Yin Yang Tattoo Read Online Free Page B

over bills that have yet to arrive – I would turn up on the other side of the world with credit cards groaning, and next to no cash. I kept telling myself I would be earning by then. Earning serious money.
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    Checking in a mountain of luggage creates its own headaches, but the generous Business Class allowance saw off much of the excess baggage bill and the rest of the potential damage died in the face of a calm declaration that of course the heaviest of my stand bags was a set of golf clubs.
    Airlines can afford to treat Economy class passengers like second-class citizens, but they fall over themselves to keep businessmen’s bums out of the competition’s club-class seats. With a Business class ticket, golf bags fly free if you insist, and I insisted. I may only be an average photographer, but when it comes to lying to people in uniform, I know I am world-class.
    I was flying Korean Air because to my hosts, ardent patriots to the last, my arrival on the national flag carrier could only generate points in my favour. In Asia, little things go a long way towards setting things off on the right foot.
    There was another reason for flying Korean Air. Like mobile foreign embassies, airliners are patches of mother soil arranged in an ever-moving diaspora, never mind that the livery and the fittings all hail from Seattle. The moment I stepped aboard that Korean Air jet at Heathrow I was already in a little fragment of Korea, and that was fine by me.
    I settled into my upper deck lounge bed of a seat. I had done it, mission accomplished, and I was buckled up and Seoul-bound. Pre-flight orange juice or champagne, Sir ? Just leave the bottle, will you. The champagne bottle.
    The public address system burbled with the soft tones of the Captain welcoming everyone aboard, wishing us all a pleasant flight, and taking a moment to remind us to switch off all mobile phones before the aircraft left the terminal. My hand reached instinctively towards my pocket, but stopped half-way as my mind’s eye drew an instant picture of my mobile exactly where I had left it, plugged into the charger at home.
    Right now the only other cloud on my horizon hung over the seat next to me, enough perfume to wrinkle noses downstairs in Economy. I have a theory that the power of a woman’s scent is directly proportionate to her ugliness and here was a case in point. She was an ageing Filipina, hair of the monotone dulled black that comes only from a bottle, heavily-painted face pulled surgically taut across razor cheekbones, a reptilian neck ringed by oversized pearls.
    At least she was on the window side, as I was in the aisle seat that I had been so careful to reserve. Window seats are fine for tourists, but the frequent flier knows an aisle seat is all about freedom. Freedom to walk off the threat of deep-vein thrombosis, freedom to have drinks and whatever delivered as you like, freedom to hit on the stewardesses in their tight primary-coloured dresses and immaculate make-up, lustrous black hair pulled back in pony tails that accentuated almond eyes and broad, honest foreheads.
    Once we reached cruising altitude I gave Miss Lee the flight attendant my warmest smile and, speaking Korean, asked for a Bloody Mary, a double in a tall glass, plenty of pepper and Worcester and three big drops of Tabasco. Two minutes later, with the drink and a bowl of smoked almonds in front of me, I ran through some mental checklists. I had every intention of drinking far too much during the flight, but first, there was thinking to be done.
    I was surprised when Rhee vetoed my request to take an assistant to Korea. This kind of work almost invariably involved one or more paid assistants, but Seoul insisted that local help would be provided, and I reluctantly conceded the point. More of a worry was the expenses situation. Standard practice is for half of the entire fee to be paid upfront. I had settled for a fraction of that from Rhee, and now I hoped that