Zero Minus Ten

citizen and a Chinese warlord, James Thackeray was allowed to continue his lucrative opium trade and Li Wei Tam was able to perpetuate his comfortable, horizontal life on an opium bed. I suppose you know what happened in 1842?”

Bond answered, “The war had ended, and Hong Kong Island was ceded to the British.”

“Yes. The ban on opium still existed, however. The Chinese government, as a result of what they viewed as an unfair and unequal Treaty, made trade an even more challenging endeavour despite the fact that the Treaty had guaranteed Britain’s right to trade openly and freely.”

Bond added, “In China’s view, the ceding of Hong Kong Island was a humiliating experience and was never wholly forgotten nor forgiven.”

“You are an intelligent man, Mr. Bond,” Li said. “I can almost forget you are a gweilo. Shall I continue?”

“Please do.”

“While companies like Jardine Matheson were allowed to build headquarters on Hong Kong Island, James Thackeray still found himself dealing independently and without any established, legal structure from which to conduct business. He, too, needed a legitimate enterprise that he could call his own. Even though he had made what some men might call a fortune over the last few years, Thackeray needed more capital. It was Li Wei Tam who came to his rescue. One night in 1850, over an exquisite meal, a tremendous amount of rice wine, and quite a bit of opium smoke, a deal was struck that would have repercussions for both men’s descendants. My honourable ancestor offered to “loan” Thackeray the much-needed capital to start his own trading company. Thackeray, who was basically an honest man, was flabbergasted. He said he would accept the money only on condition that they made a provision by which Li could be repaid.

“My great-great-grandfather was drunk and high from the amount of wine and drugs consumed that night, and thought whimsically about Thackeray’s request. For the sake of xinyong, a term that means ‘trust’ in our language, Li Wei Tam attempted to think of a ridiculous demand, which Thackeray could never fulfil, as a gesture of his own generosity. After all, his primary motivation was the continuing supply of opium. James Thackeray was his friend, and Li Wei Tam hadn’t many friends—Chinese or otherwise.

“The ceding of Hong Kong happened to be a much-discussed and extremely controversial topic in southern China at the time. The Treaty signed at Nanking had provided that Hong Kong be handed over to the British in ‘perpetuity.’ ”

Bond added, “There were even British citizens who thought the Treaty was absurd.”

“Yes. At that time, no one could predict that it would one day be the Manhattan of the Far East. Therefore, with a sly grin, my great-great-grandfather told his friend, “Mr. Thackeray, you may have the money for your company on one condition. You must sign an agreement with me. Should Hong Kong ever come under Chinese rule again, then your assets in the company shall be handed over to me. It would then become my company.”

“Thackeray, who believed that Hong Kong would never leave British rule, laughed and agreed. The two men drew up official legal documents. James Thackeray signed them, and Li Wei Tam applied his chop, our official family seal, alongside the signature. It was maijiang of the highest order. Thus, EurAsia Enterprises was born.”

My God, Bond thought, the roots of this whole mess went back a century and a half!

Li continued. “Opium was legalized in 1856 as the Second Opium War began, and during the following years James Thackeray became one of Hong Kong’s wealthiest men. EurAsia Enterprises flourished, and even London recognized his and the company’s importance. The Kowloon peninsula was ceded to Britain in 1860, and finally, in 1898, the New Territories was leased to Britain for ninety-nine years. Little did anyone know at the time that this last Treaty, signed at the Second Convention of Peking, would have a direct effect on Hong Kong Island and Kowloon as well.”

“What happened to Thackeray and your great-great-grandfather?” Bond asked.

“James Thackeray died in 1871. His son Richard took over EurAsia Enterprises and continued to trade opium to Li Wei Tam, who had reached a ripe old age. The company expanded, opening branches all over the world. My great-great-grandfather finally succumbed to the gods in 1877, and the partnership between the Thackeray family and the Li family ended. My great-grandfather, Li’s only son, never approved of his father’s addiction to opium, nor of the gweilo who sold it to him. He did, however, make sure that the agreement signed by the elder Thackeray and his father remained intact and safe. Perhaps someday it would come in useful.”

Li stood and refilled Bond’s glass, then resumed his place in the leather armchair to continue the story. “Now the tale gets a little complicated,” he said with a smile. “To cut a long story short, in 1911 civil war broke out in China. You may know that an ambitious, Western-educated revolutionary named Dr. Sun Yat-sen initiated a rebellion dedicated to establishing a republican government in China. He succeeded; by 1912, the Ch’ing Dynasty was no more.”

Bond was quite familiar with China’s tortured twentieth-century history, but he allowed Li to tell it in his own words.

“It was a period of great turmoil. During a skirmish in Guangzhou, my great-grandfather was killed, leaving his son Li Pei Wu, my grandfather, to look after the family fortune. Unfortunately, the republican government was extremely unstable; between 1912 and 1949 there were times when it didn’t exist at all and the country was a …” again he searched for the right word, and finally said in English “… a free-for-all!” Li smiled at his choice of phrase.

Bond continued the history lesson. “As for Sun Yat-sen, he formed the Kuomintang party in an attempt to limit the republicans’ power. The government outlawed the Kuomintang and Sun Yat-sen was forced into exile.”

“You are well informed, Mr. Bond,” Li said. “Ambitious warlords vied for leadership for more than a decade. In 1921, the Communists organized in Shanghai, with Mao Zedong among their original members. They made bids for power in the turbulent country, and in 1923, Sun Yat-sen agreed to admit them to Kuomintang membership. But after Sun’s death in 1925, the young general Chiang Kai-shek took over the leadership of the Kuomintang and set about reunifying China under its rule, ridding the country of imperialists and warlords, and exercising a bloody purge of the party’s Communist membership.”

Bond wondered what all this had to do with Li’s family. In answer to his thought, Li said, “My grandfather’s family got caught up in the maelstrom that ravaged China during this period of unrest. The family fortune was lost to the Communists in 1926, and my grandfather was murdered for having “secret society” connections. My grandmother and her two young children became refugees and fled across the border into Kowloon. The eldest of the children was a boy of seven, named Li Chen Tam.”

“Your father?”

Li nodded. “The Communists had seized all of my family’s property, amongst which was the ancient document signed by James Thackeray and my great-great-grandfather, Li Wei Tam. The document was considered lost for all time. I’ve already told you a little about my father. Li Chen Tam fell into the hard life in which many Hong Kong Chinese refugees found themselves during the years between the two World Wars. He supported his mother and baby sister by selling food on the street. When he became a teenager, he made the acquaintance of several other young Chinese boys who belonged to a fraternal organization. They offered to help him financially and protect his family. In exchange, he had to pledge allegiance, as well as secrecy, to their organization. This organization was the San Yee On, which you know as one of the largest and most powerful Triads in Southeast Asia.

“My father rose rapidly through the ranks, especially after entering the lucrative entertainment business in the 1950s. Along the way, like so many of the Triad leaders at the time, he made a few enemies even within his own organization. In the early 1960s, when he was approaching fifty, my father broke off from the San Yee On and formed his own Triad, the Dragon Wing Society.

“He was quite aware of his great-grandfather’s agreement with EurAsia Enterprises but was unable to do anything about it. So, my father concocted an underhanded scheme to get his own back. By putting the squeeze on EurAsia’s shipping department heads, the Dragon Wing Society infiltrated the company’s inner workings. Nothing was shipped out of Hong Kong without the Triad’s intervention. Things came to a head, and eventually news of the squeeze went all the way to the top of the company.”

“Who must have been, let’s see … James Thackeray’s greatgrandson?” Bond asked.

“Correct. Thomas Thackeray, then the current taipan of EurAsia Enterprises, and