Chapter 24#

“The common saying is that Guanyin has thirty-three manifestations. The Virtuous King Guanyin is considered supremely virtuous — symbolizing both blessings and prosperity — though the emphasis tends to be on guiding descendants toward success in their careers and official advancement. Since this is a birthday gift for an elder in the family, a better choice might be the Medicine-Giving Guanyin, also called the Joy-Bestowing Guanyin — the name carries the meaning of ‘granting joy to all sentient beings,’ with protective power for the health and longevity of the elderly, a wish that good health may last as long as the southern mountains. It conveys a child’s devotion more fittingly…”

Yan Zishu spoke at his ease, eyes lowered, unhurried and fluent. Without his glasses, he bore a distinct resemblance to the Water-Moon Guanyin — that most luminous and refined of the manifestations. The sales associate thought herself fortunate: an unexpectedly handsome visitor had descended from nowhere, and it was worth her while to look a little longer.

Li Chang’an, standing to one side, was a man of resolutely conventional tastes and could not particularly appreciate the view.

Running into these two at a jewelry store struck him as peculiar and thoroughly aggravating.

“My goodness, Chang’an — these young colleagues of yours, such a good-looking young man, and he even knows all of this.” The woman laughed behind her hand, her skin beautifully maintained. “What can I do — Mother-in-law is turning eighty, she’s believed in Buddhism her whole life, and I had no idea there were all these distinctions. To me they all look the same — Guanyin is Guanyin. If that’s how it is, I’ll just take this one.”

Ben genuinely couldn’t work out what Yan Zishu was up to, coming to a jewelry store and helping a couple select a Guanyin statue. But he understood one thing: his only job right now was to play his supporting role and fill out the atmosphere.

“Mrs. Li, you’re so young yourself — why are you speaking like someone three generations older?” Ben chimed in attentively.

“Not at all — I’m well into my thirties, I can’t very well still talk like a young girl.” The woman waved this off with gracious composure.

“That can’t be right. When I first saw you just now I guessed twenty-eight or twenty-nine at the most — I was just thinking what a lucky man Director Li must be.” Ben paid out compliments as freely as though they cost nothing. “Married to someone so young and beautiful. I only knew he was married; today I’ve finally had the pleasure of meeting you.”

“Now you’re just being ridiculous — you’ll make me blush. Honestly, it’s not as though I—ha ha ha.”

Every woman receiving this kind of flattery, real or invented, tends toward good humor. The woman’s face lit up with warm pleasure, smiling throughout.

Ben didn’t recognize this woman, but her identity wasn’t difficult to deduce: expensively dressed, mature elegance, somewhere between thirty and forty, and the man beside her wearing the unmistakable expression of a husband enduring a shopping trip with the patience of someone counting the seconds — the legitimate Mrs. Li, without question.

Yan Zishu ignored Li Chang’an’s look that clearly said have you both lost your minds, and devoted himself to accompanying Mrs. Li from conversation about birthday gifts to jewelry to luxury goods in general.

Li Chang’an barely stifled his yawns, dark circles visible, making several attempts to usher them out. His wife, however, found chatting with a handsome man very agreeable and wasn’t in any hurry.

Then Yan Zishu shifted course without warning: “Everyone loves shopping in Hong Kong City, but honestly, if you ask me, Macao City is better.”

“Oh? How so?” Mrs. Li asked, smiling.

“Compared to Hong Kong City, which gets absolutely overrun with people, Macao City has a Vuitton, a Gucci, a Chanel in practically every five-star hotel — almost any brand you want is there, and the crowds are significantly thinner. The shopping experience is just better overall.” Yan Zishu said. “And since Macao’s casino industry is thriving, if you’re staying at one of the hotels you can have a little flutter while you’re at it — what does Hong Kong really have to offer in comparison?”

“That’s true, really. I’ve been to Hong Kong City too many times already — next season I’ll get a group together and go to Macao.” Mrs. Li nodded. “Though the gambling isn’t for me. I’ve always kept away from that. Everyone says nine out of ten end up losing.”

“You’re clearly the level-headed type.” Yan Zishu said. “Some people tell themselves it’s just a bit of harmless fun — a small bet here and there, nothing serious.”

“Well, I wouldn’t put it quite that way either — it’s just that our family has quite a few people in public service.” Mrs. Li said. “In families like ours, you have to be careful about your image. If someone photographed you anywhere near anything involving scandal or gambling, the repercussions would be very damaging.”

“You’re absolutely right — steering clear is always the wisest approach. These days anything can be posted online and spiral out of control. I’ve actually met quite wealthy businessmen who tell themselves it’s just for entertainment, then end up gambling their entire fortune away. By the time they regret it, it’s already too late. Gambling really does ruin people.”

Li Chang’an’s expression had been stiffening by degrees.

He turned to his wife firmly. “I think we’ve chatted enough — shouldn’t we be going? Didn’t you say you had something on later?”

Yan Zishu quickly said: “I’m so sorry — have we been taking up too much of your time? We’re here to pick out a gift for a client ourselves.”

Mrs. Li was understanding: “I got completely absorbed — my fault. You carry on; we’ll head off.”

The couple left the jewelry store. Once outside, Mrs. Li’s pleasant expression dropped.

She gave Li Chang’an a sidelong look. “Tell me. Have you been up to something out there? Gambling and losing money?”

Li Chang’an feigned unconcern: “Of course not. What would I be up to? Stop jumping to conclusions, will you?”

Mrs. Li said coldly: “Someone went to the trouble of dropping that warning straight in front of my eyes. Do you take me for an idiot? I’m telling you — if you’ve made a mess outside, you’d better be able to clean up after yourself. Don’t let me find out you’ve opened a can of worms you can’t close.”

Li Chang’an deflected with indignation: “What kind of person do you think I am? Women always blow things out of proportion!”

This Deputy Director, who dismissed his wife as overblown, managed to brush her off with bluster, then turned up the following day at the office and cornered Yan Zishu.

In an empty meeting room, Li Chang’an’s face was dark: “What exactly do you think you’re doing? Who gave you the nerve to threaten me?”

Yan Zishu said: “Have you not been sleeping well lately, Director Li? You seem rather irritable.”

Li Chang’an stared at him, eyes bloodshot: “Who told you? Who told you?”

Yan Zishu remained calm and mild: “I’m just a working person. I don’t know anything.”

A long silence. Li Chang’an gave a cold laugh. “Well, well. You’ve got some guts.”

He kicked over a chair in fury and stormed out of the room.

Yan Zishu shook his head, bent down, and set the chair back in its place.

*

The day before, he and Ben had failed to buy any gift for a nonexistent client, but had stopped for dinner on the branded street.

“I’d heard before that Li—that Director Li and his wife came from a political-commercial alliance marriage. Apparently that’s true — his wife has quite the presence.” Ben reflected, as if the pieces had just clicked into place. “And he’s been gambling in Macao and racking up debts — I actually thought at first we were there to catch him out for an affair.”

Yan Zishu picked up a chopstickful of stir-fried rice noodle and smiled, without mentioning that evidence of Li Chang’an’s infidelities was absolutely trivial to obtain.

Men were all the same — sleeping with one socialite today, keeping a minor celebrity tomorrow, photographs stacked high. Yan Zishu’s own assigned people had come back with a stack of the sort that seared the eyes, but his wife wasn’t going to care about any of that.

The ordinary transgressions, the small and large misdemeanors alike — she didn’t register them.

A political-commercial alliance marriage was its own unit of interests.

Only interests could draw real blood.

What was genuinely damaging was this: Li Chang’an had been gambling in Macao, and the accumulated debt now stood at nearly one hundred million yuan.

That explained, satisfactorily, why Li Chang’an was this desperate — reaching into the company’s operations for every project he could find, with an appetite that was frankly embarrassing to witness.

Mrs. Li was not bothered by her husband’s conduct in other areas of life; they might well have their own separate arrangements. But she could not be indifferent to the community of marital assets and liabilities that the law bound them to share. Nor to the impact on her uncles’ official careers if Li Chang’an brought himself to criminal disgrace and reputational ruin.

If it came to that, Mrs. Li’s side of the family was not without teeth.

The casino proprietors in Macao, however, were themselves shrewd operators — these high-rolling debtors tended to be people of standing and reputation, and even with debts running to hundreds of millions, the casinos would strictly protect client privacy until they were absolutely certain a debtor had gone completely bankrupt and had nothing left to sell. Privacy was part of the service.

Li Chang’an’s gambling habit was not hard to know about. The specific figure he owed, however, was the kind of detail a casual investigator couldn’t have unearthed.

Prior to this, Yan Zishu had not appreciated that Fu Jinchi’s reach extended all the way to Macao.

The man had intelligence networks that seemed to span everywhere, as though he had personally employed a small army of paparazzi.

Come to think of it, that might not even be far from the truth.

In any case: the next time Zhang Yan passed Yan Zishu in the corridor, he no longer bellowed an exaggerated “Director Yan!” across the floor. It was as though he had, overnight, discovered the virtues of humility and discretion — a development that was, truly, heartwarming.

As for Dongyun Bank and whatever Manager Qu or any other Manager was involved, Yan Zishu left time and space for Zhang Yan to work through the negotiations himself.

So this Friday, his schedule loosened again — no need to work late — and he sent Ben straight home.

He flagged a taxi downstairs, and the driver chatted as they crawled through traffic: “Every Friday, this city wants to strangle itself.”

Yan Zishu looked out the passenger window. “No rush. Take your time.”

“No one waiting at home? No date on the weekend?”

“Not at the moment.”

“I understand — you young people are all focused on building your careers. But you still ought to find someone, you know. It gets lonely without company.”

Outside the apartment building, the street parking spaces that were usually jam-packed had opened up a little — perhaps quite a few people really had gone out on dates.

As Yan Zishu walked past, one particular car registered as familiar — both the model and the plate. He turned his head with a trace of alertness.

Before he could fully process it, the car door was pushed open from the inside, and Fu Jinchi stepped out.

Yan Zishu stopped for a fraction of a second, and was already intercepted on the pavement.

“Surprised to see me?” Fu Jinchi smiled. “Could I come up for a bit?”

In adult parlance, come up for a bit and spend the night amounted to roughly the same thing.

“What made you think of coming by?” Yan Zishu asked him.

“Suddenly? I even made a point of coming on a Friday.” Fu Jinchi said. “You blocked me on WeChat — I thought you were trying to get out of our arrangement.”

More nonsense, Yan Zishu thought. He’d only blocked him on WeChat; the phone number and texts were unaffected.

As for the intelligence on Li Chang’an: Fu Jinchi’s people had delivered it in hard copy, on paper, with the implicit expectation it would be destroyed after reading.

And now Fu Jinchi was here in person, making clear he had come to collect.

Yan Zishu said evenly: “I don’t recall agreeing to anything.”

Fu Jinchi moved closer: “Maybe not explicitly — but don’t rule anything out. And don’t forget — you still owe me one request.”

Yan Zishu thought back, and found this was accurate.

Fu Jinchi said, close to his ear: “Coming up for a bit — that’s not an unreasonable ‘small request,’ is it?”

Yan Zishu stood where he was and considered for a moment. Fu Jinchi simply watched him, entirely patient.

“Fine — come up.” In the end, Yan Zishu gave a quiet, brief smile. “I’m in a decent mood today. You can come in as an honored guest.”