Inspector Singh Investigates (4 page)

Nine

Inspector Singh sipped his tea from a delicate bone–china teacup. The fragile thing looked out of place in his large, grubby hand and his forefinger barely fitted through the handle. However, he was a guest and the Indonesian maid who ran the kitchen knew better than to exercise discretion in the choice of crockery.

Across from him, Chelsea also sipped her tea. He could smell it – it was a fragrant green tea. He hated the stuff, give him a strong black tea any day, but the smell was like a slice of heaven. Singh noticed that Chelsea's fingernails were trimmed and glossy, but colourless. She had found time for a manicure. Her hair too was trimmed and shining although still coiled in a bun on her head. As he stared at her she pulled off the jewelled clips and her hair cascaded down her shoulders. He was sure that he had seen a TV shampoo advertisement once where she had done the same thing. The hairclips looked like rabbit traps with their long teeth and spring–loaded action.

Chelsea shook out her hair and said, 'You have no idea how wonderful it is to be clean! I've been scrubbing for days to get prison off my skin.'

He did not respond. Inspector Singh was not the sort to indulge in small talk. Not when murder was the subtext of the conversation.

Chelsea changed tactics smoothly. She said, 'You must be wondering why I asked you back here. Now that you've done your job and I'm free.'

He shrugged to indicate a willingness to hear her out but also to deny anything as crude as curiosity.

'I need your help.'

'What can I do?' he asked, puzzled.

'I want you to clear Jasper. You know, find out who actually killed Alan.'

'I am a policeman from Singapore, not a private investigator for hire,' he said crossly. 'My flight back is booked for tonight.'

'You have to stay.'

'I can't! And anyway, even if I did, I would be of no use to you. I was sent here to look after your interests. You're out of jail. My job is done.' He added as an honest afterthought, 'Not that your getting out had anything to do with me in the end.'

She did not say anything. The rigidity of her shoulders was the only sign of her tension.

The inspector asked, 'Why me?'

She looked at him, eyes pleading. 'I don't know anyone else with the skills to find a criminal, a murderer. And I trust you to look out for my interests.'

'What makes you think you can trust me?'

She did not answer. He knew she was right though. She could trust him. Somehow or other she had gotten under his skin.

He said heavily, 'I could lose my job!'

A twig snapped underfoot and the leader turned to

glare at his companions. He was distracted from censuring the culprit by the sight that he was looking for – a thin, curling wisp of smoke in the distance. He pointed at it with his thumb, an affectation belonging to a past where he had been punished for pointing because his parents thought it rude. The men made their way until they could smell the cooking fire. With a wave of one hand, the leader indicated that the men were to spread out. They did, splitting into two columns and surrounding the small native encampment. The Penan, a nomadic tribe who wander about the Borneo rainforest in small communal groups, were gathered around a small river turtle being turned on a spit. Except for one or two young men who were wearing T–shirts, the men wore loincloths and the women were bare breasted. All were barefoot. It was a cheerful breakfast get–together. Old women cackled with toothless laughter. A wizened old man was telling a story in a high, quavering voice to a group of young men who were largely ignoring him. A young woman deftly lifted the spit and sliced the turtle onto a large banana leaf.

The men surrounding them waited for the signal. It came in the form of a sudden yell from their leader. They rushed into the encampment, scattering the gathered crowd. Women fled into the jungle clutching their children. A few men tried to protest. They were thrown to the ground and clubbed with thick wooden staffs. The old Penan man sat cowering, never moving from his spot. One of the men unstrapped the jerry can on his back and began to pour petrol over the area. He set the whole place on fire, stopping for a moment to admire his handiwork.

The leader grabbed the old man by the arm and yanked him to his feet. He shouted at him in Malay 'You understand me?'

The old man nodded, his terror showing through cataract–filled eyes.

A young, pregnant woman, with long black hair and a gentle face, rushed over to his aid. She stood in front of the old man and glared at the intruders.

The leader grabbed her by the arm and yanked her towards him. He said, 'Go! Take your filthy kind and leave this place. If we see a Penan in this jungle, we will kill him. And we will hunt down his tribe and kill them too! Do you understand?'

The woman managed a nod.

She was flung back to the ground. She landed awkwardly and yelped with pain. The old man bent over her. The leader kicked him once in the knee for good measure. He fell. The man aimed another kick at him. He rolled over to escape. The pregnant woman took the whole weight of the boot. She curled up silently, trying to protect her stomach and the unborn child within.

The leader gave a whistle and his men fell in behind him. He led them back into the jungle, well satisfied. That had been quick and easy. But there were other communities to track down.

The Penan do not have many possessions. They have lived for generations in the Borneo forests in harmony with their environment, taking what they need from the jungle, leaving no footprint but that of bare feet on muddy earth washed away with each rain. It was not difficult for them to regroup and move deeper into the forest. They would not be missed and traces of their ephemeral presence would soon be erased.

Inspector Singh took a leave of absence. He had accumulated a lot of leave – hardly ever having taken time off in the course of his career. His superiors did not ask him what he intended to do. If they had and if he was honest, they would have ordered him back to Singapore at once. Instead he implied that there was some sort of family crisis involving his sister. And since he was on the spot, he felt he should take a few days off and try and fix the problem.

Having been sent to try and avert a scandal, Inspector Singh was now well placed to become one himself. For, against his better judgement, he had agreed to Chelsea's request to stay on and try and help Jasper Lee. It was an absurd assignment. Even more ridiculous than his original remit to keep an eye on Chelsea and make sure she got a modicum of due process. At least she had always protested her innocence. Second time around, he was being asked to look out for a man who had blithely confessed to being a murderer. Singh had heard Jasper with his own ears – unforced, willing even – admit to shooting a man. Not just any man but his brother. Surely a man deserved to hang for holding his own blood so cheap?

But Chelsea Liew pleaded with him, urged him to believe that he was the only one who could help, that if he turned his back on her she would have nowhere else to go. She appealed to his dormant masculinity. It was a long time, the inspector thought, since any woman had made him feel needed. Chelsea explained her concerns in hushed, heartfelt tones. The Malaysian police were not going to look any further for a killer. They were embarrassed at having charged the wrong person once. She could not turn to any private investigator. She could not be certain that they were on her side. They would be in it for her money and the kudos of such a high–profile job. Probably they would sell any dirt they dug up to the tabloids.

She needed a professional. And he was it. After all, she pointed out, he had been sent to help her in the first place. She did not realise perhaps the large element that politics had played in the decision of the Singapore government to send him – corpulent knight to the rescue. Singh had no doubt that she sensed that he was emotionally embroiled in her affairs. Finally, he agreed. He could not quite remember the point that the conversation ceased to be about whether he would help but about how he would help.

She put a slender hand on his arm and said, 'Thank you. You have no idea how much this means to me.'

And he could see both that she meant it and that he was trapped.

Singh had no idea how he was going to proceed. He had no
locus
to ask questions. He had Chelsea's support which might open a few doors but not many. And he would certainly need the cooperation of the Malaysian police if he was going to try snooping around. He did not even know if Jasper would be willing to see him.

'Mum, is Uncle Jasper in jail?'

Chelsea looked at her eldest son. Marcus was a thin and wiry seventeen–year–old with a teenager's quick passions. But of late the feisty, combative youth had become quiet – his eyes always on the ground in front of him. She told herself that it was inevitable that recent events had taken their toll. Marcus had been very unhappy with his father –coming to her defence when he had started to hit her. He would pit his strength against the grown man and be brushed aside. But when Alan had died it had still hit Marcus hard. She had not understood his reaction, fluctuating between despair and anger. But she had tried to give him the confidence that they could carry on, that time would make them whole again –until she was arrested for murder and dragged away from her children. She had no idea how the boys had coped. The wounds were so raw that she had refrained from discussing her ordeal or theirs but just tried to compensate them with love.

She had not answered his question and Marcus asked again, 'Is Uncle Jasper in prison?'

She nodded and tried to put her arms around him but he resisted and pulled away.

'For killing Daddy?'

'Yes,' she said.

'Do you believe he did it?'

She shook her head emphatically.

Marcus punched a door, hard.

Chelsea looked at him, her face creased with intense concern. It was a fleeting snapshot of what she would look like as an old woman.

Of her three sons, it was Marcus she was most worried about. The other two, with the resilience of children, were recovering from their ordeal. They were insecure, clinging and demanding – punishing her for having left them. But she did not doubt that time would restore their equilibrium. Marcus was another matter. He was the one who had understood a little of what she had gone through being married to Alan Lee.

It had started to affect his behaviour well before the divorce. Seventeen years old, with a driving licence and the Mercedes sports car his father had bought him as a birthday present over Chelsea's angry protests, he was always out or locked in his room. She knew he went clubbing. She could smell the stale cigarettes and old beer on his clothes and his breath in the morning. She knew he had girlfriends, impressing them with his fast car, moneyed background and devil–may–care attitude. She could see the hatred he felt for his father, as well as a burning anger at her, Chelsea, because she was his mother and she had let herself be hurt and there was nothing that he could do.

As the divorce had approached, Marcus calmed down – relieved perhaps that his mother was finally taking steps to leave his father. He was still out of the house at all hours but seemed calmer and happier. Chelsea had wondered if he had found a serious girlfriend. Marcus needed all the affection he could get. Chelsea knew that a mother's love was not proving enough to stop her firstborn from losing his way.

But during the custody hearings, Marcus had reverted to his old ways. She had found bottles of alcohol in his room. He never washed or changed his clothes. She had asked him whether he was worried that his father might get custody, assured him that she was going to win.

He had laughed bitterly and said, 'I'm seventeen, Mum. Neither of you has any control over me – it doesn't matter a damn which of you has "custody".'

She had not been able to work out what was upsetting him. She could not find a way through the wall her son had erected around himself – to keep her out.

She tried again. 'Marcus, what's the matter?'

He shook his head.

'Don't shut me out. Let me help you.'

'You? You can't even help yourself!'

Inspector Singh still had the file on the murder. It was time to look at it again – this time with a view to exonerating Jasper. He sat down at the desk in his hotel room.

Three hours later he stood up, felt his knees creak with the effort, and left the hotel in one of the red and white taxis that spread like a rash across Kuala Lumpur. Any plans to think about the contents of the file he had just read were soon lost in the important business of hanging on to his seat as the driver weaved his way through traffic, missing each motorbike by inches and every car by less.

He stopped some way from the scene of the murder. Singh told himself this was in order to understand the general environment of the crime better but it was actually because he was starting to feel carsick. He got out, gave the driver a few ringgit and looked around him.

In every direction, rows of terraced houses stretched. Each one had started identical but the owners had used the many years since their homes were built to express their individuality. In Singapore, house renovation had only one goal – to convey wealth. He had seen houses that appeared huge, with a vast amount of road frontage, only to pass by another day using another route and discover that the same house was narrower than a long boat.

In Kuala Lumpur, thought the inspector, the personalities expressing themselves in architecture were unique.

In many of the homes, charming well–tended gardens were the owners' innocuous way of stamping personality on their abodes. Rows of heliconia, pots of hibiscus and hedges of bougainvillea adorned many houses. Large mango or guava trees, sometimes outgrowing their small gardens, loomed large and dark over the road. Other householders had decided bricks and mortar were the best way to assert themselves and had built a puzzling array of additions to their tiny houses. Roof tiles had been swapped from the traditional rust to blue or green. Balconies with balustrades protruded. Ponds with carp and complex water features took up all the available garden space. Gates were wrought iron and picked out in gold. One house had stone elephants on the roof. Another had ceramic peacocks. An otherwise normal home had chickens pecking about in the garden. Bird flu was apparently less of a concern in Kuala Lumpur than back in Singapore.