The Ambassador's wife

“Just doing my shopping, girl. A boy’s got to eat.”

The man lifted up the white plastic bag he was carrying in his left hand and wiggled it. Tay could see what looked liked a bunch of carrots and a head of lettuce bouncing around at the top.

“This store is a real dump,” he said as he put his free arm around Cally and gave her a hug, “but it’s on my way home and I’m just too darned lazy to go anywhere else.”

“Sam,” she said when the hug ended, “this is Jack Tanner. He works in the embassy.”

Tay offered his hand and received a rather limp and moist one in return. He studied Tanner as they shook. Since Tanner had found them standing in front of the building where Ambassador Rooney’s body had been discovered the day before and made no reference at all to it, either the murder wasn’t common knowledge yet or Tanner was being very discreet.

“Sam is over from Singapore with me for a couple of days,” Cally said to Tanner, but that was all she said.

“So…” Tanner said, giving Sam a thorough looking over. “This is the new boyfriend, huh?”

Sam could have sworn Cally blushed faintly.

“No, Jack, nothing like that. We’re here on business.”

“Yeah,” Tanner said. “Sure.”

Then he winked. Winked. Tay didn’t know people actually did that anymore.

“Monkey business maybe,” he said. “Anything to get away from Singabore, huh?”

“Get out of here, Jack.” Cally waved one hand at Tanner and with her other gave Tay a nudge toward the Volvo. “Not everyone has your appetites.”

“Oh, girl! You’d be surprised how many people do. I’ll bet you really would.”

Cally waved again. “So long, Jack.”

“Now don’t be a stranger, girl!” Tanner waved back. “And you either, Sam. Drop by the embassy anytime and say hello. You hear?”

Tay and Cally circled the building in silence and got into the Volvo.

“You seem to have friends everywhere,” Tay said.

“I have acquaintances everywhere,” Cally said. “When you work for the State Department it goes with the territory. Whether it’s a blessing or a curse I haven’t yet decided.”

“Do you figure this guy knows what happened here yesterday?”

“Yes, of course, he knows.”

“Then why didn’t he mention it? Was he just being discreet in front of me?”

Cally shrugged as she started the engine.

Well, Tay thought, so they were back to that again.

“Anywhere else you want to go?” Cally asked.

Tay looked around. From where they sat he could see nothing but an unbroken vista of decaying buildings and mounds of trash. The alleyway looked as though a pack of wild animals, crazed with hunger, had dragged all the garbage in the neighborhood there and scattered it around in a desperate hunt for scraps of food. It also looked like nobody cared.

He had never really thought much before about how green and luxuriant Singapore was. The rows of trees lining wide, clean streets; the banks of carefully tended flowers; the landscaped and tightly mowed vacant lots. He had almost forgotten that every city didn’t look more or less the same. Bangkok certainly didn’t look the same. It was dirty and ugly.

Tay shook his head and glanced at his watch.

“No, I’ve had enough. I want to take a shower. I want to change clothes. I want a drink. Any suggestions on finding a hotel before it gets any later?”

Cally hesitated. “I’m staying at the Marriott.”

“What is it with you people and Marriotts?”

“A lot of government people stay in Marriotts. Why shouldn’t we?”

“Why should you?”

“They give us a good rate.”

Tay nodded, but he didn’t say anything.

“The Bangkok Marriott is a really classy place,” Cally prompted. “You’d probably like it a lot.”

Tay was pretty certain there was a compliment in there, but he was too tired to tease it out.

“Then take me to the Marriott, driver,” Tay said, leaning back in the seat. “I place myself entirely in your hands.”

A few days before, Tay would have cheerfully bet his life he would never spend a single night in any Marriott hotel anywhere, ever. Now he was about to spend his second in two days.

Wasn’t it extraordinary what a mess of a man’s principles the intrusion of a beautiful woman could make?

THIRTY

The Bangkok Marriott looked like an ocean liner unaccountably run aground on lower Sukhumvit Road. The lobby was lush and romantic with art deco furnishings and melodramatic lighting. Just walking across it made Tay feel like Fred Astaire in Flying Down to Rio. Cally was probably too young to have ever heard of Fred Astaire, of course, so Tay kept the idea to himself.

There was room at the inn and the front office manager even offered Tay the same government rate that Cally was getting. To tell the truth, Tay liked the look of the place so much that he would have stayed regardless of what they wanted to charge him.

They checked in and headed for the lifts.

“I think I’ll hit the gym,” Cally said. “You want to go?”

Tay looked at her as if she had begun speaking Urdu.

“Oh, come on,” she said. “It’ll do you good.”

“I doubt that,” Tay said. “Besides, as luck would have it, I didn’t bring anything with me I can wear in a gym.”

“Then how about a swim instead?”

“No swimming gear either.” Tay spread his hands, palms up. “Sorry.”

“Just walk out front.” Cally pointed toward the main road. “I’ll bet one of the street vendors sells bathing suits.”

“Buy a bathing suit off the street?”

“Oh, God.” Cally put her hands on her hips and looked at Tay. “You are such a Singaporean. What are you thinking here? If it’s not wrapped in plastic at a department store, it’s not clean enough for you to wear?”

That was exactly what Tay was thinking, of course, but he tried to look thoughtful and said nothing at all. A faint chime announced the arrival of the lift. When it opened it was empty and they got on. Tay didn’t like talking in lifts and apparently neither did Cally, so he had a few moments of silence in which to weigh his options.

Going for a swim with Cally was certainly an appealing idea or, to jump straight to the important point without flinching at the unadorned political incorrectness of it, hanging around with Cally while she was wearing a bathing suit was certainly an appealing idea. On the other hand, he couldn’t sit by the pool with Cally wearing a white dress shirt and dark slacks. The whole concept led inevitably to the necessity of him putting on a bathing suit, too. That was perhaps not altogether such an appealing idea.

Out of the corner of his eye, Tay could see Cally was watching the lights that tracked the upward progress of the elevator. Experimentally, he sucked in his stomach a bit and tried to hold it there. Could he keep that up for an hour or so? Well…maybe.

The chime sounded again and the elevator stopped on the eighth floor. Cally got off and looked back at Tay.

“I’ll be sitting by the swimming pool in half an hour,” Cally said. She pointed her index finger at him and