[Surveillance]
Dinner with Lakshmi and Jill was winding down. I had stopped my consumption of sake. I wanted to be sharp. Lakshmi, the healer from Punjab, had added an exciting new element to the Miranda Weiss case, something that her husband, Philip, apparently knew nothing about.
“Why didn’t she want her husband to know about you?” I asked her.
“She thought he would disapprove,” Lakshmi put her hand on my wrist, just for a moment, and then it flew away. “She thought he would be negative. Negativity would ruin everything we were doing.” She glanced over at Jill, who was listening with a slightly dubious expression on her face. “Look at Jill,” Lakshmi laughed. “She’s not sure I’m not a crazy woman.”
“Miranda willingly ingested these mercury balls you gave her?” Jill asked, clearly perplexed by the procedure.
“Yes, she did. She saw me take them. She saw how they worked for other patients. I told you, this is not the mercury they’re finding in seafood, Jill. Not the mercury they put in thermometers.”
We sat there, our feet under those low Japanese tables, silent for a moment. Cogitating. Lakshmi pulled her big shoulder bag into her lap. “I’m not sure you want to see this during dinner.”
“What is it?” I asked
“Some pictures of one of my patients.”
“I was an assistant medical examiner,” Jill told her. “I’ve seen almost everything. I don’t have a delicate stomach. And I can assure you that Mr. Callison has seen everything, and more.”
“Very good,” Lakshmi withdrew a couple of enlarged photos from a file in her bag. “This is a young Thai lawyer by the name of Wiwat. That’s not his real name. As I told you, all my work here is very confidential. I have Wiwat’s permission to show these to you. He’s even willing to meet you in person, if you desire.”
The first photo she handed us was quite hideous, if you’re not used to seeing the things that disease can inflict on a person. This young fella, ‘Wiwat,’ who turned out to be 33 years of age from Phuket, was a terminal case, afflicted with facial bone cancer. A tumor was protruding out the side of his face, about the size of a grapefruit. Not pretty.
“This was five months ago,” Lakshmi explained softly. “They were going to cut him up in a local hospital. He ran away from the hospital before they had their clamps on him.”
“ He ran away?” Jill said.
“He knew what would happen if they started cutting up his face. He found me.”
“God whispered in his ear?” I asked.
“His aunt who knew me, whispered in his ear.”
Lakshmi pulled out a second photo. “This is Wiwat three weeks ago.” The lump was still there, but considerably smaller in size. The young man was smiling at the camera.
Just then my cell rang. I looked at the Caller ID. It was Seng, the head of security at the Weiss estate. I untangled my legs from beneath the table and excused myself.
“What’s up, Seng?” I asked as I walked to the hallway just outside the dining area.
His voice was excited, actually breathless. I could hear traffic and Thai voices in the background. “I’m following Sandy Barrett.”
“Following Sandy Barrett? I thought you were on duty at the estate tonight.” I looked at my watch. It was almost 10:30.
“I got Ong to take my place. I’m down near the Rocky Bar. I’m in a tuk tuk.” Your basic tuk tuk looks like a motorized rickshaw: a cabin compartment attached to a motorcycle. It’s a nimble but noisy little vehicle that’s pretty good negotiating traffic in Thailand.
“What happened to your motorcycle?
“I can’t follow Sandy on my motorcycle, Ty. He’s in Mister Philip’s Porsch,”
“Are you moving now, Seng?” It didn’t sound like it.
“He went into the bar. He’s got a boy in the Porsch.”
“ A boy? What kind of boy?”
“A boy – about seven or eight years old. He does this. Mister Ty- can you come?”
I was somewhat stunned at that moment. This isn’t what I came to Thailand for, but it didn’t sound very good. I heard my voice in my head remind me that I had said Sandy Barrett was prone to perversions.
“He just came out, Mister Ty. I think he got some drugs there.” I heard him say something in Thai, probably to the tuk tuk driver. “Can you come?” he asked again, as I heard the raspy rumble of the tuk tuk starting up.
“Jeese-uss,” I muttered under my breath. The Rocky Bar was only about five minutes away. I hadn’t brought any weapon with me to the dinner date. Seng had loaned me one of those Sig Sauers that Phil had generously passed out to his security staff. It was presently locked up in my room safe. I had to make a quick decision or else Sandy and Seng would soon be out of my reach.
I talked into my cell as I swiftly walked back to our table to tell Jill I was taking the rental car, and asked Lakshmi to drive Jill back to our hotel. “Which way you going?” I asked Seng.
“North,” he said from the tuk tuk. “Are you coming, Ty?”
“I’m heading for my car, as we speak, bro. Stay in touch. I’m gonna try to catch up with you.” I ripped out of the parking lot, just another crazy driver in the night. I knew how to get to the Rocky Bar. Beyond that, I might have to just rely on my direction finder angels.
Seng kept his phone on while the tuk tuk followed the Porsch. I heard a lot of Thai garble, then English “He’s turning, Ty. Turning right, right after the Baan Andaman Resort. Do you know it, Ty?”
“Yeah, yeah—I’ll find it.”
“There’s a big house on the left, Ty. Off the road. Thai style. Sandy’s driving in there.” In Thai I think he told the tuk tuk driver to stop. To wait. In English, he came back to me, whispering, “It’s half way up the hill.” Then there was silence for thirty seconds, as I kept forcing my Honda rental forward. Seng came back in a hushed voice, “Ty, there’s some guys coming.”
“Where from? “
He sounded confused, even frightened. “I think there’s a car up the road.”
A voice spoke in Thai, maybe the tuk tuk driver. “He says we shouldn’t be sitting around here,” Seng again.
“You have your Sig?”
“Yes.” Seng’s voice was tense.
My headlights picked up a hotel sign on the left. It didn’t say Baan Andaman, at least not that I could tell. Maybe I heard him wrong. My Thai was only a week long. I remembered some from my Vietnam days. Not enough, I guess. “Seng, what’s happening?” I said into my cell.
Then I heard a new voice. It wasn’t Thai. He spoke English, but with some kind of east European accent. “Seng cannot come to deh phone now,” he said in a voice that could only be described as mocking.
[To be continued]
Ty Callison
Krabi, Thailand
June 29, 2010
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