John Davis - The Year of Dangerous Loving

They climbed the wide stone steps leading up to the ruin of Saint Paul’s Cathedral, only the beautiful façade remaining, towering up, with carvings and colonnades. ‘This was also the very first university in Asia,’ Olga informed him. ‘Did you know that? Started by the Jesuit missionaries nearly five hundred years ago.’

Hargreave didn’t know that. ‘I thought it was just a church.’

‘No. The Jesuits were very rich because they taxed all the ships that came to Macao to trade. They wanted money to convert the whole of China to Christianity. But then the Duke of Pombal took power in Portugal and banished all the Jesuits and took all their money, but when the soldiers came to this cathedral they found everything gone, all the gold and silver and silk, even the library. The Jesuits were sent to Goa in chains, but the treasure was never found. So where is it?’ She tapped her toe on the stone steps. ‘Under here. People say there are secret rooms under these steps leading to the harbour, the treasure is buried there. Exciting, huh?’ She added, ‘When China takes over they will probably dig all this up, to look for it. That would be terrible.’

‘How do you know all this?’

‘I got books from the library. So interesting. There are some nice little museums here, I will take you one day. Have you been to the new University of Macao, on Taipa?’

‘No.’ Hargreave smiled. ‘Should I have?’

‘It is very important because now there will always be Western education in China. Like the University of Hong Kong. That’s good, huh, good for China, good for the rest of the world, it will stop China being so …’ She put her hands to the sides of her eyes, like blinkers. She added: ‘One day I would like to go to a university.’

‘And study what?’

‘There’s so many interesting things to learn.’

Oh, this lovely girl was no prostitute, not in her heart, nor in her head …

They stopped at a Chinese restaurant in the narrow crowded streets of the old quarter, where Portuguese wine was served. It was noisy and pungent with a multitude of cooking smells, all the Chinese talking loudly, young girls circulating with trays of dim sum, small plates of Chinese delicacies, and there were glass tanks of fish and crayfish and crabs with their claws bound. Olga sat with her back to them so she couldn’t ‘see their unhappiness’. She did not know that the restaurant also served snakes, puppies and monkeys – when Hargreave went to the toilet he saw them in their cages in the kitchen, but he didn’t tell her. They drank a bottle of vinho verde while they picked at a selection of dim sum as an aperitif before returning to the Bella Mar for lunch.

Olga said: ‘So you don’t know whether you will continue to work after 1997?’

Hargreave sighed; he was at a loss where to begin. ‘Do you understand what the Rule of Law means?’

She shook her head.

No, there was probably no such thing in Russia either. ‘The Rule of Law means that everybody is equal before the law, and the law always rules, not the politicians. It is the fundamental principle of the English legal system. The courts are not afraid of the politicians. But in China the Communist Party rules, the only law is what the Party wants, and that can change from week to week, day to day. And when China takes over in 1997 it will be the same in Hong Kong – despite the Joint Declaration which says that English law will continue to apply.’ He shook his head. ‘I couldn’t practise law like that, it’s against everything I believe in.’

‘So are the people in Hong Kong worried?’

‘Oh, the poor old average Chinese worker has no choice but to hope for the best – and pretend to be patriotic when China comes marching in. But thousands upon thousands of middle-class Chinese have emigrated to Canada and Australia and the US. And most of the British civil servants are worried as hell about whether China will pay their pensions, and there are very good reasons to think China will not, no matter what she promises – once they see these vast sums leaving every month to pay capitalist foreign devils who made a career of exploiting the holy soil of China, they’ll put a stop to the outflow, and there’ll be a lot of poor pensioners. Yes, they’re very worried. But the big business houses are staying because all they’re interested in is trade and most of their assets are safely offshore – they don’t care about democracy and the Rule of Law.’ He shook his head. ‘But they should – because Hong Kong is prosperous only because there is British law here to give them justice. Take that away and Hong Kong will be a dangerous place to do business.’

Olga said pensively, ‘I do not believe it. I look around and I see all the big business, all the new buildings, the big new Bank of China, and I do not believe China will eat the gooses who lay the golden eggs.’

Hargreave sighed.

‘Lord, they’ve already broken the Joint Declaration half a dozen times. Look, the Joint Declaration is a legally-binding international agreement between China and Britain, and it says, amongst other things, that when China takes over Hong Kong will be an autonomous region and that there will be democracy. So in 1985 Britain began to introduce democracy, and China immediately protested, before the ink was dry, and has been threatening us ever since, vowing to throw out our legislative councillors.’ He looked at her. ‘How’s that for breaking the Joint Declaration?’

‘But,’ Olga said, ‘it is understandable, Hong Kong never had democracy before, now Britain introduces it –’

‘How can it be understandable when China said that “only the flag will change”, that her policy was “One Country, Two Systems”, that there would be a “through-train” on which the civil servants and the legislative councillors would travel smoothly from being a British colony into the new era?’ He shook his head. ‘The only thing we can understand from her behaviour is that China simply does not understand the law because they think the Communist Party is the law and can do what it likes – that is how Communists think. They have never had democracy or human rights in China, so they simply do not understand the real world – that is all that’s understandable about them.’

‘But,’ Olga argued solemnly, ‘they will change because they want trade.’

‘But only on their lawless terms. Do you know that thirty-one foreign banks are presently trying to recover debts of six hundred million US dollars owed by China’s state-run companies? And they owe millions to numerous American companies. Like McDonald’s – the world’s biggest fast-food chain? They signed a twenty-year lease with China for a prime site in Tiananmen Square, and after a while China just evicted them.’ Hargreave frowned at her. ‘They’re simply not like us, Olga, they simply don’t feel that the everyday laws of contract are binding on them, let alone strange international treaties made with foreign devils about this strange thing called democracy … And ,’ he held up a finger, ‘China will suffer dearly for it. What China needs is what Hong Kong has – the Rule of Law. Last year Fortune Magazine voted Hong Kong the best place in the world to do business in, better even than New York or London. Why? – because of our free trade, of course, but particularly because of our Rule of Law: the international business community knows they can rely on our courts. But that will go when China starts interfering – Hong Kong is going to go to the dogs.’

‘What does that mean, go to the dogs?’

‘Go into a decline. But that’s only part of the godawful story, Olga. The rest is even worse. Because what about human rights?’ He waved a hand. ‘China has agreed that our Bill of Rights will continue to apply, and they even wrote it into the Basic Law – but what does China now say? That will be thrown out along with our democratically-elected legislative council!’ He spread his hands: ‘Lord, how can anybody trust these guys on anything? And freedom of the press?’ He snorted. ‘Do you know that freedom of speech is actually enshrined in China’s constitution? Well, we all know what that means in China – life in jail, more likely the executioner’s bullet for speaking out against the Party. Tiananmen Square massacre, that’s what happens.’ He snorted again. ‘The Basic Law also says there will be freedom of the press – but what happens?’ He spread his hands again. ‘China’s propaganda chief has recently warned Hong Kong journalists to “be wise and bend with the wind”, and “to watch out”. And now China has banned television satellite dishes because she is terrified of her people learning what is going on in the rest of the world. Because information, general knowledge, is power, it empowers the people.’ He shook his head. ‘The press in China is just a propaganda machine, Olga, and it’ll be the same in Hong Kong after they take over. And that’ll be the death of our open, free-market culture that has made us so prosperous.’ He looked at her. ‘How can one do business with a country like that?’