The Princeling of Nanjing (4 page)

Ava had seen only one collection of Clark’s clothes, and that was months before at the sample factory where they were deciding if they would invest in PÖ. The clothes had been made almost exclusively from linen, in a host of bright, vibrant colours. Now he’d expanded his use of materials to include textured weaves, silk jersey, and silk crepe, and he’d balanced the bright colours with black, grey, and muted browns.

The clothes she’d seen at the factory had also been presented haphazardly. Now they were grouped by look, and it was obvious to Ava that the money the company had invested in hiring the producer and his team had been well worth it.

Of the clothes she now saw on the runway, the jackets and coats were particularly inventive and breathtaking. They were of various lengths, many with asymmetrical hems, and were layered and wrapped and belted in an almost primitive way. Some had collars inspired by cheongsams. Many were softly structured, with voluminous shoulders and sleeves.

Ava was pleased to see that Clark hadn’t abandoned the beautiful needlework and intricate stitching that had characterized the early designs she’d seen, and his signature oddly shaped buttons of glass and semi-precious stone continued to make his pieces unique.

As the show progressed, the music of Jacky Cheung morphed into that of Eason Chan and then Zhou Xuan, keeping the factory ladies and the Pos’ friends on their feet and making noise.

“It’s almost over,” May said, looking at her watch. “I’ve never felt time move so fast.”

Almost as soon as she spoke, the runway emptied and the song “Stand Up” blared from the speakers. It had been a hit for Leslie Cheung, one of the kings of Cantopop, who had committed suicide. Ava wondered if the final song was a tribute to Cheung, who was gay. The guests in the front rows were now standing. Ava wondered if Clark was waiting in the wings before coming out to take his bow. Then a model walked onto the stage and stood with her head lowered. She wore a white, almost sheer linen coat that flared like a trumpet from her shoulders to her feet. The linen was lightweight, almost gossamer, and verged on translucent. An intricately embroidered high collar partially masked her face. The coat was cinched at the waist with a toggle that looked as though it was made from green jade.

The music stopped.

The model walked down the runway and stopped halfway. She was close enough now that Ava could see the words
A SINGLE SPARK CAN SET THE WORLD ON FIRE
stitched down both sides of the coat’s front.

The model paused, threw her head back, and reached for the toggle. The coat slipped from her shoulders and onto the floor. Underneath she wore an evening dress that looked as if thin strands of liquid silver had been wrapped around her, strand by strand.

The crowd began to chant Clark’s name.

A group of models carrying red silk bags walked onto the stage. They moved down the runway and then parted to each side, revealing Clark standing alone in the centre. He raised his arms high and slowly turned to acknowledge the entire room. He was wearing a simple white cotton T-shirt with “PÖ” printed on it in red. The models reached into their bags and began to toss T-shirts into the crowd.

“Don’t worry, we have enough shirts for everyone,” Amanda said from behind them.

Ava jumped in surprise and turned to see Amanda, Chi-Tze, and Gillian. Each of them had bags stuffed with shirts.

“We’re going to hand them out to everyone who didn’t get one,” she said.

“Where did you come from?” Ava said.

“Through the back corridors. Tell us, was the crowd this enthusiastic throughout?”

“The audience was like this right from the start. You didn’t hear them?”

“We were working, and it was so busy that we couldn’t concentrate on anything else.”

“The show was unbelievable,” May said, her voice rising. “Gillian, you should be so proud of your brother. And the three of you, you should be proud of everything you’ve done to make this happen. I don’t care if we sell a single coat. The experience of this last half-hour was worth every dollar we’ve spent on PÖ since day one.”

“We will sell coats,” Chi-Tze said. “I promise you that.”

“And this won’t hurt,” Amanda said, looking at her phone. “I just got a text from Elsa. She wants to do a feature on Clark. She says she’s going to stay a few extra days, and she’s already asked the Hong Kong office to make arrangements for a photographer.”

Before the group had a chance to react, the audience began to file out of the ballroom. The women offered T-shirts that were rolled up and tied with a strip of silk. Ava took one and opened it. The words
THE SPARK WAS LIT
and the date were printed under the PÖ logo. Ava stared at it. It was only a T-shirt, but she’d never owned one that meant so much.

Ava opened the door to her hotel suite, feeling exhausted and exhilarated. Immediately after the show, she had met briefly with Carrie Song and her assistant, Laura Deng. Clark’s designs had impressed them and — without making a commitment — Carrie said she had told Laura to start the process of assessing how the clothes might be acquired and introduced at Lane Crawford and Joyce. Ava said the PÖ contacts for Laura would be Gillian and Chi-Tze, and she took her backstage to meet them. Commitment or none, the fact that Lane Crawford was showing interest was enough to make everyone at PÖ dizzy. Their excitement about Lane Crawford and the
Vogue
photo shoot hyped an already electric environment at the after-show party at the sample factory, which had been organized by the factory ladies and the Pos’ friends. Ava arrived there with May Ling in the late afternoon, and both of them got caught up in the excitement. Ava couldn’t remember the last time she had drunk and danced so much. It was almost ten when she made her escape in a taxi, leaving May and the rest of team at the party.

She went directly to the hotel bed, looked at it lovingly, and was starting to step out of her dress when she saw the blinking red light on her hotel phone. She pulled her cellphone from her bag and saw two missed calls from Xu. She went to the hotel phone, guessing that any message would be from him.

“I’m in the car coming back from Nanjing,” he said. “It’s past nine o’clock, and we’ve got another hour or so before we’re back in Shanghai. I’d like to see you tonight when I get back. Ring me and let me know if that’s possible.”

“Shit,” Ava said. All she wanted to do was sleep. She contemplated calling him in the morning, but she knew she couldn’t. He had sounded worried.

“Hey, it’s Ava,” she said when he answered her call.

“Where are you?”

“At the hotel. I just got back from the after-party at the sample factory in Pudong.”

“I heard from Wu. He said the show was a huge success. He and Fan are thrilled that they’ll have a chance to make some of the clothes.”

“They’re very nice people.”

“Do you remember Auntie Grace?”

“Of course.”

“Fan is her niece.”

“Ah, that explains why you told me to be nice to her,” she said. “And where are you?”

“About twenty minutes from the hotel. If you’re up to it, I’ll drop by and get you. We’ll go to the house. Auntie Grace always has a pot of congee on the stove, and if you’re really hungry she can make a plate of the best noodles in Shanghai.”

“I’m stuffed. I ate all night. I couldn’t eat a grain of rice.”

“Then we’ll just have a drink.”

“I’m close to being drunk already. I don’t think I can handle much more.”

“Then you can drink tea and watch me drink Scotch.”

“Xu, is everything okay?” she asked.

“No, it isn’t,” he said quietly.

“Tsai?”

“Yes, Tsai and his father and his whole fucking family. I need to talk it out.”

“Sounds like it could be a long talk.”

“Could be.”

“Then I’d better shower and put on some fresh clothes. I’ll come down to the lobby when I’m ready.”

Ava knew that science said a shower would have no impact on her blood-alcohol level, wouldn’t cure jet lag, and wouldn’t make her any more alert, but she believed in the power of placebos; for her, warm, strong streams of water had somehow always worked. She stood in the shower for close to ten minutes and then quickly towelled herself dry. She threw on clean underwear, the PÖ T-shirt she’d got at the launch, and her Adidas training pants and jacket. She headed downstairs feeling, if not invigorated, at least refreshed.

She almost walked right into Xu’s Mercedes when she exited the hotel. Suen was standing by the rear door. He opened it as soon as he saw her. She slid in and leaned over to kiss Xu on the cheek.

“You’re lucky I checked my messages before going to bed,” she said. “If I’d gotten between those sheets I don’t know if anything could have wakened me.”

“Are you okay?”

“I took a shower. It helped.”

“To the house,” Xu said to the driver.

“Were things that bad?” Ava asked as the car pulled away from the hotel.

“Let’s not discuss that until we’re home,” Xu said.

Xu lived in the French Concession, a neighbourhood primarily west of the Bund. The land had initially been ceded to the French in 1849, and the territory was expanded around 1920. Its original street layout and architecture were mainly French with a touch of other European styles, but after the Communists took over in 1949, some buildings were torn down and parts of the area were badly redeveloped, until a public outcry ended the destruction. Xu’s neighbourhood had escaped the Communist-style development and still had the aura of a European enclave. He lived in a cottage that was accessed through a narrow alleyway with brick walls on both sides.

She knew they were close to the house when the car slowed to a crawl and made a left turn down an alley with a fruit cart vendor at its entrance. The driver rolled down the window so Suen could talk to the vendor. Ava knew that at the other end of the alley was another fruit cart. They manned the alleyway twenty-four hours a day, and she was sure that under the piles of oranges and apples were a gun and an alarm.

As the car moved down the narrow alleyway, a gate swung open to the left. They turned into a courtyard that was big enough to park three cars alongside a fish pond and a patio. Just inside the courtyard, two men flanked the gate, while a third stood near the door to the house.

“I thought that after the issue with Guangzhou was resolved you wouldn’t need this much security,” Ava said.

“I don’t think I’m in any particular danger, but security has become part of the structure, and Suen would be aggravated if I reduced it. Besides, I love it here and I don’t want to move,” Xu said.

They left the car and began to walk towards the house. The front door opened before they reached it, and Ava found herself looking at a tiny grey-haired woman.

“Auntie Grace,” she said.

“Ava, I’m so happy to see you again.”

“And I to see you,” Ava said, knowing that she was looking at the one woman in Xu’s life who could never be replaced. Auntie Grace had been Xu’s nanny from the day he was born and his housekeeper from the day he became head of the family.

“I have congee,” she said.

“I wish I could eat, but I’m stuffed.”

“Noodles?”

“Auntie, I can’t.”

“Xu?” she said.

“I’ll have noodles,” he said. “But first, bring me that bottle of whisky I’ve been saving and let me get started on that.”

Auntie Grace stepped back into the house so they could pass. “I don’t like it when he needs that whisky,” she said to Ava as if Xu wasn’t standing next to her.

“We’ll go to the kitchen,” Xu said, pretending not to hear.

They walked through the living room and into the kitchen. The white-tiled floor was stained and chipped, and a folding table — the kind brought out for a game of mah-jong — had been set up in the corner with two folding chairs. The appliances looked as if they were twenty years old. On the stovetop was a pot of what Ava assumed was congee. On the counter sat a hot-water Thermos and a rice cooker.

Ava and Xu sat across from each other.

“Ava, do you want tea?” Auntie Grace said.

“Please.”

The old woman took a teapot from the cupboard and filled it with leaves and hot water from the Thermos. She placed the pot with a cup in front of Ava. She then went to another cupboard and took out a bottle of whisky and a glass. She put those in front of Xu.

“Are you ready to eat?” she said to him.

“Not yet.”

“Let me know when you are. I won’t sleep,” she said.

“Thank you.”

Auntie Grace turned to Ava. “I spoke with my niece Fan tonight. She was very excited about her day.”

“She seems to be a very intelligent young woman.”

“She was my only sister’s only child, and she is my only immediate family.”

“I understand,” Ava said softly.

Auntie Grace stared at Xu and then walked out of the kitchen.

He filled his glass half-full with whisky. “Here’s to family,” he said.

“That sounds sarcastic.”

“A day with Tsai will do that to you.”

Ava sipped her tea while he took a gulp of the alcohol. “So, what the hell happened?” she asked.

“I hardly know where to begin.”

“Is it that complicated?”

“It’s a fucking mess.” Xu ran his fingers through his hair, pressing down on his scalp. “They’re going to destroy me. They’re going to destroy everything I’ve built and everything I want to build. What’s making me crazy is that I don’t think it’s even deliberate. They just think they can do whatever they want and get away with it. I’m the one who sees the danger. But Tsai won’t listen because his father doesn’t listen and because his grandfather never had to listen. I’m dealing with three generations of people who have no idea what it’s like to be denied anything.”

Ava leaned across the table and touched the back of Xu’s hand. “Why don’t you start by telling me about the grandfather,” she said.

Xu was sipping the eighteen-year-old Macallan whisky with something close to respect.

“Tsai Da-Xia marched with Mao,” he began.

“The Long March?”

“‘The Long March of the Red Army’ is how the Party people refer to it,” Xu said. “Do you know much about it?”

“A little, but go on.”

“In 1934 the Red Army was losing to Chiang Kai-shek and the Kuomintang in the struggle for control of China. The army was in Jiangxi Province and wasn’t strong enough to take on the nationalists. So the soldiers withdrew. They retreated for more than a year, marching 9,000 kilometres. When they finally confronted Chiang, they had grown large enough and strong enough to beat him. The men who were on that march became legends. It vaulted Mao into his position. And the other senior officers all became office holders of the highest rank. Tsai Da-Xia was one of those men. He was eventually appointed to the Politburo Standing Committee.”

“Standing committee? That doesn’t sound like much of an appointment.”

“It was the second most powerful group in the country. Only the chairman was superior to them. In fact, since Chairman Deng Xiaoping died in l997, the committee has been the main seat of power. There have been no more chairmen since then.”

“So Tsai survived the Cultural Revolution, he survived Mao’s lunacies?”

“Yeah. The Tsais know how to keep their heads down.”

“How long did Tsai Da-Xia serve?”

“He died in 1984, when he was seventy-nine. He was a member of the PSC until his last breath. He was one of eight men on the committee, and five of them were associated with the Long March. Tsai was ranked third. He had responsibility for government administration and the economy.”

“How do you know all this?”

“My father and Uncle made it a point to know. We were already holding hands with some government officials and they wanted to know who we were doing business with and how they were connected further up the line. And, as they told me time and time again, there’s always someone further up the line.”

Ava poured more tea and then heard the gentle slap of slippers on tile. Auntie Grace appeared in the kitchen doorway.

“I think I’ll start your noodles,” she said. “They’ll help reduce the effect of the alcohol.”

Xu stared at her. “Do what you want. You will anyway,” he said, and looked back at Ava. “Let’s sit in the living room until the noodles are ready.”

He picked up the bottle and glass. Ava took her cup but left the pot on the table. As Xu walked past Auntie Grace, he stopped and bent down to kiss her on the forehead.

“Get going,” she said, smiling.

The living room was furnished with carved wooden benches and chairs with thin, flat seat cushions. An old tea chest doubled as a coffee table, and two corners of the room were guarded by stone lions. The walls were decorated with traditional paintings of rushing waterfalls, rice paddies, and dragons. Xu sat on one of the benches. Ava took the chair across from him and put her cup on the glass top of the tea chest.

“You said to me yesterday that Tsai Men’s father was the governor of Jiangsu,” Ava said. “Can I assume that Tsai Da-Xia had something to do with making that happen?”

“Something?” Xu said. “He had everything to do with it.”

“What’s the governor’s name?”

“Tsai Lian, and he’s what’s called a ‘princeling,’ or, as my father used to call them, ‘the entitled ones.’”

“Neither term sounds particularly positive.”

Xu shrugged. “They are the sons of the legends, and in this society, where for decades we tried to restrict the size of families, those sons were the most precious things imaginable. So they were pampered as children, given the best education possible as teenagers and young adults, and then immediately put into government positions. All the while, they were being guided by fathers who had the power to make sure they succeeded. Tsai Lian wasn’t unique. I know of at least seven other sons of men who were on the PSC who today are running various parts of China. They’re the closest thing we have to royalty. They certainly feel and act like they’re part of a dynasty.”

“How did he become governor?”

“He was appointed, like every governor in China, except he was given one of the largest and wealthiest provinces. There are eighty million people living in Jiangsu, and it has one of the highest per capita incomes among all of the provinces in the country.”

“His father appointed him?”

“No, he was appointed by a committee in Beijing, but every member of the committee knew who his father was. And every member knew that sooner or later he might need Tsai Da-Xia’s influence.”

“
Guanxi
.”

“Now and forever. The Communists have turned it into an art form.”

“How old was he when he was appointed?”

“Forty.”

“And he’s been in that position ever since?”

“He has, and so has the Communist Party secretary for the province. That’s where Da-Xia was smarter than some of his colleagues.”

“Why?”

“The secretary has, in theory, as much if not more power than the governor. Da-Xia arranged to have a nephew appointed. The nephew isn’t an idiot, but he isn’t nearly as smart or as tough as Tsai Lian, and Da-Xia let Tsai Lian call the shots. It’s been that way for what seems like an eternity. Other governors and party secretaries come and go, but in Jiangsu the Tsai family rules the province.”

“So why has it become so difficult all of a sudden?” Ava said. “From what I’m hearing, your father must have made some kind of arrangement with them.”

“He did, and it lasted for years, but Tsai Men has decided he’s going to change the way things are done, and his father is either letting it happen or is directing it. I’m not sure which. And it doesn’t matter — the end result is the same.”

“Do they really have that much power?”

“Yes,” Xu said, reaching for his bottle of whisky.

Ava had emptied her teacup. Now she held it towards him. He half filled her cup and raised his glass. “To the Tsais.”

“It sounds like you’ve given in to them.”

“I haven’t. Not yet, anyway.”

“So what do they want?”

“Let’s back up for a moment,” Xu said. “I want you to understand how this has played out.”

Ava nodded.

“When all my father ran were illegal activities — the underground gambling and prostitution and drug-dealing businesses — he didn’t have to bother that much with the provincial government. Although he obviously knew who the Tsais were, it was enough that he paid off the Shanghai police and the mayor and his family. But when he started to move into production of knock-off designer clothes and the like, he had to move outside Shanghai to find land where he could build a factory. Jiangsu is Shanghai’s immediate neighbour, and going there made sense. But the moment he did that, he ran into the Tsai family. He discovered that he wasn’t going to get any land unless they approved the sale and transfer, and he wasn’t going to build a factory unless they gave him the permit.

“The government in Beijing may control the military and foreign affairs and set the macroeconomic policies for the country, but it’s the provinces that manage things like education, health, social security, and welfare. Those all require money, of course, and the provinces have the right to generate their own tax and revenue streams. They can also pass their own laws and regulations as long as they don’t conflict with national laws. Since Beijing doesn’t care about things like land rights, building permits, and tenders, those are left to the provinces as well. A lot of it is small stuff, but it all adds up.”

“And the Tsais had their fingers in everything?”

“Of course. At first we paid for actual services rendered, like getting the rights to a piece of land and a building permit. Then they decided they wanted regular cash flow and demanded monthly payments from ongoing operations. My father gave ground grudgingly, but when all was said and done, he eventually didn’t have any choice except to concede.”

“How were they paid?”

“For years the money went through underground remittance shops in Hong Kong, and then they started using VIP junket operators in Macau to clean money. They finally opened some offshore accounts, but when two senior officials in other provinces were discovered to have bank accounts in Europe that had hundreds of millions of dollars in them, all hell broke loose. They were arrested, tried, and executed within a month. I don’t know what the Tsais did with their offshore accounts, but we were told to stop sending money to them. Instead we found ourselves paying management and consultant fees to various companies.”

“Did those companies do anything to earn the money?”

“No.”

“How many are directly owned by the family?”

“The Governor owns nothing that we know of and has no formal association with any of them. Tsai Men is the managing director of one firm. We also send money to a company operated by a woman who is Men’s sister. Then from time to time we’re asked to pay a consulting fee to a third firm, run by a Hu Chi, who I was told is the sister’s husband. So any way you look at it, all the money flows to someone who is a Tsai or related to the family. And you can be sure, one hundred percent sure, that the old man knows and ultimately controls everything.”

“They aren’t concerned about receiving money from your organization?”

“The payments come from our factories. They actually invoice them.”

“Does Tsai Men have an official government position?”

“No, he’s just an ordinary businessman whose father happens to be governor and whose cousin is party secretary for the province.”

“How much have you been paying these companies?”

“When the monthly payments started, it was about half a million renminbi — about one hundred thousand U.S. dollars. It just keeps growing, and it seems like every month there’s a new fee for something or other. And then those fees are always increased whenever we open a plant.”

“And of course they would know when you expand.”

“They issue the permits and the licences, so they sure as hell do know. Tsai says he likes to think of us as partners.”

“And you don’t?”

“They’re leeches.”

“How much do you pay them every month now?”

“In total, about five hundred thousand U.S. dollars.”

“Is that the problem?”

“The monthly amount isn’t the issue. As long as they provide us with services, protection, and a stable environment in which we can grow our business, they’re worth the money.”

“So what’s changed?”

Xu reached for the whisky bottle and this time filled his glass. He took several sips and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

“They want us to build a new factory,” he said.

“Is that what was being discussed in Nanjing?”

“Yes. They started talking to us about a month ago. They approached Feng first. He’s my administrator. Their proposal worried him. He didn’t like the idea that they were telling us what businesses we should be in. He said if we gave in to that, then next they’d be telling us how to run them. He sees it as a matter of principle.”

“He has a point.”

“Yeah, except arguing principles with the Tsais is a total waste of breath,” Xu said. “When Feng came to me with their proposal, I met with Tsai Men. I told him right away and as bluntly as I could that I wasn’t interested. He insisted. We reached an impasse. His trip to Shanghai was another attempt to resolve the matter, and we couldn’t. That’s why I went to Nanjing today. I met with him and his father. It’s only the second time in the past ten years that I’ve seen or spoken to the Governor. The other time was at my father’s funeral.”

“He stays that much in the background?”

“He acts like he’s invisible.”

“But he met with you yesterday?”

“Yes, at the home of an elderly relative of his. They took me in through the back door.”

“I can understand why he thinks he has to be discreet,” Ava said. “What was important enough for him to meet with you?”

“He wanted to tell me how pleased he was about the number of jobs we’d created in Jiangsu, and he hoped that I would continue to work with Men to bring more jobs and prosperity to the province. Then he spent ten minutes drinking tea with me and reminiscing about my father.”

“That was all?”

“That was enough. What he had to say didn’t matter. The message was in the fact that he had bothered to meet with me at all. After he left, Men told me that I was being stubborn and stupid by refusing to build the plant. He told me that I had insulted his father and that the decision was no longer mine to make. They had selected the land and lined up the people we needed to operate the plant, and he was going to have a permit issued to one of my companies. Because I was being difficult, they’d also decided to partner with me. It would be a fifty-fifty arrangement. They’d be silent partners, of course. He said I should be pleased with the security that their involvement guaranteed. He gave me three months to get started.”

“And if you don’t meet that deadline?”

“He didn’t say. He knew he didn’t have to.”

“What kind of plant is it?”

Xu took another sip of whisky, his eyes wandering away from Ava. She turned and saw Auntie Grace.

“Your noodles are ready,” she said.

“I’ll be right there,” Xu replied.

“What kind of plant?” Ava asked again as they got up from their seats.

“The Tsais are determined to get me back into the drug business.”