drinks, washing glasses, and talking out of the side of his mouth all at once. He reminded Conor of Jimmy Lah. The back of the bar was another world. On the far side of all the Jasmines, parties of Chinese men sat around round tables drinking brandy from magnums, shouting jokes at one another, and desultorily talking with the girls who drifted by their tables. Far at the back a black-haired man in a tuxedo who looked neither Chinese nor Caucasian sat at a baby grand, singing words Conor could not hear.
He squeezed past the woman, who went on mouthing cheerful meaningless sounds, and got to the bar just as Mikey took one of the photographs of Underhill out of the envelope. “Let’s have a drink, what d’you say, gimme a vodka on the rocks.”
The bartender blinked, and a brimming glass appeared on the bar before Conor. Beevers already had one, Conor saw.
“Don’t know him,” the bartender said. “Five dollars.”
“Maybe you remember him from years back,” Beevers said. “He would have started coming here around 1969, ’70, around then.”
“Too long ago. I was little boy. Still in school. Wif da priests.”
“Take another look,” Beevers said.
The bartender removed the picture from Poole’s fingers and flipped it over his shoulder. “He is a priest. Named Father Ball-cock. I don’t know him.”
As soon as they got back out onto the humid street, Harry Beevers took a step ahead of the other two and faced them with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders raised. “I don’t care, I have to say it. I get the wrong vibes entirely from this place. There isn’t a chance in hell that Underhill’s still here. My gut tells me to go to Taipei —it’s more like his kind of place. Take my word for it.”
Poole laughed. “Not so fast, we just got started. There are at least twenty more bars on this street. Somewhere along the line, someone will know him.”
“Yeah, someone has to know him,” Conor said. He felt more confident of this after having put down his vodka.
“Ah, the peanut gallery has an opinion too,” Beevers said.
“You got your rocks off in Taipei, so you want to go back there now,” Conor said. “It’s so fucking obvious.” He stomped away to avoid hitting Beevers. Cries of “Best bar! Best bar!” erupted from various doormen. Conor felt his shirt sticking to his back.
“So it’s Swingtime next, is it?” Beevers had come up on the far side of Mike Poole, and Conor felt a little flare of satisfaction: Beevers wasn’t taking any chances with him.
“Yeah, let’s try out good old Swingtime,” Poole said.
Beevers made an ironic little bow, pushed open the door, and let the other two precede him into the bar.
After Swingtime came the Windjammer, after the Windjammer the Ginza, the Floating Dragon, and the Bucket of Blood. The Bucket of Blood was a real bucket of blood, Conor thought—that had been his father’s term for any dive with rickety stools and ripped booths, a floor too scummy to be visible, and crapped-out drunks lining the bar. Beevers groaned when one of the shambling drunks followed another into the cubicle that was the men’s room and, to judge by the noise, began tearing his arms out by the sockets. The flat-faced bartender just glanced at the photograph of Underhill.
Conor understood why the Jaunty Jasmines stayed down at the end of the street.
Harry Beevers looked like he wanted to suggest giving up and going back to the hotel, but Poole kept them moving from one bar to another. Conor admired the way he kept on going without getting discouraged.
At the Bullfrog the guys sitting around the tables were so drunk they looked like statues. There were moving pictures of waterfalls on the walls. At the Cockpit Conor finally noticed that at least half the whores in the place weren’t women at all. They had bony knees and big shoulders; they were men. He started laughing—men with big tits and good-looking cans!—and sprayed beer all over disgusted Harry Beevers.
“I know this guy,” the bartender said. He looked again at Underhill’s face, and started smiling.
“See?” Conor asked. “See now?” Beevers turned away, wiping his sleeve.
“Does he come in here?” Mike asked.
“No, other place I worked. Good-time Charlie. Buy everybody a drink!”
“You sure it’s the same man?”
“Sure, that’s Undahill. He was around for a couple years, back in the old days. Spend lots of money. Used to come in da Floating Dragon, before it change hands. I worked nights, see him alla time. Talk, talk, talk. Drink, drink, drink. Real writah! Show me a book, something about animal—”
“Beast, right.”
When Poole asked if he knew where Underhill was now, the man shook his head and said that everything had changed from the old days. “Might ask at Mountjoy, right across street. Real hard core over there. Probably be someone there who remembers Undahill from old days, like me.”
“You liked him, didn’t you?”
“For a long time,” the bartender said. “Sure, I liked Undahill for a long time.”
2
Conor felt uneasy almost as soon as they walked into the Lord and Lady Mountjoy, and he couldn’t figure out why. It was a quiet place. Sober men in dark suits and white shirts sat in booths along the sides of the room or at little square tables set out on a slippery-looking parquet dance floor.
There were no transient whores in this place, just guys in suits and ties, and one character in a glittery blouse, sprayed piled-up hair, and about a hundred scarves hung loose around his neck, who was cooling out at a back table.
“Loosen up, for God’s sake,” Beevers said to Conor. “You got the runs or something?”
“Don’t know him, never saw him,” the bartender said. He had barely glanced at the photograph. He looked like a young Chinese version of Curly, the bald stooge in the Three Stooges.
“The bartender across the street told us that this man used to frequent this place,” Beevers said, pushing himself against the bar. “We’re detectives from New York City, and it’s important to a lot of people that we find this man.”
“Bartender where?” When Beevers had said the word “detective” a lead shield had slammed down over the bartender’s face, making him look a lot less like Curly.
“The Cockpit,” Mike said. He gave a fierce sidelong glance at Beevers, who shrugged and began toying with an ashtray.
The bartender shrugged.
“Is there anyone here who might remember this man? Anyone who was around Bugis Street in those days?”
“Billy,” the bartender said. “He’s been here since they paved the street.”
Conor’s heart sank. He knew who Billy was, all right, and he really didn’t want to have to talk to him.
“In da back,” the bartender said, and confirmed Conor’s fears. “Buy him a drink, he’s friendly.”
“Yeah, he looks friendly,” Beevers said.
At the back table Billy had straightened his shoulders and was patting his hair. When they approached his table, carrying their own drinks and a double Chivas Regal, he put his hands in his lap and beamed at them.
“Oh, you bought me a little drinkie, how dear of you,” Billy said.
Billy wasn’t Chinese, but he wasn’t anything else either, Conor thought. His eyes might have been almond- shaped, but it was hard to see them under all the makeup. Billy’s skin was very pale and he spoke with a British accent. All of his gestures suggested that a woman had been trapped inside his body and on the whole was enjoying herself in there. He raised his drink to his lips, sipped, and set it down gently on the table.
“I hope you gentlemen are going to join me?”
Mike Poole sat down opposite Billy, and Harry Beevers drew up a chair beside him. Conor had to sit on the bench beside Billy, who turned his head and flicked his eyelashes in his direction.
“Are you gentlemen new to Bugis Street? Your first night in Singapore, perhaps? You are looking for entertainment of an exotic nature? Precious little left in our city, I fear. Never mind—anyone can find what he
