that might bring a Boston lawyer to Hawaii, and Hong Kong was all for dispatching a cable to a Kee who was studying at Harvard asking for detailed information on McLafferty, but his grandmother told him to wait. "Don't get excited until he makes some specific move," she cautioned him.

Two days later Mr. McLafferty returned and said casually, "If my syndicate decided on one of the big hotel sites ... at your price? Could you deliver title to the land?"

Hong Kong realized that considering the intricate Hawaiian system of land ownership, this apparently trivial question was a trap, so he answered slowly and cautiously, "Well, I'd better explain, Mr. McLafferty, that out here we don't sell land fee simple. What I'd be willing to do is guarantee you a fifty-year lease."

"You can't sell us any land outright?" McLafferty probed cautiously.

"My hui--are you familiar with the word hui?--well my hui has a little fee simple, but not choice hotel sites. What we do have is control of some of the best leases in Honolulu."

"Why don't you people sell fee simple?" McLafferty asked directly, but not bluntly. He was a careful operator.

Hong Kong decided not to waste time. "Mr. McLafferty, I don't think you're paying attention to land problems here. If you're far enough along to talk seriously about a hotel site you're bound to know that our estates never sell land. They lease it."

Mr. McLafferty liked this blunt answer, liked all he knew about Hong Kong, which was considerable, and felt that the propitious moment had come. "Could we send your secretary out? For maybe an hour?"

"Certainly," Hong Kong replied, his pulse hammering. He had learned that when this happened he must slow down . . . instantly. So he took some minutes giving his