by Wiley Brooks
“Wait. Back up. You have a motorcycle?”
“Yeah.”
“And we’ve been taking taxis?”
“I didn’t know what you might think about touring around on the back of a motorcycle.”
“Well now you know,” she said smiling.
Joey said the cycle really wouldn’t work for this trip. It would be impossible to load more than one bag. She joked that women don’t share their bags.
They stopped at the ferry terminal on the way back to Batu Ferringhi and bought tickets for the eleven o’clock departure. The fare was about fourteen US dollars each.
The ferry departed right on time. By midnight, Joey and Jessica were huddled under a blanket sharing a chaise lounge in the open sea. The moon had yet to rise and the sky was filled with thousands and thousands of stars.
“This isn’t half bad,” she said looking up. She snuggled a little closer to him and closed her eyes. Amid the balmy salt air, she fell asleep to the gentle rocking of the ship.
Mason and the pilot were up, fed and at the Cessna by eight. As the only plane at the airstrip, they were airborne within minutes. Less than three hours later they were taxiing to a stop in Melaka. Mason paid the pilot, got in his rental car and headed to Azred Restaurant. Over lunch, he had Haziq show him on a map where the old mission school was.
By noon, he had pulled up to the old building that housed the school. It sat vacant and appeared to have been unoccupied for years. He asked around and eventually was directed to an older man, Mohamed bin Ali, who had rented the property to the pastor and his wife.
“Yes. Yes. I remember Pastor Johnny and Mrs. Helen well,” Mohamed said. “Very nice and always pay rent on time.”
“That’s great to know, Mohamed. Can you tell me their surname?”
“Oh. Let me think.” He paused for an extended time. “I don’t remember. Everyone just called him Pastor Johnny.”
“Perhaps you could check a copy of the lease he signed.”
“Too long ago. I don’t keep papers for more than a couple years after someone leaves.”
Mason looked clearly frustrated. He decided to take a different approach.
“Did Pastor Johnny ever tell you about his home back in the States?”
“Oh yes. He had many stories about growing up.”
“Did he ever mention a place?”
“I’m sure he did,”
“And. . .”
“I don’t really know. I’m sorry.”
Mason thought some more for a new angle.
“Did he ever talk about anything that happened back home?”
“I remember a story. He said that every year they’d have a celebration for some battle. Lots of flags and banners. They would fix up the school for it, too.”
“US flags?”
“No. Some other flag.”
“Was it bright red with a blue X that ran from corner to corner with white stars in the blue?”
“Yes. Yes. That was the flag. ‘The south will rise again.’ That’s what Pastor Johnny would say. ‘The south will rise again!’”
“Do you recall anything about the celebration? Anything about the battle?”
Mohamed closed his eyes and seemed to be trying to remember the celebration at the school.
“I believe it started with a B. There was a banner that said ‘Battle of B something. Bennervul? That’s not right. Sorry.”
Mason was getting enough for Fitz to piece it together.
“Do you recall when during the year they’d have the celebration?”
“I don’t know. Maybe the first part of the year.” It was more of a question than a statement.
Mason tallied it up in his mind. A small town in the south with a big battle that they celebrate every year, probably in the early part of the year. Battle likely starts with a B. Might be close to Bennervul, or more likely Bennerville. He thanked Mohamed and returned to the restaurant. He needed to use a phone to call Boonsri.
He dictated a fax to send Fitz:
Fitz, found out a little more about Pastor Johnny and Helen. They’re from the South, not the Midwest. They held a celebration every year at the school for a Civil War battle. I imagine they have the same celebration in their hometown. Their former landlord said they’d put up a banner that said Battle of Bennerville. Or something like that. He said it started with a B.
Then he hit the road for the long drive to meet Bo in George Town.
Mason and Bo took a booth at Best Bar and Grill. Mason liked this place because they made a real cheeseburger with bacon and nice, crispy French fries. The waiter took their orders. For Mason, that included a Jack Daniels. Bo had a beer.
“Mason, you look like shit man,” Bo said as they settled into the booth.
“I know. I haven’t been sleepin’ well.”
Mason wasn’t ready to talk about his nightmares. Bo knew the backstory. He was in Vientiane when Mason assassinated the general. They had never spoken of it, though.
“Listen, Bo,” he said, changing the subject. “We have a lot to go over. Before we do, though, I need your word that you and I will agree before we share any of it with your government. You’ll see why in a minute. Okay?”
“Oh shit. My government’s involved?”
“No. It’s just gonna cause a diplomatic row. My guys need to be ready to keep it from gettin’ out of hand.”
“This doesn’t sound good, Mason. Just tell me. I can keep it secret, at least for a bit.”
Mason told Bo that Joey had killed six young, blonde American girls, seven counting Mary Higgins. He started about two and a half years ago. Same MO in each case.
Except for Mary, the murders had been spread out by time and distance. He explained how each happened on the mainland but where travelers would catch a ferry or boat to an island. Each of the girls had been traveling alone. The killer had sex, apparently consensual, with each, then slashed their necks severing their carotid arteries.
Like Amanda and Mary, the motive was robbery. For each girl, he took all their valuables. The credit cards were then used in Penang and that he suspected that the traveler’s checks were, too. The passports had mostly been used out of Bangkok.
“This will be ugly if it goes public,” Bo said. “I agree that we should try to keep it quiet.”
“You got that right, bud. The good news is that we have a name and an old photo.”
“I have some news on Yusof Zaina,” Bo said. “As I said last night, there are twelve showing up in national records. Five have passports, but none of those match our guy. Seven have a driver’s license, but again none fits our guy.”
Bo then looked at Mason and got a devilish look in his eyes.
“What?” Mason asked.
“Late today, I got motor vehicle records,” Bo continued. “Five cars registered to people named Yusof Zaina, but they all match up to one of the driver’s licenses. But, there was one motorcycle registered four years ago to a Yusof Zaina. The address is in George Town. It doesn’t match any of the other addresses we have. I thought you and I could check it out in the morning.”
“Motorcycle would fit,” Mason said. “He stashes it near where he expects to make a hit. Then after he kills the girl, he gets back to the motorcycle, cranks that sucker up and makes a beeline for George Town. By the time anyone finds the girl’s body, he’s probably at least a couple hundred miles away.”
Mason took the last sip of his Jack Daniels and signaled the waiter for another.
“What’s happenin’ with the Mary Higgins case?” Mason asked.
Bo laid out the evidence.
“She graduated from Boston College earlier this year,” Bo said. “It looks like she hit the road a month or so later. Flew into Bangkok and used every day of her sixty-day tourist visa before crossing into Malaysia on the upper east coast. Worked her way down to Tioman, then headed up to Taman Negara. She then stopped briefly in KL, then came here on a bus the day before they found her body. I pieced most of this toge
ther after talking with her mother by phone this morning. Mary planned to take a year and go around the world.”
Bo said she had rented the single room at the Lum Fong that she was found in.
“The manager said she hung out with another young woman, a Kiwi named Samantha Watson,” Bo said. She was the one who asked the manager to open the door to Mary’s room when Mary didn’t show up for breakfast, as they had planned.”
Bo looked at his notes. Everything inside the room was the same as the Amanda Anderson case. He paused and looked at Mason. “My guess is that all the victims’ rooms were the same,” he said. The body was found naked on the bed with a deep slash across the front of the neck.
“Cause of death was blood loss from the wound,” Bo said. “No other injuries. Coroner puts the time of death between midnight and 4 a.m.”
“The coroner confirmed she had sex shortly before she died,” Bo continued. “Nothing to indicate it was forced. But our guy, Joey, left nothing behind. No semen on her or in her. None on the bed. We think he was wearing a rubber.”
Bo said the guests in the surrounding rooms had not yet checked out when she was found, so his team had a chance to interview them.
“The guy next door said he could hear them going at it about two in the morning,” Bo said.
“What did he hear?”
“The guy said it was just her moaning like she was really enjoying it. No sounds from the guy. He said he could hear the bed thumping a little against the wall, at least that’s what he thought it was. They were definitely doing the nasty.”
Mason asked if anyone of the front desk saw them come in.
“The desk isn’t staffed after ten o’clock,” Bo said. “If someone comes in after ten, they have to ring the bell to summon the night manager or be there at the same time as someone leaving.” No one remembered seeing them come in.
“When he kilt Amanda, I think he slipped out a back door,” Mason said.
“Probably same here, I think,” Bo said. “Mary’s room was close to the back stairs. Highly unlikely that anyone would see him leave that way.”
Bo said he personally had interviewed the friend, Samantha, yesterday. She had run into Mary briefly the evening of the murder. She and her boyfriend were walking past a restaurant on Chulia and Mary called to her. They went over and spoke with her briefly, then Samantha and Mary arranged to meet for breakfast.
Mary introduced the fellow she was having dinner with, but Samantha couldn’t recall his name. She said it was something like Jimmy or Johnny.”
“Or Joey.”
“Yeah. My thought, too. I asked her if it could have been Joey. She said maybe, but she wasn’t sure. She gave a decent description, though. Sounded like our guy.”
“When I got the photo you faxed, I went back to the hotel to show it to her,” Mason said, “but she had already checked out.”
Bo said they tried to find her, but they think she left Penang. “We’ve asked a contact at the New Zealand foreign office in KL to contact her family to have her contact me when they next hear from her,” he said. “Nothing yet, but it’s only been one day. I’d like to show her the photo.”
“Should we head to the George Town address tonight?” Mason asked.
“I don’t think so,” Bo said. “If he gets away at night, we’ll never find him and we will have tipped our hand. I think we should do it tomorrow and bring back-up just in case he’s there. I have a guy watching the place tonight. Had to get overtime authorized. I think we’re okay for tonight.”
Bo suggested that he swing by Mason’s hotel at eight in the morning to pick him up with a couple uniformed officers. Sounded good, Mason said.
Bo said goodnight, then added that he hoped Mason could get a full night’s sleep. Mason stayed to finish his drink. He was nervous about not moving on Joey’s apartment right away, but Bo had made a good point and the place was staked out. About ten minutes later, Mason walked back to the hotel, went up to his room and was sound asleep within minutes.
It happened again at about three in the morning. This time it was an old man, walking with a cane. There was a bright flash, then the old man’s body was crumpled in the street. Mason’s heart was racing, as was his mind. Was his brain going to dish up every innocent victim of his bomb blast? He didn’t even recall seeing any of these people. How was he seeing them now?
Were they even real? Did it matter, he asked himself? If they were figments of his imagination it didn’t change the fact that he had killed fifty-four innocent people that day. And they all had private stories. He might not have thought about their lives before, but now they were about all he could think of. One thing he knew for sure was that all fifty-four of those he killed that day had their own lives that had nothing to do with the general.
Yet, he killed them. Gripped by revenge, he had taken their lives along with General Tho’s without a moment’s thought of what it might all mean. One word came to mind: terrorist.
Day 14
The overnight ferry from Penang docked at Kuah, the only real town in Langkawi, a little after seven in the morning. Kuah wasn’t much to look at. No one would ever confuse it with Penang. Joey had called it undiscovered. As she looked at the old, weather-beaten buildings, she wondered why Joey had been so excited about this place.
“Don’t worry. We’re not staying here,” he told her. “We’re going to a smaller island south of here called Pulau Bumbon. I know a place there that rents very basic bungalows and serves great meals.”
To get there, Joey said, they need to find Omar among the boats near the ferry dock.
“Won’t be hard,” Joey said. “Look for a bright yellow boat with the word ‘Bumbon’ painted on the side.”
“There it is!” Jessica said, pointing to a boat about one hundred feet offshore.
“Omar!” Mason called out and waved to get the man’s attention. Omar waved back then moved the boat toward them, eventually running it up on the beach.
“Welcome, Yusof and lady,” Omar said, securing the boat on shore. “You go to Bisaam’s?”
Yep, Joey said, as Omar helped Jessica into the boat. Joey climbed in and sat next to her, then Omar pushed the boat back from the beach, turned it to face the sea, then jumped in himself.
The trip to the bungalows took about thirty minutes over calm seas. They circled about halfway around what appeared to be an uninhabited island when Omar steered the boat to the left toward the beach. Jessica could see, nestled in the trees, three bungalows and a small house next to an outdoor eating area and kitchen under a thatched roof. The setting was spectacular. A thick jungle appeared to begin a few short feet behind the buildings.
A Malaysian man walked toward the beach from the kitchen area. He was older than Joey, perhaps in his mid- to late-thirties.
“Yusof! Welcome my friend,” Bisaam called out.
“Bisaam, I couldn’t stay away,” Joey said as the two men shook hands and helped Jessica from the boat. “This is my friend, Jessica,” Joey continued as they walked toward the bungalows. “We need two bungalows for two nights. Is that possible?”
Bisaam stopped and faced Joey.
“I’m sorry my friend, but two of my three are taken.”
“Jessica and I are,” Joey paused, “friends, Bisaam. Perhaps there is a hammock for me?”
“It’s ok, Joey,” Jessica said. “We can share the bungalow.”
“Very good!” exclaimed Bisaam, smiling broadly at Jessica.
“Are you sure?” Joey asked Jessica. She looked at him, and said, “Yes,” then turned back to see Omar carrying their packs from the boat while a gentle breeze swept across her face. No turning back now, she thought. She was sure that her Southeast Asian adventure was going to get a punctuation mark tonight. It better, she thought as a small smile spread on her face.
The bungalow was the very definition of basic. It was an unpainted wooden structure elevated about three feet off the ground. A small porch with two chairs adorned the front of the
cabin looking out at the sea. Omar set their packs on the porch, then headed back to his boat. Jessica said, “Thank you, Omar,” and the man kindly nodded his head in response.
The bungalow’s one room was a tight eight feet by eight feet. In the middle against one wall was a double mattress on a platform. A mosquito net hung over it. A small wooden table sat next to the bed. A single light bulb hung at arm’s height on a wire in the middle of the room.
The bungalow had a small bathroom at the rear. Jammed in a space of about three feet wide behind the back wall was a hand sink, a toilet and a handheld shower. The back wall of the bathroom rose about four feet with just a screen extending the rest of the way to the roof.
“So, Jessica, this is rustic,” Joey said, “but that’s why I love it here.”
“Joey, this place is incredible. It’s so beautiful and,” she paused to think of the right word, “primitive.”
“Wait till evening when you start to hear the creatures in the jungle,” he said. “The cicadas and other insects go nuts. And the birds and the monkeys. Bisaam says there might be a tiger in there somewhere, but I don’t think anyone has ever seen one. It’s just a story he likes to tell.”
“Oh, God, tigers? You said it wouldn’t be dangerous.”
“No, no, no. I’ve been here a half dozen times. There is no tiger. Every time Bisaam tells the tiger story there is a twinkle in his eyes. He likes telling it. That’s all. You’re safe here.
“The biggest danger,” he continued, putting air quotes around the word danger, “is that you’ll catch a cold from the shower.
“There is no hot – or even warm – water. The water comes straight from a spring-fed stream Bisaam piped into a couple hundred feet back in the jungle. Brace yourself when you turn on the shower. It never warms up. In fact, it gets colder! You’ll get used to it, though.”
They dropped their packs on the bed. Joey suggested they walk the beach.
The beach was not wide but consisted of pure white sand. The surf was gentle and there was an ever-present light breeze. The jungle was just twenty to thirty feet to their left as they strode up the beach. She could hear the occasional sounds of what she took to be birds.
