The Scottish Banker of Surabaya

( 5 )

Her mother was barely awake when Ava called. Her voice was throaty, smoky. “I played mah-jong until six this morning,” Jennie said.

“How many hours straight was that?” Ava asked.

“Not so many. We took a break at two and went for fried noodles at Big Mouth Kee.”

“Do you want me to call back?”

“What is this about?”

“Theresa.”

“No, no, don’t call back. Tell me now what you’ve decided.”

Ava couldn’t remember the last time her mother had been so eager to talk about anything that early in the morning. “I haven’t decided anything. I spoke to Uncle, and he says he has no interest in chasing after three million dollars.”

“Ava!”

“Wait, Mummy, don’t start having a fit. It isn’t what it seems.”

“Then what is it?”

“You have to understand that for us to go after three million costs us the same amount in money and time as going after twenty or thirty million. Uncle is suggesting that Theresa contact some of the other people who got ripped off and get them to sign on with us. If we can get enough people, and enough money as a target, then he says he’ll agree to take on the job.”

Her mother went quiet and Ava knew she was steaming. Ava was now certain that she had told Theresa it was a done deal, and the last thing she wanted to do was eat her words. “Theresa thinks you have taken the case,” Jennie confirmed.

“I don’t know how that can be, since I never made a commitment. And even if I did, I report to Uncle, and the final decision is his,” Ava said, giving her mother the excuse she could use.

“It won’t be easy for her to do this, you know,” Jennie said. “Outside of their immediate families the Vietnamese are close-mouthed. Even if they want to hire you, they won’t want everyone else to know how much money they had, how much they lost.”

“I’ll keep their secrets. If she can get them to agree to hire us, we’ll give them individual contracts. They won’t have to disclose anything to anyone.”

“I’ll talk to her.”

“It’s the only way.”

“You didn’t have to say that,” Jennie snapped.

“Sorry.”

Jennie sighed. “Me too . . . It’s just that she’s such a nice woman and I really want you to be able to help her.”

Ava felt the first traces of guilt creep in. “I want to help her too. So talk to Theresa and tell her to get some more people onside. When she talked to me before, she said she was getting a monthly statement of affairs from that company. All the other people have to do is bring their last statement so I can confirm what they are owed. I’ll also need some basic bank information from each of them — bank name, branch address, and account number. We’ll take it from there.”

“I wish you didn’t have to drag other people into this.”

“That’s the way Uncle wants it.”

“And do you always do what he wants?”

“Yes,” Ava lied.

It would take at least a few days for Theresa to locate and talk to the others, Ava knew, and it was by no means certain that they would want to hire her and Uncle. Agreeing to give up thirty percent would be hard for some of them, even though, as Theresa had said, seventy percent of something was better than a hundred percent of nothing.

Uncle had taught her the most basic truth about clients on the day he hired her. “They are always initially overjoyed that we will help them, prepared to pay just about anything we ask. But the moment we actually have the money, they remember that it was all theirs and they begrudge paying us even five percent, let alone thirty.” It was why Uncle nearly always moved the recovered funds through their own bank account, so he could subtract the fee before passing on the balance to the client.

Ava showered and dressed. It was getting close to lunch time, and now that she was back in the city, dim sum was on her mind. She phoned Mimi, who worked within walking distance of Ava’s condo, to ask if she could join her. Mimi said she had a lunch meeting at her office, so Ava called Maria’s office and was told she was at a meeting in Oakville, a suburb just west of Toronto. She didn’t feel like any other company, so it was dim sum alone or no dim sum.

The Dynasty restaurant was east on Yorkville Avenue, no more than a five-minute walk for Ava. She ordered hot and sour soup, har gow, chicken feet, and steamed pork wrapped in bean curd. As she started in on the soup her cellphone rang. It was a 905 area code, the outskirts of Toronto, and an unfamiliar number.

“Ava Lee,” she said.

“This is Theresa. Your mother called and told me what your boss had to say.”

“Yes?”

“It is done.”

“Done?”

“Me and my brother contacted some of the people we know, and they did the same. I think we have about twelve people who are willing to hire you now.”

“How much money does that represent?”

Theresa hesitated. “I don’t really know. We didn’t want to start asking people how much they’d lost. Your mother told me what you want to know and we passed that information along. Everyone who is coming to the meeting will bring their own paperwork. You have to keep it secret, though. You know that, don’t you?”

“I also told Mummy it had to be more than twenty million, not more than twenty people.”

“Ava, I think it is more than twenty million, but the only way to be sure is for you to look at the paperwork. That’s why we organized the meeting.”

“The meeting?”

“We told everyone to be at the Pho Saigon Ho restaurant on Highway Ten — Hurontario Street — in Mississauga at seven o’clock and to bring their documents.”

“When?”

“Tonight.”

“That’s short notice.”

“Our people can all make it. It’s too important for them not to. And your mother said you are between jobs right now.”

Between jobs, Ava thought. More like between two women. Why hadn’t she said no when they were in Orillia? Why hadn’t Uncle said no? “Pho Saigon Ho?” she said, feeling trapped.

“Yes, it has a private dining room in the back we can use. The owner is one of the people who lost money.”

“Okay, I’ll be there.”

“That’s wonderful. Thank you so much.”

“And Theresa, just in case, bring me the licence plate number of the car your sister saw Lam get out of in Ho Chi Minh.”

“I have it with me. Do you want it now?”

“Why not,” Ava said.

As Theresa recited the number, Ava couldn’t help thinking about one of the maxims of the great American community organizer Saul Alinsky: If you don’t make a decision, someone else will make it for you. She had procrastinated, tried to fob off the decision onto Uncle, and in the end had been caught up in other people’s expectations. Alinsky had been writing about Boris Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago, caught between his lover, Lara, and his wife, Tonya. He couldn’t decide which woman to live with — Too bad he wasn’t Chinese, Ava thought. He could have had both — and as he rode from Lara’s house back to Tonya’s, filled with doubt and guilt, a Red Army patrol burst from the woods and took him away to serve for years as their surgeon. If he’d made up his mind, Alinsky said, his life would have been entirely different. Ava believed that. Normally, if she was guilty of anything, it was of being too decisive. Now Theresa had turned into the Red Army.

“How many people will be there?” Ava asked.

“At least forty, maybe more.”

“How many speak and understand English?”

“Some.”

“I’ll need someone to translate. I don’t want there to be any misunderstandings.”

“The restaurant owner is good.”

Ava had a copy of their standard contract on her computer but had no idea how many copies she would have to bring. “Theresa, I want one person signing for each family, for each group, so how many of those will there be?”

“At least the twelve I mentioned.”

“Okay, I’ll bring twenty contracts just in case.”

Ava checked her watch and wondered if she should call Uncle, then decided not to. Better to wait until she saw exactly how much money they would be chasing.