Zhao Ming led Xu Ye along corridors and through doorways until they came out in an empty rear courtyard.

Zhao Ming looked left and right, and once he was sure there was nobody about he took out a pack of cigarettes Xu Ye had never seen before from an inside pocket of his suit. He shook one out and put it in his mouth with practiced ease. “Do you smoke?”

Xu Ye shook his head and smiled. “I don’t, thanks.”

At that Zhao Ming put the pack away, produced a Zippo lighter, lit the cigarette with a flourish, and remarked, “I didn’t smoke before I went abroad either. When I was studying I had an idiot roommate who smoked in the room all day. I breathed his secondhand smoke every day, and in the end I just started myself.”

“Heh~”

“Did you do your degree at your father-in-law’s university?”

“No.”

Xu Ye didn’t explain what lay between himself and Jiang Chao. He answered easily instead. “I’m at the School of Finance. Very ordinary compared with Fudan or the University of California — nothing like you.”

Zhao Ming laughed. “Bullshit. I got into the University of California because my uncle donated a building. I never even sat the college entrance exam — I went to America halfway through my last year of high school.”

“That’s still something to envy.”

“True enough.”

Zhao Ming plainly didn’t find it in the least shameful. On the contrary, he laughed rather smugly. “All roads lead to Rome — but some people are born in Rome. Though now I’m back in the country, my good days are over.”

“How so?”

“Abroad there was nobody to keep an eye on me. I did whatever I wanted. Now I’m back I’m about to start work at my uncle’s company, and he’s kept me on a tight rein since I was small. I expect I’ll be getting told off every day.”

Xu Ye heard him out and asked, curious, “Did you study finance too?”

“Mm.”

“You’ve never thought about making something of your own?”

Zhao Ming shook his head. “Never. The domestic market is close to saturated now. My uncle got where he is partly on the luck of the times, and however hard I work now, there’s no chance of surpassing him — so I might as well coast along and enjoy life properly.”

“Everyone has their own way of living. If I were you, I might not think about getting ahead either.”

“That won’t do at all.”

Zhao Ming put a hand on Xu Ye’s shoulder and blew out a smoke ring for show. “If you don’t get ahead, that father-in-law of yours won’t think much of you.”

Xu Ye went blank for a moment, then joined him in a wicked grin.

Zhao Ming smoked well over half the cigarette, and with a little still left he dropped it on the ground and put it out with his foot. He clapped Xu Ye on the shoulder. “Come on. Back to the performance. I’ve got to seem ‘well behaved’ today, or my uncle will start on me again.”

Xu Ye reminded him, “You’d better go by the bathroom and rinse your mouth first.”

Zhao Ming caught on and laughed out loud. “Right, right, right — nearly forgot. Wait here, I’ll be back in a moment.”

“Mm.”

Zhao Ming disappeared quickly from view.

Xu Ye’s impression of him was quite good. Not every rich kid was the arrogant, overbearing sort — and this Zhao Ming, for all his many faults, was at least not a bad person, and spoke frankly.

When Zhao Ming came back he took Xu Ye straight to the hall, where the two of them stood talking quietly. Xu Ye didn’t know most of the people in the room, and after he asked in passing, Zhao Ming started introducing them one by one.

“That bald man over there is a vice president of China Securities. Surname Zhong. I forget his given name.”

“The one in glasses is a deputy president of Pudong Development Bank. Surname Liu.”

“Those few talking over there — from left to right, the finance director of Shanghai International Group, the head of investment division one at Yin’an, the executive vice president of Shanghai State-Owned Assets Operation…”

“…”

“Can you keep all that in your head, told like that?”

Xu Ye smiled. “More or less. As long as I can recognize them next time I see them, that’s enough.”

“Come on, let’s go see whether the cake’s ready.”

“The cake?”

“Mm. They’ve had one of the better-known pastry chefs in the country make it. Six tiers, I hear. It should have been brought over by now.”

Zhao Ming took Xu Ye through to a room behind the hall, and just as he had predicted the cake had arrived and had already been set on a cart. Six tiers in all, with a longevity peach made of white chocolate on the top.

Zhao Ming looked it up and down and rolled his eyes at once. “That peach was definitely my uncle’s idea. It’s unbelievably tacky.”

“In this country the longevity peach signifies long life and good health. Older people do care about that sort of thing.”

Zhao Ming put out a hand to stop one of the club’s staff. “Excuse me, could you bring us something to eat? I’m starving.”

Xu Ye had driven straight to meet Jiang Chao the moment his afternoon classes ended, and hadn’t eaten either. Hearing Zhao Ming, he stepped up quickly as well. “I haven’t had dinner either. One more portion, if you don’t mind.”

The staff member Zhao Ming had stopped had been taken on temporarily. There were not usually this many people at the club, so there weren’t enough servers, and some had been hired in for the occasion.

“Would small cakes be all right?”

“That’s fine.”

“Anything that fills a stomach.”

The girl wasn’t old either — twenty-four or twenty-five, at a guess. Once she had heard them out she set off at a run for the kitchen.

A few minutes later she came back with a plate of small cakes, and once Xu Ye and Zhao Ming had taken it they started eating, one after another.

“Miss, is there any water? I’m choking here.”

“There is.”

“Thanks.”

While the two of them were talking, an older member of the staff came in. She glanced at Xu Ye and Zhao Ming, then started in on the girl. “They’re starting in the hall any minute. Go get ready. And I’m telling you, everyone here today is somebody important — whatever you do, don’t make a mistake.”

“All right.”

The girl dug a small mirror out of her pocket, touched up her makeup, and went over to stand beside the cake, glancing at the time every so often.

Her task for the day was this: shortly she and a colleague were to wheel the six-tier cake out into the hall, and once the evening’s gathering was over, to clean up afterward. The job had not been easy for her to come by, and she valued it a great deal.

When Zhao Ming and Xu Ye had finished eating they went back to the hall.

They didn’t have long to wait before Zhao Wenhua came down from upstairs with a group of people. As the host for the evening, he first made a short speech, then thanked several people particularly, and finally, amid a round of applause, gave the club manager a look. Light instrumental music started up in the room, the main lights dimmed slowly, and everyone moved toward Zhao Wenhua.

At that moment the girl who had fetched the small cakes for Xu Ye and Zhao Ming was wheeling the six-tier cake slowly toward the center of the hall with a colleague.

And just as every eye in the room was on the cake, the girl’s ankle suddenly turned under her. She didn’t fall, but the cart rocked all the same.

With it, the topmost tier of the cake and the white chocolate longevity peach went straight over and onto the floor.

Everyone in the hall who saw it froze.

Zhao Wenhua, the host, went black in the face.

And the girl was completely stunned. Her whole system might have crashed. She stood rooted where she was, not moving at all, dumbstruck.

Something had gone wrong.

(End of Chapter 239)