White Tiger

recorded her number. The call wasn’t there.
    The chef broke a couple of eggs on the teppan, stirred them around, and made fried rice for us. ‘Last dish.’ He bowed crisply. ‘Thank you.’
    ‘I have to go soon,’ April said. ‘I need to go to the Consulate and do some paperwork for Andy.’
    While April was in the ladies’ room Louise and I shared speculation.
    ‘Do you think it’s possible that he’s genuine?’ I said. ‘And that the emergencies are for real?’
    ‘Not in a million years,’ Louise said. ‘Something is definitely going on here. He’s avoiding her.’
    ‘If he married her for the Australian passport, he’d have been over there months ago. She must be a cover for him.’
    ‘The funny thing is,’ Louise said, ‘she doesn’t really seem to care. She’s quite happy to be married to a manwho avoids her, provided he visits her at Chinese New Year.’
    After lunch I wandered through the shops of Causeway Bay for a while. I went to the computer mall in Windsor House to buy a few pieces of hardware for my computer, a new DVD drive and some more memory. I’d asked Gold to upgrade the machine but he never seemed to have time.
    I felt a coldness behind me as I walked back through Causeway Bay to the lay-by where Leo would collect me. I knew what it was. I quickened my pace without looking back, then dived into a tiny below-ground shopping centre selling Japanese collectibles and video games. The shopping centre had glass everywhere and I could see them following me.
    They looked like perfectly ordinary Chinese men in their mid-twenties, but they were definitely following me. Two of them. I felt a jolt of panic, then calmed myself. As long as they thought I wasn’t trained in the Arts they wouldn’t come after me; it wasn’t honourable. I checked them: they were only small, about level five or six. I could take them if I had to.
    The shops were in a loop and I wandered casually through, pretending to look at the collectible trading cards and gundam figures in the windows. The demons followed me.
    They were still further back in the shopping centre when I reached the entrance again. I trotted smartly up the stairs into the busy Causeway Bay street and hauled my mobile phone out of the pocket of my jeans.
    ‘Yes?’ It was Leo on his mobile in the car.
    I headed quickly down the street towards the lay-by where he would pick me up. ‘How far away are you, Leo?’
    ‘About five minutes. Is there a problem?’
    ‘There’s a couple of demons tailing me. About level five or six. If you don’t turn up soon I may have to face them.’
    ‘ Don’t take them on, whatever you do ,’ Leo said fiercely. ‘Go to the pick-up point and wait. I’m on my way.’ He hung up.
    I hurried to the lay-by. Fortunately there were a large number of people there, waiting for taxis. There was the usual scramble every time a cab appeared; Hong Kong people would sometimes conveniently forget how to queue.
    I nervously stood at the lay-by and waited. The demons positioned themselves across the road at the entrance to one of the shoe shops, leering at me. They didn’t make a move towards me.
    The car appeared and I quickly climbed in.
    ‘Why did they follow me?’ I asked Leo when I was in the car. ‘They shouldn’t be coming after me; as far as they know, I’m not trained.’
    ‘They may try you out, Emma,’ Leo said. ‘It’s becoming obvious from the way you move that you’re trained.’
    ‘ What ?’ I cried, horrified. ‘They’ll attack me?’
    ‘I’m surprised they haven’t had a go at you already,’ Leo said. ‘I think it’s only a matter of time before something small gets sent against you, just to see if you really are learning from Mr Chen.’
    I thumped the back of his seat, furious. ‘Why the hell didn’t you tell me?’
    He shrugged. ‘We didn’t want to freak you out.’
    I leaned back, crossed my arms over my chest and looked out the car window. ‘You will both thoroughly keep.’
    ‘He knew you’d react like this, too, and he was scared.’
    I glanced at Leo. ‘He was scared ?’
    Leo’s expression didn’t shift. ‘When you get mad, you are extremely scary.’
    I glared at him, then I couldn’t help it. I collapsed over my knees, laughing. The four-thousand-year-old God of the Arts of War was scared of me !
    ‘You are more and more scary every day.’
    When I returned to the Peak I stormed straight into Mr Chen’s office without knocking. I leaned on the mess