The Trail to Buddha's Mirror - Don Winslow [42]
They come for a lot of reasons: opportunity, freedom, refuge, asylum. But the reason that most of them come can be summed up in one simple, uncomplicated word.
Rice.
Neal Carey didn’t crawl under a fence or wade a river or paddle a raft. He came in a Boeing 747 wide-body on which the Singaporean stewardess handed him steaming hot towels to wipe his face and wake him up. He came on the overnight flight from San Francisco. Mark Chin and his associates had driven him to the airport, and Chin had given him instructions on what to do when he landed at Hong Kong’s Kai Tak Airport.
“My cousin Ben will be there to meet you, right outside of immigration,” Chin had told him.
“How will I know him?” Neal asked.
Chin had smiled broadly. “You’ll know him.”
It didn’t take long for the efficient and unsmiling immigration officials to handle the incoming crowd. Neal told them that he was there as a tourist, and they asked him how much money he had brought with him. His answer matched the number he had put down on the immigration form, and they let him right in. He didn’t tell them he was going to put the Bank’s gold card away for the duration, though, lest he be tracked down via the paper trail.
He didn’t have any trouble recognizing Ben Chin. He had the same thick chest, the same block-of-granite face, and the same short black hair. He sported a silk lavender shirt, white denims, and black tassled loafers. His wraparound reflective sunglasses were pushed up on his head.
Ben Chin didn’t have any trouble recognizing Neal, either.
“Mark said to hide you out and help you find some babe, right?” he asked as he grabbed Neal by the shoulder.
“Close enough.”
“So maybe I should get you out of a crowded airport,” Chin said. “Where’s your luggage?”
Neal hefted his shoulder bag. “You’re looking at it.”
Chin led him through the terminal and out into the parking lot.
“Kai Tak Airport is a very sad place, you know. According to legend, this is where the Boy Emperor, the last ruler of the Sung Dynasty, jumped off a cliff into the ocean and drowned.”
“Why did he do that?”
“He lost a war with the Mongols or something, I don’t know. Anyway, he didn’t want to be captured.”
“I don’t see a cliff or an ocean.”
“Bulldozers. We’d rather have an airport than a suicide launch pad.”
Chin unlocked the trunk of a ’72 Pinto and threw Neal’s bag in. Then he opened the left-side passenger door for Neal. He gestured for Neal to get in and then walked around to the right side of the car and squeezed himself behind the steering wheel. As they pulled out of the lot, he asked, “Aren’t you going to tell me how good my English is?”
“I hadn’t planned on it.”
“I did a year at UCLA.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, but I flunked out.” He patted his belly. “I clean-jerked a few too many brews, you know what I mean?”
“I’ve had those nights.”
“Did you go Greek?”
“Hmm?”
“Which frat?” Ben asked.
“I lived at home.”
“Oh,” said Ben.
He sounded so disappointed that Neal added, “In an apartment. By myself.”
“Cool.”
Help me, baby Jesus, Neal pleaded. Less than a week ago I was happily burrowed in my little hill, now I’m trapped in a ’72 deathmobile in Hong Kong with a failed frat rat. Life is a strange and wonderful carnival of experiential delights.
“So what do you do now?” Neal asked, trying to avoid a discussion of those good old college days of keggers, mixers, and coeds.
“I’m a security guard at the Banyan Tree Hotel.”
Please, baby Jesus, come down now. I’m off the midway and headed for the sideshow tents.
“It’s the family trade. Besides, it gives me access to a gym. And a place where I can conduct a couple of sidelines, if you know what I mean.”
Yeah, I think I know what you mean.
“The security work?” Ben continued. “I have it dicked. The place was a mess when I took the job. Thieves … beggars