"I'm sure they're not. Not a matter of record."

"Good. What villain in Sinclair Towers?"

"One of our important capitalist dogs but suspected secret Commie fellows. Very boring but SI have to earn their daily bread, don't they?"

"Do I know him?"

"I imagine you know everyone."

"Shanghainese or Cantonese?"

"What makes you think he's either?"

"Ah, then he's European?"

"He's just a villain, Ian. Sorry, it's all very hush-hush at the moment."

"Come on, we own that block. Who? I won't tell anyone."

"I know. Sorry old boy, but I can't. However, I've another hypothetical idea for you. Say a hypothetical married VIP had a lady friend whose uncle happened to be the undercover deputy chief of the illegal Kuomintang Secret Police for Hong Kong. Say, hypothetically, the Kuomintang wanted this VIP on their side. Certainly he could be pressured by such a lady. Couldn't he?"

"Yes," Dunross had said easily. "If he was stupid." He already knew about Wei-wei Jen's uncle and had met him at a number of private parties several times in Taipei. And liked him. No problem there, he had thought, because she's not my mistress or even a lady friend, however beautiful and desirable. And tempting.

He smiled to himself as he drove in the stream of traffic down Magazine Gap Road then waited in line to circle the roundabout and head down Garden Road toward Central, half a mile below, and to the sea.

Now he could see the soaring modern office block that was Struan's. It was twenty-two stories high and fronted Connaught Road and the sea, almost opposite the Terminal of the Golden Ferries that plied between Hong Kong and Kowloon. As always, the sight pleased him.

He weaved in and out of heavy traffic where he could, crawled past the Hilton Hotel and the Cricket Ground on his left, then turned into Connaught Road, the sidewalks jammed with pedestrians. He stopped outside his front entrance.

This's the big day, he thought. The Americans have arrived.

And, with joss, Bartlett's the noose that'll strangle Quillan Gornt once and for all time. Christ, if we can pull this oft!

"Morning, sir." The uniformed doorman saluted crisply.

"Morning, Tom." Dunross eased himself out of the lowfflung car and ran up the marble steps, two at a time, toward the huge glass entrance. Another doorman drove the car off to its underground parking and still another opened the glass door for him. He caught the reflection of the Rolls drawing up. Recognizing it, he glanced back. Casey got out and he whistled involuntarily. She carried a briefcase. Her sea-green silk suit was tailored and very conservative, but even so, it hid none of the trim of her figure or the dance to her stride and the sea green enhanced the tawny gold of her hair.

She looked around, feeling his eyes. Her recogmtion was immediate and she measured him as he measured her and though the instant was short it seemed long to both of them. Long and leisurely.

She moved first and walked toward him. He met her halfway.

"Hello, Mr. Dunross."

"Hello. We've never met, have we?"

"No. But you're easy to recognize from your photos. I didn't expect to have the pleasure of meeting you till later. I'm Cas"

"Yes," he said and grinned. "I had a deranged call from John Chen last night. Welcome to Hong Kong, Miss Tcholok. It is Miss, isn't it?"

"Yes. I hope my being a woman won't upset things too much."

"Oh yes it will, very much. But we'll try to accommodate the problem. Would you and Mr. Bartlett care to be my guests at the races on Saturday? Lunch and all that?"

"I think that would be lovely. But I have to check with Linc may I confirm this afternoon?"

"Of course." He looked down at her. She looked back. The doorman still held the door open.

"Well, come along, Miss Tcholok, and let battle commence."

She glanced at him quickly. "Why should we battle? We're here to do business."

"Oh yes, of course. Sorry, it's just a Sam Ackroyd saying. I'll explain another time." He ushered her in and headed for the bank of elevators. The many people already lined up and waiting immediately moved aside for them to get into the first elevator, to Casey's embarrassment.

"Thanks," Dunross said, not noticing anything out of the ordi- nary. He guided her in, pressed 20, the top button, noticing absently that she wore no perfume or jewelry, just a thin gold chain around her neck.

"Why's the front door at an angle?" she asked.

"Sorry?"

"The front entrance seems to be on a slight tilt it's not quite straight I was wondering why."

"You're very observant. The answer is fang sub When the build- ing was put up four years ago, somehow or other we forgot to consult our housefung sui man. He's like an astrologer, a man who specializes in heaven, earth, water currents and devils, that sort of thing, and makes sure you're building on the Earth Dragon's back and not on his head."

"What?"

"Oh yes. You see every building in the whole of China's on some part of the Earth Dragon. To be on his back's perfect, but if you're on his head it's very bad, and terrible if you're on his eyeball. Anyway, when we did get around to asking, our fung sui man said we were on the Dragon's back thank God, otherwise we'dtve had to move but that devils were getting in the door and this was what was causing all the trouble. He advised me to reposition the door, and so, under his direction we changed the angle and now the devils are all deflected."

She laughed. "Now tell me the real reason."

"Jung suit We had very bad joss here bad luck rotten in fact until the door was changed." His face hardened momentarily then the shadow passed. "The moment we changed the angle, everything became good again."

"You're telling me you really believe that? Devils and dragons?"

"I believe none of it. But you learn the hard way when you're in China that it's best to act a little Chinese. Never forget that though Hong Kong's British it's still China."

"Did you learn th"

The elevator stopped and opened on a paneled hallway and a desk and a neat, efficient Chinese receptionist. Her eyes priced Casey's clothes and jewelry instantly.

Cow, Casey thought, reading her loud and clear, and smiled back as sweetly.

"Morning, tai-pan," the receptionist said smoothly.

"Mary, this is Miss K. C. Tcholok. Please show her into Mr. Struan's office."

"Oh but " Mary Li tried to cover her shock. "They're, they're waiting for aa" She picked up the phone but he stopped her. "Just show her in. Now. No need to announce her." He turned back to Casey and smiled. "You're launched. I'll see you shortly."

"Yes, thanks. See you."

"Please follow me, Miss Tchuluck," Mary Li said and started down the hall, her chong-sam tight and slit high on her thighs, long silk-stockinged legs and saucy walk. Casey watched her for a moment. It must be the cut that makes their walk so blatantly sexual, she thought, amused by such obviousness. She glanced at Dunross and raised an eyebrow.

He grinned. "See you later, Miss Tcholok."

"Please call me Casey."

"Perhaps I'd prefer Kamalian Ciranoush."

She gaped at him. "How do you know my names? I doubt if even Line remembers."

"Ah, it pays to have friends in high places, doesn't it?" he said with a smile. "A bientot"

"Oui, merci, " she replied automatically.

He strode for the elevator opposite and pressed the button. The doors opened instantly and closed after him.

Thoughtfully Casey walked after Mary Li who was waiting, ears still tuned for every nuance.

Inside the elevator Dunross took out a key and inserted it into the lock and twisted it. Now the elevator was activated. It serviced the top two floors only. He pressed the lower button. Only three other persons had similar keys: Claudia Chen, his executive.secretary; his personal secretary, Sandra Yi; and his Number One Houseboy, Lim Chu.

The twenty-first floor contained his private offices, and the Inner Court boardroom. The twenty-second, the penthouse, was the taipan's personal suite. And he alone had the key to the last private elevator that connected the basement garage directly with the penthouse.

"Ian," his predecessor tai-pan, Alastair Struan, had said when he handed over the keys after Phillip Chen had left them, "your privacy's the most valuable thing you have. That too Dirk Struan laid down in his legacy and how wise he was! Never forget, the private lifts aren't for luxury or ostentation, any more than the tai-pan's suite is. They're there just to give you the measure of secrecy you'll need, perhaps even a place to hide yourself. You'll understand better after you've read the legacy and been through the tai-pan's safe. Guard that safe with all you've got. You can't be too careful, there's lots of secrets there too many I think sometimes and some are not so pretty."

"I hope I won't fail," he had said politely, detesting his cousin, his excitement huge that at long last he had the prize he had worked so hard to achieve and gambled so much for.

"You won't. Not you," the old man had said tautly. "You've been tested, and you've wanted the job ever since you could think. Eh?"

"Yes," Dunross had said. "I've tried to train for it. Yes. I'm only surprised you've given it to me."

"You're being given the ultimate in Struan's not because of your birthright that only made you eligible for the Inner Court but because I think you're the best we've got to follow me, and you've been conniving and pushing and shoving for years. That's the truth, isn't it?"

"Struan's needs changing. Let's have more truth: The Noble House is in a mess. It's not all your fault, there was the war, then Korea, then Suez you've had bad joss for several years. It'll take years to make us safe. If Quillan Gornt or any one of twenty enemies knew half the truth, knew how far we're overextended, we'd be drowned in our own useless paper within the week."

"Our paper's good it's not useless! You're exaggerating as usual!"

"It's worth twenty cents on the dollar because we've insufficient capital, not enough cash flow and we're absolutely in mortal danger."

"Rubbish!"

"Is it?" Dunross's voice had sharpened for the first time. "Rothwell-Gornt could swallow us in a month if they knew the value of our present accounts receivable, against our pressing liabilities."

The old man had just stared at him without answering. Then he said, "It's a temporary condition. Seasonable and temporary."

"Rubbish! You know very well you're giving me the job because I'm the only man who can clean up the mess you leave, you, my father, and your brother."

"Aye, I'm gambling you can. That's true enough," Alastair had flared at him. "Aye. You've surely got the right amount of Devil Struan in your blood to serve that master if you've a mind."

"Thank you. I admit I'll let nothing stand in my way. And since this is a night for truth, I can tell you why you've always hated me, why my own father has also hated me."

"Can you now?"

"Yes. It's because I survived the war and your son didn't and your nephew, Linbar, the last of your branch of the Struan's, is a nice lad but useless. Yes, I survived but my poor brothers didn't, and that's still sending my father around the bend. It's the truth, isn't it?"

"Yes," Alastair Struan had said. "Aye, I'm afraid it is."

"I'm not afraid it is. I'm not afraid of anything. Granny Dunross saw to that."

"Heya, tai-pan," Claudia Chen said brightly as the elevator door opened. She was a jolly, gray-haired Eurasian woman in her midsixties, and she sat behind a huge desk that dominated the twentyfirst-floor foyer. She had served the Noble House for forty-two years and succeeding tai-pans, exclusively, for twenty-five of them. "Neh bob main?" How're you?

"Ho ha " he replied absently. Good. Then in English, "Did Bartlett call?"

"No." She frowned. "He's not expected until lunch. Do you want me to try to reach him?"

"No, never mind. What about my call to Foster in Sydney?"

"That's not through either. Or your call to Mr. MacStruan in Edinburgh. Something's troubling you?" she asked, having instantly sensed his mood.

"What? Oh, no, nothing." He threw off his tension and walked past her desk into his office that overlooked the harbor and sat in an easy chair beside the phone. She closed the door and sat down nearby, her notepad ready.

"I was just remembering my D Day," he said. "The day I took over."

"Oh. Joss, tai-pan."

"Yes."

"Joss," she repeated, "and a long time ago."

He laughed. "Long time? It's forty lifetimes. It's barely three years but the whole world's changed and it's going so fast. What's the next couple of years going to be like?"

"More of the same, tai-pan. I hear you met Miss Casey Tcholok at our front door."

"Eh, who told you that?" he asked sharply.

"Great good God, tai-pan, I can't reveal my sources. But I heard you stared at her and she stared at you. Heya?"

"Nonsense! Who told you about her?"

"Last night I called the hotel to see that everything was all right. The manager told me. Do you know that silly man was going to be 'overbooked'? Huh, if they share a suite or a bed or don't, never mind I told him. This is 1963 and the modern age with lots of liberations, and anyway it's a fine suite with two entrances and separate rooms and most important they're our guests." She chortled. "I pulled a little ranka Ayeeyah, power is a pretty toy."

"Did you tell young Linbar or the others, about K. C. being female?"

"No. No one. I knew you knew. Barbara Chen told me Master John had already phoned you about Casey Tcholok. What's she like?"

"Beddable would be one word," he said and grinned.

"Yes but what else?"

Dunross thought a moment. "She's very attractive, very well dressed though subdued today, for our benefit I imagine. Very confident and very observant she notice the front door was out of whack and asked about it." He picked up an ivory paper knife and toyed with it. "John didn't like her at all. He said he'd bet she was one of those pathetic American women who're like California fruit: great to look at, with plenty of body, but no taste whatsoever!"