Make a phone call and ask the switchboard to transfer...
Thinking of the detective films he had seen before, Han Yu’s eyes lit up, and he lifted the walkie-talkie to call Director Zhang.
"They might make calls to others, and others might call them too. Plus, this Ye guy has a pager; in East Sea, people can page him if they need something, and if it works here as well, they will definitely call back when paged."
"Whether making or receiving calls, it all goes through the switchboard!"
"If we could go to the switchboard and listen in on their conversations, we could figure out exactly what they’re up to."
"Salted Fish, this is a great idea. I’ll report to the leadership right away; there shouldn’t be any problem."
The Sailor Club’s switchboard is inside the Sailor Club itself; the leaders just need to notify the person in charge of the club to go and monitor, no need to ask the post and telecommunications office.
Moreover, we have already obtained evidence of three suspects violating the foreign exchange regulations.
Zhang Junyan thought it made more and more sense, and immediately went upstairs to find the chief, who had just returned from a meeting, to report on the investigation progress and request to arrange for police to monitor the Sailor Club’s switchboard.
Two suspects have been captured, and more than fifty-six thousand Yuan involved in the case have been seized, and various signs indicate that what has been discovered might just be the tip of the iceberg.
Director Chen of the Binjiang Port Police Bureau felt it was necessary to employ technical methods on the three suspects. Considering the shortage of personnel on Zhang Junyan and Jiang Xiaojun’s team, he not only agreed immediately but also ordered the Security Department and the Political Security Department to allocate three police officers to join the operation.
Han Yu received the news that police were monitoring the switchboard at 5:56 PM.
His sister was worried about Xiao Dongdong and took a half-hour leave to go and check.
Upstairs in the guest rooms, he was the only "attendant," and with no one to keep a lookout, he had to turn off the walkie-talkie, or else it would be easy to blow his cover.
Just as he was wondering if the three suspects might make a call, Sister Wu, who was responsible for the first-floor guest rooms, came upstairs with two lunch boxes.
"San’er, it’s time to eat!"
"Sister Wu, whose lunch boxes are these?"
"Are you saying they’re unhygienic?"
"How could that be possible? I’m afraid they might find me unhygienic."
"The lunch boxes belong to Director Jiang, just clean them after eating. There are foreign guests today, so they baked bread downstairs. I sneaked one for you; eat it quickly before they see you."
"It’s just a bread, no big deal. If you’re not eating, hide it well so you can let your sister take it to Dongdong later."
Sister Wu looked back, then said with a mix of envy and jealousy, "Speaking of sneaking food, the waitresses down in the restaurant, which one hasn’t snacked? Bread, cake, milk, ice cream—they eat whatever’s there, almost more than the guests."
The Sailor Club is definitely a place full of mutual envy and disdain.
The restaurant waitresses are young and pretty girls; they think the housekeeping sisters have an easy job as they are always slacking and can freely swap shifts.
The housekeeping sisters envied them for being young and beautiful and working in the restaurant with plenty of delicious food to eat.
On the matter of how the waitressing department and housekeeping department view the foreign trade shop sales staff on the first floor, their attitudes are strikingly unanimous.
They all think the sales staff have it the easiest, sitting pretty at the counter, all dolled up, doing nothing. If it weren’t for the recent spike in prices, they wouldn’t sell much tobacco and alcohol in a year.
The most detached in status are arguably the chefs in the back kitchen, the cooks, and the pastry chefs, though it’s said they too are divided into several factions.
The chefs who do stir-frying look down on the ones who make Western cuisine, and the Western chefs don’t think much of the stir-fryers. The pastry chefs who make buns, dumplings, and rolls don’t get along with the ones who make bread and cakes.
As Sister Xu says, the interpersonal relationships within the club are quite complex.
Han Yu was an outsider and didn’t want to get involved in this topic. He hid the bread, opened the lunch box, and curiously asked, "Sister Wu, the seven guest rooms were tidied up early, when are the foreign guests arriving?"
"Manager Wang called the ship agency, who said they’re handing over things on the ship. The old captain and a few old crewmen can’t leave the ship until they finish handing over."
"When will the handover be done?"
"I don’t know either."
As they were chatting, downstairs, a guest called for a waitress.
Sister Wu didn’t dare to keep the guest waiting and hurried down with the lunch boxes.
The staff at the Sailor Club have a pretty good meal—there’s one meat dish, one vegetable, and a soup, but you have to get the soup from the staff canteen yourself.
Han Yu was only halfway through his meal when Ye Xingguo, Zhang Asheng, and the couple Shen Rulan came out.
Seeing the three approach the duty room door, Han Yu quickly put down his chopsticks and stood up.
"Manager Ye, going out for dinner?"
"We ate late at lunchtime, not really hungry, thought we’d go downstairs for a walk first."
Ye Xingguo stopped in his tracks, peeked in, and then smiled, "You’ve started eating too, sautéed chicken, not bad."
Han Yu didn’t know how to respond, when Shen Rulan, all done up, squeezed to the edge of the door and smiled, "Are you Manager Ye’s hometown boy, Salted Fish?"
"Where’s your sister?"
"I’ve gone home to see the kids, I’ll be right back. If there’s anything you need, you can tell me."
Shen Rulan knew that Ye Xingguo had talked with this little punk about Foreign Exchange Certificates, and she asked frankly, "Salted Fish, I hear that some sailors are coming ashore today and staying here. When will they arrive?"
She wouldn’t be asking this for no reason; it was obvious that she was waiting for the foreign sailors.
Han Yu hurriedly said, "I just inquired. Sister Wu downstairs said that the crew on the ship is still handing over duties and they can only come over after that’s completed."
"How many days did they book their rooms for? How long are they planning to stay?"
"It seems they only booked for one night and will leave early tomorrow morning."
"They’re in such a hurry, why aren’t they staying for a few more days?"
"They are off the ship on vacation; they probably want to get home quickly. Sister Xu at the front desk is a schoolmate of the translator Yang from the Ship Agency. Sister Xu said the Ship Agency has booked all their tickets for them."
Han Yu noticed that all three of them carried a bag wherever they went, and without asking, he knew the bags were full of money, fearing it was unsafe to leave them in their rooms.
Ye Xingguo didn’t know what Han Yu was thinking, and subconsciously asked, "Tickets for where?"
"For East Sea tomorrow morning."
"Did Miss Xu at the front desk say anything else?"
"Sister Xu mentioned that Translator Yang is also going to East Sea tomorrow, and will be taking those foreign sailors all the way to the airport."
Shen Rulan’s husband, Zhang Asheng, the short and chubby suspect with a mole on his chin, thought this situation was very important, and immediately pulled out his keys: "Manager Ye, I need to make a phone call in my room first."
Ye Xingguo also felt that time was of the essence, and said pensively, "Let’s go together."
In the telephone switchboard room of the Sailor Club, not only were the two police officers from the Security Department of Binjiang Port Police Station wearing headsets like the operators, but one was stationed at a recorder with a large reel of tape and the other was ready with a pen to take notes.
The operator on duty was a bit nervous at first, but has now relaxed quite a bit. As soon as the indicator light came on, he would ask in standard Mandarin where the call was to be directed, and then unplugged and plugged it into the corresponding socket.
There were a lot of calls, keeping him happily busy.
However, until now, the targeted rooms 216 and 218 remained silent.
As the operator wondered why, the indicator light for room 218 lit up. He quickly gestured to connect the call and pressed the headset to ask, "Hello, this is the switchboard operator, may I ask where would you like to call?"
"Hello, I’m the guest in room 218. I need to make two calls, one local to Binjiang and one long-distance to East Sea. Do you dial for me or do I dial directly from here?"
"Hello, I will connect you to the external line, and you can dial directly."
"Alright, thank you."
After waiting for a few hours, there was finally some activity.
The tall police officer immediately pressed the record button, and the tape reels began to spin audibly.
The short police officer held his pen tightly, fully focused.
The operator turned on the timer, while also busy connecting other internal calls, and looked curiously at them.
"Brother Zhu, it’s me, Zhang Asheng. I bought tickets from you before, that’s right, three for tomorrow morning to East Sea. You don’t have third-class? Come on, think of a way, money is not an issue. Okay, okay. I’m staying in room 218 at the Sailor Club..."
The call was to a scalper to buy boat tickets.
The short police officer peeked at the timer and quickly noted the scalper’s phone number.
Now they were dealing with a major case, and they didn’t have time to focus on the scalper selling tickets.
He was thinking that once the current major case was over and with the evidence they had, they could pass it on to the Binjiang Port Police Station for investigation. The suspect then dialed the second call.
From the conversation, it appeared that the other side was a public phone.
After waiting about two minutes, the actual target arrived and asked urgently, "Who is this?"
"Brother-in-law, what’s wrong? Is there a problem with how things are going?"
"Everything’s going smoothly, but there’s been a bit of a change. Those guys are going to East Sea around early morning tomorrow to take a flight back home. They are still transferring duties on the ship and haven’t disembarked yet.
We don’t have much time left. If we can’t make a deal here in Binjiang, we might have to go to the airport tomorrow. Can you drive to the port to pick us up tomorrow?"
The person on the other end of the line said, "Among those disembarking for vacation this time, the captain is German, and the rest are Indians. Indians are tricky; if there’s money to be made, they won’t pass it up."
Zhang Asheng said, "They haven’t been to China before. What if they don’t trust us and are afraid to accept our Foreign Exchange Certificates?"
"Brother-in-law, are you planning to go with them to the airport and stay with them until they exchange the Foreign Exchange Certificates for US Dollars?"
"If it comes to that, I will have to."
"Brother-in-law, I probably can’t pick you up tomorrow, it’s really busy at the company recently, the leaders need the car every day..."
"If you can’t make it, help me find a car."
"Alright. Wait for those Indians to come ashore, then you try talking to them. If you can make a deal, great. If they don’t trust you, call me at that time and I’ll help you find a car."