Nury Vittachi - The Feng Shui Detective

And the air, of course. Although it was a cloudy, breezy day, and the sun had disappeared, the air remained hot, humid, unmoving. If this sort of weather hit London, it would be described as a heat wave. There would be topless sunbathing in Hyde Park, and reporters would be trying to fry eggs on the pavement. Here, people had put on their sweaters.

What other differences were there? She became suddenly aware that she was focusing on this mundane comparison because her mind didn’t want to acknowledge what was really going on in her head. She was trying to block out something which had shaken her. She wasn’t sure what it was.

But as she absently chewed on the muffin, she felt herself relaxing, and she gradually started turning over recent events in her mind. She had spent a rather fruitless afternoon talking to members of Motani’s family. His mother spoke little English, but was clearly devastated by the arrest of her oldest son. Then there were the four brothers and two sisters who still lived at home in the small apartment in a characterless housing estate called-called what? Already she had forgotten. The girls had been uncommunicative, and she had spent most of the time talking to two of the taxi driver’s younger brothers. One was seriously good-looking, but was sullen, and spoke in monosyllables.

The other had a huge nose and wispy facial hair, but was animated and helpful.

She felt a fraud. She was trained in neither police work nor feng shui. What was she there for? What could she do? All Wong’s instructions had been were to talk to the family and find out if there was anything they could tell her that would be helpful in resolving the case. She had no idea what to ask, or what information to record. Should she have taken notes? Should she have recorded the interview? At least that would have given her some air of professionalism. But then, they may have thought she was a reporter, after a scoop.

Was anything said that would be useful to relate to Wong? There had only been one topic of conversation during the time she had been in the house. And that consisted of repeated declarations that Motani was entirely innocent and how could the gods have got him into the situation?

When Joyce had explained that she wasn’t a police officer, but was someone who wanted to help, they assumed she was a type of social worker, and asked a slew of questions about what welfare help they could get if Motani, the main breadwinner of the family, was locked up for years-not that he had committed any crime, of course.

She had surprised herself with her ability to answer some of their questions, and deflect the ones that baffled her. ‘Where did I learn to bullshit so well?’ she asked herself. Maybe it came naturally. Her dad was an expert, after all. Anyway, she had not brought any shame onto C F Wong & Associates, which was the main thing. She reckoned she had acted professionally enough-except, perhaps, for her impulsive request to borrow a bootleg CD of a Pearl Jam concert she saw on the desk that Motani’s youngest brother was doing his homework on.

So why did she feel so shaken? She decided that it might be because she had soaked up a lot of the misery of the mother, who had drifted in and out of the room in tears throughout the afternoon. Or perhaps it was more than that; perhaps she had taken on some sort of moral responsibility for getting Motani free? Maybe that was why she felt like she was carrying a huge burden.

Or perhaps it was just all the events of the past few days that had left her in shock. Finding a corpse in the garden. That was the second corpse of the summer. So far. Not a lot of seventeen-year olds spend their gap year finding corpses. Perhaps I’m just like, growing up, she said to herself.

She had stopped for a drink to put off the main job of the afternoon, which was to report back to Wong what she had discovered. But she had discovered nothing. How could she communicate this to him? She called him on her mobile phone.

‘CF? It’s me. Jo.’

‘You find flat okay?’

‘Yeah, thanks. The cabbie took me right there.’

‘You find anything?’

‘Well… he’s got this huge family. His dad’s dead. He’s the main breadwinner. He has loads of brothers and sisters. They’re all really upset, of course. And…’

‘And?’

‘Well… that’s it, really. I mean, I didn’t find out anything to like, solve the mystery or anything. I didn’t really know what to ask. Or what to look for. I just sort of talked to them.’

‘Okay, no problem.’

‘But there is one thing, I guess…’

‘What thing?’

‘We have to get him off. I mean, he didn’t do it.’

‘Why you think that?’

‘No reason. I just do.’

‘Understand. Me too. You go home now. Walk-walk slowly.’

She smiled. Emma had explained the Chinese equivalent of ‘take care’. ‘Yeah. You walk-walk slowly too. G’night.’

Late the following morning, Wong found Gilbert Kwa in the corridor of the court house. The police officer was in a bad mood. ‘Why oh why can’t court cases be done on proper schedules, like dentists or doctors? Why do I have to spend hours hanging around like this?’

‘I have an important question for you,’ the geomancer said. ‘Then maybe we will have answer.’

‘Better be quick. We’re charging Motani this morning. We’re going to be called into court three any minute now. Or any hour now. Hard to tell.’

A clerk appeared at the door and read out a sheet of paper. ‘Case 12/768-F. Motani, N.’

‘I should have said any second now. Sorry, we’re on. Talk to you after.’

‘No. Wait, Mr Kwa. One question: was it raining Tuesday night? I slept early. I don’t know. But very important.’

‘No, if I remember, it rained in the afternoon, but was dry in the evening, okay? Sorry, Wong, I have to go in now.’ The officer started to move towards the door of court three.

‘Wait. I have something important.’

‘Got thirty seconds only, C F. Judge Simeon Malik is on today. He keeps everyone waiting but no one can keep him waiting.’

The geomancer took a deep breath and started his explanation. ‘The main thing is that Motani is a weak fire person who needs wood to give him strength. On the night of the killing, his pillars were bad. There was a clash between metal and wood. Also a clash between wood and earth. But the hour pillar of the death shows strong support of wood to Motani’s fire. If water was present-if it had rained at that time, then very bad for Motani. But no rain. Only wood. This means that what happened at that hour was not destruction of Motani’s life. Only part of the cycle. He will not be locked up. He will be released.’

‘Sudah-lah,’ said the officer. ‘Thank you and goodbye.’ He stepped towards the door of the court.

‘There is another thing. Semek was dead before he met Motani.’

‘What?’ Kwa stopped. ‘What do you mean? Proof, please.’

‘Semek was stabbed on the street. His friends carried body to taxi. He was not drunk. Dead. Big American put Semek into the car. Propped him up.’

‘But he-Semek spoke to the driver-told the driver the address even.’

‘American reached into the car. Switched on a tape recorder. In Semek’s pocket. Contained the sound of a voice saying Mr Semek’s address. Then a gap. Then later a voice humming song called New York.’

‘“ New York, New York ”.’

‘Yes.’

Kwa’s legal assistant approached. ‘Gilbert. We’ve been called. Come on.’

‘Wait,’ said the police officer.

Wong continued: ‘This is designed to make everyone think he dies later. On cab journey. Even the taxi driver thinks he dies later. Later police examine body. Then tape player has switched itself off. Auto rewind. You play tape. Hear a voice saying an address. You think is the start of dictating a letter. You think nothing strange. You listen to the tape more. You hear voice singing. Mr Semek is big karaoke fan. You think nothing strange.’