Spirit Tiger (19 page)

‘
Bagai punggok merindukan bulan
, like an owl moping for the moon,' Rubiah whispered.

Under ordinary circumstances Rahman would have heard it, as he usually listened intently to their conversation as he drove. But today he was distracted.

Maryam considered they had tortured him sufficiently, and anyway, it was time to see Noriah.

‘Rahman,' she barked loudly, and he snapped to attention. This, too, boded well for a prospective son-in-law. Aliza was perfecting her order-giving technique in school, with an eye towards keeping her classroom in line, but it could conceivably work elsewhere.

‘Let's go to the station,' she instructed him as she sat back in her seat, grinning. ‘I have to get home quickly. I think my daughter's giving birth tonight.'

Chapter XXVI

Noriah was out of her cell and in the interrogation room: it had been two nights in jail, and she was tired and cranky, in addition to being hungry and irritated. Seeing Maryam and Rubiah did not improve her mood any.

‘What are you doing here?' she asked ungraciously. ‘And why am I here? Do you know I've been here for two days? Two days! Enough is enough,' she stated with absolute certainty. ‘I want to go home now!' She glared at Rahman, who didn't seem to be paying that much attention, certainly not enough to be intimidated by her.

‘You look like it's been kind of rough,' Rubiah told her with some degree of sympathy, but not as much as Noriah felt was warranted.

‘Rough? How would you like it?'

‘Not at all,' Rubiah admitted, ‘but then, I didn't hire anyone to come to Kelantan and collect gambling debts either. Really, if you think about that, maybe it isn't so surprising.'

Noriah narrowed her eyes, but thought better of replying. She haughtily accepted the Rothman's cigarette Maryam proffered, and they all lit up as a prelude to getting down to business.

‘
Cik
Noriah,' Maryam began, ‘we know you hired these Thai men to come and collect gambling debts, so please, let's not waste time arguing what we all know is true. The question as I see it is, did they also kill your husband? Or shall I say, did you hire them to kill him?'

‘How can you say that?' Cik Noriah was in high dudgeon. ‘Kill my own husband?'

‘It's been done before,' Maryam pointed out drily. ‘And being loud doesn't make something true.'

Cik
Noriah was apoplectic. ‘I will not be insulted like this, I insist…'

Maryam sighed tiredly. ‘
Cik
Noriah, I must admit to you that we don't care if you stay in this cell forever. The only way to get out is to answer the questions truthfully, or you'll be getting new clothes to wear here.'

Noriah had taken up enough time, Maryam thought, and had spread enough misdirection. It was her certainty that everyone would believe her lies that annoyed Mariam, and as indirect as Noriah could be, Maryam could be that direct and even more. ‘I don't think you'll like it,' she finished mildly. ‘But if that's what you want …'

Noriah's eyes filled with tears, a combination of frustration, anger and lack of sleep. ‘I have to go home,' she whined. ‘I can't stay here anymore.'

‘Of course not,' Rubiah crooned. ‘Who would want to stay here? Now,
Kakak
, tell us, what happened with these Thais?' She leaned back in her chair, preparing to hear the story. It would probably be a good one.

Noriah sniffled for a few moments, then took another deep drag on her cigarette. Believing this would be a multiple cigarette story, Maryam came prepared with a whole box of Rothman's taken from Mamat's stash. She placed the box on the table, the better to keep the words flowing. A look to Rahman brought coffee: at least they would be alert. Noriah spent several moments staring at the table, no doubt running through scenarios in her mind to see if any might extract her from the situation, but it seemed nothing looked promising. She began to cry again, out of disappointment this time, and Maryam began to shift her demeanor from magisterial understanding to impatient watch-tapping.

‘It was like this,' Noriah finally began, reluctantly. ‘After Yusuf died, I knew I would take over the business. Well, it's a good business, you understand, and I want to keep it going.

‘But this was my problem,' she held up her hand like a schoolteacher. ‘I'm a woman, and how do women collect debts? You asked me yourself,' she nodded at Rubiah, ‘and that's the issue. People paid up when Yusuf came to see them because they knew he'd hurt them if they didn't, and he could do that himself. I don't think I could.

‘So, what to do? If I can't do it, it doesn't mean I'm just going to let those debts drop. If I did that, I'd have no business very soon.' The other women understood the truth in this, even if they disapproved.

‘So, who do I ask? If I get someone from Kelantan to do it, how do I know he won't try to take over the whole thing from me, and then start threatening me? I could get people from Malaysia, but the same problem – especially once they see how much is being made here.

‘If my son were old enough,' she said regretfully, ‘and I wanted him to go into this business, which I don't, that would be ideal. A family business, you see. But he isn't able to, so I need to find someone who can make people pay, but can't stay here. Then I found some of Yusuf's contacts in Patani, where he bought his whiskey, and had them come down. I thought they'd be in and out, anxious to go home.' She shook her head. ‘But they weren't.

‘They got here, and God knows what they were talking about. I couldn't understand a word. Well, they're Siamese after all. I gave them the list of people they had to see, and then I thought it was a stupid thing to do, they'd take anything they got away from me.

‘I couldn't believe they'd gone to see Din. By that time, I already wanted them out of here. They collected some money, but didn't give any to me!' She threatened to cry again: apparently the memory of this lost revenue was heartbreaking. She took a deep breath.

‘I was relieved when Din went to see the police. At last, I thought; the police will send them packing back to Thailand and I'll be free of them. But then no one could find them, and I was worried they'd come after me. I have to say, I was … relieved when the other one was found dead. At least I didn't have to worry about him any more.'

She thought for a moment and then realized how very cold that sounded. ‘Well,' she amended hastily, ‘then I didn't have to fear him. Coming back, you know.'

She quickly abandoned the attempt to make herself look more concerned about these men. No one would believe it anyway. ‘And they won't dare come back here now.' She couldn't keep the satisfaction out of her voice.

‘Do you think it was a were-tiger?'Rubiah asked. ‘That's what everyone's saying: first Ruslan and then this guy.'

‘That's a story to frighten children,' Noriah scoffed. ‘
They
killed Ruslan. An example, they said, so everyone else would know they meant business when they came to collect.' Maryam was both greatly relieved and stunned to hear it. No tiger. Then who, or what had it been who came to her? She yanked her attention back to Noriah, who was still talking.

Rahman leaned over, fascinated. ‘How did they do it? Everyone was talking about it.'

Even though Noriah had just denied any real relationship with them, she looked smug. ‘Well, of course, the whole point is to make sure people talk and get the message. I saw what they used: a board with five nails sticking out the bottom at one end. Then you swing it and it tears through whatever you're hitting and shreds it.' Maryam winced just to hear this. ‘It looks just like tiger marks. It's a good idea. Clever.'

She looked around at her audience, who did not seem impressed with the ingenuity of it all. ‘Yes, it's a vicious thing to do. These Thais; what can I say?'

No wonder Ruslan looked so horrified when he died. To see a heavy board with protruding nails was probably no more comforting than seeing a real tiger. And it must have been so very painful. Poor man.

‘You paid them,' Rahman pointed out.

She waved that away. ‘I paid them to collect the debts,' she corrected him. ‘I didn't tell them how to do it. This was their idea, not mine.'

Rahman did not continue the argument, but was confident a court would not see it that way, and Noriah would get what she deserved.

‘So they killed Ruslan, in a particularly frightening way,' Maryam summed up. ‘But if it was a warning message, it wasn't very clear.'

Hearing this, Noriah looked perplexed.

‘I mean,' Maryam amended, ‘everyone heard about it, they weren't talking about anything else. But it was all about the
hala
, not about collecting debt, so it wasn't a message everyone understood.'

‘I disagree,' Noriah answered formally, as though they were at a school debate. ‘Most people saw it only as a
possible
were-tiger.' She smirked at Maryam, knowing well what had happened to her, and Maryam understood the urge to murder. She restrained herself. ‘But the people who needed to understand, they knew. Ask Din. He's not smart, but even he got nervous. I think it worked. Better than if it were, as you say, clearer, since it seemed more …'

‘Sinister.'

‘Yes, that's it exactly.' Having settled all that, Noriah looked satisfied.

‘But they didn't kill Yusuf.' Maryam added, wanting to make sure about it.

Noriah shook her head again and lit another cigarette. Why not? Following her example, everyone else lit their own, finished their coffee, and ordered more, with curry puffs. ‘How could they? I only called them after Yusuf was dead, and only because he was dead. Otherwise, he'd collect his own debts, and why would I need them?'

‘What about the last body, the Thai who died? That looked like a tiger, too, but there never was any tiger. Was it one of the other ones? A fight over money, perhaps?' Rahman asked slowly.

‘I don't know anything about that. Nothing at all.' She shrugged. ‘For all I know, it was a real tiger.'

Chapter XXVII

Her last words both terrified and relieved Maryam, who preferred a real were-tiger to a delusion. She would much rather be in real supernatural danger to being mad. Nevertheless, she had other things to do. She rose from the table: it was time for her to leave and take care of Ashikin. She'd done her job here.

‘Wait. Aren't I going with you?' Noriah asked.

‘I'll be back soon,' Rahman promised, ‘and we'll talk then.'

The prospect of running into Aliza made Rahman blush all the way back to Kampong Penambang and, amazed at his luck, she was waiting for her mother at the bottom of the stairs.

‘
Mak
! We need to go straight to Ashikin's. They baby's coming!'

Maryam bustled into the house and emerged moments later with a bag full of things she might need. ‘The midwife?' she asked Aliza.

‘Already there,' she replied. And as they hurried to Ashikin's, Aliza turned and favoured Rahman with a wide smile, which he returned and then sat down heavily in the car, feeling giddy, and rested his head on the steering wheel.

Ashikin's house was filled with relatives, but Maryam took charge. The midwife said all was going well, and Maryam set about making her daughter comfortable, while the other women cooked. The men waited outside with Nuraini, smoking and talking only fitfully: they were nervous.

Even in labour, Ashikin looked good, and Maryam wondered how she did it. Maryam herself was under no illusions of her own appearance during labour, and would not have wanted any pictures taken to commemorate it, but Ashikin could still carry it off. Looking from her to Aliza, busily wiping her sister's brow with a cold cloth, Maryam marveled at how she'd had such beautiful daughters. Her reverie was interrupted by a sharp poke from the midwife, who told her the baby was just about here. One more tremendous effort, and out he came.

‘A boy!'

At his first cry, Daud barreled into the room to see him and assure himself his wife was healthy. He smiled in pure delight. Ashikin, too, was pleased to be finished with the birth and delighted to see her new son.

‘Zakaria!' Daud announced, and she smiled in agreement. Daud bent over his son, overcome with tenderness, and whispered the call to prayer in his ear, welcoming him into the world as a Muslim.

As soon as she was cleaned and comfortable, the family rushed in to see the mother and child. Mamat was transported to see his grandson, and he held Nuraini to greet him. ‘See: this is your new
adik
,' he told her. ‘Now you're a
kakak
, an elder sister, and you'll take care of him.'

Her face clouded. ‘No. Why is he here?'

‘He's your
adik
,' Mamat repeated patiently, ‘and he's just come to meet you. See? How soft his hair is? And he's so little …'

Nuraini deigned to pat his head softly and smile at him. Then she made it clear she'd had enough and wanted to go outside again and play with Yi, who was more fun than a baby. It promised to be an interesting transition.

Maryam regretted ever having seen the tiger, which had brought her nothing but misery, and wasn't even real. She wondered about it, and whether it was all her imagination as it now seemed it might be. Though Maryam remained painfully aware they still had no idea who had killed the second victim, and perhaps a real tiger was roaming up there. She admitted this was probably more a desire not to admit to herself that she might be completely delusional than any hope a tiger actually prowled the Tumpat district.

And though the most grisly of the mysteries was now solved, they were no closer to finding Yusuf's killer than they had been at the start, though they knew a great deal more about his wife and associates than they had, and the consensus was negative.