She cleared her throat. “How quickly can you have them translated?”
“Three, four months.” He smiled, waiting for a reaction.
She ignored his time estimate, meaning that was a problem. “Three or four days,” she countered.
Calvino replied with a broad grin. “It’s not just money. Only a handful of people can do a good translation. And the ones who can aren’t available. They’re working at embassies, the UN, the multinationals. You ever see that Johnny Cash biopic? I remember the English subtitles. Johnny Cash in the early days is a door-to-door salesman. He introduces himself to the woman who opens the door. ‘Hi, I’m Johnny Cash.’ The subtitle underneath translated it as, ‘Hi, they call me Johnny Fresh Money.’ ”
Tanny neither laughed nor smiled.
“When you see a movie, you can figure out what’s happening. But when you read a paper translation, all you’re left with is trying to figure out why anyone would be called ‘Fresh Money,’ ” he said.
“I’m certain that you can figure out something,” she said.
“Put someone on the job.” Tanny understood Marshall well enough to think that if Achara had investigated the background of Sawyer’s family, he would have required a roomful of file cabinets for the divorces, committal orders, arraignments, depositions, suspension-of-shares reports, class actions, security-commission hearings, shareholder lawsuits. None of the allegations involved common crimes; nothing stuck, but a lot of mud had been thrown against a lot of people. The most secretive decisions and discussions were done behind a secure boardroom door, in hotel suites, on yachts, at first-class airport lounges. Nothing any investigator could find, no matter how hard he looked.
Calvino pulled to a halt in front of a gate and guardhouse.
Uniformed guards asked for his identification. “You need to show some ID.” Calvino handed the guard his Thai driver’s license.
Tanny dug out her American passport, the wings of the golden eagle catching the sun.
“I wouldn’t give them that,” he said, noticing her birthday and place of birth. She was thirty-two years old and had been born in Ayuthaya. Her name appeared as Tanny Craig. He pointed at the New York driver’s license in her wallet. “That will do it.”
The guard returned the documents and Calvino drove gently over the speed bump into the gated community.
Next to him, riding shotgun, was a Thai who neither spoke nor wrote Thai. She didn’t wai, or, even worse, she hadn’t developed the habit of returning a wai she’d received; she didn’t smile, and she held herself with the tense posture of a combat infantry solider waiting for the order to advance. That was a first, he thought. He filed the information away; sooner or later he’d find out how that had happened. The Land of Smiles was good at producing laughter, sunshine, and mystery. She’d managed to filter out any personal feelings.
Whoever she was, her life in New York, what made her laugh or cry, had been buried under the professional mask. Calvino found himself wondering, if he chipped away at the façade, what he’d find underneath. With his stockbroker and neighbor, Siriporn, he’d been on the other end of the chipping away. She had been looking to get inside him, and he’d been backpedaling. Considering Tanny’s personal coolness while working on a case, he thought he was looking at someone very much like himself.
FIVE
BRANDON SAWYER’S HOUSE was inside a moo ban, a private gated village, with uniformed security working control gates in and out of the complex of houses. Thailand existed outside the gates. It was no different from similar enclaves of seriously wealthy people in California, Arizona, or Florida. Places with good weather and cheap, illegal alien labor. The moo ban had a network of wide avenues with mansions hidden behind high fences and bamboo, speed bumps twenty meters apart. The Thai ground crews worked under the hot sun setting up sprinklers, cutting the grass, and trimming trees. They could have passed for Mexican laborers in their oversize hats and baggy clothes.
The houses had been built on an epic scale, with enough stone, brick, and concrete to erect an upcountry village. The main difference was that this village was the end of the rainbow. Most of the owners stayed locked inside their castles, terrified that upcountry people were under the spell of French revolutionary ideas and one day might invade, break open the gates, knock down the walls, and walk away with everything inside. Sawyer accepted the communal paranoia of the rich as normal; he’d grown up with it. The fear of having one’s rich throat slit in the middle of the night cut across race, culture, ethnic divides. Those at the receiving end of the pipeline dumping mountains of money created their own villages to house victors and to keep out the losers who could turn vengeful at any moment.
“Here’s where they’ll build the farang guillotine,” Calvino said as the east wall of Sawyer’s estate came into view.
“I don’t understand,” she said.
“You’re not following the politics? Doesn’t matter. Most people don’t. After the revolution it’s too late.”
“The guillotine is French. Not Thai.”
“Crushing by elephants is an old-time favorite Thai method of execution,” said Calvino. “The guillotine is more humane, don’t you think?”
She shivered at the thought, let out a small sigh before she shrugged off Calvino with a disapproving look. Then he pulled into Sawyer’s driveway, and a gradual change, subtle at first, overtook her. Money did that to people. Parked in the driveway were Brandon’s silver BMW, an eight-seat van, a black SUV, and several motorcycles, including two Harleys, the chrome polished like mirrors, catching the sun.
Two women were wiping down the BMW as Calvino shut off the engine of his Honda.
“He lives here?” Her mouth dropped.
“Brandon calls it Castle Sawyer.”
Brandon Sawyer’s house was a mansion that a nouveau riche Chinese merchant built in homage to Tara, the southern plantation house from the movie Gone With The Wind. Regal and elegant, it was ringed by a circular driveway, and inside the house a circular staircase spiraled to the upper floor. There were African black marble floors and Burmese teak tables and chairs, two salas, and a pond with carp and goldfish swimming in it, nestled in the garden behind the main house. They stopped in the redbrick drive sheltered from the private street by banana and mango trees. Barefoot servants ran up to the car to open Calvino’s door. They remembered him from his last trip, when Calvino had brought them a basketful of durian.
The car door swung open, and Calvino stretched out his right leg. Two maids and gardener waied him, pulling at his arm and shoulder, staring at Tanny in the passenger seat. She sat quietly, gazing straight ahead. One of the maids waied and spoke Thai to Tanny, who looked blank and ignored her. The maid, confused and hurt, had been deflated.
“She doesn’t speak Thai,” Calvino said in Thai. “Don’t take it personally. She speaks only English.”
The maids smiled, thinking Calvino was telling them some kind of farang joke. Anyone who looked like Tanny was expected to speak perfect Thai. That was a given. He looked up at the house. Sawyer’s large bulk stood framed in the open door.
“I hope to hell you didn’t bring durian again,” Brandon called out.
Calvino walked around to the rear of the car and opened the trunk. He pulled out a basket and handed it to one of the maids. She removed the top, smiled, and the others looked inside. “Sticky rice and fresh mangoes,” said Calvino.
“I’ve got mangoes coming out of—” Sawyer stopped as he watched Tanny get out of Calvino’s car and walk toward the house.
She held out her hand. “I’m Tanny Craig.”
“I can see why my brother hired you. You’re beautiful.”
She didn’t return the smile. “Actually, I work for Sawyer Corporation.”
“Okay, his corporation hired you, if that’s how you want to play it. But you’re still a dish. And I approve of Marshall’s taste. He pumped her hand in the kind of shaking exercise that gives the appearance of no probable ending point. Bra
ndon smacked his lips and rolled his eyes. “I’d like a taste of that dish.”
“Does that mean you won’t need Mr. Calvino’s services?” she asked as Calvino walked up, surrounded by Sawyer’s servants. His vulgarity hadn’t fazed her in the least.
Calvino grinned. This woman, despite her accent, had to be from New York, he thought. She had balls. Sawyer’s smile vanished.
“Hey, you’re kinda pushy, aren’t you?” That was his first shot, fired wildly and, more important, missing the mark. It was an example of a Sawyer statement that began as a declaration and ended as a question mark. Calvino was accustomed to Brandon and tried to think what someone who didn’t really know him would be thinking at that moment.
She let go of his hand.
“I like to get to the point,” said Tanny. “I find it’s easier.”
“She’s a professional, Brandon,” said Calvino. “That’s what she told me.”
Sawyer grinned. “Sweetheart, you never want to call yourself a professional in this town. It has an entirely different meaning. You could give a man the wrong idea.”
She had expected to be baited. He waited a beat, thinking she would slap him.
Instead, Tanny checked the time, then the door. She half turned, her eyes on the move as she swept the grounds.
“Perhaps we can we start to work?” One of Brandon’s small yappy dogs with rat-size teeth yammered at her ankles until a maid called him: “Benjamin, Benjamin, pai loey.” Enough already. Off.
“I have another one just like him. His name is Marshall,” said Brandon. “That one over there is Vincent. If I get a fourth, I’ll call him Tanny. Good name for a bitch.”
Three Chihuahuas, white with brown markings on the face and body, ran around yapping and jumping, baring their teeth, the maids in hot pursuit; they had all been from the same litter. The yings were forever feeding them cookies, raising their blood-sugar levels, causing them to go into hyperactive cartoon mode. The one that answered to Vincent spun like a top as a servant brushed him away.
At the entrance to the house, Calvino stopped, braced himself against the doorjamb, and removed one shoe, then the other, and lined them up behind some of Sawyer’s shoes near the wall. Tanny had gone halfway inside with her shoes still on.
“You mind removing your shoes?” asked Brandon, making his question sound more like a declaration. Calvino had to give it to her. She was a quick study. She glanced around at the others; none of them wore shoes. “I keep forgetting,” she said.
“Is that right? You forgot?” asked Sawyer, his tone in the Sawyer-like way of not asking.
After she removed her shoes, Brandon, walking barefoot, led them upstairs to the main sitting room. The windows overlooked the large salas, a swimming pool, and the Chinese carp pond in the garden. Calvino stood and looked out at the garden. He liked the view—water, flowers, and coconut trees. Birds singing. One of the maids was playing with the dogs.
Brandon started the meeting while Calvino continued to take in the expanse of green below. “I don’t really know why Marshall had to send you business class from New York to look over Calvino’s work. Does Marshall think Calvino’s stupid and you’re Einstein?”
Tanny raised a finger to her lips to signal silence. Brandon replied with an arched eyebrow and a shallow sigh. She nodded at the three yings in short shorts and halter-tops sitting around the table, eating strawberries and whipped cream, dangling bare feet not quite touching the floor. They moved like a troupe of mimes who’d been hit thigh high with a tranquilizer gun.
“Who are these children?”
“There’re not children. They’re support staff,” said Brandon. He had intended it as a joke.
“I’d asked for the meeting to be private. That means no one else.”
“I understand what it means. But they don’t understand a word of English,” said Brandon.
One of the bored yings shuffled a deck of cards.
“They might have picked up more English than you think,” she said. “Security is essential. Marshall told me he briefed you on that.”
“Marshall’s been briefing me on shit my whole life. I am twelve thousand miles away, so I don’t have to listen to his briefings.” He walked over to the yings and asked them to go outside for a swim. “It will be fun.” The invitation had been issued with the magic word, and they were out of the room in under a minute.
“Thank you,” Tanny said in a half whisper, as if she were in a library.
“Why do I have to be silent? Can you explain that to me?” asked Brandon.
“Routine precaution,” she said. Tanny laid her briefcase on his desk, snapped open the latches, removed an antenna from the inside until it stretched two feet in height, and then pushed several toggle switches before securing a pair of earphones over her ears. Calvino glanced back from the window and smiled at Sawyer, who shrugged, rolling his eyes. “You’ll let me know when I can talk, won’t you?” he asked her.
Calvino sat in a chair next to Tanny. “She thinks someone might be listening to us.” He whispered, smiling as he caught Brandon’s eye.
“No one listens to me. Not the staff, the women, my brother—why would a stranger want to listen to what I’ve got to say?” Inside Brandon’s world of maids, drivers, handymen, gardeners, security guards, the help acted like a fifth column; they worked on the inside for those with money, sometimes acting as nominee shareholders, signing documents they didn’t read. They had all kinds of sensitive information that could be easily converted into fast cash. This was a downside to living in the moo ban. The staff had a community of eyes and ears watching and listening.
“Now we can start,” she said.
Playing meeting leader seemed to come naturally to her. Brandon grinned and winked at Calvino. “Don’t you wanna eat something first?”
Calvino had a history of clients who’d been in Thailand a long time. One of the things that rubbed off was the Thai preoccupation with food.
Before Tanny could say anything, two servants appeared from the kitchen, in that submissive half crouch, one with a vase containing freshly cut orchids and the other with a silver tray bearing a bowl of coconut milk, a bowl of sticky rice, and a plate of fresh-cut mangoes laid out like tiny bars of gold. The servant set the tray on a coffee table. She resumed her bent-over position and backed away. The older maid sucked her teeth as she cleaned up the mess of splattered strawberries and whipped cream left behind by the yings. The attitude of the maids made it clear that Brandon’s latest collections of yings not only didn’t bother to be neat, they used the house servants to do their laundry. It was the domestic struggle between bar yings and house servants—same class, same background, but they’d been assigned a different set of duties. The younger maid finished arranging the flowers and the food, and then both women beamed as they stood back from their offering.
“Ms. Craig, enjoy the mangoes,” said Brandon.
“Why don’t we go through some talking points first?”
She was negotiating already.
“Vinny, what about you?” Brandon asked, ignoring her.
“I thought only politicians had talking points.”
Calvino held up two fingers. Brandon beamed. “Bring Khun Vinny some of that single-malt whiskey and mangoes. Do you want a drink?”
They sat at the table while Tanny, controlling her anger, waiting near the door, managed to shake her head and retain some sense of dignity.
“Feel free to sweep the room again,” said Brandon. “You never know if the tray is bugged. The maid who sliced the mangoes used to work for the CIA bureau chief.”
“I’m not certain if you realize how serious this is, Mr. Sawyer.”
“In the land of fun, being serious is fucking bad manners, Ms. Craig. It’s also said to cause headaches, make people depressed. As a Thai you should know that seriousness only has downsides. No one would be in the streets protesting if the government could offer them some fun things to do.”
Brandon finished h
is sticky rice and mango in several greedy swipes, like a bear devouring a couple of baby salmons. He held the plate out for a servant to collect. He didn’t even have to put the plate down. “I want to say something. The joint venture with Achara is one of the best deals Sawyer Corporation has ever made. Financial meltdown or street demonstrations, none of it matters to our business. It will remain highly profitable. We’ve checked him out. Meaning, of course, Vinny and me asked the right questions of the right people. And Achara’s as straight as a line of Colombian coke.” Brandon tapped a finger on Tanny’s electronic device.
“Tell me why the police investigated Achara in the murder of the journalist,” she asked.
“Because that’s what they get paid to do. The more people they interview, the more chances they have to shake down the nervous types. Everyone has something to hide. They slip the cops a white envelope and get their name checked off the list.”
“You’re saying Achara bribed the police?”
“Never, my dear Ms. Craig. Achara’s a good man. He doesn’t need to bribe anybody.”
“That’s only your conclusion. ‘A good man’ and that’s it? The board wants slightly more than your opinion about his goodness.”
“My brother said he was sending a Thai investigator. You don’t seem very Thai,” said Brandon. He winked at Calvino. “You look the part. That’s why you were cast. But you’re not really Thai. I’d say it’s my brother who’s dealing in some misleading generalizations.”
“We can’t progress if you keep changing the subject,” she said.
“We keep our shares. Achara stays in the picture. That’s the way it is,” said Brandon.
“Work with Vinny, and after you’re finished next week, go back to New York and tell my brother to fuck himself.”
“Why didn’t you tell Marshall about Mr. Calvino’s August report?”
Brandon’s eyes widened, the crow’s feet spreading outward. Calvino looked away from the window, where he’d been watching the three yings playing like dolphins in the swimming pool. “Pool decorations” was how Brandon had once described the young women who came to visit and stayed on, from a couple of days to six months, before new ornaments appeared to replace the old ones. “Who told you about that?”
The Corruptionist Page 4