by A. M. Stuart
Harriet looked up at the woman. Despite everything she now knew about Viktoria Van Gelder, she still resembled a comfortable Dutch matron, albeit one in trousers and riding boots.
“Do take a seat, Mrs. Van Gelder,” Harriet said, employing the tone her mother would use to invite an expected guest to take tea. “If I’m going to die, we may as well pass the time of day and I am curious to know a little more about you.”
Viktoria let the curtain fall, and in the dark, Harriet sensed the woman’s gaze locked on her. “I have nothing better to do. As you are so curious, you may as well know I was born Viktoria Klop. My mother was a prostitute in Amsterdam and I grew up in brothels, scraping for every piece of food. Neither of you know what it is to have nothing,” she said, the contempt spitting the words from her mouth. “My mother sold me to my first customer when I was eleven years old. I grew to hate men but I learned one thing: how to be a good businesswoman. By the time I was twenty-one I ran the best brothels in the Walletjes.”
Harriet thought back to her earlier meetings with Viktoria Van Gelder. It was almost impossible to tell Viktoria’s age. She may have still been in her thirties but early forties seemed more likely.
“What bought you to the Far East?” Harriet asked, in the hope that by keeping the woman talking, help might arrive in time to save her from the grave Zaw and Paar were digging.
“Opportunity, Mrs. Gordon. My clients in Holland had a taste for the exotic. I arranged for girls from Batavia to be shipped to my houses in Amsterdam and I also took the opportunity to open a few houses in Batavia itself. I was doing very well.”
“What changed?”
Viktoria heaved a sigh. “I got bored and I saw an opportunity in Rangoon. There I did a foolish thing, Mrs. Gordon. I made the mistake of falling in love with a most unsuitable man.”
“Van Gelder?” Harriet tried to picture what sort of man a brothel keeper would consider unsuitable.
Her suggestion was met with a peal of harsh laughter. “Van Gelder? No, Mrs. Gordon. Guess again.”
“Newbold?”
Viktoria snorted. “Oswald Newbold was a means to an end but he wasn’t very bright.” She approached Harriet and bent down until she was on a level with her. In a lowered voice, she said, “Charles Kent.”
“You do surprise me,” Harriet responded in an icy tone.
“Never had I met a man so immoral and unprincipled as me. A match made in heaven.”
“And what about Sir Oswald?”
“Kent told me of the expedition he had been on with Newbold. Of the stones they had found and the possibilities of playing on a man’s greed. He introduced us and we saw at once that we could make a convenient business arrangement. I had the contact in Amsterdam—my son-in-law, Cornilissen. All we needed was a way to smuggle the rubies out of Burma and onto the gem market without suspicion. Newbold introduced me to Van Gelder as the respectable widow Klop; we married and moved to Singapore. The hotel was the perfect cover for the operation and I was the perfect hotelier’s wife. The poor fool had no involvement in any of this.”
Lawson groaned. “And I was the one who stole the bloody stones and this is how you reward me.”
Viktoria laughed. She bent over him, lifting his chin so he looked her in the face. “You are a weak, greedy man, Lawson.” She glanced at Harriet. “Has he been bleating to you about how much he loved his darling Annie? All the time I kept him supplied with pretty girls.”
Harriet swallowed, trying to bring some moisture to her dry mouth. “And the sapphire?”
Viktoria released Lawson and his head fell back, causing the atap to rustle. “Newbold thought we did not know about the sapphire or where he hid it. The prize of the collection. It was the last stone we needed to seal our fortunes. That silly boy Visscher overheard a conversation between Kent and me. We were planning to snatch it from him that Sunday night but someone got there first. By the time Zaw reached the house, Newbold was dead and the stone had gone. Zaw covered up the location of the stone and left empty-handed.”
“So, who killed Newbold?”
Viktoria straightened and took the few paces back toward the door. “I don’t know but I can tell you it was not us.”
“But you did kill Visscher?”
Viktoria’s silence gave her the confirmation that she needed.
“Vik?” Kent called.
Viktoria pushed aside the curtain and paused in the doorway. “It has been pleasant passing time with you, but we have preparations to make.”
FORTY-TWO
Curran reached the village of Changi just before nightfall. He found the constable in charge of the police post, a large man who clearly enjoyed his food, snoring peacefully on a bench outside the station. He rolled off the bench at the sound of Curran’s voice.
“My apologies, tuan,” he said, retrieving his hat from where it had fallen. “It has been a busy day.”
“No doubt,” Curran responded, his voice dripping ice. In this far-flung corner of the island the most exciting thing to happen would be a stolen chicken.
A second man, as thin as his colleague was fat, appeared at the door. He cast his colleague a sharp glance.
“You are Inspector Curran? I am Constable Musa bin Osman. This is Constable Najid bin Hasif.”
The introductions made, Musa said, “I had word to look out for a suspicious boat in these waters and such a boat has been seen. We go now to talk to Aswad the fisherman.”
They found Aswad the fisherman crouched beside his cooking fire, frying a fish.
He stood up, brushing his hands on his checkered sarong, as Curran and the constable approached.
“Aswad, you tell the tuan what you saw,” Musa addressed the elderly man.
Aswad clearly enjoyed being the center of attention as he described in vivid detail, accompanied by extravagant hand gestures, how he had been out in his boat just past the point when an unfamiliar fishing boat had passed him. He had hailed the vessel, as was the custom, but the single man at the helm, whom he did not recognize, had not acknowledged him in any way. A second man, sitting in the prow of the boat, had turned to look at Aswad and Aswad had got a clear view of him. The description he gave could have matched that of Kent’s man, Zaw.
“You saw no one else?”
Aswad shook his head. “He had atap screens over his catch and the boat was sitting very low in the water. A big catch,” he added with admiration in his tone.
A very big catch, Curran considered. Five adults concealed in a small fishing boat. Here Aswad reached the climax of his story, his chest puffing out as he said, “I saw the second man had a gun, tuan. I saw the sun glint off it. A small gun . . . like yours . . .” He indicated Curran’s service revolver in its holster.
Instinctively Curran’s hand went to the butt of the Webley.
“Did you see where they went?”
“Ah yes, tuan. They sailed past the point and I believe the boat turned toward the Sungei Selarang.”
Curran dispensed a few coins to the man. “You did well, Aswad.”
Musa did a quick step beside him as Curran strode back to the police post. “What do we do now, tuan?”
“How well do you know the river?”
Musa laughed. “I have lived here all my life. I know the river as I know the lines of my hand. What are we looking for?”
“I believe there were five people hidden on that boat, the catch your friend Aswad spoke of. Three people who are wanted on suspicion of murder and two hostages.”
Musa stopped in his tracks. “Murder? We have never had such a thing. What can Najid and I do to help?”
Privately Curran considered Najid to be more of a hindrance than a help but Musa seemed bright and keen. “My men will be here in a few hours,” he said, glancing up at the sky. “Take me to the Sungei Selarang.”
“There are fishermen’s huts
on the banks of the river. Would they be sheltering there?” Musa asked.
“Possibly. Draw a weapon, Musa.”
The constable blinked. “A weapon? These men are dangerous?”
“Very.”
Buckling the police-issue weapon onto his belt, Musa followed Curran out into the compound.
“We don’t have time to walk. You can ride behind me,” Curran said as he untethered Leopold’s reins.
The constable drew back with a shake of his head. “I do not like horses, tuan. I have a bicycle.”
Curran didn’t argue but they must have made an odd sight, the tall European policeman in his khaki uniform on a chestnut horse led by a diminutive police constable on a bicycle that looked, and sounded, in sore need of mechanical attention. The uncertain light attached to the bicycle at least provided some illumination on the rutted tracks.
Curran glanced around as the jungle closed in around them, filled with the clatter and buzz of a myriad of insects and the calls of macaques and other wildlife. There were said to be no more tigers in Singapore but in this isolated corner of the island, who could say if that was true? He loosened the revolver in its holster.
The track ended in a clearing. Above them the sky arched clear and bright with stars and the waning moon rose slowly above the trees. In an hour or so it would provide good illumination.
Leaving the horse tethered to a tree, Curran followed Musa on foot through the jungle that fringed the banks of the Selarang River. He could not see the water but the air became closer and he could smell the musky tang of mangroves and the drone of mosquitoes and knew they must be close.
Musa knew every hut along the high bank of the river. Most were unoccupied or the inhabitants quietly going about their evening routine. Careful questioning confirmed that an unfamiliar boat had been seen on the river that afternoon, heading upstream.
“I think I know where they will be,” Musa said. “This way.”
As they approached an isolated hut on the bend of the river, Musa signaled to Curran and both men went to ground. A casual observer would notice nothing amiss. A native fishing boat drawn up on the bank and two men crouched over a cooking fire in front of a derelict atap hut. Curran sniffed the air and smiled. Above the smell of the woodsmoke, the scent of English pipe tobacco drifted through the humid air. Kent’s favorite twist. It reminded him, with a pang, of several pleasant afternoons in this man’s company at cricket matches. He had few people he called friends, but he had always enjoyed the company of the man he had known as Colonel Foster.
Beside him Musa tensed. “Hantu,” he murmured.
From the back of the hut a man appeared, shirtless and dirty, his thin torso so white, he could well have been mistaken for a ghost.
“Not hantu. His name is Paar,” Curran muttered under his breath.
Stefan Paar crouched down next to the cooking fire and took a swig from a bottle.
Musa indicated that he was going to scout the direction from which Paar had come and Curran nodded. The minutes ticked past before Musa crawled in beside him.
“I do not wish to worry you, tuan,” he whispered, “but at the back of the hut, they have dug a very large hole.”
Curran’s blood ran cold. There could be no other reason for a very large hole, other than the disposal of bodies. What was the plan? To kill Harriet and Lawson and turn up on the beach demanding the stones on the understanding that their hostages were safe and well? What sort of fools did they think the police were? Or maybe the stones were no longer the main game?
He tapped Musa’s weapon and both men eased their revolvers from the holsters. Curran checked both his and Musa’s Webleys to ensure they were fully loaded. Drawing a deep breath, Curran squashed a large mosquito on his bare arm and settled himself to watch and wait.
FORTY-THREE
The sound of shoveling stopped and those outside must have moved the lantern. Except for the faint flickering from a fire, the dark inside the stuffy hut became absolute.
“Will the police come?” Lawson’s voice cracked.
“Curran knows what’s at stake. A few stones are not worth the sum of two people’s lives,” Harriet responded. “Yes, they’ll come.”
She hoped her newly kindled faith in the police in general and Curran in particular would not prove to be unfounded.
The flicker of the fire outside provided some illumination inside the hut and she could hear the murmur of voices but even straining her hearing she could not make any sense of the conversation. Across from her Lawson had fallen silent, either asleep or unconscious.
She shifted position and the wall behind her gave slightly under her weight. If her feet had not been tied, it would be a simple matter to push out one of the atap screens and make a run for it. She mused on this thought for a while and tried wriggling her hands to see if the knots would loosen but Zaw knew his business, and the more she tried to loosen them, the tighter the knots became. She stopped struggling.
Despite the tantalizing smell of cooking fish drifting into the hut on the smoke from the fire, no one offered the captives food or drink. Harriet swallowed. She didn’t believe it was possible to feel so desperately thirsty. She wondered if she should pray for rescue or if her prayers should be a plea to be admitted to heaven and that death, when it came, would be swift and painless. Her calm at this thought surprised her.
She closed her eyes and began to recite in her mind the Lord’s Prayer, Psalm 23, and any other psalms she could remember. The patterns of the familiar words were oddly soothing.
She was not aware she had been voicing the words aloud until John Lawson joined in. “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death . . .” he murmured.
“Psalms?” The derisive snort came from the doorway. Viktoria again. “Spare me your religious ranting, Mrs. Gordon. There is no God.”
She stood aside to admit Zaw.
Harriet caught the glint of the man’s knife in a flicker of light from the fire and she cringed against the insubstantial wall, embarrassed by the sob of fear that escaped her as Zaw knelt and sliced through the ropes that bound her feet. As she stretched her cramped legs and feet, he turned to Lawson and repeated the action.
Zaw hauled Harriet up by her right arm. Her legs buckled underneath her but he dragged her upright and pushed her out of the door into the grip of Stefan Paar before going back for Lawson.
After the close, stinking hut, the breeze coming off the river lifted her hair and she took a deep, appreciative breath, praying that these would not be her last moments on earth.
Harriet glanced behind her. Zaw came out of the hut, half carrying John Lawson. They walked around the hut and Paar released her, pushing her to the ground. Lawson collapsed in a heap beside her. The smell of freshly turned dirt filled her nostrils and with difficulty she rose to her knees and found herself looking down into a gaping hole. Harriet recoiled, falling backward against Zaw, who stood behind her. For one of the first times in their acquaintance he uttered a sound. He laughed.
Now kneeling with her hands tied behind her, Harriet twisted slightly, her fingers closing on the glass head of the hairpin she had slipped into her boot. She withdrew it, clenching it tightly in her right hand.
Hard experience learned during her time as a suffragette came back to her and she flung her head back with all her force, feeling the satisfying thud of contact with a vulnerable part of the man’s anatomy. Zaw gave a muffled cry and crumpled to the ground.
Harriet scrambled to her feet and took off into the dark while behind her she heard Viktoria screaming at Paar to follow her.
She knew she wouldn’t get far . . . not in long skirts and with her hands tied behind her. Her foot caught a tree root that sent her sprawling, facedown, knocking the wind from her.
A man fell on top of her, a heavy hand pushing her face into the soft humus of the jungle floor. Her fin
gers tightening on the hairpin, Harriet jerked her bound hand with all the force she could muster. It may not have been as sharp as a hat pin but it had the desired affect. The man gave a howl of pain and his weight fell off her.
“You bitch!” Stefan Paar screamed, and grabbed her by the hair, hauling her to her feet. “I should kill you now!”
One look at his contorted face and Harriet believed him.
“Uh-uh . . . Paar, we need her alive.” Kent’s hard voice cut across the night.
“But she stabbed me in the leg . . .” Paar broke off into Dutch, an obvious collection of invective clearly aimed at Harriet.
“I have to admire a woman with spirit, Mrs. Gordon, but that little show of resistance is really no assistance to your cause. Come with me.” Kent’s hand closed on her arm and, without waiting for her to regain her feet, he dragged her, breathless and wheezing, back to the hut, with Paar limping and still cursing behind her.
Kent flung her back on the ground and Paar laced his fingers in her hair, jerking her head upward. Zaw had recovered his feet and his composure and addressed his master in hysterical tones, gesticulating and waving his knife in Harriet’s direction.
Kent held up his hand and the man fell silent, his malevolent gaze fixed on Harriet.
“He would like to cut your throat, Mrs. Gordon, and my friend Paar here would happily hold you while he did it, but personally I prefer modern weaponry. So much quicker and effective and far less messy.”
Kent drew the revolver from the holster he wore at his waist and lovingly stroked the barrel. Harriet whimpered as he brought it up, the muzzle pointed directly at her.
FORTY-FOUR
Musa’s fingers tightened on Curran’s arm, and in the dark, the young constable’s eyes gleamed. Curran nodded. He had been watching the scenario unfolding before them and knew that reinforcements would not arrive in time.
It had taken all his discipline not to go to Harriet Gordon’s aid when she had made her bid for freedom but he relied on the knowledge her captors needed her alive and unhurt in order to retrieve the stones.
