At the end of Dirk's Street, directly ahead, was Connaught Road and the praya, then sea walls and the squat bulk of the Golden Ferry Terminal. Dunross slowed, blinded, the wipers unable to cope with the quantity of rain, the wind tearing at the canvas roof and side screens. The number nine storm warning had been hoisted at dusk and already eighty– to a hundred-knot gusts came out of the tempest that stretched a thousand miles southward to send the rain horizontal against the roofs and hillsides where tens of thousands of squatters huddled defenseless in their shantytowns of makeshift hovels. Throughout the Colony-here on Hong Kong Island, across the harbour in Kowloon and the New Territories that were part of the China Mainland-streets were almost totally deserted, everyone and everything battened down, waiting for Typhoon Mary. : His name was Ian Dunross and in the torrential rain he drove his old MG sports car cautiously around the corner into Dirk's Street that skirted the Struan Building on the waterfront of Hong Kong. I would also like to apologize at once to all Hong Kong yan-all Hong Kong persons-for rearranging their beautiful city, for taking incidents out of context, for inventing people and places and streets and companies and incidents that, hopefully, may appear to have existed but have never existed, for this, truly, is a story. It is peopled with imaginary persons and companies and no reference to any person or company that was, or is, part of Hong Kong or Asia is intended. ISBN: 3-4 Reprinted by arrangement with Delacorte Press Printed in the United States of America First Dell printing-March 1982 I would like to offer this work as a tribute to Her Britannic Majesty, Elizabeth II, to the people of Her Crown Colony of Hong Kong-and perdition to their enemies. Dell® TM 681510, Dell Publishing Co., Inc. For information address Delacorte Press, New York, New York. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. 1 Dag Hammarskjold Plaza New York, New York 10017 Copyright© 1981 by James Clavell All rights reserved. Noble House James Clavell's NOBLE HOUSE A Novel of Contemporary Hong Kong A DELL BOOK Published by Dell Publishing Co., Inc. JAMES CLAVELL'S NOBLE HOUSE NOBLE HOUSE THE CHILDREN'S STORY NOBLE HOUSE is the fourth novel in the Asian Saga that so far consists of: A.D.

Ian dunross noble house