by Lee Stone
The Rat shrugged.
‘Maybe he guessed it was valuable.’
‘Maybe,’ Lim said. ‘But more likely it was taken by someone who knew what it was worth. A Cambodian maybe.’
He let the accusation hang in the darkness.
Veasna took his time answering.
‘You think I took it?’
Lim shrugged.
‘It’s more likely to be Jimmy who has taken it, don’t you think?’
Lim smiled. It was much better for Lim that the Rat accused Jimmy. It would be easier to explain to Ta Penh. After all, if Veasna was making wild accusations then wasn’t he, Lim, duty bound to investigate? If Jimmy had taken the carved wooden box, which Lim thought was a strong possibility, then he could take the credit for finding it. If Jimmy turned out to be innocent, Veasna could take the blame.
‘Why Jimmy?’ he asked.
‘Because he knows the value of it,’ Veasna said, sounding relieved that Lim was following this line of investigation rather than focusing on him. ‘He’s used the Smoke Child to build an empire. It has made him strong and powerful. Why would he let go of it now? If someone sent you to war, and they gave you a gun, would you hand it back while you were still on the front line?
‘So, Jimmy or Leisler,’ Lim thought out loud. He reached over to the kettle. He unscrewed the lid of the coffee jar with his gnarled fingers and emptied the granules onto the wooden board Veasna used as a worktop. ‘That’s the question. Did Leisler steal the suitcase to get the cash, or did Jimmy disrupt the drop so he could take the Smoke Child?’
Lim carried the empty jar across the tiny room to the bare light and followed the bare wire back to a car battery that was powering the bulb. The bulb dulled for a moment as Lim tipped the battery upwards. In the gloom, The Rat watched him pour acid into the coffee jar and twist the lid tight shut.
‘Still the old methods, eh?’ he said.
Lim smiled, he features sharp and demonic in the restored light.
‘Why not?’ he asked. ‘They work. The girl will know which of the men opened the case. She will tell us what we need to know.’
The Rat stood up and walked over to the microwave. He opened it with a ping and pulled out a Makarov pistol.
‘You might need this, too.’
Lim leant forward and took it. The weight of it in his hand brought back a thousand memories from the killing fields. He found a pocket for it and adjusted his jacket to accommodate the bulk.
‘Thank you, old friend,’ he said to Veasna. ‘I will make sure she tells us everything.’
37
‘When Kate and I were kids, we used to switch identities from time to time. It’s something twins do. It can get you out of a lot of trouble.’
The woman on the sofa spoke in the monotone of a busted criminal, relieved to no longer have to carry the lie.
‘Sometimes she was me. Sometimes I was her. We shared fake ID when we first hit the bars, that kind of thing. Mostly it was fun.’
‘This is more than fake ID,’ Lockhart said. ‘Why go halfway across the world and pretend to be your sister?’
‘It’s a long story.’
Lockhart stared out at the storm.
‘I’ve got all night.’
The woman on the sofa sighed and stretched and then looked him straight in the eye.
‘My name is Matilda Braganza,’ she said, like she was at an AA meeting. ‘I’m sorry that I told you I was Kate. And I’m sorry that I made you think it was my sister in trouble with those guys in Kep. It was me that the guy was after.’
‘Ta Penh?’ Lockhart said.
‘Yeah, Ta Penh, although I didn’t know that was his name until we were out there. Kate had nothing to do with any of it. It’s my fault she’s dead. She was an amazing sister, and she thought she could help. She was in Nepal when I told her I was in trouble, and she booked a ticket to meet me before I could argue with her. We cooked up a plan, and I went along with it, and now she’s gone. And you have to believe me Lockhart. I will never ever forgive myself as long as I live.’
‘What was the plan?’
She sighed and settled back on the couch a little.
‘About a month ago, I guy I know asked me to take a suitcase overseas for him.’
Lockhart looked away from her, back out to the storm, chewing down on a jagged nail and thinking. She had lied to him from the start, but Lockhart decided he trusted her more at that moment than he had five minutes earlier. Her confession felt real, and he could feel the pain of her loss pulsing from her.
‘You agreed to do it?’ Lockhart asked.
Her eyes widened.
‘Of course I agreed to fucking do it,’ she whispered. ‘Nobody wants to smuggle cash out of a New York airport. You’re looking at five years if you get caught. But they make it hard for you to say no. They make it impossible. That’s how it works.’
She was talking more quickly now, relieved to unburden her secrets and confess her sins.
‘But you backed out, didn’t you? That’s why you needed a plan.’
She said nothing.
‘What changed your mind?’ Lockhart pushed. ‘Did you find something in the case you didn’t like?’
She looked at him as if he had slapped her in the face, and when the shock subsided, what remained was fear. She said nothing for a few seconds, and then she allowed herself to become distracted by the television set, which was still casting dull shadows across the room. Lockhart brought her back.
‘Ta Penh wanted a package. In the prison, he kept asking for a box. And you didn’t have it. Why not?’
Reluctantly, she looked back from the TV.
‘What happened to the box?’
She let her knees slipping out from under her chin and her legs fall away from her chest. She shook her head and ran a hand around the back of her neck.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I didn’t open the case.’
‘Because?’
‘A million reasons,’ she said. ‘Partly because I was scared of what might be inside. Partly because if I got busted, I didn’t want my grubby prints on whatever it was. I wanted to say, ‘Yeah, I’m stupid… but this isn’t my case.’ But mostly I didn’t open it because they told me they’d kill me if I did.’
‘You must have guessed what was in there?’ Lockhart said.
She nodded.
‘I heard them talking about drugs. Crack, they said. It scared me I’d get through US Customs and get busted on the other side. I’d be looking at the death penalty for that. I checked.’
Lockhart frowned.
‘That makes no sense,’ he said.
Outside, a fork of lightning struck liberty, right on her flaming torch. For a moment everything across the harbor lit up, and then the gloom extinguished the moment of brilliance. Lockhart moved towards the window to watch the angry sky.
‘Think about Vietnam. And Laos. Burma. Thailand. All major drug exporters, all right next door. Why would anyone ship crack from New York over there?’
‘I don’t know,’ Matilda said, and Lockhart thought she looked panicky. ‘I didn’t stop to ask questions. I told you these are not people who you say no to. Like I said, I didn’t get a choice.’
From the window Lockhart held his hands up.
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I get it.’
‘Do you?’
Her voice was terse now, but Lockhart fixed her with his calm grey eyes and said: ‘Yeah, I do.’
He kept her fixed in his gaze for a moment, processing what she had told him so far. Behind him, a storm surge headed down the Hudson like a giant wall of water, making landfall everywhere and flowing into the lowest streets.
‘So they put you between a rock and a hard place and started turning the screw,’ Lockhart said, beginning to understand. ‘And you did what you’ve done all your life, right? You used the only thing that could get you off the hook. Your twin sister.’
‘Exactly.’ Matilda Braganza said.
‘How d
id you do it?’
Her face fell as she remembered.
‘I used Kate. They knew nothing about her. She was the only way I could think of to get away from them and I used her, Charlie. She wasn’t supposed to get hurt. I used her.’
‘You switched passports?’ Lockhart guessed.
‘Exactly,’ Matilda said.
Her voice was little more than a whisper, her face twisted in anguish as she confessed.
‘I switched passports as soon as she arrived at The Happy. I guessed they’d be watching the airports for me if I tried to leave. I thought I could slip through on her passport without getting flagged. Once I left the country, I thought Kate could drive across the border into Vietnam and then report her passport lost.’
‘Did she know?’
Matilda nodded.
‘She knew I needed her help, that was all. She was happy to lend me her passport, thank God. I would explain it all to her on the beach the next day. After we’d hit the town with you that evening.’
A melancholic smile bloomed on her lips.
‘Remember that?’ she breathed. ‘We were going to hit the town hard that night. We were going to have a party. Some joke, huh?’
Then she sobbed, rubbing the back of her hand with her thumb and glancing up at the picture of her sister on the wall, still smiling down in the sunshine.
‘I wish you’d met her,’ Matilda said. ‘You would have liked her.’
‘I’m sure I would.’
Lockhart looked out across the white churn over the slate gray Hudson, letting the new information fall into place in his mind. After a long moment he looked up and frowned.
‘The first time I met you on the plane, you lied about your name. You told me you were Kate.’
‘I was getting into character, I guess.’
But she knew he didn’t believe her.
‘No, you needed me,’ Lockhart said. ‘You needed someone at least. Once you’d come up with your plan to switch identities, you needed someone who would introduce you as Kate, someone who would vouch for you, and make you more authentic. You needed someone who would believe beyond doubt that you really were Kate. That’s what you wanted from me. You used me.’
‘Yeah,’ she said, the fight gone from her. ‘Busted. I’m sorry Charlie. You’re a nice guy. You think I enjoyed lying to you? I didn’t. But what do you want me to say? I had no choice.’
‘You could have leveled with me,’ he said.
She laughed.
‘What’s funny?’
‘Charlie, I don’t know you. It sounds like nobody does. You haven’t been home in a year; you won’t stay in the same place two nights running. You’re a complete fucking riddle.’
‘Doesn’t mean you can’t trust me.’
‘I know,’ Matilda said, running a hand across her face. ‘I know that now, but I didn’t know it when I first me you.’
It was a fair point.
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I get that. You had a plan, and you kept it to yourself. You told your sister you were in trouble, but nothing more.’
She nodded.
‘I think it was a good plan, for what it’s worth’ Lockhart said.
‘Was it? I got spotted from the second I left the airport. They’d told me they’d meet me at the Happy a couple of days after we landed, but they were waiting for me. They wanted my luggage. And I just jumped on a bus to Kep and led them straight to….’
Her voice tailed off and Lockhart said, ‘I know the rest.’
‘Lockhart,’ she said, and her voice was suddenly strong and clear, just like it had been the first time he met her. ‘It never, ever crossed my mind that they would kill her.’
‘I know.’
Her eyes wandered across his face, searching for clues.
‘I know,’ Lockhart repeated, and this time he watched Matilda sit back and breathe out. For a moment he remembered his journey through the dark corridor up to the room where he had found the dead girl. His desperate attempt to revive Kate Braganza. The real Kate Braganza. The one he had never met while she was alive. He looked around the plush Battery Park apartment. This was her place. These were the views she’d enjoyed before she had flown off to see the world; before they had murdered her. She had lived a luxurious life, removed from street drugs and dangers that had apparently surrounded Matilda for so long. Lockhart guessed she had gone to Asia looking for a little excitement. And for a moment, he completely understood Matilda’s pain and grief and guilt.
‘So you’re safe here?’ Lockhart asked her after a moment. ‘You’re sure they won’t find you?’
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘They’ll come looking for me, but it’s a big city.’
Lightning struck again. Thunder rolling in behind it like an avalanche, threatening to rip through the fabric of the building, shaking ancient brick and splintering wood in its wake. Matilda flinched as hard white light flooded the room. The power tripped and when the lightening receded. The room fell dark except for the soft emergency lighting that cast a dull glow across the scene.
Then Lockhart heard it again. Splintering wood and shaking brick. But it wasn’t the lightening. The sound was coming from the hallway. Someone was coming through the front door. On instinct, Lockhart started moving towards the noise. The doorjamb gave way on the third crash, just as Lockhart arrived in the hallway. The door flew open and smashed hard into the wall. All at once - filling much of the gap where the door had been - was a brutish-looking man, cast in relief in the moonlight. He was still swinging the metal baseball bat that had almost split the front door into two pieces. A sanitation mask obscured most of his face, but above it he had eyes that were small and shrewd, shining with malice and adrenalin.
By the time Lockhart reached him, the man in the mask was three strides into the apartment, and the bat was mid air. Lockhart dived at him like a rugby player, coming in low beneath the swing of the bat and hitting him just above the knee. He was planted like an ancient oak, but Lockhart had created enough momentum to knock him off his feet. The guy crumpled his full weight on top of Lockhart, landing an elbow first on top of his ribs. They scrabbled on the floor for a moment, neither man wanting to allow the other back to his feet. The guy in the mask kicked out hard at Lockhart, and they bounced off the walls before they finally got back upright and started slugging it out. Slowly, the intruder forced Lockhart back into the main space of the apartment where he had room to swing the baseball bat.
Lockhart had time to see it coming, but not enough time to duck. It hit him close to full force on the side of his arm. A second swing glanced across the top of his head and white hot pain began to radiate from the top of his skull. He tried to move forward and put together a couple of combinations, but his legs went from under him. Suddenly he was on his knees, defenseless against the man with the bat. Behind the mask, his bright eyes narrowed with no hint of pity. Lockhart pulled his sluggish leaden arms upwards in a futile attempt at self preservation. The masked intruder pulled the baseball bat high, ready to deliver a coup de grâce. He wondered how they had found Matilda, and he wondered how many times the guy would hit him before he lost consciousness.
It never happened. To Lockhart’s confusion and relief, the guy froze. He slowly extended the fingers that had been wrapped around the bat and allowed it to fall from his hand. It clunked hard on the ground as he slowly raised both of his hands aloft. It was all Lockhart could do to stay on his knees. He was dizzy, and the room had begun to spin. With a supreme effort, he turned to look at Matilda Braganza who was in the kitchen, hovering by the cutlery drawer. She was standing with her hips square, her legs braced, and both hands firmly on a shaking revolver. Lockhart crumpled towards the floor as the room spun and his body closed down.
38
Lockhart was aware of his breath first, rasping and slow. Consciousness returned in stages and pain shot down his neck when he tried to move. Eventually he ran a hand through his thick brown hair. It was wet. There was blood and a tender spo
t behind his ear at the back of his skull. He remembered twisting and slumping backwards as he lost consciousness. He had ended crumpled onto his back, but now he was facing the ground, rolled onto his side. Someone had moved him.
He struggled to his feet, gradually getting the pain under control and stumbling back into the heart of the apartment. He went slowly, never straying far from the supporting wall. Behind him, the door was still splintered and open. In the kitchen he found the open cutlery drawer and remembered the gun. Where the hell had she got that from? Beyond the kitchen, the bedroom door was just ajar. Just enough. Deserted, the room’s minimalist style suddenly reminded him of The Happy. The raw architecture, the echoing walls, and the sickness in the pit of his stomach all reminded him of the terrible moment when he had discovered the dead girl back in Kep. Déjà vu. For a moment, Lockhart waited outside the door, steeling himself for what he might find inside. Then he eased through into the dark. Blue gray moonlight cast shadows across the bedroom. He hit the lights. Empty and undisturbed. The man with the mask was gone, and Matilda Braganza was nowhere. Lockhart searched the bedroom, but found nothing.
Whoever had smashed down the door had managed to find Matilda in a city of millions. Ta Penh had stretched out from Cambodia, reaching for whatever she had stolen from him. She had hidden as best she could. She had stolen her sister’s identity and hoped to blend into the background of New York’s bustle. Smart move. But not smart enough.
When he returned to the lounge, white netting curtains were blooming from the window on the breeze. Beyond them, the scene dropped away to the gray water below. Across the swell, the Statue of Liberty kept careful unblinking watch and seemed unperturbed by whatever violence had unfolded in the apartment. Liberty had her own worries, staring out into the heart of the storm. If she had seen anything, she would not tell.
He rummaged through the drawers in the kitchen, wondering where she had found a gun and whether she knew how to use it. One thing was for sure: she should never have come back to New York. She had skipped Cambodia, and she had ended up back in the city where her troubles had begun. He looked around the apartment she had thought was a sanctuary. The guy in the mask had wasted no time finding her. Why? Lockhart moved from room to room, searching for an answer. Eventually, when he was almost out of ideas, he found flecks of fresh paint on the wooden floor in front of the refrigerator. Two screws in the panel below showed signs of recent movement. Lockhart reached back into the cutlery drawer and found a steak knife. He jammed it into the nearest screw head and started to twist. It came away easily, and with the second removed he was able to slowly ease away the white panel to reveal a dark cupboard behind it. The space was small, and the interior was rough and unfinished compared to the polished white facades of the other units. The suitcase was inside. It was a square black Gore-Tex model. Anonymous and uninteresting. Lockhart eased it out into the light and onto the work surface. It was heavy enough. The zip felt starchy, its teeth new and unworn. Inside, several black shrink-wrapped cubes jostled for position around an ornate wooden box, hand carved and dark like mahogany.
