Provincetown Follies, Bangkok Blues (Cape Island Mystery)

by Randall Peffer

  “How? Almost everything she tells me seems to have a backstory that she only lets out by accident, by offhand remarks. You know what I mean?”

  “Like her relationship with that motherfuckin’ Big Al?”

  The force of these words almost knocks him off his stool. He really wants to talk about the stalker Prem, and Bangkok. But okay, start with the victim.

  Chivas pours them both another glass of scotch.

  “I suppose she’s let you think Alby adored her. Treated her like royalty right up ‘til all the bad shit about Silver and the stolen DVDs, the weird Vietnamese knife? And everything else that went down in the day or two before the fire, right?”

  He nods. “Well, sort of. I can tell there is something off there. Something I don’t know.”

  “You bet your bippy. I swear to you on a collection of my favorite show tunes she didn’t kill him. But who could blame her if she did? Big Al Costelano was the worst of the bottom feeders in this burg. Good riddance to bad garbage, I say. That bastard tried to make a whore out of her. Did you know that?”

  “The police reports mention the escort service.”

  Chivas jumps off her barstool with the slap of her pumps on the hardwood.

  “Fuck the police! Pardon my French, dear. They have no idea what Alby did to her, how the Sisterhood worked. I bet you don’t know a thing about her trip to Montreal, do you? Ever heard of the Mile-High Club?”

  Every night she sees her lion’s face mooning at her through the spotlights and smoke at the Underground, looking like someone just ripped out his heart. And every time she sees those high cheeks and sad eyes, she feels tiny little fish swimming through her veins. More than once during the shows, she catches him looking at her, feels the fish scatter, misses beats, and—twice—a whole verse in her songs. The crowd groans.

  “We got big trouble, la,” says Delta in the dressing room after this happens about three nights in a row. “She make lala with rich boy. He screw every song right out her mind. What we do now?”

  “She big girl; all grown up,” says Brandy, like Tuki is not in the room to talk to … just for spitting on. “No more little princess. No song, no dance. Just cheap bar ho. Better get her good pimp and little lala room to do her business. Rich boy be gone like Saigon days when she no fresh.”

  She feels a storm exploding in her throat. “You have no idea!” she shouts. “He adores …”

  Then, before those nosy, old queens can see her tears, she is out the stage door into the alley, still dressed like Tina Turner in a silver mini and knee boots.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  The summer is in full heat this Tuesday after July Fourth weekend. Tuki is just starting to rake in some serious money at the Follies.

  She is chilling in her little bungalow in Truro, partying a bit with the gang that Alby and Ruby invite to Shangri-La on the weekends, having an occasional night of dinner and sex with the Great One. No pressure, no commitment. Just amazing dates. She has not yet figured out that she is Alby’s side dish. That Silver lives in the Glass House with him most of the time. That he has invested well over a quarter of a million in promoting Silver’s TV and film career in New York. He owns the Chelsea loft she lives in during the winter. And a lot of the money that pays the big bills comes from the Sisterhood, extortion, and a collection of other shady deals.

  Tonight she is expecting another romantic date after the show with Alby. Maybe something like the last one when he took her out overnight to watch whales on the motor yacht of a record producer from Long Island.

  The limo shows up for her at ten forty-five, after the other girls have gone from the Follies for the night. Which is cool. She is a little embarrassed about what she has gotten herself into with the Big Guy. And she is a little nervous because she does not want Nikki to see her borrowing a hot-date suit she finds among Nikki’s costumes at the Follies. Black, lace-trim crepe. A total mixed message to blow Alby’s mind with a power jacket over a slip dress. She goes with tiny gold hoops in the ears, a subtle touch of white shadow, liner. Cinnamon on the lips and nails. Her hair is pulled back in a simple silver barrette. Then she takes a deep breath and grabs four condoms from Nikki’s makeup bag.

  The black limo driver named Justin gives her a twice over, whistles, and says, “Go, girl.”

  So when he opens the door, her body is all perky, tingly feeling. She sees a dark figure waiting inside with a dozen black roses in his hand.

  But the flower boy is not Alby. He is a guy from Long Island. Alby’s friend. A guy who everyone calls Joey. He is telling her that something came up at the very last minute. Alby had to leave for Boston.

  “He wanted to tell you himself how sorry he is … but you were on the stage when he had to leave. He did not want you to be disappointed, so he asked me to show you a very special evening.”

  She has been set up. She knows it. The Sisterhood is finally sinking its claws into her. She feels a fool, a soh phehnii—a complete ho. All she wants to do is cry because who else can she blame but herself?

  She knows what Alby expects. Here comes payback time. An escort job. She played, now she pays. But this tubby little record producer does not worry her. She has seen him in action on the yacht. He just wants to show off his money, have a pretty face laugh at his jokes and smile into his eyes.

  She takes a deep breath, then busts a smile, and says the night is young. She feels like dancing. No emotion here. She is a grown-up girl. Tonight is strictly business. Like maybe it is time for the Great One to get a new perspective on who’s zooming who?

  He was thinking Montreal, he says. The jet is ready to go.

  She tries to act unimpressed, says she is very hungry. Can they pick up dinner to go? Chilled lobster tails.

  So that is how it is. Justin makes a phone call, they stop by the Lobster Pot, then head off to the airport with seafood takeout.

  She knows that she is out of her league here. The only airplane she has been on before tonight was the China Airlines 747 that took her from Bangkok to New York more than five years ago. So she is surprised by the little rocket that they climb aboard at the airport. The plane is so small you have to bend over to walk around. And there is nowhere to go anyway. They sit on a couch at the back of the cabin. Everything you need—a fridge, a table, a microwave, CD player, and TV/DVD player—surrounds them. It is like they are in just another limo with the pilot in his own place up front.

  After the pilot closes and locks the cabin door, Joey asks her if she is afraid of flying.

  She rolls here eyes. Like dream on. She flies every night onstage.

  The next thing she knows, she is strapped in just to the right of the pilot with her own set of controls, earphones, and a mike on her head like Janet Jackson in one of her dance numbers. The cockpit is dark and glowing with little green dials, and they are rolling out to the runway. She sees the runway lights line up in front of the plane. The pilot asks if she is ready. A second later she is pinned pack in her seat staring at the stars.

  When things calm down, she goes back to the couch. They feast at a little table all laid out with linen and silver and crystal goblets. Perrier and a pitcher of daiquiris sit in the center. The lights are dialed down low and Natalie Cole is on the stereo, singing about love on her mind.

  She decides that under the circumstances, a little alcohol may not hurt, so—ever so cautiously—she sips two or three rum and lime concoctions while working her way through the lobster tail and asparagus tips. Now, Joey is starting to look a little studly with his dinner jacket thrown aside, bow tie hanging lose around his collar, and some funky, red suspenders curving around his belly. It crosses her mind that maybe she should give the folks back in P-town something to talk about.

  He must be thinking the same thing, because they are only a few minutes into watching a Tina Turner video before his tongue is in her mouth. His hands are all over her breasts, and he is whispering about something called the Mile-High Club.

  She tells him to shut up and kiss
her. Joey comes through in spades with a serpent’s tongue and musky cologne.

  Things are moving along nicely until a little bell goes off somewhere in the cabin.

  “What is that?”

  “Nothing to worry about, love,” he whispers. “Just the signal that we will be landing in Montreal in about twenty minutes.” They get down to more face.

  But suddenly, without any warning, he just unzips his fly, pulls out his big red chaang. Pushes her head toward his lap.

  What makes him think she wants any part of this scene? Not her hands, nor her mouth, have ventured anywhere close to his private parts. This ride in the dark is only about giving her body a little lobster, her weekly quota of face, and maybe causing a little envy with Alby.

  “Do me,” she hears his voice say. And it seems far away.

  She is not believing this.

  “I’m fucking bursting. Do me.”

  Oral sex is the stock in trade of drag queens for some pretty obvious reasons. Heading south on a guy is hardly a new adventure. But at the moment the whole concept makes her sick to her stomach.

  She tries to pull away. But she cannot move.

  His pudgy hands pinch her neck and shoulder. He presses her face toward his lap, holds her eye to eye with the elephant.

  “Do me, bitch.”

  “Please, no!”

  She tries to jab her left elbow into his ribs. He grunts, lets go. For a second her head is up and free. She catches a glimpse of moonshine on the clouds through the window.

  But an instant later he has her in a headlock, ramming her face toward his open pants again.

  “Do me, for fuck’s sake. Give me a million-dollar blow job to remember.”

  Now she is calling herself ten ways a stupid little Patpong street sweeper because she drank his drinks and ignored the no-deep-kissing rule and generally let him think the wrong thing. But you know what? She did not ask for this. And no means “N-O.”

  Something is catching fire behind her eyes, and the next thing she knows, she is imagining herself saying, “Here is your million-dollar blow job, la—” right before she bites him and he screams for the love of Buddha.

  But just as she is picturing blood spurting out of him like a fire in his crotch, she feels his breath against her ear.

  “Don’t let this get ugly. You know I really like you. Be a good girl now. Do me like you do Alby … or I’ll crush you like a bug. Just think of this as a business obligation. Something we do to please the boss. And since you joined the Sisterhood, that boss would be me. Because Alby owes me a bundle. So I give the goddamn orders now. Hear?!”

  There is a click as he racks a pistol. When she opens her eyes, she is looking at his prick and a 9mm side-by-side in his hand … so close they both are out of focus.

  “I’m sure you know what to do next,” he says. “And when you finish, we are going dancing in Montreal to celebrate our initiation into the Mile-High Club.”

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  He feels angry and shaky when he gets home. It is after dark in Chatham. There is a rotten taste in his mouth that he blames on the shots of scotch at the Tango. Now he rings Varat Samset with a mission fixed in his mind. While Samset fires out a barrage of Thai on the other end of the line, Michael is promising himself that he is going to get to the bottom of this case sooner rather than later. And he is not going to take any more shit from anybody. Tuki? God! A flower in the wasteland. She is surrounded by monsters.

  “So you finally called back, counselor!” Samset is stealing the power already. “Feeling a little lost in a swamp with that luk sod shemale client of yours, are you?”

  Michael cannot lie. He could use a little help here.

  “Anybody start shooting, yet?”

  “Jesus, no. You’re kidding, right?”

  The voice from Bangkok grunts. “I don’t have time to make a joke, Mr. Decastro. I think you are dealing with a very explosive situation. Can you not see your client is very fragile? Very angry?”

  “Not really. She seems a little giddy, a little in denial about her legal problems sometimes. Secretive. But she smiles a lot and—”

  Another grunt. “You do not understand our culture in Southeast Asia, counselor. The more people in Thailand smile and make light of things, the more nervous we are. You understand that? A smile for us is not like a smile for you Americans. A smile is not always happy or content or delighted. Many times we smile when things are tearing us apart.”

  Damn. And he thought the Portuguese had cultural peculiarities. Like their fascination with saudade, that paralyzing form of nostalgia and regret that seeps from his grandmother’s fado music.

  “So what is tearing my client apart besides the possibility of spending the rest of her life behind bars for arson and murder?”

  “Guilt and shame. We do not do well with these emotions.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “She obviously hasn’t told you why she left Thailand.”

  “I’m reading between the lines. Something went wrong between her and this Prem guy?”

  “That’s putting it mildly, my American friend. He had a very sick and abusive relationship with your client. Then he dumped her. She raised what you call holy hell. Caused great embarrassment to a very important family in our country. Lot of problems for my office.”

  He is starting to get the picture. “Prem’s family. She caused some kind of scandal. They put the screws on you to cover it up, is that what happened?”

  “You are saying this, not me.”

  “What exactly did she do?”

  “That’s not for me to say. We do not make our suspicions public. Maybe you better ask Tuki. Your client left the country before we could find her, talk.”

  “So this Prem guy has come here to get even? After all these years?”

  “That’s what we think.”

  “He is stalking her because he’s still in love with her, obsessed?”

  “That too. It is a dangerous combination isn’t it? Love, obsession, anger, shame?”

  This does not sound like the gentle, sad, cowardly lion Tuki has been talking about. “How do you know he’s dangerous?”

  Samset grunts again. Seems to wish this American would just trust him.

  “What aren’t you telling me, detective?”

  Another grunt.

  “I am not at liberty to speak. Just accept what I am saying. We believe Kittikatchorn is in a dangerous way. Does everything have to be spelled out for you Americans? Just get your client back behind bars where she belongs before all hell breaks loose.”

  “Why? Are you trying to prevent another scandal? Are you feeling the heat from his family?” He does not say, “The ex-admiral, the pharmaceutical czar.”

  “I am trying to prevent more deaths.”

  “What?”

  “Off the record. I am speaking off the record now, Mr. Decastro. You understand me?”

  “Go ahead. Trust me.”

  “Prem Kittikatchorn’s wife and children have been missing for a month. We think they are dead. We think he killed them and now he is coming after your client. And anybody who gets in his way. Okay, counselor? He left a note. For his mother. About his love for the luk sod, his hate for her, hate for himself. For the shame he has brought on himself and his family. His anger for being rejected for what he is, a man who loves the shemales. Does this get your attention?” Michael feels his stomach drop. “Cristo Salvador!”

  “Beg your pardon?”

  “Nothing. What do I do?”

  “I told you. Get your client back in jail where she belongs. Call me if you see Kittikatchorn. Duck if someone starts shooting. I would say you are in the line of fi—”

  “I can’t do that. I’ve got an obligation to …”

  A sigh from Bangkok. “Then you are on your own. I have done my job. It is your neck, after all.”

  He does not remember who hangs up first.

  Prem is waiting outside the club in his limo … just as he has b
een every night. Just to see her one more time. He cannot get the smell of her perfume out of his nostrils. His eyes say he is helpless. He loves her. He will be her devoted admirer and protector. Forever.

  When he sees her tears, he is out of the car, holding her. His long arms wrap around her like a soldier shielding her. “What happened?”

  She cannot answer. She does not know how to explain. She just cries.

  Finally, she says she thinks maybe she needs to find a place to stay for a while. Brandy and Delta have told her that she is on her own if she persists with this liaison.

  Not a problem, he says. But how about they start with a late dinner at the Oriental?

  “I cannot wear these clothes.”

  “I know a little dress shop.”

  She kisses him on the mouth. Very long and very hard. She is telling him that maybe, yes, at this moment, she is falling in love with him.

  This is the night she gets her first real string of pearls. This is also the night they make love to songs from the Beach Boys, drink his bottle of rice whiskey … and move her into the River House. Prem speaks softly to her in Thai. He calls her his butterfly, his little Daughter of the Dark. She tells him of the silver beauty of his skin in the moonlight. And she calls him her River Lion, before he falls asleep in the big hammock with his head on her right breast.

  TWENTY-NINE

  It is almost midnight when she leaves the Follies. Another Friday of Mardi Gras in the Magic Queendom. Commercial Street is packed. But here in the alley, no one is around. It is another world, reeking of charred wood, cat piss, and beer puke. She is feeling, more than hearing, the heavy thump of bass speakers pulsing from the clubs when he steps out of the shadows.

  “I just talked to Varat Samset.”

  She jumps, is not expecting to see him. “Who?”

  “The detective from Bangkok. He says you’re in danger. He says your old friend Prem has come here to kill you.”