Chu Xiaozhong's reaction was that Song Tianyao was talking nonsense, and that his identity as the Chinese manager of Malado Trading Company was probably a lie.
Chu Yaozong's reaction was that Song Tianyao had spoken with certainty, and judging by his earlier conduct, he was a steady young man who would not make extravagant claims. He probably knew something about Malado Trading Company's inner workings.
Chapter 40: The Scene
"A trading company merged with a shell company to go public. After the listing, its revenue growth depended mainly on acquisitions and mergers. That in itself was abnormal. Chairman Chu, you also started out running a trading company, so you know better than anyone how one grows. Malado Trading Company rose rapidly without ever engaging in trade. A start like that could only mean it intended to rake in money on the stock market. This year alone, Malado Trading Company made more than twenty acquisitions. Those deals were what drove its share price up, and it's still climbing. That's the biggest problem." Song Tianyao spoke to Chu Yaozong without looking at Chu Xiaozhong.
Chu Yaozong gave no indication of his stance, but Chu Xiaozhong let out a laugh. "Too many acquisitions are a warning sign? Wouldn't the shareholders be keeping an eye on Malado Trading Company's statements themselves—its cash flow, reserves and revenue?"
"Young Master Zhong, however pretty you want your operating cash flow and revenue statements to look, I can produce them for you. First, make an acquisition, then immediately write off most of the expenses and set aside reserves. When needed, turn those reserves into revenue. Keep making acquisitions like that, increasing the reserves shown on the statements, then turn them into earnings whenever needed. Keep it up, and the shareholders will see operating cash flow, reserves and revenue that all look beautiful, without finding a single problem. I wonder if you can understand that simple explanation, Young Master Zhong." Song Tianyao spoke to Chu Xiaozhong.
He had told Chu Xiaoxin that he was Malado Trading Company's Chinese manager because, when he studied at business school in his previous life, his economics professor had used Portugal's Malado Trading Company as a case study in publicly listed company fraud. Song Tianyao was therefore very familiar with Malado Trading Company's rise and bankruptcy, and even knew exactly how it had legally raked in money under the inadequate laws of the time.
He was familiar with it because of what he had learned in a later era, but the few simple sentences he had just spoken were enough to make Chu Yaozong, a Chinese business magnate in 1951, and his son Chu Xiaozhong ponder for a long time. That was the gap between eras. In the fifties, when economic law was still inadequate, this method of raking in money was a highly sophisticated legal maneuver, but in his previous life, it had already been classified as a commercial crime.
Chu Xiaozhong thought for a while, then looked at Song Tianyao uncertainly. "If the accounts look so good, why do you say Malado Trading Company will declare bankruptcy within a year? Surely it can rely on those beautiful—"
"Have some soup." Chu Yaozong interrupted his eldest son and said to Song Tianyao, "A-Yao, slow-cooked soup is best while it's hot."
"Thank you, Chairman Chu," Song Tianyao said after tasting a spoonful.
Chu Xiaoxin's face practically lit up. He had not understood a word of what Song Tianyao had just said, but after so many years as father and sons, as brothers, he could read his father's and elder brother's expressions and movements. Clearly, his secretary had not been talking at random; his words had given both men enough to think deeply about. That made Chu Xiaoxin even more certain that Song Tianyao was a talented man.
Chu Xiaozhong looked uncertainly at his father and started to speak, but stopped. In the end, he picked up his soup and drank.
Dinner passed uneventfully. Chu Yaozong chatted casually with Song Tianyao about a few amusing stories from their native Chiu Chow. Once the servants had brought tea and fruit and they had drunk their tea, Chu Yaozong prepared to leave for his study, and Song Tianyao hurriedly rose to take his leave as well.
When Uncle Yan escorted Song Tianyao out, Chu Xiaoxin left the dining room with them. Once no one else was there, Chu Yaozong, who had just said he was returning to his study, sat down again and picked up his teacup. Chu Xiaozhong, who had been holding his curiosity in check, asked:
"Father, just now..."
"You couldn't keep your composure, and a few words were enough for him to read your face. Song Tianyao left things unclear just now precisely to bait you into asking more." Chu Yaozong calmly took a sip of warm tea and said to his son, "In business, the greatest mistake is letting someone read your face with just a few words. You're usually steady, and I can't really call tonight a mistake either. After all, even I was interested in hearing more after Song Tianyao dangled that bait. A-Zhong, you still have much to learn."
After dinner at the Chu family mansion, Song Tianyao was being driven back to the pier. At the Taibai Seafood Restaurant, however, the scene was entirely different.
On the vast third floor, a lavish banquet table divided two groups as clearly as the waters of the Jing and Wei rivers. Chan Ah-sap had arrived first and sat on the left side of the table. He was now rubbing the jade thumb ring on his hand, his face dark. Behind him stood five or six Red Pole-level bosses from Chiu Yong Shing, all tough men who guarded territory at the various piers. Rotten-Life Ju and Fish Stall Kun were among them. On the water behind these men were more than a dozen sampans, each carrying four or five burly men armed with cargo hooks or carrying poles. All of them watched a Chao Yong Yi White Paper Fan standing in a corner on the restaurant's third floor, waiting for his command to send the sampans charging straight in.
Opposite him sat Golden-Tooth Lei, Fuyixing's chairman. He had arrived later after first going to Song Tianyao's home and finding no one there, and his expression now shifted between anger and uncertainty. Behind him stood Yan Hung and Red Pole-level disciples who ran gambling dens and heroin stalls under Fuyixing's banner in places such as Yau Ma Tei and Kowloon Walled City. Likewise, four fishing boats bobbed on the waves behind him. Their canopies had been pulled back, revealing thirty or forty men standing aboard the four boats, all holding gleaming machetes. Golden-Tooth Lei's personal subordinate A-Lok stood by the railing on the right, waiting for his boss to give the word so he could call the brothers on the boats up to start hacking people down.
Everyone at the Taibai Seafood Restaurant, from the workers and managers to the singing girls who usually leaned against the railings, smiling sweetly and flirting, was now silent as cicadas in winter. They huddled in the first-floor dining hall, not daring to breathe too loudly.
"Golden-Tooth Lei, we all know what tonight's business here is about. You don't still think you have a chance, do you?" Chan Ah-sap stared at Golden-Tooth Lei across the table and raised his thumb. "If Secretary Song hadn't rushed back himself, his younger sister would probably have been sent by Fuyixing's men to Kowloon Walled City to work as a little prostitute. If my men hadn't arrived just in time, Secretary Song himself would probably have been hacked to death by those brothers of yours. You're really something. I admire you."