By early evening Carl was sitting in one of Bangkok’s famous and trendy bars. He was inconspicuous as his blue jeans and three-day beard were perfect camouflage amongst Bangkok’s middle class drinkers. Brown Sugar was a jazz pub on the street that ran behind Lumpini Park. It had opened in the 1980s when Carl was a relatively young man and its murky and relaxed atmosphere where Thais and foreigners mingled was a novelty in the Bangkok of that time. It suited his mood that night as he craved something familiar. The frontage was mostly glass so Carl had gone straight to a table at the very back where there was the least light.
He had called George from the taxi and given him a cryptic clue to where he was going; the Rolling Stones like it in their coffee. He was confident that George would be able to solve it; he had taken great interest in Carl’s daily battles with the Bangkok Post’s cryptic crossword. George was reliable as always. Carl was only on his third beer when he arrived and sat down opposite him.
“I took the long way here to make sure I wasn’t followed.”
“I figured you would,” Carl told him as he ordered him a beer.
“What is our present status?”
Carl placed a rolled up paper bag on the table in front of him.
“What is it?” George asked without picking it up.
“Spoils of war. Two hundred thousand Hong Kong dollars in cash that I need you to hide for me.”
George wrinkled his brow, looked at the bag, looked at Carl and then slid it onto his lap.
“Do you have a plan or is this bohemian look permanent?” he asked, having taken note of the designer stubble and new wardrobe.
“Floundering a little,” Carl told him. “Seems the colonel doesn’t believe that telling the police our man is a serial killer is a prudent thing to do.”
“Why would he say that?”
“Seems our target may be doing business and playing golf with General Amnuay. Information is that he may be a bit of a handful.”
“Handful? The man is the biggest gangster in town. You have really got yourself in a mess again. How the hell do you plan to get out of this one?”
“That, George, is the question that murders sleep.”
“I see a future with a very long beard if you don’t think of something soon.”
Carl was relieved to see he still had his sense of humour. A sense of humour goes a long way when surrounded by people who want you dead and possess the means.
“I want to pay a late night visit to Inman’s old office building on Phetchburi Road,” Carol told him. “Don’t know where it fits in, but something about it isn’t right. It is a very expensive piece of real estate to leave idle for so many years. Especially when you are in the real estate business. That and the fact that somebody is still paying the electricity bill.”
“What’s on your mind?”
“Do you still pick locks?”
“Sounds like I’ll have to,” he said wearily.
The plan was to go there late. Closing time, when the police were all busy dealing with the drunks. George left to put the money somewhere safe and Carl ordered a plate of food and slowed down his beer consumption. Getting comfortably numb on alcohol was always a temptation when dealing with stress but not a good idea before a burglary. The piped jazz music was pleasant enough but he wasn’t in the mood.
The live music started at nine and the band typically showed up a little before. The band comprised a piano player, double bass, tenor saxophone, and a long-legged black vocalist. She was beautiful. Her name was Jacqueline, and once upon a time she had almost become another Mrs. Engel. When she saw him in the corner she came and sat in the seat George had recently vacated.
“It’s been a long time Carl,” she told him, looking at him with sparkling but disapproving eyes.
“Sounds like the title of a song. How’ve you been?”
“Tall, black, and beautiful mostly. How ‘bout you?”
“Cynical, grumpy, and self-possessed. Same as always.”
“No wonder you’re so irresistible to women.”
“Do you still sing Misty in your sleep?”
“How would I know? Who’s around to tell me?” she said as she signalled the waiter for a drink. “The Dutchman comes here regularly, he told me that you are back. Why didn’t you come and see me?”
“I didn’t think you’d want me to.”
“That’s your most annoying trait, always thinking. Real life is such a mystery to you. I could never work out whether you are an idiot genius or a genius at being an idiot.”
“Me too. I thought about calling you, but eh, you know me.”
“Yeah I know you. Forgiving everybody except yourself. I have to go and sing, will you be around later?” she asked as she leant over and kissed Carl on the cheek. She picked up her drink and walked away without waiting for an answer.
Carl missed her more than he liked to admit. The relationship was not going to be warmed up by him under his present circumstances and he couldn’t tell her why without making her an accomplice. She was going to be handled at arm’s length for a while. Being close to him immediately shaved decades off a person’s life expectancy and she sang far too well to die young. Like dodgem cars that crashed and passed in the night, Carl knew another wedge had just been put between them.
They had only ever had one argument but one had been enough. She had asked Carl what it had been like living in Thailand as a young foreigner during the 1970s and 1980s. He told her that it had been like being a Negro in a Swiss village in wintertime. She was offended and declared it a racist statement. Carl disagreed and told her that racism would be behaving and speaking differently when she was around and that he had no intention of putting a governor between his thoughts and his mouth. She gave Carl a lecture on American style political correctness. Carl insisted that political correctness was just an insidious form of racism, as it required putting on different behaviour for different people. They did not agree and her programming had kicked in. She remained angry with him for quite some time after. Carl could put up with almost anything, but not her disapproval. So he had gone quietly.
She stood in front of the grand piano and sang Misty. She sang the words to him across the crowded bar as if it was only the two of them there. Just like the old days when he used to pick her up at the Brown Sugar late at night. She didn’t sing at Carl again all night and didn’t come back and talk to him. After taking time to think about what she had said, Carl’s money was on just plain ‘idiot’. He would do what he had to do and then go to bed with his bottle of Ardbeg. A marriage made in heaven.
Once, she had confided to the Dutchman that she reckoned some woman had broken Carl’s heart, and how she would like to get her hands on that woman for ruining him for everybody else. The Dutchman said, ‘no, no, no,’ and told her that it was not a woman that had drawn first blood. It was life that had broken Carl’s heart but that had been a very long time ago. The Dutchman’s theory, he had claimed, was based on something he had heard Carl say in India whilst wasted on hashish and booze. Carl thought they were both talking nonsense but then, what did he know?
George got back around midnight and spent a few minutes huddled at a table with Jacqueline. They openly conspired whilst unashamedly glancing in Carl’s direction. They had long ago joined forces believing two heads would be better than one at unravelling the enigma that was their common burden. Carl always let them have their fun; two martyrs were definitely better than one. He paid the bill and waited.
George had brought a discreet midsize Japanese car with him that Carl didn’t recognize and thought it best not to ask about. George got in the driver’s seat and drove the car towards their destination in silence. The traffic was only medium weight even though some of the bars had already begun to send their customers home. The cold gun pressed against Carl’s belly was disturbing but uncharacteristically comforting. As usual, Carl hoped he knew what he was doing.