Matt played back what Shan-tung had just said and realized that it confirmed exactly what he had thought. “The Old Ones are in Hong Kong,” he said.
“The Old Ones have taken over Hong Kong,” Shan-tung replied. “They control almost every aspect of the city. From the government and the police to the street cleaners. I do not know how many people they have killed, but the number must run into thousands. My people have been fighting them on your behalf. We are the only remaining resistance.”
“Who are your people?” Richard asked.
Shan-tung sighed. “It is unnecessary to keep asking me these things. I am about to tell you anyway.”
“I’m sorry.” Richard realized his error. “I suppose it’s a habit. I used to be a journalist.”
“I do not like journalists. It is nothing personal – but they have caused me trouble in the past. I suggest you continue eating. I will tell you everything you need to know.”
Han Shan-tung had barely eaten anything. But he laid down his chopsticks and began to speak.
“I have the very considerable honour to be a member of an organization called the Pah Lien. This translates as the White Lotus Society. You might have remarked upon a clue that I sent you at the airport. The man who met you was carrying a bunch of lilies. The lily is part of the lotus family. My society is a very old one. It was founded in the fourth century to resist the foreign invaders known as the Mongols who then ruled over China. The aim of White Lotus remained the same over the next four centuries. It was to help the Chinese people fight against tyranny and oppression.
“But over the years, something very interesting happened. The White Lotus Society changed. It will be difficult for you to understand the nature of this change, so let me explain it to you by referring to a character from your own history. You will, I am sure, know Robin Hood. He stole from the rich and gave to the poor. He was a hero to the peasants in Sherwood Forest. But to the authorities, he was an outlaw, a criminal. They would have hanged him if they could.
“In the early days, the White Lotus Society operated in much the same way. Indeed, it might interest you to know that the society had a motto: Ta fu – chih p’in. This translates as ‘strike the rich and help the poor’. But here was the crucial difference. As the years passed, White Lotus found that it was enjoying and benefiting from the criminal nature of its activities. It was also remarkably successful in the world of organized crime. It continued to steal from the rich but, as its members became richer themselves, it found itself giving rather less to the poor. It also changed its name. It became known as the Three United Society. There was a reason for this. White Lotus believed that the world was made up of three different parts: heaven, earth and mankind. Its members therefore had a triangle tattooed onto their body. The triangle also appeared on their flags. And in the end, they became known simply as the Triads.”
There was a long silence. Matt had heard of the Triads, the criminal gangs that were active all over Asia. They were drug dealers. They were involved in people smuggling, prostitution, extortion and murder. They would torture or kill anyone who got in their way. They were as brutal as they were powerful. And this man was calmly admitting that he was one of them! He glanced at Jamie. The American boy was listening politely. He didn’t seem shocked by what he had just heard. Richard, on the other hand, was staring open-mouthed.
“I can see that you are dismayed,” Shan-tung remarked. “And before you ask me one of your inane questions, Mr Cole, I will answer you. Yes. I am a criminal. More than that, I am what is known as Shan Chu, the Master of the Mountain. This means that I am the supreme leader of my own Triad. I cannot tell you how many people I have murdered to get to where I am today, but at a conservative guess I would say about twenty-five. I do know that I am wanted in exactly nine countries, including the United Kingdom and the United States – and I would have been arrested a long time ago if I hadn’t paid the right people a great deal of money to leave me alone.
“You are now wondering if you should be sitting at my table, eating my food. You are asking yourself why I should wish to help you in your struggle against the Old Ones. You are thinking, perhaps, that it would be more natural for me to be on their side. But you would be wrong.
“Until very recently, I controlled all crime in Hong Kong. I have, for example, heroin laboratories in Kowloon and the New Territories. I have illegal casinos and betting shops throughout the island. Immigrants from China were paying $5,000 a time for me to help them cross the border illegally. The arrival of the Old Ones has changed everything. They have no interest in profit. They do not want to do business. They want only to destroy everything around them – and that includes the Triads. They are as much my enemy as anyone’s, the only difference being that I have the means to fight back. And that is what I have been doing. There is a certain irony, don’t you think? I am undoubtedly a bad man. But a greater evil has come my way and now I am forced to do good.
“And so I have used all my resources within Hong Kong to set up a resistance. I have buildings. I have people. I have weapons… not that they are of much use against creatures that can form themselves out of flies. Above all, I have determination. I will not be defeated by the Old Ones. They can destroy the world. But they will not destroy me.”
“I’m surprised they didn’t ask you to work for them,” Richard said.
“As it happens, they did indeed ask me to serve them. The Nightrise Corporation approached me exactly a year ago. But the Master of the Mountain does not serve anyone. I mentioned twenty-five victims. The man who put that question to me would have been the twenty-fifth.”
“May I ask a question?” Matt asked.
“You have my permission,” Han Shan-tung replied. “But I should warn you that soon I have a question to put to you and I very much hope you will be able to provide me with the right answer.”
Matt didn’t like the sound of that, but he went on anyway. “How do you know about Scarlett?” he asked. “And why did you call her Lin Mo?”
“The White Lotus Society has always known about the Gatekeepers. You must remember that in our early days, almost two thousand years ago, we were to all intents and purposes a religious order. We still are. That means we are the keepers of many secrets… sacred texts and ancient beliefs. Even when we began to devote ourselves exclusively to crime, we stayed true to ourselves. The secrets were passed on from generation to generation. And I think we always knew that one day we would be called upon to return to our origins, to take up the sword once again.
“As to the second part of your question regarding Lin Mo, that I am not yet prepared to tell you. I need to be persuaded that I can trust you and that is still not the case.
“However, I can say that she was born in a place called Meizhou. We always knew that the Old Ones would return and look for her… that she was one of the Gatekeepers. We therefore arranged for her to be adopted and taken to the West. We wanted her to be as far away from here as possible. We hoped that she would be safe.”
“It didn’t work.”
Shan-tung shrugged. “We did everything we could to protect her. It was not our fault that the Old Ones found her. In fact, if anyone is to blame, it is her. Nonetheless, you are right. The Old Ones found her and brought her back.”
“You tried to get her out of Hong Kong,” Jamie said. He hadn’t eaten very much, absorbed in what he was being told.
“Scarlett was kept under guard from the moment she arrived,” Shan-tung explained. “With great difficulty, we managed to get a message to her. My most trusted agent in Hong Kong, a man called Lohan, contacted her and arranged for the shape-changer who had been guarding her to be killed. He took her to a safe place where we hoped to keep her hidden, but unfortunately – and again through no fault of our own – she was found again. As I mentioned to you, several of my people died. However, Lohan managed to move her to one of our warehouses and had planned to smuggle her out on a cruise liner. That was yesterday. The plan failed for reasons that are not yet clear. She is now their prisoner.”