J.F. Kirwan - 88° North

Chen puffed out his chest. ‘Then we will accompany you.’

Jake didn’t miss a beat. He’d thought it through. She’d have to have a word with him later about her low tolerance for surprises.

‘No,’ he said. ‘If you come with us, no one will talk to us, and we’ll have a big target painted on the backs of our heads.’

She watched Jake. There was something else. He didn’t trust the local police. Hardly surprising. Salamander, his son Cheng Yi before him, and now his granddaughter Blue Fan all operated out of Hong Kong, yet were never arrested, never brought in for questioning. The HK database had been completely empty on these three, except for Cheng Yi’s funeral. Not even birth certificates. Which made her wonder … Now the Territories were run by China. Power had shifted since British colonial rule had expired. Still they’d remained hidden all this time. Did Salamander have friends in the Hong Kong government? Or China?

Chen had his hands by his sides, the pinkie of each stretched out, and his three men drew their pistols. Slick. No barking of orders that would draw attention to the group. She and Jake were on the wrong side of passport control. They were in international space. Chen could put them back on the plane, send them home. It looked as if Jake had overplayed his hand.

A man in a crumpled beige suit hustled over to them, his brow sweating despite the aircon, dampening the wavy fringe of unkempt rusty-grey hair, his belly protruding far over his belt. When he spoke, it was in the Queen’s English.

‘Inspector Chen, no need for that, these are my guests.’ He held out his palm as he approached, and bowed with such an amiable face that Chen had no choice but to shake his hand.

‘Mr Hanbury,’ Chen said, for the first time his voice slowing to a normal pace.

‘So sorry I’m late. Traffic, you know, and I had to take the dogs to the vet again, well you of all people know how it is, with Biyu and Da Chun, how they fuss over their Boxer.’ He turned briefly to the three men. ‘Guiren, Jun, so good to see you again. And you, young sir, I don’t believe we’ve met?’ He offered his hand to the third policeman who still held his pistol, his eyes darting between his colleagues to know how he should react.

Chen spoke again. ‘Mr Hanbury, we have a situation here—’

‘Oh come, come, I think not. I have a letter here from the Embassy, and an email from the HK CEO’s office, granting these two good people diplomatic immunity. It just came through an hour ago, so how could you possibly have known.’ He showed his iPhone to Chen. Nadia caught sight of it. A sea of Chinese characters.

Hanbury was good. And prepared. Nadia noticed two male baggage handlers who were taking their time, stealing occasional glances in Hanbury’s direction. She doubted they were armed, but they belonged to Hanbury.

Chen took and read the letter, quickly scrolling down the iPhone, stabbing it with his forefinger, knowing he’d been outplayed. He turned to Jake, his face breaking into an award-winning fake smile.

‘Welcome to Hong Kong. Enjoy your stay.’ He glanced briefly towards Nadia. His smile evaporated, and he and his men marched off. The baggage handlers melted into a group of tourists.

‘So sorry about all that. Alex Hanbury, at your service., but just call me Hanbury, everyone does for some reason.’ He offered his hand to Nadia. She shook it. Clammy and limp. Somehow it suited him.

Hanbury led them towards the express train, then at the last moment they veered off towards the taxi area. As soon as they passed through the automatic glass panels to board one of the red and white taxis, whose door and boot automatically swung open, the heat and humidity smacked into her. Hanbury said some words in Chinese, then spoke again as the driver seemed not to understand.

Catching her inquisitive eye, Hanbury explained. ‘I always try Cantonese first, in case the driver is local, then if that fails, I switch to Mandarin, which is what the influx of Chinese mainlanders speak.’

She climbed in next to Jake, Hanbury in front. As soon as the doors closed, she was washed in cool air. The taxi pulled out of the underground car park into eye-blistering sunlight that made her wince, until they descended into a long tunnel full of red tail-lights.

She leaned her head towards Jake. ‘You like changing your mind.’

‘The sooner we disappear the better.’

She nodded towards the front of the cab, to Hanbury. ‘We could do with some local knowledge.’

Jake asked, and Hanbury filled the role of a cosy radio station, covering weather, politics, where to eat, where not to go – he spent rather a long time on that. All in all, he was an entertaining and jovial tour guide. Eventually they came out of the tunnel, and she got to see the bottom halves of the skyscrapers she’d admired a couple of hours earlier, most of the cloud cover burned off by the sun. Each tower was an architectural marvel, but also a middle finger to nature, and in the case of the tallest, to all its shorter contemporaries. On the Hong Kong skyline, size mattered.

At ground level, everyone walked fast, termites swarming around their metal-and-concrete mounds. There were a number of religions in China, but in Hong Kong the undisputed one was work. The taxi driver veered right and climbed a zig-zagging road, revving through the lower gears. Abruptly he stopped by a railing, and they piled out into the morning heat. The sign at the entrance said ‘Zoological Park’ and Hanbury wandered inside, his handkerchief already drawn to mop his brow.

‘So few places to meet and not be overheard,’ he said. ‘We don’t kid ourselves at the embassy. Besides, once there, they’d track you easily.’ He turned to Nadia, eyes suddenly bulging with excitement, like an overgrown kid. ‘Have you ever seen a snow leopard? Can you imagine, a snow leopard in this heat?’

Without waiting for a reply, he strode up a winding pathway towards metal cages containing shrieking birds, some monkeys, and … the snow leopard didn’t look too happy.

Suddenly she felt nauseous. Not the common garden variety. This was the clawed-animal-in-your-colon kind. She walked as calmly as she could towards a bench.

‘You okay?’ Jake asked.

She didn’t meet his eyes. ‘It’s the heat.’ Second lie. She made a promise to stop at ten.

‘It’s the humidity,’ Hanbury interjected. ‘Over ninety per cent in August. Poor little bugger.’

She glanced up sharply, but Hanbury was staring at the snow leopard. ‘Sometimes I think about coming here in the small, wee hours and putting it out of its misery. You see, animals can’t kill themselves. This one never even moves. Animals don’t realise when the game is lost, don’t know when to call it a day.’ He turned to her, and the playful, avuncular veneer was gone. He looked into her, through her, as if she was already gone.

He knew. Possibly through his embassy connections, maybe via the Colonel back in Moscow. But he knew.

Jake was squatting on the pebbles, staring at the leopard. It got up and came over to sniff his fingers through the wire mesh. Jake stroked its nose. Hanbury raised an eyebrow.

‘Are you talking about Salamander?’ Jake asked, standing up.

‘Who else?’ Hanbury replied, smoothly.

The nausea ebbed. Nadia needed to get her head into the game. ‘So, can we talk here?’

Hanbury plonked himself down next to her, with a middle-aged sigh, and the wooden beams under her bottom lifted a few centimetres. He pulled out a smartphone, touched it a few times then surveyed the blue and white sky. ‘Definitely.’

‘Do you know the location of Blue Fan?’ she asked.

‘Yes.’

She and Jake exchanged a glance. They hadn’t expected that particular answer.