by Jake Needham
CHAPTER THIRTY
LEE PULLED UP to the curb in front of a building exactly like all the other buildings in the Woodlands HDB estate. Ten stories tall, it had about a dozen apartments on each floor, every single one with the same number of windows and an identical narrow balcony. The only visual distinction Tay detected was the variety of junk each resident had piled on his balcony.
The whole area was as deserted as if it had been abandoned. A few cars and motorcycles were parked on the street, but there was no sign of human activity anywhere. No music on the breeze, no conversation in the distance, no flashes of movement. The place was as barren and sterile as anywhere Tay ever remembered being. If it hadn’t been for the laundry drying on some of the metal poles that extended out from each balcony, Tay would have wondered if anyone lived here at all.
“Mr. Wang is in 504, sir.”
Tay’s eyes flicked up five stories. He scanned the apartments on that level and saw absolutely nothing interesting, so he just nodded and got out of the car.
When the elevator opened on the fifth floor, they stepped out into a corridor with a white tiled floor, freshly painted off-white walls, and six black metal doors on each side. There was a faint smell of accumulated cooking odors and something else Tay thought might be urine. He hoped it was from dogs and cats.
They walked down the corridor checking the numbers painted on the doors until they found 504. Lee looked at Tay and raised her eyebrows in the obvious question. Tay nodded.
“Police!” Lee called out. She knocked on the door with her knuckles and the metallic rapping sound echoed in the quiet hallway. “Police!”
No response. After a polite interval, Lee knocked again. Still no response and no sign of life from any of the other apartments on the corridor. Tay reached out and jiggled the doorknob, but it didn’t turn.
“I could probably open it, sir. It looks like a simple pin tumbler.”
“You know how to pick locks, Sergeant?”
“I have no idea how to pick locks, sir.” Lee took out her police warrant card, a laminated card about twice the size of a credit card and a little thinner. “But this works more often than you might think.”
Bending over until her eyes were level with the doorknob, Lee slid her warrant card between the door and the jamb and moved it down until she felt the edge of the bolt. She pushed on the door with her left hand, jiggled the card a little further down, and bent it to the left until it almost touched the doorknob. Maintaining her pressure on the door, Lee suddenly bent the card back in the opposite direction and pushed it hard into the jamb. The bolt snapped back and the door swung open.
“It’s that easy?” Tay asked.
“Not always, sir, but usually.”
Tay just shook his head. He wouldn’t have believed that if he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes.
The smell came to them the moment they opened the door. Neither Tay nor Lee had any doubt what they would find somewhere inside.
Dead bodies have an unmistakable odor, a sickly sweet stench with stomach-churning undertones that always made Tay think of spoiled cheese. The odor comes from the urine and feces released by the relaxation of muscles at death mixed with the gases from the first stages of organic decomposition. It is a smell anyone who has encountered will remember forever. It is a smell that no homicide investigator can forget no matter how hard he tries.
“He’s in here, sir,” Lee called from the bedroom.
The body was face down on the carpet just inside the door. The corpse’s head was turned to the right and Tay could see the face clearly. He had no doubt, but he stepped to the side so Lee could get a good look as well. Lee just nodded.
It was the elderly Chinese-looking man who had been behind the desk when they rushed into the Fortuna Hotel at the sound of gunshots. Lee squatted down beside the corpse and studied the wound.
“One shot to the back of the head, sir. Looks to me like a nine.”
Three men dead from a single shot in the back of the head with a nine millimeter handgun in less than a week. Was there any chance at all that was a coincidence?
Tay didn’t want to think about his dream and the conversation he imagined having with his mother, he really didn’t, but of course it all came back to him clearly now…
“And what about the other body?”
“What other body?”
“You know, that man who…oh wait, never mind. You haven’t found that one yet.”
When Sergeant Lee got to her feet, Tay was standing and staring off into space.
“Are you okay, sir?” she asked.
Tay shook off the memory and nodded. He got down on his knees and lifted the corpse’s right arm an inch or two. The body was cold and he felt very little rigor in the elbow. The man had been dead for a while, probably two or three days. Tay lowered the arm, put his cheek against the floor, and examined the corpse’s face.
“There’s no exit wound,” he said. “The bullet must still be in him.”
“Must have been a low velocity subsonic round,” Lee said. “Heavy bullet, slow speed, no penetration. Fired through a suppressor, it wouldn’t have made much noise.”
A low velocity subsonic round? A heavy bullet fired through a suppressor? That wasn’t some robber with a cheap revolver who panicked when he was discovered.
Tay pushed himself up and stood looking down at the man lying on the floor of the dreary little apartment in the Woodlands. He was just an old guy trying to earn a living running a second-rate tourist hotel, and then somebody came into his apartment and shot him in the back of the head. Who would do that? Who would want to do that?
Tay could only think of one answer to that question. He tried to put it all together in some other way, but he couldn’t.
Somebody was trying to cover up the connection between ISD and Suparman. They were tying up loose ends, getting rid of anyone who knew about it. Tay didn’t have a lot of respect for ISD, but couldn’t see them as cold-blooded murderers. He simply wasn’t prepared to believe the Internal Security Department went around killing people because they knew something they didn’t want revealed. But if it wasn’t ISD tying up those loose ends, who in the world was it?
There had to be another explanation. He just had no idea what it could be.
“Should I call this in now, sir?”
Tay hesitated. Nothing good could come of their discovery of the hotel manager’s body lying on the floor of his apartment. Not for him, and certainly not for them. How would they explain to the SAC what they were doing there, or how they had gotten in?
But what else were they going to do? Just leave the guy’s body lying there and walk away?
“Maybe we should call it in anonymously,” Tay said after a moment.
“Anonymously, sir? Why?”
“To keep anyone from knowing who made the discovery, Sergeant. That’s what anonymously means.”
Tay took a couple of steps over to the window, pulled the flimsy curtain aside, and looked out. The glass was grimy and streaked with dirt, but off in the distance he could see the narrow straits that separated Singapore from the southern tip of Malaysia. Just on the other side, indistinct in the afternoon haze, loomed the buildings of Johor Bahru, the slightly shabby Malaysian city at the other end of the causeway.
What if his worst suspicions were true? What if ISD had killed the hotel manager and did it because he could connect ISD to Suparman? That meant ISD was willing to go to pretty much any lengths to cover up the fact that they had Suparman and were protecting him for some reason.
Any lengths?
Tay knew of only five people in the world who could link ISD to Suparman. One was the hotel manager, and he was lying dead on the floor right in front of them. The second was Suparman’s sister, but she was dead as well, run down by a truck in the middle of Serangoon Road. The third was Robbie Kang, and of course he was dead, too, presumably shot by Suparman.
That left two people, just two people, who could tie ISD directly to S
uparman: Tay and Lee.
Tay didn’t like looking at it that way. He really didn’t. But that was how it was.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
IT HAD STARTED to rain when they were in Robert Wang’s apartment. The rain began with a mist so light it was as if the city were being cooled by a spritz from a gigantic spray bottle, but by the time they got back to the car the rain had turned earnest and fat drops pinged against the windshield with a rhythm that reminded Tay of a song he couldn’t quite remember. He watched the raindrops collect at the top of the windshield, join into big rivulets, and streak across it.
Tay walked his memory back through the time they had spent in Wang’s apartment. He was pretty certain they left the apartment exactly as they had found it. Neither Tay nor Lee had touched anything but the body and the front doorknob and Tay had used his handkerchief to wipe the doorknob on both sides of the door. It was probably more caution than the circumstances required, but if it was wasted effort it wasn’t much effort to waste.
“This isn’t right, sir.”
“No, it isn’t, Sergeant, but we’re going to do it anyway.”
“We should call it in, sir. We just left that poor man lying there.”
“I doubt he cares much one way or the other.”
“You know what I mean, sir. For God’s sake, we’re the police. We can’t just ignore a dead body.”
“We’re not going to ignore it. Tomorrow you will find a pay phone and report it. You’re just not going to tell anybody who you are.”
Lee looked away and shook her head, but she didn’t say anything.
“Look, Linda, don’t you see what’s going on here?”
“No, sir, I guess I don’t.”
“ISD is protecting Suparman. You saw them and I saw them.”
“Yes, I saw them, sir. But I still don’t understand why they would be doing it.”
“Neither do I, but the woman they claimed was Suparman’s sister saw they were protecting him, and she’s dead. Robbie Kang saw they were protecting him, and he’s dead. And the hotel manager saw they were protecting him, and now he’s dead, too.”
“The woman’s death was an accident.”
“Maybe,” Tay shrugged. “Maybe not.”
“Are you telling me what I think you’re telling me, sir?”
Tay just looked at Lee.
“My God, sir, you can’t seriously believe the Internal Security Department is going around murdering people to cover up whatever it is they’re doing.”
“Somebody is, Linda. You believe all this is just a coincidence?”
“No, sir, but—”
“Think it through. Only five people know ISD was at the Fortuna Hotel with Suparman. And now three of them are dead.”
Lee stared at Tay.
“Listen to yourself, sir. You sound crazy.”
“It’s not crazy at all. We’ve got four people murdered—”
“Four? You said three: Sergeant Kang, Suparman’s sister, and the hotel manager. Who else?”
“A floater that Robbie and I caught just before all this started. Dr. Hoi says he’s probably an Indonesian. He was killed with a shot to the back of the head, and the shooter used a nine. Just like Robbie and just like Wang.”
Lee just stared.
“It’s all tied together somehow. If ISD is protecting Suparman, and if somebody is cutting off the connections between ISD and Suparman, we’re the only two connections left.”
“You can’t really believe ISD would kill two Singapore Police officers, can you, sir?”
“I didn’t think so about an hour ago, Linda, but why kill Wang and let us walk away? That’s why you’re waiting until tomorrow to call this in, and that’s why you’re going to do it anonymously. Until Wang’s body is discovered, they’re not going to be in any hurry and we’ll still have a chance to get in front of this.”
It was the most optimistic thing Tay could say to Lee.
Whether he believed it or not was another story altogether.
They took the Bukit Timah Expressway back to the city. The rain had stopped and they drove in silence. Tay listened to the hissing sound the tires made on the wet pavement and thought about what to do now.
Did he really believe he and Lee were in danger? Did he honestly think ISD would kill two Singapore policemen because they could tie ISD to Suparman? He still couldn’t bring himself to believe an agency of the government of Singapore was going around killing people.
On the other hand, if ISD wasn’t trying to protect itself from being tied to Suparman, who killed the hotel manager? And who the hell was that Indonesian they pulled out of the Singapore River with a bullet in the back of his head? What did he have to do with Suparman and ISD and all the rest of this?
Tay was just going around in circles and he knew it. It came as a welcome relief when Lee broke the silence.
“How long do you want me to wait, sir, before I make the anonymous call?”
“Not very long, Linda. Right now we know the hotel manager was murdered. Except for whoever killed him, nobody else does.”
“I still don’t see why that matters, sir.”
“Honestly?” Tay shrugged. “Maybe it doesn’t matter, but it’s the only thing we’ve got going for us. I don’t want to give it up until I know for sure what it tells us about the other killings.”
Tay took a packet of Marlboros out of his shirt pocket, shook one out, and lit it. He lowered the passenger window a few inches and the sound of rushing air filled the car. Tay smoked quietly and listened to the rumble of the slipstream.
Several minutes passed like that, then Lee cleared her throat.
“Where are we going, sir?”
“Drop me on Orchard Road and you head on home.”
Lee shot Tay a surprised look. “There must be something else we can do, sir.”
“There is. We know a lot. We just don’t know what any of it means. We need to stop running all over the city and sit down and think.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
AFTER SERGEANT LEE dropped Tay off on Orchard Road, he walked home and he did what he always did when he needed to think. He sat in his garden with his shoes off and smoked one cigarette after another. He really was going to have to quit. He understood that. He just wasn’t going to do it right now.
He and Lee didn’t have much time before ISD found out they knew about Robert Wang. The problem was he had absolutely no idea yet what to do with the time they did have.
After a while, the light softened and dusk began to settle over the city, and Tay realized he was hungry since he hadn’t eaten any lunch. Before they discovered Wang’s body, he didn’t wanted to take time to eat. After they discovered Wang’s body, he hadn’t felt like eating anymore. But now he did. Maybe that was a good sign.
Tay stood up and put on his shoes. Then he went inside, washed his hands, and headed out his front door without any particular destination in mind.
He turned right and walked in the direction of Orchard Road, but as he was passing through Preranakan Place he glanced into the Alley Bar and was surprised to see it wasn’t very busy. Tay liked the Alley Bar. It was high-ceilinged and pleasingly dim, and the long bar with the big mirrors behind it stretched for what must have been fifty feet until it almost disappeared into the cool interior shadows. Somehow the scarred wooden bar and hazy mirrors and under-lit interior of the place all combined to make Tay think of what he was sure had been better times, although more and more he wondered if those times had ever really existed.
He took a stool at a section of the bar that was completely deserted and ordered a medium-rare burger and an Irish whiskey. They didn’t have any Powers so he settled for Bushmills. It wasn’t the same, not nearly, but he could live with it.
While he waited for his order he had the choice of watching himself in the cloudy mirror behind the bar or reading something on his phone. He decided to read the Asian edition of the Wall Street Journal on his phone, but he only half registered the words as
they scrolled by since his mind was still focused on what he and Sergeant Lee could do to get on top of what he knew would be coming at them all too soon.
Tay was dimly aware of a man wearing a baseball cap walking up to the bar and sitting one stool away. It annoyed him that the guy chose that particular place to sit. There were plenty of empty stools further down the bar. Why did anyone have to pick one so close to him? He didn’t want to do anything to suggest he might be open to conversation, so he kept his eyes on his telephone and didn’t look up.
At least not until the man spoke to him.
“Just keep your eyes on your phone, Tay. Don’t look at me.”
So, of course, Tay immediately looked at him. He didn’t turn his head, at least he was that subtle, but he did his best to focus on the man’s features out of the corner of his eye. He seemed familiar, but the blue baseball cap and sunglasses made it hard to get a fix on his face using only his peripheral vision.
“You looked at me, Tay. I knew you would, you contrary son of a bitch.”
The voice was familiar, too, and Tay started clicking through his memory trying to match it to somebody.
“Do you remember,” the man went on, “where we met to talk about that kid who was found hanged in his apartment?”
Now Tay did turn his head. “Goh? Is that you?”
“My God, Tay, you’re the original fucking bull in the fucking china shop. Even the simplest tradecraft is too much for you, isn’t it?”
“Tradecraft?” Tay rolled his eyes. “For Christ’s sake, Goh, do you have any idea how silly you sound? Grow up, man.”
“Do you remember where we met, or don’t you, Tay?”
“Of course I remember. We met at—”
“For fuck’s sake, don’t say it out loud.”
Tay just shook his head and looked away.