to start,” she said.
“The man from Harrington’s — go and see him. See if he can point you in some direction. I’ll give you everything I have on the art dealer Kwong, his business, his family, his friends. Just spend a few days in Hong Kong and then decide. Do that for me. Just that.”
Ava sighed. “Okay, I’ll tell you what: I will go to Hong Kong. But that doesn’t mean I’m taking the job.”
“I’ll pay you anyway.”
“No, I don’t want anything from you unless we have an actual agreement in place. If I decide to take this job, then you can work out the financial details with Uncle.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
“You can’t say anything to your husband.”
“I won’t.”
“And I’m not making any promises past Hong Kong.”
“I understand.”
“I shouldn’t be doing this,” Ava said softly. “You should know that I’m not hopeful.”
May Ling touched Ava’s hand. “My husband was the one who insisted on calling Uncle. When I found out, I was nervous. Uncle hasn’t lived in Wuhan for many years, but people here know all about him. They take pride in a hometown boy doing well, even if his chosen profession doesn’t always sit well with the authorities. I made some phone calls and was told that he had retired from the old business to start a new one, and that there was a young woman working with him whom he admired, a young woman who had special talents. So I told my husband he could invite Uncle here only if you came with him.”
Ava nodded.
“They told me you were extraordinarily pretty. I admit I was surprised when I saw you, so plainly dressed, hardly any makeup, simple hair. Not what I expected, but very pretty all the same. When my husband saw you, he said that you reminded him of me when I was younger. I know he meant it as compliment, but no woman likes to be told that she’s aged.”
“Auntie, you’re beautiful and very elegant.”
“Stop calling me Auntie. It really does make me feel old.”
“What should I call you?”
“May.”
“May, you are very beautiful and very elegant.”
She shrugged as if it was something she had heard countless times. “Ava, I would give up everything — everything — if I thought I could undo the harm that has been caused my husband.”
(7)
Ava had difficulty getting back to sleep after May Ling left. Changing her mind wasn’t something she did often, and she couldn’t help but feel she had been manipulated at some level. The woman was shrewd, coming to Ava in the middle of the night to share confidences, appealing to her as a woman living in a man’s world. Well, what’s done is done, Ava thought. She had given her word and she would honour it. She’d spend two days in Hong Kong, and if nothing came of it she’d move on.
Uncle was an early riser, and the door to his room was open when Ava went to see him.
“Wong Changxing was here an hour ago,” Uncle said. “I told him that we are not going to take the job. Tam is outside waiting to take us to the airport.”
“May Ling came to my room last night,” Ava said.
Uncle looked surprised, an infrequent reaction.
“She begged me to talk to some people in Hong Kong. I said I would.”
“You want to take the job?”
“No, I would never agree to anything like that without talking to you first. I just said I would do some investigating for a couple of days, no commitment beyond that. She was very persistent. It was hard to turn her down.”
“Wong did not mention this to me.”
“He doesn’t know, and that’s part of the arrangement. I don’t want him to know; I only want to talk to May Ling. Uncle, if after Hong Kong I think there is something in this, some way to recover money, then you can negotiate our fee with her.”
“Are you sure she won’t tell him?”
“If she does, I’m gone. I refuse to be a party to some triad vigilante action.” She regretted the words the moment she had said them.
“He was emotional,” Uncle said.
“Still truthful, I think,” she said.
“Perhaps.”
“Uncle, I didn’t mean to imply — ”
“No bother,” he said.
They rode the elevator to the ground floor, bags in hand. Ava was dying for a coffee but was even more eager to get away from the Wongs. There was no sign of either of them, just staff scurrying back and forth. “Is the mistress here?” Ava asked one of the servers.
“No, but she left this for you,” he said, handing her a large brown envelope.
She opened it. Three pages of notes, names, phone numbers, a cheque for fifty thousand dollars, and May Ling’s business card. On the back she had written her mobile number, her direct business line, and her private email. The word private was underlined. So were the words Thank you. Love, May.
She handed the cheque to Uncle, and everything else went into her Double Happiness computer bag.
They caught a Dragonair flight back to Hong Kong. Uncle returned to his racing form while Ava pulled May Ling’s papers and her Moleskine notebook from her bag. She scanned the documentation. Every painting they had bought was listed, along with the date and price and its supposed origins. The ones that the appraiser thought were genuine were marked with a black asterisk, fakes with a red one, and those in doubt with blue. Many of them had been plucked from private collections, others from galleries, none acquired at auction. That should have raised some questions, Ava thought. She did some quick math. The Wongs had spent more than a hundred million dollars on their collection, the Monet the most expensive, at fifteen million.
The appraiser they had worked with at Harrington’s was Brian Torrence. May Ling had included his cellphone and office number. The office was on the Hong Kong side, in the Langley Tower on Queen’s Road Central. That made her hotel choice easy.
Kwong’s business was called Great Wall Antiques and Fine Art. He had been the sole owner and the business had been shuttered when he died. His brother had inherited everything. He had sold off the inventory, shredded the records, and made Great Wall history. That doesn’t mean there aren’t records somewhere, she thought. The Hong Kong Department of Inland Revenue would certainly have tax returns.
The flight was uneventful, and Uncle and Ava breezed through Hong Kong Immigration. She called the Mandarin Oriental Hotel as they were walking out of the arrivals hall to meet Sonny, booking a room for three nights. As she did she saw Uncle glancing sideways at her.
“I have been thinking you need to be careful with this woman,” he said.
“A couple of days, that’s all. If I don’t find anything, then that’s it.”
“She will have expectations.”
“I made no promises.”
“You know how selective some people’s memories are. I do not want you to be the subject of recriminations.”
“I’ll be careful what I say.”
“I would be happier if her husband knew,” he said.
“Let me try it my way for a few days. That’s all — a few days.”
She knew Uncle wasn’t arguing with her and that he wasn’t about to tell her to change her decision. He just
