HV2?

Getting my excuses in: Recently, I've been abducted by David Icke, hit by Russian meteors, and you don't even want to know about the North Koreans.

Or maybe you do.

HV2 is on it's way. Slowly. Very, very slowly, but it's coming:

“You’re a hard man to find, Harry Vee,” said the woman.

Clearly not hard enough, thought Harry.

He didn’t turn around but sat at the bar staring into the depths of his Dry Martini. Oil from the single olive had formed a slick on the surface. He’d been playing with this drink, his last, for twenty minutes or more and it was warm.

Nothing worse than a warm Martini.

The woman spoke again. “I was told you could help me.”

An English accent, cultured, delicate. Harry stared into the flashing neon tubelights that provided most of the illumination in the bar. He stared into the clock which so proudly declared it Miller Time, although if he’d bothered to glance round at the lack of other clientele in the place, he might have felt inclined to disagree. “I don’t know why anyone would tell you that,” he said.  

“I’m looking for someone,” she said.

Harry pushed against the bar to swing himself unsteadily round on his stool. He faced a young woman who didn’t belong, in so many ways. She didn’t belong in Hong Kong, in this district, in this bar, and certainly not at half-past one in the morning. Her blonde hair was curled too delicately at the ends, her wire-frame glasses too carefully chosen for a late night out in eastern Wan Chai, the red light district on the northern edge of Hong Kong Island. The conservative suit was too warm for the weather, and her face showed uncertainty at her surroundings. Uncomfortable. But apparently determined.

“I’m looking for someone. I was told you do that sort of thing.” She held out a business card. “Rebecca Phillips.”

Harry tried to focus on the card. It wasn’t easy. “Tell me, Rebecca Phillips, Freelance Journalist: do you know what Humphrey Bogart’s last words were?”

Confusion on her face, “No, Mr Vee, I can’t say that I do.”

Harry swung back around and called to the Chinese girl polishing glasses in the corner. “Kimmy,” he said, pushing the Martini back across the bar, “Never serve me one of these again, you understand?”