The Feng Shui Detective Goes South

by Nury Vittachi

  He felt himself being manhandled into a small, dark room. The door shut behind them. The room was partially soundproofed, so it was suddenly possible to talk, although the thudding music outside continued to surge through the floor and walls.

  ‘More quiet,’ he said. ‘Better.’

  ‘This is the karaoke room,’ said Joyce.

  ‘We call it the snogging room,’ sniggered one of the creatures accompanying her.

  ‘He won’t know what that means,’ said another.

  ‘Pashing,’ explained a third.

  ‘Makin’ out,’ translated a fourth.

  ‘Yee-yee yup-yup,’ said a fifth.

  ‘Oh,’ said Wong, none the wiser.

  ‘But karaoke’s so out these days. The room’s good for like talking?’ Joyce put in.

  ‘Out there, you can hardly hear yourself fink,’ said someone.

  ‘Yes,’ the feng shui master agreed.

  ‘Wait here, please,’ Joyce continued. ‘I’ll get him for you.

  Wanna drink?’

  ‘Er, ching cha,’ said Wong. ‘Bo leih.

  ’ Joyce looked nonplussed. ‘I don’t think they have Chinese tea. I’ll ask.’ She slipped out, a roar of drums surging into the room like a dragon as she opened the door.

  Wong slowly shook his head. How could a Chinese drinking venue full of Chinese customers in a Chinese city not have any tea? The new Singapore baffled and discomfited him. It was not his planet.

  The feng shui master had agreed to meet his intern at this bar because she had demanded he meet a denizen of the club scene whom she insisted had some useful information that would help Wong in one of his investigations. But what could any of these wild-eyed, androgynous young people have to do with his quiet world of offices and homes and floor plans? He sighed. She fouled up his days often enough—why did she have to waste his evenings as well?

  Joyce was thoughtful as she queued impatiently at the bar to order drinks. Although she was happy enough when she was spending time with the group of friends she had acquired in Singapore—all of whom were borrowed from her flatmate Ling—Wong’s presence in the nightclub had reminded her of how she spent most of her days feeling like an alien. She could achieve a reasonable degree of intimate communication within Ling’s little teenage clique. But she knew that most of the people in the city that she was trying to call home were more like Wong: quiet, intense Chinese adults who drank absurdly watery tea, talked in incomprehensible non sequiturs and thought about business all the time.

  Catching the bartender’s eye, she barked out: ‘Do you have Chinese tea?’

  ‘What? No,’ he shouted back.

  She frowned. Sometimes it felt like everything here was a problem. But then she recalled that she had felt the same when she had lived in Hong Kong. She decided she was rootless—not just in Singapore, but on the planet as a whole.

  Joyce assumed that her feeling of not being able to fit anywhere was a direct result of her having inherited the restless nature of her father Martin McQuinnie, a 53-year-old property developer. Born in Brisbane, he had expanded his business to Sydney and then London, where he had married Alison Smart, a regional television presenter from Nottingham. They had their first child, Molly, two years later. After another two-year gap, Joyce was born, first drawing breath at St Luke’s, London, a little under eighteen years ago. McQuinnie moved his wife and children to his home country to ‘Australianise’ them. She’d grown up in a drinking culture.

  ‘You want Long Island Iced Tea?’ the bartender hollered.

  ‘That’s tea.’

  ‘Is that like Chinese tea?’

  ‘Yeah. A bit. Well, not really.’

  She chewed her thumbnail. What on earth should she order for her boss? What do old guys drink? She decided to ask the barman. ‘I wanna drink for an old guy. Chinese. But I think no alcohol.’

  The barman handed her a drinks list and she scanned the pages. She couldn’t imagine Wong drinking beer, and didn’t want to insult him by buying orange juice. She flipped to the cocktails page. Between The Sheets? Orgasm? She couldn’t order drinks with names like that for her boss.

  She had got the habit of hanging out in bars despite being underage from her time in Hong Kong, the first place where she had achieved a little independence. Her parents divorced in Sydney when Joyce was nine. Her father won custody of Molly and Joyce—to the great surprise of lawyers and Australian newspaper gossip columnists. The main reasons were that he told lies in court and their mother had not put up any sort of fight for them. Alison Smart had decided that both girls were far more like their father than like her. She moved back to the UK and quickly found a new boyfriend, a producer who got her a job as a newsreader. Joyce and Molly had lived with their father for the next four years, mostly in New York.

  Since the lawyers weren’t looking, Martin McQuinnie was again never at home. Molly, on reaching the age of eighteen, had gone off to live with a boyfriend who worked in a five-star resort in Jamaica. Joyce had continued to follow her father around until he was persuaded that the constant moving was doing no good for her studies or her emotional stability. So he had sent her to live with an aunt of his in Hong Kong, which was reputed to have excellent international schools.

  Asia had become her home. For a while, it had worked. Life at a school where each classmate had a different cultural background had been fun. There were plenty of young people as mixed up as she was. There was even a sociological term for them: Third Culture Kids. And she had quickly got into the habit of sneaking off to the bars of Lan Kwai Fong with friends who used make-up to make themselves look over eighteen.

  But her time in Hong Kong had passed too quickly. Now the exams were over and the goodbye parties were just memories. Suddenly she was out of the safe and cosy confines of the international school system and out on the streets of the real world—and she felt more lost than ever. Would she ever be an Asian?

  Joyce had an idea. ‘Do you have chendol?’ she asked.

  The barman shook his head.

  Wong wondered if the walls of the karaoke room were strong enough to prevent him suffering from permanent deafness. Suddenly the volume jumped as the door open and Joyce reappeared.

  ‘Sorry, no ching cha. I got you a virgin colada?’

  He was alarmed at this. ‘No thank you. Not want bar girls.’

  ‘No,’ she scolded. She put a tall drink surmounted with a cherry and a little umbrella into his hand. The glass was painfully cold and slippery and the contents smelt revoltingly sweet. He took a sip of it. It tasted like a dessert. The umbrella went up his nostril. He hurriedly put it down on a counter.

  ‘The Iceman will be along in a minute.’ Joyce looked a little concerned about something. ‘CF,’ she said, slowly. ‘I have to tell you about something first.’

  The other young people stopped talking, suddenly aware that Joyce might be about to say something important.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s a bit like hard to tune into what he is saying, know what I mean? He doesn’t just, like, say things, you know, straight.

  He’s a bit hard to understand?’

  ‘Not like us,’ one of the creatures put in.

  ‘No waaay,’ said another, shaking its head.

  ‘Waaaay,’ said a third, nodding.

  ‘Jammo Ice J is a rap-singer?’ explained Joyce.

  ‘Wrap sinner,’ Wong echoed, without comprehension.

  ‘That means, like . . .’ she trailed off, looking to her friends for inspiration.

  ‘Like P Diddy,’ said one of the creatures.

  ‘He won’t know P Diddy,’ said another. ‘He’s way too old.

  He’ll only know old music.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ said a creature. ‘Old music. Public Enemy?

  Grandmaster Flash?’

  ‘I don’t think he knows any of those groups,’ said Joyce.

  ‘He’ll only know really old music.’

  ‘He doesn’t know any of that stuff? That’s amaz
ing,’ said a creature, pity in its voice. ‘Run-DMC?’

  One of the other young people had a stroke of inspiration.

  ‘A rap singer is like a poet.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Joyce. ‘Like a poet.’

  ‘A poet,’ said Wong. ‘Like Po Chu-i?’

  Joyce considered this for a moment. ‘Yeah,’ she decided at last. ‘Like Po Chu-i.’

  There was another stunning blast of sound as the door opened and a young man entered. He failed to shut the door behind him, which meant that his opening remarks were missed by everyone in the room. One of the creatures kicked the door shut, and the young man spoke again.

  ‘Yo good peeps, is dis da guy?

  ‘Dis da guy who is apple of ya eye?’

  Wong stared. The man, who appeared to have forgotten to put his shirt on, was slowly throbbing. He apparently suffered from an extraordinarily powerful case of delirium tremens or St Vitus’ Dance. His shoulders moved up and down continuously. His head rocked back and forth. His hips swiveled from side to side, providing some counterpoint to the way his upper body was moving. The chains and bits of leather that draped his upper body swung from left to right and back again. He spoke in a gentle rhythm, his words keeping pace with the slick, feline current that appeared to be surging through his body.

  ‘Is he sick?’ Wong asked Joyce.

  ‘As if,’ she whispered back, her eyes running over the young man’s brown, muscular chest.

  She made the introductions. ‘CF, this is Jammo Ice J, rap singer. Jammo, this is CF Wong, feng shui master. Jammo’s solo now, but he used to be in the Gropies?’

  Wong wondered whether he should offer to shake the entrant’s hand. But as he moved forward, the young man raised his hand up in a gesture that appeared to ask him to halt where he was.

  ‘Gimme five ‘If you’re alive,

  ‘Slip me some skin ‘If you’re not too dim.’

  The feng shui master felt in his pocket for a five-dollar note.

  Joyce realised what he was doing and grabbed his arm. ‘No,’ she hissed into his ear. ‘Not five dollars.’

  There was a slight impasse. Neither knew what to do next. Then Jammo dropped his hand and shook Wong’s hand.

  ‘You like to do it the old-style way; ‘D at’s cool with me, if it makes your day.’

  ‘He’s so cool,’ the geomancer heard one of the creatures say, its voice touched with awe.

  ‘Totally,’ said another.

  ‘Totally cool,’ added a third.

  ‘And totally hot,’ agreed the fourth.

  ‘I am Wong. You are . . . ?’

  This was the cue for Jammo to go into one of his set pieces. He spun around on one foot, clapped his hands and proclaimed:

  ‘Da name is Jammo, da temperature’s high.

  ‘Ain’t no one like me, for I am I.

  ‘I’m da main man, let no one disagree, ‘For only I have da real pedigree.

  ‘I was born on da street, I raise’ myself up, ‘Climbin’ da ladder to da very top.

  ‘For da top of the pile is where I belong ‘And getting up dair won’t take very long, ‘Cause I am da king and dair ain’t no other, ‘I won’t make room for any other mother. Unh-unh.’

  He spun around again.

  Joyce’s creatures shrieked and clapped. ‘Awesome,’ said one.

  ‘Totally,’ said the others.

  Wong was frozen to the spot. He didn’t know what the young man was talking about. It had become clear that this visit had been a very bad idea. Nothing this young man could say could possibly impinge on any of his cases. He needed to escape, immediately.

  Joyce, apparently noting Wong’s look of alarm, grabbed Jammo’s arm. ‘Iceman, I want you to be serious for a moment. You know what you told me last night about the fire in that building on Orchard Road? Could you tell CF about it too, please?’

  The young man looked at her.

  ‘Jammo never say da same thing twice; ‘You may not like it, but it’s not very nice; ‘I am da future, I cannot go back, ‘I say what I say, and baby, dat’s dat.’

  ‘You don’t have to say it exactly like you said it last night. But just tell my boss the same story, please? Use any words you like.’

  Jammo thought for a moment. ‘Okay,’ he said.

  ‘I was walkin’ down da road jes’ da other day, ‘When somethin’ kinda odd jes’ happen my way.

  ‘I saw a man walkin’ out with a waving cat, ‘Came strollin’ out his shop, just like dat.

  ‘He put it in his car and he drove right off, ‘One hour later—’ Jammo paused, apparently unable to think of a rhyme for ‘off ’.

  Then he snapped back into his speech:

  ‘One hour later, out ran all da toffs, ‘Coz da building, you see, it wuz on fire, ‘Da flames dey rose up higher and higher.

  ‘Was it because, I ask to myself,

  ‘Da guy remove da cat from the shelf?’

  He stopped and made a slinky flourish with his hands. The creatures applauded. Joyce looked at Wong. Wong did not move his head, but his eyes slowly moved to the right until they connected with Joyce’s.

  The young woman decided that she should interpret. ‘You see, CF, what he is saying is this. He saw a guy coming out of a building with a waving cat. On Orchard Road. That means one of those feng shui cats, you know, gold ceramic with one paw in the air? And then, one hour later, the building catches fire. Maybe there was a connection?’ She looked at him, her face open and hopeful.

  Wong, to Joyce’s obvious relief, appeared to take the suggestion seriously. His head tipped to one side—but just for a few seconds. Then he turned to face her: ‘Joyce, I tell you. Probably half the shops in Singapore have feng shui cat.

  New shops open, old shops close, every day. Every day, people bring feng shui cats into new shops or take them out of old shops. Every day there is a few fires somewhere in Singapore.

  Is nothing odd. Only coincidence.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said, disappointed. Her eyes fell. Suddenly she looked embarrassed and he noticed her cheeks redden. ‘I’m sorry. Are they really that common? I just thought—sorry, I think I just wasted your time. Never mind. Whatever. It’s like nice to introduce you to my gang and like have a drink with you?’

  ‘Yeah,’ said the gang in unison.

  Wong involuntarily glanced down at his drink—which remained untouched on the counter beside him.

  Jammo Ice J was backing out.

  ‘Time for me to go, ‘It’s da end of da show,

  ‘So I’ll say bye, and see ya nex’ time, ‘You come back and enjoy my witty rhymes.’

  There was another thundering blast of dance music as he opened the door and slipped out.

  Wong watched him with all the fascination of a biologist looking at a newly discovered species.

  Through the open door, he noticed that a young woman was staring at him, as if she had never seen anyone so strange or so old. She had streaked hair and a severely disapproving expression. She spun around and moved away. It made him feel uncomfortable. Truly, he was out of place in this bizarre, noisy world.

  Joyce looked out of the doorway. ‘That girl was looking at you,’ she said to the geomancer. ‘I think you’ve pulled.’

  ‘Woowooo!’ shrieked one of the creatures. ‘Who would have thought that Mr Wong would be the first to pull tonight?’

  ‘Pull?’ asked Wong.

  ‘Clear the snoggin’ room,’ said another creature.

  Wong pushed the door shut.

  ‘Don’t tease him,’ Joyce ordered. ‘It’s so mean.’

  She turned to her boss. ‘I hope it’s been like interesting for you? Not many people your age, I mean like grown-ups, have hung out in Dan T’s Inferno with rap singers? And everyone wants to meet Jammo Ice J. If he becomes famous you can tell all your friends you met him? They’ll be ever so impressed, I promise.’

  ‘Hmm. I see what you mean,’ Wong said, his mind turning back to Jammo. ‘Is a poet. But not very much like Po Chu-i.’


  He raced for the door.

  Tuesday:

  No such thing

  as ghosts

  The world was melting into sweat. There was salt in his eyes. His hair was wet. And now he had entered his office to find that even the walls of the office were perspiring. And something, somewhere, was ticking. From the corner of his eye, he caught sight of a drip of condensation running from the picture rail down the spongy wallpaper to the floor. It was hot.

  ‘Stolen,’ explained Winnie Lim, without looking up from the gossip magazine she was reading.

  The feng shui master, who was standing in the doorway, wondered for a moment what she was talking about—and then he glanced in the direction of the windows, where the air conditioner should have been. It was missing. Raw sunlight and furnace-like heat poured into the room through the missing pane where it had been. Not only had its absence turned his office into a sauna, but it had made the room unnaturally quiet without its brooding presence.

  Joyce, who had entered the room a few steps behind her employer, wiped the sweat from her upper lip with her thumb and forefinger. ‘Geez,’ she said. ‘Killer heat. And what’s with the water running down the walls? Leak upstairs?’

  CF Wong was still looking at Winnie. ‘Laang-hay-gei hai bindo?

  ’ She merely shrugged her shoulders without looking up, and turned the page of her magazine.

  He repeated his question in English with a sterner tone of voice: ‘Air conditioner: where is it?’