Operation Barracuda

Hendricks lives in the Mid-Levels, halfway up Victoria Peak. The Peak is the place to live in Hong Kong, especially when the British were here. The higher up you go, the more expensive the real estate. The Mid-Levels is the equivalent of upper-middle-class to lower-upper-class neighborhoods, if that makes any sense. It’s still damned expensive.

I take a taxi to his home, a detached dwelling next to a block of apartments off of Conduit Road. When he answers the door, I’m surprised by how young he looks. Hendricks is supposed to be sixty-one but he appears to be forty-five.

“Sam Fisher,” he says. He holds out his hand. “Mason Hendricks.”

I shake it, evaluating his firm grip. This is a man of strength. “Glad to meet you after all these years.”

“Likewise. Please come in.”

The inside of his home is tastefully decorated in a mixture of Western and Eastern styles. The British influence is definitely present but the Asian flavoring tends to dominate. For example, there’s a very large Buddha in the room, something you notice when you first walk in. The smell of burning incense fills the place. Next to it is a shelf containing a collection of ships in bottles — and they’re all British warships from the classic eighteenth-century period.

“Forgive the incense,” Hendricks says. “I’m afraid I’ve grown to like it after forty-some-odd years in Hong Kong.”

“Doesn’t bother me,” I say.

Hendricks is dressed in a simple beige tunic and loose-fitting matching trousers. He’d be at home in any beach house.

“I know what you’re thinking,” he says. “I look younger than I’m supposed to be.”

“As a matter of fact,” I reply, “you don’t look fifty. But you’re sixty-something, right?”

“Sixty-two next month. It’s the clean living that does it. And of course, a stress-free lifestyle. I admit to having a little plastic surgery, I dye my hair, and I never eat fatty foods. My health improved immeasurably after I retired from the CIA. I also finally found time for a love life. I’ve had so many Chinese girlfriends in the last ten years that it puts my college years to shame. That will certainly keep you young! And that’s another reason why I take care of myself. Anyway, everything I do these days for our precious government is simply for the fun of it or because it interests me. I’m happy to help out the NSA. I hope I can give you some useful information. How about a drink?”

I shrug. “Sure.”

“I’m having scotch. What will you have?”

“Just fruit juice if you have it.”

He goes straight to the bar on the opposite side of the room from the Buddha and fixes a couple of glasses. I take the moment to browse his bookshelf, which is full of historical military reference books and suspense novels. When he brings my glass of juice — apricot — he clicks it and says, “Cheers.”

“Thank you. Cheers.”

Hendricks leads the way through a sliding glass door to a terrace that overlooks the skyline. “I wish I were higher up. I bought this place twenty-five years ago for a song. I could probably make a fortune if I sold it. Or if it accidentally burned down, the insurance would make me a rich man.” He laughs. “Then maybe I could buy a place farther up the Peak. The view’s much better. That’s where all the hoity-toity live.”

“I think it’s a very nice place, Mr. Hendricks.”

“Oh, please, call me Mason.”

“All right.”

We sit on deck chairs and enjoy a slight breeze. In serious contrast to the weather in Maryland, it’s quite warm on the island. I don’t think I’ve ever been to Hong Kong when it wasn’t.

“Did my equipment arrive safely?” I ask.

“It did indeed. I have it in one of the bedrooms. But please, let’s relax and talk out here a while. Where are you staying?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’d offer you my spare bedroom but I tend to have female company at night. I hope you understand.”

I smile at him. “Whatever rocks your boat. I’ll find a place. I’m not picky. I may stay in Kowloon. There are inexpensive hotels I know there.”

“Suit yourself.”

We sit for a moment in silence. Finally I bring up the mission at hand. “Mason, what can you tell me about this Professor Jeinsen?” Hendricks relates what I already know — that Jeinsen was shot in the head, wrapped in burlap, tied to the Promenade in Kowloon, and left to float in the water until he was found. An Interpol bulletin on the missing physicist was what did the trick in helping the police to identify him. Once the corpse was ID’d, the U.S. government was notified.

“The interesting thing here is that Professor Jeinsen wasn’t murdered,” Hendricks says. “He was executed.”

“By whom?”

“I’d say it was a Triad killing.”

I nod with understanding. The Triads are the Chinese equivalent of our Mafia, the Japanese Yakuza, the Russian Mafiya, and other organized crime outfits. They’ve been around for centuries, originally formed to help oust the Ch’ing dynasty and reinstate the Ming. It was during the twentieth century that they became criminally oriented. As secret societies, they pride themselves on being patriotic and nationalist. Violently opposed to the Communists, the Triads primarily settled in British Hong Kong and Portuguese Macau. Eventually they spread around the globe to other Chinese communities. I know for a fact that Triads operate in the Chinatowns of big American cities. They traffic in drugs, weapons, prostitution, and slavery, as well as operate protection rackets and gambling parlors. The Triads are fiercely anti-Western and their rites and meetings are sacred, usually never witnessed by non- Asians.

“I believe we’re also dealing with a very specific Triad,” Hendricks continues. “Most Triads use knives, hatchets, machetes — blades — to do their killing. Jeinsen was shot in the back of the head, gangland style. Like the Mafia does it. There’s one Triad known to use that particular method of execution in Hong Kong. They’re called the Lucky Dragons.”

“I don’t know them.”

“They’re not the biggest Triad by any means. The Dragons are awfully small when you compare them to, say, the 14K or Bamboo Union. But they’ve been around as long as I can remember. They’re based in Hong Kong but I know they have extensive branches reaching into mainland China.”

“But Triads are notoriously anti-Communist,” I say.

“They are. And so are the Lucky Dragons. But I’m fairly confident they have some pull with certain government officials. Ever since the handover, it was expected that the Chinese government would crack down hard on Triads because of their widespread ideology against Communism. It hasn’t happened. The Triads are just as powerful now as they were under British rule. Sure, it’s still illegal to be a member of a Triad and all that, and the police make arrests all the time. It’s just one of those things, like the Yakuza in Japan. They’ll always be with us.”

“What’s the leadership like?”

“A fellow named Jon Ming is the leader. The Cho Kun, the Dragon Head. He’s, I don’t know, forty-eight or so. About your age I think. He became Cho Kun about fifteen years ago after a bloody coup within their organization. Ming is a wealthy gangster that lives on a plantation-style estate in northern Kowloon, just below the border of the New Territories. Actually, he acts more like a Yakuza than a Triad. He flaunts his wealth and power in public the way the Japanese gangsters do. That’s not the norm for Chinese Triads. Here you can be arrested for just acting like a Triad, yet he seems to steer clear of legal trouble. That’s why I think he’s got some politicians in his pocket.”

“Where can I find this Jon Ming?”

“He runs a fancy nightclub in Kowloon. The Purple Queen. It’s one of those hostess clubs, the kind that cost you a fortune to sit and talk with a beautiful girl. Sometimes you can get her to go home with you, which will cost you even more.” Hendricks rattles the ice in his glass. “I guess you can say that’s how I came to know some of my girlfriends. I do frequent the hostess clubs a lot. The Purple Queen, too. I can’t take you there, though. You’ll have