The Assassin on the Bangkok Express

by Roland Perry

  ‘As you wish, sir,’ the Thai captain said.

  The expensively tiled en suite bathroom was not much smaller than that of a five-star hotel. The timber-lined interior also had a stunning inlaid table that could be folded out for meals. There was a polished redwood wall desk. The wall lamps’ designs were a feature copied from the Orient Express in Europe, as were other lights and objets d’art throughout the train.

  When the attendants left the suite, he stood, locked the door, and went straight to the partition leading to the adjoining state cabin. Its latch was locked. He ran his hand down the sides of the partition. After several attempts to find the button catch that would open it, he dropped to his knees and examined the partition near the floor. He leant his shoulder against the door and it moved a centimetre. Cavalier ran his fingers around the side again, pushed a small raised button and heard an almost indiscernible ‘click’. He tried the latch. The door slid across. The next-door cabin was empty as expected.

  It had been booked by him in the name of Frenchman Claude Garriaud, who would be joining the train at Kanchanaburi.

  *

  At 5.44 p.m. to the second, a crotchety old Thai conductor called for stragglers to board the Express.

  ‘I’m not waiting!’ he yelled in Thai and English, keeping his eyes on the ancient clock mounted on the wall two metres above him. ‘All aboard! All aboard!!’

  He dropped his red signal flag. His shrill whistle cut the thick evening air. The Express crawled and clattered the first a thousand metres as it avoided children playing on the tracks, then it built speed on its seventeen-hundred-kilometre journey to Singapore. Cavalier was moved to wave to Thai families, backpackers and other tourists on the platform, who all gaped in admiration at the luxury train, despite its hiccups for the halting first kilometre as the station fell away behind it in the encroaching dusk. The Express built speed and more certitude and swayed rhythmically out of Bangkok’s north and bound for Kanchanaburi in Thailand’s west, approaching the Myanmar border.

  The poor suburbs, intermingled with modern high-rises and mansions, were animated by scores of fascinated children who ran along beside the tracks waving. For a moment, Cavalier felt a pang of guilt over the luxury he was about to experience compared to the lifetime of struggle most of those kids would probably have to face. But the feeling passed when they disappeared into suburbia and the landscape changed as the colonial anachronism wandered on its way. Cavalier opened the suite’s window to let in the warm evening air streaked with the smell of trackside grills, woks and make-shift stoves that would feed several million people in the next hour or so. In between these strong wafts, Cavalier caught the more pleasant aromas of flowers growing in thick clumps beside the track.

  He went to the door and asked a Thai steward for ‘a malt whisky with ice, stirred, not shaken’. He reflected that this might be one of the few moments of near-relaxation he would have in the next few days. After finishing his drink, he lay on the bed and was almost asleep when he heard shouting and screaming, then someone crying. Concerned, he got off the bed, placed crutches under his arms, opened the door and called to the steward.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Cavalier asked.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ the Thai steward said.

  Cavalier was about to break into Thai when he stopped himself. ‘Listen,’ he said.

  The muffled sound of raised voices could be heard: one that of an angry male; the other of a distressed female.

  ‘I think you should investigate,’ Cavalier said.

  The Thai steward bowed and nodded. Cavalier shut the door, lay on the bed and waited.

  24

  THE CAPTIVE

  In the very next carriage, Cavalier’s daughter Pon, wearing just a bra and pants, was on her knees. She had her head over the toilet in the state cabin as she gripped the sides of the bowl and threw up.

  A few metres away in the bathroom, thirty-eight-year-old Jose Cortez, wearing a white suit, was having trouble adjusting a cravat. He seemed oblivious of her plight as he cursed under his breath.

  ‘I want you to perform at your best tonight,’ he said. ‘You will have an audience of maybe a hundred people in the piano bar; the biggest you have played before in a year.’

  ‘I cannot,’ she whispered hoarsely. ‘Can’t you see I am ill?’

  ‘My dear, it is your condition … bulimia …’

  ‘No! It is the drugs you give me. You sedate me. You abuse me!’

  ‘I keep you alive.’

  ‘I’d rather be dead!’

  ‘So you show me with your pathetic slashed wrists.’

  ‘I hate you! Always have, always will!’

  ‘That’s not what you say when I fuck you.’

  ‘Rape me!’ she corrected him. ‘You rape me!’

  Cortez tore off the troublesome cravat, pushed into the toilet and backhanded Pon across the face, sending her sprawling to the floor. Blood sprang from the corner of her mouth. He held her by the throat, causing her to begin choking. Cortez’s face was demonic. He’d lost an eye in a Florida gunfight with FBI agents and his appearance was made more frightening by his tartan eyepatch slipping and exposing a white glass substitute, which bulged from the socket. His one good eye was opaque like that of a fish. He eased his grip. Pon coughed and used all her strength to release his hold.

  ‘Now look, you stupid bitch!’ he hissed. ‘I promise I will murder your father if you don’t do as I say. If you attempt suicide again, he is a dead man.’

  Pon refrained from responding. She would never admit it to Cortez, but the only thing that was now keeping her alive was the concern that the Mexican would kill Cavalier.

  ‘You know he is a professional like me?’ he asked staring so hard that his one ‘good’ eye flared red, went pale again and let go a trickle of fluid.

  Pon shook her head.

  ‘You know nothing about him,’ Cortez said. ‘You think he is a simple journalist. It is a cover for his killing, sanctioned by the CIA.’

  Pon broke down. Cortez pushed her head over the bowl and flushed the toilet. She struggled to avoid being wet.

  ‘Clean yourself up and prepare for the show.’

  Pon struggled on all fours into the shower. Cortez turned it on and left her slumped on the floor and sobbing under the cascading water. He returned to the mirror, adjusted his eyepatch and had a second try at his troublesome cravat.

  *

  Cavalier was unable to rest, although the sound of heated argument and worse had abated. He locked the door to his suite as the train rattled west for three and a half hours towards Kanchanaburi, where it would stop for the night. In the first hour he took out five tubes containing high-powered rifle parts from his backpack and cleaned them. He then removed his old Glock-17 handgun, put six bullets in it and placed it back in the cavity of the chair’s right arm.

  He refused to come out for the first dinner sitting of the trip in the dining cars. Instead, he accepted a soup entrée, which a waiter brought to his door. After devouring the food, accompanied by a glass of Chablis, he took out a detailed description of the train, studied it and placed it back in his pack. At 8.15 p.m. he climbed into the chair and began to wheel down the corridor towards the observation car at the end of the train, passing slowly through carriage 30, watched by four armed security guards, and another four Mexicans with concealed weapons under sleeveless leather vests.

  Cavalier noted the door to the suite where he believed Cortez and Pon were. He pushed beyond it to the two carriages harbouring the gold and manned by most of the cartel bodyguard. He took some time easing through the doors, looking at their locks and wondering if he could cut off the guard from the rest of the train. He did not linger too long, aware from his glasses and movement behind him that he was being followed by other passengers and two of the Mexicans.

  There were a half a dozen people sitting on the observation car’s seats watching the passing scenery of part jungle, part rural west Thailand with its myriad villages
. The end of the train was also open and three suited travellers were having an after-dinner drink. He positioned himself next to the seats in the car’s centre and ordered a scotch and ice, keeping up his pretence of being both nearly blind and almost deaf. Cavalier looked out on the passing vista with his back at forty-five degrees to the door leading to the observation car.

  A half-hour later three Mexicans came out of carriage 30 followed by Cortez, his eyepatch slightly askew as ever, his cravat on straight and his violin in his right hand. Pon was behind him in a long white dress, head down, and ‘assisted’ by two Mexicans either side of her. Despite efforts to use make-up to mask her injuries, one eye was black and slightly closed. The corner of her mouth was red and swollen.

  They strode through the observation lounge. Cortez brushed the wheelchair with his elbow, cursed under his breath and glared at Cavalier as if it were his fault for being in the way. For a split second Cortez’s eye flashed red, as if an oven door had been opened. It was the look of a psychopath, a person who may well have enjoyed every one of his scores of murders. He moved on into the next car.

  Cavalier touched his glasses, not quite believing what his reflective lenses were showing him. The woman with Cortez looked like Pon, or a bedraggled, bug-eyed and bruised version of her. His heart raced. He gripped the right arm of his chair and had to stop himself from taking out his handgun and killing his intended victim.

  Overriding his rage in the moment was a rational thought. He would be gunned down, and his daughter could be killed in the crossfire. Instead, he kept looking out at the passing parade until the Mexican contingent had a quick drink and moved back down the carriages to the piano bar and lounge.

  Cavalier swung his wheelchair around, just as Huloton scurried into the car.

  ‘Mr Blenkiron, sir,’ he shouted into Cavalier’s ear, ‘would you care to listen to a wonderful violin and piano recital?’

  ‘Who is giving it?’ Cavalier said, attempting to conceal his shortness of breath and anger.

  ‘Arh! A special performer from Bolivia and his Eurasian partner.’

  ‘No, I’d rather stay here,’ Cavalier said off-handedly. ‘Never had much time for classical music. New Orleans jazz is my thing.’

  ‘Are you all right, sir?’ Huloton said solicitously. ‘You look, if you will permit me, somewhat pale.’

  ‘I’m okay,’ Cavalier said, keeping his slight drawl and trying to calm down. ‘Thank you for your concern. I have these “turns” at times.’ He tapped his chest. ‘Heartburn sometimes; erratic beat others. But don’t worry, I take pills for it.’

  Cavalier returned to his suite. He could not stop thinking about his daughter and this caused him to change his mind. Although still emotional to the point of tears of anger, he felt he had to see her again.

  25

  THE PERFORMANCE

  After about twenty minutes, when he believed he had calmed down, Cavalier pushed down to the lounge piano bar where the performances were going on. Once there, he could not see for the throng and was embarrassed to be helped, still in the chair, closer to the makeshift stage area and the piano. A Thai female was going through a wrist-writhing, traditional dance routine. Passengers were taking photos. He could barely see the musicians, Pon at the piano and Cortez with his violin, waiting to perform. Pon was seated on a stool, her head slumped forward like a rag doll.

  Cavalier could see Azelaporn, carousing with exquisite Chinese courtesan twins who wore identical neck-to-ankle green dresses, split to the hip for occasional glimpses of thin legs perched on high heels, and adorned at the back by red Chinese dragons. The former Thai police chief was enjoying himself on what he considered a cushy assignment. His hired help, namely Jacinta, was doing all the security organising. Azelaporn did not believe that there would be trouble on the train. Jacinta sat near him, ignoring his fondling of the Chinese women. He squeezed their waists, rubbed their shoulders and cuddled them together. His groping public display was not appreciated by the women.

  One commented loudly enough in English for Jacinta to hear: ‘Please be discreet. We are not whores!’

  That caused Jacinta to smile inwardly as she ran her eyes over the crowd, wondering if Cavalier was on the train. No one among the guests had seemed remotely like him at the boarding in Bangkok.

  The audience applauded the dancing. Cortez prepared for his show. He announced in a husky, hesitant voice on a microphone that they would be playing a piano composition by French composer Maurice Ravel.

  Cavalier kept his eyes on Pon. Her head remained down. She seemed to be refusing to tune up. She pouted and looked angry. Visions of the occasional spoilt child he recalled so well flooded back.

  The performance began. It was soon clear that she was behind the tempo and producing the odd discordant note, including one or two off-key blunders that had Cortez glancing at her. After a minute she stopped playing and stood in front of him. She seemed ready to strike him. Cortez took a step back, his one good eye betraying the inner demon for a moment before he controlled his anger. Two Mexicans hurried forward and gripped Pon by the arms.

  ‘Murderer! Assassin! Rapist!’ she screamed at Cortez as they escorted her out of the carriage as.

  Pon came close to Cavalier’s chair, accidentally kicking a wheel as she was pulled from the room. She winced in pain and stumbled. For a split second she looked down at Cavalier, whose arms reached up to stop her fall before the Mexicans had pushed her on through the audience and out of the carriage. The guests were stunned into silence.

  Cortez leaned to the microphone with a false smile. ‘My partner has been under stress of late,’ he said. ‘Her father has been missing for some time. She was in a state before we began, but insisted on performing. We apologise to you and will continue.’ He nodded to a stand-in Thai pianist, who seemed reluctant to go on. Only a word in his ear from Cortez caused him to start playing. Couples began filtering off to their compartments.

  Cavalier backed his chair up to the exit and was in two minds about leaving. Tears were trickling down his face from under his glasses. He wiped his cheeks and looked up to see the diminutive Down syndrome man, standing by the wheelchair and staring at Cavalier from not much above eye level. His mother introduced herself as ‘Janet Hinkley’ and her son as ‘Cowboy’. He was wearing a slouch hat, dark-blue check shirt, jeans, outsized studded belt and boots with spurs. A large sheriff’s badge was pinned to a shirt pocket.

  ‘Hi, Cowboy!’ Cavalier said, reaching to shake hands. Cowboy ignored him, his round, pinched face expressionless, apart from an eye twitch.

  ‘He was worried about you,’ Hinkley said, bending down and smiling pleasantly. ‘He relates to anyone else with …’

  ‘A handicap?’

  ‘Anyone “challenged”,’ Hinkley said with a sweet smile.

  ‘Thank you then, Cowboy,’ Cavalier said his voice a thin rasp. ‘How’d you get that name?’

  He had not taken his eyes off Cavalier. He just blinked as if it were a kind of code.

  ‘He likes old cowboy movies,’ Hinkley explained, ‘don’t you Cowboy?’ She stood up and took her son’s hand. ‘C’mon, let’s go to the observation car. You said you wanted to go.’

  ‘He speaks okay?’ Cavalier asked.

  ‘Not exactly. We can communicate via a computer program.’

  Cavalier had to be careful not to engage with anyone too much on the trip, just in case the merest suspicion was aroused.

  ‘Bye, Cowboy!’ Cavalier said, patting him on the back.

  Jacinta had been watching the interaction. She came to Cavalier, leant down and whispered as the recital continued:

  ‘We are sorry about the musical interruption. Can I take you back to your suite?’

  ‘No,’ he said, his voice steadier, ‘I’d like to watch this violinist until he finishes.’

  When the shortened performance was complete there was only about one-third of the original audience still in attendance. They clapped without enthusiasm. Cortez’s ap
parent lack of sincere concern for the distress of his first piano accompanist had cooled their response to him.

  Concerned about his wellbeing, Jacinta pushed Cavalier along the corridors despite him saying he did not need assistance. She helped him open his presidential suite door and before he could stop her, was inside the spacious compartment helping him out of the wheelchair. She poured him a drink of water.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Never seen anyone so beautiful this side of the Potomac.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘That you are pretty darn pretty, that’s all.’

  Jacinta smiled faintly. ‘I did not ask what you did for a living …’ she said sweetly.

  ‘No, I don’t believe you did. I was a merchant seaman most of my life.’

  She sat at the chair to the inlaid wooden desk and observed Cavalier as he stretched out on the bed.

  ‘I should have some sleep; feeling pooped,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll leave you. Anything I can bring you?’

  ‘A double malt whisky would be nice, with ice.’

  ‘A double malt,’ she repeated.

  Jacinta stared at him before saying, ‘Do you mind me asking why you were crying during the piano recital?’

  ‘Was I? Gee, I didn’t notice. Great music moves me to tears.’

  ‘I thought you told Monsieur Huloton that you preferred New Orleans jazz?’

  ‘I do, ma’am, I do. But lovely sounds like that move me. Always have and will.’

  ‘It was hardly a great recital.’

  ‘That I grant you, Ma’am, but still it’s often the thought that counts, isn’t it? I always say, if somethin’ is worth doin’, it’s worth doin’ badly.’

  Jacinta frowned and continued to stare.

  Cavalier manufactured a yawn. ‘Now if you’d excuse me,’ he said, ‘I’d like that scotch.’

  ‘I’ll pass that on to the steward,’ Jacinta said, standing. She added, ‘If there is anything I can help you with, you must let me know.’

  ‘There is just one thing, Ma’am. Please inform the carriage manager that I will not be leaving this suite tomorrow when you all see the Commonwealth War Graves ceremony at Kanchanaburi. I want to rest.’