The Feng Shui Detective's Casebook

by Nury Vittachi

  Jackie Lavender leaned back in her chair, still supremely calm and confident, despite his nervous, hostile manner. ‘Okay, you tell me, what is it you’re after? Why are you here? It obviously isn’t my body.’

  Wong wasn’t sure what she was talking about. He thought for a moment before replying. ‘I have a feeling about your training course. Sometimes people die from training too much. I am a bit worried, that’s all.’

  She looked at him. ‘Did your compass tell you I was at risk? How did you work out that I was in danger?’

  Again, he found himself baffled as to how to reply. He didn’t want to go into detail about the deaths at the other health clubs. The chances were that this had no connection. He decided to take the simplest option. ‘Yes, my compass needle point at you. It show me you have danger. Need to check your training program.’

  She rose to her feet. ‘Come. I’ll show you.’

  She led him down a white corridor to an office containing an untidy desk and two computers. ‘Ashanti’s not here, but I’m sure she won’t mind. Ashanti’s my personal trainer.’

  ‘Is this computer link —’

  He stopped as a small, wiry young woman with brown skin stepped into the room.

  Jackie Lavender gave a small cry of pleasure and kissed her on both cheeks. ‘Hello dear,’ she said. ‘I want you to meet Mr Wong, a friend of mine. He’s very interested in my training regime. Mr Wong, this is Ashanti Carle, my trainer, and managing partner of the Stretch Yoga Centre.’

  Ashanti Carle gave Wong just enough of a smile to be minimally polite, but no more. ‘Can I help you, Mr Wong? What is it exactly that you need to know?’

  ‘Ah. Er,’ Wong stammered. ‘I, er, want to know what is the doctor connection for your health programme.’

  ‘Are you a salesman from some sort of consultancy?’

  ‘No, no, nothing like that. I am feng shui master. I am interested in health of Mrs Jackie Lavender.’

  ‘Oh. Well, I am also interested in her health, and since I am paid a considerable sum of money to improve it, I hope you don’t mind if I get on with that job.’

  ‘Yes, yes, of course.’

  ‘So goodbye, nice to have met you.’ Ashanti Carle spoke dismissively.

  ‘Ah. Goodbye, yes, goodbye.’ Wong did not move. ‘Just one question. You use group called Executive Doctors on Call?’

  ‘No, we don’t,’ said Ashanti. ‘We have our own doctor, retained by our group. Goodbye.’

  The personal trainer slipped her arm into Jackie Lavender’s and whisked her to the aerobics room where something called Hi Lo & Sculpt was about to begin. He turned away but managed to catch Ashanti’s comment to Mrs Lavender.

  ‘He’s either after your body, or Dr Brackish’s consultancy contract. Either way, he gives me a bad feeling.’

  ‘I think he’s rather cute,’ Jackie replied.

  Wong froze. Where had he heard that name before? He recalled the name being spoken with a French accent. Dominique Alegre must have mentioned it. He was somehow connected with Executive Doctors on Call. That meant that all the same factors were in place: a young trainer, an aging client, an over-strenuous programme, a connection with Executive Doctors on Call—it might just be all coincidence. Or perhaps it wasn’t—in which case, Mrs Lavender’s life was in danger.

  The feng shui master turned around and marched into the gymnasium. ‘Ms Jackie Lavender,’ he said. ‘I think you should not to do this program. Maybe not safe.’

  Ashanti Carle, tiny though she was, tensed her muscles and suddenly looked very dangerous indeed. She grabbed Wong, spun him round and picked him off the floor with pincer-like grips on his upper arms. She marched with him to the entrance of the room. ‘I’ve had quite enough of you, Mr Wong. I know exactly what you’re after. Kindly don’t darken our doorstep again.’

  She carried him protesting all the way to the front door of the Stretch Yoga Centre and unceremoniously heaved him outside. He landed heavily on the pavement.

  She theatrically dusted her hands. ‘Goodbye and good riddance.’

  It was very bad feng shui to sit in the dust, so Wong quickly picked himself up and brushed himself down. His bony bottom hurt. Then he sneaked around to the front of the building and peered through the window.

  He saw Jackie Lavender on a treadmill. She was running very fast, and her face was bright red. Even from this distance, he could see a throbbing vein standing out from her left temple.

  Ashanti Carle was watching the woman run with her lips down-turned and a puzzled look on her face.

  Wong wanted to march in and turn the machine off. But he was frankly terrified that if he as much as showed his face near the door again, the tiny woman would grab him and beat him to a pulp.

  Jimmy and Joyce were back in Bev’s Snags and Sarnies.

  They were sipping milkshakes.

  Joyce was just about to make an attempt at a joint period of silence. This was a relationship test she learned about from her greatly accomplished man-killing older sister, who said that a friendship only became a true friendship when the two people involved could be silent for one hundred and twenty seconds together without feeling awkward.

  She and Jimmy had now had several hours of small talk if you counted lunch yesterday, dinner last night, and now this mid-morning meeting. But she wasn’t sure that they were ready to try out a two-minute silence yet.

  And even if they were, her mouth wouldn’t let them—it kept opening and filling up the slightest gaps in the conversation. And since Jimmy was not a great conversationalist, there were lots of pauses to fill.

  They had both stopped talking to slurp from their striped straws, and it had become too quiet. Joyce said to herself: I should just let this silence remain, see what happens.

  ‘So what’s your favourite food?’ asked Joyce’s mouth, taking the decision into its own hands.

  Jimmy thought about this. ‘I don’t know. I don’t really like food. It’s bad for you.’

  ‘Yeah! You are so right! It has calories.’

  ‘Yeah. Bad for your health.’

  ‘Yeah. I hate food too! It’s so like, calorific.’

  Jimmy tried to nod his head and slurp at the same time, which resulted in the straw slipping from his mouth and a dribble of chocolate milkshake snaking down his chin. ‘Oops. Ha ha.’

  A similar fake laugh echoed out of Joyce’s mouth, but she misjudged it, and ended up with some strawberry milk going down the wrong way. She had a coughing fit. It took a few seconds for them both to recover.

  As another silence threatened to descend, Joyce’s mouth again took the initiative, racing to plug the gap.

  ‘What are you doing for lunch today?’

  ‘I dunno. What are you doing for lunch?’

  ‘I dunno! Fancy something to eat? Any good places round here?’

  ‘Yeah, loads. There’s a brilliant burger place and there’s Hot Dawg which is a hot dog place, and there’s a totally amazing kebab place which does these totally amazing turtle wraps or whatever it is.’

  ‘Tortilla wraps.’

  ‘Yeah, and them.’

  ‘I love tortilla wraps!’

  ‘Yeah, me too.’

  Jimmy looked up and gazed into Joyce’s eyes. ‘You know, something Joyce?’

  ‘Yes, Jimmy?’ she said, her voice jumping an octave and turning breathy.

  He gradually leaned towards her. ‘I feel like I’ve known you all my life.’

  ‘Yeah, me too! Like ages and ages!’ She leaned towards him.

  ‘Yet if you think about it, we only met yesterday.’

  ‘Yeah, just a few hours ago!’

  ‘It’s just been like minutes only.’

  ‘Yeah, and it’s flown by!’ said Joyce, moving her face closer to his. She didn’t know whether to gaze at his eyes, his lips or that gorgeous chin, so she scanned them all in turn. ‘It’s all flown by in like a few seconds!’

  ‘Yeah. Like ten seconds or something. Time flies when you’re having
fun.’

  ‘Yeah.’ She noticed that he was looking at her lips.

  She focused on his lips.

  They moved closer together.

  That was when Wong interrupted them. ‘Come! Quick-quick. Plenty urgent work.’ The feng shui master, who had appeared from nowhere, painfully tapped her shoulder with his index finger. ‘Quick. I think problem is happening again. Come, come!’

  ‘It’s Saturday,’ complained Joyce, turning to glare at her boss. ‘I’m having a day off. Tell me later.’

  ‘No,’ said Wong. ‘Need help now.’

  ‘Trust your boss to lob in just then.’ Jimmy looked up at him. ‘What’s the sweat, guv?’

  ‘Some trainer in Stretch Yoga. She is following instructions from Dr Brackish. Same doctor wrote your special bulletin. Same trick. Maybe even might kill Lavender, Jackie, I think. Trainer won’t let me in. You must go stop her. Ms Carle will listen to you. You are also one of them.’

  ‘What?’ Jimmy said. ‘What on earth is he going on about?’

  ‘Dunno,’ said Joyce. ‘I’ll ask him. What are you saying, CF?’

  ‘Come.’

  He beckoned them with his hands.

  Joyce reluctantly started to move. She reached for her purse. ‘I’ll pay.’

  ‘No, I’ll pay,’ said Jimmy.

  ‘No, you’re unemployed. I’ll pay.’

  Wong turned around and thumped a twenty-dollar note onto the table. ‘Quick. Must go now.’

  ‘Cheese,’ said Joyce, astonished. ‘This must be really important.’

  At two o’clock that afternoon, a thin man in an ostrich-leather coat hurried into the ground floor entrance of Stretch Yoga.

  Although there was a ‘Closed’ sign on the door, Ashanti Carle stood waiting in the reception to let him in.

  ‘Thank you so much for coming, Doctor. It looks really bad.’

  ‘Have you called an ambulance?’ Doctor Frankie Brackish asked.

  ‘I just did. They should be here in five minutes. But I think it’s too late.’

  ‘Where’s the bod—the patient?’

  ‘Still in the gym,’ said Ashanti, wiping her eyes and sniffing. ‘I followed the special bulletin for Mrs Lavender on your database really, really carefully. But it seemed to be too much for her —’

  Doctor Brackish marched sternly down the corridor. ‘I hope you haven’t been foolish. Jackie Lavender is not a young woman. She has a heart condition. It would be madness to overdo the exercise.’

  He opened the gym doors and stepped into the cool, sprung-floored room. The lights were off and the curtains were shut.

  ‘Now,’ said a voice he thought he knew.

  Switches were flicked and the room was suddenly ablaze with light.

  ‘Surprise,’ said half a dozen voices.

  Doctor Brackish, blinking, stared at the individuals who stepped out from their hiding places behind the gym equipment. There was Jimmy Wegner, whose voice he had just heard. And Dominique Alegre, a client from the Millennium Health Centre. And Kees Luis de Boer, general manager of The Players. And Stan Eknath, another fitness trainer whose career he had ruined. And his patient Jackie Lavender—not collapsed on a treadmill as alleged but looking perfectly fit and smiling. And two other people: a teenage girl and an old Chinese man.

  Ashanti Carle came up behind him. ‘Sorry, Doctor Brackish, but it’s over. The game is up, as they say in the cop shows.’

  ‘What—what—what are you talking about?’ he stuttered. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘We compared notes, that’s what. Stan and Jimmy and me. You added bulletins onto the instructions on your website, sent us heart patients and tried to make us work them to death. Mr Wong says he is going to ask the police to examine the wills of patients of yours who have died. I don’t know exactly what you’re up to, but I know you’ve been using us as saps.’

  ‘I did no such thing. The notes on my database recommend very mild exercise. Check it and see.’

  ‘I bet they do. I bet they do now,’ said Jimmy. ‘But you add special individual bulletins and delete them, don’t you? You tried to make Ashanti kill Jackie—and as soon as you got the call from her that her client had collapsed, you deleted the individual bulletin in the database, didn’t you? Removed the work-her-to-death stuff, so that all that was left was a mild list of exercises.’

  ‘You can’t prove any of this.’

  Jimmy held up some sheets of paper. ‘We printed the bulletin. And we have witnesses to everything.’

  ‘You couldn’t have. You’re lying. My bulletins are in a graphic file format. You can’t print them out. They would come out blank.’

  Jimmy gestured at Joyce with his hand. ‘We got some expert help.’

  Joyce blushed. ‘I wouldn’t call myself an expert. But I can find and install shareware and I can reverse fonts and I can do screen dumps and all that sort of thing. It was really easy, anyone could do it.’

  ‘Bugger,’ said Doctor Brackish. He turned around and faced Jimmy Wegner.

  ‘I’ll fight you in court. You haven’t a chance.’

  Jimmy turned to Stan. ‘Hear that? He wants a fight.’

  Stan grinned. ‘A fight? Bloody fantastic idea.’

  The dark-skinned trainer peeled off his shirt in one easy movement, revealing a wiry torso with muscles rippling like a panther’s.

  ‘Let me help,’ said Jimmy. He pulled his shirt over his head, to reveal his equally impressive bodybuilder’s physique.

  Joyce’s eyes bulged, her jaw dropped open and her tongue slipped out. ‘I think I’m going to faint!’ she whimpered.

  3 The cars that

  flew away

  The King of Qi was having trouble governing, and needed some help.

  So he called the Governor of Xue Di. The Governor of Xue Di was a tough man whose name was Meng Changjun.

  The King of Qi said: ‘I will give you a post in my government.’

  So Governor Meng Changjun moved to the Kingdom of Qi.

  The time came for tax to be collected in Xue Di. (Meng Changjun remained Governor of Xue Di.) He called his servant, Feng Yuan.

  Governor Meng said: ‘Go back to Xue Di. Collect the taxes for me.’

  Feng Yuan said: ‘Shall I bring the money back here?’

  Meng Changjun said: ‘No. Buy something with the money.’

  Feng Yuan said: ‘What shall I buy?’

  Meng Changjun said: ‘You know what I have. Buy something I do not have.’

  So the servant looked all around Meng Changjun’s house in the capital of Qi.

  Then he travelled in a chariot to the district of Xue Di.

  Later he came back to the Kingdom of Qi.

  Meng Changjun said: ‘What did you buy with the money?’

  Feng Yuan said: ‘I looked in your house. You have gold and silver. You have wine and food. You have women and heirs. I bought something you did not have.’

  Meng Changjun said: ‘What is it I do not have?’

  Feng Yuan said: ‘The love of your people.’

  Meng Changjun said: ‘How you can buy love?’

  Feng Yuan said: ‘I told the people of Xue Di that you were cancelling their debts. This will help them to have love for you.’

  Meng Changjun was very angry. He said: ‘You have done a bad thing. You have lost my money.’

  But later the King of Qi said to Governor Meng Changjun: ‘I do not need you any more. You can go home now.’

  Meng Changjun went home. He was still angry with his servant. He reached Xue Di.

  He found all the Xue Di people lined up on the street to greet him. They all loved him. They cheered. They sang his name.

  He was happy. He turned to his servant. He said: ‘The servant has taught the master.’

  Blade of Grass, simple minds think earthly treasure only is valuable. Wise men know that treasure of the spirit is harder to find and far more valuable. The younger the age you realise this, the sooner you are born.

  From ‘Some Glean
ings of Oriental Wisdom’

  by CF Wong, part 22.

  Wong read through the chapter he had just written and pondered. The story of the wise servant Feng Yuan reminded him of a related tale, and he was feeling creative. Perhaps he could write another chapter this morning—or even two? It was 10 am and he didn’t have any appointments until a reading of a new Szechuan restaurant at 1 pm. It appeared that neither Mr Pun nor any of his board members was in need of his services today.

  He flipped to a fresh page of his journal to begin writing again, but then noticed a movement from the corner of his eye. His secretary Winnie Lim had adopted a curious posture. She was sitting up straight behind her desk with her arms spread out in front of her. Her hands, palms down, were stretched out flat with the fingers splayed. She looked as if she were performing some sort of spell.

  ‘What?’ he inquired.

  ‘Drying nails. Two colour holographic blend. Mus’ keep fingers horizontal for ten minute.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘You answer phone.’

  ‘Okay okay.’

  Joyce looked up from the magazine she was reading. ‘No probs. I’ll answer the phone. He’s the big boss. He shouldn’t have to answer his own phone. People’ll diss him. I can do all that secretary stuff, easy.’ The young woman beamed a 100-kilowatt smile at her boss and yanked the phone off his desk on to her own.

  Wong did not return the smile. Instead, he gave her a malevolent glare.

  Joyce was in disgrace and he wanted her to know it.

  She had brought a group of friends into the office the previous night. They had apparently missed the 7:30 showing of a movie and she had decided to kill some time by giving them a tour of her workplace.

  As a result, Wong arrived at the office at eight the next morning to find that it stank of stale beer and was littered with small polystyrene boxes from the hamburger store. But worst of all, there was writing on the wall—a Chinese character drawn badly in blood—a shocking sight, and extremely negative feng shui. After he had got over his fright, he had become puzzled. His knowledge of Chinese characters was encyclopedic, but he was unable to precisely identify the one on the wall, and had wasted half an hour going through his old stroke-order dictionaries to try to locate it.