He meets Edward Tung Lee at Ah Sing’s Bar amp; Grill on Pell Street.
He sees Lee and Chen Chang Wang in deep conversation.
Wang gets blown away and is later revealed to be an officer in the Giant Panda organization.
During the excitement, Edward Lee notices that Timothy Cone carries a shooter in an ankle holster.
When the Giant Panda soldiers pick Cone up, the first thing they do is dust him down for an ankle holster. It was no normal frisk; the alpaca jackets went directly to his shins.
Ergo: Edward Tung Lee is a member of, or working closely with, the Giant Panda mob and tipped them off that Cone was carrying on his leg bone.
So, if Edward Lee is buddy-buddy with the Giant Pandas, those phone calls he received must have come from someone else. The United Bamboo gang maybe? And are they also responsible for the letter to Claire Lee? United Bamboo owned the San Francisco kip where she worked, and could easily have taken the photographs.
Musing on all these permutations and combinations, Cone lights his first cigarette of the morning, coughs, and wanders over to his desk to consult the White Lotus shareholder list. He’s curious about how many shares are owned by Henry Wu Yeh, the pooh-bah of the Giant Pandas.
No list. He can’t find it. He searches, even in such unlikely places as the cabinet under the kitchen sink. No list. He gets down on hands and knees and peers beneath the claw-footed bathtub, thinking Cleo might have dragged it there. No list. The White Lotus annual report is still on his desk, but that confidential record of shareowners has disappeared.
He inspects the locks on the loft door. No signs of a break-in. But that doesn’t mean shit. A good picklock could open almost any door and never leave a trace. And no use wondering when it was done. Last night or yesterday afternoon while Cone was at work. Whenever, the White Lotus shareholder list has been snaffled.
Cone glares accusingly at Cleo.
“What a lousy attack cat you turned out to be,” he says to the beast. “What’d the gonnif do-toss you a fish head? You fink!”
He’s in his office in a sour mood and telling himself he’s got a lot to be sour about.
That missing list bothers him, mostly because he promised Chin Tung Lee he’d take good care of it. It would be easy to assume it had been glommed by the Giant Pandas while they had him in custody, but that just won’t wash. If Edward Lee is snuggling up to the Pandas-and Cone believes he is-he could easily provide a shareholder list anytime it was wanted.
That probably means the guy who burgled the loft was a paid-up member in good standing with the United Bamboo mob. But what would that gang of cutthroats want with a list of White Lotus investors? Unless they were going to put the company into play.
Three days, he reflects: that’s how long he’s got before he faces the long knives. The prospect of his immediate demise doesn’t dismay him as much as fears for Cleo’s future without him. He wonders if he should leave Samantha Whatley a letter, willing the cat to her. Unless, of course, when he is knocked off, Cleo is also sent to the great litter box in the sky.
Engrossed with these morose musings, he suddenly becomes aware that his phone is ringing. He picks up, wondering if it’s Mr. Yeh, calling to remind him that the clock is ticking.
“Yeah?” he says.
“Mr. Cone? This is Claire Lee. I’m calling from home. My husband is with me and would like to see you as soon as possible.”
She sounds breathless. Maybe distraught.
“At your Fifth Avenue apartment?” he asks.
“Yes. Please. As quickly as you can, Mr. Cone.”
“Okay,” he says, “I’ll be there.”
He has no idea what it’s all about, but figures that maybe it would be smart if he had wheels. So he grabs a cab back to his neighborhood, reclaims the red Ford Escort from a parking lot on Wooster Street, and heads for the Lees’ Fifth Avenue apartment.
Finding a parking space in that area is like the search for the Holy Grail. Finally Cone gives up, double-parks on East 68th Street, and locks up. If the Escort is towed, so be it; the client will pay the ransom to get it out of hock.
Claire meets him at the door of the apartment. She looks yummy in a white linen jumpsuit with an alligator belt. But her face is drawn, and when she clasps Cone’s hand in both of hers, her skin feels moist and clammy.
She draws him into the apartment, closes and bolts the door, then turns to face him. He wonders if she’s been weeping; her eyes are lost in puffy bags. She leans close, and he catches a whiff of 80-proof something.
“My husband is ill,” she says in a low voice. “Maybe not ill, but very upset. Troubled.”
“Sorry to hear that,” Cone says. “What’s he troubled about?”
“You better hear it from him.”
She leads the way through a maze of hallways, corridors, empty rooms, up two steps, down two steps, until they finally reach what is apparently the master bedroom.
It is a huge, high-ceilinged chamber dominated by an enormous oak four-poster that could sleep the Celtics, spoon-fashion. And there are armoires, dressers, escritoires, cabinets, chests, cupboards, etageres-all in dark, distressed woods, looking as if an entire Scottish castle had been denuded to furnish this one melancholy room.
In the center of the immense bed is Mr. Chin Tung Lee, shrunken under a sheet and light blanket drawn up to his scrawny neck. His complexion is tallowy and his eyes are dimmed. Even his little beard seems limp. He withdraws a hand from beneath the covers and offers it to Timothy. The skin is parchment, the bones as thin and frail as a chicken’s wing.
“Thank you so much for coming,” he says in a wispy voice. “Please, pull up a chair.”
Cone wrestles one as heavy as a throne to the bedside and sits, leaning forward.
“Sorry you’re feeling under the weather, Mr. Lee. Is there anything I can do?”
Claire Lee is standing on the other side of the bed, opposite Cone. Her husband turns his head slowly in her direction.
“The first letter, dear,” he says, and there’s no vigor in his voice. “Please show it to Mr. Cone.”
She plucks a single sheet of paper from a bedside table and brings it around to him. It’s heavy stationery, thrice folded. The letterhead is embossed. Cone scans it, then looks up at Chin Tung Lee.
“Yangtze International, Limited,” he says. “On Pine Street. Never heard of them. Have you?”
“Oh, yes, I’ve heard of them. My countrymen.” Then, bitterly: “I understand criminal elements are involved.”
“Uh-huh,” Cone says, and reads the letter. It’s in polite legalese, but the meaning is clear. Yangtze International has accumulated 16 percent of all White Lotus stock, with the pledge of proxies by “many other shareholders” and requests a personal meeting with Mr. Chin Tung Lee with a view toward “proper representation” on the Board of Directors.
Cone reads it twice, then folds it and taps the letter on his knee.
“I checked with the SEC early this week,” he says. “No one has filed a 13-D notifying an investment in White Lotus of five percent or more and declaring intent. But that doesn’t necessarily mean anything; there’s a ten-day delay allowed.”
“But what does it
“You know what it means,” Cone says harshly. “They’re making a run on your company. Now we know why the stock has been going up, up, up.”
“I’ll never sell out,” the old man wails. “Never!”
“You won’t have to,” Cone says, “if you play your cards right. You’ve got options. You can pay them greenmail-more than the market value of the stock-and buy
“No. I’ve never had the need for one.”
