Umbrella Man (9786167611204)

by Needham, Jake

  The center itself was low-slung and built in an architectural style that was obviously meant to appear cheerful and happy and encourage people to buy things, but Tay thought it mostly evocative of a child run amuck with paper and crayons. The signs were all large and their bright primary colors screamed out the names of the usual suspects: Armani, Nike, Salvatore Ferragamo, Coach, Lacoste, Brooks Brothers, Gap, Guess, Burberry, and Timberland. The place was, for Tay, Exhibit A in the homogenization and decline of contemporary culture.

  The Polo logo was so familiar even Tay spotted the big blue sign right away and parked the Volvo directly in front of it. He collected the two photo albums and went inside. He was more than a little curious what he would find.

  John August was a hard man among hard men. It was beyond the limits of Tay’s imagination to picture August hanging around a clothing store in an outlet mall.

  TWENTY-THREE

  “MAY I HELP you, sir?”

  The woman was very young, not more than twenty-five, and very attractive. Tay of course wondered immediately what her connection with John August was.

  He didn’t want to look foolish to an attractive woman by asking for August and having her say something like Look, old man, we sell socks here, not arrange meetings, so he glanced around quickly before he said anything. All he saw were displays of colorful shirts that reached to the ceiling and chrome racks supporting what looked like thousands of pairs of jeans and khaki pants.

  “Ah…” Tay finally stuttered because he couldn’t think what else to do, “I’m supposed to meet…well, I was asked to come here to—”

  “You’re here to see John?”

  “Yes, exactly.”

  “He’s expecting you. Will you follow me?”

  The woman threw out one of those dazzling smiles that some women went around firing off like solar flares. Tay tried to concoct some major witticism that would cause her to fall instantly in love with him, but before he could think of anything at all she spun on her heel and headed across the store. Tay followed quietly. Maybe a major witticism had been a little much to hope for.

  She led him through an unmarked door in the store’s back wall that was set between shelves holding packages of underwear and some horizontal rails hung with ranks of identical blue blazers. Inside was a short hallway paneled in blond wood off of which opened another half dozen doors that matched the paneling. The woman went straight to the last door on the right, knocked briskly, then opened the door and gestured Tay inside. He offered a smile of thanks and she hit him with another solar flare.

  ***

  The room was on the small side and it felt even smaller since the walls were covered in those faux-classic oil paintings in heavy gold frames that depicted hunting parties, dead ancestors, and the majestic landscapes that Polo stores used to create their atmosphere of made-up tradition. John August was seated at a mahogany table that took up nearly half of the room, his feet thrown up on it and crossed at the ankles. He was reading a Chinese-language newspaper.

  The first time they met at the go-go bar August claimed was his retirement gig, Tay had guessed August was in his mid-forties. He still wore the same round eyeglasses with what looked like steel frames that he had worn then, and he still kept his dark brown hair long and brushed straight back against his head. It made him look a bit old-fashioned to Tay. The man could have been a university professor in his office preparing for class, but Tay knew all too well August was anything but a university professor.

  The room smelled slightly of cigarette smoke and Tay remembered August had smoked Camels the first time they met. That was promising.

  Without being invited, Tay sat down in one of the two green upholstered side chairs across the table from August and took out his Marlboros. August folded the newspaper, fished a gold lighter out of one trouser pocket, and flipped it to Tay. Tay lit his cigarette and tossed the lighter back to August, who by that time had a cigarette between his lips as well.

  August lit it and exhaled a long stream of smoke, but he didn’t say anything.

  “I liked the go-go bar better,” Tay said after a moment.

  “No, you didn’t.”

  August had him there.

  “So,” Tay said, “you…what, own a Polo shop now instead of a go-go bar?”

  August looked amused.

  “I just work here when we need a base in the area. I’ve still got the bar in Pattaya. It’s a hell of a lot more fun than a Polo shop, I’ll tell you.”

  August had never before admitted to Tay he was acting in some kind of an official capacity. In the face of all provocation, he had always maintained he was retired from the State Department. Tay didn’t believe him, of course, and August knew Tay didn’t believe him, but he had stuck to the story, regardless.

  “Who is we?” Tay asked.

  August said nothing, but then Tay hadn’t really expected him to.

  “I think you fit right into this place,” Tay continued after a short silence. “You’re tanned and fit. You’re thin. You could be one of those models on the posters outside.”

  “You’re looking good, too, Sam. At least you are for a guy who’s right in the middle of the biggest shit storm ever to hit Asia.”

  “I’m not in the middle of anything. I can barely see a storm from out where they stuck me.”

  “Then count yourself as one lucky man. I am right in the middle of it, and the view isn’t so great from where I am either, let me tell you.”

  Tay had never thought of August as an investigator, as a man who patiently dug out the facts and brought the guilty to justice. He knew him as a man who executed plans made by others. Although with reference to John August, perhaps the world execute was best avoided.

  “Do you know who was responsible for the bombings?” Tay asked.

  August shook his head.

  “Not Jemaah Islamiyah?”

  August made a snorting sound. “Is that what your people think?”

  “I already told you. I’m not involved with the investigation so I don’t know what they think. But…well, yeah, Jemaah Islamiyah is what I hear.”

  “Round up the usual suspects? Something like that?”

  “So you’re saying JI wasn’t responsible?”

  August said nothing, but his expression spoke volumes. Tay and August sat and smoked in silence until August’s curiosity finally got the better of him.

  “You said there was some connection between these photos you have and the bombings, Sam?”

  “Yes.”

  “So…what’s the connection?”

  “I have absolutely no idea.”

  “Then all we’re really talking about here are the famous Inspector Tay instincts?”

  “Yeah, that’s pretty much it.”

  August nodded and drew on his cigarette, but he didn’t say anything else.

  So Tay told August about the body at the Woodlands, and he told him about the feeling he got at the crime scene that he knew the dead man even if he had never met him. He also told August about his father’s initials on the accounts in the safety deposit box, and he told him about the pictures in his father’s old photo albums.

  “My best guess,” Tay continued, “is all of these photos were made around the mid-seventies. I think some of them were taken at my father’s office in Singapore and the rest of them were taken in Vietnam just before the war ended.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “I’m not sure. I’ve never been to Vietnam and maybe I just think they look like they were made in Vietnam because I’ve seen too many movies.”

  “When did your father die?”

  “In 1975.”

  “August’s eyebrows went up slightly. “In Vietnam?”

  “Saigon. The day of the evacuation. So his body was never returned.”

  “He was killed in action?”

  “No. He wasn’t military. He was just an accountant and he had a heart attack. But it was the wrong day and the wrong place to have a heart attac
k.”

  “How old was he?”

  “Thirty-three.”

  August did the thing with the eyebrows again.

  “Pretty young for a heart attack,” he said.

  Tay shrugged. “It happens.”

  “So what do you want from me?” August asked.

  “I just want you to look at the photographs and see if anything jumps out at you. A familiar place or face or anything that might give me a way to start tying all this together.”

  Tay laid the two photo albums on the desk in front of August. Then he leaned back and waited.

  ***

  August opened the Singapore album first. He flipped a couple of pages while Tay sat in silence, then stopped and put a finger on one of the photos.

  “This is your dad?”

  Tay looked to see where August’s finger was resting and nodded. “How did you know?”

  “You look just like him.”

  Tay didn’t know exactly what to say to that so he said nothing. He just sat and watched August as he went back to turning the pages of the album. Once or twice Tay thought August was about to say something, but he never did. When he reached the last page he closed the album and set it aside.

  “The other one has the Vietnam pictures?” he asked.

  Tay nodded and August pulled the second album across the desk toward himself and opened it. Tay noticed he turned the pages more slowly than he had turned the pages of the Singapore album. After a moment he looked up.

  “It’s Vietnam all right. Probably the mid-seventies just like you thought.”

  Tay nodded.

  “Who’s the broad?”

  “No idea. But it seems obvious she and my father had a relationship.”

  “You mean your dad was banging her.”

  Tay didn’t know how to respond to that so he didn’t, and after a moment August went back to turning pages. He didn’t speak again until he got to the last page, the one that held the black and white print of Tay’s father, the corpse from the Woodlands apartment, and the umbrella man.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” August chuckled.

  Tay was pretty sure he had never heard August chuckle at anything before so he paid close attention.

  “God, he looks so young there.” August reached out and put his finger on the photo and Tay leaned forward to see where he had rested it.

  It was right in the chest of his corpse from the Woodlands.

  “Your father knew Johnny the Mover.”

  “That’s the dead man,” Tay said.

  That seemed to stop August for a moment.

  “Johnny’s dead?”

  “The man you’re pointing to is dead. If that’s Johnny, then…yes, Johnny’s dead. Who’s Johnny the Mover?”

  August tilted his head away and consulted a corner of the room. He pursed his lips and Tay could see him thinking about what he ought to say. Tay just waited to see what it turned out to be.

  “I don’t remember Johnny’s last name. He moves things for us: money, weapons, people. He gets all kinds of stuff to wherever we need it to be. At least he used to. He’s been retired and out of the game for a while.”

  “You knew him?”

  “Sure. I’ve known him for ten or fifteen years. He had a network like you’d never believe. That’s why we called him Johnny the Mover. Nobody was better at delivering the mail for us than Johnny.”

  “Who is this we you keep talking about?”

  August ignored Tay’s question, which was exactly what Tay had expected him to do.

  “I haven’t seen Johnny in a few years,” August continued instead. “He must be damn near seventy by now.”

  “Why was he in Singapore?”

  “No idea. Even if I did know, I probably wouldn’t tell you, but I don’t. Like I said, I haven’t seen him in years.”

  “How about the third guy? Who’s he?”

  August glanced back at the photo. “You mean the guy with the umbrella?”

  Tay nodded.

  “No idea. I’ve never seen him before.”

  “You’re sure?”

  August looked up with a small smile. “Come on, Sam. I do tell the truth occasionally.”

  Tay studied August and tried to decide if this was one of those times. He was good at detecting lies, but August was probably even better at lying. Tay couldn’t make up his mind.

  “Any idea how I could find out who he is?” Tay asked.

  August shook his head. “Maybe it’s just a coincidence he’s in the picture. In real life, some things do turn out to be coincidences.”

  That was true enough, of course, but Tay didn’t think this was one of those times.

  The umbrella man was some kind of connection between his father and the dead man at the Woodlands. If he could figure out who the umbrella man was, Tay felt certain that would be the start of unraveling all this.

  But even if he did figure out who the umbrella man was, then he still had to find him. Assuming he was still alive.

  “Piece of cake,” Tay said.

  He didn’t even realize he had spoken out loud until he saw August grinning at him.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  WHEN TAY GOT to his office at the Cantonment Complex the next morning, Sergeant Kang was waiting for him.

  “I’ve got something on that accident for you, sir.”

  It took Tay a moment to figure out what Kang was talking about since he had never been at his best first thing in the morning, but then he remembered he had asked Kang to find out about the accident in which Ethel Zimmerman had been killed back in 1976.

  “Does that mean you don’t have anything on any of the other names I gave you?”

  “They’re all such common names, sir, and it’s been nearly forty years. I just don’t see how—”

  “All right, Sergeant. Don’t whine. Just tell me what you’ve got for me.”

  Kang flipped a few pages in his notebook.

  “Well, sir, the accident was on October 12, 1976. Ethel Zimmerman was driving a 1973 Mercedes north on Woodlands Centre Road toward the causeway. She—”

  “She was headed for the Woodlands?”

  “No, sir. It looks to me like she was headed to the causeway to JB. The Woodlands Centre Road was the old road to Malaysia until the new Woodlands checkpoint was opened and then they—”

  “Never mind about all that, Sergeant. What happened to Ms. Zimmerman.”

  “It’s hard to tell all that much from the report, sir. All it says is the car went out of control and hit a tree. She was dead when the first fast response car got there.”

  “Was anyone with her?”

  “No, sir.”

  “What time was the accident?”

  Kang glanced back at his notebook again. “According to the report, a call came in just after 11:00 pm. The first fast response car didn't get there until 11:27 pm.”

  “That doesn’t sound like a very fast response to me.”

  Kang said nothing.

  “What were the road conditions?” Tay asked

  “I don’t recall anything special in the report, sir. I guess they were normal.”

  “Don’t guess, Sergeant. Find out.”

  “Sir, how am I supposed to find out—”

  “I’m sure you’ll think of a way. After all, you’re a highly trained detective, aren’t you?”

  Kang fidgeted in his chair and looked uncomfortable.

  “Out with it, Sergeant. What’s on your mind.

  “Well, sir, why are you so interested in this? It was just an ordinary one-car accident that happened nearly forty years ago.”

  Tay ignored Kang’s question and asked another of his own instead. “What did you find out about her family?”

  Kang looked at Tay for a moment, then shifted his eyes back to his notebook.

  “Her husband died in 1982 of a heart attack. One daughter, born 5 November 1965. Never married. She’s still living here in Singapore.”

  Tay’s eyebrows went up. That was a lucky
break. He figured he was entitled to a break every now and then, but was always mildly surprised when he actually got one.

  “Do you have an address? A telephone number?”

  Kang ripped a page out of his notebook and passed it across the desk. Tay could have thanked him and congratulated him on his good work in tracking down Ethel Zimmerman’s daughter, but he didn’t.

  “One other thing, Sergeant,” he said instead. “That Woodlands apartment is only a few minutes from the causeway to JB. Get me a list of all the male foreigners who entered Singapore over the causeway during the twenty-four hours immediately before the body was found.”

  Kang closed his notebook and gave Tay a baleful look. But he didn’t say a word.

  ***

  When Kang had gone, Tay looked again at the page from Kang’s notebook and read what was written there. Laura Anne Zimmerman, followed by an address he thought was somewhere out near Holland Village, and a telephone number.

  Why did he think talking to this woman was going to be any help at all? Her mother had worked in his father’s office nearly forty years ago, it was true, but she had been only a child when her mother died. What did he expect her to remember? He had been almost exactly that same age when his father died, and he could remember next to nothing about him.

  Tay was beginning to get a sickening feeling this was just a wild goose chase. Was he pursuing the idea of talking to this woman just because he didn’t have any other ideas to pursue, or did he really think it might get him somewhere? Tay had to admit he wasn’t absolutely sure. Maybe if he went outside and had a cigarette everything would become clearer.

  Probably not, but he was going to do it anyway.

  Tay put the page from Kang’s notes into the center drawer of his desk, collected his Marlboros and some matches, and headed for the elevator.

  ***

  As Tay walked north on New Bridge Road away from the Cantonment Complex, he shook a Marlboro out of the pack. He stopped, turned his body to block the breeze from the south, and lit it with a match from a box he always carried. The act of smoking had been stripped of all dignity by the public nannies who gloried to instructing everyone how to live, and it was Tay’s self-conscious act of rebellion against that always to have a box of real matches on him. Not a matchbook of cardboard imitations matches, not a plastic lighter, but a box of actual matches made of real wood and sulphur. It didn’t matter to the cigarette what he lit it with, he knew, but it damn well mattered to him.