Page 125 of Never

Wu carefully picked up the delicate antique bowl, threw the tobacco ashes on the floor, and silently put the bowl at the other end of the desk, out of Huang’s reach. Then he said: ‘What did you have in mind, general?’

Huang answered without hesitation. ‘We should sink theVu Trong Phung. That will teach the Vietnamese a lesson.’

Huang wanted to turn the heat up – as usual.

Wu said: ‘It’s a bit drastic. But it might put an end to these repeated offences.’

Kai said: ‘There’s a snag. My intelligence says that the Vietnamese oil industry is advised by American geologists. There may well be one or more Americans aboard theVu Trong Phung.’

Huang said: ‘So?’

‘I merely ask whether we want to kill Americans.’

‘Undeniably,’ Wu said, ‘to sink a ship that has Americans aboard would escalate the incident.’

That infuriated Huang. ‘For how long must we allow the motherfucking Americans to dictate what will happen in our territory?’ he raged.

This was impolite. The strongest Chinese swear words all had to do with fucking someone’s mother. Such language was not normally used in foreign policy discussions.

‘On the other hand,’ Kai said mildly, ‘if we’re going to start killing Americans there is more to consider than merely oil under the sea. We would need to gauge their likely response to the murders and prepare for it.’

‘Murders?’ said Huang with rising indignation.

‘That is how President Green would see it.’ Kai judged it was time to make a concession, to calm Huang down. He went on quickly: ‘I don’t rule out the possibility of sinking theVu Trong Phung. Let’s keep that option open. But we would need to say it was a last resort. We should first send Hanoi a protest –’

Huang gave a derogatory snort.

‘– then a warning, then a plain threat.’

‘Yes, that’s the way to do it,’ said Wu. ‘A ladder.’

‘Then, after all that, if we sink the ship, it will be clear that we did everything we could to seek a peaceful solution.’

Huang was not happy but he knew he was beaten. Making the best of it, he said: ‘Then let us at least station a destroyer in the vicinity ready to attack.’

‘Excellent proposal,’ said Wu, standing up to indicate that the meeting was over. ‘This is what I will suggest to President Chen.’

Kai went down in the elevator with Huang, who was silent as they descended seven floors. Outside, Huang and his assistant were met by a gleaming black Hongqi limousine, while Kai got into a silver-grey Geely family sedan with Monk at the wheel.

Kai wondered whether he should pay more attention to these status symbols. The marks of affluence and prestige were more important in Communist countries than in the decadent West, where a guy in a battered leather jacket might be a billionaire. But Kai, like the American students he had met at Princeton, felt status symbols were a waste of effort. And today he had proved that, for the foreign minister had followed his advice, not Huang’s. So maybe the assistant and the limousine did not count for much after all.

Monk pulled out into the traffic and headed for the Beautiful Films studio. This evening there was a party to celebrate the hundredth episode ofLove in the Palace. The show was a hit. It attracted a huge audience and the two leads were celebrities. Ting was paid a lot more than Kai – which was fine with him.

Kai took off his tie to look less formal among the actors. When he arrived the party was just getting under way on the sound stage with the sets all around, great and small rooms furnished and decorated in the lavish style of the late Qing dynasty.

The actors had removed their heavy television make-up and changed out of their costumes, and now they flooded the room with a sea of colour. In Kai’s world the men wore suits to make themselves look serious, and the few women wore grey and dark blue to look like the men. Here it was different. The actors and actresses wore fashionable clothes in all colours.

Kai saw Ting across the room, looking cute in black jeans and a pink sweatshirt. She was enchanting the show’s producer. Kai had taught himself not to be jealous. This kind of behaviour was part of her job, and half the men she was flirting with were gay anyway.

Kai took a bottle of Yanjing beer. The technicians and the extras were guzzling free booze as fast as they could, but the actors were more circumspect, Kai noticed. Ting’s co-star Wen Jin, who played the emperor, was talking seriously to the studio boss, a subtle piece of self-positioning. Jin was tall and handsome and authoritative, and the boss was a little awestruck, treating him somewhat as if he was in reality the all-powerful ruler he merely played. Other actors seemed more relaxed, chatting and laughing, but they were being charming to the producers and directors who had the power to give them jobs. Like so many parties, this one was work for a lot of the guests.

Ting spotted Kai, came to him and gave him a long kiss on the mouth, probably to make sure everyone knew this was her husband and she loved him. Kai basked in it.

However, he could see that her happy party smile was masking a different emotion, and he knew her well enough to understand that something was troubling her. ‘What’s wrong?’ he said.

Just then the boss of the studio, wearing a black suit, got up on a chair to make a speech, and everyone went quiet. Ting murmured: ‘I’ll tell you in a minute.’

‘Congratulations to the most talented group of people I have ever worked with!’ said the boss, and they all cheered. ‘We have now filmed one hundred episodes ofLove in the Palace– and they get better all the time!’ This kind of hyperbole was normal in show business, Kai knew. They probably talked that way in Hollywood, he thought, though he had never been to Los Angeles. ‘And I have some special good news,’ the boss went on. ‘We have now sold the show to Netflix!’