THE GIRL IN THE WINDOW (The Inspector Samuel Tay Novels Book 4) (28 page)

“Is Claire your real name?” Tay asked

“Don’t be fucking stupid, Sam,” August chimed in. “Of course it isn’t.”

Claire said nothing. She just smiled. A little.

“Okay, here’s the deal,” August said. “Suparman could be anywhere. We’re not going to find him by blundering around the city. We need to make him come to us, and I have a way to do that.”

“Don’t you think ISD will throw a blanket over him after all this?”

“They’ll try, but they aren’t going to want to piss him off. Remember, they’re treating him like a valued informant, not a prisoner. And he’s had enough freedom of movement to kill at least two people and not get caught at it. He knows how to get around the city, he knows how to avoid his handlers, and he’s willing to do whatever he thinks needs to be done.”

“So what you need is a motivation powerful enough to convince him to surface and go after somebody else.”

August nodded.

Tay took a long drag on his cigarette, flipped away the butt, and thought about what August had just told him. He shifted his eyes back to August.

August nodded again.

“Oh shit,” Tay said.

“Yeah, that’s pretty much the deal, Sam. He knows you’re coming after him, but he also knows either you or that woman sergeant who was with you can blow him up even if you don’t find him just by going public with what you know. He has to stop you before you do that or his cushy gig is over. Where’s your sergeant now?”

“She’s…” Tay hesitated. “Out of the country. I told her to lie low for a while.”

“So that leaves you,” August said.

“That leaves me. I gather you want me to be the bait.”

“Doesn’t matter what I want, Sam. You
are
the bait. Suparman is coming after you anyway. I’m just proposing we use that to set a little trap for him.”

Tay looked out across the lawn, thought about it, and then he looked back at August. “You better explain that to me.”

“We just want you to go about your life as you always do. Don’t do anything that might scare him off.”

“You’re going to have a group of armed guards following me everywhere just in case Suparman shows up?”

“He’s not going to come after you on the street, Sam, and he’s sure as hell not going to come to the Cantonment Complex and take an elevator up to your office. He wants to walk away after he gets rid of you.”

“Then what do you think he has in mind?”

“Suparman will come for you when you’re at home. He’ll have you alone then. There’s really no other way he can do it.”

“So you think—”

“Your house will be completely covered. And Claire will be there to take him when he shows up. She’s the best. She’s not going to waste another chance.”

Tay shifted his glance to the woman. She had said nothing at all. He couldn’t see her eyes behind the sunglasses, but he thought there was a hint of a smile at the corners of her mouth.

“You were the girl in the window,” Tay said to her.

“I would have waved, but I never wave at strange men.”

“I’m not strange.”

“That’s not what John says.”

Tay looked at August.

August shrugged.

August’s van carried Tay up to Orchard Road and he found a taxi to take him home. The taxi dropped Tay in front of Preranakan Place where he usually asked taxis to drop him, and he walked up Emerald Hill toward his house exactly the way he always did. As he walked, he examined the vehicles parked further up Emerald Hill Road with as much subtlety as he could muster. The ISD van that had been there before was gone, but did any of the other vehicles contain a new set of watchers? Tay had no idea.

He assumed August would have his people in place soon. For all he knew, they were already there. If they weren’t and Suparman made an early appearance, Tay figured he was pretty much screwed. He doubted he would be any match for Suparman one on one, so he was largely in August’s hands. He trusted August, that wasn’t the problem, but he also recognized that people made mistakes. He only hoped he wouldn’t be one of August’s.

Tay went straight to the kitchen, poured himself a couple of inches of Irish whiskey, and took it and his cigarettes out into the garden. August had told him to behave normally, hadn’t he? And this was as normal as life got for him.

As he smoked and sipped his whiskey, he thought about how it felt to be the cheese in John August’s mousetrap.

He couldn’t blame August, no matter how much he wished he could. He alone was responsible for the position he was in now. It was his decision to freelance and not tell anyone else what he was doing that had started all this. It was his decision that left Robbie Kang dead and him hoping very much now not to become dead.

On the other hand, it was also true that his decision to freelance had accomplished something of real value, too. That was how he found Suparman, and how he found out ISD was protecting Suparman to save face for the men who ran ISD and the politicians to whom they reported.

The idea of face was very much an Asian concept. When Westerners heard people talk about saving face, they generally thought it meant avoiding embarrassment, but losing face was far more serious to an Asian than suffering an embarrassment. Lost face was something never regained. When you lost face you were permanently diminished. You mattered less than you did before. You
were
less than you were before. To most Asians, their face was their very existence, and protecting it was everything.

Had Robbie Kang and other people died because some bureaucrats feared losing face? Was it possible that people above them, politicians at the top levels of government, knew and approved the plan because they would lose face too if it became known how badly they had screwed up?

If that was what had happened here, Tay thought, maybe August was killing the wrong man. If bureaucrats or government ministers had known who Suparman really was and what he had done and they had said nothing to save face, they deserved shooting as much as Suparman did. Maybe more. Perhaps he ought to see what he could do about that.

Tay stubbed out his cigarette, finished his whiskey, and went upstairs to bed.

TAY WAS FULLY awake in an instant. He had felt the foot of his bed move slightly, but he didn’t open his eyes. If he did open his eyes, he was certain he would see one of two things. Either a murderous terrorist waiting to kill him, or the ghost of his mother preparing to give him advice. On the whole, he thought he might prefer the murderous terrorist.

“Samuel, I can see you’re awake. Don’t try to pretend you’re sleeping. That’s childish.”

Tay sighed and buried his face in the pillow.

“Oh, for God’s sake, Samuel, cut it out,” his mother snapped. “You’re a grown man. Act like it!”

Tay yawned. He realized there was no point in trying to ignore her. She had always been able to wait him out. Better to let her have her say and get it over, then he could go back to sleep.

He pushed himself up on his elbows, jammed a pillow behind him, and leaned back against the headboard. A very realistic manifestation of his mother was sitting at the foot of his bed. Usually his mother’s little visits didn’t amount to much more than a few swirling lights, but this was the second full-body materialization within a few days. This was getting serious.

“Good evening, Mother. To what do I owe the pleasure tonight?”

“You owe the pleasure, as you put it in that snarky tone of yours, to the same thing you always do. I’m your mother. It is my responsibility to try to help you in any way I can no matter what obstacles I must overcome to do it.”

“And is one of those obstacles the fact that you’re dead?”

His mother unfolded her arms and gave an airy little wave with one hand. “That’s the least of my problems. It’s your obstinacy and pigheadedness that make helping you so difficult.”

“Can we skip the part where you criticize my character just this once, Mother? I’m really very tired. It’s been a hell of a few days and I’d like to go back to sleep. Please tell me what you’ve come to say and then bugger off.”

“Such language, Samuel, such language. I swear I don’t know why I go to all this trouble for you. It’s not as if doing these materializations is a day at the beach, you know. Do you have any idea how much energy I have to put into this?”

“Perhaps next time, you could just send me an email.”

“You don’t read emails.”

“Yes, exactly.”

Tay’s mother shook her head, and then she stood up and walked across the room to the low dresser between two windows that overlooked his garden.

“Every single time I’m here I hope to see a framed picture of a woman on your dresser, Samuel, but I never do.”

“You’d only start asking me a lot of questions about her.”

“Of course I would. Shouldn’t a mother be interested in the woman with whom her unmarried and I should also say increasingly elderly son is keeping company?”

“I’m hardly elderly.”

“Getting close, Samuel. Getting very close.”

“And I’m not keeping company, as you put it, with anyone.”

“Yes, I can see that,” she said, waving vaguely at the top of the dresser. “More’s the pity.”

Tay’s mother strolled around the room casually peering here and there, and then after a bit she returned to the foot of Tay’s bed and resumed her seat.

“Why are you here, Mother?” Tay asked.

“I heard what you and your friend were talking about yesterday. And I wanted to tell you—”

“What friend?”

“That August person.”

“I wouldn’t really call John August a friend.”

“Whatever you call him, when he asked you to—”

“Wait a minute. You’re saying you heard what August and I were talking about yesterday?”

“Yes, that’s what I just said. Don’t you ever listen to me, Samuel?”

“How could you have heard us, Mother? You weren’t there.”

Tay wasn’t certain what to make of the rather humorless smile on his mother’s face. He had never seen an expression quite like it before.

“
Were
you there, Mother? Somewhere?”

Tay’s mother shook her head and looked away.

“Why must we always have the same tiresome conversation, Samuel?”

“Are you saying you know about my conversation with John August yesterday because of your universal knowledge?”

Tay’s mother just looked at him. “I’ve told you over and over. It’s one of the few advantages of being dead.”

“You know everything I say? All the time? Regardless of where I am or who I’m talking to?”

“More or less. Sometimes I don’t really pay any attention to you, but you haven’t paid any attention to me in forty years so I think that’s only fair, don’t you?”

“You’re telling me you hear—”

“For God’s sake, Samuel, would you stop talking long enough for me to say what I came here to say?”

“Sorry, Mother. Yes, please, by all means. Say whatever you would like to say so I can go back to sleep.”

“I wanted to tell you I’m proud of you for doing this.”

Tay couldn’t ever remember his mother telling him she was proud of him about anything before. For a moment, he had no idea what to say.

“Did you hear me, Samuel?” his mother prodded.

“Yes, I heard you. I’m just too surprised to speak.”

“You really can be an ass sometimes, Samuel. Can’t I even tell you that I’m proud of you without getting a dose of sarcasm?”

“I’m sorry, Mother. You’re absolutely right. I am glad you’re proud of me, but…well, I’m not exactly sure what it is you’re proud of.”

“You went after Robbie Kang’s killer in spite of my advice, and I realize perhaps I was wrong to tell you not to. Now you’ve found him—”

“Not exactly, Mother. August thinks he’s going to find me.”

“Same thing. Anyway, I’m sure you’re going to get this man before he hurts anybody else. Superman? Isn’t that what they call him?”

“Suparman, Mother. Not Superman.”

“Whatever.” Tay’s mother lifted one hand languidly. “What matters is that you and this August person are going to get him.”

“I’m only the cheese in the trap, Mother. The cheese isn’t entitled to take much credit for nabbing the rat. It’s the trap that does all the work.”

“Now you’re being modest, Samuel, and modesty bores me. What matters is that soon this Superman—”

“Suparman, Mother. Suparman.”

Tay’s mother gave him a hard look. “What matters is that soon this man will be dead and you will have had a part in killing him.”

“Not if I can help it.”

“What? I don’t understand.”

“I am willing to be the bait, Mother. But if Suparman takes that bait, I’m going to try to arrest him if I can. Not just stand there and let August’s people kill him.”

Tay’s mother cocked her head at him.

“Arrest? Are you out of your mind, Samuel? You arrest the little shit and the people who have been protecting him will put him right back on the street.”

“Mother, please. Watch your language.”

“Oh, shut up, Samuel. Let August kill the bastard or you do it yourself.”

“I will only kill him if I have absolutely no choice.”

“I’ve seen you shoot, Samuel. You probably couldn’t kill him even if you had absolutely no choice. If it’s you pointing a gun at this man, he’s as safe as he’ll ever be.”

“Thank you, Mother.”

Tay’s mother looked away and shook her head.

“Please remember, Mother, that I am a policeman. We arrest people and then they are punished according to the law. We don’t set them up to be killed, particularly not by some assassin working for the American government.”

Tay’s mother leaped up and began pacing furiously back and forth at the foot of Tay’s bed.

“Samuel, I swear you are the biggest fuddy-duddy I have ever known. This man isn’t a purse-snatcher. He’s responsible for the murder of hundreds if not thousands of completely innocent people. He killed Robbie Kang. You get him when you have the chance. You do not arrest him and let the politicians set him free. The barbarians no longer live in a land far, far away. They’re right next door.”

Tay said nothing, hoping his mother would run down of her own accord.

“You have to take a stand, Samuel. Life has always been nasty, brutish, and short, but never—”