Nury Vittachi - The Feng Shui Detective

‘Cool,’ said Joyce.

‘Hot,’ said Wong, mopping his face with a handkerchief.

After a brief wait, the two of them were led up an old staircase to a rectangular conference room and introduced to many executives of the company, all of whom had identical moustaches and names featuring an extraordinary number of syllables, nearly all of which over-featured the letter ‘a’. There was a Mr Nadarajah and a Mr Vishwanathan and a Mr Kanagaratnum. The last of these added, in a strong north Indian accent: ‘But you may cull me Ravi.’ Joyce’s thanks were heart-felt.

There was much open staring at the young Caucasian woman, and one elderly bald man commented quietly to Wong: ‘She doesn’t look very Chinese.’

The geomancer turned his eyes to his assistant and nodded as if he was noticing this for the first time. He nodded. ‘Yes. She does not look very Chinese.’

After the exchange of pleasantries, the conversation quickly dried up. Wong was anxious to escape the small talk and get down to work. ‘Where are the rooms, Mr Ravi?’

‘Not Mr Ravi. Ravi is my farst name. I’ll just write your names in our visitors jarnal and then we’ll go. Come, come.’ As they walked, Ravi explained that he was the external relations manager for Associated Foods, and would be looking after them during their stay. He led them down a dark corridor to a door leading to another gloomy passage. A slow-moving, potbellied man with pockmarked cheeks, Ravi ’s calm, warm smile was welcome after the tumult of the streets. A turn to the left, another to the right, and the ascension of a small flight of steps led them to the room of the man who had died.

‘Here, this is the place,’ said the Indian executive, smoothing down his moustache with his finger and thumb as if he felt it were stuck on with insufficient glue. ‘Mr Sooti Sekhar’s old room.’

It was a large office, ill-organised and unappealing. Even without the use of his lo pan to take bearings, Wong could see many ways in which the room had not been properly formed. There was a desk sideways to the main door, leaving the occupant with his back to a second door. Light should have come from a series of tall sash windows on the far side, but bookcases and filing cabinets obscured them. Several jagged edges caused the ch’i energy to flip and swirl. The room reeked of musty paper, overlaying a damp, mildew-like smell. Ravi flipped a pair of switches, but only one of the two ceiling fans started to whirl.

Stepping into the middle of the room, Wong became aware that it was a distorted L-shape. ‘Ah. This room needs much work,’ he said. As did the rest of the building, he thought, wondering why he was not required to review the entire premises.

Ravi seemed to sense the question. ‘We are wanting you to do your thing here, because this wing is the international division, and most of the Far East deals are being done here. See those files over there?’ He pointed to a wall of filing cabinets and cupboards. ‘All the Far East deals are there, including, in that locked one on the right, the papers that bind us to your own East Trade Industries. Our Far East Division staff work in that room there, behind Sekhar’s desk. At the moment, there’s only one person there, a Malaysian woman, Ms Dev.’

He pointed to the main desk and the chairs around it.

‘We used to be big in niche Far East animal products, ivory, tiger medicines, things like that. Sekhar did all that for us. When we have clients from the Far East, they were always dealt with by Sekhar in here, around this table. After Sekhar died, some of them said that the feng shui was bad here. That’s why this room needs a touch of your magic, if you don’t mind me calling it that.’

‘I understand. You have no need of feng shui readings to be done in other parts of the building.’

‘Correct. They’re all Hindus on that side, except for some Muslims in one of the departments, who make their own arrangements, but you don’t have to worry about all that. You’ve just got to fix up this room and the one behind that door on that side, to keep our Far East clients happy, and of course our Singapore shareholders.’ He said this last line with a nod and a half-smile, to acknowledge the corporate bonds between Associated Foods and East Trade.

‘I thought you weren’t allowed to sell ivory and stuff?’ asked Joyce.

‘Yes, this sector is warsening warldwide. We are dropping the animal products entirely and going to relaunch this part of the operation as import-export of appliances. More politically correct.’

He pressed his moustache onto his upper lip again. ‘One more thing. The internal engineering team, who will reorganise the office and redecorate it after you have done your stuff, they are only available tomorrow and the day after. That means that you only have today to do your readings. I hope that will be enough time for you.’

‘It is not much time. But I think I can do it,’ said Wong.

The executive left the room with a polite farewell nod, and Wong and McQuinnie spent some time talking to the one remaining staff member of the Far East Division, who was spending the day packing files into boxes, in advance of the redecoration. The woman, Mardiyah Dev, had been with the company ten years, and was happy to tell them the full story.

Sooti Sekhar’s history was that of many young executives. He had joined the company some twelve years ago as an enthusiastic thirty-year-old fellow of a university near Mumbai, and risen relatively quickly up the ladder to be assistant director of sales of animal products by the time he was thirty-six. Two years later, he had settled, quite happily, in a job which required little effort from him, as executive director of sales of animal products. This was a bit of a sinecure, since he simply had to analyse sales trends for his sector, with those under him doing the active sales work.

‘Although some people were surprised that he was happy to be deskbound, the timing seemed to be right. He was then thirty-eight, he had got married to someone his parents had chosen for him, they had had a couple of sons, and he no longer wanted to travel half the year,’ said Ms Dev, a rather solid woman in her thirties. ‘For a few years, he had lived a simple life. He worked nine to five, he spent his Sundays with his family, he occasionally went out for a drink with friends. There was less and less work to do. But then the division was reorganised, he was moved to that dark room, and he became more and more quiet.’

Her brow wrinkled as unpleasant memories came to the fore. ‘About a year ago, he still said good morning, but it was more of a groan than a greeting. There was just two of us left by then.’

‘Poor you. Must’ve been a major downer. Did you like, ask him what was wrong?’ asked Joyce. Wong was glad his assistant was with him. His questions always sounded harshly interrogatory compared to hers, which came across as sympathetic concern.

‘Oh yes, we were good friends,’ the woman replied. ‘He insisted that nothing was wrong. His wife and children were happy and healthy. He had no debts, as far as I knew.’

Wong looked around the old-fashioned room. It was not a happy room, but neither were the negative forces in it great enough to kill its occupant. Its wooden furniture and hand-built cupboards were actually rather more attractive and durable than the modular furniture of modern cities, although this particular office probably underwent less wear and tear than the somewhat ragged reception downstairs. ‘Business was good?’ he asked.

‘Not particularly,’ said Ms Dev. ‘Animal products is not a good line to be in these days, and there was shrinkage. But it was gradual. Nothing dramatic.’

The Malaysian woman said ‘nothing’ as ‘nut-thing’, having picked up an Indian lilt in her many years here, he noted. ‘And then…?’