I sipped my coffee as I watched the drama unfold.
Another lamb to the slaughter.
Derek was saying that he wanted children and that his mum would soon be a grandmother. His mum beamed and nodded.
‘We’re going to have kids soon, aren’t we Apple?’ he asked, jabbing at her with his knife.
Apple took the phone away from her mouth and nodded. ‘Soon, darling,’ she said. ‘I want your baby too much. I want handsome son, like you.’
So why didn’t I warn Derek that his bride-to-be didn’t really love him and was only after his money?
Because it was none of my business.
Most countries in Asia have a saying along the lines of you don’t mess with another man’s rice bowl, and I’ve been in Asia long enough to respect that philosophy.
Apple was doing what she had to do to survive.
If Derek was too dumb to see that, then really he deserved what was coming to him. I reckoned he was in his late thirties, a good fifteen years older than her. He was overweight and clearly hadn’t bothered to learn any of the language, so why would he think that a pretty girl would see him as anything other than a cash cow? Or more likely a buffalo to be led around by the nose.
I finished my coffee. I knew that the Dubliner didn’t sell Phuket Beer so ordered a half pint of Guinness instead. I was half way through it when Bear came in, followed by three young men in sharp suits. Bear was as big as his name suggested, a little over six feet six inches tall, broad shouldered and pot-bellied with a bushy beard and a pair of black horn-rimmed spectacles.
He sat down on a stool at one of the circular tables fashioned from a barrel and ordered three beers as his colleagues joined him.
I picked up my beer and went over. ‘Alistair?’ I asked. ‘Alistair Wainer?’
Bear screwed up his eyes as he looked at me. ‘You look like a cop,’ he said suspiciously.
‘I used to be one,’ I said. ‘In another country and in another life. But I sell antiques now.’ I took out one of my business cards and gave it to him.
He frowned as he read the card. ‘If it’s about shares, I work in administration, you need to talk to your broker.’
‘Relax, Bear, I’m more of a cash-under-the-mattress sort of guy.’ I took out the photograph of Jon Junior and gave it to him.
‘He owe you money?’ asked Bear.
I shook my head. ‘He’s missing. His parents have asked me to look for him.’
Bear nodded. ‘Jon, right? Jon Clare. That’s his name, yeah? A Yank?’
‘He came to see you?’
Bear gave me back the photograph. ‘A week or so ago.’
‘Can you remember when exactly?’
Bear frowned. ‘Why does that matter?’
I put the picture back into my jacket. The waitress brought over three pints of beer and put them down on the table. ‘Remember the nightclub that burned down? The Kube?’
Bear nodded. ‘That was some serious shit,’ he said.
‘Yeah, well his parents are worried that he might have been caught up in it.’
Bear picked up his pint and took a long drink. ‘Yeah, he came to see me a few days before the fire, looking for a job. I asked him back for a trial and he came to the office last Monday, which was what, two days after the fire?’
‘Yeah, the fire was on Saturday.’ I couldn’t stop myself from grinning. At least I had definite proof that Jon Junior was alive and well after the Kube had burned down. ‘Did you offer him a job?’
Bear took a drink, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘He didn’t have the balls,’ he said. ‘Absolutely zero killer instinct.’ He nodded at one of his companions. ‘Jimmy took him under his wing, gave him a script and watched as he made a few calls.’
‘Bloody disaster,’ said Jimmy in an upper-class English accent. ‘Couldn’t sell smack to a heroin addict.’
Nice analogy. But I got the drift.
‘Did he say where he was going? What he was doing?’
‘He was teaching English at some school,’ said Bear. He clicked his fingers at a waitress and asked for a menu. ‘I figure he’d make a better teacher than broker.’
‘He’s left the school,’ I said. ‘That’s the problem. Did he say why he wanted the job?’
‘The money, probably. But he wasn’t happy at the school. He thought there was something not right about it.’
‘In what way?’
‘It’s run by some Russian guy and he thought he was Mafia. Kept seeing shady characters hanging around the office.’
‘The thing is, he was only supposed to be in Thailand for a year, he was going back to work for the family firm. And he already had a job, teaching English.’
Bear and his two companions laughed. ‘Teaching English isn’t really a job, Bob,’ said Bear. ‘I spend in one night what a teacher earns in a month.’
‘He’s a Mormon,’ I said. ‘They’re not driven by money.’
‘The Osmonds performed for free, did they?’ laughed Bear. ‘Everyone’s driven by money, trust me. If they weren’t, we wouldn’t make the living we do.’
‘Greed is good?’ I said.
Bear laughed. ‘It might not be good, but it keeps me in booze and hookers and puts gas in the Ferrari.’ He took a long pull on his pint. ‘You ever thought about sales, Bob?’
‘I told you, I sell antiques.’
‘I mean real sales. Stocks. Shares. The margins we operate on, a guy like you could make a good living.’
‘I’ll pass,’ I said. I nodded at my business card which he’d put down on the table. ‘If by any chance he gets in touch again, give me a call, yeah?’
CHAPTER 30
The Friday night poker game was at the house of John Muller, an American who I’d met soon after arriving in Thailand. John was a Vietnam vet who’d been involved in the Phoenix programme, winning the hearts and minds of the Viet Cong and occasionally throwing them out of helicopters. That’s just rumour and conjecture, John doesn’t talk much about what he did back then. He’s been married to a Thai lady for more than thirty years and runs a security company that looks after big hotels and VIP clients in Thailand and Cambodia.
John and his wife live in Sukhumvit 101 in a house they bought just after they married. I went by taxi because a lot of alcohol is consumed on poker night.
A rottweiler on a chain snarled at me as I pressed the doorbell and ignored my attempts to win it over by making shushing noises. The dog hates me, but when I visit with Noy it’s all sweetness and light.
The door opened and Muller grinned amiably. ‘Brought your money with you, Bob?’ he asked and gave me a bear hug that forced the breath out of me. I’m not a small guy but Muller is a couple of inches taller and good deal heavier. His hair and moustache are greying but he looks good for sixty-odd.
‘I’ve gotta warn you, I’m feeling lucky tonight,’ I said.
Muller laughed and slapped me on the back, then finally released me and I stumbled into the house. ‘The wife’s out with the girls so we’ve got free rein,’ said Muller. ‘And the pizzas are on the way.’
I went through to the sitting room where there was a large circular table covered in green baize.
Somsak was there, dressed casually but expensively in chinos and a pink Lacoste shirt. He raised his glass of brandy in salute. ‘The late Bob Turtledove,’ he said.
‘We’re in the middle of nowhere,’ I said. ‘And the traffic was terrible.’
Muller handed me an opened bottle of Phuket Beer and waved me to an empty chair. I sat down and took out
