The King of Shanghai by Ian Hamilton

Author:Ian Hamilton
Language: eng, eng
Format: epub
Publisher: House of Anansi Press Inc.
Published: 2014-11-24T19:05:12+00:00

( 21 )

Ava and Sonny took the train from Hung Hom to the Lok Ma Chau MTR station, just across the river from Shenzhen. It was Sonny’s choice to take the train, which surprised her. When she had phoned him the night before to say she needed him to drive her across the border, he hesitated and then asked if she really wanted to take the car.

“Is that a problem?” she asked.

“The lineups at the border are completely unpredictable. We could be waiting hours to get through, and then when we do, we’ll have to contend with the Shenzhen traffic. There are always traffic jams, and worse than that, no one there knows how to drive — and that’s not a joke. I read in Sing Tao last year that Shenzhen has a million unlicensed drivers. They drive like they’re in bumper cars.”

“What do you suggest?”

“Where’s your meeting?”

“Futian.”

“The train from Hung Hom goes directly to the station there. A forty-five-minute ride, tops. Do you have a Hong Kong ID card?”

“Yes.”

“We get out of the train, swipe the card, and we’re in Shenzhen. We can catch a cab from the station to wherever you’re going.”

“The meeting starts at one, but I want to be there a few hours earlier.”

He didn’t ask why. Sonny had worked with Ava enough times to understand that she liked to be prepared for anything, and being early sometimes prevented nasty surprises. “I’ll pick you up at the hotel at nine. I’ll park at Hung Hom. We should get to your meeting place by eleven.”

They reached Hung Hom at nine thirty. As they walked from the parking lot to the station, Ava was aware that they made an odd couple: diminutive Ava and the hulking Sonny. In Borneo Ava at one point had found herself standing between Sonny and the even larger Suen. She had never felt quite so small. As if conscious of the height disparity, on the way to the station Sonny walked a couple of paces behind her, his eyes flitting in all directions.

Ava bought two first-class tickets for the nine-fifty train, which left the station on time. Hong Kong trains always seem to leave on time, Ava thought. “You know, I met Uncle for the very first time because of a case in Shenzhen,” she said as the train headed north on its thirty-kilometre trip towards the Pearl River Delta.

“I remember. I was still working for him in Fanling. He hadn’t cut off all his old connections yet. He told me he had a crew in Shenzhen chasing down a debt and they had run into you. They had no idea how to handle you.”

“Or me them.”

“I heard you wrapped them around your finger,” he said, smiling.

“They felt sorry for me.”

“And then you managed to get enough money out of the guy to look after everyone. That’s when Uncle said, ‘I need to meet that girl.’”

“And the rest is history.”

“Shenzhen was smaller then,” he said.

“Still had to be five or six million people.”

“Yeah, and now it’s over fifteen million.

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