THE DEAD AMERICAN (The Inspector Samuel Tay Novels Book 3) (9 page)

“No.”

“Are your shareholders individuals or other corporations?”

“I really couldn’t say.”

“Private equity funds?”

Goodnight-Jones smiled, but said nothing.

“Governments?”

Goodnight-Jones remained silent, but Tay saw a flash of something in his eyes at Emma’s mention of governments.

Did that mean The Future
did
have a direct connection with some government? Tay wasn’t sure what the implications of that might be even if it were true. They were less than ten minutes into this conversation and already he felt like he was out of his depth.

Emma scribbled in her notebook and then, without looking up, asked, “Since Tyler Bartlett was one of your key software developers, did his death set back your program?”

Goodnight-Jones threw back his head and laughed loudly, but Tay could hear no humor in the sound.

“So
that’s
what this is really all about.”

“I don’t understand what you mean, sir,” Emma said, keeping her face e
xpressionless.

“You can drop the act, young lady. It’s obvious you are not interested in our work here, but I wasn’t sure what you
were
interested in until you asked about Tyler Bartlett. If that’s what you wanted to interview me about, why didn’t you just say so?”

“Because you probably would have refused to see me.”

“Exactly right.”

Goodnight-Jones stood, but he did not offer his hand.

“Good day to you both. Thank you for your interest in The Future.”

Emma closed her notebook and returned it to her purse, taking her time about it. Then she glanced at Tay and they both rose to their feet.

Goodnight-Jones crossed his office, opened the door, and led them back out to the reception area.

“And thank you for coming, too, Inspector Tay,” he said. “I hope I was successful in satisfying your curiosity about… well, whatever it was you were curious about.”

Emma looked at Tay.

“Damn it, Sam, you told me you weren’t famous.”

Tay shrugged and stabbed his finger at the elevator button.

TAY WAS AT
home that afternoon sitting in a high-backed leather chair, smoking a Marlboro, and thinking about Emma’s interview with Zachery Goodnight-Jones when his doorbell rang. He and Emma had agreed as they parted outside The Future that she would come by later, so without his usual second thoughts Tay got up and went outside to open the gate.

It wasn’t Emma. A
young man who looke
d to be Malaysian was standing there instead. He was wearing dark glasses and a white long-sleeved dress shirt with a nondescript blue tie, and he was holding an identity card up next to his face.

“Good afternoon, Inspector Tay.”

Tay nodded. It annoyed him that he couldn’t see the kid’s ID from where he was standing. He really was going to have to think about getting glasses, whether he wanted to or not.

“Philip Goh wonders if you could spare him a few minutes,” the young man said.

Philip Goh was a man who was high up in the Internal Security Department of the Ministry of Home Affairs, although Tay wasn’t certain exactly how high. Tay wasn’t certain of much when it came to ISD.

The Ministry of Home Affairs ackn
owledged that ISD existed, but that was about it. ISD didn’t even appear in the Singapore Government Directory. Officially, ISD’s job was to collect intelligence and protect Singapore against threats to its internal security, things like espionage and terrorism. Unofficially, ISD was Singapore’s secret police force.

The Internal Security Department cultivated an air of mystery that Tay thought was downright silly. Even the identity of the Director of ISD was kept a secret while he held his position, although after he left office he was quickly identified so he could be showered with congratulations for a job well done. Tay knew he could find out who the current director was easily enough, but the truth was he didn’t really care.

“He wants to see me today?” Tay asked.

“Actually,” the young man said, “Mr. Goh asked me to bring you to New Phoenix Park right now.”

New Phoenix Park was what everyone called the heavily secured compound of the Ministry of Home Affairs. That compound was, among other things, the headquarters of the Singapore police force. The Cantonment Complex, where Tay had his office, housed only CID and the Central Narcotics Bureau. All the rest of police operations were run from New Phoenix Park.

But Tay knew that perfectly well this kid wasn’t here to take him to police headquarters. New Phoenix Park was also ISD headquarters. Tay hadn’t seen Goh in a year, not since he had gotten tangled up in the matter that had eventually resulted in the shooting that got him suspended, twice now, but he remembered that Goh’s office was on the fourth floor of a building at New Phoenix Park that had an unforgettably charming and picturesque name: C Block.

What was going on here? Maybe Kang had been right about ISD having him under surveillance. Then all at once a deeply unhappy thought occurred to Tay.

ISD had extraordinary powers under the Internal Security Act to detain people more or less indefinitely without charges. They were exactly the sort of powers that would never have been given to any government agency under American or British law, the kind of government powers of which real democracies were deeply and justifiably suspicious. In Singapore, however, no one questioned those powers.

Was ISD detaining him for some reason? Surely not. Detaining a CID inspector would be a major scandal. At least it would if anyone knew he had been detained, which come to think of it they might not.

The kid may have noticed a brief look of alarm cross Tay’s face so he went on in what he apparently thought of as a soothing tone of voice.

“This is just an informal chat, sir. Nothing to be worried about. We’ll have you back home in an hour or so.”

Well, Tay thought to himself, he
would
say that, wouldn’t he?

“What’s this about?”

“I’m not at liberty to say, sir. Mr. Goh will explain that to you. Shall we go?”

Tay quickly ran through the alternatives in his mind. It didn’t take very long because there weren’t any.

What was he going to do? Not open the gate? Refuse to go to New Phoenix Park with this kid? And then what? Flee the country?

“I’ll be with you in ten minutes,” Tay said as he closed his front door.

“I’ll be right here, sir.”

I have no doubt you will be, kid. No doubt at all.

They drove from Emerald Hill Road to New Phoenix Park in a nondescript white Toyota. The kid parked, escorted Tay to the fourth floor of C Block, and knocked on Goh’s door. Opening it without waiting for an answer, he gestured Tay inside and closed the door behind him.

Philip Goh was doing exactly what he had been doing the last time Tay walked into his office. He was sitting behind his desk drinking from a bottle of water. N
either man spoke for a moment. Goh kept drinking his water and stared at Tay. Tay stared back.

Goh had a square Chinese face and black, badly cut hair. His eyes were so dark it was hard to distinguish between the pupils and the irises. His most prominent feature was a scar that started somewhere inside his hairline just above his left ear, meandered more or less diagonally across his cheek, and then disappeared just below his jaw. It looked like the sort of dueling scar actors in old black and white movies had when they played German aristocrats. In Goh’s case, Tay doubted the scar came from dueling, but he didn’t particularly want to think about where it
had
come from.

Goh finally moved the water bottle away from his mouth and inclined his head toward a straight-backed chair in front of his desk.

“Sit down, Tay.”

“Why am I here?”

“Sit the fuck down, Tay.”

Tay thought about it for a moment and then sat down. Continuing to stand would have been such a childish act of defiance that it would have embarrassed even him.

“You want coffee?” Goh asked, snickering slightly.

The coffee in ISD’s cafeteria had once been something of a joke between them. The stuff was so awful that Tay had accused Goh of trying to poison him. Goh had thought that was very funny. Tay had never bothered to tell him he wasn’t actually kidding.

“Does ISD have me under surveillance?”

“Why would we do that?”

“That’s not exactly a denial.”

“I don’t answer to you, Tay.”

“I don’t answer to you either, Goh.”

“Actually… you do.”

Tay had only been in Goh’s office for thirty seconds and he was already tired of the bullshit.

“If you don’t tell me right now what this is all about,” he said, “I’m gone.”

Tay saw the scar on Goh’s face turn red. Watching that scar was like watching an oven thermometer. He wondered what would happen if it went completely off the scale.

“Just calm the fuck down, Tay.”

“Is this about your goons grilling Sergeant Kang and trying to make something out of the discrepancies you imagine you found in our statements?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I know ISD took another statement from Kang, and I know you probably have my house under surveillance.”

All of a sudden Tay remembered he wasn’t supposed to know that ISD had interviewed Kang. Now he would have to claim that someone other than Kang had told him, but he doubted Goh would believe that. This was all getting worse and worse, wasn’t it?

Tay saw the color of Goh’s scar start to fade. The oven temperature was falling, but Tay didn’t understand why.

“I got no idea what you’re on about, Tay.”

Goh laced his fingers behind his head and swung his feet up on his desk.

“But it doesn’t matter since it’s got nothing to do with why I asked you to come in for a little chat. Now do you want to hear why you’re here, or not?”

Okay, so it looked like he hadn’t dropped Robbie in the soup after all. If this wasn’t about Robbie’s statement, however, what in the world
was
it about?

Tay plastered a look of utter disinterest on his face, spread his hands in a gesture that could have meant almost anything, and waited to see what was coming next.

When he found out, he couldn’t believe it.

“This morning you went to see Zachery Goodnight-Jones. You claimed to be a researcher for the Wall Street Journal.”

Tay tried to keep his face empty, but he was far too surprised to make a decent job of it.

“And before you ask,” Goh continued, clearly relishing the look on Tay’s face, “I’ll tell you how I know. Goodnight-Jones called me the minute you left his office.”

“You know Goodnight-Jones?”

“I know a lot of people.”

“Good for you. But why would one of them call you about me?”

“Because he didn’t like the questions you were asking.”

“I didn’t ask him any questions. I never said a word.”

Goh shrugged. “How’d you hook up with that woman anyway?”

“
That woman?
You sound like Bill Clinton.”

“What?” Goh wrinkled his brow. He looked genuinely confused.

“Never mind.”

“Let’s talk about Emma Lazar,” Goh said, shaking his head. “Why are you involved with her?”

“I don’t really think that’s any of your business.”

Goh folded his hands in front of him on the desk. The gesture struck Tay as strangely prim.

“Do you know what I’m thinking, Tay?”

“Only if you tell me.”

“That you’re doing it for love.”

Tay said nothing.

Goh leaned back in his chair and gave Tay an unpleasant grin. He lifted his left hand and made a circle with his thumb and forefinger. Then he lifted his right hand and pumped his forefinger in and out of the circle a few times.

“Have I got that right, Tay?”

“You know, Goh, you really are an asshole.”

“So you’re telling me you’re not —”

“Look, you arrogant prick, who the hell do you think you are to haul me in here and ask me something like—”

Goh started making little patting gestures in the air.

“Jesus, Tay, I was just needling you, man. For God’s sake, lighten up.”

“I’ve got a perfectly good sense of humor when I hear something funny. That wasn’t.”

Goh started to say something else, but then he appeared to think better of it. Instead, he just knitted his fingers together behind his neck, tilted back in his chair again, and began studying the ceiling.

“Why am I here, Goh?”

“I’m trying to do you a favor.”

Goh abruptly shifted forward in his chair and leaned against the desk on his forearms. He fixed Tay with what he probably thought of as his steely stare.

“You’re sticking your nose in where it doesn’t belong, Tay. Stay away from Zachery Goodnight-Jones. Stay away from his company. You’ll have problems if you don’t.”

“I love being threatened by you, Goh. It’s always the highlight of my day. Really, it is.”

“I’m not threatening you, I’m only—”

“That’s the first thing people who threaten you always say.”

Goh flung up his arms in exasperation. “For God’s sake, Tay, do you ever just listen to anybody? Or are you so overwhelmed by your compulsion to be a smartass that you just talk all the time without hearing what anybody else is saying?”

“I heard you perfectly well. Your threat came through loud and clear.”

“This wasn’t a threat, Tay. I’m just trying to help you.”

“And that’s the second thing that people who threaten you always say.”

Goh shook his head slowly and sighed.

“We’re getting off on the wrong foot here, Tay.”

“Doesn’t matter. We don’t need any feet. You and I aren’t going anywhere.”

“Do yourself a big favor, big man. Listen to me. Zachery Goodnight-Jones is well connected. He’s very important around here. Do not fuck with him.”

“Even on the highest throne in the world, you’re still sitting on your ass.”

Goh grinned. “Hey, that’s pretty good. You just make that up?”

“It’s something Michel de Montaigne said in the sixteenth century.”

“I should have known.”

“Known it was a quotation from de Montaigne?”

“Known you’d start spouting horseshit from the sixteenth century when you ought to be listening to me.”

Tay shook his head and looked away.

“Look, I really am trying to do you a favor here, Tay. I’m a working stiff just like you are. You and I don’t really matter. We carry other people’s water. And if we spill it, they’ll crush us like bugs.”

“Whose water are you carrying now?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Can’t? Or won’t?”

“A little of both, I guess, if I’m going to be truthful.”

“I guess there’s a first time for everything.”

“Now who’s being an asshole, Tay?”

Tay stood up.

“You never gave me a straight answer, Goh. Does ISD have me under surveillance, or not?”

Goh started to say something, but he just ended up shaking his head slowly from side to side.

“I want to hear you say it,” Tay said. “Yes? Or no?”

“As far as I know, ISD doesn’t have the slightest interest in you. As far as I know, we do not have you under surveillance. Satisfied now?”

“Then why were two of your goons grilling my sergeant about the incident that got me suspended?”

“I have no idea. This may come as a surprise to you, Tay, but I don’t know everything that goes on around here.”

Goh opened a desk drawer and took out a plain white card. He wrote something on it and held it out to Tay.

Tay took it. There was nothing on the card but a telephone number.

“What’s this?” he asked.

“It’s my cell number. Maybe you’ll want to call me about something one of these days.”

“I doubt it.”

“Well then, fuck you, Tay.”

“Yeah, fuck me.”

Tay shoved the card in his pocket, turned around, and started for the door.

“I’m trying to help you here,” Goh said. “Be careful. Be very goddamned careful.”

Tay didn’t say anything. He didn’t even look back. He just walked out the door and closed it behind him.