Big Mango (9786167611037)

by Needham, Jake

  “Where did that money go after he died?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Did you find any trace of it at all? Deposit books? Bank certificates? Anything like that?”

  “No.”

  “I’ve got to tell you that something bothers me here.” Eddie looked evenly at Lek. “You sound pretty cold about your husband’s death. You talk about his money, but you never say anything about him. Why is that?”

  “I’m sorry I don’t meet your California standards of grief,” she snapped. Her face was taut. “Harry was just—”

  “He didn’t really trust you, did he? He never told you very much.”

  “Harry was a peculiar man in many ways,” Lek said, and then lapsed into silence.

  Eddie thought she looked like someone walking through a minefield. Something worked at him, but he couldn’t figure out exactly what it was.

  “He just kept some things to himself,” she added after a moment. “You had to know him to understand.”

  “I did know him.”

  “Maybe not as well as I did.”

  Eddie stood up and walked over to the windows and looked down at the Chao Phraya River, still and black in the moonless night. He didn’t really want any more coffee, but he picked up his cup anyway and tipped it to his lips, letting the lukewarm liquid just hang there against his tongue without swallowing.

  What the hell am I doing, Eddie asked himself. Why am I eyeing this woman’s legs one moment and cross-examining her like a criminal the next? He felt like he was once again standing in front of the same door that had started to swing open for him when he was back at the embassy, the papers from Harry Austin’s safety deposit box spread over the table in front of him. Although the door yawned unmistakably now, standing wide open, and he saw that as clearly as he had ever seen anything in his life, he could still make out nothing at all of what waited beyond it.

  Eddie returned his cup to its saucer and put them both down carefully on a table. Then he took a deep breath and, without so much as a glance back, plunged through that door.

  “I’m not going to miss this party,” he told the others. He wondered for a moment if there was anything he was leaving out, but there wasn’t. It was just that simple. “That’s it. I’m in this until it’s over, whatever that turns out to mean.”

  The room was still. Bar, Lek and Winnebago watched Eddie carefully, but no one said anything. The silence quivered around them like jelly.

  “If any of you want to throw in with me…” Eddie paused long enough to underline the significance of what he was going to say next “I’ll divide whatever we get out of it equally with each of you. If we get anything at all.”

  Winnebago took another bite of his sandwich. Chewing on it thoughtfully, he swallowed and rubbed the back of his hand across his mouth. “In ‘Nam you got me into some shit that still makes my asshole pucker, man. You know, I got to think about that.”

  “I understand.”

  “I guess…” Winnebago paused, thinking back. Suddenly he flashed a wide grin and punched a fist into the air. “Hey, fuck this hippie shit! Let’s do it!”

  Eddie looked at Bar. “How about it?”

  “What if I say no?”

  “Since I’ve already told you everything, I’ll have to kill you.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Yeah, but only barely.”

  Bar tapped his forefinger absentmindedly against his coffee cup for a moment and then he looked across at Eddie and held his eyes. “Okay, Eddie. What am I saving my youth for, huh? I haven’t had any real fun in a long time either. I’m in.”

  “You won’t be sorry.”

  “I already am,” Bar laughed. “But only barely.”

  Then the three of them looked at Lek.

  She lifted both hands in a mock gesture of surrender. “I’m not going to get very far on my own. Count me in, too, I guess.”

  “Well then,” Eddie said, “I guess we’re in business.”

  “So, what’s the plan?” Winnebago asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You got no plan?” Winnebago looked pained. “Nothing?”

  “I’ve got a place to start. After that, we’ll just have to see how everything works out.” Eddie glanced at Bar. “Can you organize somewhere for the four of us to stay for a few days.”

  “What for?” He looked around the suite. “The Oriental’s not good enough for you?”

  “Not a regular hotel. We’ve got to disappear for a while. Do you know anyone who’s out of town; maybe someone who could lend us a house or an apartment?”

  Bar thought for a moment while they all watched him. “Okay, I know just the right place.”

  “We’ll need it tomorrow night.”

  “You got it.”

  “I don’t understand something,” Winnebago interrupted. “With the Secret Service, the Vietnamese, and Christ only knows who else watching every time we take a leak, how are we supposed to get to wherever this is without them all knowing where we’ve gone?”

  “That part I got worked out. We’ll just do something so boring they will all lose interest for a while.”

  “What could we possibly do in Bangkok that’s boring?” Bar looked stumped.

  “That’s easy,” Eddie smiled. “Go to Singapore.”

  ***

  THEY left Bangkok a little after noon the next day on a Thai International Airways flight, each of them having bought a ticket to Singapore from a different travel agent and paid for it in cash. No one checked in any luggage. Eddie and Winnebago left everything in their suite, other than what they packed into two small carry-ons, and slipped out the back of the Oriental to the river landing. They took the ferry to Silapakorn University, lost themselves in the crowds of students, and found a taxi to the airport. Bar and Lek each made their own way to the airport; Lek using the Thai International limousine service, and Bar on a bus.

  Once at the airport, they all checked in separately without speaking and then scattered themselves around the three cabins of the big airbus. Four apparently individual passengers would be far harder for anyone to remember later, Eddie thought, and certainly a lot less conspicuous than three American men and an Asian woman traveling in a group.

  Eddie had no illusions about his ability to keep them hidden for very long. He was an amateur and they were up against professionals. Neither Vietnamese Intelligence nor the Secret Service were stupid. Both would trace them relatively quickly in spite of anything he could do. When they all disappeared from Bangkok, airport departures would be the first thing everyone thought of and it wouldn’t be particularly difficult to find out where they had gone.

  Every passenger leaving Bangkok filled out a departure card and, at the immigration check just before the gates, the cards were marked with both a flight number and a destination. Within twelve hours after they dropped out of sight, those cards would be retrieved—either officially, or more likely, unofficially—and it would be simple enough for anyone to find out that they were in Singapore.

  Except, of course, they wouldn’t be.

  At the concierge desk the night before, Eddie had gone through the schedules and learned that fifty-two minutes after the noon flight from Bangkok landed at Singapore’s Changi Airport, there was a Silk Air flight leaving for Phuket, the Thai resort island in the Andaman Sea. Forty-one minutes after the Silk Air flight arrived in Phuket, a Thai Airways domestic flight left there for the short hop back to Bangkok. They could all be tucked away back in the city, almost before anyone had worked out that they’d left in the first place. The gambit had flare, if Eddie did say so himself. Since they’d never leave the international transit lounge at Changi and never enter Singapore, there would be no record left behind there. No trail at all.

  That wouldn’t stop anyone for very long, of course. When no entry record was found in Singapore, it would become obvious what they had done and all the outbound flights from Changi following their time of arrival would be checked. But t
here were a lot of them, and that would take quite a while. Even when they were finally traced to Phuket, the whole process would have to be repeated there again before anyone figured out that they were actually back in Bangkok.

  Eddie hoped his little subterfuge might get them two or three days to poke around discreetly about Harry Austin before they started drawing a crowd again. It might if they stayed lucky.

  It wasn’t much. Maybe it was nothing at all. Right then, however, it felt like a pretty good start.

  Twenty-Six

  THE loading bridge nestled snugly up against the airbus and Eddie, Bar, Winnebago and Lek all filed out, each separately losing himself in the crush of passengers thronging Terminal One at Changi. Ten minutes later, they assembled at a spot in the terminal next to a goldfish pond with a wooden bridge which looked vaguely Japanese and led to a Planet Hollywood gift shop.

  Stores of all sorts stretched as far as they could see inside the huge complex. Overhead signs pointed to a movie theater showing four recent Hollywood films, a gym with two jogging tracks and a swimming pool, a 24-hour children’s play center, a desk providing hourly city tours of Singapore, and a nondenominational chapel with a meditation area. Eddie glanced in the direction of the chapel and wondered what kind of crowd it drew.

  “Okay, listen up. There are Silk Air desks over there,” Eddie said, pointing past a computer shop and a florist to a few airline signs were barely visible in the distance, “ and down there.” He pointed in the opposite direction toward where a storefront displayed exercise equipment. “Split up and buy your tickets one by one. Everyone got money?”

  They all nodded.

  “Okay. There’s supposed to be something called the Traveler’s Bar right the middle of this building. We’ll meet there.”

  After they had all bought their tickets, found the bar, and settled in, they ordered beers all around and Winnebago reached for his Camels. Almost before the pack had cleared his pocket, a young Singaporean in a brown blazer with a gold patch of some kind over the pocket materialized next to their table. He beamed down at Winnebago with a beatific smile.

  “My apologies, sir, but smoking is not permitted here. Only over there, “ the man said, gesturing toward the opposite side of the terminal building, “in the smoking booth.”

  Winnebago turned and looked in the direction the young man was pointing, but he saw nothing except milling passengers and more stores. He looked back at the guy, who was still smiling maniacally, like a Mormon on speed.

  “What the hell’s a smoking booth?”

  The man gestured again in the same direction, nodding encouragingly.

  Winnebago looked again and this time he saw it. In a distant corner of the terminal was a glass room the size of a small office. It had a sort of airlock for a door and inside a dozen people sat and puffed energetically on cigarettes, their bodies dim outlines through a smoky haze.

  Eddie looked where Winnebago’s eyes were pointing. “I wonder if there’s a please-don’t-feed-the-animals sign on it?”

  Winnebago returned the Camels to his pocket and tossed the young man a salute. “Up yours, captain.”

  The man looked bewildered as he flipped quickly through his mental dictionary of English idioms. ‘Up yours?’ What means ‘up yours’? Eventually, still baffled, he returned the salute with a military snap and walked away.

  Winnebago watched him go. “Fuck, man. That’s un-American, treat people like that.”

  “This is Singapore,” Eddie reminded him. “They like rules. You can’t chew gum either.”

  Winnebago just shook his head some more.

  They all sat in silence for a while and watched a man in white tie and tails play a silver grand piano. He rippled through Some Enchanted Evening and You’ll Never Walk Alone, and he was just launching into The Impossible Dream when Winnebago quickly drained the rest of his beer and stood up. “I’m going to the gate. If I have to listen to any more of this shit without smoking, I’m going to puke.”

  “I’m with you,” Bar chimed in, chugging the rest of his own beer.

  The corridor that led out to their boarding gate was decked out in pink and blue pastels and it stretched into the distance until it seemed to disappear from sight over the horizon. It was crowded with passengers heading in both directions, but the moving walkways allowed them to make rapid progress. Eddie and Lek fell behind the others, cut off by a troop of elderly Japanese tourists led by an earnest-looking young woman waving a small flag but, when they stepped off the section of walkway that ended in front of Gate F54, Bar reached out of the crowd with one hand and caught Eddie by the elbow. He pointed ahead.

  It was still at least fifty yards to Gate F58 where the Phuket flight was loading, and making out exactly what was happening there was difficult, but one thing was unmistakable. A cordon of Singapore police was blocking the entry to the gate lobby and they were carefully checking each passenger who entered.

  “That’s impossible,” Eddie shook his head for emphasis. “No way anyone could have traced us that fast. No goddamn way. Stay here. I’ll check it out.”

  Working himself into the crowd, he drifted with it to the line waiting to enter F58. At the head of the line, two stony-faced policemen in starched, khaki uniforms were questioning each passenger individually, meticulously examining their passports before another pair of cops behind a table completely unpacked every piece of carry-on luggage and searched painstakingly through its contents.

  Eddie eased up next to a boy in the line who looked like a good bet for striking up a conversation. The boy was in his early twenties, tall, with the deep tan and the long, stringy hair of a traveler. Eddie guessed the boy had to be a fellow American. He would have guessed that anyway because of the boy’s clothes and his cocky slouch, but what sealed the deal was the big sticker across the worn backpack lying at his feet. It unapologetically proclaimed the boy’s personal policy on foreign relations: NO FAT CHICKS.

  Eddie swapped the San Francisco in his voice for something that might sound a little more down home. He tried for Texas, and made it as far as Oklahoma.

  “What’s going on up there?”

  “You English?” The boy looked Eddie over neutrally.

  “No, buddy. American.”

  “Oh.” The kid didn’t bother to hide his disappointment. “I’m from London.”

  Eddie was just working on a quick change of tack when the boy took him off the hook. He pointed to the front of the line where the cops were grilling a short, dark man and examining his passport with evident skepticism.

  “Looks like the local stormtroopers want somebody pretty bad.”

  “Do you know who they’re looking for?” Eddie kept his voice casual.

  The kid was just starting to shake his head when an elderly woman in the line behind him leaned forward.

  “They’re not looking for anyone,” she volunteered in a voice that immediately reminded Eddie of his third grade teacher. “This is a special security flight because of the Prime Minister.”

  Eddie and the kid glanced at each other in puzzlement.

  “The Prime Minister and his family are on the plane today,” the woman went on in the same pedantic tone when it became obvious that neither of them understood what she was talking about.

  “Tony Blair?” the boy asked, obviously confused. “Tony Blair’s on this flight?”

  The woman looked scandalized. “I meant our Prime Minister. Prime Minister Goh of Singapore.” She narrowed her eyes at the boy. “Everyone isn’t English, you know, young man.”

  “And I for one thank Christ for it,” Eddie said as he turned and walked away.

  ***

  “THE Prime Minister of Singapore apparently picked our flight for a little jaunt of his own today,” Eddie said when he got back to the others. “That’s why the cops are double-checking everything. It’s got nothing to do with us.”

  “Oh, man.” Winnebago loosed a long sigh. “I guess I can start breathing again.”

 
“Wait a minute,” Lek said. “Maybe we should still take another flight.”

  “What’s the problem?” Eddie glanced at her and saw that she was obviously concerned about something. “They’re not interested in us.”

  “It still makes us conspicuous. We should wait.”

  “Look, we can’t wait.” Eddie’s voice was firm. “There’s no problem. Let’s go.”

  “I say we wait.” There was an edge to Lek’s voice and her bag remained on the floor.

  “This is Eddie’s show,” Bar said keeping his voice level. “He says we go, we go. We all go. That’s the way it works.”

  Lek glanced first at Bar, then at Eddie who was watching her curiously. She lowered her head. “Sorry. I guess I’m a little edgy.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Eddie said as he moved off toward the gate. “We’re all edgy.”

  After they all went through the passport checks and had their boarding passes collected, they were each passed along separately for inspection of their carry-on bags. Bar and Eddie got through first and stood together inside the boarding lounge waiting for the others.

  “Ever been to Phuket before?” Eddie asked Bar.

  “Once.”

  “Liked it?”

  “I liked everywhere once.”

  Winnebago was straggling across the lounge toward them when the doors to the loading bridge opened and the rush to board the aircraft started. Over Winnebago’s shoulder, Eddie could see that Lek was still in front of one of the security tables, the contents of her carry-on bag having been fastidiously distributed into piles by a khaki-uniformed security man.

  “Ready?” Winnebago asked when he reached them, shifting his bag from one hand to the other.

  Eddie pointed back to where Lek appeared to be having an angry conversation with the security man and they all turned to watch. They were too far away to hear what was being said, but the man was holding up what looked like two small books he had taken from Lek’s bag and was waving them at one of the cops.