The loud sounds of discontent rumbling back and forth between the Stanley Ho and Sheldon Adelson organizations in Macau almost make it possible for Steve Wynn to walk through a room unnoticed.

Ho and Adelson have been going at it. In a fashion that’s attracted a lot of attention

Steve told a reporter this is one case he is very satisfied to remain a  spectator. Business has, reportedly, been good and the number of  people  streaming through  his doors appears to have exceeded expectations.

Wynn has also reportedly hired a top Malaysian junket rep away from the Sands Macau, according to the South Chinas Morning Post.  Phua Wei Seng had been responsible for customers who have been big contributors to the VIP handle of the Sands.

And Ho has had his problems.

It’s been about a  month since two of the senior executives at Ho’s flagship Lisboa were found stabbed to death in a mainland city just across the border from Macau.

Chao Yeak-hong was executive director of the Golden Palace, the biggest of the VIP rooms (which collectably account for 70 percent of the revenue generated by Ho’s casinos). The South China Morning Post reported that her throat had been cut. Her husband had been stabbed  repeatedly.

Follow-up police reporting leaves something to be desired in that part of the world and so there are no reports so far about who did it or why.

Ho’s never had the level of competition he’s facing now. He’s charged that the commissions being paid junket reps by Sheldon Adelson’s Sands Macau are out of line, forcing some of his VIP rooms toward bankruptcy.

Adelson grumbled as only he can that if Ho can’t stand the heat he should vacate the kitchen.

Senior Adelson executive Bill Weidner seemed to give that a forced chuckle and chimed in with the observation that Ho ain’t seen nothing yet. You  think this is competition? Just wait till Steve Wynn really gets cranked up. That’s what Weidner said, in so many words.

“Crybabies don’t win new business,” Weidner sneered, according to the International Herald-Tribune.

Ho snapped that not only was he NOT getting out of the kitchen, “but I will cook a pork barbecue rice set.”

At which point Adelson and Weidner might have glanced toward their translator and said, “Huh?”

Some of this heavy-on-the-metaphor rhetoric does not translate easily.