'Thanks for the tip': Restaurant keeps £9million from favourite customer's £10million contested will

In one of the most unusual wills of recent times, Golda Bechal, who died in 2004 aged 89, made Kim Sing Man and his wife Bee Lian the main beneficiaries of her estate, cutting off her own relations without a penny.

The couple became friendly with Mrs Bechal over a period of more than 20 years, regularly cooking her preferred Cantonese dishes of bean sprouts and pickled leeks.

Chinese restaurant owners Lim Sang Man and his wife Bee Lian Man at the High court. The terms of the 'secret deal' have not been revealed, but the couple are thought to have kept £9million

But after her bequest was published, a High Court battle ensued with five of Mrs Bechal's nephews and nieces.

They claimed she was suffering from dementia when she drew up the will in 1994, depriving them of their inheritance.

After months of wrangling, last December a judge ruled in favour of the Mans keeping all of the money they had been left, rejecting the idea that Mrs Bechal, who lived in Mayfair, Central London, was senile. He also ordered Mrs Bechal's relatives to pay £450,000 costs.

But this month the relatives forced a hearing to contest the December judgment. By mutual consent, the hearing was stopped on its second day and the secret deal was struck.

Now a source close to the case has revealed that, under the terms of the settlement, the Mans have kept 'around 90 per cent of the money', or £9million. 'The rest of the money will go to Mrs Bechal's relations,' the source added.

The five nephews and nieces who contested the will are Sandra Blackman, Barbara Green and Louise Barnard, all from London, Mervyn Lebor, of Leeds, and Laurence Lebor, who lives in Israel.

As usual, Kim Man was behind the counter of his restaurant, Lian, in Witham, Essex, last week.

He said: 'I am not allowed to say anything about it. It is a condition of the settlement that neither party speaks about it or discloses any details.'

But he insisted that he and his wife plan to continue living in their detached house and operating the restaurant, which they have run since the Eighties.

Last year the High Court heard that Mr Man first met Mrs Bechal in 1967, when he was 13. After she was was widowed in 1971, and her son Peter had died in 1974, she became close to several members of the Man family, to whom she rented premises from her property empire. Towards the end of her life, she regularly spent Christmas with the Mans and also went on holiday with them.

By contrast, she is said to have had little contact with her own relatives, and on one occasion described them as 'hooligans'. Gerald Lebor, Mrs Bechal's brother-in-law, who has previously spoken on behalf of the five who contested the will, refused to comment on the secret deal.

But Mrs Man, 54, said: 'I am still carrying on here. Why change things now? Your customers become your friends and you can't just give all that up.

'I love what I do and I am not going to change anything.

'My life will continue just as it has before. That is what I have always said.'