Flower Lounge(2) -- Leap Day Verdict

Staring at the speckled ceiling, I don’t feel one bit tired, all the more certain that I had not dozed off earlier.

The events of today keep replaying again and again in my head like a broken record.

I’m rarely insomniac. Staying awake all night shivering over potential disasters would only result in puffy eyes and fuddled reasoning, not solutions. I’d rather snore on my problems. Hey, nasty issues might just evaporate overnight; we never know what friendly forces could be at play while we sleep. In any event, a well-rested mind is more likely to dream of a way out of dire straights, or face it with dignity.

Though troubles don’t stop me from falling asleep, I tend to wake up early when troubled — the bigger the trouble, the earlier I wake. This behavioural pattern hasn’t changed after retirement, though bad news has become less frequent.

This morning, I woke before five, about two hours earlier than usual, an indication of the size of the looming distress. Couldn’t get back to sleep after tossing and turning for ten minutes, so I went to the terrace for a bit of fresh morning air and a quiet moment — both precious commodities in Hong Kong. The translucent sky was cloudless, but clearly impenetrable. Without any logical connection, I took that as an auspicious sign that my nightmare was about to end. In any event, a decision had no doubt been made by then. The outcome had been set in court documents duly prepared, filed, printed, photocopied, probably a few days before. Wishful thinking may not affect the outcome, but helped make the moment more reassuring.

Might as well catch a relaxing moment before too late. In this town, we have to rush to relax. Irritated vehicles will soon appear, honking contemptuously at each other, poised to explode from vexation. Everyone would be impatient to move on, to go somewhere, anywhere, right away. And everyone else would be in the way.

A few meters away, the bulbul couple twittered happily, resting, digesting wriggly worm carpaccio.

They were born in this terrace. The birth nest on the white jade orchid had long been abandoned, but they continue to visit daily just as their forebears had for generations. We know each other. I can get quite close to them, though not close enough to offer my finger for perching, or invite them into the house like Asa did. Asa was the Indian coach of the squash club I belonged to in the 1980s. He lived in a room at the rooftop of the club building, and wild birds would enter his tiny home through the windows to hop or fly around. It was surreal, absolutely enchanting.

Much more recently, a friend in Chongqing bought a sun parakeet from the market. Amazingly, she manages to toilet train the little green bird. It flitters from its open cage to drop uric acid composite on a cotton pad labelled Bird Toilet. More amazingly, she has repeated the success with a second purchase from the market. Triply amazingly, she now takes the birds to the park to fly. When they have had enough of nature, they’d return to their cosy cage and whistle all the way home. I have not met and examined these birds in person, but have seen many proud photos and videos on my friend’s social media.

Humans understand very little about animals. Perhaps there’s more to the saying ‘a little bird told me’ than modern folks know? The fact that bears can smell something fishy twenty kilometres away cannot be simplemindedly rationalised in molecular terms. In fact, we know very little about ourselves as well. Homo sapiens are supposedly clever and knowledgeable according to self-assessment, but most of what we know are wild guesses or cosmic fudge factors, like dark matters in space, for example.

Anyway, I’m no bird whisperer, and these bulbuls are ordinary and nervous. The slightest jerky movement from me would send them fleeting.

‘Hey, little birds,’ I said stupidly. I normally deride people who talk to animals in a human language, but today is an exceptional occasion. ‘Tell me what you know, anything.’

Their twitter sounded spirited and encouraging. Perhaps that’s how bad news sound in bulbul songs? In another half a day, I would also encounter many happy jail birds. Maybe the bulbuls were trying to tell me Hey, there’s a great Triad party tonight in jail, have fun! Too bad I couldn’t decode the message at the time. ‘Wish me luck,’ I added wishfully instead, then whistled their favourite routine. They cocked their heads and looked puzzled like birds always do.

Just then, Satu came out, phone in hand, obviously in distress.

‘What’s the matter?’

The birds leapt off and disappeared into the concrete jungle. Cowards.

‘Leslie…’ she burst into tears.

That was my first terrible news today.

For nearly three long years, my sister-in-law Leslie combated cancer while I fought the government. About three weeks ago, my battlefield went quiet. The endless hearings stopped. The good judge retreated from his bench to contemplate for an unspecified period. Meanwhile, Leslie was admitted to the hospital. Silence hummed in the background.

Last week, she suddenly showed flashbacks which seemed at once hopeful and portentous. Friends and families told her and each other how miraculously better she looked, smiling sunshine, nodding emphatically. We were probably lying or wishful thinking. What else could we have said though? ‘Hey, everyone, don’t get too excited, Leslie is just experiencing terminal lucidity’?

On our final visit a few days ago, the dilemma was gone.

Her condition had plummeted overnight, reduced to a singleminded struggle for air from the oxygen mask. The machine was hissing a relentless countdown, leaving no room for positive thinking. Subconsciously, I synchronised my breathing with the machine’s morbid rhythm. Breathing is one of many critically important things in life that we take for granted. The average person breathes about twenty thousand cycles a day. If one gets stuck, that’s it. Yet he hardly notices.

Death would be a relief now, I thought, then immediately felt guilty for having had such an honest thought. Don’t lose hope! I hastily covered it with contrived positivity. Hope meant nothing to Leslie anymore, but would anaesthetise us against the looming loss, though sustaining unrealistic hope is tiring.

Three long years. Leslie must have been tired also.

After my parents died, she had been organising all major eating-and-drinking family events. Without her, me and my five siblings would have been far too lazy to see each other. Though frail, capable Leslie had been reasonably healthy until doctors discovered malignant cells in a regular checkup.

As she went through chemo, many questions popped up in my mind.

Had the tumour remained undiscovered and unprovoked, would it have continued to co-exist with Leslie in peace? Or eventually wilted, gotten reabsorbed or digested? I know nothing about the mysterious life force driving my fleshy shell with a dark and slimy interior. Neither do doctors, though they pretend they do. I also know nothing at all about death, except that I’m merely raw material for a future corpse. Had Leslie stayed away from the vicious cytotoxic agents, would she have recovered unknowingly? Or died without drawn-out pain?

She had doubted the treatment process as it killed her cell by cell — good ones, bad ones, ugly ones, innocent ones. It didn’t look right, and felt horrible. What would be left when all the cells are gone?

Modern medical practice is like a self-driving car speeding down a signless highway. The destination seems clear and simple — get rid of those damned renegade cells. How to get there? Press the button. Follow the protocol. The programme knows where to go and what to do next. Doctors have been turned into mechanics. To the passenger, things look increasingly blurry outside as she hands her life over to the protocol — the same protocol for all ages and genders and constitutions as long as the symptoms and diagnosis are similar. Deviation is unethical, even criminal, definitely uninsured. Don’t you dare.

Alternative treatments appeared like curious turnoffs. Would that work? Uh…

Too late. As she weighed these options, they retreated in the rearview mirror. Matters of life and death allow no hesitation. The main road was full of unknowns, but official. Turning off into an unconventional unknown was not covered by insurance. Following the protocol would at least clear her from personal responsibilities in the event of death.

As I write this, I have also been diagnosed with stomach cancer myself, and finally decided to opt for herbal treatment and give self-healing a chance. I have therefore experienced, am still experiencing, Leslie’s dilemma first hand. In order to live, we must risk death.

It’s only six thirty. A long day ahead.

‘Should we light an incense?’

Satu nodded.

Smoke billowed skywards, bracing a light breeze, trying to catch up with Leslie with our farewell wishes.

My mind drifted: Death, the only absolute certainty in life, is infamously unpredictable. Bureaucratic justice, on the other hand, though tedious and peculiar, operates within rigid boundaries, following due process. Thankfully, it has finally run out of steam. There is no more solemn non-event to repeat. The fiasco will end in about two hours……Bring down the curtain.

Classical wishful thinking.

Was I being deliberately naive? For I had been warned. Derek had unequivocally cautioned against optimism. Having worked with him for more than two years, I had learned to enjoy his cynicism, and take his unremitting cautions as something that solicitors do for a living. A couple of days ago, when he notified me that judgement will be handed down today, the 29th, and repeated the same trite warning, I yawned.

Judgements have to be handed down because judges are perched upon elevated benches. Awaiting judgement down below is humbling and suspenseful. Defendants are in effect criminals in waiting, denied many basic rights and courtesies. The remanded are even locked up while remaining theoretically ‘innocent until proven guilty’. It reeks of hypocrisy, but my pragmatic side actually appreciates the need to balance common sense and theory in the real world of criminal justice.

Colonial legacy divides Hong Kong lawyers into two castes — solicitors, and barristers aka counsels. Each class is stratified into permanent ‘expatriates’ who might have lived and worked in Hong Kong most of their lives, and the natives. As my pre-retirement employer was a joint venture between an old British Hong and a French multinational (let’s call it the Company with a capital C from now on), our legal team comprised all English-only lawyers with a few also-Chinese-speaking local assistants.

Solicitors work in offices. Counsels work in chambers which look exactly like offices. Solicitors don’t wear wigs — not the white and curly kind anyway — or gowns like barristers do, and normally not permitted to speak directly to the judge whom everyone addresses Your Honour or My Lord with a gentle bow of the head. A solicitor’s main job is to explain legal obscurities to uninformed clients on a need-to-know basis, and to extract worthy information from them for a barrister’s rumination and strategic design. Barristers don’t deal directly with clients but for investigative interviews and mock interrogations. Even their hefty bills are presented and settled through solicitors.

Having worked closely with my defence team for a couple of years allowed me to make some general observations about lawyers — the face and hands in the judicial clockwork.

Firstly, none of the law boys I have chatted with care about justice more than undertakers care about the dead. Law is a job, an income generator, nothing to do with social or moral principles. Cynical? Perhaps, but understandable, even inevitable. Some — the ones the Company employed anyway — were highly intelligent, but their clever minds were peculiar. For example, the assistant barrister was an effective and clever young native, a great research asset in our team. Over lunch one day, however, his anecdotal explanation of the technicality of theft shocked me. He explained that had I stolen a hundred bucks from someone, spent it on ice cream, then regretfully snuck a hundred back into his wallet, I would still have committed theft. Okay, got that. A wrong action can’t be undone. But had I returned the same hundred-dollar bill, I would not have committed a crime, technically speaking.

The logic was alarming. Was he trying to be funny? I squinted to examine him for a second: A proud professional trying to explain his sacred trade to an ignorant outsider. He was dead serious, not facetious.

Secondly, lawyers are professionally ambiguous. When asked by an anxious client what his chances are, the barrister would turn to stare outside the window — hmm, not my business — leaving the solicitor to calm him with universal wisdom: ‘Uh, I’d say fifty-fifty. Your case is tricky, really hard to say. Best to refrain from wishful thinking. Be prepared for the worst, you know. Yet, you’re in good hands. Nothing’s impossible.’ He may then add an afterthought: ‘Worst comes to worst, well, we may have to face additional costs.’ This is when word-perfect lawyers tend to confuse pronouns. His we definitely does not include his good self or esteemed firm.

All that may sound cynical. Reality often does. But my barrister, an equable elderly Queen’s Counsel from New Zealand, was an exception.

Don’t think he had actually defended the Queen in court, but had done a good job imitating the way she spoke. Dropping one’s natural accent to sound snobbish is odd and disingenuous from my Chinese perspective, suggesting perfidy, but he quickly overcame my prejudice and became one of a very few lawyers whom I trusted and respected. His acute analyses and calmly disarming court manners, loaded with strategic intents, instilled confidence. He also shared one of my favourite books The Grapes of Wrath.

He made the rare move of sending me a brief personal email the day before judgement day: ‘You’ll be acquitted tomorrow if justice still has meaning.’ I was grateful for his reassuring prognosis and exceptional display of personal feelings, though his well-intended message unduly raised my optimism even further, and filled me with dangerous hope.

Anticipating a favourable verdict, I planned to celebrate the end of my slo-mo ordeal with friends and families who had been showing up in numbers, filling the last few hearings with hush-hush greetings, hugs, and surprise whispers.

Oh my God! He’s at university? Last time he was only this tall.

We must get together more often!

They lent the ambience of a grandparent’s funeral to the courtroom, until the marshal announced the judge’s colourful arrival with as much pomp and solemnity a lowly paid public servant could muster in English: ‘Coo…ourt!’

Let’s go get drunk after the verdict, dear friends and families!

I might have tempted fate, but I had extremely strong reasons to be optimistic rather than superstitious.

I’m a typical engineer — cautiously optimistic, accepting risks to be unavoidable, always prepared for contingencies. Some have labelled me ‘cynical’ because they can’t distinguish realism from cynicism, but nobody has ever called me a wishful thinker. Yet, throughout the trial, I had been uncharacteristically sanguine. In my mind, acquittal was the only possible outcome to this dumbfounding trial.

Of course I knew that common sense was rare. With due respect, I also expected judges to be insular beings with multiple fragilities and personality faults. Decades of managing engineering contracts had also taught me that reasonableness is subjective, even delusive. The human world comprises multiple shades of grey, shifting according to self-interest. Nonetheless, I strongly believed in an instinctual sense of reasonableness among humans, however vague it may be. Without that as foundation, human societies might just collapse; no contract or agreement can possibly cover every possibility, no matter how wordy. It’s that critical, seriously. It underscores Homo sapiens’ viability as a social species.

In my reasonable judgement, our case is so fundamentally clear-cut it leaves no room for misjudgement. Having linked my judiciary fate to the future of mankind, I felt assured and confident. Plus the alleged offence was committed outside Hong Kong’s jurisdiction, so, there you go. I regarded myself legally, morally, judicially, and anthropologically protected. Local bureaucrats had fabricated a case out of thin air to keep in-boxes full and employment contracts renewed, that’s all.

However…

‘Perhaps we should cancel the booking?’ I interrupted Satu’s meditation over pale blue smoke twirling in an imperceptible breeze. ‘Doesn’t seem right to party anymore.’

‘Let’s think about that later.’ Difficult decision.

‘It shouldn’t be long according to Derek.’

‘Breakfast?’

‘Sure.’

Good thing that I ate. It was to be my last meal of the day.

It’s late morning. John and I are inside the dock, a cage for presumably innocent defendants. Throughout the trial, we were kindly permitted to sit at the gallery, probably because we wore nice suits and expensive ties. Today, things are more formal. When we arrived, the duty guard from the Correctional Services Department (CSD) checked our IDs, then asked us to enter the cage. He came in after us, sat by the entrance, and pulled the door shut with a clank. The gallery is packed. Late comers have to stand. Collective whispers sound like a drain pipe in a soft rain. Those who catch our eyes make encouraging gestures.

John, the First Defendant in the present trial, is an old-school Briton a few years my senior, my predecessor at the Company from which I retired as Director and General Manager four years ago in 2008. When I took over, he had gone to work for the French shareholder. That didn’t last long; Anglo-French cooperations seldom do. They seem to me two cultural siblings with similar background and aspiration stuck in very different self-image, secretly admiring and loathing the way each other appears to be. But John was very experienced in the solid waste business, and one of the most meticulous workers I knew, so I retained him as Special Project Director at the Company level, chiefly responsible for tender management, and Macau where he had a long history and great personal connections. Who could have guessed that dreamy Macau would one day turn into this nightmare?

‘Coo…ourt!’

The learned judge looks fancy today, donning a yellowish springy peruke, looking like an emoji. The gallery quiets down. Everyone stands.

I childishly admire his wig again to distract myself from mouth-drying anticipation. Does he powder it to hide the funk like people did in the old days, or take it to the neighbourhood dry cleaner instead? A historian friend told me that the perukes became fashionable because of syphilis, a hair-losing disease common among licentious gentlemen with high stations and low judgement. Soon, they all wore wigs whether or not they had sexy bald spots to confuse the public. But donning animal hair once used to whisk flies off the natural owner’s butt in this climate seems crazy. I’ve also been told that judges and barristers never wash their wigs. The faint stain of tropical sweat accumulated over the years are status symbols in their business.

His Honour keeps his head down, lifting his eyes halfway to acknowledge the gallery’s greeting, then sits down behind his elevated bench. He proceeds immediately to look busy with the papers before him, avoiding eye-contact with anyone.

After a brief moment of obligatory suspense, he recaps a few salient points about the case unceremoniously, reading from a prepared sheet. He sums up the lengthy trial in five minutes; I could have done that in three. In conclusion, he says he finds the accomplice witness compelling.

What?!

Who?

He’s the one and only witness in the trial — an accomplice witness for that matter.

He’s one of a few convicted persons in Macau’s unprecedented corruption scandal who isn’t a family member of the phenomenally corrupt ex-Secretary for Transport and Public Works Mr. Ao Man Long.

He’s the person who admitted to this court when cross-examined, to this very judge sitting up there, to having previously lied four times under oath.

He’s someone who sent a letter (Yes, Your Honour, in black and white, incredible isn’t it? The letter you read carefully and admitted as an Exhibit, remember? Where is it now?) from his cell in a Macau prison to extort money from the Company. ‘Otherwise,’ he threatened without mincing words. ‘I promise there’ll be trouble.’ The Company refused. Two days later, coincidentally, he reported to Hong Kong’s work-hungry anti-corruption agency, the ICAC.

The judge just pronounced this witness compelling because ‘he freely admitted to having lied on multiple occasions. That tells me he’s now telling the truth.’

The gallery gasps.

I swallow saliva, or air.

The extortion letter is not mentioned. A minor detail. File lost?

Logic is subjective and personal, but — only to a certain extent, right?

Nope.

Goddammit, Derek’s right.

A while ago, Derek and I went through some glaringly contradictory statements the witness had previously made to the Macanese anti-corruption agency and law courts at various levels. These official testimonials, most of them made under oath, explicitly contradicted each other, as well as the most recent version he had given to the Hong Kong court. He seemed prolifically imaginative and grievously amnesiac, recalling irreconcilable stories each time he was interrogated or cross-examined.

I expressed relief. Nobody — hey, nobody! — would rely on a witness like him. Without him, there’ll be no case at all.

Derek begged to differ, as usual.

From experience, he said, someone may coach him to admit immediately to having lied when questioned, in order to deflect attacks on his credibility and gain the judge’s confidence.

‘What?’ I blurted. ‘Now, Derek, don’t be ridiculous. That’s too cynical even for me. Is your lawyer clock ticking? I’m not paying for this one.’

‘Well, let’s hope I’m wrong,’ he laughed.

‘I know you are.’

But that is exactly what the judge just said, nearly verbatim of Derek’s ridiculous concern, before a full gallery. It has been duly transcribed for the archive, to be made Googleable in due course.

My head reels. I don’t know what to think, but faintly realise that thinking is pointless under the circumstances.

I instinctively entered emergency mode: Focus on blanking out the moment.

Satu breaks down sobbing. I wave, then raise a fist — Hey, be strong! Am I still qualified to be supportive?

The gallery appears more dumbfounded than I am. In an email a few days earlier, I cheekily asked a few friends to ‘come celebrate with us, or see me off.’

A few wave at me but I can’t make out who they are.

I turn to John. Oh no, he looks dead.

After the English judge has given his verdict, the attendant gaoler rouses from his daydream and confirms with me in Cantonese: ‘No good for you guys, right?’

I nod.

He remains affable, but a tad more authoritative.

A colleague of his enters through the backdoor without knocking. I hadn’t noticed there’s a hidden doorway inside the cage. They escort us backstage, and put a pair of handcuffs on John and I, one loop each.

Mine’s too tight.

‘Can it be loosened a bit?’

‘Sure.’ He removes an inner shim, then closes the loop.

I thank him, then add: ‘Ah Sir.’ In their hands now, better be respectful.

We take a lift down to the basement.

Once underground, they remove the cuffs. All that for a fifteen-second elevator ride? I suppose it serves a psychological purpose. John and I have made the transition from being defendants to convicts awaiting sentencing.

We are sent to separate cubicles, a little bigger than clothing store fitting rooms.

An officer wearing tight surgical gloves gives clear and simple orders: ‘Remove all your clothes. Empty the pockets. Spread the contents out on the table.’

I promptly obey.

‘Hands on the wall. Spread your legs.’

Oh no.

I fixed my gaze on a dirt spot on the wall. There are quite a few.

Is that an ancient snot smear with dried blood?

Nothing happens.

Another long moment. Bated breath. Still nothing.

The relevant muscles relax a little. Is he conducting a visual inspection at arm’s length? Or texting his wife behind my back?

‘Put your clothes back on,’ he orders.

‘Thank you, Ah Sir.’ I let out an imperceptible sigh of relief, feeling nearly happy.

Exiting the tiny room, I feel giddy, as if rousing from general anaesthetics.

‘Keep to the wall,’ another officer takes over, directing me from behind. The place is packed with screws. Many look dazed as they roam about, looking aimless, probably from carbohydrate overdose at lunch. My colleagues from Paris would commission a huge team of consultants to study streamlining and reorganisation options.

Why must we walk along the wall? I wonder.

Better stop asking why from now on. Just listen, obey, observe, and shut up.

We turn left at the end of the wall into a long corridor. Cells on both sides. The guard overtakes me and stands wordlessly beside an empty one. His expressionless face tells me he’s either distracted by other thoughts, or bored. I walk in, assuming that’s what he wants me to do. He closes the gate — clank — then saunters away without double checking if the gate has been properly closed. From the time he takes charge of me, he hasn’t looked me in the eyes once. He doesn’t care, the message is clear, but doesn’t seem belligerent either. I stare at his back until he turns the corner. His indifference seems deliberate.

Later on, I’ll discover that his mannerism is industry standard. Not hostile, not friendly, as little human interaction as possible, nothing personal. I suppose that’s a sensible way to spend time with a bunch of criminals 24/7. Right this moment, however, I’m yet to register what has just happened to me, fully and thoroughly befuddled, definitely not in the mood for analyses.

My room — cell — is quite sizeable, about seven to eight square metres, brightly lit, sparsely furnished, reasonably clean. At the far right corner is a squat toilet on an elevated platform, a mini stage. People with performance anxiety will prefer constipation. Next to the entrance is a tiny dull grey fibreglass stand. On it is a translucent plastic mug covered by a thick slab of white bread. I lift the bread to investigate. Gruel — soybean gruel! Concentration camp gruel! I love soybean derivatives but detest the beans themselves. Try a little bit anyway. Yuck. Medium rare beans in lukewarm diluted brine. What if this is all I’ll get in the years to come? My heart sinks.

Through two layers of steel bars, across the narrow corridor, barely a few metres away, my neighbour squats over his elevated toilet with head down, making audible efforts. I’m not fastidious, but decide to skip my first prison lunch.

I sit down in front of the stand, facing inside to give the guy nominal privacy, and blank out. My fingers feel icy.

Later — half an hour? an hour? — the taciturn guard reappears. Silently, he unlocks and opens the gate. Silently, I follow him to the elevator. John’s already there, waiting to share his handcuff with me. He’s never late.

The air in the packed gallery seems thicker, more difficult to breathe. Satu looks calmer. I give her my best smile. Strength and resignation, alas.

The learned judge looks less sombre. Must have had a good lunch. He announces without looking up that he’s ‘sentencing with a heavy heart’, probably paving his way for a stiff decompression drink after this unpleasant task. He once had his membership suspended by the Cricket Club — where most members don’t play or watch cricket and John is a senior member — for an alcohol related misdemeanour. In Hong Kong’s tight and tiny British circle, gossips travel at the speed of sound. Would the honourable judge be…No! Absolutely impossible. Just the thought constitutes contempt of court, stop right there…

Listen!

As I daydream anecdotally about His Honour, he compliments us!

‘They have been exemplary citizens, and are leaders in their profession. It’s clear that they did not seek personal gains from the crime.’

With due humility, I wholeheartedly agree with him. Nice of him to clarify publicly for the record though. I wish I could reciprocate honestly with some nice thoughts. There’s a sober sense of absurdity in his speech. He must have grown up watching Monty Python.

Maybe he’ll acquit us in his next breath, then apologise for the prank? Ha ha.

After beating around the court with apologetic niceties, he finally comes to the sentencing. He starts with four years, much shorter than Derek’s scaremongering estimate. ‘If you guys are convicted, which is quite unlikely, it’ll be five to seven years minimum because of the amount involved,’ he said, equivocally stating a matter of fact with due emphasis on minimum.

‘A minimum of five to seven is redundant, Derek, you’re a lawyer,’ I corrected him. ‘Just say a minimum of five.’

Thankfully, John and I have been nice guys — exemplary in His Honour’s esteemed opinion. Furthermore, the judge adds with heightened compassion that we have suffered undue distress during the drawn-out process. (So, he has noticed too!) Putting these factors together, he hereby mitigates our sentence by nine months. Not bad. Bureaucratic inefficiency isn’t all bad. What’s four years less nine months? Thirty nine months. If I refrain from dangerous drugs, vicious fights, and sexual assaults, there’ll be a further discount.

The big black ugly van with grilled windows and gruff suspension is about to exit the basement carpark.

A guard hands John and I each a face mask. ‘Journalists outside,’ he warns.

Unlike ICAC agents and DOJ prosecutors who overtly smooch to journalists in the courtroom, handing out readily usable Press Releases with big fawning smiles, CSD officers don’t care for media attention. I take mine, thank him, and translate for John who can’t understand Cantonese after having lived and worked here for a quarter of a century. He’s finally been given one of the most effective and forceful opportunities to learn the native language.

The gate rolls open. A swarm of reporters flickers against a screen of sunlight, pushing cameras against caged windows.

Journalists are like flies, constantly in search of steamy ordure for a living. Are we their poo poo du jour? Our boring case doesn’t involve intricate plots or sex or violence. It’s hardly newsworthy. Why the excitement? Because it’s an unprecedented conviction of extra-territorial bribery by a reputable old British Hong? It’s a landmark case. The ICAC has opened up a new horizon. It can now extend its arm well beyond Hong Kong’s tiny boundaries. Its ‘business development manager’, whatever his official title is, must be high-fiving his colleagues right now. Tomorrow, he would revise his annual budget and business projection. Many anti-corruption officers are on a renewable two-year contract partly because their predecessors had done an excellent job, and greatly reduced demand for their professional talents. What unfortunate irony. The men and women handling our case can now count on renewing their contracts. They know we will appeal for sure, and that may take years. Steady business.

John doubles over to bury his face between his knees, as if expecting a plane crash. Bent by desperation, he reveals a talent in yoga.

I stare straight at them instead, fascinated by the perplexing frenzy.

Go ahead. Can’t change my pose though. Locked in here. Sorry.

With a little gas, the vintage vehicle wallows onto Queensway, leaving the predatory foot-soldiers of the free-press behind to review hastily snapped shots on camera monitors. The outside world looks strange to me, as usual. A tram trundles past, rumbling dreamily, defying urban anxiety as it has done for more than a century. The Admiralty subway station looks unreal, deserted.

Half an hour later, we arrive at the Lai Chi Kok Reception Centre on Butterfly Valley Road, adjacent to Mei Foo — Hong Kong’s first mega housing estate by a private developer. When a kid, father had especially taken me here for a visit. A novelty back then, it now looks antiquated, just as ugly.

Derek had met with me briefly in the basement after the sentencing.

‘The legal team opines that the judge has erred on numerous points,’ he assured me with a beam, using lawyer words. ‘The company has already instructed us to prepare the appeal application immediately.’

Has he, like the ICAC, included us in his annual budget, even the next five-year-plan? Our 50:50 chance event is turning out more sustainably profitable than initially expected. It’d be only prudent to revise the financial projection accordingly.

He noted as an aside before departing: ‘Oh, by the way, Lai Chi Kok is a leftover dungeon, the worst hellhole in Hong Kong.’

I looked at him blankly. Is he trying to be funny?

But he appeared earnest, probably with the good intention of preparing me for the worst. He has been most consistent and perspicacious in foreseeing the worst possible outcome for more than two years though.

‘Thanks, Derek,’ I said. ‘Thank you very much.’

He didn’t seem to have registered sarcasm.

* * *

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