Elio’s Notes: The chapter title alludes to the saying “The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind,” describing someone pursuing a target without realizing another danger is waiting behind them.
If Ms. Zhao ever found out afterward, she would certainly regret it. Mr. Yan, whom she had quietly taken an interest in all by herself, was only a few steps away from her at that very moment. Unfortunately, they passed right by each other without meeting.
She did not know Yan Xiaodao, but Yan Xiaodao already knew who she was.
During the day, when Yan Xiaodao stepped over her car for the second time, his sharp ears had caught the woman calling someone “Mingxun” on the phone.
Yan Xiaodao rapidly ran through every prominent person he knew or had heard of whose name fit. Jian Mingxun—the head of Jianyue Mingliu Real Estate. That had to be it.
At the time, he had casually glanced up at Zhao Qifeng, his gaze sweeping just as quickly over her license plate.
There were few enough Bentley sports cars of that new model in the city that you could practically count them, which made the registered owner easy to look up. So while Zhao Qifeng was admiring the photograph of the man on her phone and naively congratulating herself on getting the jump on him, Yan Xiaodao had already pulled up the wealthy woman’s full name, background, and identity on his own phone. She was either Jian Mingxun’s mistress or the legitimate Mrs. Jian.
Yan Xiaodao knew Mr. Jian. They had eaten together once and played a round of golf once.
The man now hiding his entire face beneath a ski cap, comically oversized sunglasses, and an anti-smog mask, however—the man who did not even dare use the main entrance and had slipped in through the side door—was obviously not the real Mr. Jian.
That elevator went up to a corridor in the guest-room wing of the Baiyue Atrium Hotel, separated from Ziyunlou restaurant by only a single wall.
Inside Room 1608, heat and the scent of aromatherapy filled the air, while the volume and frequency of the moans seemed nearly enough to shake the crystal chandelier from the ceiling.
The man had thrown aside his sunglasses and anti-smog mask, revealing his real face, and had already turned the bedsheets into a damp, suggestive wreck.
Ms. Zhao toyed with the man’s sweat-dampened hair and teased, “What’s this? Useless already? Tired?”
Jian Mingjue lay there panting weakly for a long while, grumbling inwardly. The second we got through the door, she latched onto me and wouldn’t let go until she’d screwed me once. Sure enough, women are wolves at thirty and tigers at forty—and Zhao Qifeng is thirty-seven! Fuck, she’s a goddamn tigress, specializing in devouring strong young men, skinning them, drinking their blood, and sucking the life right out of me.
Zhao Qifeng said, “Where have you been screwing around lately? You think I don’t know?”
Jian Mingjue’s eyes were still damp with a wanton haze. “Where would I get the energy? Who could possibly compare to you? One round and you’ve already sucked all the yang energy out of me.”
Jian Mingjue had a very long face—what people commonly called a horse face, with a touch of shoehorn to it as well. When the lower half was covered, his thick brows and large eyes made him look perfectly respectable, but the moment his whole face was exposed, the effect was ruined. There was simply no hiding that second-rate chin.
He was hopeless at business, but very capable when it came to relations between men and women. People did say that men with long chins had especially vigorous appetites.
To siphon money and advantages from his own elder brother, Chairman Jian, into his own hands, his sister-in-law was naturally the most convenient and useful “bridge of communication” and business partner available. Each exploited the other and got exactly what they wanted. What could be more carefree and pleasurable?
Zhao Qifeng skimmed several text messages, then casually tossed her phone back onto the bedside table.
While catching his breath, Jian Mingjue happened to glance over and suddenly pulled up a photograph on her phone.
“Which one of your flings is this now?” Jian Mingjue sneered.
Zhao Qifeng snatched the phone back at once, which only made him more curious. He seized it again and studied the picture carefully. “This guy is…”
Leaning thoughtfully against the headboard, Zhao Qifeng said, “Just caught my eye today. What do you think?”
Jian Mingjue narrowed his eyes and stared at the photograph for a long moment. “Isn’t this fucking… Yan Xiaodao?”
Now it was Zhao Qifeng’s turn to be surprised. “You know him? Who is he?”
Jian Mingjue looked even more astonished. “You don’t know who he is?… You’ve got to be kidding me. You actually ‘dare’ to set your sights on him?!”
This time, Ms. Zhao’s curiosity was definitely piqued.
“You know who he is?” Jian Mingjue tossed the phone heavily onto the pillow and sneered at the big-breasted, empty-headed woman. “You know Qi Baoshan, the head of Baoding Group, right?”
Zhao Qifeng shrugged. Of course she knew him. She had met him twice. He was formidable in business, sure, but the man himself seemed perfectly ordinary. So what?
The sleazy, playboy air in Jian Mingjue’s eyes disappeared completely. For once, he spoke seriously. “Qi Baoshan—Master Qi—has fought his way from the old city into the new one over all these years, staking out territory and calling the shots in Linwan New District and the port. You think he got there by living like some harmless vegetarian monk?
“I heard all this from my big brother. Qi Baoshan used to have fierce men all over the place under him—of course, they’ve washed their hands of that life now. But there were two men in particular, his left and right arms, who helped him carve out his territory. One was ‘Hundred Hands’ Pei Yi. The other was ‘Xiaodao’ Yan Xiao.”
Zhao Qifeng silently repeated the name to herself: Yan Xiao.
The little flame of interest that had just begun to flicker inside her was immediately doused with half a basin of cold water, yet she remained deeply unwilling to give up.
Jian Mingjue could no longer stand it and viciously dumped the remaining half basin over her as well. “Stop fucking dreaming, baby. Yan Xiaodao is Qi Baoshan’s godson! And Qi Baoshan doesn’t even have a biological son. You want to hook him? You think he’s easy to mess with? You think he’d even let you hook him?”
Zhao Qifeng gave a disgruntled little snort. “So what?”
Jian Mingjue said, “You think he’s short of money?”
Zhao Qifeng said, “Is money all I have?”
Jian Mingjue thought, What the fuck do you have besides pile after pile of money sitting in your bank accounts? What came out of his mouth, however, was a heartfelt, painstaking warning. “Stop looking for trouble. If he finds out what you’re thinking… Believe me, he could take a knife to those tits of yours and slice them right off, then slash up your face.”
Jian Mingjue laughed as he said it, reaching a large hand without ceremony into the low neckline of her silk camisole and giving her breast a rough squeeze.
Zhao Qifeng inexplicably shuddered at that. She was far too fond of this smooth, pale, tender body of hers to let anyone cut pieces off it. Her new interest from earlier that day suddenly seemed much less appealing, and she snorted, “He’s not even that good-looking anyway. His face is pretty average.”
Jian Mingjue suddenly gave a strange smile and blurted out, “You think ‘those people up there’ might be interested in Yan Xiaodao’s type?”
Zhao Qifeng glanced sideways at him and could not resist taking out her phone to look at the photograph again.
He truly was not exceptionally handsome or eye-catching, but a man’s attraction was never only about his facial features. Especially when the man was this difficult to get your hands on—the harder he was to obtain, the more maddeningly tempting he became.
Jian Mingjue dismissed his own idea. “Forget it. Anyone who likes that type has some fucking heavy tastes. Too rough. But…”
“I do know something from the inside…” He lowered his voice, his eyes turning secretive as a hidden greed gleamed within them. “Somebody netted a ‘big fish’ in the South China Sea. Supposedly an absolute, country-toppling beauty! Several parties have already been privately passing him around for sale and bidding on him, with prices openly named. These past few days, practically everyone connected to the right channels has heard about it. They’re gathering people together for a whole ‘mermaid banquet’ feast, and the venue’s been set for Yilulifu Island in Southeast Asia.”
Zhao Qifeng stared at him sourly. “Oh? You’re going too? ‘Blue Sea Cloudtop’?”
Over the previous couple of years, anti-corruption and anti-prostitution campaigns had swept through the “Haitian Feast” on South Island along with the local officialdom and the male and female escorts connected to it, so everyone operating beneath the surface had become comparatively cautious and restrained. These days, when people in those circles organized social events like this, they did not dare hold them domestically. Instead, they chartered luxury cruise ships and invited everyone out to islands in Southeast Asia.
“Of course I’m going.” Jian Mingjue laughed lewdly. “It’s Yilu Island, aboard the Cloudtop. I’ve got to go broaden my horizons too and get a taste of that beauty.”
Before Jian Mingjue raised his cannon for a second round with Zhao Qifeng, he sighed beneath the pool of light cast by the bedside lamp. “Better let me take care of you. You ought to cherish me, baby!
“Not every man in this world can be bought with your money. Sure, there are plenty who’ll sell as long as you name a high enough price. You could make just about any man crawl over and kneel in front of you right now, lick your toes, become your kept boy, and call you his precious granny.
“But there are still some people money can’t buy, and you don’t have anything else that could buy them either… You still want to sleep with Yan Xiaodao? Quit dreaming. Give up on that idea while you’re ahead and just enjoy sleeping with me!”
＊
The occasional moan penetrated the door, its trailing note echoing faintly down the hotel corridor carpeted in a floral pattern.
From outside, no one could make out what the people inside were saying. Yan Xiaodao glanced at the room number, put his phone away, lit another cigarette, and slipped back into the stairwell to leave.
He roughly replayed the masked man’s height, build, and way of walking in his mind. He already knew it was the wastrel second son of the Jian family, whom he had shared business dinners with twice.
He used to do this sort of thing all the time. With a photograph pinched in one hand and two knives tucked inside his clothes, he would head out to do a job. Naturally, he had to be extremely good at recognizing faces and remembering people; otherwise, you could leave home to chop somebody up and end up chopping the wrong target.
Of course, he had not chopped anyone up in many years. He had washed his hands of that life.
Jian Mingxun, head of Jianyue Mingliu Real Estate, was something of a prodigy in the property business and had a good reputation both professionally and personally. But everyone knew he was lame. Probably because childhood polio had never been properly treated, one leg was crippled and his growth had also been affected. He was plain-looking and needed a cane to walk.
As Yan Xiaodao lit his cigarette and left, a bored, cold smile appeared at the corner of his mouth, his earlier good mood completely chilled.
Peel back the clothes of these wealthy, powerful families, and underneath you found nothing but ugly, filthy lice that could never be shown in public.
Pan Jinlian and Wu Erlang were carrying on as happily as fish in water. If Wu Dalang, the man who actually ran the household, happened to die one day in some inexplicable “accident,” then at least there would be clear people to look to when it came time to collect the debt.
Elio’s Notes: Pan Jinlian, Wu Dalang, Wu Song—also called Wu Erlang—and Ximen Qing are characters from the classic tale associated with Water Margin. Pan Jinlian is Wu Dalang’s wife and attempts to seduce his younger brother Wu Song/Wu Erlang, but he rejects her; her actual lover is Ximen Qing. Yan Xiaodao is darkly joking as though Pan Jinlian and Wu Erlang were happily carrying on together, paralleling Zhao Qifeng’s affair with her husband’s younger brother, Jian Mingjue.
＊
Yan Xiaodao did not regain his relaxed, cheerful mood until he returned to his own detached villa near Linwan.
Bear Two and his wife were sweetly rolling around together beside the wall. At the sound of movement by the front gate, they both sprang upright and charged toward it as though racing a hundred-meter sprint. Halfway there, Master Bear’s paw slipped and he went sprawling flat on his face! His wife seized the lead and rammed her head straight into Yan Xiaodao’s arms first, pawing him all over as she sweetly demanded kisses.
Yan Xiaodao spent quite a while nuzzling and mouthing Third Lady’s wet pink nose, until the little black mole on his own nose was almost licked clean off.
They were two Alaskan Malamutes, one male and one female. Yan Xiaodao was the undisputed boss of the villa, with a Number Two and Number Three under his roof. Bear Two was fat, strong, and magnificently built, powerful enough to ram Yan Xiaodao backward into a full somersault, yet he was also a spineless coward utterly terrified of his wife. Third Lady had a patch of depigmented scarring on her nose that made it look pink.
Several brothers were playing cards in the downstairs living room and noisily called out to him, “Boss! Come play a couple rounds!”
Yan Xiaodao wandered inside and said disdainfully, “Last time you lot lost everything. The clothes and underwear you lost are still hanging outside under the eaves making fools of you.”
“Let ’em hang there. They can be a ‘signboard’ for your place,” Yang Xifeng said with a grin. “We’re wearing new underwear today, Bro. We’re not afraid to keep losing!”
Bear Two followed Yan Xiaodao in and desperately shoved his snout against Yan Xiaodao’s backside from behind, begging for affection. Third Lady, meanwhile, was behind Master Bear shoving at his butt.
Yan Xiaodao turned around and pointed at Master Bear. “What? Got no shame?!”
Yang Xifeng immediately borrowed his boss’s authority and pointed too. “Absolutely shameless. Pair of adulterous dogs!”
Yan Xiaodao went into the master bedroom, took a quick shower, and shut the door on the racket of cards being dealt and called downstairs, finding his own little pocket of peace amid the noise. He sat down at the head of the bed, pulled out a book, and read while eating a plate of cold steamed buns he had pilfered from the kitchen.
He sprawled shamelessly across the extra-wide, extra-long bed, limbs flung in every direction. This was what real comfort and relaxation felt like. He even had one in each arm: his left elbow crooked around Third Lady’s sleek, glossy neck, while his feet rested on Second Master Bear’s thick-furred shoulders.
The three of them—one man and two dogs—often slept in the same bed like this. He truly had never found the space beside him bleak or lonely. The bed was crowded enough already; there was no need for a second person.
He did read a few books in his spare time. He was a man, after all, so what interested him were things like history and military affairs.
In truth, he had not even finished high school and could hardly be called an educated man, though he at least knew the three thousand commonly used characters and understood the basic principles of things. Books such as “All Quiet on the Western Front,” “The Ming Dynasty,” and biographies of Zeng Guofan often sat at Yan Xiaodao’s bedside, and he read whatever interested him. For the past couple of days, he had been reading a copy of “The Nanjing Massacre.” When he reached a section that filled him with such anger he could barely contain it, his brows knotted tightly and he kicked Master Bear straight in the stomach!
Second Master Bear woke from his doze with a low whine, indignantly shifted into another position, and still did not dare retaliate with a bite, having no idea how he had managed to offend his master.
Yan Xiaodao stared coldly and silently at the pages, unable to bear it and unable to calm the fury in his heart. The Japanese are nothing but beasts wearing human skin, and even now they still harbor some twisted affection for war criminals whose crimes are too numerous to record. How the hell have these Japanese devils not had their country destroyed and their whole race wiped out?
When his next kick sent Master Bear straight off the bed, there was a sound at the bedroom door, and the person outside simply pushed it open and walked in.
“So who are you this pissed off at that you need to kick somebody—” The man entering gave an easy hum, his voice steady and calm.
There was only one person who would dare walk straight into Yan Xiaodao’s room in the middle of the night without knocking. Yan Xiaodao privately wondered how he had failed to notice the footsteps, or even hear anyone downstairs greeting the visitor.
The man who entered was his godfather, Qi Baoshan.
Bear Two and Third Lady both rolled upright from the bed at once in defensive postures, only to hesitate nervously, intimidated by Qi Baoshan’s expressionless, gloomy face. In the end, both canine followers recognized that this was the master above even their own master—and therefore someone even less safe to provoke. Very sensibly, they climbed off the bed, circled Master Qi without daring to brush so much as a hair against him, and were promptly shut outside the room by Qi Baoshan.
“Godfather, what’s wrong? Something happen?” Yan Xiaodao rolled off the bed and tossed the book behind the pillow.
“What, I can’t come see you unless something’s wrong?” Qi Baoshan remained expressionless. His gaze fell on the leftover steamed buns beside the bed, and for some reason he picked up one of the not-particularly-tasty cold buns himself and finished it in a few bites, as though he had somehow gone hungry.
When a person had something weighing on his mind, he would inexplicably want to eat, using food to relieve the pressure and tension.
“I took a few cops out to dinner tonight. Ziyunlou. Came straight back when we were done,” Yan Xiaodao reported truthfully, hiding nothing.
“Mm.” Qi Baoshan briefly closed his eyes. Naturally, he was not concerned with such trivial matters.
Turning his head, he noticed the book lying facedown on the pillow. He picked it up, flipped through it, and shook his head with a laugh. “How old are you already? Still such an angry young nationalist.”
“I’m not…” Yan Xiaodao smiled awkwardly and sat down at the foot of the bed. Even where he chose to sit followed rules of courtesy and respect.
Qi Baoshan was still wearing the clothes he had arrived in from outside, yet he sat without ceremony in the middle of the large bed and crossed his legs. Only then did he slowly state why he had come. “Xiaodao, I rushed back this time because I need you to go out and handle something. Do a job for me.”
Every expression on Yan Xiaodao’s face froze, settling into grave seriousness. Even the light in the room seemed to dim as shadows gathered around them and the entire atmosphere abruptly changed.
What did “do a job” mean? This certainly was not the first time Qi Baoshan had given his godson an order in those words.
“What happened? Just tell me straight,” Yan Xiaodao said.
Qi Baoshan patted his leg. “I was going to come find you tomorrow morning, but after thinking about it, I decided to come tonight. I don’t want to delay this.”
“What kind of job?” Yan Xiaodao asked directly.
Qi Baoshan said, “An enemy has come calling.”