“Oh—here he comes, looking blacker than the devil. Let’s have some fun with him, shall we?” Harry said to his friend. “Lovely day, isn’t it?” he called out.
“It might have been, had you not…” Michael began in a surly tone, before catching sight of the man standing next to his father-in-law. It was Hu Lee Shan, the minister of commerce, nattily dressed in a brightly striped Sligo golf shirt.
“Good morning, Mr. Teo,” the minister said jovially.
Forcing a smile, Michael said, “Good morning, sir.” Bloody hell! No wonder he was able to sabotage my meeting so quickly. He’s golfing with the friggin’ boss of the boss of the Monetary Authority!
“Thank you for meeting me on such short notice,” Harry continued politely. “Now, I’ll get right to the point: this matter over the silly magazine story.”
“
I’m sorry, Dad. It was never my intention for your name to get mentioned,” Michael began.
“Oh I don’t care about my name. I mean, who am I in the grand scheme of things, right? I’m a public servant—people can print any sort of nonsense they want about me. It’s all much ado about nothing in my opinion, but, you see, other names were mentioned in that article. Other people who are touchy about such things. Like my wife and my mother-in-law. That side of the family. You know how we mustn’t ever upset Astrid’s grandmother, or Uncle Alfred.”
“Heh heh heh—no one should ever upset Alfred Shang,” chuckled the minister.
Michael wanted to roll his eyes. What was the big deal about Alfred Shang that made every man so bo lam pa*4 in his presence? “I really had no idea that reporter was going to go digging. It was only supposed to be a flattering stor—”
Harry cut him off mid-word. “The Tattle people know never to write about us. So you went to the other magazine, Pompous or whatever it’s called. Tell me, what did you hope to achieve?”
“I thought the article would allow me to increase my company’s profile while respecting Astrid’s—and your family’s—need for privacy.”
“And do you think it does? I’m assuming you’ve read the article by now.”
Michael swallowed hard. “It doesn’t quite do what I had hoped.”
“Makes you out to be a pretentious buffoon, doesn’t it?” Harry said, as he reached for another putter. “Try this Honma, Lee Shan.”
Michael’s jaw tightened. If the minister wasn’t right there, he would give this old man a piece of his mind!
The minister executed a precise chipping swing and the golf ball rolled smoothly into the hole.
“Nice shot, sir,” Michael said.
“Do you play, Mr. Teo?”
“I do when I can.”
The minister glanced at Harry as he stepped up to the tee box and said, “You’re a lucky man—you have a son-in-law who golfs. My kids are far too preoccupied with their important lives to ever play with me.”
“We should all play at my club at Sentosa sometime. The ocean views are spectacular,” Michael offered.
Harry paused in the middle of his golf swing. “You know, I’ve never set foot in that club and I plan to die never having set foot there. If I’m not at St. Andrews or Pebble Beach, the only place I play is the old course right here.”
“I feel the same way, Harry,” the minister said. “Didn’t you use to catch Concorde to London on Fridays after work and then hop over to Edinburgh just to play a round at St. Andrews?”
“Those were the old days when I only had the weekends to spare. Now that I’m semiretired, I can go a whole week at Pebble Beach.”
Michael fumed in silence, wondering when this audience was ever going to end. As if reading his mind, his father-in-law looked him in the eye and said, “I need you to do something for me. I need you to go in person and apologize to your mother-in-law.”
“Of course. I’ll even write a letter to the magazine disavowing the article, if that’s what you want.”
“There’s no need—I’ve bought up the entire print run and had every issue of the magazine pulled from the bookstores and pulped,” Harry said lightly.
Michael’s eyes widened.
“Heh heh heh. All those subscribers are going to wonder why Pinnacle is missing from their mailboxes this month,” the minister cracked.