The Sleeping Army Awakes

Part 5 Chinese Restaurant

Sir Percy laughed so hard that one of the buttons of his amply occupied waistcoat, parted company with the fabric and shot above across the table to land near a large Ming dynasty vase. His secretary, Spencer Butler, deftly followed it, swept the errant fastener up, and put it into his pocket. In reaching the button, Spencer inadvertently knocked over a small oriental looking man with a blowpipe, who had been crouching behind the vase and had chosen that moment to leap out and make his mark. The shocked man exhaled sharply down the pipe but instead of hitting its target, the poisoned dart embedded itself into one of the waitresses and she slumped elegantly to the ground, smiling to the last.

While the assassin was still off balance, two of Sir Percy's security guards scooped the little man up. One of them twisted the assassin's neck until there was a sickening snap.

"Did you have to do that in here you oaf?" Sir Percy chided, "We're just about to have dinner!"

Spencer got as far as offering the button to Sir Percy and asking nervously, "Should I?" before Sir Percy waved him away irritably as if he were swatting at a mosquito.

"Just deal with it appropriately Butler!" Sir Percy said, sounding unwarrantably blasé and ungrateful that Spencer had just saved his life, but this for the benefit of his dining partner. "Can't you see that I have better things to do?"

"Begging your pardon sir!" Spencer said. "No sir I meant should I sew the button back on and have the tailor punished for the lack lustre stitching?"

"Oh! Fred the button for now!" Sir Percy said and then added ominously, "You and I will have a quiet little chat later."

Sir Gilbert nodded his approval. Didn't pay one to be too nice to the servants. "Treat them mean and keep them keen" was his motto though secretly he had been very shaken by the incident.

Spencer nodded to Bung Chow, the manager, who clapped his hands and several burly Oriental looking men, dressed ninja style in black, appeared from the kitchen to remove the corpses at the double. Once they had hoisted the bodies aloft they headed back for the kitchen. Chow tried to keep his cool but showed signs of an imminent breakdown.

"No not the kitchen we don't know where he's been!" He snapped in broken Cantonese, because he had actually been born in the east end of London. "These western imperialist swine already think that half the chicken we serve is cat or dog. Next they will think that we serve minced assassin!"

Spencer approached Bung Chow, loomed over him and asked in a hoarse and menacing stage whisper. "How could you let this happen?"

"I velly solly!" Bung Chow said, he was visibly sweating, in fact water was almost squirting from his brow. Spencer was almost one and a half times as tall as him.

"And you can talk to me in proper English!" Spencer added. "I happen to know that you have never been further east than Southend."

Bung Chow blushed. He looked like a rabbit caught in the headlights of a fast approaching three wheeler.

"Look mate I'm just trying to do my job!" Bung Chow said.

"By the way your Cantonese is terrible." Spencer continued, "You and all your staff were thoroughly vetted before I booked."

"Listen mate!" The manager pleaded, "It's all part of the product!"

"What is?" Spencer asked intrigued.

"The assassination attempt!" Bung Chow explained. "The man that your security team have just terminated was an actor, my uncle actually! My team were supposed to have dealt with the assassin."

"And the girl that he killed?" Spencer asked.

"He didn't!" Bung Chow lied. "She's gone back to folding napkins!"

"Indeed!"Spencer said. "My condolences about your uncle."

He wondered if anything was real in this place.

"Look mate I'd better get on or they'll be complaining about the service."Bung Chow said.

"We will have a conversation about this later!" Spencer threatened.

Bung Chow smiled endearingly at his guests and in his best mock Chinese English he announced, "Honlable gentewmen prease pardon this tlagic rapse in plotocol I wiw personarry see to it that my seculity guards are sevelery punished foe this unaccedpibew intlusion."

"What did the man say Spencer? You speak foreigner don't you?" Sir Percy asked, as if all foreign languages, apart from Latin, were the same.

"I believe that he said sir 'Honourable gentlemen, please pardon this tragic lapse in protocol. I will personally see to it that my security guards are severely punished for the unacceptable intrusion.'"

"How severely?" Sir Percy asked Bung Chow.

The manager made a throat cutting sign.

"Good see that you do it!" Sir Percy chided. "And make sure that they are dealt with slowly so that they know that they are being killed! And send me the video clip."

"Your wish is my command Sir Pissy!" The manager charmed.

"He called you Pissy, Perseus!" Sir Gilbert found this very funny and almost choked on his fifth brandy.

"That man's diction is terrible!" Sir Percy complained.

"Was that one of yours?" Sir Gilbert asked, surreptitiously pointing the smallest finger on his right hand in the direction that the assassin had been taken. "You know. The assassin dwarf chappie."

"Gilly! Gilly! Gilly! I'm hurt!" Sir Percy said, slapping a flabby hand on his forehead in exasperation, "We have a gentleman's agreement on the subject. I know that we've had our differences before... but a deal is a deal isn't it? In any case, would my own secretary be stupid enough to interfere with one of my own assassins?"

He glanced over to Spencer who agreed assiduously. Sir Gilbert was fumbling ineptly with some rather expensive chop sticks and Spencer's assurances went unnoticed.

"By the way where's yours?" Sir Percy asked. "Your secretary that is."

"I had him stuffed and mounted!" Sir Gilbert said matter of factly. "Damn fella couldn't spell for toffees!"

"Wouldn't have been easier just to buy him a dictionary Gilly?" Sir Percy asked. "Or let him use the Hinter-net!" The Hinter-net was a propriety branded data transfer service run by the Zeli Corporation.

"Didn't come to mind at the time," Sir Gilbert bragged, "And I have my own data transfer system. Still what's done is done and I don't give a damn... to quote the prophet Peter Gabriel!"

"I don't think that he was really a prophet." Sir Percy corrected."more of a profit centre!"

Bung Chow, now the master of ceremonies, removed his top hat, revealing his sweating bald pate, and settled back at his dais smiling obsequiously to the two prematurely ageing school chums. His uncle was dead but he was pleased to have two such eminent guests to grace his table. They would fill his coffers with virtual riches and he would probably do more business today than he would do normally in a month of normal trading. In a restaurant where a simple slice of toast cost more than a month's wages, the bill for this party would be immense, astronomical... almost adequate, but such guests also posed risks. There was a down side if not everything was up to scratch then he knew that he could end up paying with his life.