Ying smiled. She knew that she was going to enjoy working with Danny and she thought that she would learn a lot from the ‘Great British Detective’. They finished their drinks and walked back around the pool to the front of the building. They took a tuk-tuk to the Police HQ.
Danny followed Ying through the police station, up a small flight of stairs and along a corridor to a locked door. Ying had carried the key with a big tag on it from the reception. She unlocked the door and they went in.
“Holy Jesus! Do you call this a Murder Incident Room?”
“No. In Thailand we call this a store room.”
“Ying, I’m sorry. I can’t work in here. It’s too small and there is no window. There is no room to work in here.”
“What do you want to do then Danny?”
Danny picked up an orange coloured book and opened it. It was all written in Thai, but from the outlay of it, he guessed that it was an exhibits book.
“What’s this Ying?”
“That’s the Exhibits Book.”
“Jesus!”
“What’s wrong?”
“I never thought about it before. Everything is going to be in Thai.”
“Of course. That’s why you have me. I can translate everything.”
“Yes, I know. But it’s going to be a lot of hard work for you Ying. I don’t just need you to read out what this says in English, I need you to write out the whole book again for me. Make a copy of it in English and we’ll have to do the same with the reports and statements. Maybe not every statement. You can read them out first and I’ll tell you the ones I want typing in English. Ying, it’s a lot of work. Sorry. Maybe we can do it together?”
“No problem. We can do it. Yesterday in the car, when I asked you how you solve a murder case, you said with a lot of hard work and luck. So now, we start with the hard work.”
“Yes, but we are not going to try and do it here. We are going to take everything we need back to my apartment. We’ll work from there. Can you get some officers to move this lot for us? I don’t want the actual exhibits. We can come back and look at anything we need to see here. But I want all the statements, exhibits book, photographs, forensics report, all the paper work we have so far. You are going to need blank forms to rewrite the stuff we need translating. Oh! We need a big whiteboard.”
“Big whiteboard?”
“Yes. A 4ft by 8 ft dry-wipe marker board. You know, to write on. Oh! And some coloured pens. Can we do all this?”
“Yes. Can do. No problem.”
A few hours later they were set up in Danny’s apartment with three boxes of paperwork and the white marker board, which Danny had told the men carrying it to put in front of the TV. When the uniformed officers left the apartment, Danny turned to Ying.
“Now, this is a Murder Incident Room; a view of the sea out the front, a view of the pool out the back. We’ll be working long hours Ying, but we will have plenty of breaks to have a drink or something to eat. Jesus! We can even go and have a swim.”
Ying had noticed a difference in Danny today. There seemed to be a sparkle in his Irish eyes. Maybe that’s what happens to a great detective from Scotland Yard when he is on another murder case.
“See this white board, Ying?”
“Yes I see. It is very big….. and white.” She allowed herself a giggle.
“Well, by the time we have finished, this is going to be covered in writing and it will give us the killer.”
Ying was impressed, but she did not know how a whiteboard was going to give them the killer.
“Watch” said Danny, reading the doubt in her mind.
At the top of the board he wrote in big red letters.
‘SARAH APPLEBY MURDER 8TH APRIL’
In the middle of the board he wrote ‘Sarah’ in green pen and enclosed it in a circle with five lines coming from the circle. He wrote a word on each line, ‘LOVERS, ASSOCIATES, SUSPECTS, WITNESSES and KILLER. Down the right hand side of the board he wrote in blue ‘QUESTIONS’. ‘WHO IS SARAH APPLEBY?’ ‘WHY DID SHE HAVE TO DIE?’
‘WHO DID IT?’
Down the left hand side of the board he wrote in orange.
‘MOTIVES. JEALOUSY, BLACKMAIL, SECRETS, SECURITY, LOVE, HATE, REVENGE, WRONG TIME/PLACE, MISTAKEN IDENTITY’
“Just shout up Ying if you can think of anything else we need on here. We can add whatever we want as we go along. Sometimes it helps to have things like this written down, so you can look at them, in case you are missing something obvious.”
Along the bottom of the board he wrote. TIME LINE and drew a long line in black pen all the way across the board.
Now Ying really was impressed. Seeing the ‘Great Detective’ start to work had put a tingle down her backbone. She had no doubt in her mind now. Surely he was going to catch the killer. Danny loosened his tie.
“Do you mind if I smoke Ying?”
“No, not at all.”
Danny opened up the windows and the patio doors onto the balcony, before lighting up a cigarette and pouring himself a Jack Daniels and coke. He did not ask Ying what she wanted and just poured her an orange juice. With the windows and doors open the air conditioning became ineffective. The room became warm and muggy with the tropical air even though it had now, once again, started to lash it down with rain outside.
They settled down to work. Ying read, translated and typed on the computer whenever requested by Danny. They started with the exhibits book, which Ying copied in its entirety into English. She then copied the forensic report into English, while Danny studied the exhibits book.
“Ying, according to the exhibit book, Sarah’s laptop computer and her mobile phone were handed over to the British Embassy, on the very same day that she was found dead?”
“Yes, somebody came that day to identify the body and they took the laptop and mobile phone, because of security I think.”
“They can’t have possibly had time to examine them in that time.”
“Nobody examined anything. The man from the Embassy was the British Ambassador himself.”
“Sir Anthony Armstrong?”
“Yes, that’s the name. So the Colonel took charge of showing him the body and it was the Colonel who handed over the phone and laptop, at the Ambassadors request, for government security. I did not make the decision.”
“Yes I know that. Sir Anthony Armstrong is Sarah’s Uncle, so I’m told.”
“I did not know that.”
“I have a contact number for him. We’ll go and see him tomorrow as well, while we’re in Bangkok. We need to get these exhibits back from him and have a look at them.”
Danny wrote on the white board ‘Sir Anthony Armstrong’. He wrote it under ‘Associates’ and again under ‘Witnesses’.
They worked all through the day and late on into the night, only stopping to eat some Thai food that they had delivered to the apartment. It smelt great; pork and rice and papaya salad. But Danny could not eat it, because of the ridiculous amount of mouth blistering chili that was in it. Danny had added to the white board, writing the names of Nui and her dog Chi under ‘Witnesses.’ He also added all the police, simply as ‘Police’ under ‘Witnesses.’ Along the Time Line he marked 02:08hrs ‘Sarah murdered’ and 06:45hrs ‘Dog Chi finds body’ and 07:30hrs ‘Police confirm dead body’.
It was after midnight when Danny looked up from where he was sitting out on the balcony reading another typed statement, and saw that Ying had fallen asleep on the settee. He knew that she must be exhausted. She had been doing all the work today. It was much too late to send her home. He put his drink down, stubbed out the cigarette and then gently swept the sleeping beauty up into his arms and carried her into the spare bedroom. He covered her with the white cotton sheet and kissed her on the forehead, before sneaking back out of
the room and quietly closing the door behind him.
Chapter 9 Bangkok.
Ying was very apologetic during breakfast for falling asleep last night, but thanked Danny warmly for putting her to bed. Danny showered and dressed in another suit for the important meeting of today, but Ying said that she might as well shower at her apartment, because she would have to get changed into fresh clothes anyway.
Danny did not know what he was expecting of Ying’s apartment, but he was not expecting this. She had driven him onto Nanai Road and then along what was little more than a dirt track, which took them to a small row of ground floor apartments. In reality they were little more than a concrete box with a door at the front and, at the back, another door and a little window. It had an outside kitchen. The apartment consisted of one medium sized room with a separate shower room with toilet. Danny could see that she shared the room with another female and that they slept on mats on the floor. He did well to hide his culture shock from Ying and, even if she did notice, she pretended that she had not. Danny waited outside and had a cigarette while he waited for Ying to shower and change. He had to take his jacket off and loosen his tie. He seemed to be sweating all the time in this tropical heat. Even when it was pouring down with rain he was hot and sticky. Ying appeared fresh and bright at his side. She was excited about today and, as usual, she looked fantastic. Danny noticed that she had put just a hint of shiny gloss lipstick on today. In any other country in the world, surely this girl would be a model.
While they were waiting at the airport Danny was trying to think of a way of putting a delicate matter to Ying. He did not want to offend her, but he had been shocked at the humble conditions in which she lived and he wanted to make her life a little easier. He ran through a few conversation options in his mind and, when they were finally seated on the plane to Bangkok, he pitched his best one.
“Ying, you worked really hard last night and I want to thank you. But I was thinking about something and I just want to know what you think. I think there will be many nights when we will have to work well into the night and it might be better if you moved into the spare bedroom for the next six months. Maybe you could sublet your own apartment in that time and then, at least, we will be able to work and take rest as and when we can.”
Ying did not answer, but seemed deep in thought.
“You can bring all the things you need, and I’ll stock up with food and anything else you require” he continued.
“Look, Ying, you’ll be perfectly safe. I just think it might be a good arrangement, purely a professional relationship. Jesus! I’ve offended you now, have I?”
He need not have been worrying. Ying loved the idea of sharing the luxury apartment for six months. She loved the bathroom and the air conditioning and she already knew someone who would want to sublet her apartment. The extra money that she would make would come in very useful. No, it wasn’t that at all. She was thinking of a far more delicate matter and now it was her turn to think about the best way to say it to the farang.
Ying knew that, as soon as Danny started taking the Sarah Appleby Incident Room to his apartment, that Sarah’s spirit would be coming too. Last night, while she slept, she was visited by a blonde haired spirit. It was the dead wife of Danny. She had decided as soon as she woke up not to tell Danny about her dream, because she knew that farangs don’t understand the spirit world at all and she didn’t want to freak him out. Now, Ying wasn’t afraid of Spirits. But, like all beings, they have to be treated with respect. She was more than happy to share the apartment with Danny, but not with two spirits as well. She would need to make a shrine to Buddha in the apartment and put a Spirit House out on the balcony. There was already a big Spirit House at the front of the apartments for all the apartments, but this was a special case. She thought it best if they also had their very own to avoid any trouble. But how can she tell all this to Danny?
“No, you haven’t offended me. It is very kind of you and I would love to take the spare room, but I can only do this if you allow me to buy a present for the house.”
“Oh, you don’t have to do that, Ying.”
“Yes I do. It is a Thai custom. That’s the only way I can live at the apartment.”
She knew that Buddha would forgive her lie and she promised him that she would tell Danny the truth, when he was ready to listen to it. Danny knew that they have some funny customs in south-east Asia, so he agreed and they both smiled, happy with the ‘done deal.’
It was already late afternoon when they got to the Bumrungrad Hospital. The air in the city felt heavy and polluted and made a dirty, oppressive heat. This felt like a busy city and, so far, the only thing Danny had seen of it was the traffic on the toll road from the airport to the hospital. The hospital was a very impressive complex; all new, light buildings and inside it was five star. They were taken into a private waiting room with soft leather cream coloured seats.
“Jesus! This hospital would put any other anywhere in the world to shame” was Danny’s considered opinion.
Chapter 10 The Pathology.
After a few minutes they were taken into the Pathologist, Dr. Wongchengyun. Ying gave him a high wai.
“Sawaddee kha” (Hello) she almost sang the words, and Danny did a perfect wai the way that Ying had shown him. The Doctor returned it.
“The farang detective has a handsome wai. Did you teach him?” the Doctor asked in Thai, while smiling at Ying.
“Yes, but now he does it better than the wai I showed him.”
Ying felt a rush of pride that the Doctor had noticed how nicely Danny had wai’d.
Dr. Wongchengyun was in his late 50’s and he was the first Thai person that Danny had seen with grey hair, almost white. Gold rimmed dual focus spectacles perched low down on his nose and kind eyes peered out over the top of them from a chubby tanned face. Danny liked him instantly.
“Ying, does the Doctor speak English, or are you going to translate?”
“I speak English Detective, but I don’t know what I can add to the report I have already submitted.”
“Oh, right. Thanks. No, I understand that Doc, but I always like to speak with people face to face. I know that the report will be concise and medically accurate, but I want to ask you about what you feel. I have only had a chance to glance at your report, but I have brought it along with the post mortem photos, in case you wanted to jog your memory.”
“No. I can remember it without reading my report. What do you want to know, Detective?”
“Well, maybe let’s start with the obvious. The cause of death, and then we can possibly have a general little chat about what you think about it.”
“Okay. Well, when I went to the scene and saw the body I would say that she had been dead for around ten hours, which would have put her time of death at about 2:00am. I don’t want to say anything else about the crime scene. That might step into the realms of the forensics, but I can tell you about the body. I had it removed for a full post mortem examination. The cause of death was obviously knife wounds, but I cannot tell you which actual wound was the cause of her death. She suffered many slashing and stab wounds all over her body, before she then suffered several hundred stab wounds to the chest, particularly massed around the heart. Several of her fingers from both hands had been cut off. The wounds were clean, suggesting a forceful slashing with a very sharp blade. Presumably, at some point, the hands were raised in self-defense. Her right breast had also been sliced off. ”
“Was her heart cut out Doc?”
“No. The wound around the heart was massive and the police initially thought that her heart had been cut out. I am aware that that was the story printed in the newspapers. But no, her heart was really stabbed into a pulp. There were two types of puncture wounds. One with a sharp pointed, bladed weapon and the second type of wound was with a two pronged type of weapon, but in fact it was only one wea
pon. It was a large knife, at least to start off with. But at some point, well into the attack when the victim must have been lying on the floor, the knife stuck in her pelvic bone and snapped, thus making it now a two pronged type weapon, which the attacker used to continue the attack. Blood samples were sent off for toxicology and they came back positive for Meth Amphetamine, Cocaine, Cannabis and Alcohol. She must have had quite a party. I took vaginal and anal swabs, both higher and lower, and can confirm that intercourse had taken place within the 24hrs before death, by both vagina and anus.”
“The tests have since come back from the Lab, Doctor, and we have sperm from three different men present in the samples” added Ying.
“So, we have matches for the sperm?” asked Danny.
“Sorry Danny. Here in Thailand we don’t have the huge Data Base that you have in the West. There is nothing currently in our Data Base that matches.”
“It took me two days to complete the post mortem examination and, as best as I can tell you, there were 187 lacerations or slash type wounds of various depth to the back and front of the body, 314 puncture or stab wounds and then at least another 200 puncture wounds to the heart. Most of the stab wounds were to the front of the body. There was of course some bone damage to the ribs, but no head wounds and the brain was unremarkable. There was not enough left of the lungs, liver, kidneys etc, for me to make any firm conclusions.”
“Holy Jesus Mother of God!” Danny said in a deep exhaled breath. “The poor girl was butchered” he continued. “Doc, tell me what you think. I don’t mean officially. I just mean off the record. What the feck happened up there that night? What does your instinct tell you?”
The Doctor got out of his chair and went to look out of the window as he considered his answer.
“Well, I don’t think anyone heard any screams and maybe that is because he slashed her across the throat early on in the attack. That would certainly stop her from screaming. She would only be able to make a low hissing or gurgling sound. I think then, a natural reaction is to try to run away as the attacker chases after her, making further slash wounds to her back, arms and legs. The Meth Amphetamine and Cocaine would have certainly prolonged her death, giving her the ability to stay on her feet and run longer. At some point she has turned to face the attacker or been cornered by the attacker, probably both. She instinctively put her hands up to protect herself. The attacker, continuing with the large swiping blows, has taken her fingers off. One of the swipes has taken her breast off. At this point she can’t scream, she can’t protect herself, she probably can’t run much further anymore. She has lost a lot of blood and she is seeing her body parts being sliced off, possibly stomach contents now coming out. She falls to the floor and the attacker then changes the attack to stab wounds, probably sitting astride the victim. At least, this part of the attack became frenzied, if indeed, it wasn’t all frenzied. The victim then received probably the fatal blow to the heart and dies. But the attacker carries on for some time after that, continuing to stab away with a lot of force. At some point the knife sticks deep into the pelvis and snaps. I recovered two and a half inches of the tip of the blade. As we know, the attacker then continues with the knife, now pronged, which mushes the chest and heart. This attack was done with a lot of strength and a lot of anger. That’s what I think.”
The Thai Dragon Page 5