929 Diamonds, Diamonds, Diamonds
Harry Winston Inc.'s annual meeting was very successful—extremely successful. The shareholders had shifted all their attention to the gentleman's agreement between Carlston and Li Du.
The majority of them were in favor of Carlston. Cole was the only one who supported Li Du.
It was nighttime. He invited Li Du to dinner to discuss the classified information of Harry Winston Inc.
Carlston Frits was a well-known gemstone merchant. According to him, his family had been in the same field for many years.
The Fritz started their business by searching for rubies and sapphire. Then, they began to search for diamonds in the 20th century. They were able to converge these businesses a developed great wealth. They even owned a diamond mine in Canada.
Cole's decision to invest in Ekati Diamond Mine might be related to the Fritz. In regards to this, he was not certain. It was just his own assumption.
Carlston had the ability to be very slick and sly. He stated during the board meeting that he was fully against the investment in the Ekati Diamond Mine. However, during Cole's and Carlston's private conversations, Carlston would always support this investment. He did not show his support directly but in secret.
He gathered a lot of information for Cole. Finally, the information led to the conclusion that Ekati Diamond Mine was a diamond beneficiation mine, which would improve the future prospects of Harry Winston Inc.
Based on the information, Cole insisted and purchased the mine. In the end, when the mine was properly reclaimed, it turned out to be an abandoned ruin.
Carlston had risen in revolt during the board meeting. He raised difficult questions against Cole's decision. He claimed that since the very beginning he had been against Cole regarding the Ekati Diamond Mine investment decision. As a result, he gained the majority of the shareholders' support.
At this point in time, Cole downed two glasses of wine.
Without a doubt, this was a tough blow.
Later, Cole had investigated the Ekati Diamond Mine case. He realized that there was a connection between the Fritz and the mine. In public, the mine was owned by the largest mining company in the world, BHP Billiton Co. In reality, part of its ownership rights belonged to the Fritz.
His guess was that Carlston had intended to kill two birds with one stone. He secretly encouraged Cole to purchase the mine, but publicly claimed he was against it. This way, he was able to gain the support of the shareholders and earn money at the same time.
Of course, Cole admitted that he couldn't blame Carlston on this. He had been too clumsy.
However, Cole was not pleased with Carlston. Last year, the Swatch Group had raised difficult questions to Harry Winston Inc. They wanted to acquire his group.
During this matter, Carlston had been deceptive. He used his identity as the group's second-largest equity holder to spread the negative news. For this reason, many shareholders were eager to sell their equity shares.
Cole was extremely bothered by Carlston. Hence, when Carlston's sons and Li Du had a conflict, he'd helped Li Du out.
Although Cole did not mention this, Li Du assumed.
Besides that, he managed to make other assumptions.
The conflict between Carlston and himself originated from those kids. And the villa he rented in Green River Valley had been recommended by Cole.
Therefore he could not help but wonder, What does Carl know? Did he set this up?
There were just too many coincidences. He wanted a place in Green River Valley. Cole coincidentally knew a decent villa there, which was coincidentally located beside Carlston's house?
This raised too many suspicions. Too many coincidences had happened around Li Du within the past two days. He already felt weird about everything.
Thinking from a different perspective, everything began to make sense.
Cole and Carlston were not on good terms. He suffered a loss and wanted his revenge. Therefore, he wanted to deal with Carlston but he couldn't find a way.
Hence, coincidentally, Li Du wanted to rent a place. He found out that Li Du wanted to stay in Green River Valley. He immediately recalled that there was a vacant villa next to Carlston's house.
Either he had a connection with that house, or he knew the person named April.
Cole was very familiar with Carlston. He had to have known the characters of his sons. And he also knew about Li Du's short temper. Thus, he knew that this living arrangement would lead to conflict between them.
The conflict occurred, and Carlston's sons had gotten the worst of the fight. Carlston had been ready to deal with this matter, but Cole managed to persuade him to let it go.
Clearly, Carlston could not let this go, even more so as he realized the relationship between Cole and Li Du. Hence, the matter had gradually turned into the current situation.
Li Du and Cole thoroughly became allies to deal with Carlston.
If his assumption was accurate, then Cole had clearly made a great move. He didn't have to expend a thing. And yet, the group's two major shareholders had become arch-enemies.
If his assumption was accurate, then Cole was not as good and honest as he had first thought. If his assumption was accurate, then Li Du wouldn't allow Cole to manipulate him without a price. He would plan a counterattack because he was not willing to be taken advantage of.
All this was still just his hypothesis. The truth was still unknown. He urgently needed to look for a diamond mine.
Cole fully assisted him on this matter. He gave some of Harry Winston Inc.'s classified information to him, which contained investigation reports on some mining pits.
Before searching for the diamond mine, Li Du had to have some understanding of diamonds. He was unfamiliar with this type of gemstone.
As everyone knew, diamonds were solid carbon. Basically, this little thing was the same as coal.
Some people also knew that carbide also consisted of the single element carbon.
Diamond and carbide were both closely related. Some would think that they were the same. As a matter of fact, diamonds were classified as carbide, but they were actually a gemstone grade carbide.
In other words, all diamonds were carbides but not all carbides were diamonds.
Some would think that the preciousness of diamonds was a scam but they did have rare qualities. For instance, they required hundreds of millions, to even billions, of years to form and required conditions of extremely high temperature and pressure to form.
In fact, Carlston was right about one thing: diamond productivity was very low.
This type of gemstone was mainly extracted from a small piece of ore called kimberlite Many Chinese had heard of the brand Kimberlite Diamond. In fact, the name of this brand had been inspired by the ore kimberlite.
According to statistics, only one carat of raw diamond could be extracted from 250 tons of kimberlite. After processing it to a finished product, merely 0.25 carats of genuine diamond could be obtained.
After reading this information, Li Du had a slight tingling sensation. He realized that he had been slightly careless with this bet.