Dragon Breath

by Valerie Goldsilk

  “Best carvery lunch in town,” the ADC said as he squeezed his ample gut in behind the table.

  “Thank you for meeting with me, sir.”

  “Not at all, I’m always glad to listen to your adventures. They’ve pushed me so far from Operational work that I feel as if I’m retired already.”

  “Frustrating, is it, sir?”

  “Don’t ask me questions to which I’m bound to give answers that are less than truthful. I should be grateful that there are still stacks of files on my desk and plenty of things to occupy me. I’ve been getting letters from old friends who are back in England or living in Spain tending their roses and wishing they hadn’t taken the money and jacked it in earlier than they had to.”

  The ADC had a florid complexion and wore a wreath of grey hair around a bald skull. He lit a Benson & Hedges and coughed several times. The waitress, a plump, cheerful Filipina, arrived and took their orders.

  “Who’ll be the new Commissioner then, sir?” Foxcroft asked once they were tucking into their roast and Yorkshire pudding.

  “Hard to say and if I knew I couldn’t tell you,” the ADC chuckled, “but my money’s on young Frank Choi. He’s got family connections and he’s managed not to blot his copy book in the last few years.”

  “His brother’s the Immigration Commissioner, isn’t he?”

  “Inland Revenue.”

  “All in the family.”

  “Nothing’s changed in Asia. Us gwailos have always had the old boy network and they have had their nepotism. Now that we’re not in charge anymore let them do things their way.”

  “I heard a rumour that the Chief Secretary isn’t getting on with the Chief Executive,” Foxcroft said.

  “Not a rumour, idle gossip. Can’t say I approve of the man myself but he’s the ultimate example of being trapped between a rock and a hard place. One has to feel sorry for him. He was never cut out for the job. Should have stayed running the family business. What was left of it after he ran it into the ground.” The ADC winked mischievously. “Very few people could make a success of the Chief Executive’s job and he wasn’t helped by the economic crisis. But there we go. We have our own problems to deal with. Now what’s on your mind?”

  “Politics, as you can tell.”

  The ADC nodded and made a face that showed distaste. “In the old days when we said politics it was usually something that could be settled over a few beers in the mess, now it really means messing with Beijing.”

  Foxcroft took his cue and explained his suppositions to the ADC. He spoke in a low, steady voice making sure that any other diners couldn’t overhear him. When he’d finished, he took another sip from his beer and waited for the ADC’s direction.

  “There’s not much advice I can give you which you don’t know already. Sounds like it could be a hot potato. Not worth holding onto for too long. In the old days I’d have said a copper has to pursue any lead right to its end but nowadays we’re all better being wary. Surely you can bring this up to the Commissioner through the right channels but there’s a chance that he won’t like it because there are people he’s friendly with, who might get embarrassed. Then it will be buried and your career along with it. I’ve seen it happen before. So have you. Nothing against the CP, bless his soul, but he’s a political creature and so will be any of his successors. Even more so.”

  Foxcroft nodded because he was only having his own concerns confirmed.

  The waitress came back and the ADC ordered a dessert while Foxcroft stuck with coffee.

  “Don’t stop the investigation. Just tread carefully and document everything confidentially,” said the ADC when they had finished lunch and stepped out into the Wanchai street. “Good luck, lad and keep me posted if you need some support. I’ve got a few markers I can pull in but chances are I won’t be around much longer than another year or two. Times are a-changing as that American singer once said.”

  Foxcroft made his way to the MTR station because he had to get up to North Point. Earlier that morning he’d had a piece of luck when one of Sergeant Topgun’s informers called in with some information. He pondered the senior officer’s words, weighing up each sentence, running back the conversation on a mental tape recorder. He hadn’t expected much from the meeting but it had been important to talk to someone. The puzzle he faced baffled and challenged him. Despite the political implications it would have to be attempted, solved, the evidence arranged in neat lines that told clear tales.

  They met in a chaan-teng, a cheap local restaurant. Topgun and the informer, Ah-Wan, were sitting in the back booth smoking Marlboros and sipping at sugared coffee. Ah-Wan shook Foxcroft’s hand obsequiously and pushed his packet of cigarettes at the Detective Chief Inspector.

  “The ADC sends his regards,” Foxcroft told Topgun and smiled. The Detective Sergeant nodded gravely and reached for the toothpicks. He rarely had contact with such exalted ranks but when he’d been a young uniform constable the ADC had been a Probationary Inspector.

  Foxcroft said, “So where are we, anything really useful?”

  “He say he know the Indian killer.”

  “Oh, yes, and how come?”

  “He heard the people talk about it. Sometimes when the Triad don’t want to deal with a big problem they will use this Yan-do-yan, this Indian killer. His race, it is a Sikh, the ones with the turban.”

  “Okay, that makes sense. Which Triad uses him?”

  “Any one. He is alone, the Indian.”

  “How come CIB doesn’t have him on file?”

  Topgun shrugged and addressed the informer. Ah-Wan was slight in build, with the shrunken cheeks of a heroin addict. His movements were nervous and his eyes never stopped flickering around as if he was constantly expecting somebody or something bad to creep up on him. His index and middle fingers were stained yellow from nicotine and his teeth had long since ceased to be any colour that could vaguely be described as white. He wore a dirty black T-shirt that hung loosely around his arms and shoulders.

  “Ah-Wan says that the Indian is a bit crazy and it is part of his religion to kill people. He always uses a cloth.”

  “A thuggee perhaps?”

  “I don’t understand,” Topgun said.

  “It was a big thing in India in the last century. The British Army managed to stamp it out eventually. They went around killing travellers. It was a cult.”

  “A cult?”

  “Yes, a secret religion. Like Falung Gung.”

  Topgun nodded and translated for the informer whose expressions appeared to convey that he agreed.

  “He must be somewhere on file,” Foxcroft said, more to himself. If anyone wanted to kill a police inspector with too much information, a mad Indian thuggee would be a good choice. On the other hand that kind of man shouldn’t be hard to locate. The Indian community was large but generally law-abiding and concentrated on specific types of businesses. Tailoring and Trading were more popular than strangling.

  “Any name?”

  “They call him Amir Singh.”

  “I’m sure that’s just their equivalent of John Smith.”

  “Who? I not heard of this guy,” the Sergeant asked.

  Foxcroft laughed and told him it didn’t matter. “We’ll check CIB and DATS and send a teleprinter message to all Divisional CID formations who have their own listed informers. We’ve got to be able to dig him up somewhere.” He snorted in irritation. It was turning out to be a very strange case as he’d expected. “A thuggee!” he said derisively into his coffee cup.

  Chapter 16

  In comparison with Hong Kong, the city of Singapore has much greenery and the government was pleased to call it the Garden City. Brigadier Wee, bald with liver spots freckling his skull and back of his hands, was staring out of his office window at the forest stretching into the distance. Over the tree tops he could see an SIA hump-backed Boeing taking off from Changi Airport and another smaller, twin-engined Airbus preparing to land.

  There were files on his ample de
sk but no computer. He didn’t need one as his acute mind processed data with the speed of a Pentium III and never let him down by crashing in the middle of an operation. Electronic data manipulation was performed by the enthusiastic men and women who worked for him and there were plenty of those.

  Sitting on the other side of his desk was one of his finest operatives: a young Captain by the name of Larry Lim.

  “There are always different options and some are better than others, more or less proactive, more or less potentially damaging and some options appear more suitable for a while until one obtains the other half of the information and the entire picture changes,” the Brigadier was saying. He was in one of his philosophical moods today.

  “Yes, sir,” Larry replied because he was a military man and despite the confidence that his boss placed in him he’d been taught that respect was important and easy to show.

  “And have we got all the information or are we waiting for the other half?” Wee asked, elliptically.

  “We’re missing a lot of information,” the young officer said, being both cautious and honest.

  “As always.” The Brigadier ran a hand over his near-bald dome. He repeated the gesture as if it soothed the complex thoughts sparking around beneath his skull. “Do you think, Larry, we should progress with an aggressive action?” It was a testing question as always.

  “You mean kidnap and interrogation?”

  Wee nodded, a pattern of pensive lines around his mouth. Despite his reputation for ruthlessness and his life-long belief never to shirk from a decision that might involve violence if the greater good of the nation and that of its people were involved, it wasn’t something that visibly gave him pleasure. Larry Lim was well aware of this. Here was a man who bore the burdens of one of the world’s toughest jobs on his shoulders. He didn’t stumble or falter from the weight, nor did he show weariness or cynicism, both insidious evils that could gnaw away at powerful leaders without them being aware of its consequences. No, Brigadier Wee didn’t show weakness—ever. He showed a tough-minded dedication to the principle that if the end was good, the means justified the end. There was often compassion but there was rarely mercy for the sake of it. He was one of the great protectors of the constitution and Larry, an intelligent man who bolstered idealism with pragmatism had no more over-riding ambition than to become at least half as impressive a man as his aging boss.

  “It’s the kind of operation we can’t be seen to have a hand in.”

  “Of course,” Larry noted, knowing already where the Brigadier was going and what his task would be.

  “We’ll want our friend,” a brief pause, ”who can be very professional when he wants to be, as long as he’s given the right guidance.”

  “Should he kill the businessman afterwards?”

  They’d had similar conversations before and knew each other well. The room was safe from bugs and Wee would only speak this way with the most trusted of his team. The boss trusted all of his operatives but the level of faith that Larry enjoyed was not shared by many others. There was no need to know, mostly no need to burden the consciences of those fellow soldiers who might not sleep well at night if they were aware of the hard decisions being made in the executive wing.

  Both men understood that this was an extreme operation. It was something akin to invasive heart-surgery where the patient was expected to die but the knowledge gained from that activity would benefit others. And the surgeon they intended to use was well-known to them, not always predictable, however mostly controllable, moderately civilised and never afraid to commit murder for money.

  “Think it through, Larry, what he needs to be briefed on, then find him and make sure he’s available. Perhaps it can be done in a neutral country. Then write me a briefing document before tomorrow morning. I’ll get the PM’s approval in principle and we’ll launch it this week. We’ll have to get the British involved in something else that’s a bit dirty or they’ll get all outraged if anything comes out and try and wash their hands. Given our mutual history the British are starting to become nearly as hypocritical as the Americans.” He made a sound that could have been construed as a chuckle. After all Wee had learnt his craft from the British when Singapore was still a colony.

  Larry expressed his understanding and left his boss’s office. He passed through the confidential typists’ pool where the girls were chosen for their digital dexterity rather than their pulchritude. He walked down the grey linoleum corridor that had the same smell as Mount Elizabeth Hospital where his mother had spent some time last year, and finally came to the small office which he shared with two other men, both of whom were out of the country on training courses with the Israelis.

  He’d gotten a postcard from Iraq, unsigned, so he assumed this was where they were hiding. He didn’t envy them if they were lying in a desert sniper shelter monitoring the movements of Saddam Hussein’s tank regiments, but someone had to do it. His colleagues were both Malays and with their dark skin and Moslem religion they could blend easily into an Arab country. Although what two good Singaporean boys were doing armed and offensive in the Middle East might be questioned. Except that good Singaporeans didn’t question their government. Duty came first. Family values second. And individual wishes a poor third.

  Larry whistled a few bars from a Spice Girls song that had been on his brain all week. He’d be packing his satchel for Bangkok tonight because that’s where their heart surgeon could be found.

  * * * *

  Surrounded by box files and faded faxes, Jim Beauregard was making heavy weather of his self-appointed detective task. He wanted to find some connections, some evidence, some links, something dubious and devious, but all he could uncover was messy and incomplete information. He marvelled at the incompetence but suspected that it was done on purpose. So far he could make no head or tail of any of it.

  The phone rang and it was Scrimple. Jim was suddenly reminded of their strange and violent Sunday afternoon. It had been out of his mind for a few hours while he was concentrating on Bob Chen’s legacy.

  “How’s the office?” the policeman asked.

  “Quiet and nobody’s been shot yet,” Jim found himself replying tersely.

  “Yeah, I’m sorry about that but I wasn’t thinking too much and I was pretty angry.”

  “The guy deserved it. Hopefully they got him to a doctor and he’s all right. No arrests or anything?”

  “Nothing, the triads have their own medical network. They have people in every walk of life. Just want to let you know that I’ll probably be leaving for a week or so. All this is getting a bit too heavy for me and I think I need some I & I and time to work out what I’m going to do with my life.”

  “Bit late for that, isn’t it?”

  Scrimple made a noise at the other end of the line that could have been a growl. “I suppose so,” he said ruefully. “I’ve just handed in my resignation. I’m not sure I want to be involved in all this shit anymore. It’s happened to me before and it really fucked my career over. I don’t need any more excitement than I’ve already had this week. I’m probably the world’s unluckiest man. I can go to the Seven Eleven for a packet of fags and some old sod will choose exactly that moment to jump off a building and splatter at my feet.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m leaving for Thailand tonight.”

  “I and I?”

  “Intoxication and Intercourse.”

  “More small brown creatures with fur between their legs?”

  “As many as I can physically handle.”

  “Be careful.”

  “I will, I might get a gun there. You can pick them up on the black market easy as hell.”

  “I meant with the girls. Condoms and stuff.”

  “Oh, that. When I’m drunk I get numb down there.”

  “It’s your life.”

  “What I can salvage of it,” Scrimple said grimly.

  “Keep in touch, you know the numbers,” Jim said and replaced the ph
one. There was something sad about Scrimple but he had to admit he liked the guy and wished him well.

  * * * *

  Shortly after lunch, which was a greasy egg and ham sandwich accompanied by a vile cup of brown sludge that was described as coffee and had been procured for Jim by the old domestic they called Ah-ma, there was another visitor.

  “Detective Chief Inspector,” Jim said, standing up and wiping his hands on a flimsy tissue before he shook hands with Foxcroft who was dressed in his usual casual attire.

  “My mates call me Simon.”

  “Jim.”

  “Looks like you’re really digging into the paperwork,” said the detective waving his Nokia at the littered desk. They sat down.

  Jim explained, “It’s a mess but then that’s what I was expecting. I know it’s politically correct to localise and have the Chinese take over in all sorts of positions but they have a different approach to business and organisation.”

  “Ah,” Foxcroft said and smiled gently, “that’s certainly a reality that we long-term expats have all learnt to live with. We take it for granted and don’t find it remarkable. It’s just the way things are.”

  “Is it cultural or physiological? Why are they so complicated and messy, or why do they appear to be?”

  “The Chinese?” Foxcroft shrugged knowingly. “There are many theories and I’ll be glad to explore them with you over a few pints of beer. They think differently. It’s like women. There is a very definite logic but you have to tilt your head upside down and squint to grasp it. After that it becomes more obvious. But who wants to go around tilting their head and squinting? In my job I’ve gotten used to it but you get dizzy and lose your sense of perspective if you spend too much time doing it. That’s why men and women always end up getting on each other’s nerves. Men could, if they really wanted to, understand what their wives were after but it’s time-consuming, irritating and uncomfortable. We get bored and the girls get angry with us.”