The Thai Dragon

by Lilburne, Guy

  Chapter 16 Breaking the silence.

  Danny took his coffee out onto the balcony and smoked another cigarette. There were two people down in the pool. That was the first time he had actually seen anyone in the swimming pool and it was only 8:30am.

  There had been no question of Danny and Ying staying overnight in Bangkok again. After they left the British Embassy they took the sky train to Soi Cowboy and had something to eat before making their way back to the airport, but they hardly spoke. It just seemed difficult for either of them to bring up the topic that they both wanted to talk about, so they didn’t speak at all. Danny avoided even looking at Ying and it wasn’t until she fell asleep on the flight back to Phuket that he could risk looking at her without her catching him. He looked as closely as he could. She looked amazing; her skin was smooth like porcelain. She had never shaved in her life. Her features were delicate and she wore hardly any makeup. Danny wondered if she had lied to him and asked himself ‘why would she do that’? She must be a woman. He watched her breasts rise and fall with her deep breaths as she drifted deeper into sleep. Through the gap in her blouse he could see the curve and the swell of her breast. He looked away shaking his head and whispering to himself.

  “Holy Jesus Mother of God!” He was none the wiser.

  Ying was inside the apartment making herself spicy pork and noodle soup for breakfast. She had offered to make some for Danny, but he preferred having a coffee and a cigarette for breakfast. It had rained for hours during the night, but now it was bright and sunny and it was a new day.

  Danny went back inside the apartment and started examining the mobile phone and the laptop. He was making notes in his KIV book and on the white board. Ying wanted to ask what he was finding out about Sarah from the laptop and mobile phone, but she couldn’t find the moment. Danny didn’t include her as he looked at the contact names list on the mobile phone.

  “What would you like me to do today?” Ying finally asked.

  “Come here and look at this.”

  Ying beamed a smile and sat down next to Danny.

  “What am I looking at?”

  “We need to cross reference the names on this phone against the names on these photos on the laptop. Well, as best we can. Some of the photos haven’t got names and some of the names on the mobile are nicknames.”

  “Then what will we do?”

  “Then we will trace these people and find out who they are and what do they know about Sarah Appleby. Some of them stick out like a sore thumb. This one ‘Brad’ was on the recent call list and look in the history. There was regular contact and he is also on the laptop photos. Look, lots of them. He is obviously a regular boyfriend.”

  Ying looked at the photos on the laptop of Sarah Appleby naked in lots of sexual positions with Brad. All of the photos on the laptop were naked sex photos except one, which was a nice photo of Sarah; a close up of her smiling face looking at the camera with her head slightly turned. She had pretty eyes and she looked happy in this photo. It looked like it had been taken in one of the beach bars along the Beach Road in Patong.

  “Can I print this photo Danny?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “I just like it. You wrote on the white board ‘Who is Sarah Appleby?’ I think she is the girl in this photo. I want to stick it up on the white board.”

  “Yes, sure. Knock yourself out.”

  The photo was printed and Ying stuck it up on the big white board. She was right, it was a nice photo and now they had Sarah Appleby looking at them and smiling.

  “This name was the last person she called on her mobile” said Danny.

  “What name?” asked Ying

  “‘Boots’. He was obviously her drug dealer.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Well, because he was the last person she called on the Tuesday evening and 20 minutes later he called her back. They must have been arranging to meet and then there were all the drugs found in the apartment. She had just been supplied, but the real clue is in the name. ‘Boots’ as in ‘Boots the Chemist’”

  Ying didn’t get it, Danny shrugged his shoulders.

  “Maybe it’s an English humour thing. And look in the call history. There is only ever contact between Sarah and Boots on Tuesdays. He was her dealer alright.”

  “So we have Brad the boyfriend and Boots the dealer.”

  They spent the rest of the day listing the names and contact numbers from the mobile phone and, where possible, cross referencing them with the names tagged to the photos on the computer. But there were a lot more photos on the computer then there were names on the phone. It looked like Sarah had captured her whole sexual history on camera and she had been with a lot of men. Was she the sex slave or the mistress and why did she photograph it all? As they examined and re-checked the two exhibits, Danny kept writing names and numbers on the white board. It seemed to Ying that they suddenly had leads to work on, a lot of leads. And at least, Danny was talking to her now and there was eye contact again.

  Chapter 17 Brad.

  Brad was sleeping, laid out on his boat, when the mobile rang and disturbed his dream. He jumped up and answered, trying to sound as awake as possible; this could be new business.

  “G’day. Brads Boats. What can I do you for?” This was how he always answered the phone when he didn’t recognize the number calling.

  “How yer doing, Brad is that yerself I’m talking to?”

  “Yeh, mate. Brad speaking.”

  “I’m Detective Sergeant O’Brien, I’d like to talk to you about Sarah Appleby. Can we meet you somewhere?”

  “Sure. I was wondering when you guys were going to catch up with me, but I wasn’t expecting a Brit.”

  “I’m not a Brit. I’m feckin Irish.”

  “Where do you want to meet? I’m down on the beach at the moment in my boat.”

  “Is there a bar or somewhere where we can meet up in about an hour?”

  “Sure. I’ll meet you at ‘Blackie’s Monkey Bar’”

  “And where’s that now?”

  “It’s in Soi Dongtan, about 100 metres further along the Beach Road from Bangla Road. You can’t miss it.”

  “We’ll find it. See you in an hour.” Danny closed the phone.

  It had been raining on and off all morning, but for the moment at least, the sky was clear and blue and, as always, it was humid and hot. Ying knew a parking place near the top end of Bangla Road and suggested parking there and walking down Bangla Road to make the meeting. Danny agreed, but soon regretted it, as the walk wearing his tatty suit in the intense heat made him sweat so much. He wiped the sweat from his face with his hand and took his suit jacket off. He had never really seen the streets of Patong in the daytime. Well, only flashing past in a car, but now walking along he got more of a feel for them. They were busy even at this time of day; with food sellers cooking food on the back of converted motorbikes and teams of pretty girls, all dressed elegantly in the same coloured long Thai dresses, sitting patiently outside the massage parlours, fanning themselves and calling out “Hello, massage please.”

  In front of him was a mass of boards; shop, bar and business signs. All sizes, shapes and colours, some familiar like Kodak and Subway. Above the signs and criss-crossing the roads was a massed tangle of black electric cables; some ending in uncovered electric boxes halfway up lampposts that flashed and sparked. Girls rode past, two or three on motorbikes. A Nissan pickup truck was stacked high with big plastic bags of ice, the two delivery men working against time to deliver before it all melted completely. Another pickup was collecting empty beer bottles from the bars and yet another one was delivering new ones. There were tourists shopping, locals going about their business and street vendors eking out a living as best they could, but always with time to smile and wai to the farang in the suit.

  Yin
g knew where Soi Dongtan was. It was a tiny street with a small cluster of bars, but at least it was shaded from the direct sun, although Danny still put on his sun glasses as he ordered a Jack Daniels and coke, a beer, and an orange juice for Ying.

  Brad was dead on time. There were a few old guys sitting around the bars with young Thai girls wrapped around them, but he couldn’t miss the two smartly dressed detectives sitting in ‘Blackie’s Monkey Bar’. Everyone else was wearing flip flops and shorts. Danny took off his glasses as the big Aussie approached them.

  “G’day. I’m Brad.”

  “Hello Brad. Please sit down, won’t ya” said Danny. Ying just smiled and Brad smiled back at the pretty Thai detective.

  “Will you have a drink, Brad?”

  “Yeh mate. I’ll drink a beer with you. Cheers.”

  The young bar girl came over and took the order. Danny looked Brad up and down. He was obviously a bit of a body builder, tanned, with a heavy gold chain and bracelet. The tattoo of the Australian flag on his right shoulder and the boxing kangaroo on his left calf looked cheap and tacky, and looked like cartoon drawings compared to the artful masterpiece that he had seen on Ying.

  “Oh! Your checking out my tats. Good, aren’t they?”

  Danny winced.

  “I’ve seen better Brad.”

  “Oh!…..Right.” Brad’s beer arrived and he chugged down half the bottle in one go and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “Well, you did call me a feckin Brit, so we are even now” laughed Danny.

  “Oh! Good on yer, mate. Cheers.” Brad finished off the beer from the bottle.

  “Actually, Mr. O’Brien, I was a bit nervous after you called me, but I feel okay now.”

  “Why were you nervous?”

  “Well, speaking to the police, I guess. I mean, I knew they were going to want to speak to me. In fact, I was just surprised that it took you so long.”

  “You know about Sarah of course?”

  “Yes, of course. I read it in the paper the day it happened. Terrible, just shocking, I couldn’t believe it. I was with her on the day it happened.”

  “Why didn’t you go to the police?”

  “Well, I figured they would find me anyway. I mean, I know they must have my number on her phone and all those photos of me and Sarah. You know what I mean, and I didn’t want to just turn up at the police station because, well actually, because I thought that they would just put me in jail until they found the killer.”

  “So you are not the killer then?”

  “Blimey mate! Are you kidding?”

  “What can you tell me about Sarah?”

  “I don’t know where to start. She was a crazy chick, you know. Her life was one long party. I’m shocked that she is dead, but I’m not surprised.”

  “Why not surprised?”

  “Well, like I say, she was wild. Her life was a party and parties don’t last forever.”

  “How did you meet her?”

  “I met Sarah on the beach here about seven months ago. She came down to the beach with her little dog, Chi.”

  “She had a dog?”

  “It wasn’t hers. She just looked after it for a neighbour during the daytime. Anyway, she came down to the beach and asked me to take her out on the boat and when we were out, she just stripped naked there in front of me. She stripped me off too and took out her camera and started taking photos of us. Then she put it on automatic and the bloody thing kept clicking away as we had sex. After that she came to see me, sometimes three or four times a week, always in the daytime.”

  “Did you ever see her at night?”

  “Yes, sometimes. But only when it suited Sarah. I always got the feeling that I wasn’t her only lover, but I never actually asked her and she never said anything. Actually I don’t think I really wanted to know.”

  “Did you love her Brad?”

  Brad paused to think before he answered.

  “Yes, I did love her in the end. At first it was just great sex with a beautiful hot girl, but I did fall in love with her. She had a sort of self-destruct thing going on and I wanted to save her, but I didn’t know how to, really. I think she had to get away from Thailand to ever have any chance of being saved, but she loved the place too much. She was never going to leave here.”

  “Did you ever go to her apartment?”

  “Yes, a few times, but only when she invited me. I never ever just turned up there. Like I say, I really didn’t want to find out what I had always suspected; that there was another man.”

  “Have you got a key to her apartment?”

  “No. I think I loved Sarah a lot more then she loved me. I don’t think she would have ever given me a key. I think Sarah was happy with our relationship just the way it was. Sex on the beach.”

  “What happened on the day she died Brad?”

  “Well, on the Tuesday morning she came down to the beach with her dog and we went out on the boat and had sex as usual, I guess. Actually, it wasn’t as usual. She never had the camera. She said that it had got damaged and she had to take it for repair. I told her that I had tried to call her the night before and she told me that she had been out with some girlfriends. Oh, and I asked her if I could see her that night and she said something strange.”

  “What was that?”

  “She said, ‘you can’t, it’s Tuesday’, or something like that. I said ‘what’s that got to do with anything’ and then she changed it to something else. She said she was busy or something, but anyway, I never got to see her that night. I never got to see her again. Wow! I didn’t realise at the time that it was going to be our last ever time making love. Would I be able to have any of the photos that she took of us?”

  “I’ll think about it and let you know. Can you remember what she was wearing?”

  “Yes, I know exactly what she was wearing. I brought it for her. It was a little pink T-shirt with the words ‘Boy Toy’ in silver written across the tits, and she had on some little white hot pants.” Brad smiled to himself as the memory flashed across his mind.

  “Did Sarah do any drugs?”

  “It said in the paper that the place was full of drugs and that she had taken loads, but I only ever saw her smoke the Ganja.”

  “Have you any idea who would want to kill her, Brad?”

  “No. But it wasn’t me. I really did love her.” He paused and looked at Ying.

  “No offence Miss, but you can’t trust these Thai birds Mr. O’Brien. Half of them are fucking ladyboys. No kidding, you have to be careful.”

  “Okay. I think we’re done here. Thanks.” Danny got up and put on his sun glasses and jacket. Brad offered his hand, but Danny just walked off. Brads words about the ladyboys had pierced him and changed his mood at a stroke. He didn’t really understand the whole ladyboy thing, but everybody else seemed too. It was obvious that Brad didn’t realise that Ying was a ladyboy. Ying walked alongside Danny, but once again there was silence between them and she could feel his mood darken.

  As they were walking back along Bangla Road towards their car Danny became aware of four young English lads, aged about twenty, all wearing England and Man United football shirts. They were sitting outside the front of Scruffy Murphy’s Irish Bar and pointing and laughing at Danny or Ying or both. As they approached Danny could hear that their jeers were aimed at him.

  “Fucking hell. It’s the Blues Brothers. Come on Elwood, give us a fucking song.” The four lads were holding their sides, banging their hands on the wooden table in front of them, laughing a bit too much at their own humour. But they were on holiday and determined to have a good time.

  “Excuse me a minute” Danny said to Ying.

  He walked towards the four lads and as one they stood up sensing a threat, but waiting to see what the man in
the suit was going to say to them. It was only as he got closer that they realised how hard he looked. He wasn’t scared of them at all. Danny did not speak. As he approached he smashed the open palm of his right hand into the nearest man’s face and pushed through, causing his nose to shatter and sending blood and snot splattering. The youth flew backwards through the air with the force of the blow and then crashed crumpled on the floor rolling around with his hands to his face, blood seeping between his fingers.

  “My nose. He’s broke my fucking nose!”

  The other three men backed away with their hands held up in surrender.

  “Fucking hell mate! He was only having a laugh.”

  “He wasn’t having a laugh. He was taking the piss, and he doesn’t know me well enough to take the piss. My names Danny O’Brien. I’m a Police Detective. I support Ireland and Liverpool and I’m not a feckin queer. So boys, now that you all know me better, is there anyone else who wants to have a laugh with me?”

  “No. You’re alright mate” said the tallest and skinniest of the three remaining standing youths.

  Danny took out 200 baht in notes from his pocket and threw it on the table.

  “Get yer man a taxi to the hospital.” He turned to walk away but then turned back again.

  “You know lads, when I was your age, if some old fella like me would have come up and cracked one of my mates like that, I’d have kicked his fucking head in. You’re not very good mates now, are yer?”

  He turned and walked back towards Ying, who was already walking quickly off up along Bangla Road. Danny caught up to her and pulled her arm to turn her round to face him. She was crying.

  “Why are you so angly?” she said.

  “Angly! I thought that you could speak feckin English. Do you mean angry?”

  Ying composed herself. She was annoyed at herself now. Usually her grammar and pronunciation were perfect. It was just the sudden surge in emotion that had momentarily exposed her peasant roots. She took a deep breath. Tears still glistened in her beautiful oriental brown eyes.