Black Tiger (46 page)

Without warning, the heavy teak door was brutally flung open and her brother Pao rushed in. Chee Laan regarded him with a chilly stare. He pounded up to the desk in fervid agitation, slammed both his hands on it and shouted into his sister’s face, ‘So here you are lurking!’ He glanced round the room. ‘You have made yourself a cosy little nest, sis! Well, here’s some news to wake you up! No good lolling here playing the big shot! This a crisis! We have to do something!’

Chee Laan studied him, wondering what he was up to now. His bullying stemmed from insecurity, and his aggression from jealousy and feelings of inadequacy; she could pity him, and when he went too far, she allowed her pity to show, as the most calculated revenge. But the thought of his duplicity, his acting as go-between between
Tsu mu
and the Black Tiger, turned her stomach. It tested her loyalty to her grandmother to the maximum. Looking at him now she thought how like their father he was, his youthful good looks already dissolving in fat, the expression of peevish cunning settled more permanently upon his face.

‘What is it, Pao?’ she demanded with ill-concealed irritation. ‘Why are you yelling at me like this? I don’t need this right now.
Tsu mu
and I have had a very difficult experience. Poor Ah Lee has been murdered, and we were nearly killed ourselves.’

He snorted dismissively. ‘I heard about the old woman. The earth rises higher. I wish to talk of something important, not some old coolie woman.’

Chee Laan gripped the edge of the desktop to steady both hands, refusing to display anger. She pressed a button to stop the music. When she spoke her tone was cool. ‘Still the same callous toad, Pao! I suppose you’re here for your usual handout?’

He shook his head in pretend wonder. ‘What is the matter with you, Sister? You are not a woman but a cash register!’

She scowled. ‘Not, however, a hole-in-the-wall cash point. Not for you. Not anymore. So: if it’s not money, what do you want?’

‘There was a helicopter on the roof,’ Pao howled, banging his fist on the table. ‘When you were all off getting yourselves murdered. That Devil Sya, the Black Tiger. In a helicopter.’ He gestured wildly toward the darkened window. ‘He’s got a woman with him, either drugged or dead. And—and a monster. He’s got a monster with him.’

She saw that he was genuinely afraid, and she laughed. ‘A monster? A dragon, breathing fire and smoke?’

‘You don’t believe me,’ he said bitterly. ‘You mock. But you will see. I recognized that woman. It’s that friend of yours, Miss Thailand, who was going to marry the drowned prince—that girl they married off to that Akha devil, to get her out of the way…’

Pao saw that he had caught her attention.

‘What is this about Salikaa, and helicopters? And monsters?’

‘The monster is a great hulking fellow. His mouth hangs open. His hands are as big as durians.’ In illustration, Pao let his own arms swing loose, slackened his jaw, assuming an expression of mindless, unfocused menace. ‘I saw the helicopter land. I was going to run—I thought it might be terrorists!’ His voice rose shrilly. ‘You were all gone; there was nothing but music on the radio, no news, the way they do when anything happens—just pour out dance music, you know, hour after hour, while they decide what the official line is to be. I knew something was up. I heard a rumble and I looked and saw the tanks heading out from the barracks toward Chinatown, and—oh, gods, he saw me. The demon, the black Akha! And he forced me to open up one of the private rooms on the penthouse floor, for VIPs, the family…and he’s here, in the hotel!’

Chee Laan leaned back in her chair, stiff with bafflement and the firm desire to keep her wits. ‘Pao.’ She studied him as though in the past few minutes he had suddenly become an entirely different person. ‘Why are you telling me all this?
Tsu mu
has returned; why aren’t you telling
Tsu mu
?’

‘Oh, yes, the all-powerful old woman! Damn the old woman—and damn you, too! Well, I did tell her. Small thanks I got!’ Pao slumped in a carved chair. His heavy body scattered the fuchsia silk cushions to the floor. He glared at his sister, blaming her for whatever had caused him so much aggravation. She saw then that he was drunk, and that his drunkenness was about to explode in frenzied rage. But she couldn’t help being alarmed by his news, and she rose, pacing the carpet, thinking fast.

‘Is
Tsu mu
safe?’

He snorted, spluttering slightly, plucking at his rubbery lips with wine-stained purple fingers. ‘
Tsu mu
will survive. That old woman is made of ice. Nothing moves her. I tell her that devil Sya Dam is on the roof with a helicopter and a monster, and what does she do? Orders me about like a market coolie. “Pao, send the servants to fetch Honourable Colonel at once!” And then what am I to do?’ He broke off and gazed furiously at his sister. ‘I am to go check the vintner’s accounts. I am not permitted to hear her business. She and the Tiger, they make conspiracies and plots, and me, I am a lackey, sent to check the damn wine bill!’

Chee Laan looked at him. ‘If our grandmother told you to go and check accounts, do it!’ He glowered, squinting furiously at her. He fumbled at his pocket and produced a bottle. She swooped in and seized it from his hand. ‘No! No drugs! No more booze! For once in your life, Pao, face your responsibilities, and face them sober. This is serious!’

‘Give me that!’ he shouted, his face purple. She held it away, taunting.

‘Shall I tell
Tsu mu
? Shall I show her that you can only function with the poppy-sleep?’ He halted and glowered, seeking a means of escape. His eyes returned to the bottle, which she held just out of reach. ‘Go. Check the accounts—check them very carefully.’ She stood up to indicate dismissal, ignoring his claim, as oldest son, to her deference. She was trembling. Pao might be fat and flabby, but she had not forgotten his bouts of insensate violence. She was wary, even now. Some memories never died.

Still shaken by what he had seen, Pao shambled toward the door. In the doorway he looked back at her, slack-jawed, questioning, but finding no words. She considered how ugly he was. He looked like their father. She shuddered.

As the door closed behind him she placed the bottle in her purse and took the elevator down to the lobby. Her grandmother’s office was in a suite off the lobby, next to Chee Laan’s old, smaller office, where some of her things, including changes of clothing, had not yet been moved to her new quarters. The offices were next to the smaller rooms used by the hotel staff; thus, a watchful eye could be kept on both the highest and the lowest levels.

Chee Laan did not approach her grandmother’s office but entered the adjacent staff sitting room. Finding it vacant, she locked the door behind her and moved softly to the listening panel in the wall. Sunii Lee herself had installed it. It was useful, she explained, to be able to check on employees. Disloyalty was a contagion which must be eradicated at first appearance. Chee Laan pressed her ear to the thin panel, then froze, hearing her grandmother’s voice. As she listened, she felt her loyalties eroding, her old life crumbling around her.

‘Why bring the girl back?’ Sunii’s tone of cold anger shocked Chee Laan. ‘Your people condemned her to death. Why make trouble? Why not leave matters to take their course?’

‘Really,
Khun
Sunii,’ a man replied, his tone rich and deep, and profoundly scornful. With a shudder, Chee Laan recognised the voice of Sya Dam. He laughed, a snort of disgust, bitter as bile. ‘Condemned, yes—by the Akha!’

‘Condemned for killing her husband. For which crime Thai law, too, would condemn her.’ Sunii’s voice tone stung like a whip. ‘What use is she?’

‘I need to discover the depth of the king’s feelings for her. If it was more than a mere passing fancy, she is potentially extremely useful. And otherwise, she will be easily disposed of.’

In the pause that followed, Chee Laan sensed the tension, imagined them staring at each other, neither willing to concede, weighing each other like wrestlers.

At last Sunii said, ‘As to that, well and good. But why bring that thing, that thug, here?’

‘Archin is a simple fellow. It is that very simplicity which makes him invaluable. He has served us well. Archin has done more than you know.’

‘He may be useful and obedient, but his stupidity is dangerous. The attack on this so-called environmental expert, this Raven, for instance.’

‘Nothing was ever proven. There was no publicity, either.’

‘No, and that is fortunate, because we cannot afford publicity. Thanks to the quick thinking of the American general, a disaster was averted. It was unfortunate that my granddaughter became involved in the sordid business, though. That should not have happened.’

‘One might have thought you of all people would have welcomed the timely removal of Raven. Given your views on miscegenation.’ He paused. Chee Laan realised, with a stab of anger, that he was talking about herself. ‘Raven poses a threat for other reasons, as you know. The man masquerades as an absentminded professor, but I am reliably informed that he is a spy—a very dangerous man.’

There was silence on the other side of the panel. Chee Laan wished she could see their faces, read their expressions. Her chest throbbed. She steadied herself with a hand on the wall, wishing she could press herself through it and emerge, invisible, on the other side.

‘My views on miscegenation?’ Sunii’s voice was still and clear as silk stretched taut.

His voice, in reply, had a studied casualness. ‘I have always found it curious that you, especially, should entertain such strenuous objections to alliances as, for instance, the relationship between your esteemed granddaughter Miss Chee Laan and this
farang
.’ He paused again to let this sink in, then continued softly, his voice purring deep in his barrel chest like a great engine idling. ‘That you, of all people, should object…’

‘What do you mean, me of all people?’ she demanded. There was a high note in her voice, both challenge and panic, and her words were quick and sharp.

‘One cannot ever blame women.’ Sya had adopted a lighter, musing tone. ‘Does not your sage Confucius say the saddest of all fates is to be born female? Weak beings have to embrace expediency. There are ladies, I hear, who even managed to stifle their revulsion toward East Ocean Nippon Devils, seeking advantage in…’ The pause was heavy with insult. ‘Certain friendships.’ He continued with an undertone of menace. ‘Such alliances may have unforeseen consequences. Well-known local businessmen, pillars of the community, yet fatally flawed—who are now gone to their ancestors.’ He sighed piously.

She burst out, her voice tight with accusation: ‘You were not told to kill him! Why did you have to kill him?’

‘You requested my help. Your son was robbing you, destroying your empire, dissipating your life’s work. You told me so yourself, madame,’ he countered coldly.

‘You did not need to kill him!’ she cried brokenly. Chee Laan trembled at the pain in her voice.

‘There was no other way,’ Sya reasoned calmly. ‘Not to save face, and ensure the problems did not recur. Your son has joined his paternal ancestors. Not, perhaps, after all, Cantonese tycoons murdered by the Japanese, but instead those very warriors from the East Ocean islands…’

There was a fragile silence, delicate as a spider’s thread. Then Sunii spoke, her voice little more than a whisper. ‘Who else knows this?’

‘Not many. Be reassured. Certainly, your granddaughter, at any rate, has no idea her grandfather was Japanese!’

‘You can prove nothing!’ Sunii said loudly. Then she switched tacks. ‘My granddaughter would never believe it. My grandsons are strutting fools like their father and his odious, bowlegged bantam-cock of a father before him. Chee Laan is loyal to me. That is all that matters.’

The eavesdropper, engaged in an act of shame, blushed to hear herself commended.

‘I am sure she is,’ Sya replied smoothly. ‘Rest assured, I shall not be the one to tell her. And do not concern yourself with this man Raven. He has cheated death for the last time. He and I shall come face to face one day, and one of us will not survive that encounter.’

‘You will not find me ungrateful, Colonel.’ Chee Laan shivered at her grandmother’s steely tone.

There was a smile in Sya’s voice as he said, ‘Indeed! I have a certain respect for your granddaughter. She has brains. There are few women I admire. Yourself, of course. And the Princess Regent. It was she, you know, who contrived this marriage with my late cousin for this bitch-thing I have brought here while we decide what is to be done with her…’

‘I had wondered,’ Sunii murmured. ‘Yes, I had wondered about that.’

Sya chuckled. ‘I informed Her Highness that I discovered the young king disporting himself with the bitch. We agreed that a speedy marriage was the best solution—in view of possible future developments, you understand.’

‘But the woman, Salikaa…there was already a fiancé, so I understood.’

Sya sighed, as if in genuine sorrow. ‘Yes, poor young Prince Toom. One of the few acts I have genuinely regretted in my life.’

‘That was you? The drowning?’

‘How strange that you should need to ask. He did not suffer. The training offered to BPP specials is excellent. His neck was snapped before his body was placed in the yacht. Then it was capsized. Very neat.’

Chee Laan shivered. Weariness dragged at her limbs. She had hugged her commonplace little love to her breast like a child burying her face in a soft toy, while all around her was an adult world of chaos and malice. Infatuation had made her both deaf and blind. It was unforgivable. Despite the flame shrivelling inside her chest, she went on listening.

‘Why such an elaborate remedy? Would it not have been simpler merely to bring forward the date of her wedding to Prince Toom?’ Sunii asked, in a measured tone.

‘Alas! I had no room to manoeuvre. You see, I was not alone when I discovered the young couple—Prince Toom was with me. And there were others. Toom himself saw me hustling His Hot-blooded Majesty into his pants.’ He paused. ‘Toom broke down.’