The magnificent Zhonghua Hotel. Stone had made his way to a large lobby in front of one of the hotel’s ornate reception rooms: The Crabflower Club. Stone walked in and picked up one of the house telephones at a distance from the entrance to the club. He made like he was on the phone while he observed the entrance and figured out how he was going to crash the party.
A single hostess stood behind a counter at the entrance to the Crabflower Club, flanked by two tuxedo’d security men. There were two obvious ways of getting in here. A simple con — pretend to be someone else, bluff your way in, and be sure you get the body language right, and say the right things. There was also “dumpster diving”. The hostess was taking the tickets and letters of invitation from the guests and throwing them in some kind of waste bin behind the counter. If Stone could make out he was a cleaner and swipe the bin, he’d be sure to find something to get him in.
The problem was, the bin was hidden right behind there, beside one of the security meatheads. Stone thought the simple con would be more fun in any case. He observed the hostess and the two security men for a few more seconds.
Torso and arm movements are strong giveaways to activity in a person’s limbic brain, the body’s emotional centre. The Chinese hostess was bending forward toward the guests, confident and friendly — but not subservient. Every so often her body language would betray her and she leant back, or angled her torso defensively, side-on to one of the guests. Someone she didn’t like. She also subconsciously leaned or moved away from both the security guys whenever they stepped towards her.
Stone had counted on searches, frisking, lynx-eyed detectives he’d have to make his way past. But there was none of this. It was all very low key — no doubt Semyonov wanted to look cool. Getting in should be easy if Stone made the right impression on the hostess. In the second he walked up, she had to trust him more than she trusted the security men beside her. He put down the phone and approached the hostess, gaining eye contact for a second. Warm smile. Then he flashed a look at the security boys. They wore the lapel pin in the shape of a small, silver hammer. The same silver hammer Stone had seen on Ekstrom in Afghanistan. These were Special Circumstances men in tuxedos — and yet the atmosphere couldn’t be more different from what he’d expected.
Stone looked again at the hostess. She wore a Chinese silk dress, elegantly high up on the neck and with the leg slit from ankle to thigh. Stone ran his eyes over her, from shapely hip to breasts. The split-second examination that hints at interest and flattery. So she knows she’s been noticed, but no more. Helps build rapport with some women, and this lady was one of them.
He glanced over the counter at the name badges for the guests. Not many left. He was late after his interlude at the Snake Market.
‘There I am. Armistead Harker,’ said Stone, glancing back up in her eyes.
She returned the smile with a hint of flirtatiousness. Leaned forward, looked Stone back in the eye and paused, like she was thinking about it. The meathead to the right had angled his body. Aggressive. Not good.
‘Professor Stone,’ said the hostess, with a knowing smile. ‘No need for that.’ She handed over a badge in the name Ethan Stone. ‘We were expecting you.’
Well, well. The woman had been told to look out for Stone, and she’d found him. She was perfect hostess for Semyonov’s party — a good figure and “the smarts” as the Americans say. Masters degree from one of Virginia Carlisle’s “good schools”. Equally at ease in English and Mandarin. All part of the carefully burnished image that surrounded everything to do with Semyonov — relaxed, cool, intelligent. No one — least of all those Semyonov invited — would believe that he was anything other than the super-intelligent, cultured man. A moral and intellectual hero, as George Watts put it. Could it be that the naive young reporter, Junko Terashima, was the only one to see through Semyonov’s facade? Looking around at the cool intellectuals arriving at the Crabflower Club, Stone half-doubted Junko’s story himself. But then there were still the men in tuxedos with a silver hammer on their lapels. And Junko was dead.
The hostess nodded imperceptibly to one of the guards as Stone walked past her into the club. Stone half-expected to be followed inside. He felt his mind calculating how to deal with the two guards. They’d let him in quite deliberately — but why?
The Crabflower Club was a different world from the teeming sweatshops and markets of Hong Kong only a couple of hundred metres away. Stone had expected something of orgiastic extravagance, and indeed there was champagne, entertainers, and lavish food. There were gorgeous models stalking around in revealing designer outfits. But it was the omissions from the guest list which impressed Stone. No politicians, racing drivers or fellow billionaires for Steven Semyonov. Here were the up-coming futurologists, thinkers and entrepreneurs. There were charity directors, architects and experts in little known technologies from the whole of the Pacific Rim. Semyonov had handpicked the guest list, it appeared. Semyonov’s parties in California were legendary, and it would be obligatory to have a good time, to get wild even. Stone glanced around. Certainly a buzz. A room full of PhD’s had never partied so hard.
And it was a great party. It was euphoric. Because most people there couldn’t believe they were even invited to a party by Steven Semyonov. Even Stone felt himself relax a little. And if he was honest, Stone couldn’t believe himself that those SCC meatheads had let him in. It was so relaxed. He’d expected a truly fascistic security operation, but that was way wide of the mark. The atmosphere at the Crabflower Club was open, welcoming. The opposite of what he’d expected.
Steven Semyonov. At twenty-two he had been the brains behind the start-up SearchIgnition Technology, whose technology powered the world’s top five search engines. He’d just sold out at the age of twenty-nine for $25 billion. Plenty of people want to meet a twenty-nine year old billionaire. It’s only human. But the nine zeros on his personal net worth weren’t the reason these people wanted to meet him. Money, ultimately, is commonplace.
The reason all these brilliant, clever, successful people had cleared their diaries and hot-footed to Hong Kong was clear. It was written on their faces. They were there for The Man. For the chance to meet Semyonov, The Man himself. For it was said that Semyonov was the cleverest man alive.
Stone was different. Stone wanted to meet Semyonov to ask him, why, with all his money and intelligence, he was devoting his energies to designing his own exotic line of… weapons of mass destruction. Why? Because he could? As a private joke? For kicks?
But none of that fit in with what Stone saw around him. The revelry was cranking up in the soft light of the Crabflower Club. Everyone was waiting for The Man. To see him, speak to him, even touch him, like pilgrims touching a jade Buddha in a mountain temple.
Vodka circulated, with caviar and Chinese dim sum of exquisite taste. Champagne flowed amongst clever kids, and the designers and the IQ babes. There was laughter, shouting, high spirits. And then the buzz which it seemed could go no further, suddenly hit fever pitch. The volume, the excitement went up a notch. They could sense he was there, in their midst. They felt his presence, his aura moving through the throng. Stone stood alone, his champagne flute full in his hand. He spotted Semyonov — his smooth, hairless head shining slightly with perspiration, his red eyes twinkling, but his face utterly impassive. Thirty seconds here, a minute there, a smile. Casting greetings and wisecracks around like candy to a crowd of kids. They whispered, gossiped in excitement as he approached them in the crowd. Star-struck.
Stone looked with steely gaze across the press of tuxedos and cocktail dresses. The guests were each shoving gently but insistently towards the spot in the crowd where Semyonov would move onto next. Stone held his champagne glass lightly, maneuvered himself closer. He tried to get Semyonov’s eyes. To catch his gaze. The man was shorter than Stone’s six-two, but not by much. His smooth head — hairless but unshaven it seemed — and his chunky physique were distinctive. Finally Semyonov’s impassive red eyes face turned towards him, just as a female hand grabbed Stone lightly on the bicep through his jacket.
‘Stone!’ An American voice. Depressingly familiar. ‘Stone!’ She said with false delight. Upper class, North Eastern United States. Self-consciously, intelligently deep for a woman. The preppy, Vasser-educated woman from the airport. Virginia Carlisle.
‘I knew it was you,’ she said. ‘Did you find anything?’
‘I guess not,’ said Stone without looking at her. He was holding Semyonov’s gaze still. ‘You?’
‘Suuure,’ replied Virginia, immodestly. ‘But you’ll have to wait to see it on GNN “Wake up World” in the morning.’ She had on a black silk dress and looked more glamorous than ever. She moved up beside Stone and smiled at Semyonov five metres away through the crowd. ‘I was gonna say it’s a surprise to see you, but I guess I knew you’d get in here. Junko couldn’t make it, then?’
‘No, Virginia. She couldn’t,’ Stone replied, his jaw clenched. He couldn’t look at her, so he continued eyeballing Semyonov. Virginia was trying to be genuinely friendly now, as if their meeting in the Limo never happened. An actress. On another day, at another party, he would like Virginia if he was honest. She was sassy and upfront. She was intelligent, attractive, driven. Like him? No. Not like him. But there was definitely something.
‘Steven just looked at you Stone,’ said Carlisle. ‘He picked you out in the crowd. Wow!’
‘I didn’t notice,’ Stone lied.
‘Don’t be modest, Stone. Modesty’s a sin. You’re a cult figure,’ commented Virginia. ‘So act like it. You could be just as famous as me in your own way, except that everyone knows me and no one knows you. You just need more airtime on TV. You could be someone. A hero for the peaceniks and the anti-globalisation gang.’
‘Like you gave a shit about the “anti-globalisation gang”,’ he said.
‘Like you give a shit about TV,’ she retorted. ‘But you should. Most people here don’t even know your face. But it looks like Steven knows you.’
‘Maybe he was looking at you,’ Stone said, affecting boredom, still staring at Semyonov, who was now making an effort not to look at Stone. That pleased Stone. Semyonov, who had everyone’s eyes on him, could feel Stone’s cool grey gaze on him. Guilt? Or was he about to ask some guy wearing a silver hammer to nestle an automatic into Stone's ribs and show him the door?
‘Semyonov likes guys like you,’ Virginia went on, flashing a smile at Stone. Patronizing. ‘Radicals, charity people, do-gooders.’
‘Suuuure,’ said Stone, aping her preppy American voice. ‘Do-gooders. Semyonov just loves us. Sorry to disappoint you, Virginia, but I had to crash this party, remember? Obviously not doing enough good.’ Stone was thinking of the Snake Market only minutes before. He hadn’t done much good there either.
‘Anyhow, Virginia. I guess you’ve done your research again? What do you know about Semyonov?’ asked Stone.
‘I know plenty. It’s my job,’ said Virginia. Self-satisfied look again.
Stone still concentrated on Semyonov. He was going to be in The Man’s face any minute.
‘He was always a bright kid,’ said Virginia. ‘Studied at Columbia, then a masters at MIT. But he was no more than a bright kid. There were others like him. His search business was just the right thing at the right time. The weird thing is he was a regular guy back then. Averagely good looking, played a little basketball, brown hair. He looked and acted normal. Look at him now.’
Stone watched the beads of sweat on Semyonov’s smooth forehead. What was Carlisle talking about? The man’s skin was whitish-pink, and entirely hairless, and he had to be fifty, sixty pounds overweight.
‘Maybe the exertion of acquiring those billions did something weird to him,’ said Virginia. ‘Or maybe stress.’
Semyonov didn’t look stressed. The pinkish skin was completely without lines or dryness. In fact he looked — well, just weird, like a plump, bouncing baby, inflated to adult size and given an IQ of 200.
‘I have heard the whackos claim he’s an alien,’ said Virginia. ‘That you can’t just gain fifty points in IQ in your twenties,’
I’m not surprised.
‘Anyhow, he’s not average,’ she said. ‘He’s not even an average geek. And I guess looks don’t matter if you have the smarts.’
Stone felt a thrill of anger. Junko Terashima killed, Hooper and fifty others dead in the Afghan village — did none of that matter if you “have the smarts”? Maybe Semyonov’s mind had become morally addled by his money and his IQ.
Virginia Carlisle’s face may be known on five continents, but Stone was barely listening to her. He wanted to see The Man’s reaction. To see that big, smooth, white face react when Stone asked about the weapons. Guilt? Pleasure? Shock? Relief even? Semyonov was close now, and the crowd tighter than ever around him. Two metres away.
Stone slipped away from Virginia, past a knot of three Australian programmers. Stood in front of The Man. His eyes smouldered. A bodyguard noticed and slid in beside Semyonov, spoke in his master’s ear and then stared again at Stone.
Stone could handle that guy, if he came looking for it. He kind of hoped he would. Stone looked directly at Semyonov’s red eyes — something no one else in that place seemed to want to do. But then he had a shock, like he’d been slapped across the face, or across the eyes to be precise. Semyonov finally looked Stone back in the eye, and Stone could see where the talk about an alien intelligence had come from. Up close, those eyes had an unknowable depth and intensity, even after a couple of seconds.
‘You’ve changed, Armistead,’ quipped Semyonov. ‘You look as good as that well-known peacenik, Ethan Stone. Still, it’s only fitting to have a Stone at the Crabflower Club, I guess.’ Semyonov’s shaven pate glistened slightly. He’d just made a highbrow remark, a joke intelligible only to himself. His face was expressionless, except for the depth in his eyes. It wasn’t just an intensity either. Stone held the eyes and wondered whether even one other person in there had seen what he saw in Semyonov’s eyes. There was a weariness. Semyonov was jaded. All this stuff, the money, the adulation, the brains. None of it was enough for Semyonov.
‘No. You’ve changed, Mr Semyonov,’ said Stone after a pause. ‘You surround yourself with all these clever, creative people. Do they know your latest toy is a nasty line in Weapons of Mass Destruction?’
‘Do you?’ replied Semyonov, still expressionless.
‘How many do you think you’ve killed already, Semyonov?’ said Stone, undaunted. ‘Keeping score? Is that the big announcement everyone’s gossiping about? The latest body-count?’
Stone looked back at Semyonov’s eyes to record the reaction, but a black-suited arm came between them.