Dragon Breath

by Valerie Goldsilk

  He decided against staying for breakfast so got into his sweat and tobacco-stenched clothes, checked that the gun sat correctly concealed and slipped out of the flat having left his friend a short note.

  He now remembered being pleased on seeing Kenworthy alone and slightly worse for wear. It would have upset him if a girl as smart as Louise had fallen for the patter of a shark like Bob. But you never know with women and a white girl was even more unpredictable. Maybe she hadn’t been laid for ages and anyone half-way good-looking would have been lucky.

  Scrimple wasn’t sure why he particularly cared. He wasn’t into white women. He wasn’t into any women at the moment, to be accurate. The image of the dead Filipina flickered in front of his eyes and he fought hard to dispel it.

  A taxi brought him home in twenty minutes. Half an hour later he felt much better, lounging after a hot and cold shower and another dose of pain killers, flicking through the cable channels and wondering what to do for the rest of the day.

  He tried calling Gwailo Pete but the voicemail only came on and he didn’t want to sound desperate and leave a message. For about fifteen minutes he toyed with the idea of calling Louise Walker. Not so much to ask her out but to—sort of—pursue his enquiries. She might tell him more about the company where she worked if he got friendly with her. And she’d been pretty friendly last night. It was worth a try.

  The namecard she’d given him contained her mobile phone number, and after five rings her guarded voice answered.

  “Hi, is that Louise?”

  “Yes,” now she sounded puzzled.

  “This is Theo Scrimple here, remember. The copper?”

  “The one who ran away? Shame on you leaving me with that smooth-talking Lothario.”

  “Yeah, I felt guilty about that but what else could I do? You seemed to be getting on and I was feeling left out. Are you busy today?”

  “Quite busy. I’ve got my colleagues from London and Bangkok here.”

  “Oh, well I thought if you had some time, maybe we could have a drink.”

  “Is this business or pleasure?”

  “Both maybe,” Scrimple said, and was surprised at his own forthrightness although he noticed that he’d begun to perspire.

  She laughed at the other end, probably suspecting him of wanting to pump her for information regarding her dead boss when in fact he was just mainly bored and here was an attractive woman one could spend a pleasant afternoon with.

  “I’m sort of having a business lunch now but I’m just thinking that my colleague from the London office might want to go out for Chinese food tonight and he might be interested to meet you.”

  Scrimple wasn’t too keen on this plan but it was too late to back out. He’d rather have the girl on her own but if he wanted to pursue the case some more then meeting some manager from London would be a good move. He agreed and she told him to call her an hour later once she’d confirmed everything.

  He made himself another cup of coffee, checked all the cupboards and under the bed, found an old cloth and a can of oil and began cleaning the snub-nosed revolver. Later he would go down to the gym. He hadn’t done much about his gut for a while.

  Chapter 13

  It was Saturday night and the streets of Tsim Sha Tsui were humming with men, women and children on their way to dinner. Restaurants were packed and at every street corner the touts were harassing Westerners who might be tourists.

  Scrimple ignored a few but after the fifth Indian tailor asked him to step into his fine shop he resorted to more brutal tactics and told the next five simply to fuck themselves. If only they could recognise faces they might realise that his was one that passed up and down those same streets regularly but for them a white man was a white man and they were all to be accosted.

  He crossed Chatham Road and passed the Wing On building where McPherson Ferguson had their offices. The next building was the Shangri-La Hotel. Entering the marbled lobby he fingered his mobile phone nervously. He wasn’t quite sure how he’d play things. He didn’t feel like being social and wasn’t in the mood to talk too much about the case.

  Checking his watch he found it was eight o’clock precisely but Louise wasn’t to be seen. He waited five minutes and studied the movement of guests and greeters that went on around him. This was mainly a business hotel and the local contacts were coming to bring their overseas customers for dinner. Two attractive, older Chinese girls stood in a corner. They were identical in looks and dress, tall, not Cantonese, probably of Shanghainese heritage, wearing tight black leggings and small boots that made them tower over the short, silver-haired, Semitic man who emerged from the lifts a little later. Lucky bastard, Scrimple muttered, but probably the girls were merchandisers and he was a customer from New York, in town to haggle over a shipload of silk.

  He fiddled with his phone but couldn’t see anyone who looked like his idea of the man from London. By the fountain there was a younger bloke, early thirties perhaps, in a pink polo shirt and beige, baggy Chinos. He kept on checking his watch. Somebody was late. Well, perhaps it was him. He did appear like a junior exec, well-groomed hair, fit with broad shoulders and an air of self-importance about him.

  Time moved on until it was eight-twenty with still no sign of Louise. Scrimple tried her mobile number and only got the voicemail. The young exec by the fountain had began to frown and pace. Scrimple thought it worth the effort and sauntered over.

  “You’re not waiting for Louise Walker are you?” he said.

  “Yeah,” the exec said with an air of relief. “Are you the copper who’s joining us for dinner?”

  They shook hands.

  “Where the hell is she? Traffic jam or something?” Jim said.

  “I don’t know. Maybe she’s one of these women who aren’t any good at turning up on time.”

  “No, she seemed to be fairly switched on when I met her at lunch.”

  “First time in Hong Kong?”

  “No, I’ve been here plenty of times but only once a year for a week or so. How about you? Lived here for many years?” They eyed each other with cool politeness.

  “Too long. Fifteen years.”

  “And you’ve been in the police all that while?”

  “Came over as a young inspector and now I’m an old inspector. Money’s good though. Didn’t use to be but it’s worth staying for a while.”

  “But what about the Chinese? Has it changed much?”

  “A little, but that’s life. Things move on, don’t they?” Scrimple didn’t want to get into that boring old topic. Not standing in a lobby. If he knew the guy better and they were pissed together, perhaps. “Where the hell has she got to?”

  “Do you know her well?”

  “Not really. Just met her two days ago. I’m involved in this murder investigation.”

  “Double murder isn’t it?”

  “No, triple murder to be precise. And a fourth attempted murder.

  Jim’s face took on a puzzled expression. “What do you mean ‘fourth murder?’”

  “I’ll explain, it’s a bit complicated but there was a Filipina girl who’d overheard some Triads talking about a hit they were planning but before she could give us any details someone topped her.”

  “That’s awful,” Jim said.

  “It was me the girl told. I knew her, you know, and then the next minute—”

  “You knew her? Was she a girl-friend or…”

  “No, not really, just a casual acquaintance but, it upset me, you know. She was a nice girl. Good heart, a bit confused of course but they all are out here. Most of the time.”

  “So she knew that they were going after Bob Chen and Dougie before it happened?” Jim said, somewhat incredulous.

  “Not exactly, but she heard someone was going to be chopped, so we started investigating. I was there when it happened.”

  “You saw it, the chopping?” Jim became agitated and wanted to know the details. Scrimple gave him an abbreviated version by the end of which the English girl
still hadn’t turned up.

  He called her mobile again. “Do you have her home number?”

  Jim shook his head. It was nearly nine o’clock.

  “This is bollocks,” Scrimple said.

  “It’s odd.”

  “I’m not happy about this,” the policeman said, wondering if his words sounded paranoid to the guy from London. “There’s been some bad shit going on lately and this makes me nervous.” He then told Jim about the Sikh who’d come to his flat with a silk scarf. Jim stared at him with an expression that indicated he wasn’t entirely convinced that he was hearing the truth.

  “Let’s go and check her apartment,” Scrimple said. He dialled up Gwailo Pete’s office number and found the Detective-Inspector still at work. The RCU team had three cases they were working on and all of them took time and energy. He explained the situation and within three minutes Gwailo Pete had pulled Louise’s home address from the statement form. She lived on Robinson Road in the Mid-Levels.

  The two men crossed the road and behind the Royal Garden Hotel found a Cross-Harbour Tunnel taxi. Twenty minutes later they were outside the building and Scrimple was flashing his warrant card at the security guard who reluctantly allowed them in. Outside the flat Scrimple rang the bell and for some reason he began thinking of a previous time, years ago when somebody he knew well had not answered their door only to be found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot to the head. He rang the bell again and shook the images of the past away. They were negative thoughts and Louise would have a perfectly sensible reason for having missed their dinner appointment.

  “Let’s try her mobile again,” he said. Jim was standing by the fire exit with his hands in his pockets looking as if he wasn’t sure what he’d got himself into. Scrimple got the voicemail, hung up and tried her home number. Through the door he heard the ringer but there was no one there to pick it up.

  “Want to break down the door?” Jim asked.

  “No need, I can get a locksmith.”

  “Are you serious. Maybe she just got sick or something and had to go to hospital.”

  “But she would have left you a message or called my mobile. I tell you, mate. I’ve got a really bad feeling here. I know I might be over-reacting but there’s something that’s not quite right.” Scrimple pulled his wallet from his back-pocket and checked how much money he had. Then he riffled through the other contents until he came across the name card of Mr. Yip the locksmith. They’d had regular business dealings before because Scrimple made it a habit to lose his house keys.

  It took Mr. Yip another twenty minutes to arrive at the building during which time Jim gave in and started smoking one of Scrimple’s cigarettes.

  Mr. Yip was calm, and frighteningly professional as always. He examined the metal grille outside the wooden door with great care. He hummed a Canto-pop tune and selected a number of gadgets from his toolbox. He knelt down and applied himself to the grille, prodding and jiggling. Within half a minute it popped open. He sighed with pleasure at his own skill.

  Scrimple and Jim crowded closer, amazed at this arcane art and horrified at how easy it was to open doors that should have been guarded by the patents of Mr. Yale. The door took a bit longer but one of the locksmith’s gadgets fitted. He pulled, turned and twisted and it finally gave way without the man breaking into a sweat.

  Handing over the 500 HKD that Mr. Yip earned for his ten minutes work, Scrimple thanked him and pushed into the flat. He was expecting the worst and hoping for the best.

  The latter was wishful thinking. On the floor, face down, a silk scarf wound tightly around her neck was the prone body of Louise Walker.

  Scrimple swore to himself and vaguely registered the fact that Jim behind him was vomiting on a small Persian carpet that decorated the hallway.

  * * * *

  “That’s Simon Foxcroft, he’s a Chief Inspector from OSCB,” Gwailo Pete said as a tall, patrician-looking Westerner with blonde hair walked onto the crime scene. Foxcroft wore faded jeans and a T-shirt implying he’d been off-duty when someone had rang him.

  Jim was still sitting on the sofa holding a bottle of Perrier that had been found in the fridge for him. The body of Louise Walker was now covered by a blanket, awaiting the body-bag.

  “You off the case?” Scrimple asked. Gwailo Pete shrugged. Things were getting out of hand and he didn’t mind shedding some responsibility.

  Foxcroft nodded in greeting at Scrimple. They’d never met before but were both familiar with each other’s names.

  “They tell me you have this habit of finding dead bodies. You do realise that under any normal circumstances that makes you a very likely suspect,” Foxcroft said pleasantly.

  “Very funny, ha, ha.”

  “I once had a Sergeant who was always coming across robberies and burglaries in progress. It was a bit uncanny. Some sort of psychic ability to attract trouble. Made him very successful. He didn’t have to go looking for criminals to arrest. He just walked around a corner and they came running at him.”

  “I’m beginning to think I know how he felt.”

  “My point exactly.” The Chief Inspector studied Scrimple for a while with a light smile around his lips. He absentmindedly tapped his Nokia phone against his thigh.

  “You’re the guy who caught the MTR stalker?” said Scrimple for the sake of saying something because he was getting uncomfortable at the quiet scrutiny.

  Foxcroft pursed his lips and gave a little twitch of his shoulders. “My team. It wasn’t me, I’m not like an Inspector Morse or something. It’s just regular police work. Like we all do. Chasing down every little lead until one turns up to have a dog collar with a dirty big beast attached to it.” He turned and pointed at Jim Beauregard with the antenna of his mobile phone. “What’s the story with him?”

  “From the London office of that company. He was supposed to meet up with the girl for dinner.”

  “Curiouser,” the Chief Inspector said and stared at Scrimple again. “Tell me the story. Maybe we’ll go downstairs and get a coffee. Nothing much to see here that hasn’t been photographed.”

  * * * *

  Jim couldn’t sleep. Hadn’t slept all night. Every time he closed his eyes the image of the strangled girl rose up and reminded him of his mortality and how fragile our simple, little lives truly were.

  He lay in bed and watched as the dawn light seeped under the heavy drapes. The timer on the television told him it was only ten to seven. It was Sunday so there wasn’t much to do. The office was closed of course. The woman who was supposed to act as his guide was cold and decaying somewhere in a mortuary drawer.

  “Shit,” he said out loud because he wanted to jolt himself from this mood. This kind of thing was outside his normal area of competence. He’d stepped beyond his comfort zone. From the mini-bar he took two tiny bottles of brandy and poured them into the cut glass tumbler. It was a good hotel so the glassware was impressive and the alcohol was French. The burning hit his throat and then his stomach, after which he reached for a bottle of Evian and continued watching CNN.

  An hour later he’d seen the news three times and thought it was time for breakfast so he ordered room service. The scrambled eggs were just the right texture and the coffee was as good as he made it himself in the percolator at home. Jim took a shower, watched some more TV and then decided to go for a run. Outside his window stretched the waterfront and joggers were already trotting up and down the tarmac, their T-shirts dark with perspiration.

  Once he was ready and he’d put a tape into his Walkman he stopped and went to the telephone. First he called Scrimple’s mobile number but got only a message which said the subscriber wasn’t available or out of range. Then he called the London mobile number for Doris Yung. If she was in Hong Kong the GSM system should work and she might answer this one. It rang five times and a voice answered.

  But it was a man. Jim asked for Doris. The voice grunted and spoke in Cantonese. Jim repeated himself, starting to feel embarrassed. The Cantonese man k
ept on talking, probably asking who he was. Finally Jim hung up. It sounded as if her mobile was in Hong Kong but where was she?

  “Fucking nightmare,” he cursed the city and the situation he had flown into, then he went out and ran five miles until the endorphins pumped through his body and made him feel less morose.

  * * * *

  It wasn’t until three in the morning that somebody made the necessary connections and alerted Madeleine Rose in London to the fact that Louise Walker had been murdered.

  Rose turned on the bedside light because there was no Mr. Rose, and listened to what information they could give her.

  “Who found her?” she wanted to know. This was explained to her by the duty officer in Hong Kong but she couldn’t quite follow his convoluted explanations about Louise having been involved in a double murder investigation. “Does this have anything to do with her regular work?” She paused and listened to the young fellow at the other end who had a strong Scottish accent. “I think you’d better find out and do some digging. Don’t you have any high level contacts at the Royal Hong Kong Police…yes, yes, Hong Kong Police Force now? When does David Murphy get in the office? Oh, yes, of course it’s a Sunday over there as well.”

  By now she’d slipped into her mauve dressing gown and moved into the kitchen, the remote of her phone wedged between chin and shoulder as she began installing the filter into the machine and reaching for the shelf where she kept the coffee powder.

  “You’d better give me his mobile or his home. I know I have them somewhere. Yes, of course this is a secure line. You dialled it. You should know.”

  Ten minutes later with a strong, dark cup of Brazilian in one hand she was curled on the sofa with an A4 pad and pen in front of her and dialling through to the Head of Station Hong Kong.

  “Didn’t take you long, Madeleine,” Murphy said, his voice thick with the morning.